Guns don’t kill people, people do, but the gun helps

Ask not what your country can do for you, ask what you can do for your country

Posted on April 16th, 2008 in Uncategorized

Everything happens for a reason and once again, I feel like you never have a strong opinion about something until you have an experience. Ron Kovic is an antiwar but he didn’t start that way.  He enlisted in the marines out of his own free will. Captivated by Kennedy’s “Ask not what your country can do for you, ask what you can do for your country.”

I was curious of how our friend The Usual Suspect got his start. After blog-stalking, I found his old blog, went back to the beginning of it and finally found the post where he answers the million dollar question, “Why Am I Doing It?” It answer is a little half-hearted but maybe it’s because he’s not entirely sure or just doesn’t know how to say it. The answer he comes up with is that it feels right and it’s his “calling.” Reading further it seems like his family is also involved in the armed services. His uncle served in Desert Storm.  But reading is current blog, “Combat Blue Balls,” it seems like his view have changed. He’s bored and angry and it seems like he wants to do more than what he is doing.

“Instead, you’re standing there with sweat running down your face, thumb still on the safety, ready to feel like you’re in Iraq for a reason, to fulfill your own individual purpose, and nothing. Sorry bud.”

It makes sense because it doesn’t seem like he is doing much. In this blog he tells a tale of how his instinct took over and he was told to go by the slow protocol instead of getting approval to give a “justified a warning shot” to an Iraqi ambulance driving down the military lane.

People may start for all sorts of reasons but it seems like a lot of them aren’t satisfied once their time is done.

Some changes are only minute and some are drastic. I found a writing piece by Ron Kovic  about Born on the Fourth of July.

To kill another human being, to take another life out of this world with one pull of a trigger, is something that never leaves you. It is as if a part of you dies with them. If you choose to keep on living, there may be a healing, and even hope and happiness again–but that scar and memory and sorrow will be with you forever.

Some changes are permanent. Hopefully our friend will find the excitement he was looking for.