The Way It Is
a letter from the President of Vets for the
Truth
Like so many veterans who have served their country honorably, I find
it hard to accept the words and actions of many of my countrymen —
politicians, professors, protestors from the 1960s — who miss no
opportunity to condemn their country and those who fight to defend it.
I am angry at them all, those scum of the earth who abuse the freedom
that our veterans have bought at the price of their own lives and
blood. I especially despise the George Soros/Michael Moore/Howard
Dean crowd — the so-called “Shadow Government” that poses so much
danger to our republic, and about which so few Americans know.
Many of us veterans have vented our anger on those who would forfeit
the freedoms that our nation cherishes, and yet we still lack the
political organization and power that would enable us to be the force
we should be in the defense of our country. We defended it with our
guns and our lives, but we seem powerless to defend it through
political action.
Yes, some great patriots have tried to organize us. God bless those
men and women who founded the Veterans Party; it is a great idea, but
there is a reason that it and other organizations like it have failed
to make the breakthrough we would all like to see. That reason for
that failure has become clear to me in the last couple of years,
starting with my involvement with Vietnam Vets for the Truth, a group
that sprang up to expose the lies of John Kerry.
And my observations of the wonderful efforts of the Swift Boat
Veterans and POWs for the Truth confirm the conclusion I have drawn:
it is just the nature of things that veterans can only organize for
PROSCRIPTIVE, vice PRESCRIPTIVE, purposes. That is to say, we are
most effective when we draw a line and say, “No farther!”
I seriously doubt that any organized veterans group will ever be able
to elect a candidate for major office. That is just not the nature of
things. Veterans are simply not inclined to push for the election of
one of their candidates on a large-scale basis. Sure, we can make a
critical difference in certain close races, but as a general rule that
is about as far as we can go.
As the Swiftees, the POWs, and Vietnam Vets for the Truth demonstrated
so clearly in 2004, however, we CAN make a vital difference when we
say, “No farther” to candidates like John Kerry. And that is my point
— we can be tremendously effective when we fight AGAINST those who we
know in our hearts pose a clear and present danger to these United
States.
We have another chance to prove our mettle in denying office to
another fraud who claims the right to the support of veterans —
Congressman John Murtha of Pennsylvania. When he accused the Haditha
Eight of “…killing innocent civilians IN COLD BLOOD” on May 17th, he,
in my not-so-humble opinion, crossed the line, and in so doing he
forfeited any claim he had on the support of his fellow veterans.
That is why several veteran buddies and I formed “Vets for the Truth”
and pledged to each other that we would do everything we could to deny
a SEVENTEENTH TERM to a man whose military record is very similar to
that of John Kerry’s.
No, most of us are not residents of the 12th Congressional District of
Pennsylvania, nor are most of us even Pennsylvanians. We are US
military veterans from across the country who see in John Murtha the
type of self-serving politician who uses a largely bogus military
record to portray himself as one deserving our support.
More importantly, however, we recognize in “al-Jazeera Jack” Murtha
the tendency to ally himself with the most extreme left-wing,
America-hating elements in the country simply to accommodate his
outsized ego. His hunger for greater political power has caused him
to sell out to the George Soros/John Kerry/Michael Moore/Hillary
Clinton wing of the Democratic Party.
More ominously, he has become the darling of Code Pink, the avowedly
Marxist organization that not only harasses the families of our
wounded military men and women as they visit their loved ones in
Walter Reed Army Hospital but actively courts the most America-hating
scum in the world — including Hugo Chavez of Venezuela, Fidel Castro
of Cuba, and Bashir Assad of Syria.
Code Pink recently bestowed upon John Murtha an award for his anti-war
activities. His grateful acceptance of that recognition “puts paid”
to any claim he might manufacture for veterans’ support.
While veterans should be expected to vote for Murtha’s opponent, as an
organization we provide the most effective support for that candidate
when we stand en masse and say, “No farther” to John Murtha.
The defeat of that self-serving “Marine” will send a message to
veteran-pandering politicians for generations to come that they cannot
expect and will not receive automatic support from those of us who
understand where they are coming from.
We at Vets for the Truth invite all thinking veterans to join us as we
pull out all the stops in showing the country that, while we are not
particularly effective at uniting behind a candidate, we are
unconquerable when we stand in front of politicians like John Murtha.
Join us. Come to our “Boot Murtha” rally in Johnstown, PA, on October
1st. Send our website URL (www.bootmurtha.com)
to every veteran and America-loving patriot you know. Stand
shoulder-to-shoulder with us now and in the future as we do our part
in denying political office to those who would sell out their country
for a traitor’s reward—political power.
Thank you.
