I disagree with Rachel tonite on the issue of a ticker parade for Iraq Vets

[pinboy3niner]

27. No. They put their lives on the line for each other.

I served because I listened to JFK. When he said, "Ask not what you country can do for you. Ask what you can do for your country," I was young and I took it to heart.

I volunteered for the draft, for infantry, for OCS, for Vietnam, and for combat duty.

I turned 21 on a hill in the A Shau Valley on a night when I was sure I was going to die.

I led an Infantry platon that at one point volunteered unanimously--all 36 guys--for a suicidal mission to rappel into a heavy firefight only because we had a man down with a sucking chest wound and they were willing to risk their lives to try to save him--even though he was an officer.

Those good, good men were the "useful idiots" I was proud to serve with.

Later, I got hit with AK fire and was medevac'd to the States. For 18 months I lived on the hospital floor that had all the facial casualties and the amputees.

I guess you never heard the kinds of stories I heard from those guys. About struggling to survive, and to save others. Not a word about military industrial corporations.

Like one friend of mine who jumped on a grenade to save his squad. They gave that "useful idiot" the Medal of Honor.

Another friend and roommate was awarded the Medal of Honor posthumously. I recently got a Christmas card from his parents. To you, a "useful idiot." Would you tell them that? The men he saved by his sacrifice will always remember him.

To generalize and dismiss so many human beings as nothing but "useful idiots" is far more narrow-minded and ignorant than the ignorance you ascribe to them.