Ott on Sheehan...
Scott Ott nailed it. Absolutely nailed it.
Best known for penning bitingly direct sarcasm with accurate zingers, his blog entry this week comprises the very best response to the Camp Sheehan hoopla I have encountered. I cannot imagine a more perfectly crafted response.
I quote,
"You ask for what noble cause your son died?
In a sense he died so that people like you, who passionately oppose government policies, can freely express that opposition. As you camp in Crawford, you should take off your shoes, for you stand on holy ground. This land was bought with the blood of men like your son.
Now, 25 million Iraqis cry out to enjoy the life you take for granted. Most of them will never use their freedom to denigrate the sacrifice of those who paid for it. But once liberty is enshrined in law, they will be free to do so. And when the Iraqis finally escape their incarceration, hope will spread throughout that enslaved region of the world, eventually making us all safer and more free.
The key is in the lock of the prison door. Bold men risk everything to turn it.
Mrs. Sheehan, everyone dies. But few experience the bittersweet glory of death with a purpose -- death that sets people free and produces ripples of liberty hundreds of years into the future.
Casey Sheehan died that freedom might triumph over bondage, hope over despair, prosperity over misery. He died restoring justice and mercy. He lived and died to help to destroy the last stubborn vestiges of the Dark Ages.
To paraphrase President Lincoln, the world will little note nor long remember what you and I say here. But it can never forget what Casey Sheehan did during his brief turn on earth. If we are wise, we will take increased devotion to that cause for which he gave the last full measure of devotion."
PLEASE READ the full text of his brief blog. It is ABSOLUTELY worth the approximately 270 seconds it will take to you to be transported to his site and to read the entry from start to finish. I stand in awe of your eloquence, Scott, and the coherent brilliance nourishing it which gracefully lays this bare and puts it to rest.
posted by lachen at 2:14 PM
7 Comments:
Wow, well worth the blog trip indeed. It's amazing what people don't realize. We are amazingly lucky to be in the USA.
AMEN. Worthy reading. It harmonizes so well with my own mind and heart on this issue that his words actually become an echo of my own melody, which is such a new experience for me.
Again, a resounding THANK YOU, and AMEN! to Scott Ott. Preach it.
In a sense he died so that people like you, who passionately oppose government policies, can freely express that opposition.
Two questions.
How does the war against Iraq make us freer to express opposition?
and
If the US wages war so its citizens can be free to express their opposition, why are the people who express those opinions vilified, smeared, reviled and detested?
Just wondering.
Also wondering if your friend Mr. Ott will be sending any of his children or grandchildren to die so gloriously.
Now, 25 million Iraqis cry out to enjoy the life you take for granted.
If you really believe this, you are very sad indeed.
Hi L-girl. Welcome.
Good questions. Well, the first two are excellent. Then the dicsourse went a bit askew.
I fail to see the relevance, but you'd have to ask Scott Ott directly if he has relatives or children in the military. I do not know the answer to this question, as I have never met the man, whose voice on this subject is superbly brilliant.
Speaking of relevence - I am curious why you infer that having relatives directly involved in the war or who have given their lives in battle somehow entitles their opinions to greater validity?
As for me, the answer to your query would be a resounding YES. And my pride for their service and honor to my children and gradnchildresn cannot be overstated.
The war in Iraq released an entire nation of caged people from under the evil rule of a tyrant. Hussein used weapons of mass destruction to routinely exterminate those who disagreed with him or happened to be ethnically or geographically undesirable. Throughout the late 80's until as recently as March, 2000, Hussein exterminated upwards of 100,000 people ~10,00 of them in ONE DAY when he used airborne missle attacks with chemical weapons on the Kurds. (for more information, please see: http://www.phrusa.org/research/chemical_weapons/chemiraqgas2.html). Those who would devalue the purpose of the war because of philosophical disagreements with our sitting President are serving their own agenda and not reconciling the reality of what is actually happening.
Our society depends on the ability to disagree openly with one another. I completely support Mrs. Sheehan's right to do so. But in HER mane only, not her son, whose life and death were in service to a cause HE believed in which she clearly doesn't. She is using her son to vilify our President, this war, and those who believe in a cause which she so clearly loathes.
Because the greatest single "WMD" in this new era of rouge terror we are combatting is HUMAN, eliminating perti dishes of nations in which terror flourishes and is exported directly to our front doors is clearly in our national interest.
Our purpose, our hope, and our mission in Iraq is valiant and noble. Freedom is always thus. Unfortunately for many of us who have long enjoyed the freedoms so elusive to most of the world's people, we tend to forget the price our lives are based upon.
Our freedoms at home are bought with the blood of our soliders across the globe.
Casey Sheehan is a hero, recipient of the Bronze Star, who volunteered twice for the Army and for the specific mission which ended in his death. His service and heroism is worthy of our utmost respect and gratitude. How best to honor a fallen solider? Certainly not by turnig him into a freak show. His life and death must not be politically prostituted into this circus of a media spectacle fueled by the mislaid accusations of a bitterly misguided mother. Who, in her own words (see links below), has hated our President and conservative America in general long before September 11 or the War on Terror ensued. Her son's service and ultimate death as a war hero has been degraded as an instrument for her to weild to further her drive to express that hatred anew.
