MEMORIAL DAY, 2008: lest we forget... lives wasted in a needless war waged deceitfully by an illegitimate president

The Human Cost of Occupation

American Deaths: 4082

Iraqi Deaths Due to US invasion: 1,213,716

American Wounded:
Official: 30,329 
Estimated: 23,000-1,00000
 

Comments

[AuthenticAndrew]

BART, and misguided jingos alike, if you honor the dead without paying attention to how and why they died then more people will die, and we'll be even busier next Memorial Day. I can't think of a better way to spend this day then thinking about what we have or haven't gained at the expense of people's lives.

It's not universaly agreed that the Iraq War was necessary and don't expect everyone to make believe that it was, even for a special occasion. We're all hoping future wars won't be so dubious and that we'll all realize what asses we were for letting politicians and the media convince us that optional wars can have good outcomes.

[DT]

1.2 million Iraqi deaths, huh? I'm not buying it. Cite your source. You're obviously not using IBC. You must be using Lancet, which has been discredited.

[RedmondDem]

So Bart, why not sign up and go fight in your President's war?

[Duffman]

Viet Nam = 59,000. I'm no Bush fan but in fairness the bottom line is not in on this yet. And RedD don't tell me to sign up for the VNam war, cause I was there - because I signed up...not drafted.
And your honorable service was what...and it is YOUR POTUS too just like Sen Obama will be.
God Bless all of our heros who, because of their sacrifice (& that of their families) helped build this fine proud Country.

[nevets]

I think B'lam is upset for being snubbed by the DNC.

Remember your daily brainwashing

H ussein
O bama
P resident
E elect

[nevets]

WWII

US Casualties
Military dead:
416,000
Wounded:
600,000

[nevets]

WWI

US Casualties
Military Dead:
116,000
Wounded:
205,000

[nevets]

Korean War

US Casualties
Military Dead:
36,500
Wounded:
92,000

[PugetSound]

You just can't let a Memorial to our Veterans go by without trying to score a political point.
As a Vet I resent the hell out of it.

Of course, the same types that want to score a political point off the military are the same ones that will periodically bemoan the lack of civility between politicians.

[RedmondDem]

Duffboy, tell me where I said that YOU should go sign up?

[PugetSound]

If Bush was an illegitimate President in 2000 he sure as heck became legitimate in 2004 when he defeated Kerry.
But in regards to the 2000 election, both the New York Times/USA Today Papers performed an independent review under Gore's recount finding that under those scenarios Bush won. Bush had more votes. Jeez, you all sound like the Rossi Supporters begging for another recount.

The real leg to stand on is the legal argument. Read the Vincent Bugliosi book on the topic. He clearly lays out why the Supreme Court decision was wrong. Unfortunately, the Supreme Court isn't Last because it is Right it is Right because it is Last. When it made the final decision the die was cast because Gore simply didn't have enough votes. Like it or not that is how it goes. The Rule of Law.
You may not like the Sup Ct Ruling but that is how it is in this country. When the Supremes sing we have to dance to their tune.

Bush is as legitimate as Clinton in 92.

If you want to blame anyone blame Gore.
Gore really lost for a simple reason: he couldn't even carry his own state of Tennessee.
A candidate with all the advantages who ran a poor campaign. Shades of Hillary...

[nevets]

Spanish-American War

US Casualties
Military Dead:
385
Wounded:
5,000

Iraq War

US Casualties
Military Dead:
148
Wounded:
450 (180,000)

Meican-American War

US Casualties
Military Dead:
13,000
Wounded:
4,000

Invasion of Grenanda

US Casualties
Military Dead:
19
Wounded:
116

Invasion of Iran (1980)

US Casualties
Military Dead:
8

US Civil War

Casualties
Dead:
600,000
Wounded:
400,000

War of 1812

US Casualties
Military Dead:
2,200
Wounded:
4,500

And not to forget the men who paid the ultimate sacrafice to start this country.

[Rich]

I am not so sure that Bush carried Ohio in 04. Seems the Dems in congress don't have the balls to look in to it. Sam Seder had an hour on it yesterday.

