Mark Steyn on Haditha

Here are a couple of observations from two parents of American heroes fallen in Iraq. The first is from Cindy Sheehan, the mother of Army Spec. Casey Sheehan, a brave man who enlisted in 2000, re-upped for a second tour and died in 2005 after volunteering for a rescue mission in Sadr City:

"We've been talking about Martin Luther King Jr. this night. My son was killed the same day he was killed, on April 4. I don't believe in any coincidences. Casey was born on John F. Kennedy's birthday. He was born on the day, and died on the day, of two people who were assassinated by the war machine in my country."

The second observation is from Martin Terrazas, the father of Marine Lance Cpl. Miguel Terrazas of El Paso, who was killed by a roadside bomb at a town called Haditha:

"I don't even listen to the news."



Pace Mark Steyn, for whom I have the utmost respect, but I think that - like an inoculation against smallpox - Abu Ghraib has inoculated us against whatever happened at Haditha. Abu Ghraib was such drive-by-media overkill, so much hype and so much breast beating over ... what? A pile of nude men? A naked prisoner wearing a dog collar? A man forced to wear women's panties on his head? Rush Limbaugh had it right when he said that worse “atrocities” are committed during fraternity initiations.

Don’t misunderstand, prisoners are not supposed to be humiliated or abused, but the rhetorical overkill has shown the American people the excesses of a MSM that is so nakedly partisan that – for many people like Martin Terrazas
"I don't even listen to the news."

Many who support the war are preemptively cowering like a dog that expects to be hit. I think they’ll find that the blow will not be as bad as anticipated and the reaction to the blow may not be what the MSM expects. The Abu Ghraib inoculation, the fake war vets with their fake atrocity stories (straight out of the Viet Nam era), the constant drumbeats of quagmire have had their effect. I has encouraged those who despise the US, it has cause the “molting hawks” to flee, but it has made the core supporters even more angry at evil men and women who sit in editorial offices and work every day to tear America down.

This will not stand.