Joes Stein of the LA Times, our local newspaper that is the reliable beacon of the Left, has an opinion piece published today that represents the much more honest and open truth about how the Left feels about ’supporting the troops’.  Lets be serious about this, does it really make sense to support troops who volunteer to serve and go fight a war that one doesn’t agree with?  This would require supporting the mission of the troops, and opponents of the war understandably refuse to do that.  The clash of the two messages has confused many for the last few years.  The thing is, like much of politics these days, its all about SPIN.  Its just a big PR game so they don’t get publicly seen to be as hateful as they came off in Vietnam when they abused returning troops.  Many of us on the Right knew that, but it is pleasant that someone from that side had the honesty to admit it.  Post Clinton honesty just seems so rare these days.  The article is titled Warriors and Wusses:

I DON’T SUPPORT our troops. This is a particularly difficult opinion to have, especially if you are the kind of person who likes to put bumper stickers on his car. Supporting the troops is a position that even Calvin is unwilling to urinate on.
…
But I’m not for the war. And being against the war and saying you support the troops is one of the wussiest positions the pacifists have ever taken — and they’re wussy by definition. It’s as if the one lesson they took away from Vietnam wasn’t to avoid foreign conflicts with no pressing national interest but to remember to throw a parade afterward.

Blindly lending support to our soldiers, I fear, will keep them overseas longer by giving soft acquiescence to the hawks who sent them there — and who might one day want to send them somewhere else.
…
But blaming the president is a little too easy. The truth is that people who pull triggers are ultimately responsible, whether they’re following orders or not. An army of people making individual moral choices may be inefficient, but an army of people ignoring their morality is horrifying. An army of people ignoring their morality, by the way, is also Jack Abramoff’s pet name for the House of Representatives.

I do sympathize with people who joined up to protect our country, especially after 9/11, and were tricked into fighting in Iraq. I get mad when I’m tricked into clicking on a pop-up ad, so I can only imagine how they feel.

But when you volunteer for the U.S. military, you pretty much know you’re not going to be fending off invasions from Mexico and Canada. So you’re willingly signing up to be a fighting tool of American imperialism, for better or worse. Sometimes you get lucky and get to fight ethnic genocide in Kosovo, but other times it’s Vietnam.

I’ve edited down to the heart of the statement and argument, Mr. Stein makes it clear he would probably love to hang out with and generally be personally friendly with the troops as just normal folks not in the military.  But he doesn’t support their choice to serve as a ‘tool of American Imperialism’, and certainly not the mission they are now on.  He makes it clear they should still be treated humanely and decently, unlike the Vietnam period, but just no ’support’.  No parades for sure.  He opposes the Iraq War and everyone in favor of fighting it.  Including ‘the Troops’.

There it is, the air is now clear.  For a bit anyway, before the smoke gets blown again by the masters of spin.  The moment is there for those willing to see it.  Will Howard Dean pick up the call?  John Kerry, fresh from posting on Kos?  Al Gore perhaps… they are all looking for ways to grab the mantle of the anti-war leader.  It’s an election year, anything could happen.  Or not.

(Hat Tip to Hugh Hewitt for the link.)