[chucks]

SSG Chad A. Caldwell
3RD Squadron, 3RD Armored Cav Rgt
Ft Hood, TX, US Army
Spokane native SSG Caldwell was killed in action April 30th near Mosul, Iraq.
SSG Caldwell is survived by his wife Raechel and two sons Trevor, age four and Coen, two.
God bless this American hero and his family that he left behind.
We miss him.
(Chad was the son of a cousin. I only found out this morning)

[J.Hova]

Hey nevets, remember your daily brainwashing

O peration

I raqi

L iberation

[KS]

"Iraqi Deaths Due to US invasion: 1,213,716"

What is the source of that number - the Daily Kos ? Media Matters ? Code Pink ? (I have heard just under 100,000, which sounds more believable)

I disagree with having gone in there in the first place, but when I see deliberate fabrications like that, I lose respect for that part of the anti-war effort.

[J.Hova]

hey Puget, the US supreme court stopped the recount in Florida made earlier by that states supreme court. We didn't find out how many votes were left but the margin was gaining in Gore's favor.

Though a careful analysis by the Miami Herald shows Gore won Florida by about 20,000 votes

Scalia's two sons are both lawyers working for Bush. Thomas's wife is collecting applications for people who want to work in the Bush administration.

If either had recused himself, the vote would be 4-4, and the Florida Supreme Court decision allowing recounts would have
been affirmed.
Gore may not have carried TN, however, Bush did not carry the nation, the * is still there on the SCOTUS decision.

[AuthenticAndrew]

PS says "You just can't let a Memorial to our Veterans go by without trying to score a political point"

Wars start with politics. It's nobody's destiny to die in a war, and we shouldn't treat war deaths as if they were inevitable.

[fremont]

"don't tell me to sign up for the VNam war, cause I was there - because I signed up...not drafted."

Why did you do that, Duh-f?

[chucks]

The above post is bullshit. It was done on my computer at work without my knowledge.
SSG Caldwell was in fact KIA in Iraq and the post is true, except he is no known relation to me.

[chucks]

This one is mine
Over 4000 Americans have given their lives in a fight against a brutal and savage enemy. For reasons unexplainable to any rational man or woman, this enemy wants to kill or enslave all of us. If they could, they would do additional 9/11 style attacks over and over and over again.
Today hundreds of thousands of young Americans are taking the battle to them in the hell that is Iraq and Afghanistan so that we do not have to fight them here. Like the forty plus million Americans who have served in our military since our nations founding, some have died and been wounded. More will die and be wounded. Thanks to those who continue to re-enlist to return to that hell and finish the job. And finish the job they will.
After the election in November, even the most sissified (ie Reid) Democrats will not end the war while victory is in sight. They are just telling you the sweet little lies to get your votes again. They know that we are fighting an enemy that must be defeated. The only thing they need to figure out is how to take credit for our military's victory.
You know it is true. What did those bastards promise in 2006?
Defund the war? Yep. The most powerful of them know it is a war we must win. They just can't tell you.
Thank you to those who have served and given up their lives for our freedom. Thank you to those who have lost loved ones as well. You have given a lot.

[Vera Smalls]

This foolish war will echo through the next few decades even worse than Vietnam did. The damage done to our country both domestically and internationally for this folly won't even be known for a generation, if we're out in a generation. I am ashamed for my country this Memorial Day.

[sparky]

Im not ashamed of my country because it was not I nor my neighbor nor my family who caused all this mess. We are America. We just had the misfortune of having to put up with an administration bent on serving itself instead of the greater good.
The Iraq war aside, what happened to our economy and our environment, and what used to be civil discourse between those who disagreed is disheartening.
I appreciate the sacrifice of the troops and I hope they can come home soon.

[Fremont]

OMG, Chux! My gut is wrenching so much, I'm speechless......

[sanctified sam]

We must elect Democrats this Fall. Chuck might be correct, but if we don't throw the R's out this time,we will bear some of the responsiblity that Sparky says we don't have.

[sparky]

How so?

[KS]

"We must elect Democrats this Fall. Chuck might be correct, but if we don't throw the R's out this time,we will bear some of the responsiblity"

You also need to bear responsibility for the 18% approval rating that Congress with a Democrat majority has. Responsibility of what ? With logic like that, its not hard to see why this country is in peril and would continue to be so if more Democrats are elected. How about some decent candidates for a change- from both parties ?

