A Navy Mom Speaks Out Against Lies of Bushies and Pentagon

Vox Verax points us to this heartfelt and all too accurate letter from a Navy mom (Dana Melius):

Pundits and politicos have often assumed that rural America blindly ascribes to the President's polemic. Not so. The following is a beautifully worded letter from a mother whose son is in the Navy. From the New Ulm, Minnesota, Journal:

Critics of U.S. ‘war’ on terrorism are also patriots
TO THE EDITOR:

Once again, I could not hold back tears as our family last week sent off our Navy son, Matt. After missing him dearly while he served 18 months on the Indian Ocean island of Diego Garcia, he was heading back to his new base in San Diego, preparing for six to nine months at sea. Like other parents of military children, we are proud and pray for his safety. But more than ever before, we are also frustrated and angry.

And despite what U.S. Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld and President Bush say, we have every right to both support our troops AND criticize the Iraqi war. Enough is enough. This latest spin from the Bush administration — likening critics of the Iraqi “war” on terrorism to Nazi appeasers in World War II — is more than astonishing. It’s un-American.

Freedom of the press, freedom of expression, freedom to disagree. These are all attributes of democracy that must be preserved every bit as our other freedoms. Today, many journalists and politicians are realizing they were misled and misdirected by the Bush-Cheney-Rumsfeld war machine. The price — in U.S. military lives and thousands more innocent, Iraqi civilians, along with escalating violence throughout the Middle East — has been horrific. And this administration’s focus on Iraq has only blurred the war on terrorism.

This is the same administration, through the deceit and military mistakes of U.S. Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, which underestimated the number of troops needed for the Iraqi effort. Despite cries from U.S. generals for more troops and better equipment in the initial stages, Rumsfeld said he knew better. All this from a man – Mr. Rumsfeld – who shook hands with Saddam Hussein in 1983 during the Reagan administration, which then sold weaponry to Hussein’s army of thugs... <