Blogcritics The critical lens on today's culture & entertainment
Obama canceled his trip to visit America’s wounded in Landstuhl, Germany. Now there’s no shortage of people questioning his patriotism and loyalty as an American citizen to the bravest of us all.
Get off your high horses, America. Your own president hasn't visited Landstuhl once during this entire war.
I don't think it was right for Obama to skip over this visit, no matter how "inappropriate" it would've been for a presidential candidate to have been perceived as using the opportunity as a backdrop for his campaign. There was nothing and no one stopping him from going in alone as an American citizen — without media or any of his people — and nothing did stop him from making phone calls to the wounded, which he did. He has also visited the wounded at Walter Reed in June.
At the same time, if anyone is going to say Obama slapped Landstuhl’s wounded troops in the face or any such crap because he didn't visit the wounded, then apply that nasty accusation across the board — and across the ocean — to include President Bush.
Making this all about Obama’s patriotism and loyalty — or lack thereof — doesn’t change two very important realities that not one person has bothered to note in their crying diatribes about Obama:
1) The wounded have been shamelessly used — on every level by a lot of people — to tout this belief and support that contention, and for what?
2) President Bush hasn't visited America’s wounded at Landstuhl. For that matter, there are a good many American visitors to Germany who canceled — or never scheduled — visits to Landstuhl. There are even a good many political figures who visited Landstuhl and specifically requested they not see facial disfigurements or burn victims, the ICU, or the psychiatric ward.
Enough already. Leave the wounded out of it, America – just as you’ve always done when voting on (and opting out of) better healthcare and providing for those who defend your country. The wounded have already been used plenty to prop up your ridiculous arguments that hold no water and don’t do a damned thing to provide for their care.
