Thanks,
Posted by my friend Marcia Yerman on Huffington: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/marcia-g-yerman/veterans-families-cast-a_b_139934.html
I previously wrote an article about those who have served in our military, and the challenges facing them and their families. At that time, I interviewed Lorin Walker. We have stayed in touch, and she recently sent me this letter. It speaks for her, and two other women that she quotes in her correspondence. They are all members of what is referred to as a Gold Star Family - those who have lost loved ones who have died in service to our country.
As military family members, we were supportive, proud to serve, and prepared to sacrifice for our country and our values. We were not however, prepared to make the ultimate sacrifice for artifice. We are Gold Star family members, a mother, a sister-in-law, and an adult child of service members who lost their lives in honorable service of our nation. We feel strongly about the reprehensible way in which the war in Iraq was conceived. The moment that Bush, Cheney, Rumsfeld, and Wolfowitz sat down to plan how to sell the invasion to the public under false pretenses, we lost. We all lost. The damage done to us and to our reputation as a nation has still not been fixed. How then, could Senator McCain begin to fix what he doesn't even seem to acknowledge has happened? We remember all too well that the war did not begin with the surge. Senator McCain's rhetoric demonstrates a complete denial about all of the "loss" that occurred beforethat -- the loss to our nation's integrity and honor. "Still further, what are we as a country losing when we continue to lay to eternal rest the funny kid on the baseball team and the girl who always knew how to get her little siblings to finish their chores? These aren't Rambos we're sending to do our dirty work, they are our military," said Gold Star mother Rosemary Palmer. "We will forever wonder what each might have contributed to our world." We appreciated Senator McCain when he spoke up about Bush policies that were damaging. Yet, he still does not seem to have acknowledged (even to himself) the ongoing extent of that damage or the resulting loss of public trust -- which is the lifeblood of our entire system. The Iraqi budget is running a surplus while ours is in a downward spiral. When tens of thousands of Iraqis peacefully protest in the streets against long-term U.S. presence, it is time to change course. It is time to refocus and redouble our efforts on Afghanistan, not stubbornly stay in Iraq while being asked to leave. Gold Star sister-in-law, Janine Gastineau said, "The war in Afghanistan has long been overshadowed by the distraction that is the war in Iraq. Every new disaster there rubs more salt in the wounds of our grief." When combined with McCain's insulting record on veterans' issues and his tendency to be out of touch with the plight of average working Americans, it is not surprising that he is also far out of touch with the long-term loss of credibility that Iraq has caused us around the world. Only with a truly myopic definition of victory is it possible to keep talking about winning. As the daughter of a pilot who has been missing for 37 years, I can tell you that the cost of war is decades, generational in scope. To say that we will stay until we have won, in a war that has no clear lines, an ever-shifting definition of the word win is offensive, damaging, unethical, and wrong. It is playing with words to fuel a political campaign. What must we have won to say that we have won, and what more will we have to lose? By stark comparison to Senator McCain, Senator Obama will take the long view. He will look before he leaps. He will not sacrifice American lives lightly or use force to prove a point. He will restore an honor to the American Presidency that is based on mutual trust. He will respect our service members, their families, and the rest of the world. He will engender respect from around the globe and from the troops that will call him Commander in Chief. And finally, there is the question of patriotism. When the political chips are down or policies are failing, those who raise questions or who point out failures are accused of being unpatriotic. We are not unpatriotic people. As one widow said to me, "I was a proud military wife for ten years. I resent anyone who questions my patriotism, or anyone else's, simply because we question a flawed doctrine that endangers precious lives. I would never back down from defense of my country in the presence of a genuine threat. However, I cannot condone the duplicitous politics of McCain and Palin. As a survivor, I am a witness to the pain that plagues the families left behind."We are Gold Star Family Members, true patriots. We are standing up for all that is great about this nation that we love. We are standing with a leader who has inspired the nation and the world, a patriot who will command with authority and lead with intelligence and foresight. We will proudly cast our votes for Barack Obama on Tuesday, November 4th.
We are Gold Star Family Members, true patriots. We are standing up for all that is great about this nation that we love. We are standing with a leader who has inspired the nation and the world, a patriot who will command with authority and lead with intelligence and foresight. We will proudly cast our votes for Barack Obama on Tuesday, November 4th.
Posted on Vetpac.org - 2 March, 2007
Lives ARE being wasted; let us not apologize for speaking the truth.
