Thanks to Kim Priestap over at Wizbang for linking to this article over at Threats Watch. Steve Schippert outlines the depth of character and integrity which permeate General Pace's life and contrasts them with the craven lust for power and popularity which epitomizes Congress:
Yet a majority in Congress telegraphed their intent to oppose [Gen. Pace's] renomination as Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff and create a national spectacle for the self-serving political purposes of staging public opposition to the President of the United States. And as displayed by many in that elected body, leadership by example is a sword that cuts both ways. The Congressional ‘Peter’ Principle was on clear display.
And with that came the end of the exemplary service of a good man and outstanding Marine. He now must - and will - find another avenue to serve and honor those fallen Marines whom he led.
Yet there is nary a Congressional leader who does not famously proclaim “I support the troops.” But the often hollow nature of these words has the effect of reducing such phases to little more than bumper sticker slogans. For they are immediately trumpeted following a sitting Senator who compares those in the United States Military as running abusive and torturous “gulags” and their actions no different from the genocidal “Pol Pot.”
“I support the troops” immediately trailed a Congressman’s hasty and false accusations of Marines as murderers based on the unscrupulous and uncorroborated accounts of those who supported the enemy on the battlefield. “Supporting the troops” remains the official position of a sitting Senator who falsely testified before the Congress he now serves within that his fellow servicemen in Vietnam had “cut off limbs, blown up bodies, randomly shot at civilians, razed villages in fashion reminiscent of Genghis Khan.”
Our Congress, Republicans and DemoRATS alike, could use new direction, and I believe that they should be guided by General Pace's moral compass:
Chaminade students also noted that the general learned a life-changing lesson from Farinaro’s death in July of 1968 when a sniper’s bullet struck him down. Pace learned about the importance of maintaining a “moral compass,” several students noted, especially when making decisions at emotional moments.
“You could lose yourself in the heat of a situation,” the general explained, said Dennis Grabowski. The senior is a parishioner of St. Patrick’s, Glen Cove, and Tarmac co-editorial editor. Pace explained that his initial response to Farinaro’s death was to order an air strike on the village where the sniper was shooting from, but a look on his sergeant’s face gave him pause. Instead, Pace ordered a ground sweep of the village and “found it full of women and children.”
“The general said that had he ordered the air strike, he would have felt guilty the rest of his life,” Finn noted.
“You are going to come up on situations in life that are going to test you, he told us,” said Craig Hauser, a senior from St. Aidan’s Church, Williston Park. “In those situations, he told us, you go with your moral compass,” weighing the effects on everyone involved.
“He also said in making a decision to ask God for the wisdom to do the right thing and the strength to do it,” said Sal Garofalo, a senior, Tarmac co-editor in chief, and a parishioner of St. Aidan’s Church, Williston Park. “And after you make the decision, thank God for the help.”
General Pace's moral compass has proven itself to be honorable and true, and Virginia's populace as a whole ought to be pleading with this man to shoulder another duty for his country and run for Senator!
General Peter Pace:
- honor
- integrity
- humility
- faithfulness
- persistence
- determination
A Marine. A man. A leader!
