| Apr 6, 2007 @ 7:35 PM |
Dead Finally Returned With Dignity
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Martin666
Posts: 2,142
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About a month ago there was a thread here on which several of us "liberals" noted that american Iraqi war dead were being sent home in secret, off-loaded from commercial cargo planes in the dark to hide them from cameras, with no one--in some cases not even family--allowed to be present: just the baggage handlers who piled the caskets onto forklifts and took them to the warehouse, and that this represented disrespect and a lack of dignity for the war dead and their families.
We were attacked by the conservatives. According to them, this was all just a bunch of political liberal crap: that the liberals just wanted to take politically charged photos of war dead, and that the bush "administration" was actually watching out for the dignity of the fallen service men by sneaking them in after dark so that they couldn't be made a public spectacle of, and that this was the best policy to have to show respect for the fallen and their families.
Now, under pressure from the military families themselves, the pentagon has reversed it's policy and started showing the returning war dead the respect they deserve.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20070406/ap_on_re_us/military_bodies
The headline for the article should have read "Bush Supporters Disrespect For War Dead Ended At Request of Families."
[Edited on 4/6/2007 8:05 PM]
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| Apr 6, 2007 @ 7:42 PM |
Dead Finally Returned With Dignity |
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12knots
Posts: 6,400
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Friggin hell Martin!!!!!!!!!
"The Government", "The Military", "The People" AND the vets with their organizations allowed this to happen?
Despicable! Disgraceful! Shameful and darn right WRONG!
Another thing that really got my goat, the other day i received a letter from the US Navy. (I have ties), from an Admiral requesting some money for a medal! So a memorial could be built!
FRIGGIN WRONG!!!!!! Boy'o! Friggin wrong way to treat Vets and our dead comrades!
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| Apr 6, 2007 @ 7:50 PM |
Dead Finally Returned With Dignity
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Martin666
Posts: 2,142
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Calm down, 12.... 
You should have seen what some of these people were saying on the thread.
This is just the first salvo, though. Hopefully, something will be done for the way the wounded are brought into Walter Reed still to this very day--rather than brought in through the main doors in broad daylight, the government waits until dark then drives them around to the back doors in unmarked white vans and offloads them in the rain---all to avoid the cameras. If a transport plane carrying wounded arrives at the airport during daylight hours, it sits there until dark before the wounded are taken off for trans-shipment.
If I were one of the troops, and I was confronted with a gaggle of conservatives clapping me on the back saying "We support you!!," by God I'd run the other way.
From what I've seen with a lot of them on these threads, they put politics ahead of the honor of our dead and wounded.
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| Apr 6, 2007 @ 7:53 PM |
Dead Finally Returned With Dignity |
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eastham
Posts: 6,317
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Thank goodness this is finally over. What a nightmare this must have been for the families.
I remember when Nightline received hate mail for doing a show on the war dead. Likewise, Gov. Jodi Rell of CT received hate mail for instituting a policy of lowering the flags to halfmast each time someone from the state was killed in action.
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| Apr 6, 2007 @ 8:40 PM |
Dead Finally Returned With Dignity
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MusicMonster
Posts: 2,954
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I'm not sure exaggeration serves any productive purpose. But it is true that the dead coming back from the Middle East should have been more properly acknowledged, instead of having their coffins hidden away from the public eye and away from the cameras for the sake of political favor for this administration. That and using forklifts to load and off-load the bodies was pretty despicable.
-MM
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| Apr 6, 2007 @ 10:27 PM |
Dead Finally Returned With Dignity |
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Martin666
Posts: 2,142
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There isn't any exaggeration here. That's what made bush's original policy so outrageous--that, and that so many people were more concerned about supporting a terrible policy just so they could be politically correct among their own.
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| Apr 6, 2007 @ 10:58 PM |
Dead Finally Returned With Dignity
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Novalite
Posts: 3,009
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Martin
Now, under pressure from the military families themselves, the pentagon has reversed it's policy and started showing the returning war dead the respect they deserve.
No, they have simply changed the way in which they are repatriated. The privacy policy is still in effect so essentially, only the administrative policy has changed.
From your article
The ceremony was held in a shaded, general aviation section of the suburban airport. The jet rolled to within 50 feet of a waiting hearse, offering the privacy the family requested.
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| Apr 6, 2007 @ 11:07 PM |
Dead Finally Returned With Dignity |
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eastham
Posts: 6,317
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offering the privacy the family requested.
Bull. Families who have tried to take pictures of their own son's caskets have had their cameras taken away. This was never an homage to the families. This was an attempt to ensure the immediacy of the war was not brought into the American living room as it had during Vietnam.
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| Apr 6, 2007 @ 11:14 PM |
Dead Finally Returned With Dignity
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Martin666
Posts: 2,142
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Nova--I can't believe that you're actually trying to prove that you were right all along. You were one of the conservative posters on the other thread that supported midnight drop-off's from commercial cargo plains without parents present or even an honor guard. Now you're trying to minimize the consequences of that position.
