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Politics : Foreign Affairs Discussion Group -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Neocon who wrote (130583)	4/30/2004 9:25:15 AM
From: longnshort	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 281500

Campus kooks As the school year winds down, parents of college students may wonder what they are getting in return for all that tuition money. One answer: Student newspapers that ridicule American soldiers killed in combat. University of Massachusetts graduate student Rene Gonzalez wrote in the campus newspaper, the Daily Collegian, that Cpl. Pat Tillman — the former NFL star who joined the Army Rangers and was killed in combat in Afghanistan — was an "idiot" who "had it coming." "You know he was a real Rambo, who wanted to be in the 'real' thick of things," Mr. Gonzalez said. "I could tell he was that type of macho guy, from his scowling, beefy face on the CNN pictures. Well, he got his wish." "Americans automatically knee-jerk into hero worship" of soldiers like Cpl. Tillman because they are "unable to admit the stupidity of both the Afghanistan and Iraqi wars," Mr. Gonzalez said. The former football player was posthumously promoted yesterday from specialist to corporal. "However, in my neighborhood in Puerto Rico, Tillman would have been called ... an idiot. Tillman, in the absurd belief that he was defending or serving his all-powerful country ... decided to give up a comfortable life to place himself in a combat situation that cost him his life. ... This was a 'G.I. Joe' guy who got what was coming to him. That was not heroism, it was prophetic idiocy." In December, Mr. Gonzalez had distinguished himself by comparing the United States to Nazi Germany and likening President Bush to Hitler. Full-time tuition at UMass is about $16,000 a year for out-of-state students.