Futures are being lost and for what? Soldiers, marines and support personnel are dying due to poor executive management. This war was intended to accomplish the wrong mission, at the wrong time, in the wrong way and all under false pretenses. For that, troops are being bloodied and lost and individuals who otherwise would have been colonels and senators, business men and women, executives, laborers and entrepreneurs, machine workers and drill sergeants, real estate agents, lawyers and hotel staff, mothers and fathers and sons and nephews and daughters and aunts are lost to us forever. They are not wasting their own lives – the Administration is seeing to that.
When one enters the military it is for the right reasons: service, education, duty, opportunity, honor, future... To be sent to a war with no plan or strategy or clear objective is an assault on that service and an assault on those values. To die for that war is a waste of unknown and unfathomable consequence.
Lorin Walker, VetPAC Deputy Executive Director said, “In 1972 my mother and I joined my father in Hawaii while he was on leave. It was lovely and idyllic, tearful and awful. To my mother he spoke all the words that I hear now from returning troops – this is not a good situation – there is no happy ending. It took everything he had to board the plane back to his base and we never saw him again; he has been missing in action since April of that year.” She continued, “He was just a guy who joined the service out of honor and respect and duty and did his duty in spite of the fact that the overall mission was fundamentally flawed. He did his duty in order to protect his comrades – they came home – he did not. His life and future were wasted and I was left fatherless without good reason or explanation. Who will explain why and how mothers and fathers were lost to this generation of orphans? It is not an easy task when the objective is muddled and dubious.”
March 19th, 2007 is the fourth anniversary of the invasion into Iraq and it must be clearly and loudly stated that too many lives have been wasted. The Administration still has no clear or attainable military objective. People all over the United States have spoken, the world has spoken. It is not just US military lives being lost: Iraqi women, babies, children, lawyers, government officials and educators (the future of the nation), US civilian contractors, international reporters, and troops from Britain, Bulgaria, Estonia, Denmark, Australia, El Salvador, Italy, Kazakhstan, Latvia, Poland, Romania, Slovakia, Hungary, The Netherlands, Spain, Thailand and the Ukraine have died and/or are dying. The current direction has not solved the problem and it will not. The troops cannot quell the uprising; a working government cannot be forced in Iraq. The Iraqi people must stand up and govern themselves and we must support them in that weighty endeavor, but more troops for an indefinite period of time and permanent bases will not assist, only diplomacy and responsible and appropriate aid can.
It is time to be responsible and plan our redeployment, let us not delay; time is wasting.
Posted on VetPAC.org 19 October, 2007
Rear Admiral John Hutson (ret.) sat before the Senatorial confirmation hearing for Judge Mukasey’s nomination for US Attorney General and stated that torture is the refuge, “of the lazy, the stupid and the pseudo tough”. Regarding waterboarding he stated that, like thumb screws, it is one of the most ancient and common forms of torture. Torture is plain and simple:
The deliberate, systematic, or wanton infliction of physical or mental suffering by one or more persons in an attempt to force another person to yield information or to make a confession or for any other reason (Princeton University).
The United Nations defines torture as: any act by which severe pain or suffering, whether physical or mental, is intentionally inflicted on a person for such purposes as obtaining from him or a third person information or a confession, punishing him for an act he or a third person has committed or is suspected of having committed, or intimidating or coercing him or a third person, or for any reason based on discrimination of any kind, when such pain or suffering is inflicted by or at the instigation of or with the consent or acquiescence of a public official or other person acting in an official capacity.
The experience and trauma of drowning most certainly applies. The President insists that, “We do not Torture.” and yet, waterboarding and other similar disgraceful, inhumane and degrading methods are considered “gray” areas by Mukasey, the President and others.
This is not a gray area to be determined by whim. If one of our soldiers, marines, journalists, or civilians was taken prisoner and subjected to identical treatment we would certainly deem it torture, and rightly so. But by using these tactics, the United States has not only lost all credibility and nobility, the President has left the door wide open to retribution, he has shattered Pandora ’s Box and keeps dropping more of the pieces needed to put it back together. The President has made this country what we most despise: inhuman, hateful and exposed. From a man that professes to respect all life, this is detestable (if not prosecutable); there is no respect for life in the torture of it. Not only is this a matter of timeless morality, it is a matter of urgent national and troop security. For the sake of our nation and our troops, there should be no doubt where we stand with regard to torture – unfortunately for all of us, it is currently on the wrong side – we have become the “lazy, the stupid and the pseudo tough”.
Ms. Walker is the Vice President of VetPAC and daughter of Captain Bruce C. Walker (USAF) MIA 1972 (almost certainly taken as a prisoner of war and subjected to torture)
Posted on: milspousepress.com and VetPAC.org April 16, 2008
Yesterday (15 April) speaking before an audience of veterans, Senator Barack Obama condemned the Department of Veterans Affairs (DVA) for denying wounded service members access to voter registration assistance. He gets it. The DVA does not.