[joanie hussein]

chucks...this enemy wants to kill or enslave all of us. If they could, they would do additional 9/11 style attacks over and over and over again.

They were Saudis you idiot.

And Bin Laden doesn't want to kill us. He wants to bankrupt us. Don't you listen to him?

Notice Putsie didn't answer J'Hova. It was clear that there was fraud and corruption in Florida.

Also, Ohio. I heard the guest on Seder as well. Unbelievable that these tin soldiers still believe a provably lyin' POTUS and his corrupt regime.

BTW, chucks, did you hear that Petreaus now thinks we should talk to Iran. Just like the exorcised Gen. Fallon?

Guess they're just not as smart as you. Why don't you go to Washington and tell them what's up? Hmm?

[joanie hussein]

Oh, and Baart, lets honor them by sending them back even more frequently than we currently are.

Don't you think that would be the best way to let them know we really, really like them and think they're doing a hell of a job? If they're lucky, they'll all come home in body bags and have a real celebratory homecoming.

Just a thought.

[nevets]

Why is it Joanie that you know more about the enemys of this country and who they are and what they want yet you show no clue as to who is who in this country. Case in point, Fallon is/was not a General, he was/is an Admiral. I guess when you listen to the well re-searched Randi you think you know it all.

[joanie hussein]

And that, again, shows your emphasis on irrelevancies.

Steven, Lt. Col. in charge of spelling, punctuation, and titles. Now that you have a job, feel better?

Admiral or general, who cares except you. Now, do you have anything relevant or to the point to say?

BTW, Randi would have known that.

[Duffman]

Possibly...if sober!

[joanie hussein]

Sober? What do you know that I don't? Or is this another of your celebrated ass-umptions?

[PugetSound]

As usual, Joanie is a day late and a bottle short.

Here you go J Hova, that Miami Herald article you cited left out something. MSNBC article discusses the shortcomings of the Miami Herald 'recount' and the need to rely on the more comprehensive recount that I cited.

"Published on Monday, February 26, 2001 on MSNBC
Tally No! Keep Counting Votes in Florida
Miami Herald’s Recount Results were Sloppy, Incomplete
by Eric Alterman

The results are in. The hysterical anger and political maneuvering that prevented a final tally of the votes in Florida’s presidential race was for naught. According to a recount of Miami-Dade County, led by the Miami Herald, a hand recount would have given Gore only another 49 votes there.
Even when added to the Gore vote tallies in Volusia, Palm Beach and Broward counties, Bush still comes out ahead by 140 votes. You would think this figure would finally end the 2000 election controversy. You would be wrong.

The Herald and its parent company, Knight Ridder, retained a public accounting firm, BDO Seidman, LLP, to conduct the review. Spending more than 80 hours during a three-week period, the reporters and accountants examined every “undervote” separately and recorded their findings.

Of course, each time the votes were counted they changed ever so slightly. The Heisenberg uncertainty principle is never so true as in the necessarily subjective case of vote counting. Hanging chads fall off, pregnant chads give birth, writing becomes smudged, etc.

Unfortunately, the Herald recount proves only one thing: Al Gore and his campaign pursued a remarkably foolish and self-defeating post-election strategy. In picking only five counties in which to ask for a recount, the Gore campaign made two fatal mistakes. First, they gave the impression that they were hoping to cherry-pick the result by asking for recounts only in those counties where they had the most to gain. This played into Republican accusations that Gore was no more interested in a fair vote count than was Florida Secretary of State and Republican insider Katherine Harris; rather, Gore was arguably trying to lawyer himself into the presidency by hook and by crook.

Second and most damning, this strategy was not only counter-productive from a public relations standpoint; it was destined to lose. Had Gore won with a five-county undercount-only strategy, this victory would likely have been overturned by the Florida legislature, or if necessary, the U.S. House of Representatives. And as we saw in the end, the Supreme Court was also willing to place its own credibility on the line in the end if there were no other way to overturn a questionable Gore victory.

