So I'm driving back to work after a trip to the local hobby shop and I'm surfing the radio for the noon news report when I come across the public-funded news station. They're interviewing a local woman named Faith, a retired schoool teacher who had voluntarily gone to Iraq to act as a human shield at a refinery.
So right then I was getting emotionally bent. This lady suckels at the teat of government employment, collects government pension money, then goes and defies her nation?
But it got worse.
She described how she and the other human shields were housed in a community near the refinery, with the intent that they would be rushed into position when warning sirens sounded. As it turned out, given her age and physical limitations, she wasn't a fast mover and couldn't get to the refinery on time, so she spent most of the bombing time huddled in a house until the all-clear signal was given. So, not only was she defying her nation, she was also letting down the people she had wanted to support.
When the bombing stopped and the refinery was in ruins, she checked on the neighbors and, of course, nobody was hurt because the bombs landed on the refinery, not on the houses.
With the bombing over and no real purpose for her trip, she and the rest of her group decided to go to the local hospital to see what they could do, even though they had no medical training whatsoever.
Ok, so what did she expect to accomplish besides get in the way? Lift gurneys? Perform emergency tracheotomies? Then again, giving her the benefit of a doubt, maybe she thought she could simply hold an IV bag or twist a tourniquet. So, ok, I'll accept that.
And then she went on to describe "the horrible scene of blood and things that I've never seen before, but will see for the rest of my life in my dreams...". She talked about how a doctor, frazzled and stressed, pointed to beds and repeated "Children! Children! Children!" indicating the kids that had been caught in the war. She saw people screaming in pain, dying, blood-soaked clothing and bandages, and such like that.
What? Was she expecting to see something other than human carnage at the hospital after a bombing? That's what war is, sweety-pie. That ain't warm chocolate flowing out of that amputated limb.
The guy giving the interview did a good job keeping politics out of the session and keeping his distance. He asked her about the media and she said she'd spoken and given interviews with foreign reporters about her reactions to the bombing and how she was there as a human shield (like that ain't going to be used for anti-American propoganda, right?
).
Fortunately, by this point I was back at the parking garage and ready to go back to work, so I was spared any more of this lady's ignorance and naiveness.
The really scary part was, how many American kids did she teach during her career?
