An Open Letter to the Republicans:
This morning I got up at 4 AM to walk across the street to congratulate my Marine son (now home safe with his wife and two little children after 5 years service and war) on having been a small link in the chain of service that hunted down and killed bin Laden. I wanted to thank someone who wore the uniform of the US military. I also sent up yet another "up yours!" to the so-called "Real American" conservative critics of our president; those liars like Donald Trump, Michelle Bachmann, Sarah Palin et al who have nurtured the racist-motivated attacks on our first black president.
Was the SUCCESSFUL hunter of bin Laden a "secret Muslim"? Was he "born in Kenya"? Was he "soft on terrorism"? Or as Howard Fineman put it in the Huffington Post: "Does anyone remember Donald Trump? Could anyone seem more trivial now than he?"
I used to be a Republican until the party became the mouthpiece of not just "Birther" nuts like Trump but home to the loony conspiracy-driven far right "Death Panel" loons.
Unlike the neoconservative shills that drive us to war after war my son actually volunteered and served.
While the war-loving "neocons" pontificated on American "exceptionalism" and power and went to parties in Washington DC hosted by the defense industry I stayed up at night worrying while my son was shot at. He came home safe, but no thanks to Fox News and the other perpetual war shills who talk "patriotism" while other people's children -- mine for instance -- do all the heavy lifting.
While in Afghanistan my son John worked in signals intelligence, went on secret missions looking for bin Laden and did his part with thousands of other heroes. Meanwhile back home liars and racists took over the Republican Party and told us our commander-in-chief wasn't a real American. Outright lies were leveled again and again and the Republican "leadership" did nothing to shut the Birthers, Death Panel blatherers up.
A lunatic "Tea Party" was largely a reaction of white people unable to stomach the sight of a black man smarter than them sitting in the White House. That black man is leading our country out of a failed economy and also had the will and guts to kill our sworn enemy.
I know who the people are who aren't "Real Americans" they are the unpatriotic liars wrapping themselves in the flag my son fought for and that they use to sell books, reality TV shows and their racist ideas with.
Today the American right wing phony patriots look meaner and smaller than ever and about as stupid as Trump's hair.
Frank Schaeffer is a writer. His new book is Sex, Mom, and God: How the Bible's Strange Take on Sex Led to Crazy Politics--and How I Learned to Love Women (and Jesus) Anyway