Larry Bailey,
President, Vets for the Truth
{NOTE: the following can be found on
OldWarDogs.us}
The Veteran as an Ethnic Group
by George Mellinger
For at least fifty year now ethnic identity has been at the head of
the American agenda. African-American, Hispanic-American or
Mexican-American, Asian-American, and gradually Jewish-American,
Polish-, Italian-, Irish-, and other Hyphenated-Americans. The rule
is, we must never notice these differences, while remaining always
carefully aware of them. We must remember which group is the "group of
the month" and appreciate its unique contributions and specialness,
while simultaneously denying that it is in any way different, or that
its members can even be detected by appearance, accent, or name. More
recently we have discovered Gay-Americans, and even deaf-mutes, and
others with congenital disabilities are demanding to be treated as
hyphenated minorities. Even women. Women who are neither "disabled"
nor in any sense a minority often demand their Hyphenated recognition.
Don’t get me wrong, I appreciate the desire of everyone for a special
identity, and to have it recognized, just so long as it does not
become self-satirizing.
But what is an ethic group. It is not race or skin color, nor is it
language, though these features may form a significant part of the
formula. Essential is a uniquely defining background and shared
experience, which sets the members of the group apart. Frequently a
part of this experience involves being stigmatized. Essential is a
sense of self-identity.
Gradually, I came to realize that I am a Veteran-American. Am I
kidding? Veterans as an ethnic group? How can that be, when they’re
all sorts of colors, have all sorts of weird accents? True. But there
is something else. For over half a century, we have been singled out
by society, and while once upon a time we were not a minority, but the
majority, like the American Indian, we have gone from being a majority
to a minority in our own land.
Special bond and experience? Of course. Its called war, though even
those who served in peacetime share the experiences of training and
barracks life. We have our own special language. Even if our language
has dialects special to the World War, Korean, Viet Nam, and Gulf
generations, we still understand each other as civilians cannot. We
can understand military terms and make sense out of news reports as
even the reporters cannot. And we have an understanding of what war is
all about, and what is at stake in politics. There is a mindset which
seems to be peculiar to Veterans, characterized by greater sense of
self-discipline, and duty, of attention to detail and thoroughness,
more attention to old-timey virtues.
Like a number of the acknowledged minorities we have seen our members
mistreated because of our identity. And called ethnic names. "Dago"?
"Nigger"? "Kike"? Use those names at your peril. But
"Babykiller", "Warmonger", "Fascist", they
seem to be socially quite acceptable.
Veterans are scorned, both by society and by government. Government
budgets for caring for wounded and disabled Veterans is always
limited, but budgets for the needs of other, civilian ethnics always
seem to be limitless. And what company would deny a contribution to an
Aids project or to a Rainbow Coalition shakedown? But when
Military Veteran and Family Asistance came begging a few corporate
contributions for programs to help our newest veterans readjust, the
CEOs of major companies such as IBM, EDS, Raytheon and many others
lined up to give us the doorknob up the butt. AIDS, self-inflicted in
the line of hedonism, is more worthy than wounds inflicted in the line
of duty by the enemy. [/sarcasm]
And now I hear about the National Guardsman in Pierce County, Wa.,
attacked by a gang of civilians for being military. and other
incidents also have happened in the recent past.
Other ethnics have sometimes tried to conceal their identities,
changing their accents, and sometimes even trying to modify their skin
color or hair. And then, every so often a few will try to emphasize
their ethnic identity for political purposes. For how many decades
have Veterans been concealing their status, not mentioning that of
which they are most proud, trying to explain "two missing years" on
their resumes, as if it were time spent in prison. And if Blacks have
Rev’run Al and Jessie, we’ve got Kerry, McCain, and Murtha. Blacks
hear "I don’t date outside my race", we hear "I don’t
date babykillers". And yes, we also have Veterans whom we
consider traitors to our ethnicity. See the above list for a few
examples. The big difference is, we tend to disown those who would
self-anoint themselves as our spokesmen. So of course, I am not
speaking for you, I am speaking to you, urging you, us all, to stand
up and demand our own share of recognition.
I’ve got a case of the ass. A big one. I’m not impressed with "Thank
you for your service" which is becoming almost a cliche as "Have
a nice day", or "welcome home" about forty years too
late. It is appropriate for greeting someone at the airport dressed in
DCUs. But to an old guy who’s been called a babykiller for forty
years, its just rubbing in the salt. In January 1977, Jimmie Carter
amnestied all the draft dodgers, deserters and other swine, proclaimed
them my, our equals. That is a whistle which, like an ex-president,
cannot be unblown. Then they elected a draft-dodger as president.
Twice! Now they wish to honor us, equally with those who spat upon
us?! No, not really. They’re willing, finally, not to honor, but to
forgive us for our service, forty years after the fact. And only if we
become penitents and supplicants, meekly standing in line to beg a
pittance from some bureaucrat who "served" in Canada from 1968 to
1977.
Then I observe the hedonistic slackers around me, those who do not,
and will not serve. Those with no self-discipline or any willingness
even to wipe their own lardbutts. Who demand, but do not give, who
seek to cash in on the colors of their hides or their choice of sexual
oddity, who worship only the Eternal ME. I say to myself, these are
NOT my people.
I do not care what the color of your skin, or of your uniform. If you
served honorably, you are my brother or sister. By the Grace of God
and the US Congress, I am a Veteran-American. And proud. And you WILL
NOT make me hide in the closet.
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