Monday, May 15, 2006
SLANT PRESENTED
Tilty twosome Cindy Sheehan and Susan Sarandon state their usual case during John Howard’s Washington visit:
Ms Sheehan, who will be in Australia next week, told reporters afterwards that Mr Howard and Mr Bush were “fools”.
"I am going to be rallying the Australian people, who I know are overwhelmingly against George Bush and this war.
"Quit supporting my country and supporting crimes against humanity. You don’t spread peace by killing people."
Sarandon concurred. “Stop supporting Bush and the war crimes,” she said.
Okie dokie. In the same Sydney Morning Herald report:
Until yesterday, Summer Lipman did not know Australia was involved in Iraq.
She knew that her son, Steven Sirko, planned to go there for a holiday when his tour of duty in Iraq finished. “He always talked about it,” she said.
Strange how these anti-war folks remain so unaware of the war’s details; as Tim Dunlop reported in 2004, after attending a John Kerry fundraiser: “Not one person knew of Australia’s involvement.” Yet the same people will confidently assert, based on fragments of information, that the war is a complete disaster. More from the SMH’s Phillip Coorey:
As the Prime Minister, John Howard, spends the week in Washington reaffirming Australia’s support for the war, Ms Lipman’s story, and that of the other 2400 mothers who have lost their sons in Iraq, is beginning to loom large in the US.
An outright lie. Only the stories of those who oppose the war loom large. Parents who support the war—a considerable, possibly even majority number among parents of war dead—find their stories rarely told. Ever heard of John Prazynski? No? Neither has Coorey, who evidently assumes every parent of a fallen soldier shares Sheehan’s views. Coorey continues:
They present a slant to the conflict not apparent in Australia, which has suffered only one death.
Yep. Never heard of any anti-war movement in the US down here. Especially not in the SMH.
Speaking to the Herald after addressing a Mother’s Day anti-war rally outside the White House, Ms Lipman was shocked to discover Australia was also involved and implored Mr Howard, of whom she had never heard, to get the troops out.
This is grotesque. Quoting her amounts to exploitation.