The only way for Gore to address all of these potential pitfalls would have been to undertake the strategy suggested in this space when the battle was still raging: to call for a full hand recount in Florida. A call for a complete recount would have provided a masterstroke of favorable publicity for the Gore team. What’s more, according to the evidence available so far, it would have worked.

When the Supreme Court made its final election ruling last December, one argument it gave for overturning the Florida high court’s pro-Gore decision was the Florida court’s refusal (at the Gore’s team’s request) to consider the 110,000 “overvotes,” where a machine count recorded more than one vote for president. When examined by hand, however, many of these votes turned out to be legal, as both the punch card (or check mark) matched the name of the candidate written in.

In late December, the Orlando Sentinel took a look at about 3,000 overvotes in Lake County. The paper found more than 600 valid ballots that had been ignored by the machines, with Gore picking up 130 even in this heavily pro-Bush county. In late January the Chicago Tribune reported that in 15 Florida counties with a particularly high rate of overvotes, more than 1,700 votes that showed a clear choice had been discarded. Most of the counties in the Tribune’s study were small, rural and predominantly Republican. Yet even so Gore’s net gain was 366 votes. And a Washington Post review of the computer records of 2.7 million votes in eight of Florida’s largest counties reported that overvotes trended toward Gore at a rate of three to one.

Add these together, even with the new undervote count, and Bush is back cutting brush in Crawford, Texas, while Al Gore is your new president. But because it chose to ignore these legal votes in its own recount, the Herald/Knight Ridder effort is an expensive waste of time, useless for everyone but Bush/Republican propagandists. It will be a test of the media to treat these results with the critical scrutiny they deserve. (One paper which has already failed this test is USA TODAY, which ran the Herald results under the misleading headline, “Recount Study: Gore Still Loses,” thoughtlessly accepting the Herald’s flawed counting standards.)

We will not have a genuine answer to these recount questions until the consortium of eight newspapers that has contracted for a much fuller investigation than the Herald’s finally completes its report. This might be months away. Having shot itself in their collective feet over and over during this election, it might behoove media mavens to keep their mouths shut and their powder dry until we have a better understanding of what the Florida vote-undervotes and overvotes—really tells us.

I’m not holding my breath.

Eric Alterman is a columnist for The Nation and a regular contributor to MSNBC."

[Duffman]

...and yet again PUTS hands the 'deserving' (and you know who you are) their ass on a platter...and continues to do it with grace. Oh My Toto...methinks these munchkins are slow learners.

[J.Hova]

Pretty old Puts. I found a fresher article also from the Nation

http://www.thenation.com/doc/20040517/palast

On October 29, 2002, George W. Bush signed the Help America Vote Act (HAVA). Hidden behind its apple-pie-and-motherhood name lies a nasty civil rights time bomb.

Gregory Palast: The purge is back, big time.
*
Scrub Helps Shrub

Electoral Reform

Gregory Palast
*
Florida's 'Disappeared Voters': Disfranchised by the GOP

Voters & Voting

Gregory Palast: On November 7 tens of thousands of eligible Florida voters were wrongly prevented from casting their ballots. Nearly all were Democrats, nearly half of them African-American.

First, the purges. In the months leading up to the November 2000 presidential election, Florida Secretary of State Katherine Harris, in coordination with Governor Jeb Bush, ordered local election supervisors to purge 57,700 voters from the registries, supposedly ex-cons not allowed to vote in Florida. At least 90.2 percent of those on this "scrub" list, targeted to lose their civil rights, are innocent. Notably, more than half--about 54 percent--are black or Hispanic. You can argue all night about the number ultimately purged, but there's no argument that this electoral racial pogrom ordered by Jeb Bush's operatives gave the White House to his older brother. HAVA not only blesses such purges, it requires all fifty states to implement a similar search-and-destroy mission against vulnerable voters. Specifically, every state must, by the 2004 election, imitate Florida's system of computerizing voter files. The law then empowers fifty secretaries of state--fifty Katherine Harrises--to purge these lists of "suspect" voters.

