In a rather tense discussion in the car last week (OK, bad choice – he was driving), I broke the news to my husband that Jane Fonda was slated to issue an apology during the 60 Minutes interview that Sunday. Although I was decidedly skeptical, the snippets I’d heard had just the bud of a hope that she had finally seen the light. She started out well, but alas, it was not to be. Leopards don’t change their spots, and Hanoi Jane just doesn’t get it.

You see, you don’t mention that name around this house unless you’re looking for trouble. My husband will relate with glee the time we were in a restaurant and he found a urinal target with her face on it in the Mens’ Room. As the son of a multi-tour Vietnam Vet, my husband has a deep and abiding dislike (to put it mildly) for Ms. Fonda. My father-in-law, obviously, isn’t too fond of her, either.

And as I’ve said before, anti-troop isn’t something I can abide, so she’s definitely not on my list of favorite people. And we have a long memory around here.

It’s not just that she protested. That, I can handle. It’s that she went way, WAY beyond that. Good ol’ Hanoi Jane gave material support to, and acted as the mouthpiece for, the enemy. That isn’t freedom of speech. It’s helping to harm and kill our troops. It’s Treason. Period. Certain areas of this camp still firmly believe she should still be put on trial.

One of my big problems with the anti-war folks, as I've also said, is that anti-war quickly descends into anti-troop, with a level of depersonalization that really angers me. The terms they fling around, like the infamous “baby-killer” of the Vietnam era, indicate a complete failure to recognize that the “killers” they so love to hate are OUR people. They’re OUR sons (and now daughters in unprecedented numbers), OUR fathers/mothers, OUR brothers/sisters, OUR friends. The troops aren’t THEM – they’re US.

Somewhere along the way, some of us have forgotten all about placing our loyalty in the right basket. I found a website a little while ago, dedicated to the Iraqi Resistance (read: Terrorists), which catalogues the “heroic” efforts of the people killing our troops. I was sickened, not necessarily because it existed – fanatical idiots apparently can use the computer, too – but because it was in English. Some of its readership is probably American. And that is repulsive.

But I digress….
So Hanoi Jane does her interview. As I said, it started off well, with an apology and an acknowledgement that seeing her posed with an enemy anti-aircraft gun was a betrayal. (Gee, ya think?) However, unfortunately, and predictably, she showed that at her core, she just doesn’t get it when the interview turned to the topic of her exploitation of the POWs. A lot of people were visiting POWs, she said. It was not uncommon, so she wasn’t going to apologize for it. (OK, but the Red Cross wasn’t going on Viet Cong radio to talk about how wrong the war was, and how the people representing the US side were murderous and detestable. Just wanted to point out that slight difference).

She called what she did a “lapse of judgment.” No, actually, I think it was a calculated act by an anti-troop, pro-Communist (or, by her own admissions, Socialist) woman with enough time and money on her hands to do more than sit in a park and sing. She knew full well what she was doing. Let’s not buy into the “I was young and foolish” story. You don’t go halfway around the world and meet with enemy leaders, make speeches denouncing the U.S., and have your picture taken with American POW’s, without knowing exactly what you’re doing.

She tried to justify her actions by saying that it was “a desperate time.” That a lot of people were against the war. That DOES NOT make it ok, in my book. Right or wrong, the troops do not choose where they go. They are doing their jobs. And it is NEVER ok to give aid to an enemy. Never. It is NEVER ok to help an enemy kill American troops. Never. And she has called the heated reactions to her past actions “ill-placed anger.” Oddly enough, I would more likely refer to them as “Spot-on Outrage.” She’s also referred to the Hanoi Jane image as being contrived to promote a narrow-minded, right-wing world view. Hmmm….sounds like a real old song.

At best, she only half-apologized. And even that, she pretty much took back. Let’s face it; she’s decidedly got an agenda. Since Vietnam, every time Jane does anything, there are groups of Vietnam Vets making sure no one forgets. She’s had to meet with them a couple of times to get the heat off when she had a project in the works. She’s got a new book out now, and you can bet they’ve been gearing up again. This was a strategic move to block what she knew was coming. And I think it fell far flat of any resemblance to a sincere apology.

Forgiving Hanoi Jane really isn’t my bailiwick, I guess. In a cosmic sense, I believe you have to account for things when you leave this place. In an earthly sense, I think it’s really up to those she harmed, our Veteran Heroes, to decide whether or not her words were sufficient.

I just know it wasn’t enough for me to let it go. It doesn’t consume my every waking moment, but I won’t forget it. And it hasn’t made my husband stop hoping to find that urinal target every time he hits a public restroom.


FYI, she’s at it again – see Jane Fonda Protesting War Again. Will we need to be renaming her Baghdad Jane? I hope not.

Labels: Moonbats, My Two Cents, opinion