Iraq thoughts.

I was not a supporter of the Iraq war when it began. Although I saw nothing wrong with getting rid of Sodamn Insane I felt, very honestly, we were being lied to about things, by a group of people who had no respect, no care, for the lives of soldiers, and no real idea of what they were doing. To date nothing has disabused me of this base notion.
However, because I do support the war in Afghanistan, our forgotten war it seems, and because I do support the troops, no matter where they are or what conflict they are in, I read, listen, view from a variety of sources about these things, about the Iraq conflict.
The conservative side of things often enough saber rattles and prances about throwing out patriotism veiled nonsense to stir the fires within past the point of common sense and into a sort of "war-lovers limbo" of the senses, where it all seems right and good and justified. I have seen damn little from that side, what I could easily enough call my side (I am certainly not liberal), that deals truthfully with this mismanaged, and horrible thought-out exercise in war-fighting.
The liberal side of things on the other hand stands back and cries foul and goes around ranging from simply condemning the mismanagement of the war to out-and-out declaring their support for Bin Laden and Al Qaeda. Everything military or troop related is wrong and condemned, the pacifist element comes out in force, and its back to spitting and screaming "baby-killer", although perhaps not in as overt ways. I hate to say it but I see more reality of the Iraq conflict from this side, although it is usually tinger (or outright painted) with stupidity, whiny nonsense and a great deal of opinions and ideas I find completely wrong.
But, out of all of this reading, watching and listening, something has struck me. The liberal media, as much as the conservative media, loves the Battle Dress Uniforms, the Car-4's with EOTech electronic sights and SureFire combat lights on foreward rails, the Barret .50 cal rifles, the Strider knives and the whole kit. As they insult it, spit on it, demand an apology to the world from those who wield it, they also love it. They would never admit they secretly, maybe even subconciously, lust for the black and camo-painted guns, the solid punch in the shoulder of firing a .308 or .50 sniper rifle, the weight in the hands, the smell of gun oil. I dare any of them, who use the pictures of all these things in such great colour and detail all the time, to look deep within themselves and tell me different.
Which may make them even more hypocritical and chickenshit.

I may not support the Iraq conflict, but we also cannot pull out now. I think some people in power need to have their heads fucked on straight, and we need to really change things in-country, because we've gotta do this right. We have got to do something that keeps our soldiers alive. Despite the blunderings and foul ups of the military industrial complex, the soldier is not to blame. He takes the job not to molest third world citizens, but to defend his nation. Its a job of following orders or going to jail, and like most of us despite strong convictions going to jail is not a valuable trade off to going on with life. We need these men and women, rough, tough and not politically correct... because without them we are laid bare and naked before the wolves who would eat us.
Even those of you who scream with such hatred that we deserve it, would cower and curr like the dogs you are in the face of the real thing... and you would scream and cry and beg your god for a uniformed man with a gun.
Our military is worth protecting... now and in the future. If people who are not in our military have to die for that, so be it. But we mustnt forget that we will pay "tuesday" for the hamburger we make of men today.
If we leave Iraq as I fear may be inevitable, we will have yet another middle eastern mess to deal with for the next decades and generations, a mess that is perhaps worse than any other to date. But we cannot destroy the country to save it.

And there is so little common sense from either side in these issues... fear and stupidity, the essential human characteristics, seem to win out.
Instead of saber rattling, instead of calling for attacks on Americans and instead of varying extremes of bullshit and bravado about the war, why dont we all put our heads togather and come up with a solution... something real and workable. Why dont you people do that? Expend your energy that way... to SAVE lives.
Anything else is wasting your time, varying degrees of mental masturbation.