Velma Berger – 12/10/06

This page was last updated on December 11, 2006.

Cartoon hits the mark; Velma Berger; Beaver County Times; December 10, 2006.

This is the latest in a series of at least 16 Bush and Iraqi-bashing letters written by Ms. Berger dating back to February 2005. In one letter, Ms. Berger told us she was proud of John Murtha.

Below is a detailed critique of the letter.

“Monday’s editorial cartoon was so accurate. It showed President Bush only seeing what he wants to see and never changing his mind.”

[RWC] Hmm, given the letter writing record of Ms. Berger mentioned above, it sounds like Ms. Berger is describing her own behavior.

“Just as he stated at the beginning of the war ‘Mission Accomplished’ and ‘bring ‘em on,’ he continues to say things are going well in Iraq.”

[RWC] Ms. Berger must have wax in her ears. President Bush never said, “mission accomplished” and doesn’t “say things are going well in Iraq.”

I guess Ms. Berger believes if she writes this stuff enough, it will become accepted as fact. In fact, at the time Ms. Berger alleges President Bush said, “mission accomplished,” he actually said, “We have difficult work to do in Iraq.”

“Meanwhile, the killing of both civilians and U.S. service personnel has escalated. The news pictures are showing the destruction of Iraq.”

[RWC] The news reports also show the progress made in rebuilding Iraq’s infrastructure, but apparently her own blinders keep Ms. Berger from seeing it. Ms. Berger also apparently missed the building of a fledgling democracy from scratch. There are a lot of challenges left, but a lot of challenges have been conquered.

That’s a primary difference between Ms. Berger and me. I can see both the good and bad; Ms. Berger sees only failure.

“U.S. Rep. John Murtha was right when he called this a civil war, and now many others have joined in, including NBC News.”

[RWC] Oh well, if NBC calls it a civil war, then it must be true.

I wish someone would explain what difference it makes whether or not you call it a civil war. Regardless of what you call it, failure on our part will only bring more trouble in the future.

“After the first of the year, Great Britain, Italy, Poland and others are going to begin withdrawing troops. Soon, we will be the only ones there.

“With the number of troops killed approaching 3,000, how much longer before G.W. takes off the blinders?”

[RWC] Given Ms. Berger’s fixation with body counts, let’s look at previous wars.

50,000 U.S. servicemen died during the Korean War, around 200,000 were killed in action during The Civil War (over 45,000 at Gettysburg alone), over 400,000 died during World War II, and over 110,000 died during World War I.