Several months ago I began actively seeking a Pat Tillman football jersey to add to my collection of NFL jerseys. The Tillman jersey has a special significance to me and I wear it proudly.
To my way of thinking, Pat Tillman is a true American patriot who gave up the money and prestige of playing in the National Football League to join the special forces and eventually end up in Afghanistan where he was shot in the head by "friendly fire" from fellow American troops.
This is not the story that our immoral leadership tried to foist off upon us after the tragedy. It wasn't heroic enough that Tillman gave his life. Bush and his speech writers made up an outrageous story about Tillman's being killed by Taliban forces in a heroic stand to save his comrades.
Even with the news that this story was false, the administration continues to stonewall efforts to get all the facts.
According to a Waxman and Davis letter, a withheld email from a White House speech writer who was preparing a speech President Bush ultimately delivered to the annual White House correspondence dinner on May 1, 2004, was a request for additional information about Tillman after news of his death had been reported.
This request seems to have been answered by what the investigators describe as a "high-level military memo warning that the president should be informed that Corporal Tillman was killed by friendly fire." The memo written by Lieutenant General Stanley McChrystal, the commander of the Joint Task Force for Afghanistan, explained Tillman was killed by US forces, and was an attempt to "preclude any unknowing statements by our country's leaders which might cause public embarrassment if the circumstances of Corporal Tillman's death become public."
Despite the warnings from the general, Bush's 2004 correspondence dinner speech included the fabricated story of Tillman's heroic death. Speaking on behalf of his family in front of the Oversight Committee nearly three years after the speech, Pat Tillman's brother, Kevin, said, "We believe this narrative was intended ... to deceive the American Public."
I wore the jersey into Menard's shortly after receiving it and immediately drew the attention of one of the floor personnel who wanted to kow why I was wearing it. I told him I was wearing it so that people would ask me that very question and I could then tell them how much and how often Bush lies to us. It came as somewhat of a surprise to me when the man agreed with me.
____________________________________________
No comments:
Post a Comment