Excuse me while I throw up.
I’m nauseated by the disgusting treatment that
the Bush administration gives to the troops it publicly professes to love.
We’ve learned about the Pentagon’s failure to provide body and
vehicle armor, plus the administration’s shameful policy to keep
America’s wounded soldiers out of the public eye and its efforts to
blame prisoner torture on a few lowly grunts. But the scandals just keep
coming.
Just when you thought your Disgust-O-Meter
couldn’t register any higher, it’s now been revealed that tens
of thousands of troops in Iraq are being sent into battle without something
so simple and lifesaving as tourniquets. This inexpensive item is no small
things to our soldiers: Officials now concede that untold numbers have bled
to death from injuries that would not have been fatal had a tourniquet been
applied.
Apparently the Pentagon chiefs have not placed an
order for first-aid kits containing tourniquets because — get ready
to barf — they have not yet developed training manuals and a pouch
for carrying the tourniquets!
Here’s another one. Although hundreds of private
companies and state governments have stepped up to pay the difference
between the low military wages that Reservists and National Guard members
are getting in Iraq and the higher pay they received in civilian life, one
big employer has not: the federal government. The federal government
exempted itself from doing what’s right for these troops on the
grounds that it could cost too much.
Why are the White House and Pentagon so lackadaisical
about providing our soldiers the basic support they need and deserve?
Shouldn’t “support our troops” be
more than a political phrase on a bumper sticker?
This article appears in Mar 31 – Apr 6, 2005.
