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| LA Times Columnist: I Don't Support Our Troops. |
| 2006-01-24 |
| I can't add anything - cleaning off my keyboard Joel Stein: Warriors and wusses I DON'T SUPPORT our troops. This is a particularly difficult opinion to have, especially if you are the kind of person who likes to put bumper stickers on his car. Supporting the troops is a position that even Calvin is unwilling to urinate on. I'm sure I'd like the troops. They seem gutsy, young and up for anything. If you're wandering into a recruiter's office and signing up for eight years of unknown danger, I want to hang with you in Vegas. And I've got no problem with other people — the ones who were for the Iraq war — supporting the troops. If you think invading Iraq was a good idea, then by all means, support away. Load up on those patriotic magnets and bracelets and other trinkets the Chinese are making money off of. But I'm not for the war. And being against the war and saying you support the troops is one of the wussiest positions the pacifists have ever taken — and they're wussy by definition. It's as if the one lesson they took away from Vietnam wasn't to avoid foreign conflicts with no pressing national interest but to remember to throw a parade afterward. Blindly lending support to our soldiers, I fear, will keep them overseas longer by giving soft acquiescence to the hawks who sent them there — and who might one day want to send them somewhere else. Trust me, a guy who thought 50.7% was a mandate isn't going to pick up on the subtleties of a parade for just service in an unjust war. He's going to be looking for funnel cake. Besides, those little yellow ribbons aren't really for the troops. They need body armor, shorter stays and a USO show by the cast of "Laguna Beach." The real purpose of those ribbons is to ease some of the guilt we feel for voting to send them to war and then making absolutely no sacrifices other than enduring two Wolf Blitzer shows a day. Though there should be a ribbon for that. I understand the guilt. We know we're sending recruits to do our dirty work, and we want to seem grateful. After we've decided that we made a mistake, we don't want to blame the soldiers who were ordered to fight. Or even our representatives, who were deceived by false intelligence. And certainly not ourselves, who failed to object to a war we barely understood. But blaming the president is a little too easy. The truth is that people who pull triggers are ultimately responsible, whether they're following orders or not. An army of people making individual moral choices may be inefficient, but an army of people ignoring their morality is horrifying. An army of people ignoring their morality, by the way, is also Jack Abramoff's pet name for the House of Representatives. I do sympathize with people who joined up to protect our country, especially after 9/11, and were tricked into fighting in Iraq. I get mad when I'm tricked into clicking on a pop-up ad, so I can only imagine how they feel. But when you volunteer for the U.S. military, you pretty much know you're not going to be fending off invasions from Mexico and Canada. So you're willingly signing up to be a fighting tool of American imperialism, for better or worse. Sometimes you get lucky and get to fight ethnic genocide in Kosovo, but other times it's Vietnam. And sometimes, for reasons I don't understand, you get to just hang out in Germany. I know this is all easy to say for a guy who grew up with money, did well in school and hasn't so much as served on jury duty for his country. But it's really not that easy to say because anyone remotely affiliated with the military could easily beat me up, and I'm listed in the phone book. I'm not advocating that we spit on returning veterans like they did after the Vietnam War, but we shouldn't be celebrating people for doing something we don't think was a good idea. All I'm asking is that we give our returning soldiers what they need: hospitals, pensions, mental health and a safe, immediate return. But, please, no parades. Seriously, the traffic is insufferable. |
| Posted by:Frank G |
| #28 #15 Not Joel Stein - that was great!! That should be required reading alongside the original. |
| Posted by: 2b 2006-01-24 23:40 |
| #27 We need more like him. Plainspeak on the left. Plainspeak on the right. So the unwashed masses can understand their honest choice. California is a lost cause, but everywhere else may save us. |
| Posted by: Master of Obvious 2006-01-24 22:47 |
| #26 Well, that certainly explains his "chatty Cathy" morning talk show "style." Gag. |
| Posted by: ex-lib 2006-01-24 22:33 |
| #25 Here is the dickhead's biography on the LA Times: http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/la-columnist-jstein,0,1575456.columnist?coll=la-util-op-ed Joel Stein is desperate for attention. He grew up in Edison, N.J., went to Stanford and then worked for Martha Stewart for a year. After two years of fact-checking at various publications, he got hired as a sports editor at Time Out New York. Two years later he lucked into a job as a staff writer for Time magazine, where over seven and a half years he wrote a dozen cover stories on subjects such as Michael Jordan, Las Vegas, the Internet bubble and — it being Time and he being a warm body in the office — low-carb diets. Being desperate for attention, he has appeared on any TV show that asks him: VH1's "I Love the Decade You Tell Me I Love," HBO's "Phoning It In," Comedy Central's "Reel Comedy" and E! Entertainment's "101 Hottest Hot Hotties' Hotness." After teaching a class in humor writing at Princeton, he moved to L.A. at the beginning of 2005 to write a column for the Los Angeles Times. He still contributes to Time and whatever magazines allow him to. But his heart belongs to you, L.A. Times reader. Only to you. |
