Hi everyone! My journey to this site is a little different than many here. When I signed on, I really wasn't 100 percent sure what "progressive" even meant and had to look it up. I am an Independent (formerly right-leaning voter) who learned of Daily Kos through the Obama web site. Am I happy to be here.
In this election, I am almost a single-issue voter and for me, this all boils down to the war and the 4,155 young American souls who have lost their lives in it.
I am more hawk than dove, but cherish moderation. When 9/11 took place, I was teaching in an elementary school classroom, shortly after retiring from the military. When Bush went in to Afghanistan hunting bin Laden, I cheered. When they dropped the mountain-buster I noted with pride that they were doing an Extreme Makeover to get this guy.
Shortly afterward, McCain, echoing Bush said, "On to Iraq."
It was here that my staunch support of this war ended. I mean, it made no sense, so I listened intently as Gen. Powell made the case to the UN. Still didn't sound right. There was no connection to 9/11 and I certainly knew Osama bin Laden wasn't lurking down there.
Then McCain said, "It will be easy" and "We will be welcomed as liberators" and "We won't get into house to house fighting in Baghdad". Mission accomplished.
Then there were 4,000 soldiers killed in house to house combat. And, because of the outstanding work of our military doctors in the field, 30,000 kids came home with brain and spinal injuries. Blinded, deaf, many burned to nearly beyond recognition. Amputees. Para- and quadra-plegics.
To spotty or no care.
McCain's record:
- TOO BUSY to vote on Sen. Webb's GI Bill that was passed overwhelmingly by a 75-22 margin (but not too busy to take credit for it from President Bush at the signing ceremony). [5/22/08]
- Voted AGAINST the Webb amendment calling for adequate troop rest between deployments. [9/2007]
- Voted AGAINST a plan to drawdown troop levels in Iraq. [7/2007]
- TOO BUSY to vote on a bill that would require the start of a drawdown in troop levels within 120 days with a goal of withdrawing nearly all combat troops within one year. [3/2007]
- Voted AGAINST an amendment providing $20 billion to the VA’s medical facilities. [5/4/06]
– Voted AGAINST providing $430 million to the VA for outpatient care "and treatment for veterans," one of only 13 senators to do so. [4/26/06]
– Voted AGAINST increasing VA funding by $1.5 billion by closing corporate loopholes. [3/14/06]
– Voted AGAINST increasing VA funding by $1.8 billion by ending "abusive tax loopholes." [3/10/04]
Walter Reed Medical Center was in deplorable condition and the government wouldn't find money to provide proper health care to our returning soldiers, so private citizens, horrified at what was going on, raised money to build the most spectacular, state-of-the-art medical facility anywhere for these heroes. The Center for the Intrepid. And John McCain had the audacity to come here for its grand opening.
So why was his presence so insulting and why am I so vehemently opposed to Senator John McCain, "war hero" and former POW? It is because we military types tend to live by a fairly simple code. We believe in Duty, Honor, Country. We live by a creed that says we never leave a man behind nor do we break faith to consort with the enemy. Considering McCain's record above, he has done both. And he had the gaul to showboat in front of the very men and women he had abandoned.
John McCain's cavalier trigger-happy thrill-seeking grand-standing has cost this country 4,155 sons and daughters. Mothers and fathers. Sisters, brothers, cousins. Friends, co-workers and neighbors.
That this incompetent doddering old fool could stand in front of Walter Reed Middle School, a technology glitch sure, but to then allow his campaign to issue the public lie on his watch that it was meant to be all along is disgusting and a further breach of the code.
Never again will the utter ineptitude of such a man be vested in a person playing commander-in-chief. Had he paid attention at the academy rather than partaking in what he now boasts of as frat boy antics, he might well have been prepared to advise our current president at a time in our history it was most needed. Now he quibbles about a surge and whether it worked or not? We do not need an operations chief, we need a commander-in-chief. Someone who gets that the position encompasses more than the warrior-class. There are diplomatic considerations, fiscal implications, host country realities. And what do we get from him? The surge? Seriously?
Never. Again. Never.
I have found an online home here. It has at once been funny, enlightening, anger-inducing, friendly, mobilizing, uplifting and frustrating. But if this adventure has been nothing else, it has proven that this is a place of passion. And I need your help. There are another 135,000 people who can't be here to ask you to help. They are the men and women stuck in a combat zone who desperately need your passion to help Obama win this election and get them out of the military-diplomatic quagmire that is Iraq.
Commanders know that when the troops get demoralized, the fight suffers. I can only ask each of you to please help our troops. To please hit the streets and do house-to-house combat on their behalf.
I thank Daily Kos for being here. This has been a remarkable journey and I look forward to meeting so many more of you and thank you each for all you've done to kick this election in the ass. This is vital work. Please don't give up on putting Barack Obama in the White House and remember these who are stuck in a senseless war spanning two foreign countries. Help take this fight to the streets so we can win this.
Yes we can!
I thank the community for the honor of putting this diary on the Rec list. My first time. So, to give something back, I am making an extra phone call for each Rec I've received (104 254 592 686 calls on top of my pledged weeklies). Dang, you beautiful people, you're killing me here and I'm loving it! I've got some calls to start making!
A Marine's somber view Comment (now diary) by NCrissieB