You and CDB can piss off on this theory... only people that haven't served criticize so blatantly.
This is a bullshit argument. I don't need to be a master carpenter to know a shitty dovetail joint when I see one, I don't need to be a soldier to know what is and is not a proper or constitutional use of the military. I respect the military and all those in it who are willing to sacrifice for this country's good. However, soldiers are not automatically saints, nor are the civilian politicians who decide how they are used. In fact the latter tend to be idiots more often than not, and in my opinion the military has been ill used by them for the better part of the last century and currently.
To go through what myself or any other Sailor/Soldier/DevilDog/Airman at least deserves some sort of respect.
And exactly how is questioning the use of the military as dictated by politicians disrespectful? You are not saints, what you go through does not excuse you or the people who give you assignments from moral and ethical judgement.
The shear amount of getting pissed at least deserves them that. They should be afforded some extra respect and/or leniency while following orders, cause Lord knows nothing else is given.
I am not questioning the troops, I am questioning morons like Sean Hannity and his ilk who try to transform legitimate policy debates and dissents into attacks on the military. It's a bullshit debate tactic and only idiots and people who are overly emotionally involved fall for. My guess is you're in the latter category. Get over it.
If they cut a fart in the green zone while getting mortared, damn strait they are defending our freedoms while flatulating.
No, they are not. Soldiers are only defending our freedom if they are fighting a
legitimate threat to our freedom. Iraq in general, Saddam in particular, and the thirty thousand or so dead Iraqi civilians out there, not to mention the thousands of troops
we lost in achieving the end of killing all of them, were never a threat to US security or safety. They were never a threat to any US citizen's rights or well being. Our security is arguably worse off because of the troops we had to sacrifice thus far.
Another favorite debating tactic of the neocons is to ask if the world is better off without Saddam. I counter with asking whether or not the world is better off without the thousands of our troops killed and the thousands of Iraqis killed in order to achieve this end? What do you think, are we better off minus a few thousand of our youngest, strongest, hard working and patriotic? How about the families here and in the middle east now minus a father, a mother, a son or daugher, are they better off?
Why not stop by the airport and spit on them when they return home?
Adams
Your emotions are clouding your judgement on this one, DA. If you honestly conflate questions of policy with attacks on the troops then you need to take a step back and realize there is a big difference between honorable men and women who are willing to die for the well being of others, and the **** storm of vile ****s in DC who are mostly responsible for taking these well meaning people and using them for means other than for which they were intended.
My quip about soldiers farting is meant to lampoon the idiotic positions of neoconservatives like Hannity and others, who cheer every 'mission' and every use of the military as if it's beyond question the most moral and ethical thing to do. There's shitloads of innocent dead brown people who were never a threat to a single US citizen would disagree for one, and I am not willing to let people like Hannity, and you if that's your wont, to use the sophmoric debating tactic of conflating policy with the troops and thus make the questioning of the former an insult to the latter. I
will question policy I find unacceptable and I
refuse to let the overly delicate feelings of some and the moronic debating tactics of others stand in the way of that questioning.
Or, in other words, I will not grant the position that every action of any soldier at any given time, whether under fire or not or following orders or not, is somehow automatically in my interest or the interest of this nation, nor in defense of our freedoms. As with any action the judgement depends on the context. In order to defend my freedom there must first be a legitimate
threat to that freedom.