War disappeared

The war in Iraq is the war that went away. Television hardly covers it. The print media might give it a paragraph on page 3. The president and most Republicans are more interested in gay marriage, flag burning and stem cells. World War II, Korea, Vietnam and Desert Storm -- I've been in one and lived through the others. Until they were over, they never went away. American history doesn't have any war that just went away. Maybe it's because wars just don't go away. Maybe the so-called war in Iraq is not a war at all. Just because President Bush calls it a war doesn't make it one. Maybe he calls it a war so he can hoodwink the American people into supporting huge expenditures and accepting the loss of thousands of American and Iraqi lives. Maybe it's an exercise in nation building. Or maybe it's retribution for a failed assassination attempt on former President George H.W. Bush. Maybe it's about oil. The Grand Old Party is now called the Grand Oil Party by some. If, in fact, we are not at war in Iraq but are there for another reason, why don't we just get out? If the war can go away, why can't we? Starting this November, make the people who created this fiasco go away. Walter Welsh, Somerdale - Published in the Courier Post, August 27, 2006