George W. Bush may not have made it to Camp Casey, but the military was there in full force. Army Reserve Spc. David Lewis, who recently returned home from serving in Tikrit, traveled from Binghamton, N.Y., to tell the story of how he joined the armed services after 9/11 because "it sort of became the least worst option.

"I was not being able to afford school. I was working part-time. I was just sort of eking by and going to school part-time. I was looking at not finishing and just getting into debt. And the Army seemed like the easy way to get out," he explained.

Lewis believed he was joining a noble cause. "Afghanistan had happened already, they were getting Osama bin Laden. And I was like, you know what, all I'm going to do is help secure the peace. I'm going to be a force for peace in the world. Because now we are going to get Osama bin Laden and no more wars because we're gonna ..." His voice trailed off.

"And then I'm in basic training," Lewis continued. "And we don't have cable television in basic training. We don't even have a newspaper. So I don't know what the hell's going on out there. And the drill sergeant started to make fun of us. 'You know you'd better shape up or else you're not going to make it in Iraq!' I'm like, Iraq? What are you talking about? The sergeant's reply was, 'Yeah. You should hear the president ...'

"I've always been against war," Lewis insisted. "I don't think being in the military means that I am a lover of war. It just means that I believe that this country needs to be defended. When I took that oath of office, I didn't take the oath to kill people. I took it to defend the country from enemies foreign and domestic." He said that he believes many of his fellow servicemen and women feel similarly but fear even discussing such notions.

Does he believe that Iraq was a threat to the United States? "It is now! I think the war on terror is a sham. I don't know what else to say."

Air Force veteran Carl Cook of Dallas was standing by the side of the road holding a sign that read: "Bush... You're Fired." "I joined to get the technical training and get a leg up in life, and it worked out," he said. "I think everyone should do a national service. Like AmeriCorps or Peace Corps or the military. It shouldn't necessarily be mandatory. But I think it's appropriate."

However, he feels the current U.S. misadventure in Iraq is not. "This is an immoral war," he said. "It was started on false pretenses. We're sacrificing our people unnecessarily. This is destructive to the nation."

Vietnam veteran and Gold Star father Steve DeFord came to Crawford from Salem, Ore., to honor his son, Oregon National Guard Sgt. David Johnson, who was killed in Iraq last year on Sept. 25 at the age of 37. Johnson had already served in the Army and then joined the Guard after Sept. 11.

"He wanted to help the people of Oregon," DeFord explained. "He was a cook by profession; he cooked at one of the larger restaurants in downtown Portland. They didn't need cooks in Iraq because Halliburton was cooking. So he was made a machine gunner on a Humvee.

"He was in a headquarters company out of Baghdad in the Green Zone. They were escorting water to various units in the country. And there was a 500-pound United States bomb that had been dropped that didn't detonate. So the enemy picked it up and set it next to the road and detonated it with a cellphone and C-5. It blew the Humvee up in the air and turned it totally around. And when it came back down, everybody was getting out and going, God, we're lucky, everyone is here. Fine. And they looked up in the turret and my son had been hit in the back of the head with shrapnel."

And it wasn't just a matter of DeFord and his wife losing a son. "He was due to be married in three weeks. He'd been over there six months and he was due for his break. He was going to meet his fiancie in Rome and get married."

In the late afternoon, Sheehan cradled a newborn baby in her arms underneath the painting of her late son as she watched Genevieve Van Cleve and Peter Ravella of Austin, Texas, get married. The pair had met a few years back at one of the legendary monthly "Final Friday" parties of Austin leftists hosted by columnist Molly Ivins at her South Austin home. "We were engaged since March," explained Ravella, whose father was a career Air Force officer and whose brother is currently serving in the military. "And we'd been looking for a way to get married."

They had visited Camp Casey II the weekend before and worked as volunteers. "After we came out here, Gen said to me: 'You know, this would be the place to get married. This is serious, this is what we're about, this is what we believe in.' And suddenly everything we were thinking of doing just looked silly. And we thought, you know what, blowing a bunch of money on chicken and a keg for our friends is not interesting. We'd rather give money to Cindy and her group. This is about our family and the celebration of this love. And whether you agree or disagree with Cindy, you have to respect the courage that she has, the courage that these women have. You can't argue with it."

"We couldn't have imagined anything nicer than this," added Van Cleve.

"That was really cool, huh?" Sheehan said afterward. "Camp Casey is all about love and life. I can't think of a better way to start your new life off, and I was really honored that they chose to do that. And there was another wedding down at Camp Casey I too."

She has been hailed as a hero and slandered as a traitor. But Sheehan remains resolute. "I don't think what I did was heroic," she said. "I just think it was something I had to do. I did it for myself, really. I did it in honor of Casey and all the other ones who have been killed. I did it for the people that are in harm's way.

"At the end of the day I have to live with myself," she added. "And if I don't stand up for what I think is right and for what I am against and I think is wrong, I can't do that. I'm hoping one of these days to have grandchildren -- I have three other children -- and be able to look them in the eye and say, 'Your grandma did everything she could.'"

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