Rick Reilly smeared in SI letter

Earlier this month, I noted a Rick Reilly column in Sports Illustrated that gently turned against the war in these concluding paragraphs:

Athletes love teams, and when they run out of sports teams they sometimes join bigger teams, ones with Humvees for huddles and tombstones for trophies and coaches they've never met sending them into a hell they never imagined.

And they throw their whole selves into it anyway, because they are brave and disciplined and will chew through concrete to win the game.

But what if the game can't be won?

Sadly, one of the four letters that SI published responding to Reilly uses tactics straight out of the GOP playbook (even in Sports Illustrated, I can't escape attacks on dissent!). Mike Castelluccio of Liberty, Missouri wrote the following:

Great article, Rick. Al-Qaeda and Jane Fonda would be proud of you. To call our cause a game that "can't be won" is a slap in the face to our government, our armed forces and our country.

It's sad to see ordinary people parroting this rhetoric -- and sad to see the letter get printed. Surely some war supporter out there had a more useful take on Reilly's column.

Comments

[Tony Smith]

Brendan,

I like to read the comments of conservative blogs (disturbing, I know). I've found many of the comments made by "ordinary people" on these blogs to be much worse than the many anti-dissent examples you have shown.

It is sad... but not uncommon. And more venomous than many pundits and pro-war politicians I have heard.