These soldiers should be grateful that the American public, which by all polls overwhelmingly disapproves of the Iraq war and the President's handling of it, do still offer their support to them, and their respect.
Through every Abu Ghraib and Haditha, through every rape and murder, the American public has indulged those in uniform, accepting that the incidents were the product of bad apples or even of some administration or command order.
Sure it is the junior enlisted men who go to jail, but even at anti-war protests, the focus is firmly on the White House and the policy. We just don't see very man "baby killer" epithets being thrown around these days, no one in uniform is being spit upon.
So, we pay the soldiers a decent wage, take care of their families, provide them with housing and medical care and vast social support systems and ship obscene amenities into the war zone for them, we support them in every possible way, and their attitude is that we should in addition roll over and play dead, defer to the military and the generals and let them fight their war, and give up our rights and responsibilities to speak up because they are above society?
Mr. Arkin must not have heard about Corporal Joshua Sparling from the 82nd Airborne, a recent amputee who showed up at last weekend's "peace" protests in Washington DC to counter-protest. Myron Pitts from FayObserver.com writes about how protesters spit on Corporal Sparling.
Sparling says the peace protestors were anything but peaceful. He was called names, cussed at and physically threatened, he says.
“The majority were being negative to us,” he says. “A minority were just walking by and saying, ‘peace.’ ”
On Tuesday morning, he was telling his story on “Fox & Friends,” the FoxNews network’s morning show. He told the Fox anchors that he was spit on. (He denies a report in the New York Times that he spit back.)
“I’m sick of everybody going and saying they’re looking out for me,” he says of anti-war protesters. “It was my choice to volunteer.”
