Real American Moms I'm sure you've seen Cindy Sheehan said, "I don't want [Bush] to use my son's name or my name to justify any more killing." and "Quit saying that U.S. troops died for a noble cause in Iraq, unless you say, 'well, except for Casey Sheehan.' ... You do not have permission to use my son's name."

Well guess what? The shoe is on the other foot. As part of the so-called "Camp Casey" near Bush's Crawford ranch, the Cindy coalition erected a "memorial" of crosses with the names of soldiers killed in Iraq. Apparently all the families of those men aren't all that supportive of Cindy's anti-America stance.

Debbie Argel Bastian, mother of Air Force Captain Derek Argel, buried at Arlington last week, demanded that her son's name be removed from Cindy's "memorial". "I'm livid about it. Derek would not want to be remembered that way." Sheehan REFUSED to remove Argel's name offering instead to move it out of the front row.

The family of Marine Corporal Matthew Matula was so enraged at their son's inclusion in the "memorial" that they drove 150 miles from Spicewood, TX to remove his cross. "It aggravates me to see them using other people's names to further their cause," said Matula's father, Matt. "He's not a victim, he's a hero and I think that everybody that's serving our country [are] heroes." Matthew's mother, Toni, said, "For people to use his name against it is not what he died for."

Maureen Dowd said, "...the moral authority of parents who bury children killed in Iraq is absolute." Great! Which parents? The Matula and Argel families both "buried children killed in Iraq and they oppose Sheehan." So let's listen to them for a while.  ¶ Thursday, August 18, 2005