I am a grieving mother (cancer, not war), and this latest example of Trump’s inhumanity has laid bare for the world to see a monster incapable of compassion for even the most wretched among us. Grieving mothers are shattered, always broken, even 12 years later. Treating us with anything less than tenderness only increases our burden and intensifies our pain and loss.
But we have seen this shit before from the Republicans, haven’t we? Long before Trump became their leader, they viciously attacked Cindy Sheehan, a Gold Star Mother who lost her son Casey in Iraq less than a year apart from Captain Khan. Remember?
Let’s take a quick stroll down memory lane. I watched it all unfold right here on the pages of DK. Cindy Sheehan began a one-woman protest a mile down the road from Bush’s Crawford ranch. In August. In Texas. Ugh. People flocked toward her, sympathetic people, other Gold Star Moms, veterans, politicians, all of them holding her as she openly wept. Her show of grief was riveting. I never forgot it. I had no idea that I would know that pain first hand, but I do, and it makes me sick to remember what she went through: the death threats, the attacks on her son’s service and patriotism, the mocking and taunting. Some dickheads in a pickup mowed down a row of white crosses symbolizing killed soldiers in Iraq. I couldn’t believe then that anyone who considers themselves human would do something so vicious to one so weak and raw and vulnerable. But they did.
Who spoke out against her treatment? Not the Republican Chickenshits responsible for the illegal invasion of Iraq or all those keyboard commandos cheering it all on. No, it was we liberals who came to her side and lifted her up because that is who we are at our core. Who goes to Nowhere Texas to sweat their asses off in solidarity of a grieving mother? We do. Who invites a Muslim couple to honor their son’s sacrifice to the country on a national stage? We do.
Who seeks to destroy them? Trump may be the one tweeting his vile attacks, but the implicit support by Republicans is neither a surprise or a one-off occurrence. They have stooped to this level before, and they were without shame just as they are now.
Now, back to the present. This is backfiring big time because most people understand that attacking a grieving mother is over the line, way over the line.