Re: Who is the real patriot?


"mg" <mgkelson@xxxxxxxxx> wrote in message
news:6d6cc728-4640-45d6-89ed-db0104658aa0@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
On Apr 3, 2:29 pm, Harry Hope <riv...@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
From The Chicago Tribune,
4/3/08:http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/chi-oped0404wrightapr03,0,92000.story

Factor military duty into criticism

By Lawrence Korb and Ian Moss

In 1961, a young African-American man, after hearing President John F.
Kennedy's challenge to, "Ask not what your country can do for you, but
what you can do for your country," gave up his student deferment, left
college in Virginia and voluntarily joined the Marines.

In 1963, this man, having completed his two years of service in the
Marines, volunteered again to become a Navy corpsman.

(They provide medical assistance to the Marines as well as to Navy
personnel.)

The man did so well in corpsman school that he was the valedictorian
and became a cardiopulmonary technician.

Not surprisingly, he was assigned to the Navy's premier medical
facility, Bethesda Naval Hospital, as a member of the commander in
chief's medical team, and helped care for President Lyndon B. Johnson
after his 1966 surgery.

For his service on the team, which he left in 1967, the White House
awarded him three letters of commendation.

What is even more remarkable is that this man entered the Marines and
Navy not many years after the two branches began to become integrated.

While this young man was serving six years on active duty, Vice
President *** Cheney, who was born the same year as the
Marine/sailor, received five deferments, four for being an
undergraduate and graduate student and one for being a prospective
father.

Presidents Bill Clinton and George W. Bush, both five years younger
than the African-American youth, used their student deferments to stay
in college until 1968.

Both then avoided going on active duty through family connections.

Who is the real patriot?

The young man who interrupted his studies to serve his country for six
years or our three political leaders who beat the system?

Are the patriots the people who actually sacrifice something or those
who merely talk about their love of the country?

After leaving the service of his country, the young African-American
finished his final year of college, entered the seminary, was ordained
as a minister, and eventually became pastor of a large church in one
of America's biggest cities.

This man is Rev. Jeremiah Wright, the retiring pastor of Trinity
United Church of Christ, who has been in the news for comments he made
over the last three decades.

Since these comments became public we have heard criticisms,
condemnations, denouncements and rejections of his comments and him.

We've seen on television, in a seemingly endless loop, sound bites of
a select few of Rev. Wright's many sermons.

Some of the Wright's comments are inexcusable and inappropriate and
should be condemned, but in calling him "unpatriotic," let us not
forget that this is a man who gave up six of the most productive years
of his life to serve his country.

How many of Wright's detractors, Rush Limbaugh and Bill O'Reilly to
name but a few, volunteered for service, and did so under the often
tumultuous circumstances of a newly integrated armed forces and a
society in the midst of a civil rights struggle?

Not many.

While words do count, so do actions.

Let us not forget that, for whatever Rev. Wright may have said over
the last 30 years, he has demonstrated his patriotism.

____________________________________________________

Lawrence Korb and Ian Moss are, respectively, Navy and Marine Corps
veterans.

They work at The Center For American Progress.

Korb served as assistant secretary of Defense in the Reagan
administration.

Harry

Here's an excerpt from one of Rev. Jeremiah Wright:

"Where governments lie, God does not lie. Where governments change,
God does not change."[25] Wright then states: "And the United States
of America government, when it came to treating her citizens of Indian
descent fairly, she failed. She put them on reservations. When it came
to treating her citizens of Japanese descent fairly, she failed. She
put them in internment prison camps. When it came to treating her
citizens of African descent fairly, America failed. She put them in
chains, the government put them on slave quarters, put them on auction
blocks, put them in cotton field, put them in inferior schools, put
them in substandard housing, put them in scientific experiments, put
them in the lowest paying jobs, put them outside the equal protection
of the law, kept them out of their racist bastions of higher education
and locked them into positions of hopelessness and helplessness."[25]
Wright concludes by stating:" The government gives them the drugs,[26]
built bigger prisons, passes a three strike law, and then wants us to
sing God bless America. No, no, no, not God bless America! God damn
America -- that's in the Bible -- for killing innocent people. God damn
America, for treating her citizens as less than human. God damn
America, as long as she pretends to act like she is God, and she is
supreme. The United States government has failed the vast majority of
her citizens of African descent."[25][27]
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jeremiah_Wright

Here's an excerpt from Bill Cosby's famous "Pound Cake" speech:

"50 percent drop out rate, I'm telling you, and people in jail, and
women having children by five, six different men. Under what excuse, I
want somebody to love me, and as soon as you have it, you forget to
parent. Grandmother, mother, and great grandmother in the same room,
raising children, and the child knows nothing about love or respect of
any one of the three of them (clapping). All this child knows is
"gimme, gimme, gimme." These people want to buy the friendship of a
child....and the child couldn't care less. Those of us sitting out
here who have gone on to some college or whatever we've done, we still
fear our parents (clapping and laughter). And these people are not
parenting. They're buying things for the kid. $500 sneakers, for what?
They won't buy or spend $250 on Hooked on Phonics. (clapping)"
http://www.eightcitiesmap.com/transcript_bc.htm

I essentially agree with both of them depending on the time frame.
Wright was probably correct if you go back 40 or 50 years. Cosby is
correct about the reality of how things are now.

I think one distinction needs to me made regarding Rev. Wrights sermon.

Slavery was not a government sanctioned or instituted practice. It was a
personal, individual practice of the time...performed by both Caucasians and
Afrikaners and others.

The internment of the Japanese during WW2 was a government sanctioned and
instituted practice.

They are different and he doesn't acknowledge that in his sermon.

Other than that, I think he was singing to the choir and everyone else.
Slavery was an ill practice...but as he points out in the last part of his
sermon when he says God damn America.......it's in the bible.....
I just wonder why he did not point out that slavery also is in his
bible.

I think we all can agree that military service alone is not a good measure
of how much a person "loves" his country, after all, wasn't Timothy McVeigh
an ex military man? There are many examples of this to prove that point.

And should we condemn someone as not loving his country or being a patriot
when his own government makes it possible for him to skip military duty by
making rules that allow that?

Perhaps we should take another look at our government and it's rules that
allow this to happen in the first place.

JP



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