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May 4, 2004 Visalia Times Delta Opinion Page

(Response to the administration's ban on photos of caskets returning from the Iraq war & occupation)

Some people will say the administration's ban on casket photos is motivated by sensitivity to the grieving families, but that explanation doesn't hold water. If it were true, you would also see President Bush attending military funerals and consoling those grieving families. But that's not happening. He hasn't attended a single funeral. And how sensitive was it to show a flag-draped corpse being removed by firemen from the World Trade Center in a Bush campaign ad? The plain fact is this administration wants to sell us a war, but it doesn't want us to see the human price tag. Start looking into the high number of disabling casualties (in the thousands) and the even higher number of our troops whose suffering from inhaled depleted uranium dust has only begun and you will find the price tag is a lot bigger than advertised.

--David Chandler