Friendly Fire

Sarah Palin is disgusting ... I have been trying to avoid political topics lately, but this was infuriating ... 

Sarah Palin spoke in San Jose yesterday, where she engaged in her usual faux-military cheerleading speechiness. Never mind that in Alaska Palin was known for being disdainful and disrespectful of many vets who served her, this is a narrative about the great Divider who waves the flag and loves blood, so naturally she has to mix God and war together. In the course of this, she felt compelled to bring up Pat Tillman since he was from San Jose.

“One of those heroes was from right here in San Jose, who gave up the money and the glamor and think what he sacrificed and his family sacrificed, giving up pro-football career to serve his country and he ultimately giving up his life for our freedom. Remember to thank god every day for Pat and for the thousands like him….”

The problem is, Pat Tillman did not believe in God and nor does his family. His brother, Richard, expressed his disgust for people talking about God at Pat’s funeral on Bill Maher’s show just weeks ago. And Pat Tillman did not want to be used as a political weapon and most certainly not as war propaganda. His death was covered up by our military and made to look like Tillman had died “fighting for our country,” when in fact he had been killed by friendly fire.

Here are some quotes from the interview via the Guardian UK:

“….Richard’s courageous response (captured on video) to religious comments made by Maria Shriver, wife of California governor Arnold Schwarzenegger, and Arizona senator John McCain as part of the eulogy delivered at his brother’s funeral.

“He’s not with God, he’s fucking dead,” asserted Mr Tillman. “Thanks for your thoughts but he’s fucking dead.” Mr Tillman, who has a low tolerance for lies was clearly offended by the sentiments, stating that his deceased brother “was not religious.””

He was clearly OFFENDED by the sentiment. Get the idea, there, Sarah? Not everyone agrees with you, Sarah. There are people who believe different things than you do. It’s a big world out there. Richard continued:

“I found it offensive. It’s like, I don’t go to a church and say, ‘This is bullshit,’ so don’t come to my brother’s service and tell me he’s with God. He’s simply not with fucking God.”

And Palin shouldn’t go to San Jose and think that just because she’s in the city where Pat lived, she can or should co-opt his death for her pro-war propaganda. Is there nothing sacred in Palin’s mind or heart? Palin thinks her religion trumps everything and everyone else, so much so that she would rather use Pat Tillman’s memory for her own purpose than to be respectful of him and his family.

Furthermore, as she should know (I realize she doesn’t read, but The Tillman Story is in theaters around the country) the Tillmans have a rather large issue with the military for the way they were lied to about their son’s death. They were originally told he died “fighting for his country” but he didn’t. He died by friendly fire.

Why would Sarah Palin go on about how he gave his life for our “freedom”? No, he didn’t Sarah. His life was stolen from him and while we do not know the circumstances, we do know that ‘blue-on-blue’ fatalities account for a significant percentage of all battlefield deaths – a tragedy, a reason to AVOID war if at all possible, not glorify it. Pat himself had decided that he would not have a military burial as he didn’t want his death to be used as a publicity tool.

Naturally, Sarah Palin took that as a sign that she should co-opt his death for her own publicity. And so she gave her usual glorifying war speech and used Pat Tillman for the local touch.

Maher asks Richard about the evidence suggesting that Pat Tillman was “deliberately attacked by his fellow troops”. Richard said, “I wish he would’ve just lit these fucking idiots up with his own gun. ‘Cause he knew that they were shooting at him. I wish he didn’t have so much character, and he would’ve shot his own guys.”

That’s what Richard thinks about the glory of war.

Palin is on video talking about how these wars are holy wars. If that isn’t glorifying war, I don’t know what is. Palin is a puppet of the propaganda machine and hence, by her very existence, she is an insult to people of integrity and thought, but in this case, an even worse insult to people dealing with having been lied to about their son’s death for the administration’s propaganda purposes.

Most people who have had to face the unrelentingly grim, gritty reality of war understand that war is a terrible thing, not to be entered into lightly. Honoring our troops for their sacrifices need not glorify war. The two are not the same, but of course, thought doesn’t sell wars. If Palin were President, she would have us at war with Iran by now. She isn’t one who can weigh disparate ideas and sift through complexities. She thinks in bumper stickers.

Sarah Palin used Pat Tillman. One can’t help but wonder if Palin is so unaware of her own reputation amongst those paying attention as a fundamentalist Dominionist that she thought she was going to get away with using Pat Tillman to make herself sound like the faithful. She couldn’t have been more deeply disturbing if she had tried.

Sarah Palin doesn’t really care about the troops. She’s a good cheerleader for war, though. There is, of course, a huge difference between the two. Palin is a moral and ethical coward who is not above using someone else’s son and brother to prop herself up a notch in the eyes of her rabid followers. She calls this loving America, but she is wrong.

Palin doesn’t love her country or the troops or she wouldn’t spend so much time dividing us (right after the Tillman freedom lie, she launches a jealousy grenade at the First Lady, driving the wedge just a bit deeper because that’s what we need in this country right now) and recklessly painting all Muslims with the brush of terrorism while our troops are trying to engage in a counter-insurgency strategy in Muslim countries.

Using Pat Tillman like she did puts Palin within shouting distance of the horrid and selfish Westboro Baptist Church. Sarah is a war coffin chaser. Anything she can drape a flag on and pose next to is game. If she missed the actual event, she’ll just use it in a speech. She’s a shameless publicity seeker, a cheap stunt, and an unworthy opponent. She insulted the Tillman family and this country with her used care salesmen platitudes and utter insensitivity to the real Pat. It’s as if she doesn’t get that these are real people, not just props for her to abuse. But why would Pat Tillman be treated any differently than Palin treats her own son?

Palin is nothing but the GOP’s latest propaganda tool, spouting off bumper sticker slogans about freedom from her $92,000 jet. Palin doesn’t know the first thing about freedom, because she suffers from an intellectual inability to comprehend what freedom really is. Freedom is not war.

And freedom certainly isn’t a bumper sticker.