It's important to remember what occured on D-Day, as it is to remember all the bravery, courage and fortitude it took to fight in World War II to defeat Imperial Japan and Nazi Germany.  But let us not get too wrapped up in the sentimentality and worhsiping of the sacrifices made to the point where we forget that what occured on D-Day was an inhuman slaughter of young men who were ground up like hamburger attempting to establish a landing point for the great invasion of France.

Young Americans and the young men of our allies have never displayed a lack of courage, fearlessness, determination to fight for the lands they love or to selflessly give their lives on behalf of their country.  What happened on D-Day demonstrates this.  My point here is to remind people that modern warfare is mass murder.  For those who may not have seen it in a while, I urge you to watch Saving Private Ryan again.  What is most evident in that movie, for me, is how outmoded are the old romantic concepts of gallantry, bravery, skill in warfare and so on in an age of mechanized slaughter.  When those teenagers were mowed down by machine guns as the doors of their amphibious vehicles opened up it was nothing but murder and they never had a chance.  That movie, while certainly paying homage to what happened then, is also the best representation I have seen on film of what the carnage of war is really all about and how inhuman and ghastly a business it really is.  There is nothing romantic or desirable about any of it.  Any veteran who has been through it will tell you so.  I ahve spoken over the years to men who have fought in World War I, World War II, Korea, Vietnam, and Iraq and they are universal in their assessment of what a genuine horror show war really is.

Having read endless volumes on World War II and other wars, having seen countless documentaries about that war and other modern wars and having read and seen the testimony of so many men who fought in World War II and our other modern wars the lesson is clear: war must come to an end.  It is a senseless, horrific activity that produces little or no good under the best of circumstances.  The weapons now employed on the battlefield completely negate most skill and reduce a soldier's chances to mere luck as can be seen so very poignantly in Saving Private Ryan.  The weapons we have invented are utterly merciless and provide no second chances. we have industrialized the battlefield to the point where it is simply shocking in every respect.

After the carnage of World War II was over, the mass of people around the world, having seen atrocities, destruction, death unimaginable and an endless amount of pain and suffering were united in their determination to put an end to warfare and to use international law and to develop a worldwide body of laws that would provide for alternative means of settling the disputes of nations so we would never again have to endure the kind of slaughter World War II brought upon us all.  The US, despite it's laudable leading role for decades in the attempt to build and strengthen the rule of international law and morality, has been at war more than any other nation since then and we have been in a state of emergency almost constantly since the end of World War II.  This experience over time has twisted and warped our country and hurt our republic, not to mention our economy.  During the Cold War there could be some justification for our obscene outlays for the military.  But since that time, especially since the beginning of our imperial and clearly illegal invasion of Iraq, there has been no such excuse.  All of the young Americans who have died in that effort have died fighting a fight that needn't have been fought.  The hundreds of thousands of dead Iraqi's have lost their lives too in a fight that should never have been fought.  And the war we are fighting which had some initial genuine justification has now become a pointless, endless process of destabilization and destruction that is perilously bleeding over into Pakistan.

Presently, as we remember the tragic slaughter in Normandy of the thousands who never got to grow old, the United States is escalating the war in Afghanistan and gearing up to fight an expanding conflict in Pakistan.  The withdawal of our troops from Iraq will likely not happen within the next decade if our leaders have their way--despite the official position that we are drawing the troop level down to "only" 50,000 troops by sometime next year.  There seems to be no real exit strategy from these wars that are only breeding more hatred, instability, and future violence in the middle east and south asia. 

We need to remember on this anniversary of D-Day that none of the major wars we have fought since World War II have concluded with "victory" but instead they have concluded in either stalemate or defeat for US forces.  And all this stalemate and defeat has come at great financial and human cost to our country and the countries in which we have fought.  There is absolutely no reason to believe that the imperial wars we are now engaged in will end in "victory" either.  We are not fighting armies as we did in World War II.  We have no defined enemy, but each day our imperial forces continue killing Iraqis and Afghanis and Pakistanis in their own land we breed enemies and hatred for our country and our people.  Far too many Americans among the elite and amongst the common people seem to think about war as little more than a strategic contest in the same way one would a major sports event.  But that is a luxury for those who are not near the death, destruction, and chaos of war.

So, now 65 years after the massive invastion of Hitler's Fortress Europe began we need to remember that sacrifice and the courage of the thousands upon thousands of young people who did what they had to do.  We need to remember those who tragically lost their lives or were wounded.  We need to remember those who were blessed and lucky enough to survive that awful conflict.  But we need also and most importantly to give meaning to all those sacrifices by remembering just exactly what war is---mass murder---and by pledging oursleves to do all we can to stop the wars currently being fought and to prevent war in the future. 

