How Easy It Is To Forget The Unforgettable

By Alicia Colon

A recent headline - "Wow, Jane Fonda Sizzles in Tight Glam Gown" - certified how easy it is to sanitize a sordid past with the trite present ensuring that the younger generation never learns the truth. Nowhere in the article did it mention that Ms. Fonda is considered by many to be a traitor to this country. During the Vietnam War she traveled to enemy territory with a group of anti-war protestors, posed in a Vietcong helmet and peeped through a gun sight looking for our soldiers calling them "blue-eyed murderers." She has never made an acceptable apology that wasn't self-serving for her career. Instead of being tried for treason she went on to earn millions for her exercise videos. America - What a Country!

This amnesia was only possible because the mainstream media agreed with Ms. Fonda and was just as determined to influence the American public that the war was indefensible. It was the ultimately untrustworthy CBS anchor Walter Cronkite who was instrumental in that campaign when he lied about the impact of the Tet offensive and changed the way the communists would fight and eventually win the war. In the memoirs of the Viet Cong colonels, they admitted that they could not win militarily but that they could win it over here with celebrities like Fonda and Cronkite doing their dirty work.

Back in 2003, I visited the traveling Vietnam Wall memorial and spoke to many veterans who all agreed that our military did not lose that war. "We lost it in America."

The same anti-military factions are at it again, trying to spin our victories into defeat by slandering our forces. Our current enemies waged the same propaganda war that worked so successfully when the Vietcong utilized it. The Democrats in Congress and the anti-war, anti-Bush brigade went on the warpath after we entered Iraq. Rep. John Murtha Murtha likened some in our all-volunteer military to those who participated in the My Lai massacre in Vietnam. Jesse Adam Macbeth, 23, turned up claiming in 2005 to have been awarded a Purple Heart for his service, which he said included slaughtering innocents in a Fallujah mosque, his atrocity story was eagerly disseminated on the Internet by anti-war groups. Iraq Veterans Against the War was one such crowd only too eager to have a soldier confirm their own agenda. No one bothered to check Mr. Macbeth's actual military record which shows he was discharged after six weeks training, kicked out in 2003 because of his "entry level performance and conduct." He became the poster boy for the evil military without any journalist bothering to check if he had actually been to war.

Unfortunately for them we now have the Internet and Americans can seek out other sources than the MSM for the truth. We are also not the only country vilified by these liars in the fourth estate. Israel has been the victim of egregiously biased coverage which turns their defensive actions into offensive actions. Again we have the Internet to thank for uncovering the deceitful tactics of the Reuters news service which was forced to admit that a photographer had doctored scenes of an Israeli airstrike to make it seem more devastating.

In the media, the anti-American and anti-Israel crowd goes hand in hand with its false reporting and still gets paid for it. The king of the self-loathers, Richard Cohen, once wrote in a Washington Post column that Israel itself was a mistake, and yet he still has a job.

Due to a sprained ankle I was unable to accept an invite last week to the Cornell Club which hosted an event for the Wounded Warriors Project. FYI, Cornell is the only Ivy League institution that has kept its on-campus ROTC programs through the years - Kudos to Cornell. The guest speaker for the event was Marine Corps veteran Brendan Hart who spoke on the help he received from the project to get his Bachelor's degree from Dartmouth. He is now the spokesperson for the education outreach of WWP.

I first heard of the Wounded Warriors in 2006 when I went to the unveiling of a Purple Hearts Memorial on Staten Island. I sat next to a young Marine, Jamel Daniels, who tapped his left leg when I asked him if he had been wounded. A Queens husband and father of a 6-year-old boy, Corporal Daniels lost his leg in Aliskandaryah, Iraq, and spent 16 months in Walter Reed Hospital. While still in a wheelchair, Corporal Daniels was one of the three soldiers flanking Mr. Cheney that April on the field at the home opener of the Washington Nationals, played against the Mets. He said the vice president was very friendly and asked Corporal Daniels all about the incident that led to his severe injuries. "Then he went to throw out the first pitch and the crowd booed. That was so cold," Corporal Daniels said, shaking his head sadly.

Then our conversation turned to the news and he told me, "The media is not telling it like it is over there." It hasn't for years.

"Never again" is the refrain that Israelis cite about the Holocaust and yet we have elected a president who has no respect for what the Israeli people have undergone from its Arab neighbors. Why are bomb shelters standard in new Israeli housing? Isn't that a major clue that Jews are being killed just because they are Jews? Sound familiar?

I see that same refrain on cars and trucks alongside pictures of the burning Twin Towers, Never forget 9/11? It's already passed the memories of many liberals in Congress who think that appeasement of our enemies will stop the next attack so they immediately call for defense cuts to our military and their families while awarding themselves pay increases.

There's a great email joke making the rounds about a marine taking a college class from an atheist and ACLU professor who dares God to knock him off his platform. Nothing happens and he again challenges God to strike him wherein the marine gets up and coldcocks him. After he regains consciousness, the professor asks him why he hit him. The marine answers, "GOD was too busy today protecting America's soldiers who are protecting your right to say stupid stuff and act like an idiot. So He sent me." Don't you wish something like that really happened?

The warriors pay a heavy price for our freedom and it is our duty to remember their sacrifices. Yet each Memorial Day and Veteran's Day becomes more important as a holiday and a shopping day then for true remembrance. This past week was Fleet week with sailors and marines walking through the streets of New York City and I make it a habit to say, "Thank you for your service" to each one I see.

The Wounded Warrior Project is an outstanding charity that expends over 85% of its donations to the veterans who receive excellent service from this organization. I urge readers to make a donation via its website - woundedwarriorsproject.org.

Note that the website's banner says that "the greatest casualty is to be forgotten." Amen to that.

Alicia Colon resides in New York City and can be reached at aliciav.colon@gmail.com and at www.aliciacolon.com