Who really cares about the soldiers?

Another gaping hole in our current journalism occurred to me last night. Where are any stories reporting how soldiers who were told they are avenging 9-1-1 by being part of Bush’s War, or that we had to go to war to get rid of Saddam’s weapons of mass destruction, are coping with finding out the pack of lies that were used to send them there – and put them at risk of death, or get them wounded, maybe grievously, or get some of their buddies killed? If the reporters cannot get to any former soldiers, then where are the stories detailing how they have been walled off from getting these facts? What is the excuse? Even the “liberals” aren’t doing it.

What a terrible thing that’s been done to these soldiers, getting them to go into the line of fire and believe in the essential goodness of what they are doing by lying to them about its purpose. What happens when they discover it was not true? Does the cognitive dissonance – the underlying faith that no genuinely patriotic American could possibly stoop so low – make it impossible for them to process the information? Do they feel paralyzed, knowing how important it is for soldiers to believe in what they are doing, from expressing themselves for fear of undermining the morale of their fellow soldiers still in Iraq?

And nary a peep about their quandary from the great American media hotshots, as far as I can tell.