Soldier’s Hell on Earth: family murdered while he was deployed

When a soldier deploys to Iraq or any of the other theaters of this larger war it is his death the family is usually worried about. Sgt. Leonid Milkin, National Guard, was deployed to Iraq with the 415th Military Intelligence Battalion when he got the news that a neighbor, possibly drunk or under the influence of drugs, had killed his wife, his children, and his sister-in-law in the Milkin home. He was granted emergency leave and has returned home to bury his family.

It is tragic, what this man is having to endure. There’s no excuse for what the killer did, given that the evidence shows he took a shower in the victims’ home to clean off the blood, stole an outfit to replace his own, and then set fire to the building to cover his tracks, albeit not very well. Sgt. Milkin is living in a hell on Earth, literally the nightmare every man has when leaving his wife and kids for an extended period.

I wish I could report that that’s all there is to this story. But there is a section of our populace right now for whom nothing matters more than being able to assign blame for any bad news to President Bush, the war on terror, Republicans, and conservatives. They take any opportunity to gloat over any ill event and tie it into their personal regimen of invective. It is all the more tragic for this man who returned home to see everything important in his life destroyed to now have to suffer the insults and vile innuendo of people who seem to be beyond honorable behavior.

Michelle Malkin points us over to Lisa De Pasquale at Right Angle. I really can’t say it better than her:

After reading about this tragedy, I clicked on the link for reader comments. I wasn’t prepared for the disgusting comments from anti-war lunatics. Many on the Left purport to “support the troops” even though they disagree with the war. Here’s what they say under the anonymity of the internet when the cameras aren’t rolling:

“Maybe he signed up for the wrong profession because who in their right mind would want to be a army man? He should have studied harder in school and found a real job instead of joining the army. Lmao , be all u can be? Don’t patronize me ! People who join the army either have no education or come from small towns.. He should blame himself for his family dying due to his lack of education.”

“Too bad the paid assasin wasn’t home also… Got what he deserved for serving an illegal government in an illegal war.”

“ANOTHER BUSH TRADJEDY [sic]… YIP FOLKS HERE ARE 5 [sic -- 4] MORE NOTCHES, BUSH CAN ADD TO HIS BELT.”

“The p***k bush has cut funds to lock away the lunatics, just to pay for his illegal war. May the same fate await the evil bushites…….they are evil and will be treated as such. They, the pig bushites, are truly the enemies of America!”

Support the troops, indeed. “Don’t question my patriotism,” indeed. Please, find me the the quotes from the Right where this kind of bile spewage is vented upon the family of murdered wives and children. Do show me, if you can, where a man’s family is butchered and some conservative somewhere is blaming it on the man’s “lack of education.” Such arrogance, that the exalted place these anti-war – and yes, unpatriotic and inhuman, even – loudmouths display is way, way beyond any reasonable definition of “dissent.”

I wonder what Glenn Greenwald has to say about this? I wonder where his condemnation will be? Not really, of course. I know exactly where it will be. Unspoken, unremarked, and completely beneath concern.

My heart goes out to Sgt. Milkin and what remains of his family. I pray he finds more strength than I have ever known and manages to come through this.