Wes Clark - Flag Draped Coffins in Web Ad not Disrespectful to Soldiers!

[FrenchieCat]

The General is currently live blogging on Dkos, after Live Blogging for over an hour at Securing America WesPAC!

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2006/7/14/1651/99433
http://securingamerica.com/ccn/node/7469

He was asked the following questions by a blogger at Kos:

"I would like to ask you a question. Do you not think it hypocritical for Republicans or anyone to criticize the DCCC's use of a picture of flag draped coffins in a campaign video, given the fact that the Republicans have expliciting politicized the war and use it to win elections? Thanks! "

To which Wes responded....."Yes, it is hypocritical. It was the Republican's bad policies, and Bush's misguided leadership that created the circumstances in which our soldiers and Marines are dying. These pictures are not disrespectful - at least, not of the men and women who sacrificed. They simply remind the viewers of the cost of Bush's mistaken policies. And hopefully, they help voters understand that the Administration which bungled all this should be held accountable!"

Hope the ad is not pulled, because if it is, we have once again, capitulated to a GOP temper trantrum!

[Avalux]

1. They'd better not pull that ad.

Bravo Wes for speaking up! It certainly isn't disrespectful; people need to remember why there are flag-draped coffins in the first place.

[FrenchieCat]

6. Flag Draped Coffins contain Dead Bodies......

Are the GOP saying that we should wipe our memories of those deaths?

Shameful, isn't it! :cry:

[IndyOp]

20. The ad was pulled yesterday evening.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=364&topic_id=1635236&mesg_id=1635236

[Amy6627]

2. NOT showing the caskets is disrespectful to EVERYONE! n/t

[Totally Committed]

3. I don't think so, either!

He was asked the following questions by a blogger at Kos:

"I would like to ask you a question. Do you not think it hypocritical for Republicans or anyone to criticize the DCCC's use of a picture of flag draped coffins in a campaign video, given the fact that the Republicans have expliciting politicized the war and use it to win elections? Thanks!"


To which Wes responded....."Yes, it is hypocritical. It was the Republican's bad policies, and Bush's misguided leadership that created the circumstances in which our soldiers and Marines are dying. These pictures are not disrespectful - at least, not of the men and women who sacrificed. They simply remind the viewers of the cost of Bush's mistaken policies. And hopefully, they help voters understand that the Administration which bungled all this should be held accountable!"

Yay, Wes!

TC

[AX10]

4. K and R! Here's something to read!

Chet Edwards and John Spratt are only helping the GOP with their stupidity.

[Ian David]

5. Bush wants to hide our dying soldiers from us the way his parents...

hid his dying sister from HIM as a child.

[gratuitous]

7. Who are you going to listen to?

Some guy who claims he's a general, or the manufactured dudgeon of the intrepid 101st Fighting Keyboarders? Who's in a better position to know what "respectful" or "disrespectful" of the troops?

[FrenchieCat]

10. Me.....

I'll listen to a Democratic general with 34 years of service! :patriot:

[saltpoint]

8. Good for General Clark. Very good answer.

[cal04]

9. What is Disrespectful.

This should be the democrats response to the hypocrite republicans

Not one funeral was attended
Not enough equiptment(equipment readiness is slipping to “historic lows)
Taking Away Benefits
Leaving them homeless when they return
Veterans appealing disability claims
Swiftboating them when they return if they don't run on a republican ticket

(among other things mentioned in this article)
Recalling that President Bush told the U.S. military that “help was on the way” when he accepted the Republican nomination for president, Skelton said the current problems led him to ask “who, exactly, is being helped?”

http://www.armytimes.com/story.php?f=1-292925-1947424.php

[FrenchieCat]

11. Maybe the DCCC should ask Wes Clark to respond......

But do you think they would ever think of that?

[cal04]

12. Maybe we should put a bug in their ear

and send some emails

[FrenchieCat]

13. Geeze...if we have to tell them that one, then they are truly

sorry! :eyes:

[FrenchieCat]

15. I know that I will be putting a foot in their ass if they pull the ad!

That's something you won't even ask me to do!...

[AzDar]

14. Well-said. n/t

[Jeffersons Ghost]

16. K&R here's a 5th vote!

[babsbunny]

17. YAY!

:bounce:

[Reckon]

18. Wes Clark is a leader

and he knows something about winning! He's out in front -- on offense -- telling it like it is -- taking the fight to THEM!

Lead and we will follow!

Go Wes Go!

