Two teenagers - both lied to
The events of last night made me think of two different teenagers. The first one is named Gerald. Gerald is an amazing basketball talent . He had agreed to go and play for Oklahoma State University - a great program led by a Hall of Fame coach and who made the Final Four just the year before last. Instead some agents and NBA scouts got a hold of him and convinced him to turn pro. They told him he was a lock to be drafted in the top ten. They said he would be starting next year on an NBA team. They said he would make at least $5 million in his first three year contract alone. But those ended up being lies. He was drafted - but not until #18 in the draft . He was taken by Boston, who already has an all star at the same position, so Gerald probably isn't going to be starting any time soon. And he does still get a three year contract guaranteed, but it's probably only going to pay a little over $3 million for that time.The other guy I thought of last night was a former student of mine named Darrell. Darrell was a decent student and a decent athlete and came from a normal family (if such a thing exists). Darrell was already in high school when the 9-11 attacks happened. They lead him to decide that after high school graduation he needed to join the army and fight the 'war on terror' to protect America.
But he isn't fighting in any war on terror (if such a thing exists). He is now in his second tour in Iraq. He was sent there to fight the evil Iraqi's who were going to use their WMD's to attack America. He was over there to fight against Saddam Hussien - who he was repeatedly led to believe by the administration as someone who was intimately involved with those horrific attacks on 9-11. He was over there when the mission of why he was there suddenly changed to being an effort to rid Iraq of Hussien - an act that the people of Iraq would be so grateful for that they would welcome U.S. soldiers like Darrell with grateful praise. And now he is there again, killing those same Iraqis, who now are trying to kill him.
So what does his president tell him now?
Same old lies
Still trying to pretend Iraq and 9-11 are connected, still acting without any timetable or plan for winning in Iraq and exiting to protect our soldiers, still not willing to acknowledge anything resembling the truth about Iraq.
And at this point, Gerald has a better statistical chance of being an NBA all star than Darrell does of making it home from Iraq without being hurt or dead. Guess not all lies are equal.
posted by gurufrisbee @ 12:02 PM
