Here is a blog that I posted on my Myspace. Thought it would be an okay one to start out my blog thing on here.
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I think that the quote in the subject line perfectly falls hand in hand with a current situation that I just read about in Yahoo News. A young Lt. in the U.S. Army is going to be on court martial tomorrow for refusing orders to go to Iraq. In the article from the, it provides the transcript from the interview with the reporter. It just BOGGLES my mind to know that there are people in this country, much less already in the service, that feel like this.
I will spare a long blog that you would have to scroll forever by just giving the link the article. Telling the story is not my intentions in this mornings blog, but merely to convey my feelings on it and what I expect to see coming about it.
http://hotzone.yahoo.com/b/hotzone/blogs19056 Check it. It is pretty interesting.
I believe that, although he is young and it could tarnish his recrod, that Lt. Watada does deserve prison time. I don't think that he should be subject to the full six years that he can possibly have thrown at him, but I do think some prison time is necessary. Not only for the fact that he made a commitment to the military and this country to serve in the Army, which means a probability of getting sent to a theatre of warfare, but also I see certain other ramifications coming of this if we let it go unpunished.
One big downside to all of this, which is going to happen whether or not he gets jail time, is how the Liberal media is going to use him as a poster child for thier twisted agenda to end the war in Iraq. The mindless left wingers are going to use him and put him on a pedestal just like they did with the bleeding heart, Cindy Sheehan.
I wonder what she is going to be saying about all of this, too. Gotta love her mind numbingly unpatriotic rantings.
He is refusing orders to go to Iraq with the rest of his unit for the reason that he believes the war to be "illegal". We found out through the trials at Nuremberg during 1945-1949, that soldiers are held accountable for their actions, whether those actions were done by direct order or not. In other words, if an officer orders a low ranking individual to do something that would be illegal and the individual follows through with it, that individual is held responsible for the crime as well because he should know the difference between right and wrong, legal and illegal. He cannot be be charged with any war crimes, unless he has a hand in specific acts that are deemed to be illegal or inhumane.
So what is is he all worried about then? He seems like he is an intelligent guy, so he should know that all he has to do is follow his orders, fulfill his service to his COUNTRY, and not do anything that is an inhumane act. I am sure that there are things that happen over there that go unreported, but he does not have to be a part of those things.
I believe this to be nothing but about a man that just doesn't want to go fight in a war where thousands of other Americans are selflessly fulfilling their commitment to the U.S. Cowardly? Yes, in my mind. What is even worse about the whole thing, which makes me think there is a whole different level to all of this, is that there is going to be a big push from the lefties about all this.
He is not the first soldier to refuse orders to go overseas and serve, however he is the first officer that has made it a point to go public with it. And by public, I mean he called the media and had them release it. Why would he need to do that? Popularity? Or is this a ploy from the far left to make it start looking like our soldiers don't even want the war to be happening?
I think that maybe he had been talking and thinking about not going over there for some time and someone got wind of it. I think that someone from either the mainstream media, or even just some anti-war sympathizer heard about him resigning because he did no believe in the war and gave him the bright idea to make a "stand". Or hell, he might have just been one of bleeding hearts all along that joined the service cause he couldn't figure out what to do, and now he is too scared to go to the war so does something that will get him national attention. Which as we all know, with the pressure from the Liberal mainstream media, you can surely get a lot of things pulled off cause the conservatives today don't want to listen to the winey tantrums from the left.
I like how he answers the question about the fact that he joined the Army while we were already at war with Iraq, but all of a sudden he started reading into things and realized that the war was illegal and that it was basically allowed to happen because of lies that the administration told. This shows exactly where he gets his ideals from.
In the interview, the journalist brought up the fact that during Vietnam his father dodged ( I am the one calling it dodged, because that is what it was)the draft by asking the draft board to let him join the the Peace Corps instead. So it seems to me that the Watada family have always been on the Liberal side of the spectrum, which gave in to where the young Lt.'s chosen resources of information came from. There is no doubt that due to his family having been anti-war supporters in the past and very left-minded, gave way to him having a start in the Liberal ideals about the war in Iraq, which naturally he followed.
Another thing that I do not want to see, but I am sure I will, is more service members doing the same thing. Especially if the only punishment that he recieves is just a dishonorable discharge from the Army. Others will see how all he had to do was refuse to physically get on a bus or airplane, call a few reporters, and poof. They don't have to go take a chance at getting shot at in Iraq or have to live in a sandbox for a year.
Communications Director for the Veterans of Foreign Wars, Jerry Newbury, said it best. "Lt. Watada has an obligation to fulfill, and it's not up to the individual officer to decide when he's going to deploy or not deploy. Some other officer will have to go in his place. He needs to think about that."
Who does this junior grade officer think he is? It is not his job to argue the politics of war. Sure, anyone can harbor their on views on what is going on, however, he is supposed to do his duty regardless of his personal convictions, politcal standpoints, and ideals on the situation. There are many other men and women that draw the same conclusions about how they believe the war in Iraq to be a personal war, war for oil, or whatever they believe the war to be over. There are a lot of them there that do not believe that it is not worth losing our fine men and women in uniform in a distant land over.
But yet, they still do their job and thier duty. This still leave thier families behind to go into a war zone even thought they do not believe in the cause totally. At least they go to honor thier commitment that they signed up for.
In my mind, I really do believe that this man deserves to have the shit kicked out of him repetitively for a week, and then a little time in jail. No, I do not think that he deserves the full six years, but he does deserve something for what he has done, and what is about to come of all of it. The Liberals are going to drag this out and make him one of thier front runners to parade around the country, making him out to be the "average" soldier. Giving false ideas to domestic Americans that the majority or all of our soldiers believe the war to be so pointless and wrong, that they would rather go to jail that fulfill thier duty.
There are no positive outcomes for the country if this soldier gets away with just slap on the wrist. There are no postives if we let the liberals and their toy, the mainstream media, get away with distorting the truth about our men and women in the service, or the war in Iraq.
Haha, if you made it down this far, what do you think?