I'll be darned if I'm going to have this conversation with you. The article on the other end of the OP link says it all.
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| Apr 6, 2007 @ 11:20 PM |
Dead Finally Returned With Dignity |
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Novalite
Posts: 3,009
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Eastham
Bull. Families who have tried to take pictures of their own son's caskets have had their cameras taken away.
Link please.
Eastham
This was never an homage to the families. This was an attempt to ensure the immediacy of the war was not brought into the American living room as it had during Vietnam.
Return of U.S. war dead kept solemn, secret
Government spokesmen say the change in March to extend the media ban to all military installations was to be sensitive to the families of those killed in Iraq. "We respect and protect their privacy diligently,"
and;
Joyce Raezer of the National Military Family Association, an advocacy group, said her organization is in regular contact with these families, and they appreciate the administration's concerns about protecting their privacy.
"Most families want that privacy at these very crucial times.
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| Apr 6, 2007 @ 11:25 PM |
Dead Finally Returned With Dignity
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Martin666
Posts: 2,142
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Seems that the conservative government in Ottowa is playing the same game with their war dead...
http://www.canada.com/ottawacitizen/news/story.html?id=9f79a313-d86e-497f-bb43-95b9e9d7ac5c&k=35931
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| Apr 6, 2007 @ 11:28 PM |
Dead Finally Returned With Dignity |
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Novalite
Posts: 3,009
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Martin
You were one of the conservative posters on the other thread that supported midnight drop-off's from commercial cargo plains without parents present or even an honor guard.
Get your facts straight Martin, I'm all for honor guards and parents being present. I simply did not agree with people like you that wanted to have the paparazzi cheapening a private and grieving moment for the families like you do.
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| Apr 6, 2007 @ 11:32 PM |
Dead Finally Returned With Dignity
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Martin666
Posts: 2,142
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Whatever makes you sleep good at night...
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| Apr 6, 2007 @ 11:39 PM |
Dead Finally Returned With Dignity |
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Novalite
Posts: 3,009
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Martin
Seems that the conservative government in Ottowa is playing the same game with their war dead...
Yes, seems compassion and common sense are contagious.
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| Apr 7, 2007 @ 12:21 AM |
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Martin666
Posts: 2,142
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So is secrecy and the manipulation of public opinion...
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| Apr 7, 2007 @ 12:59 AM |
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Novalite
Posts: 3,009
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Martin
So is secrecy and the manipulation of public opinion...
You only need to pick up a newspaper to find out who died as the names are published religiously by the Defense department so nothing is hardly a secret. As for manipulating public opinion, making much ado about nothing seems to be the gift of the left in this case.
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| Apr 7, 2007 @ 1:13 AM |
Dead Finally Returned With Dignity
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kjac
Posts: 5,484
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The Canadian has a point about the names, they pour in every day. You can't see their graves, but when you read about more dead every day, that tells the story too. If you need to actually see the graves to realize these soldiers are dying, then you're not paying enough attention anyway.
But as far as public opinion, Bush's errand boy Karl Rove said it best. The masses are not asses. And the masses have stated their opinion last November.
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| Apr 7, 2007 @ 1:37 AM |
Dead Finally Returned With Dignity |
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Novalite
Posts: 3,009
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Kjac
If you need to actually see the graves to realize these soldiers are dying, then you're not paying enough attention anyway.
Exactly. And, to forfit the families right to privacy at such a moment in order to bring a message home to really dumb people that can't, or will not read is pretty insensitive to say the least.
Kjac
And the masses have stated their opinion last November.
With a slight variation, definitely not by a landslide.
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| Apr 7, 2007 @ 4:06 AM |
Dead Finally Returned With Dignity
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MusicMonster
Posts: 2,954
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This is what I was referring to as exagerration.
rather than brought in through the main doors in broad daylight, the government waits until dark then drives them around to the back doors in unmarked white vans and offloads them in the rain---all to avoid the cameras. If a transport plane carrying wounded arrives at the airport during daylight hours, it sits there until dark before the wounded are taken off for trans-shipment.
That's just not how things really are. I don't know where you got that, but they don't do that with dying patients, sitting on a plane all day, or in a van, to wait for the cover of darkness so they can be snuck off to the hospital. Please!! 
But some of it IS bad enough. As stated before, I don't think hiding the bodies, for the sake of political favor of this administration, the media and the population, and to hide the glaring truth, that people are in fact dying way too much, and way more than was ever predicted, not to mention even far more disabilities, is at all appropriate..
-MM 
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| Apr 7, 2007 @ 8:27 PM |
Dead Finally Returned With Dignity |
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waterfire
Posts: 2,905
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We were attacked by the conservatives.
Funny, you would think (at least I do) that these people would be the most verbal against such treatment!!! 
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