LTTE in Times' Pointed Question: What Sacrifice is Bush Talking About?

[BurtWorm]

On its face, Bush's statement that the sacrifice is "worth it" is reminiscent of Madeleine Allbright's unfortunate statement on 60 Minutes when asked if the deaths of half a million Iraqi children because of sanctions were sufficiently offset by the aim of the sanctions and she replied that the loss was "worth it." Essentially Bush is saying that the deaths of 1750 American servicemen and 100,000 Iraqis, and the tens of thousands of injuries are not too steep a price to pay for whatever end he's after there (which he hasn't made clear he even knows how to accomplish).

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/06/30/opinion/l30iraq.html


To the Editor:

When President Bush claimed that the sacrifice in Iraq is "worth it," the question that begs to be asked is, Other than for the military families who have suffered loss and injury, what sacrifice?

We are fighting a war in a time of tax cuts; we are kept from seeing the coffins of our soldiers killed in war; we get little or no information about those who are seriously wounded; and in general, we are prevented from experiencing the loss and horror of Iraq.

And of course, there is no military draft.

Other than our tax money and the "Support Our Troops" stickers, there is little that has been asked of us - except to continue to believe the administration's version of what is happening in Iraq and why we are there.

Brett C. Flamm
New Haven, June 29, 2005