I refer people to the excellent Andy Rooney commentary I linked to on Memorial Day that addresses this point far better than I can: http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2005/05/26/60minutes/rooney/main697964.shtml  

You should click on the link to the brief but excellent commentary of this World War II vet, but the bottom line of his commentary was:

"Remembering doesn't do the remembered any good, of course. It's for ourselves, the living. I wish we could dedicate Memorial Day, not to the memory of those who have died at war, but to the idea of saving the lives of the young people who are going to die in the future if we don't find some new way - some new religion maybe - that takes war out of our lives. "

Amen Andy!

A doctor was assassinated today in Wichita, KS by a religious fanatic and cold blooded killer.  His name was Dr. George Tiller.  But who killed Dr. Tiller?  Was it the gunman alone?  Hardly.

Ever since the Roe v Wade decision by the Supreme Court made abortion safe and legal, the nation has endured an endless, vitriolic campaign of harrassment against abortion led by the Roman Catholic Church and Fundamentalist Protestants.  This is an indisputable fact.  For decades these institutions have drilled into the heads of their flocks that those who participate in any way in any abortion are "murderers" and "baby killers".  This would include the mothers as well as the doctors and all the other healthcare workers involved.  They founded the anti-abortion movement, they have grown it, they have taken credit for it, they have led it, they have exhorted it, they have driven it, they have funded it, they have been responsible for continuing it long after the legal question was decided and put to rest for the vast majority of our people--even those who so blindly follow them.

They have harrassed doctors, nurses, pregnant women and anyone else who happened to have business in any office or building that provided abortion services or even advice about where to find abortion services.  Gore drenched pictures of mangled fetuses in garbage pales, swastikas, and all manner of shrill visual and audio props have been shoved in the faces of any passers by and those who enter the buildings housing such offices.  These props (provided by the religiously motivated opposition to abortion) are used by misguided zealots whose hearts and minds are often filled with so much love for Jesus and the unborn that they lose sight of any boundaries of propriety in their behavior and their obsessive harrassment of people who are seeking help for a legal and safe medical procedure.  More than once this zealotry has turned criminally violent.  These narrow-minded mobs never tire of hurling invectives and the worst sorts of bile at anyone or any institution that is connected in any way to an abortion provider.

The clergy of these two organizations regularly exhort their blinded followers to continue the harrassment outside the clinics, the extremist, hateful and reckless rhetoric.  They let the sheep do the dirty work for the shepherds and then when one of those sheep literally goes ballistic they loudly proclaim their opposition to any such activity despite the fact that they have been callling men like Dr. Tiller "mass murderers" and "baby killers" for decades and thus poisoning our entire public life for nearly 40 years over their prescientific religious dogmatic extremism.

Every time a man like Dr. Tiller has been killed, the "pro-life movement" makes pro forma condemnation of the murderers of a human being and then the very next day go right back to inciting the very violence they claim to oppose.  It is sickening.  It is literally, killing people.  It has got to be put to an end.

The so called "pro-life movement" and it's religious leaders need to bring an immediate halt to the unending, venomous, harrassment of women, their doctors and healthcare workers they have been engaged in now for decades.  And yes, that means that the right wing fundamentalist Protestant preachers need to go on tv and openly and loudly proclaim their opposition to any further verbal or symbolic harrassment at clinics and offices and they need specifically to call for an immediate end to the harrassment at clinics using the words murder, murderer, mass murderer, baby killers and so on and so does the hierarchy of the Roman Catholic church.  The despicalbe and irresponsible behavior they have engaged in has led to this shocking murder today of Dr. Tiller. 

Both sets of religious leaders and the non-clergy leadership of the anti-abortion mob are culpable in the murder of Dr. Tiller for exhorting their followers to such extremes for decades, driving them to near frenzy in their religious condemnation of a medical procedure long made legal and so the minimum they can do is bring an immediate halt to the endless and quite pointless harrassment and extremist rhetoric they have engaged in themselves and encouraged in others that has now led to yet another sickening murder of a doctor simply because he did not share their religious beliefs.

So who killed Dr. Tiller?  It is time for the religious leaders who have brought us to this point to look in the mirror to find the killer.   Everyone knows who really killed Dr. Tiller.

To the murderers I say, blood is on your hands and it is from the actual murder of a living, breathing, full grown, innocent man whose life was dedicated to helping others though your dogmatic religious blindness condems him for it.  Those who have led the crazed anti-abortionists and have incited them to this kind of violence will attempt to wash their hands of this act, but I don't think simply distancing themselves from the action of the man who pulled the trigger is fooling anyone any longer. 

No one is fooled Reverend.  No one is fooled Father.  The time for your dishonet distancing of yoursevles from the logical outcome of all your rhetoric is over.  Ultimately, you are guilty of this crime and need to take responsibility for the murder you have caused to be committed in your names and in the name of Jesus.  Confess and repent before you kill another innocent man or woman and disgrace yourselves any further and before you bring further disgrace to your churches.