Letter: Ensign’s war rhetoric is just plain wrong

Thursday, May 25, 2006 | 7:16 a.m.

At the state Republican convention in Mesquite last Saturday, Sen. John Ensign criticized prominent Democrats for having "emboldened the enemy" with their antiwar rhetoric. He also stated that our military is fighting for our freedom of speech and our right to protest.

When will the senator wake up and realize that Americans are not buying this tired old rhetoric from politicians who profess to know all about war but never served a day in uniform? Neither our freedom of speech nor our right to protest was ever threatened by this Iraqi tyrant and his third-rate military.

Never before have so many high-ranking military men, alongside many prominent politicians who have served, spoken out about the flawed reasons for invading Iraq, the fact that no plan ever existed to control the insurgency that was fully anticipated by our military leaders, and that we have no hope of reaching our initial goals, and desperately need an exit strategy.

Is it any coincidence that men who served in the military, for example, Rep. Jack Murtha, former Sen. Tom Daschle, former Vice President Al Gore, Sen. John Kerry, Rep. Charles Rangel, former Sen. Max Cleland, Sen. Ted Kennedy, and Sen. Tom Harkin are speaking out against this war, while prominent Republicans who will never admit to this dreadful mistake, for example, Vice President Dick Cheney, Rep. Dennis Hastert, former Rep. Tom DeLay, Sen. Bill Frist, Sen. Rick Santorum, Sen. Trent Lott and the "President's Brain" - Karl Rove - never served a day of military service.

Sen. Ensign owes the people of Nevada, and the millions of Americans who disagree with the president's war policy, more than the narrow-minded, partisan rhetoric he continues to spout.

Phil Ventura, Las Vegas