One Man's Perspective: Put heroes before villains this weekend

It would be almost comical if it wasn't so sad.

As we gear up to honor our fallen heroes on Memorial Day Monday -- news flash, that's really what the holiday is about, not just heading to the lakes and enjoying barbecue -- the better part of the past couple of weeks, the discussion within our government, has focused a great deal on the fair and humane treatment of our captured terrori...oops, I'm sorry, enemy combatants.

Sorry, I forgot, we're banned from calling terrorists "terrorists" anymore. We may only reference our returning military veterans with such a disparaging term.

It would seem that our current administration is more concerned about the accommodations and treatment of people who think it's okay to strap a bomb to a child and send them into a crowded marketplace to kill themselves and hundreds of innocent people, as opposed to ensuring the safety of American citizens both home and abroad.

The hot topic at the center of this discussion is water-boarding. The process of essentially drowning a person then reviving them to retrieve vital information associated with planned terrorist attacks and other plans.

Is it brutal? Yes. Is it torture? Yes. Does it seem to work? According to the experts, they have been able to retrieve vital and American life saving information - so the answer is yes, if it saves an American life from death as the result of an enemy combatant act, it works.

Oh forget it with this "enemy combatant" junk, let's toss this PC stuff out the window and call them what they are, they're terrorists.

They commit acts of terror against people in the hopes of causing destruction, anarchy and chaos. They don't care who they kill as long as they spill blood, even going so far as to use women, children and challenged persons to carry out their cowardly acts while they hide in the bushes, in caves and under rocks planning the next strike against civilization around the globe.

The audacity of our government leadership to refer to our returning American soldiers under these terms a, but suggest refraining from the term when talking about the people who want to kill us.

So back to water-boarding. The truth is, it's produced results that have resulted in preventing American deaths, so as cruel as it may seem, let's keep it in perspective. We're not talking about doing this innocent Iraqis or citizens of the Middle East who are trying to make a way in this world and feed their family by making a living, we're talking about committed killers.

We insist that our soldiers and interrogators play by rules while the enemy refuses to use any sort of rules. Nothing is off guard. Even the Red Cross and emergency workers are volunteers with these animals. The terms of the Geneva Convention are out the window in this case. They are extended to uniformed soldiers, not rouge guerrilla factions - and face it, that's what we're dealing with here.

I say protect American lives at all costs. Those who fought and died for this country, did so to protect the safety and liberty of the United States people. We will honor them on Monday. Let's quit focusing on terrorist rights for a while, and put a priority on citizen safety in this country.

I would only ask you this question. If your child's life was at risk and you had the ability to extract from somebody involved information that would save your child's life, what lengths would you go to get it? I can promise you, there's nothing I wouldn't do to prevent my child from losing his life, and if I had access to a person who knew of plans to harm my child...well, that's the price you pay for being a scumbag.

Now answer the question yourself.

If you would go to any lengths yourself to save your child, and I pray that you would, why would you not expect those in our government charged with securing that info from doing whatever it takes to save everybody else's child as well?

This weekend, let's quit feeling sorry for terrorists who want nothing more than to see our country with blood running in the streets, and focus on the heroes who have for decades protected us from those very same people day-in and day-out, some paying the ultimate price for that freedom.