Veterans Day Speech a Disgrace

On this Veteran's Day, where America honors those who have gone to war in her name, President George W. Bush finds a way to disgrace the meaning of the day by making political statements in defense of the incompetence of his administration. The politicizing of the day detracts from the significance of the sacrifices made by America's men and women of the military.

"While it's perfectly legitimate to criticize my decision or the conduct of the war, it is deeply irresponsible to rewrite the history of how that war began."

"Some Democrats and anti-war critics are now claiming we manipulated the intelligence and misled the American people about why we went to war. They also know that intelligence agencies from around the world agreed with our assessment of Saddam Hussein."

"They believe that America can be made to run again [like in Vietnam], only this time on a larger scale, with greater consequences."

"The terrorists regard Iraq as the central front in their war against humanity."

"We must recognize the Iraq war as our central front against the terrorist."

President George W. Bush
11/11/2005 Veterans Day Speech
Tobyhanna Army Depot, Pennsylvania

So the facts are irrelevant! What?! No need to re-write history to more accurately reflect the truth!

Perhaps the times have changed, perhaps not, but when I was growing up, I was taught to always tell the truth. No matter how painful. Withholding the truth, or creating a lie to cover the truth, could prove more costly in the long run.

Now, here is OUR president saying it is "irresponsible" to update the history to accurately report what happened. You see, the problem is that it does not look good for the whole crew who pushed for the war. Not only that, thousands have died as a result of the rush to war, and we have a bunch of boys stuck in Iraq, for who knows how long, witnessing and being asked to do things which they will never forget.

I guess it matters not that facts have been found which point out the deception used to lead the nation to war.

In January and February 2003, President Bush and then-Secretary of State Colin Powell made dramatic assertions that Iraq had ties to al Qaeda and argued for military action to prevent Baghdad from providing its suspected stockpiles of weapons of mass destruction to terrorists.

Powell repeated the claim before the United Nations in making the case for the invasion of Iraq.

No such stockpiles turned up after the U.S.-led invasion, and the independent commission investigating al Qaeda's 2001 attacks on New York and Washington found no evidence of a collaborative relationship between the two entities.

Source: CNN

In a statement, Kerry retorted, "I wish President Bush knew better than to dishonor America's veterans by playing the politics of fear and smear on Veterans Day. Instead of trying to salvage his slumping political fortunes, the commander in chief should honor our men and women in uniform with a clear strategy for success in Iraq."

Kerry charged, "This administration misled a nation into war by cherry-picking intelligence and stretching the truth beyond recognition. . . . Today they continue the same games hoping Americans forget the mess they made in Iraq that's cost over 2,000 Americans their lives and their failure to find Osama bin Laden."

Source: Washington Post

So to distract the attention from the source of this entire mess, the administration's rush to war was based on lies and should thus be held accountable for their actions, the topics are manipulated to work on peoples' emotions. Bring up Vietnam, 9/11, how the terrosits are waging a "war against humanity", etc.

But, you know, everything is relative, depending on which side of the issue one supports. One man's terrorist, is another man's freedom-fighter. Here's a quote which could very well be the mantra for Iraqis fighting to rid their land of the invading American forces:

"No act of ours invited the rage of killers and no concession, bribe or act of appeasement would change or limit their plans for murder. Against such an enemy, there is only one effective response: We will never back down, we will never give in, we will never accept anything less than complete victory."

I am so sick of hearing the same old lines used to prey on peoples' emotions. Let emotions overrule the reason one would apply to the arguments and proof of this entire charade. We are all being played under cover of patriotism and religion. God help America. We, as Americans, will get what we deserve if we don't get wise to these ploys.
One final quote with which I whole-heartedly agree:

"Evil men obsessed with ambition and unburdened by conscience must be taken very seriously and we must stop them before their crimes can multiply."

Alrighty then, let's start with Bush, Cheney, Rumsfeld, Rice, and Rove.

UPDATE
As of 12:00 EST, CNN poll results:

Created: Friday, November 11, 2005, at 12:08:26 EDT

Do you think the Bush administration manipulated the prewar intelligence on Iraq?

Yes 74% 93691 votes
No 26% 32407 votes

Total: 126098 votes

Technorati Categories: Ethics, Holidays, Military, News, News and Politics, Opinions, Random, Truth, Veterans, War, Weblog.