Thursday, August 03, 2006

Yeah, why not wear the blood-soaked dress of some little Afghan girl just like "Courtney", folks?

Received in email from my mother this evening. My response follows below.
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Subject: Fw: A MILITARY DAUGHTER - A BEAUTIFUL STORY (and well worth the read)

Subject: Proud to be a Soldier !!!
From the daughter of a Soldier..

Last week I was in Trenton, Ontario. attending a conference. While I was in the airport, returning home, I heard several people behind me beginning to clap and cheer. I immediately turned around and witnessed one of the greatest act's of patriotism I have ever seen.

Moving thru the terminal was a group of soldiers in their camo's, as they began heading to their gate everyone (well almost everyone) was abruptly to their feet with their hands waving and cheering.

When I saw the soldiers, probably 30-40 of them, being applauded and cheered for it hit me. I'm not alone. I'm not the only red blooded Canadian who still loves this country and supports our troops and their families.

Of course I immediately stopped and began clapping for these young unsung heroes
who are putting their lives on the line everyday for us so we can go to school,
work and home without fear or reprisal.

Just when I thought I could not be more proud of my country or of our service men and women a young girl, not more than 6 or 7 years old, ran up to one of the male soldiers. He kneeled down and said "hi," the little girl then she asked him if he would give something to her daddy for her. The young soldier, he didn't look any older than maybe 22 himself, said he would try and what did she want to give to her daddy. Then suddenly the little girl grabbed the neck of this soldier, gave him the biggest hug she could muster and then kissed him on the cheek.

The mother of the little girl, who said her daughters name was Courtney, told the young soldier that her husband was a Corporal and had been in Afghanistan for 11 months now.

As the mom was explaining how much her daughter, Courtney, missed her father, the young soldier began to tear up. When this temporarily single mom was done explaining her situation, all of the soldiers huddled together for a brief second.

Then one of the other servicemen pulled out a military looking walkie-talkie. They started playing with the device and talking back and forth on it. After about 10-15 seconds of this, the young soldier walked back over to Courtney, bent down and said this to her, "I spoke to your daddy and he told me to give this to you." He then hugged this little girl that he had just met and gave her a kiss on the cheek. He finished by saying "your daddy told me to tell you that he loves you more than anything and he is coming home very soon."

The mom at this point was crying almost uncontrollably and as the young soldier stood to his feet he saluted Courtney and her mom. I was standing no more than 6 feet away from this entire event unfolded.

As the soldiers began to leave, heading towards their gate, people resumed their applause. As I stood there applauding and looked around, their were very few dry eyes, including my own. That young soldier in one last act of selflessness, turned around and blew a kiss to Courtney with a tear rolling down his cheek.

We need to remember everyday all of our soldiers and their families and thank God for them and their sacrifices. At the end of the day, it's good to be an Canadian.

Red Friday
Just keeping you "in the loop" so you'll know what's going on in case this takes off.
RED FRIDAYS ----- Very soon, you will see a great many people wearing Red every Friday. The reason? Canadian who support our troops used to be called the "silent majority". We are no longer silent, and are voicing our love for God, country and home in record breaking numbers. We are not organized, boisterous or over-bearing. We get no liberal media coverage on TV, to reflect our message or our opinions. Many Canadians, like you, me and all our friends, simply want to recognize that the vast majority of Canada supports our troops. Our idea of showing solidarity and support for our troops with dignity and respect starts this Friday -and continues each and every Friday until the troops all come home, sending a deafening message that..

Every red-blooded Canadian who supports our men and women afar will wear something red. By word of mouth, press, TV -- let's make the Canada on every Friday a sea of red much like a homecoming football game in the bleachers.
If every one of us who loves this country will share this with acquaintances, co-workers, friends, and family. It will not be long before Canada is covered in RED and it will let our troops know the once "silent" majority is on their side more than ever, certainly more than the media lets on.

The first thing a soldier says when asked "What can we do to make things better for you?" is...We need your support and your prayers. Let's get the word out and lead with class and dignity, by example; and wear something red every Friday.

IF YOU AGREE -- THEN SEND THIS ON..
IF YOU COULD CARE LESS THEN HIT THE DELETE BUTTON..
IT IS YOUR CHOICE.
THEIR BLOOD RUNS RED---- SO WEAR RED! --- Lest we Forget, Lest we Forget. HAVE A GREAT DAY!



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Yeah, Aunt ****** sent me this too. It occurs to me that it's possible to support the troops and national pride without allowing oneself to be sucked into supporting misapplications of those same troops and their lives. I imagine it's possible, for instance, for the average German to be proud of the Wehrmacht without celebrating its invasion of Poland in 1939. I support Canadian troops when they're where they're supposed to be: at home, in Canada, keeping it safe. Not blowing up somebody else's home in Afghanistan. Especially when I'm paying some chunk of my $XX,000 a year for it that could be better spent on cancer research, lower-emission vehicles, or helping people find jobs.

My father spent over 20 years in the military. He never killed anybody. What happened to that Canada?

3 comments:

M@ said...

Hell, I was actually in the military. And I hope that, if I had been killed in the line of duty, Stephen and the rest of the country would have given me a little more regard than they did Major Kruedener.

It sucks that atheists can't support our troops, too. Sigh.

Immoral Majority said...

I don't see any contradiction in supporting the troops and opposing the wars they take part in. The best way to support them is to oppose sending them into harms way for wars of imperialism.

katherine said...

Good to see dialouge on the subject, but I thought I'd point out that this email (circulating the world) has been altered ... depending on which country you live in. No word yet of it's validity. But it's being looked into.

http://www.snopes.com/glurge/daughter.asp