Mission Accomplished
01 May 2008 1:30 pm by Taylor Marsh
Mission Accomplished
guest post by WiskeyTangoFoxTrotOScar
edited by Taylor Marsh
Five years have now passed since President bush landed on the deck of the USS
Abraham Lincoln, 4,056 Service Members have lost their lives; tens of Thousands
have been gravely injured and uncounted thousands (possibly more than a million)
Iraqis have also lost their lives. Millions more Iraqis are displaced and the
region is much more unstable.
Please, sometime today think about that sunny day in San Diego. Think about
how it really is a summation of the Bush Administration’s efforts. The affair
was a photo-op from start to finish. The theme put forward was a gross overstatement
of the facts on the ground. Most importantly real service members got screwed
over by Bush to make a political point.
Few people in the United States know what it’s like to live a military life.
Fewer still have had to endure the prolonged separation that is a ship’s deployment.
It is hard on the sailors and it is hard on the families. It was especially
hard for the sailors of the USS Abraham Lincoln and it’s support group. There
usual six month “cruise” had already been extended to support the
mission in Iraq. They were so close to getting home; but instead of giving those
sailors some much needed down time with their families George W Bush had them
doing donuts just off the San Diego California shore. Those sailors much delayed
homecoming was delayed one more day for a publicity stunt.
Flash forward to the present day and Bush-Cheney are still just as awful. Returning
soldiers are being greeted at Fort Bragg by barracks not fit for housing stray
mangy dogs, never mind returning heroes. That is right, those soldiers are returning
to rotten, mold infested, stinking “housing” that is an absolute outrage.
Why? Because the funding for the barracks is held up in Congress because the
Administration can not be bothered to make sure that the funding gets approved.
Decent living conditions for our service members is just not a priority for
Bush and Cheney. No, what is a priority is magic hour photo ops with our military
members used as extras.
