Cindy Sheehan Aims at Wrong Person

The media has given much air time lately to a fringe leftist loon whose son, despite the leftist influence of his psychotic mother, actually had enough liking for his country to join her armed forces and potentially put his life on the line in defense of that value. Of course, the risk inherent in joining the armed forces, in peace or war (since war can break out at any time, and training accidents claim numbers of men and women every year even in peacetime), claimed her son, Casey, while on duty in Iraq.

 

Now she demands a meeting with the president (which she isn't entitled to, but that she has already had, apparently she was so awestruck she forgot what she wanted to say and now wants another crack at it) with a whining and extremely annoying commercial and all sorts of free air time on all news mediums. Why doesn't she condemn her son? He was the one who volunteered to defend the country she despises. She already spits upon his profession and chosen values everyday she allows pseudo-communist groups to parade around the area surrounding the private residence of the president.

 

I considered very seriously joining the armed forces after the terrorist attacks of September 11, but decided, with the counsel of my parents, to at least finish undergraduate school first before making such a life altering decision. At this point, with the prospect of fighting for the right of Iraqis to ignore the examples of modern history and the moral and political rights of mankind (by adopting a theocratic constitution based on a very faulty mode of republican government, that of an unyoked legislative leviathan parliamentary system), I could not in good conscience sign up for the military.

 

Ms. Sheehan would have a legitimate case to make if her son were pressed into service by the government and made to fight and die in the war, but he volunteered to fight and accepted the possible risk of death. He was a grown man, and any rational person can, by looking at recent and not so recent American history, foresee that any given president may send you to do idiotic things at any time and under extreme risk. The foray and retreat from Lebanon under Reagan is a small example, the large and deadly commitments in World War I and Vietnam are major examples. It's an added risk one must assume even when they join in the hopes of righting the wrong of aggression.

 

If she is not merely using her sons death in the hopes of effecting radical political changes, then she is awfully misguided and extremely gullible. That is the best that can be said for her.