feature, august 9, 2007
Not all come home suicidal: Kristen Hinman described one young man's suicidal tendencies in "The Few, The Proud, The Shattered," and twisted the Marine motto into an article that doesn't mention cowardly terrorists hiding behind innocent civilians. Nor does it mention that al Qaida, Hezbollah, Syria and Iran murder thousands of Americans to advance the "cause" of their medieval Islamic fascism. She also failed to mention that thousands of Marines, soldiers, airmen and sailors do not come home suicidal from serving their nation overseas. This includes my 25-year-old Army sergeant son, who has served two tours in Iraq on the front lines, including the "infamous" Battle of Fallujah, and is damned proud of his service.
I've read the RFT for years, but no more. Keep this in mind: If the Islamic fascists win this war, you can kiss freedom of the press, freedom of religion and women's rights goodbye forever. The RFT should thank whatever secular god it worships every day that our troops are defending its right to smear them.
Jeffrey G. Williams, Florissant
Left-wing trash: It is revolting that you would exploit the mental illness of a returning Iraq veteran as the centerpiece for a poorly disguised, anti-war propaganda piece. Cloy, from a political perspective, is an anomaly; for every anti-war veteran returning from Afghanistan or Iraq, there are hundreds, if not thousands, of Marines, soldiers, sailors and airmen who believe their cause is just, their mission is necessary and are committed to victory. The sputtering anti-war movement in the U.S., despite being the darling of the left-wing media (e.g. Riverfront Times), continues to fail to gain momentum because the majority of Americans understand that the war in Afghanistan and Iraq bears no resemblance to Vietnam. Americans are not, by and large, "against" the war in Afghanistan and Iraq. They are, however, frustrated that the war (particularly in Iraq) is not progressing as well as they expected. This is a subtle, but important, distinction that left-wingers universally fail to grasp. There is no doubt that a certain percentage of servicemen and servicewomen returns from active duty in Afghanistan and Iraq in some degree of psychological turmoil. Unfortunately, in your zeal to paint the darkest anti-war picture you could conjure, you attempted to twist and stretch Corporal Cloy's personal story into something more grandiose and with larger implications. But you didn't make the sale.
Steve A. Serati, Sunset Hills
Won More Time
The National Association of Black Journalists (NABJ) announced the recipients of its 2007 Salute to Excellence Awards at its convention earlier this month in Las Vegas. Competing against other newspapers nationwide with circulations of less than 150,000, Riverfront Times received first-place awards in two categories.
In the Enterprise category, staff writer Kristen Hinman was honored for her "Basketball by the Book" series, which revealed widespread residence violations by the legendary Vashon High School (Wolverines) basketball squad under the leadership of ex-coach Floyd Irons. And in the Business category, former RFT staffer Ben Westhoff was honored for "Ace of Spaides," a feature profile of local hip-hop artist Spaide R.I.P.P.E.R.
Additionally, the Association of Food Journalists (AFJ) announced the winners of its 2007 awards competition in Minneapolis this past weekend. RFT staff writer Malcolm Gay took third place in the Best Newspaper Food Column category, for his weekly "Keep It Down!" column.
For links to the winning stories, please visit RFT's news blog at www.blogs.riverfronttimes.com/stlog.