[farmbo]

19. Here in Ohio, Dewine is flooding the airwaves with the Twin Towers burning

From the ODP:

DeWine Uses Smear Tactics to Mislead Ohio Voters
Ohio Republican incumbent Senator Mike DeWine reached a new low in negative campaigning today when he used images of the American tragedy of 9/11 to smear his opponent in the U. S. Senate campaign, Ohio Congressman Sherrod Brown.

It is not the first time DeWine has used underhanded distortions in a campaign. During his failed bid against American hero and astronaut Senator John Glenn an Ohio newspaper reported the DeWine campaign claiming, "...if Glenn had his way the Berlin Wall still would be standing and former Soviet republics still would be enslaved."

"Misleading voters and dirty campaigning is nothing new for Mike DeWine," said Brown Campaign Manager John Ryan. "But today, he reached a new, shameful, low. The ad uses images of the burning twin towers, and mug shots of all nineteen 9/11 hijackers.

"He added insult to injury when he shrouded the images with distorted claims about Sherrod's record," Ryan said. "Sherrod has a strong record fighting for body armor for our troops and calling for full funding for homeland security programs to secure our borders and keep our communities safe."

Brown has voted for 2.4 trillion in national security funding, voted for the death penalty for terrorists, and demanded answers about body armor, troop numbers, and weapons of mass destruction from President Bush before going to war in Iraq.

"Clearly Senator DeWine is trying to mask his serious vulnerabilities on this issue," Ryan said. "He sat on the Intelligence Committee and reviewed the faulty intelligence that sent us to war in Iraq and did nothing to question the president. He voted time and again to cut homeland security funding - including voting just yesterday against funding for Ohio's fire fighters. He desperately wants to mislead Ohio voters to hide the truth. But it won't work this time. 2006 is about change."

[IndyOp]

21. The ad was pulled yesterday evening.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=364&topic_id=1635236&mesg_id=1635236

I read a thread about the GOP temper tantrum about the ad, then went to the site to watch it, and it was gone.

[Crunchy Frog]

24. If you haven't seen it already

you can watch it at this link. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6UurfouWoqs&search=flag%20coffin

[ksclematis]

27. The ad was pulled yesterday evening.

So the Dems caved in to Rove and the whining Swiftboaters again. That sucks!

Wes for Prez '08

[JI7]

22. the people are more outraged about the photos than the actual fact

that soldiers ARE dying everyday . they don't want to do anything about that. it's all about "staying the course" and allowing them to continue dying rather than doing something to change that. oh, but don't you dare show pics of the coffins.

[nickshepDEM]

23. That is an excellent response... AND... Should be a talking point

used by all Democrats.

Now if we could only get the pussies at the DCCC to start running the ad again.

[Rowdyboy]

25. Wes EARNED the right to his opinion-thats why it means so much to me....

I'm sorry our "leadership"chose to pull the spot. It shows a disturbing weakness.

[Hidden Stillness]

26. This From a Group That Wears Band-Aids with Purple Heart Pictures on Them

Republicans launch a coordinated campaign claiming that showing the returning dead is "disrespectful"--and this is from a group that featured, at their official National convention, drunken, laughing delegates wearing little BAND-AIDS with "Purple Heart" pictures on them, as if mocking the war wounds suffered by John Kerry, and by implication, everyone else. They debased the Purple Heart itself, by putting its image on little Band-Aids, which these people joking, mocking, wore at their Party's official convention. I had never heard of anything so shocking and outrageous in my life--I didn't even know what to say about it; horrible. The only thing worse, was that not a single, solitary media dicksuck ever even mentioned the disgraceful display, let alone criticized it, or demanded an apology...And this ilk demands that the pictures of the flag-draped coffins of the returning war dead--heroes, in their final public, tragic glory--be censored as they had them censored before, because to look at their return is "disrespectful"? What the hell is going on here?

[NCarolinawoman]

28. THE LONG GRAY LINE is a book about the West Point class of '66.

This was the West Point class that suffered the most combat casualties at the frontlines of Viet Nam. General Clark was a member of the class of '66, and his roomate died in that war.

I think General Clark has earned the right to say what is appropriate and inappropriate when it comes to showing pictures of flag draped coffins. What do these chickenhawks know, and why in the world are Democrats listening to them?

I'll betcha that it was Karl Rove who told all these Republicans to start faking indignation and crying crocodile tears. Too bad it worked.

[FrenchieCat]

29. I'll have to read that book! Wes was 1st in that Class......

and went to fight with the rest of them! If he was not "insulted" by the sight of the coffins (and in reality, I don't know how anyone would be), then the chickin'hawks should stop whinning for sure.

But in actually looks like its too late, as the DCCCC capitulated as fast as the blink of an eye! Heck, when it comes for standing strong.......guess the DCCCC is just more of the same; not there!