So she is using her dead son to further her personal ambition. This is utterly reprehensible to me. It is beyolnd my comprehension that ANY mother would so dishonor her son in this manner.
To address your last comment, I will only offer that it never fails to fascinate me that those who chide us Americans who honor our fallen heroes are so often the ones doing the vilification. We are all free to express our opinions. But
Mrs. Sheehan has smeared her own son's name, his personal convictions, vilified others, and detests the President and those of us who support him. She has turned a hero into a pawn for HATE and divisiveness.
That is what I find sad.
*L*
The promised links to two of Mrs. Sheehan's interviews:
1.) http://www.frontpagemag.com/Articles/Printable.asp?ID=17915
2.) http://www.democracynow.org/article.pl?sid=05/06/29/1434216
I am curious why you infer that having relatives directly involved in the war or who have given their lives in battle somehow entitles their opinions to greater validity?
I don't think anyone has a right to "support" a war unless they would go fight it themselves or offer their own children as sacrifices. I find it appalling how willing some people are to send other people's children off to die.
Thanks for articulating your thoughts. I could not disagree with you more strongly. Truly, I am sickened by them, beyond the point of rational discussion.
Thanks for graciously answering my questions and welcoming to your site. Bye now.
I have had some Dr. Pepper and am ready to jump back into the discussion with you.
I am grateful you chose to come back to check in after posting your questioning comment. It is compelling and even daunting the degree of disagreement we can be met with when we courageously post blog comments. I commend you for stepping up, since I have risked posting about items I take issue with many a time, and felt the familiar tightening in my tummy that I imagine we all experience when putting ourselves out there in the company of perfect strangers in cyberspace.
Thank you for speaking up and for listening. I am crestfallen that I did not spark the hope I savor in my own heart about the nobility of this current conflict. And my conviction that the prayers of the faithful will be answered and the resolution will be not a false sense of stability, but a lasting peace. And freedom. And hope, glorious hope.
If you are inclined, I am curious to know what sickens you about what I wrote and what I believe? That I support this particular war? That I support war at all? That I think Mrs. Sheehan is attempting to use her sons' service as macabre political currency?
Certainly, if I can live in peace, I will. I thirst for God's Kingdom to come on earth and for there to be peace at last and goodwill toward all men. But when that cannot be and we are compelled to act, I will not apologize for the cause or the casualties. I will not be afraid of the Braveheart moments in life and will not shrink back from my responsibility to support those on the front lines or join them myself. I mourn our dead, weep for their familes (I have been one of those families), and hurt because of the losses. But some causes are worth standing and fighting for. I have confidence that this is one of them and that history whas and will continue to bear witness to that.
Reading your sentence, "offering their children as sacrifices" gave me gooseflesh chills. No one is sending anyone's children off to die. This is a volunteer military, not a draft. Every single person in our armed services is there by their own voluntary CHOICE, not by the dictatorial decree of a third party.
I think I understand what you meant, in that sometimes people can seem awfully cavalier when it comes to the lives of OTHERS.
We agree on that point. Casey Sheehan lost his life for a cause he believed in, in the brave service of our nation and my family. I take that personally and am deeply indebted to him. I am not cavalier about his sacrifice for my own children.
But standing in a field to whine & rant, intent to blame the President for your sons' death because he died while serving a cause which offends you does hardly imparts honor, reverence, or gratitude.
The choices of our American heroes to defend and protect us should be honored in life and in death.
Again, WELCOME. I tend to be frank - and I see we share that commonality. I, too, have been tempted to give up this conversation on several fronts (with friends, on message boards, etc.) because it tends to boil down to the same old arguments, centering not on Casey Sheehan but on well entrenched lines of national and moral division that seem irreconcilable.
My hope is that you continue to contribute. I appreciate your honesty and 180 degree opposite viewpoint. If you feel the need to come up for air in more liberal watering holes, please consider checking in with my friend, Citizen Mom (I have her blog linked on the left side of my blog), in whose heart beats the crux of Christianity, but whose political drum beats mightily for all things liberal.
It is brilliant to be questioned in earnest by a voice which does not harmonize with your own.
Cheers,
Lachen, thank you for your further thoughts.
I'm sorry I wasn't clearer before. I wasn't questioning you or seeking discussion and debate. You and I are coming from such completely different perspectives - our basic premises are so different - that I feel discussion would be totally pointless.
Not only are we in 180-degree disagreement, we couldn't even agree on basic terms from which to start. If I were to set down my basic premises, they would be such an affront to you (as yours are to me) that rational debate would be impossible.
If you're curious about my beliefs, of course you are welcome to read my own blog - with the understanding that I won't discuss this with you there, either.
Thanks for being so polite. Good luck to you.
Post a Comment
<< Home