Denying those who have served, fought and sacrificed the opportunity to register to vote is not only undemocratic and unconstitutional, it is obscene.
The DVA should not only honor that right, they should promote it. Instead, the DVA has banned voter registration on DVA premises. Shame on them. Voter registration is legal on public property, period. Recovering service members deserve every opportunity to cast a vote.
This is more of the same from an administration that thinks it makes the rules, despite the law or history, despite justice or simply what is right. The Administration and its lackeys feign concern that voter registration drives will be partisan. First, voter registration is not partisan, it is American, second, their true concern is that if they allow service members and vets to register that they may vote in opposition to the status quo.
Let's bring some honor back to the nation, starting now. Let our service members have their Constitutional say; let them register, let them vote. Let the chips fall where they may. For once in the last 7 years, do what is right, instead of what is self-serving.
Posted on Vetpac.org April 16, 2008
My father has been missing in action for 36 years for a wrong and unjust war. I never imagined that we would begin a second travesty during my lifetime, let alone a third. The war in Iraq has been an abomination; it has been damaging to our nation and the world. It has made us monsters and the world less safe and has served to further destabilize an unstable region. To contemplate and plan yet another invasion is unthinkable and unforgivable.
Diplomacy is what we should be (and should have been) focusing on. Both the U.S. and Iran have a vested interest in a stable Iraq; instead of using that tie to our benefit and that of the world, we are behaving like the biggest bully on the block. My father would be ashamed; we all should be.
Great nations and great leaders talk; comprehensively, unconditionally and directly, capitalizing on shared interests and common goals. Great leaders have the strength and fortitude to put down their weapons and offer a hand of reconciliation toward a positive goal. Anything less is counter-productive.
It is time to honor the sacrifice of my dad and all who have fallen; it is time for the U.S. to reevaluate our positions and priorities. It is time to work for an inclusive world where talking is the first order of business, where our service members are called upon only after considering every angle and weighing all costs. Time to be as honorable as those who serve.
Posted on: Vetpac.org September 4, 2007
In 1972 my mother and I joined my father in Hawaii while he was on leave from Vietnam. It was lovely and idyllic, tearful and awful. To my mother he spoke all the words that I hear now from returning troops, “this is not a good situation”, “there will be no happy ending.” It took everything he had to board the plane back to Laos and we never saw him again; he has been missing in action since April of that year. He was just a guy who joined the service out of honor and respect and duty and did his duty in spite of the fact that the overall mission was fundamentally flawed. He did his duty in order to protect his comrades. They came home – he did not. His life and future were wasted and I was left fatherless without good reason or explanation.
Who will explain why mothers and fathers were lost to this generation’s war orphans? It is not an easy task when the underlying objective was muddled and dubious. This undertaking, along with the morally requisite support of our returned veterans and their families, and the rebuilding of Iraq and our international reputation will take decades, possibly generations. There is no time to waste - the wounds are already too deep; prolonged or indefinite combat troop deployment will not solve the problem. It is time to do what needs to be done.
The list of wrongs done by this Administration is never-ending; the outing of an undercover CIA agent, the fundamentally flawed war in Iraq, Guantanamo and the trashing of Habeas Corpus, the reckless and irresponsible overextension of our armed forces, Abu Ghraib abuses and appalling lack of Executive accountability, Alberto Gonzales and his utter lack of ethics and his demoralized Justice Department, Katrina and her enlightening, devastating fallout to name a few. The values in which my father believed so deeply, the values which were the very foundation of his great nation are being given away to the highest bidder, and to top it all off, the sickening rhetoric spewing forth about supporting the troops is backed by nothing short of negligent and morally reprehensible treatment of the troops stateside.
It is time to rebuild that great nation in which we were all so proud. It is time to face our demons and learn from them. It is time to conquer poverty, and put our financial house in order, to treat prisoners like those of a civilized nation, allowing them their day in court and guaranteeing them no cruel or unusual treatment. It is time to solve the international AIDS crisis and the national education gap, time to graduate all our kids from high school and make sure that each and every child can go to college if he or she chooses. It is time to be that proud beacon that we remember and want so much to be; a beacon of hope and purpose, of humanity and creativity, of intellect and dedication. The number one barrier to our progress toward that goal is the war in Iraq – that is the place to start and the way to start is by bringing our combat troops home; the time to start is now: Elect Barack Obama.
