A fellow peace activist wrote this and gave me permission to post it here. It is moving and thoughtful and attends to the too little attention given by the mainstream media upon these gut wrenching testimonies of our wounded warriors, our true winter patriots.

Editor:

As noted in The World (March 17, 2008), Sunshine Week is set aside “by media organizations and other groups to combat government secrecy and bring attention to the public’s right to know.” The World newspaper has been especially diligent over the years in trying to hold public officials to the requirements of open meeting laws, and they deserve kudos for that.

There is another kind of secrecy, however, that is rampant in our nation and that pertains to secrecy by omission and self-censorship by those same media organizations. Occasionally such actions are so blatant that they would cast shame and embarrassment on our media sources if they were at all serious about living up to their role of The Fourth Estate. Alas, they appear too often now to be “for the State.”

For instance, how many of us watched the Winter Soldier Hearings held on Palm Sunday weekend in Silver Springs, Maryland? How many even knew of their existence? Of course, you wouldn’t have if you depended on the mainstream media for relevant news, because there has been almost complete silence regarding this gathering. Our government did not want the light of day – sunshine – to illuminate the facts-on-the-ground in Iraq, and so there was near-blackout of this event. Was it censorship or self-censorship by the media?

How appropriate that these hearings should be held on the weekend before Easter when self-professed Christians have been engaged in a six-week season of penitence leading up to Easter. Let there be no misreading of the gut-wrenching sorrow and penitence displayed by these finest and bravest of our military who have been repulsed and broken by what they have seen and personally done. They are also the finest of our sons and daughters who have taken to heart and now tether their future lives to the beliefs and values set forth in our Constitution.

I wonder how many of our elected officials, local, state or federal, bothered to honor and support these soldiers by listening to their testimony?

Roberta Stewart

Bless them every one.

Peace be upon you…