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March 29, 2024

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Letter: America does not live up to ideals

By Bill Kelley, Yacolt
Published: May 29, 2020, 6:00am

For Memorial Day weekend The Columbian had the usual quotes: “the holiday recognizes a commitment to this nation’s ideals,” “we honor the dead by treating the living well,” “sacrificed in the defense of freedom” (“Ideals the same in a different Memorial Day,” The Columbian, May 25).

What is true about any of these statements? Nothing! No war since I was born in 1950 shows commitment to our American ideals.

We do not treat the living well (no health care), whose freedom was defended. “It is fair and necessary to question the righteousness of the toll war takes.” So why don’t we? These soldiers bore the price of a nation who lied to them and us. Vietnam, Iraq, Afghanistan wars: none fought for freedom or ideals. None had to be fought at all. What is the honor in that?

Truman, Eisenhower, Kennedy, Johnson, Nixon, Reagan, two Bush presidents, Obama and Trump: all lied. The soldier died for their lies. They used and use his commitment, his valor, his honor, to the nation, to hide those lies. “Kennedy, not to utter words but to live by them”!

Well, shouldn’t we? We, the soldiers did; his leadership did not. America did not. Get ready for the next useless war.

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