thatoneguy:

I don't Tex. I remind myself that there are millions of folks just like you still living there

Thanks. Here's the part where I have to say that while I am, and will always be, a Texan at heart, I haven't lived there in 2 years, and probably won't be back for another 1 and 1/2 + years. Hehe.

But a lot of my family lives there, and they're representin'. Hahaha.

She isn't breaking any laws.

Are you sure?  The "camp" is obstructing traffic.  They are also trespassing (the land they are on is not theirs).  Those crosses would also be considered littering in most states.

Also, did she contact the families of all those people whose names are on those crosses?  Did she have the right to use them in that way?  What if some of those soldiers weren't christian?  Did she have the right to put their names on a cross to use for her own purposes?

You ever been to Crawford Miler? I have! I don't remember seeing any Volvo's or Subaru Outbacks anywhere in that whole county.

Therefore the driver must have been a redneck?  Interesting reasoning...

The bottom line is that this "protest" is done very poorly.  Chances are, the driver of the truck is frustrated because they are making his daily life hell because of what they are doing to traffic.  What gives people the right to obstruct other people's lives?  This isn't a protest- it's more of a publicity stunt.

I think the whole thing is sick.

Interesting way to look at it, but that's burning your OWN flag

Not always.

Yes, she is a grieving mother. I can't imagine the pain that she is suffering through right now. However, she is the one who politicized her grief. She is the one who opened herself to the vultures who are more than willing to take her grief and run with it for their own purposes. She is the one who is using her son's name for a cause she knows he didn't support.

She has every right to protest the war, the president, and anything else she chooses. Her right to politicize her grief doesn't infringe on anyone else's right to speak out against her statements, activities or even herself.

It's kind of disengenuous for her and her new found handlers to use her grief for political purposes, then accuse anyone who opposes her of being "insenstive", "meanspirited" or even rude. It's a very effective ploy, but in the end, it is just a ploy.

As for the crosses, they were put up to make a political statement, a statement from people whose stated belief is that everyone killed in Iraq died for no good reason. This is a tribute?

SPC Casey Sheehan died doing what he believed in, now Cindy Sheehan (his mother) is twisting that into something he would not have backed. This is not a tribute, this is a mockery of his service, his sacrifice and his opinion. Does his feelings about his own service and purposes in participation in the war mean nothing to his mother?

As for destroying the crosses, that was mean spirited and cruel. The crosses may not have meant anything to the person who drove through them, but he knew what they meant to the people who put them up... and destroyed them anyway.

Both sides have to remember that the other side has just as much right to disagree and protest the opinions and actions of the other side. That is the freedom SPC Casey Sheehan believed he was taking part in bringing to the people of Iraq, and that is the very freedom we take for granted here in the U.S.

Well, from what I just heard on the news, the land she put the crosses on belongs to President Bush, and thus is private property. Which put him in a pretty sticky spot, because while he could have easily had them removed, it would have made him look REALLY bad.

According to the news report, the man was a neighbor and was arrested for driving over the crosses.

Sheehan apparently plans to move her display elsewhere.

Tex -

I agree completely with your reply #17 - well said.

As uncomfortable as such vigils may make us, she must deal with her loss in a way that's healing for her. I disagree with her objective, but I feel we should honor her right to protest as she sees fit. Mowing down the crosses was a classless act, though placing them on private property may have been a bit provocative, too.

Cheers,
Daiwa

Damn straight Daiwa. And well said. You get the insightful today!

I can't help but wonder if the neighbor was the idiot with the shotgun? Hmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm?

Annnnnd the troll goes to Karma.

"Casey" supported the war and Prs. Bush. Where does his mother get off using his name for a cause he didn't agree with?

cindy leaving her family behind, her son pleading for her to come home does not matter, nor does it matter that she is destroying the memory of her fallen son by using his death as a political tool.

pretty bad when her own husband basically disowns what shes doing and files for divorce

Obviously she's lost sight of what really matters the most.

She's making the president look bad, that's a given; she's making the soldiers fighting for us look bad, that too; she's making the death of her son meaningless, definately. But that's not what she's thinking about. She doesn't look at it this way. People who are grieving do it in different ways and she obviously feel she's justified in protesting the way she is regardless of how we all feel.

I will grant that she be being misguided by people around her

This isn't a protest- it's more of a publicity stunt.

She is the one who opened herself to the vultures who are more than willing to take her grief and run with it for their own purposes

SPC Casey Sheehan died doing what he believed in, now Cindy Sheehan (his mother) is twisting that into something he would not have backed

it's obvious to me she's either stupid, crazy or weak. in other words...a woman. if only her husband had the balls or good sense to get her some paxil or something.

it's equally obvious yall sure do make a lot of assumptions about what her dead son woulda wanted her to do...about how his death can be so easily diminished...about she's just some sorta robot who's being manipulated.

her son died in part because the whole country was manipulated by a small group of vultures for whom nothing was more important--not you, not me, not her son, not the war on terror--than invading iraq in 2003.

if you wanna know just how important her son's service and sacrifice is to bush and cheney, ask yourself why they aren't in attendance at any of the funerals for the fallen.

it's equally obvious yall sure do make a lot of assumptions about what her dead son woulda wanted her to do...

One indication of what her son wanted, is that he re-enlisted for six years while in Country and just before his death. He was not just a one time enlistment, but a man wanting to make the Army a career.

He was not just a one time enlistment, but a man wanting to make the Army a career.

and that would automatically mean that he would prefer his mother stifle herself or that he hadda approve what the president was doing? the hallmark of a professional soldier is service without regard to personal opinion is it not? how many career military people would there be if all of them opted out everytime a new administration took office?

Kingbee:
I can't speak for the others, but I make no assumptions whatsoever. Neither do I diminish his death by politicizing it or saying it was for nothing. SPC Casey Sheehan died doing what he believed in, if you can't accept that, well, that is your problem. As for your stupid rhetoric about "Funerals of the Fallen", Prs. Bush has met personally with many families of fallen troops, privately where they could talk openly. He has not made huge media circuses or photo ops out of their funerals with the presence of himself and those who travel with him. That, my friend, is a huge sign of respect... I'm sorry that you are so against Prs. Bush that you can't see that. Your choice though, and like Mrs. Sheehan, you have a right to your dissent.

, my friend, is a huge sign of respect...

so every president going back to the invention of the camera was being disrespectful? thankfully lincoln is so universally despised for dragging his media circus to gettysburg and insisting on openly delivering that hokey speech.

I make no assumptions whatsoever

other than the one about how that poor mindless woman is being manipulated by her handlers into dishonoring the memory of her son.

or your insistence you know what her son wanted based on the fact he reinlisted. since when do professional career soldiers pick and choose their wars?

wb btw