Getting It

Many people have emailed me and asked me why I consistently and frequently speak positively about Jeralynn Merrit’s TalkLeft, since on the face it appears that we have nothing in common politically. While it may appear that way, it is most certainly an inaccurate perception- we agree on a number of important issues (which I am not going to go into detail about right now- most notably, the death penalty, the war on drugs, and prosecutorial misconduct). However, the real reason I link to TalkLeft frequently is because Jeralynn, despite, IMHO, being wrong about the war (and that is a disagreement- a difference of opinion- adults have them from, time to time) deals with facts like adults.

Go read the bile at the Democratic Underground regarding the rescue of PFC Lynch, which features statements like this:

This woman is a volunteer who willingly invaded another country.

She’s not a hero.

She’s just lucky.

Let her get a job at Dairy Queen.

Or this:

Here’s a scenario. Fake MP’s stop the convoy take the people to a pre-planned destination. Take the West Virginia girl back to Kuwait to wait, give the others, wrong demographics, to a tame Iraqi pre-paid unit to set up a later atrocity story. Bad news day? Trot out the young woman on a bad news day. This stinks like a CIA Black Op mission.

Mac Diva innacurately speculated, as did many, that PFC Lynch was in the hospital for treatment. However, it appears that the real concern for Mac is this:

Though I wish Private Lynch nothing but the best, I have some reservations about how this story may be used by the Bush administration. They may not be above treating it as an example of American superiority and macho derring-do. While simultaneously painting the Iraqis as savages, of course. (Indeed, some of Bush’s supporters have already convicted these very same Iraqi irregulars of rape and murder.)

However, the fact she was rescued from an Iraqi hospital where she was being treated is significant. First, because the Iraqis, though irregulars, at least were decent enough to get her treatment. Second, because a rescue from a medical facility is a heck of lot easier than a rescue from a jail or other holding facility. An American POW has been rescued — but not directly from Iraqi armed forces.

This IS an example of American superiority, in both military prowess and in concern for human life. Has Saddam or his troops made any attempt to rescue his POW’s? No, of course not, for several reasons. For one, he does not care about them- they are merely disposable pawns for him to remain in power. Another reason is that they know we are not mistreating our POW’s, and they are probably receiving better food and medical treatment than they have received in years.

Mac also seems to want to believe the Iraqi propoganda over reality, and thinks that Jessica is being held in a hospital for treatment. This, despite all the evidence of IRaqi perfidy, despite the Saddamite thugs using hospitals as command posts for the duration of this conflict. It is mind-boggling, and as the evidence has shown today, there were maps, mortar rounds, car batteries (for torture), terrain mock-ups, and other various weapons in this command post in the basement of the hospital. The mistrust of the current administration runs this deep within many of our Democrat friends.

At some point, people are going to have to come to grips with reality. You may have been against this war, but you have to realize who we are fighting- which brings us back to TalkLeft. Go read Jeralynn’s account of the Lynch rescue. Despite being wrong about the war in general, Jeralynn knows who we are dealing with it, and doesn’t try to sugarcoat it, spin it, or to pretend that Bush, Ashcroft, and Rumsfeld are worse than the murderous regime in Iraq.

*** Update ***

Chalk this up as a surprise (/sarcasm)- Mac Diva disagrees with my mischaracterization of her statements (which I linked to, so you can read them for yourself), and states:

John Cole, I don’t know why you chose not to cite my second Pfc. Lynch entry, which incorporates and responds to Jeralyn’s posts of both the 28th and yesterday. I emphasize the murkiness of what we think we know about the rescue. One of the claims I question, without further proof, is that the hospital room where Pfc. Lynch was treated was a torture chamber. No evidence has been offered to support that claim other than a wrongheaded desire that it be true. You are among the people actively promoting that unsupported claim.

I also believe you are misrepresenting Jeralyn’s position under the guise of applauding her. TalkLeft reported the allegations of a torture chamber being made by the U.S. military and a single embedded reporter. However, Jeralyn has not endorsed them as true, as you imply. She most recently said:

“Hopefully, if one of the bloodied uniforms was Jessica’s, the blood was from a gunshot wound, not from being tortured. However, MSNBC also is reporting that the gunshot wounds occurred during Jessica’s rescue, and that she had been held in the hospital since March 23 when she disappeared. The Pentagon is being very close-mouthed about the details of Jessica’s rescue and her captivity. We hope she wasn’t tortured and wish her a speedy recovery.”

That is hardly an example of someone swallowing the Pentagon’s claims hook, line and sinker, as you believe it is.

To which I respond:

There is ample reason to speculate torture (such as the treatment of POW’s in the Gulf War), including this widely reported piece of information:

Late last week, Yarsinske said she had thought Lynch was probably dead after hearing reports last week that the young woman’s bloodied uniform had been found by Special Forces soldiers inside a closed Nasiriyah hospital room — not the same hospital where she was found Tuesday. It was thought that the Iraqis used the room in the shuttered hospital for torture and interrogation.

The identification tag and American flag had been torn off her uniform. There was a car battery with wires hooked up to it found in the room, a primitive instrument of torture.

Some info on the use of car batteries as implements of torture can be found here, and here.

I have not misrepresented Jeralynn- she reported those views, did not refute them, and it is rather clear to her regular readers that she believes this to be the case. Check EVERY other post Jeralynn has written- when she disagrees with a news story or press report, is is virtually always followed by a lengthy exegesis.

The information will come out, thought. We can not be 100% sure at this point that PFC Lynch was tortured, but I am willing to bet that, regrettably, that that was the case. It is clear from current reports that this was just not a hospital.