Pat Tillman: we remember you

"The profound cowardice of some top brass stands in such marked contrast to the bravery of the men and women they commanded. These officials felt brave enough to send our military into battle, and yet not one of them has the strength of character to look Pat's mother, Mary Tillman, in the face, and s ay they are sorry."
--Paul Riekoff, Executive Director of IAVA (Iraq & Afghanistan Veterans of
America)
"But the great man is he who in the midst of the crowd keeps with perfect sweetness the independence of solitude."
--An underlined quotation from Ralph Waldo Emerson found amo ng Tillman's readings.

Listen up. Today, The daddy is feeling Pat Tillman, a former professional football and a genuine hero. Now, the daddy is not going to go into the military: how both the military and the Bush administration conspired to market his name and use his death to boost its recruiting and promote its misadventures in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Nor will he talk about the National Football League, which talks about its care for American communities and its people but kept silent about Pat Tillman, a good football player and an even better community leader, during the super bowl. Remember: before Tillman, enlisted in the military, he played safety for the Arizona Cardinals, one of the teams in the super bowl. But no Arizona Cardinal player sported a #40 on his jersey to let the world know they remembered. No minister spoke at half time about how Tillman gave so much to the Arizona Cardinals, to the Arizona community through his volunteer work with youth and how he paid the ultimate price for his country. All we saw was football and ads, mostly ads. The NFL showed that it cares little for Tillman or the values that Tillman he espoused; they just wanted to make money.

No, today, the daddy is just going to say, Pat, The daddy and countless numbers of Americans remember your adult life of serving something bigger than you.

We remember that you died on April 22nd, 2004, when your unit was ambushed as it traveled through the rugged terrain of eastern Afghanistan.

We remembers that you died trying to provide cover for your fellow soldiers as they tried to escape from a canyon.

We remember that you died from friendly trying to protect others ; and we remember thinking then and now how that was so much like you-- putting others before yourself.

Yes, we remember Pat Tillman, number 40, roaming the defensive backfield with that intense expression on his face, that well conditioned body flying to make a tackle or to intercept a pass. But most of all, we remember a soldier who paid the ultimate price to save his fellow soldiers trapped in a canyon and to keep us free.
-------------------------------
Biography

Name :	Pat Tillman
Date of birth :	6 November 1976
Place of birth :	San Jose, California, USA
Date of death :	22 April 2004
Place of death :	Khost, Afghanistan. (killed in combat)
Birth name :	Patrick Daniel Tillman
Height :	5' 11