Redress Day: 60,947 Reasons
Why bother to redress government by emailing our Congressional senators and representatives on Constitution Day, September 17th? What’s the big deal, fellow blogmates?
For one thing, the media isn’t getting the human costs of the Iraq occupation right – and I mean costs to Americans, to say nothing of Iraqis.
Continuing with my daily briefings for Redress Day, I want you to please understand that it is vital for us to email our representatives that the United States military occupation forces in Iraq have suffered a total of 60,947 casualties to date. That’s right. The media misdirects public attention away from the actual costs in American life and limb by habitually reporting “only” the total killed – 3774 as of September 11. They rarely mention the 27,848 wounded in combat. That brings the total killed or wounded by hostile causes to 31,622.
But there is more. The costs are actually far greater, if you include what the Pentagon categorizes as “non-hostile causes.”
Let’s do the math for Congress on Redress Day:
31,622 killed or wounded by “hostile” causes
29,325 dead and injured from “non-hostile” causes
60,947
I will be emailing my representatives on Redress Day because I want them to get the math straight, once and for all. Isn’t that the very least that Congresspersons who sent these brave Americans into harm’s way can do? I want Congress to get it straight and I want them to take responsibility for their actions. Theirs is the power to declare and to fund war, and ours is the responsibility to redress them when they fail to carry out our will as The People.
A personal parting thought for today, from my heart: I have set before you 60,947 reasons to participate in Redress Day, friends. Each is a precious life, each now ended or partially destroyed, most with families devastated --or minimally, at risk. I am just one American, like you. I don’t want this done in my name, do you? In my case, I am the daughter of a World War II Army lieutenant. I come from generations of veterans on both sides of my family who served with distinction. As one citizen, I will demand that Congress get the numbers right. I will demand that Congress do the math correctly, and I will demand that Congress do the right things. I want them to stop this pain, to stop this death, and to stop this destruction. I want them to hold the executive branch to the highest account. It is within the power of Congress to do so. It is within our power to give them those orders, as sovereign citizens under the U.S. Constitution.
Best wishes for successful redress,
Tish
September 12, 2007 5:17 PM | Reply | Permalink
Those non-hostile causes are kind of hostile, if they account for a nearly equal number of injuries. Then again, injuries not in battle won't likely be explosive events, so recovery is likely to be nearly total. They also include medical stuff, I think.
But they also include a lot of arguably battlefield injuries that somehow miss the cut. I understand if you die in Frankfurt, after getting blown up in Iraq, it's not a combat death.
That I'm unsure how to leave Iraq does not mean the soldiers don't matter. If the order came down tonight, to begin withdrawal with all deliberate speed, many more soldiers would die or be injured from one reason or another. So the damage will continue to increase---all the more reason to bring the administration to account.
How's this for a fair turnabout---if WMD was merely a rationale agreeable to all in the administration, I'm sure the Democrats can find a rationale for impeaching Bush that is agreeable to all in the caucus.
September 12, 2007 7:10 PM | Reply | Permalink
This came out almost a year ago, but pertains to the human costs and the reasons for soldiers who redress:
September 12, 2007 9:29 PM | Reply | Permalink
You're right on, Tish. I talked to someone who works with disabled vets. She's predicting that there will be huge numbers of guys returning from Iraq needing treatment for PTSD, brain trauma and phyical therapy that will quickly overwhelm the VA system
She said, "When the money runs out, they'll dump them back into society, just like they did with the Vietnam vets. Then you'll really start seeing the true cost of this war."
Morgan
With reasonable men I will reason; with humane men I will plea; but to tyrants I will give no quarter, nor waste arguments where they will certainly be lost.
-- William Lloyd Garrison (1805 - 1879)
September 12, 2007 10:31 PM | Reply | Permalink
Ticia,
You haven't added the 3000 lives lost on 9/11/01 and the wives and husbands that will go through life without their spouse, children will grow up knowing their mom or dad was crushed or burned to death in the wreckage of the WTC at the hands of Al Qaeda. I'm sure there will be plenty of emotional and psychological scars that will never heal.
It's so easy to forget... It's so comforting to pretend it couldn't happen to "me".
Until it does.
Who are the real monsters?
September 13, 2007 12:13 AM | Reply | Permalink
Not worth answering.
9/11! 9/11! Yeah, 9/11, brought you by guess who, still at large in Waziristan.
September 13, 2007 8:33 AM | Reply | Permalink
Include them by all means, if you want to have a generic total that are actually or figuratively related to terror. The 9/11 deaths unquestionably came from terrorists. Deaths in the Afghanistan campaign also have some logical relationship to terrorism.
The question, however, remains why you are bringing 9/11 into the context of a discussion of the Iraq campaign, since there has been no conclusive evidence Saddam had anything to do with it? If you want to talk about deaths on the USS Cole, then you have a connection.
Real monsters come in assorted shapes, sizes, and flavors. Osama is clearly one, for having brought death and destruction on people that had nothing directly to do with his pet peeves. Most of those people, except at the Pentagon, were civilians.
What about someone who brings death and destruction to soldiers and foreign citizens, who had nothing to do with 9/11?
--
Howard
*equal opportunity offense to both extremes*
"Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it" [George Santayana]
September 14, 2007 6:24 PM | Reply | Permalink
On August 19, several servicemen published a piece in NYT critical of the war, "The War As We Saw It." Between thie time it was written and when it was published, one of their number had been shot in the head, (he may survive).
Today the NYT carried this sad news about two of the writers:
2 G.I.’s, Skeptical but Loyal, Die in a Truck Crash in Iraq
They won't be called combat deaths.
September 13, 2007 8:48 AM | Reply | Permalink
They were not killed in combat, nor on a daring mission. They died when the five-ton cargo truck in which they were riding overturned. NYT
Well, you know, mistakes in procurement were made unless it's a replay of Dennis Weaver's Duel.
September 15, 2007 1:22 AM | Reply | Permalink