| Posted by: Penguin 2006-01-24 22:31 |
| #24 Uh, he's not being honest - he's using a journalistic tool to seem honest in order to push the liberal agenda he holds to, except this line: a war we barely understood . . . Ain't that the truth. |
| Posted by: ex-lib 2006-01-24 22:30 |
| #23 Stein is a privileged myopic wussie dipwad. Bitch-slapping him would be a waste of time. |
| Posted by: Omavilet Glereper9991 2006-01-24 22:01 |
| #22 Read the trasncript. Hewitt just kills him. Figuratively, that is. |
| Posted by: Matt 2006-01-24 20:43 |
| #21 Wonder how long Joel Stein thinks he would be allowed to live in an Islamofascist state? This is the sort of parasite who is happy to let other people fight and die so that he is free to pose and condescend. In the same vein as his Calvin comment, Joel Stein is a putz |
| Posted by: Random Thoughts 2006-01-24 20:34 |
| #20 But it's really not that easy to say because anyone remotely affiliated with the military could easily beat me up, and I'm listed in the phone book. 98% of the military wouldn't bother, Stein. Partly because it isn't professional, partly because they know you'd simultaneously call the cops and crawl to your computer to get it all down for your next column. But mostly because Stein, well, you ain't worth beating up. |
| Posted by: Pappy 2006-01-24 19:49 |
| #19 Hugh Hewitt interviewed Stein for his radio program. Transcript can be accessed at http://hughhewitt.com/ |
| Posted by: Mark Z 2006-01-24 19:36 |
| #18 Charles Johnson sez he thinks Stein was trying to be funny. heh. Now someone locate this dickweed. N Guard's idea rings like a bell. First guy to get to him just stomps his ass into the ground. Mebbe offer an RB Deputy Sheriff's badge to the lucky stiff who gets the honor. |
| Posted by: .com 2006-01-24 18:37 |
| #17 He's been around - former Time writer |
| Posted by: Frank G 2006-01-24 18:27 |
| #16 This guy ain't unique. He writes what many of the true leftists think but don't dare say. It is not like it is hard to detect that. Is it hard to detect insincerity when they say "I support the troops" and then go on to act as the propaganda wing of the Islamists. It may be a litle suprising that one of these jerks would come out and say he doesn't support the troops, but don't kid yourself, that is the majority leftist opinion - but most of them think it is a stealth opinion. |
| Posted by: Hank 2006-01-24 18:12 |
| #15 Journalist and Parasites I don‘t support journalist. This is a particularly difficult opinion to have, especially if you are the kind of person who likes the concept of a free press. Supporting journalism is a position that even Calvin maybe is willing to urinate on. I’m sure I’d like the writers. They’re seem so full of themselves, young, arrogant, up to entertaining anyone. If you’re wandering into the guidance counselors office and decide to spend 4 years of your life for easy courses in college, I’d want to hang with you in the frat house. And I've got no problem with other people — the ones who were for the Iraq war — supporting the concept of an unrestrained free press. If you think telling the enemy every aspect of operations, endangering lives and liberty is a good idea, then by all means, support away. Load up on those pieces coin and pick up some dead wood media, the lumber industry is making money off of. But I’m not for unrestrained reporting during a war. And being against such absolutes and saying you support it is one of the wussiest positions those who believe in preserving this country and its citizens against death and destruction have ever taken - and they’re wussy by definition. It’s as if the one lesson they took away from successful wars wasn’t to avoid conflicts without absolute clarity of purpose but to remember to insure that those who actively aided and supported the enemy were not punished to the fullest extent that could be brought against them. Blindly lending support to the commercial media, I fear, will keep putting good men and women in danger longer by giving their killers the means to carry out their viscous intentions. Trust me, a writer who’s never put himself before the people to have his political views adjudged doesn’t have a mandate to decide what should the enemy know and what they shouldn’t know. He’s going to be looking for another ‘professional’ recognition award from his peers. Besides, those award little statues aren’t really for the study. They need something big to compensate for their little peckers, to impress the boys at the office, and get invited on Oprah. . The real purpose of those in house awards is to ease the guilt they feel for betraying their country and fellow citizens as reflected in the nose dive the circulation numbers have. The only sacrifices they have to enduring is putting up with stockholders who demand a return on investment. There should be a ribbon for that. I don’t understand the guilt. It’s not like Al Qaeda is grateful. They just want to see someone else who seems grateful. After we decide that we made a mistake, by allowing lies, distortions, and compromise of wartime operational practices, we don’t want to hammer the main steam media who were used by their politicized editors and staff. Or even the shareholders, who were deceived by false claims. And certainly not ourselves, who failed to object as the main stream media went to work for the enemy. But blaming the DNC is a little too easy. The truth is that people who create lies are ultimately responsible, whether they’re following