[Grovenet] Fear and Truth

Sat Sep 16 20:39:27 PDT 2006

I'm am not confusing the scared and untrained troops with the commander in 
chief (and the governor of Ohio at the time). I am not the one who 
characterized students, at least two of whom were just walking from one class 
to the next, as "criminals intent on murder," they were not given the 
opportunity to do anything but die. While your response to Ed seems to 
suggest that the media portrayed this unfairly, you might note that your 
language was also the language of the criminal in chief and the governor 
while the criminal in chief was actively engaging all elements of the 
government at his command to sabotage his political opposition.

On Saturday 16 September 2006 20:16, Ron D'Eau Claire wrote:
> I was a member of the Army National Guard, Bud.
>
> I am aware of how protesters were improperly interfered with.
>
> At times, I was among them.
>
> That doesn't alter a simple fact. When you are confronted by an armed
> person telling you to do something, even if it's not something they have a
> legal right to order you to do, you do it or risk dying.
>
> The time to argue is when the guns are put away.
>
> It's wrong to confuse the actions of the troops with the actions of the
> commander in chief, then just as it is today.
>
> Ron D'Eau Claire
>
>
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: grovenet-bounces at rdrop.com [mailto:grovenet-bounces at rdrop.com] On
> Behalf Of Meredith Bliss
> Sent: Saturday, September 16, 2006 6:29 PM
> To: Ed Davie; Forest Grove local interests list
> Subject: Re: [Grovenet] Fear and Truth
>
>
> Indeed, I think Ron has a very distorted view of those times. Being
> employed
>
> by a defense contractor may have colored his vision. He seems unaware that
> the vast majority of protesters, myself among them, were attempting to
> exercise their right "peacefully to assemble," but were more often than not
> denied the opportunity, and when they did, were often joined by agents of
> the
> opposition or other parties who were determined to make things ugly. They
> were usually pretty easy to spot, but hard to deal with. Most of those
> killed
> at Kent State were, as I recall, bystanders at that. To tar them as
> "criminals intent on murder" is an incredible slander.
>
> And he seems strangely unaware that opposition to that war grew steadily
> until
> our withdrawal. LBJ's problem was with members of his own party, having
> alienated the Southern Democrats with the Civil Rights Act and the NE
> liberal
> Democrats with his war. But his war policies were expanded and carried
> forward by the Nixon administration in the face of growing opposition in
> the
>
> country as a whole. And lest we forget, it was also the Nixon
> administration
>
> that enlisted the aid of the FBI and IRS to specifically target political
> opponents on his "enemies list." So, yes, Margaret, I'm sorry to say that
> there are plenty of these "radicals" and "idiots" at all levels of our
> society.
>
> On Saturday 16 September 2006 17:45, Ed Davie wrote:
> > That's certainly a different Kent State than I
> > remember!
> > Ed
> >
> >   ----- Original Message -----
> >   From: Ron D'Eau Claire
> >   To: 'Forest Grove local interests list'
> >   Sent: Saturday, September 16, 2006 5:39 PM
> >   Subject: Re: [Grovenet] Fear and Truth
> >
> >
> >   Of course I wasn't singling out one group of
> > idiots. They were one tiny mob
> >   in a country besieged by mobs in those years.
> > That was my point.
> >
> >   I'm disturbed that your message seems to suggest
> > that the Kent State
> >   students weren't radicals. I don't know. I only
> > know they were stupid idiots
> >   or criminals intent on murder. I don't know
> > which.
> >
> >   When one group of people attacks another with
> > deadly force, as the mob of
> >   students throwing rocks and bottles at the
> > National Guard at Kent State did,
> >   it's sheer lunacy to do that to people with
> > weapons and not expect their
> >   intended victims to use them.
> >
> >   What the Kent State students did was no
> > different than jumping in front of a
> >   train or a car on the highway. Instead of merely
> > taking their own lives
> >   through stupidity, they forced innocent men,
> > fathers, and husbands, to
> >   become their killers. Those men were there only
> > because the students refused
> >   to demonstrate under the law. It was the
> > students asking for violence.
> >
> >   And then other people managed to turn the whole
> > thing inside out and blame
> >   the defenders who were sent there under orders.
> >
> >   By the same thinking, we would not allow our
> > soldiers in Iraq to shoot back
> >   when attacked. That's lunacy. Rocks and bottles
> > will kill, especially when
> >   it's a barrage from a gang. Anyone smart enough
> > to go to college ought to
> >   understand that. The guardsmen did. They were
> > under orders to hold their
> >   ground. We still don't know exactly how the
> > shooting started, but we
> >   certainly know why. The Guardsmen were doing
> > their job in the face of a mob
> >   of deadly idiots.
> >
> >   Like the soldiers in Iraq, the fact that the
> > National Guard shot people
> >   wasn't their fault. It was those who created the confrontation, and
> > that
> >   responsibility rests with the students who were
> > throwing the rocks and
> >   bottles.
> >
> >   Ron D'Eau Claire
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >   -----Original Message-----
> >   From: grovenet-bounces at rdrop.com [mailto:grovenet-bounces at rdrop.com]
> > On
> >   Behalf Of Eric Canon
> >   Sent: Saturday, September 16, 2006 5:14 PM
> >   To: Forest Grove local interests list
> >   Subject: Re: [Grovenet] Fear and Truth
> >
> >
> >   --- Ron D'Eau Claire <rondec at easystreet.com>
> >
> >   wrote:
> >   > I doubt if there's a single Muslim state that
> >   > isn't dominated by radicals,
> >   > just as the US was dominated (briefly) during
> >   > the latter stages of the
> >   > Vietnam war by demonstrators and radicals
> >   > demanding our government bend to
> >   > their wishes.
> >
> >   I think you used the wrong term here, Ron. Were
> >   the students shot at Kent State radicals? I
> >   remember vast hoards of fed up people marching
> > in
> >   the streets, and it got especially bad during
> >   Nixon's time, not that Chicago during the D
> >   convention was a picnic. Certainly there were a
> >   lot of people feeling completely left out and
> >   ignored and reviled by what was happening in
> > Viet
> >   Nam. But who are you calling radical? Nixon was
> >   pretty radical to me!
> >
> >   I agree with you that I never dreamed it could
> > be
> >   worse than that. It is far worse now. And the
> >   worst part is that everyone is so quiet about
> >   what this president is doing.
> >
> >   I'm hoping that this torture mutiny occurring in
> >   the Senate right now will be to Bush what Sam
> >   Ervin was to Nixon, and (his name escapes me)
> > was
> >   to Joseph McCarthy when he asked him, "Senator,
> >   have you no shame?" Down they went.
> >
> >   I've said it before: Bush needs to be locked up,
> >   and he's fearful of it, too. That's why he's
> >   lobbing so hard for laws that would sanction
> > what
> >   he has created.
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-- 
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Just happy to be here, but speaking 
only for myself!
Meredith Bliss --- www.rdrop.com/~mbliss
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