Hillary Clinton talks down to people. She proposes short term answers to long term problems; appease the people and they will come. Until now, it has worked, mostly; admittedly, her plan to create a $5000 entitlement for every child born magically vanished when economists and laymen alike looked at her like she was nuts. And along comes a gas tax moratorium? Give me a break. The gas tax goes to pay for badly needed infrastructure. Mrs. Clinton would artificially lower the cost of fuel, thereby putting more money in the pockets of fuel companies and more cars on roads which are already falling apart. Roads which will not be fixed, because she has taken the funds needed to fix them to pay for the tax cut? Ludicrous. The resolution needed is harder and less immediate, the resolution is to raise CAFE standards, close tax loopholes to fuel companies and promote responsible alternative fuels and transportation methods. Mrs. Clinton, however, would have us believe that she is for the people, she understands them, because she will solve their immediate problems by placing another band aid on the crumbling dam.
While we have become a nation of immediate gratification, people are yearning to do what is right, what is required, all they need is a leader with enough fortitude to ask. No President in the last forty years has believed in the American people enough to ask them to be a part of the solution, we have been lulled to complacency and even ordered to just go shopping. We are waking up from a cheap cashmere induced slumber to a realization that things are not so great and we are the ones to fix it. Together we can.
Mrs. Clinton has no intention of being straight with the people and talking to them like adults. Likewise, she has no particular intention to permanently fix the enormous problems facing the nation. Her intention is to get elected, at any cost.
Barack Obama, by comparison, looks each and every person squarely in the eye and says, there is work to do, but together, we can do it; together we can fulfill the American dream. As adults and as equals, we can do what is needed to give our kids, all of them, a world class education. We can have safe, drivable roads and bridges. We can have an healthy economy based on real world numbers not debt and bubbles. We can do what is right in service of our military veterans. We can have living wage jobs for all of our citizens and real, humane immigration reform. We can have affordability, workability, and excellence in our healthcare system while serving all people equally. We can have adult conversations with international leaders and come to workable solutions and resolutions to our global problems and disagreements. We can conquer global warming and grow our knowledge, national income and viability simultaneously. We can do all of this, and we have to do all of this, but it will take everyone doing their part; there can be no living wage local jobs with overblown executive salaries and tax-breaks for companies shipping jobs overseas. There can be no gas tax cuts without a resolution to the road problem and the larger energy problem. There can be no green collar job growth with continued cow-towing to fuel companies. We can fulfill our moral mandate to do what is right for our veterans only if we are honest about the true cost of war, smart about waging it and about what we ask them to do while serving. We can have true, vigilant and responsible national security, without sacrificing that which makes this nation great.
Real solutions and a fundamental shift in the way we think and act are what is required in this time; Barack Obama is being very forthright about that. He is honest, demanding of people's greatness and tells it like it is; that is the far-and-away the most respectful and non-elitist manner on display in this campaign. Barack Obama will lead with grace, respect, dignity and determination toward a better nation for all.
Ms. Walker lives in Preston, Washington. Her father has been missing in Action since 1972 in Vietnam. She serves as the Vice President of Council for a Livable World’s Veterans’ Alliance for Security and Democracy (CLW-VETPAC).
In an email thread to which I was included, feminist, activist, author and commentator, Gloria Feldt asserted that, "Once we have had a woman president, or maybe two, then perhaps we might have the luxury of giving choice greater value than self interest." The gist of the exchange being that, as women and feminists, we must support Senator Clinton, or we betray all women and the entire feminist movement. While I appreciate and benefit from all the years and sacrifice Ms. Feldt, Ms. Steinem and countless others have dedicated, I respectfully disagree.
We will have a woman President, but it must be the right woman. If not, the door that so many have worked to open, will once again be closed. Hillary is not the right person for the job regardless of her sex. She is polarizing and not because she is a woman. We need the right leader in this fragile moment - Barack is that leader and not because he is a man.
Barack is the right leader because he pulls people together, he enrolls them to be bigger than themselves. It is time for this nation to stand together as one people to solve the enormous problems facing us, facing the world. Barack's cross cultural, world view and sheer brilliance pull for that eventuality. Hillary does not have that attribute. That does not make her bad or wrong, just wrong for the moment.
We will have a woman President - just not this woman at this time. This is not a feminist or anti-feminist issue, it is a human issue. As a woman and as a feminist, I support the best person to right the wrongs and heal the wounds of the past. I support the right person to move our nation forward in an intelligent, positive and humane direction. I support the person who empowers and inspires me.
As a human being, I support Barack Obama.
