Today's
New York Times has a graphic in-depth look at the lives of soldiers wounded in Iraq and who somehow managed to survive and cling to life. For many of these people, their lives will never be the same, with many finishing the rest of their lives in a state not much better than a vegetative state.
This is the sort of things that hysterical Republicans totally overlook when they accuse the left of somehow being unpatriotic or hating America. Many of these right-wingers have lived a sheltered life, have never enlisted in the military, have never had a high awareness of human suffering on an ongoing basis, and shut themselves off from the world as much as possible. For a perfect example, see the Post article on Randolph, Utah, which voted over 95% Bush, to see what I am talking about.
I would argue that many Republicans are hysterical, tyrannical, and try to win an argument by screaming and browbeating the opponent into submission. These are the kind of people whom you see listening to Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity, and Bill O'Reilly all the time. On the other hand, the great majority of Republicans are like the people in Randolph, Utah who have none of the awareness of human suffering shown in the Times article. In fact, the Post article points out that only one person from Randolph enlisted in the military and went to Iraq.
For people like the ones in Randolph, who think that Bush can do no wrong, there is not much we can do that I know of unless we can somehow persuade them to deal with such suffering on a first-hand basis. But for the rest of us, who live in the reality-based community, let us discuss some of the people profiled in the New York Times. People such as these:
Josh Cooley:
Inert in his bed, the 29-year-old Marine reservist is a survivor of an Iraq car bombing and a fearsome scramble of wounds: profound brain injury, arm and facial fractures, third-degree burns, tenacious infections of the central nervous system. Each doctor, six in all on a recent day, is here to monitor some aspect of his care.
In addition, Cooley must deal with blood clots in his legs which could kill him right away. Family members and doctors are encouraged whenever he wiggles his feet and toes and blinks to communicate with them. He needs special treatment just to learn how to swallow.
Charles Mays (pictured below):
Mays, despite the fact that he is young, faces the prospect of living in a wheelchair for the rest of his life.
Pete Herrick (pictured below):
Herrick tore his spinal cord while serving in Iraq and is now a quadriplegic.
Antwian Vaughn:
Vaughn had to learn how to swallow and eat again:
Sergeant Vaughn came to Tampa after two months on a ventilator and feeding tube. In addition to brain damage, facial fractures, pulmonary problems, blood clots and infections, he lost an eye and has trouble with complex tasks, something the card game could help.
Here he has learned to swallow and eat and in daily therapy, when he is feeling up to it, he is working to reclaim a life. But this time, he will not join the game. "My head's hurting a lot," he quietly tells the group.
People regarded as success stories are ones like these:
Sometimes the hallways bring success stories like Specialist Nicholas Boutin, who was slowly walking on his own to speech therapy in a hockey helmet, apparently not at all self-conscious about the red pit where an artificial eye will be implanted or about the large dent where a piece of skull will be replaced.
Not only does caring for these people cost thousands of dollars, loved ones frequently give up their jobs so that they can care for them.
Tonight, President Bush will give his State of the Union Address. He will surely bluster about how we need to stay the course in Iraq. But we already know what he won't say. He will not mention one word of the traumatic suffering that these soldiers must endure on a daily basis for the rest of their lives. And furthermore, he will not acknowledge the self-sacrifice that many loved ones make, including giving up their jobs and free time in order to care for their loved ones.
Bush has shown a complete lack of awareness of human suffering and an inability to relate to the families of people lost in combat or disabled for the rest of their lives. Instead, like a truck careening at speeds of 100 mph down a steep mountain road, Bush continues to remain drunk with power and always wanting more.
And the suffering written about here is only the tip of the iceberg. None of this takes into account the suffering of the hundreds of thousands of Iraqis wounded in the same war thanks to Bush's war of aggression. Most of them do not have the same kind of access to medical care that we do. So, if there is such a thing as hell on earth, what they must be going through with no medical care and no anesthesia must come pretty close. For them, I would not be surprised if death came as a relief to them.
The fact of the matter is that we have a government that thinks human lives are expendable. When you enlist in order to lift yourself out of poverty and get a little bit of discipline in your life, Bush thinks you're the finest person in the world. But when you get permanently paralyzed by the cruel hand of fate, Bush has no more use for you. As far as Bush is concerned, it is like you do not exist. After all, he sees war like a video game, not a life and death struggle which inflicts suffering on millions of people as year.
And deep down inside, the right-wingers know this. That is why so few of them will enlist - they know in the back of their minds that if they do, they risk being consigned to the same fate. They don't mind as long as the poor enlist, but they would do anything, include troll this site in record numbers yesterday or bash immigrants on Free Republic rather than back up their beliefs. There are a few right-wingers who actually do enlist - I have to hand it to them for actually practicing what they preach. In fact, I would argue that our servicemen support Bush more than the actual population, although I have not seen data and I know it is nowhere near unanimous. But many more are too scared to actually back up their beliefs by enlisting in the military.
Russ Feingold has not experienced the horrors of war like these men and women have done. But he has an awareness of human suffering that is unreal. He has been one of the few Senators or Congressmen who have kept in mind the potential for suffering as they have decided whether or not to send our troops into action. He has opposed every single recent US military action except for Afghanistan, which was in direct response to an unprovoked attack on the US by Bin Laden. He is the candidate I would trust most when deciding whether or not to send our troops into harms way.
This is the same kind of awareness that John Murtha, Walter Jones, and my own Congressman Brian Baird have as they visit our servicemen at Walter Reed on a regular basis. Jones has attended the funerals of over 1,300 servicemen killed in action. This is also the same kind of quality that Lincoln and FDR had.