A Veteran Stays Home on Memorial Day

I suspected the call might not come this year. After two years of
reluctantly turning down the invitation to join fellow Veterans marching in
my town's Memorial Day parade, no request for my participation came this
May. I was relieved.

I still don't know the origin of the list that somehow makes its way into
the hands of well-meaning people such as the parade organizer and the kind
Girl Scouts who deliver homemade cookies to our homes each Veterans Day.
Somehow they know who the Vets are in my small New York town and they go
out of their way to honor us, including asking us to march in the annual
Memorial Day parade.

And yet every year since the Iraq war began, I simply can't do it. I don't
struggle as mightily now as I did a year or two ago as my thoughts and raw
feelings on the subject have become crystal clear.

It is a sick paradox that Veterans -- who should despise George W. Bush and
his administration more than most -- are still among the groups that seem
to stand by his side, largely supported him as recently as the 2004
election and even donated to his efforts to retain his unfortunate
Command-in-Chief role. Forget the Swift Boat Liars, who so cruelly assailed
John Kerry in 2004 with their fictitious and irrelevant accounts of his
Vietnam service -- they're so far gone that only greed or mental illness
can explain their conduct and I can only hope that none live in my town.

But as far as I'm concerned, any of my neighbors who voted for Bush -- and
certainly those who support him even today, with so many more facts to work
with -- have on their hands the blood of almost 2,500 of our brothers and
sisters who have died in Iraq. And, while I understand that Memorial Day is
supposed to be an apolitical day of solemn remembrance, I just cannot bring
myself to march should-to- shoulder with them.

I give no free pass to other Vets on this one. You can't piously claim to
mourn the war dead while supporting the very people and policies
responsible for putting so many of the most recent we honor in their
graves. The grotesque hypocrisy of memorializing dead Veterans while
cheering on those who created so many young widows and widowers is not
something I can do while holding my tongue and maintaining civility.

Thomas M. Braun, a Veteran writing on Democratic Underground in 2004, said
it quite well:
"I cannot say how deeply ashamed I am of this war. I never supported George
W. Bush. I voted against him because I saw his vacant and wild stare and
heard his jumbled, chopped, and childish words. I knew he was inept and
incompetent to serve, not only as president, but as Commander-in-Chief of
our brave armed forces. I know he is a fraud. Our country has been deeply
harmed by this war and this man who hears God tell him to 'spread
democracy' so violently. All of this is based on a lie."

As someone whose biggest, personal military stress was planning how to
quietly desert his post in the Air National Guard, Bush has no idea what
battle really looks like. Leading our military and the results of war are
all an abstraction to him and it is with deadly consequences that Bush
handles this responsibility like a young boy playing with toy soldiers on a
dirt pile in the back yard. He has never seen young soldiers die or seen
everything they would ever become draining from their bodies as they die
far away from a parent or spouse's final embrace.

We have lost thousands, have many thousands more who have been maimed for
life and an untold number who will suffer the psychological effects of this
war for a lifetime. Our current leadership has also caused the deaths of
tens of thousands of Iraqi civilians and destroyed the reputation and good
faith we formerly enjoyed with other nations and that was earned by so many
others we remember today.

And somehow this president has found a way to make some Veterans ashamed to
publicly observe Memorial Day, because doing so means indirectly
associating ourselves with a hollow cause, a paper-tiger of a
Commander-in-Chief and the man responsible for too many of the deaths we
honor at the end of each May.

So, I will stay away from the parades and the speeches today.

Instead, I will sit quietly and perhaps sip a beer in honor of friends I
once had who are no longer alive. I'll also take the time to reflect on the
debt we owe all who have died wearing our country's uniform and to mourn in
advance those who will face a pointless death in the coming hours, days,
weeks and months in Iraq.

While the rest of us feel legitimate sadness for our bravest who have
passed, our government continues to pursue policies that guarantee we will
have more to memorialize one year from now.

It is sick and it is wrong. And while I will not participate in a parade
today, any of my fellow Veterans who march in remembrance, while supporting
this ongoing abuse of our military and our democracy, should walk with
their heads hung in shame.