Field Study: Why I Hate Reporters

Because they load up wacky questions via e-mail for one to answer hastily, then cut and paste to make a poor man like myself sound like a raving reverse-jihadist:

Sept. 12, 2004

Three years later, soldiers continue fight started on 9/11

By LAURA B. MARTINEZ

The Brownsville Herald

On Sept. 11, 2001, U.S. Marine Reserves Sgt. Ben Christensen was in Los Fresnos teaching a high school English class.

Like most Americans, he thought it was going to be just another Tuesday.

“I was in my classroom the morning those two airliners smashed into the World Trade towers and was utterly sickened,” Christenen, 27, said last week in an e-mail from his base in Iraq.

Christensen, a Laguna Vista resident and former sports reporter for The Brownsville Herald, had just completed his service with the U.S. Marine Reserves in June 2001 and had no plans of re-enlisting — at least until that September day.

“I knew immediately our commander in chief would strike back, so I knew it meant war in some form,” he recalled.

Christensen re-enlisted in January 2004. His unit was called up in June.

He is stationed in Central Iraq to serve a seven-month tour of duty with Charlie Company, First Battalion, 23rd Marine Regiment headquartered in Houston, with a two-platoon detachment in Harlingen.

Many of the men in the second platoon are from the Rio Grande Valley. They come from McAllen, San Benito, Harlingen, La Feria and Mission.

Miles from home, “from my beautiful wife and sons,” Christensen says his family understands why he re-enlisted. They understand it was his duty.

“My parents and brother and sister say that, like it or not, I’m a man and our nation’s men must ultimately answer when called.”

Christensen explained that the U.S. presence in the Middle East is because “the enemy” in Iraq has the same mentality as the terrorists responsible for the attacks on the Twin Towers at the World Trade Center in New York City and the Pentagon in Washington D.C.

And it is these people who keep Iraqis from getting on with their lives.

“They (terrorists) are cowardly, culturally backward bastards who do deserve to die, and the United States Marine Corps wants to ensure that we kill as many as we can here and now, keeping them away from our nation’s borders,” he wrote, explaining why U.S. soldiers were sent to the Middle East after 9/11.

Under the oppressive heat and constant threat of danger surrounding his unit in Iraq, Christensen clings to his faith.

He believes God’s will brought him to Iraq.

“We are here because He willed it, and we must only be professionals relying on Him for our care and well being.”

U.S. Army Cpl. Jurgen Valdez returned safely from a 13-month tour in Iraq in April.

On Sept. 11, he was working as a trainer at a South Beach health club in Miami.

Valdez, 32, remembers being inside the club’s cardiovascular room when someone pointed to one of the television sets.

The network was replaying video of American Airlines Flight 11 and United Airlines Flight 175 crashing into the Twin Towers.

“That was the major factor,” for joining the military, said Valdez, who is based at Fort Drum, home of the 10th Mountain Division in New York.

“9/11 changed a lot of people’s minds.”

Valdez joined the Army in January 2002 while in Miami.Troops were deployed to Afghanistan in October 2001.

Valdez suspected he would spend time in Iraq after attention turned to former Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein and rumors of a biological weapons program began to circulate among soldiers.

“We knew this individual in Iraq had a lot of power and had a lot to do with terrorism,” Valdez said. “We had an idea that we were eventually going to go in there and get to the bottom of the problem.”

The Army corporal arrived in Iraq in March 2003.

Valdez said knowing the men and women in his unit were protecting him helped him make it through the year.

“When you train, you train hard … you get to trust everybody so you know you are going to come back. Of course, it’s a matter of luck sometimes.”

According the U.S. Department of Defense, 1,005 soldiers had died in Operation Iraqi Freedom as of Sept. 9.

Though he’s completed his tour and is living comfortably in Fort Drum, Valdez knows deployment orders could come unexpectedly.

He’s not afraid, he said. It’s part of his job.

“In order for some people to be over here living and having a good time, somebody has to have a hard time. It was our (soldiers’) part to have that hard time, but I believe it’s worth it.”

(END)

Notice the date. This was the expertise of a lad who'd been "in country" for about two weeks. I hadn't carried any dead insurgents, nor fired my rifle in anger, nor suffered any wounded comrades at this point. I was still smiling and waving to the populace, and had been outside the wire once.

Still, as crazy or naive as I sound in the article, it sounds even crazier to the guy who wrote it. The "culturally backwards bastards who deserve to die" gung-ho comment was tongue-in-cheek and I did not for a second think she would actually frame it in a story as a quote, which is why I used the word "bastard." They're not allowed to print "bastard" in the newspapers, are they?