The purge is back, big time. Following the disclosure in December 2000 of the black voter purge in Britain's Observer newspaper, NAACP lawyers sued the state. The civil rights group won a written promise from Governor Jeb and from Harris's successor to return wrongly scrubbed citizens to the voter rolls. According to records given to the courts by ChoicePoint, the company that generated the computerized lists, the number of Floridians who were questionably tagged totals 91,000. Willie Steen is one of them. Recently, I caught up with Steen outside his office at a Tampa hospital. Steen's case was easy. You can't work in a hospital if you have a criminal record. (My copy of Harris's hit list includes an ex-con named O'Steen, close enough to cost Willie Steen his vote.) The NAACP held up Steen's case to the court as a prime example of the voter purge evil.

The state admitted Steen's innocence. But a year after the NAACP won his case, Steen still couldn't register. Why was he still under suspicion? What do we know about this "potential felon," as Jeb called him? Steen, unlike our President, honorably served four years in the US military. There is, admittedly, a suspect mark on his record: Steen remains an African-American.

Hey Duffman, still getting your republican hand-job while claiming to vote democratic?

[Duffman]

Blah, blah, blah, BLAH-BLAH! SOS!

[PugetSound]

Thanks Duffman.

This is tooooo easy, J Hova.

But at least this time you gave me a link.
Quick history lesson: W wasn't President until 2001. This act that you cite is in regards is post 2001 election. The discussion we were having was in regards to the fact that Bush beat Gore.

But the fact that you had to go to the Greg Palast hole-note the inaccuracy about Bush not having honorably served in the military- tells me that the New York Times/USA Today along with the other media were correct in finding that Bush won in 2000.
So I'll take your non response as a concession from you.

You should read some of Palast's books. He throws up a lot of smoke but rarely lights a fire.

BTW, anyone who can prove that they were wrongfully denied their right to vote should have a nice legal payout awaiting them.

[PugetSound]

Hey Duff
Kind of funny to hear the Great Skeddaler herself demanding that others answer her 'questions' and actually getting mad about it. The gums flap but not much comes out except the halitosis and alcohol.
Poor thing, I guess too much Guiness can be a bad thing after all.

[chucks]

Hey joanie
Crap, really? They were Saudi's? No shit? And all of this time, I thought they were Mexicans. You know, dark hair, dark eyes and talk funny. You can see where I might have gotten a little confused.
Some place in the deep dark corner of my public school educated brain, I thought that they might have been moose slim terrorists from Egypt, Lebanon, the Emirates as well as Saudi. Folks that want us all dead because we are not like them. Just because that is what they say, I guess it does not necessarily indicate that they mean it. I guess it is foolish of us to be concerned about people that say they want to kill us just because they have started killing us. That is not my fault though. If my parents would have invested in a quality private school, I coulda been smart like you.
As far as General Petreaus saying we should be talking with Aramadamadingdong, I will go with his expertise. I suspect that he has the balls to back up diplomacy with any consequences that the Iranians might need to understand.
On a personal note joanie, I hope you get a little lovin' pretty soon. You are getting a bit unbearably cranky lately.

[sparky]

Ick. Another circle jerk.

Bye.

[Duffman]

Yeah, it's obvious you only like the liberal-progressives one's! Everything viewed thru the political prism...how absolutely open-minded.

[PugetSound]

Sparky, gonna take the marbles and run home?
In Sparky-speak we can only agree with Sparky. If more than three people disagree with Sparky it becomes a circle jerk.

[Coiler]

Puget and his igor Duffmilk.

[chucks]

Hey Puts and Duffy.
You gotta admit, joanie and I usually end up just as Sparky says.
It is fun though.

[chucks]

Speaking of Memorial Day, I hear that Cindy Shithead is going to be in Olympia in a couple of weeks whining about her son's preferring to get killed in combat over listening to her incessant bull shit. Might be fun to attend the event. Maybe I will bring her a quart of fresh milk and help her get passed it.

[Duffman]

Yeah chucks at least joanie will 'get into it' once in a while before she 'skedaddles' unlike others who simply 'hit and run'.
Puts: bet you didn't mind explaining away the USSR, tho eh?

[Duffman]

...cue 'merci' for response there chucks...haha

[Duffman]

chucks, here's some Appropriate Attire for your Olympia visit with Cindy.

[Coiler]

I guess Mary Tillman is a shithead too, this invasion has been in the toilet so long it needs to be flushed out.