Vets for Freedom Pushes School Too Far

It was originally planned as "a low-key classroom discussion about patriotism and service to country" at Forest Lake High School in Minnesota. But when the Republican Party-associated pro-Iraq war group Vets for Freedom "decided to call a press conference at the school and alerted media," things got heated. "Anti-war activists, including veterans of Iraq who oppose the war" decided to organize "their own press conference and rally." The high school canceled the event, and angry conservatives began contacting the principal, "calling him a coward, a Communist or a spineless America Hater." Columnist Nick Coleman writes, "Maybe a Minnesota school was just trying to keep its students from becoming pawns in a political game. There would not have been much outrage" if, instead of being billed as the "Vets for Freedom National Heroes Tour," the event had been called the "Republican Tour to Shore Up the Pro-War Vote," he suggests.