Maggie's Farm

I am appalled by the viciousness Anonymous's retort. The partisan attitude in this country is a great underlying problem, and one of the reasons we are having a hard time getting ahead in this war, because it is making for shaky support on the homefront. As Bob James correctly stated, "We made a serious mistake going into Iraq and continue to make strategic errors". This is a statement that can (and perhaps should, from a factual perspective,) be made by either a Democrat or Republican, conservative or liberal. Now our efforts need to go to making good on these errors and doing what we can to create as stable a situation as we can over there for the Iraqis and to do this as fast as possible so they can regain a sense of normalcy in their lives, stop killing each other, and so that we can bring our troops home *ASAP*.

My boyfriend is a US Soldier in Baghdad. He is also working 18-20 hours a day, and is compelled to fight insurgents and lead dangerous missions on 4 hours of sleep, at best, per night. And this is not the restful nightly sleep of yours and mine, warm in our beds, but instead is marred and interrupted by constant gun shots and explosions in the distance; sounds they have unfortunately become accustomed to over there. Yet he never ever complains. He knows, such as the Marine and author of the letter we are discussing, that this is his job and this is their reality. He, like this Marine, knows that they have a role to fill and a goal to reach.

Anonymous, you would do well to read this letter from it's published source and note that this was not written for the likes of you to read, but was a frank letter summarizing his daily life to a close and small group of friends and loved ones to whom, as he noted a couple of times, he rarely finds time to write to. This is not "some liberal somewhere just spouting the usual BS..." You would also do well to note that nowhere in this letter does he write ANY politically-motivated statement, and it is so venomous of you to suggest that his account is such. Upon closer reading you would see that he agreed to have this published "anonymously".

In closing to Anonymous, perhaps these friends of yours who are in Iraq are not sharing with you their perspective of the "'gloom and doom'" you refer to, because they want to protect you and your feelings, knowing that it will do neither you nor them any good to share such things with you while they are over there. Additionally, any and all details of what goes on over there is highly censored through phone and email to protect any information leaking to the wrong people. Finally, you must also consider that if they are working behind a desk inside an enclosed and guarded FOB, like approximately 90% of the troops over there are, they are not experiencing the same literal and figurative battle as those troops who leave the wire and risk their lives every single day. While their work is equally important, their experience is different.

The coalition over there is working so hard night and day to complete a mission that on some days is uncertain. They are fighting enemies that are as elusive as ghosts and we over here are spitting verbal bullets. Both are a painful battle we must work to find a solution for.

And to Lt. Cook I challenge, what of these words is so impossible so as to be true? And if, hypothetically speaking, he was a Marine who would call a toilet a "loo", should his account be any less credible?

We would all do well to remove politics from such discussions, as name-calling and accusations will get us no closer to a solution to the mess that is in the Middle East right now. In the spirit of true American patriotism, we owe it to our forefathers who built this great nation and to the military risking their lives trying to uphold and defend the tenets of our society.