their ideology or not. An gaggle of reporters making individual moral choices may be inefficient, but a gaggle of reporters ignoring their morality is horrifying. An army of reporters ignoring their morality, by the way, is also George Soro’s name for the New York Times. I do sympathize with people who became journalist to just plain make money and hit on babes, especially after the movie All the Presidents Men. Robert Redford was such a role model in that movie. I get made when I get spam promising me babes and a do nothing job. A job that will be replaced in ten years by a generation getting their news from the damn internet. Hey, maybe that’s the new employment for former dead tree media hacks, spammer. About the same level of trust and respect. But when you volunteer for the dead tree media, you pretty much know you’re not going to write the next Pulitzer. So, you’re willing signing up to be a hack for neo-socialist anti-Americanism, for better or worse. Sometime you get lucky and get to report about massive brush fires near LA, but other times it’s another creative writing assignment on Katrina. And sometimes, for reasons I don’t understand, you get to hang out in Hyannisport with a drunken womanizing over the hill Senator. But there are babes! I know this is all easy to say for a guy who grew up in the working middle class, did well in school and did his twenty. But it's really not that easy to say because anyone remotely affiliated with the neo-Marxist Young Che Cell of our local university could easily key my thirteen year old Nissen, and I'm listed in the phone book. I’m not advocating that we chase journalist out of the country like we did the traitorous Tories after the American War of Independence, but we shouldn't be celebrating people for doing something we don't think was a good idea. All I'm asking is that we give our journalists what they need, real productive skills that society needs. Like marking up the local Penny Saver for english. But, please, no awards. Seriously, the small print is insufferable. |
| Posted by: Not Joel Stein 2006-01-24 18:02 |
| #14 Joel Stein? Meh, the entire staff, ownership and all stockholders are worthless. I hope he gets punched out. People who have his convictions and opinions don't count or even matter. They should be treated like that. Lower than a dog turd. |
| Posted by: Sock Puppet O´ Doom 2006-01-24 16:43 |
| #13 or what Frank said :-) |
| Posted by: 2b 2006-01-24 16:36 |
| #12 Calvin urinating is a sticker that you see on the cars/trucks of people wanting you to know that they are bad boys. calvin urinating |
| Posted by: 2b 2006-01-24 16:35 |
| #11 the Calvin cartoon pissing stickers...they're passe - have been for years...this Santa Monica puss thinks he's touching a nerve among the rustics with that reference |
| Posted by: Frank G 2006-01-24 16:33 |
| #10 In 1st para JS says, "... Supporting the troops is a position that even Calvin is unwilling to urinate on." Does anyone know what this means? |
| Posted by: mhw 2006-01-24 16:28 |
| #9 At last--an honest moonbat! That being said, after wading thru his angry screed I come to a surprisingly optimistic conclusion. He is finaly starting to process reality. In a few years, after our victory in the GWOT sinks in, he may come to realize his errors. He may even wind up like Christopher Hitchens, someone who I disagree with yet profoundly respect. But before any of this can happen, the moonbat must first be honest about himself, and be willing to express his honesty where it can be heard and commented on in public. Let The Healing Begin(tm). In the mean time, if I run into this willfully ignorant, treasonous sh!t, I'm still going to kick the stuffings out of him. Repeatedly. After I inform him that he and those like him are the sole reason the Enemy haven't quit yet. |
| Posted by: N guard 2006-01-24 15:27 |
| #8 Marine Corps morale is probably going to plummet now that they know Joel Stein doesn't support them. |
| Posted by: Matt 2006-01-24 14:38 |
| #7 I do sympathize with people who joined up to protect our country, especially after 9/11, and were tricked into fighting in Iraq. Two words: tunnel vision. |
| Posted by: Bomb-a-rama 2006-01-24 14:21 |
| #6 We should put it in perspective. Opinion writers are scum and have pretentions to greatness, so they despise those that are truly great. The public shows its support for them by not riding them out of town on a rail, nothing more. However, for those of us who don't support the ink-stained wretches, we may feel free to show our lack of support by riding them out of town on a rail. With tar, feathers, dunce cap, backwards, and with a sign about their neck saying "traitor". |
| Posted by: Anonymoose 2006-01-24 13:46 |
| #5 ed, I think you nailed it. And I must admit, even first-level self-awareness is refreshing, compared to the blatant hypocrisy of those with whom he shares opionions in common. |
| Posted by: trailing wife 2006-01-24 13:41 |
| #4 What a perfect example of the noncritical thinking that paralyzed more populous and technologically advanced civilizations such as Rome and Constantinople, to be chipped away and felled at the hands of barbarians. Let's face it, Joel Stein is just too much a pussy to spit in a soldier's face. He needs a long vacation to ShariaLand. |
| Posted by: ed 2006-01-24 13:27 |
| #3 I'm sure this idiot speaks for entire LA Times editorial staff. |
| Posted by: Rex Mundi 2006-01-24 13:09 |
| #2 At least he's honest. That's more than you can say for most of the oppose the war/support the troops types. |
| Posted by: Nimble Spemble 2006-01-24 13:06 |
| #1 We already knew that, traitor. |
| Posted by: BH 2006-01-24 12:58 |