[edited 14 years later: back in the day the string and tin can internet didn't let us embed video, so here it is!]
This morning.
Transcript provided by norn:
CHER c-span transcript
C-Span Moderator: Good Morning Miami Beach
caller: Good morning! Thank you for C-span, I watch it every day! Uh, I would like to say I had the occasion the other day to spend the entire day with troops that had come back from Iraq and had been wounded and..um...I also visited troops during the Vietnam era...but the thing that I was most shocked by...um...as I walked into the hospital the first person I ran into was a boy about 19 or 20 years old who'd lost both of his arms...and when I walked into the hospital & visited all these boys all day long...uh...everyone had lost either one arm...one limb or two limbs or had lost one limb and there were...there were a lot of legs that seemed to be missing and a couple of the boys told me it was because that their vehicles ...that the rockets pierce the vehicles so much it's like being kind of in a tin can...it doesn't have...there isn't...the walls of the Humvees are very soft and there's no protection...but three guys in the same vehicle have lost a leg. ...and another thing that I saw was that...um...if they'd lost one leg that... that shrapnel that had hit the other leg had been so devastating that they were having to pull like the thigh...you know...the muscle and the thigh around the bottom of the calf to try to make the leg workable but in some cases these boys had lost one legand the other leg was so damaged that they weren't sure what they were gonna be able to do.
C-Span Moderator: Where did you spend the day?
caller: Walter-Reed.
C-Span Moderator: And youre down in Miami beach, back in Miami beach?
caller: I'm down here today.
C-Span Moderator: what were you doing at walter -reed? are you a volunteer?
caller: no, I was just asked to come and spend the day. I was working that day in Washington, DC and...
C-Span Moderator: what kind of work do you do?
caller: um, I'm an entertainer.
C-Span Moderator: oh, what kind of entertaining? are you USO?
caller: no, I actually was called by the USO but I'm...I'm...I'm just...I'm an entertainer. And I really dont want to go much past that but...um...
C-Span Moderator: Is this CHER?
caller: yeah.
C-Span Moderator: (worshipful silence) ok. And you spent the day at walter-reed.
caller: Yeah. And I spent the day with, I mean they were great guys...and the the men that took me around were in the...you know...the services,you know, they were fabulous men...uh...Mike and John ...and they these boys had unbelievable courage and they still said for the most part hat they were glad that they they did it, they felt that it was their duty...and there were a few of the national guards that felt it was their duty that once they were over there but they wondered why they were taken out of America to spend that much time as actual service men when they really felt that their job was to be, you know, protecting this country. ...but I I have to say that they had the most unbelievable courage and it took everything that I have as a person to...to not...you know... break down while I was talking to these guys...but I just think that if there was no reason for this war this was the most heinous thing I'd ever seen... and also I wonder why...why are none of Cheney, Wolfowitz, Bremer, the president, why aren't they taking pictures with all these guys? Because I dont understand why these guys are so hidden and why... and why there arent pictures of them because you know, talking about the dead and the wounded...that's two different things but these wounded are so devastatedly wounded...you know...that I think that... the wounded...its just... it''s unbelievable...its just unbelieivable to me and i'm an independent but I....
C-Span Moderator: Are you supporting anyone yet for 2004? You supported Ross Perot, correct? in 92?
caller: Yeah, I mean when I heard him talk right in the beginning I thought that he would bring some sort of common-sense business approach and also less partisanship but then of course...you know... I was completely disappointed like everyone else when he just kind of cut and run and no one knew exactly why ...you know...being that maybe he couldn't have withstood all the investigation that goes on now...but...um...you know...I'm not a bush supporter, that for sure...and I'm definitely not Ashcroft or Cheney or any of them...but I would just like to see them have...you know, if youre going to send these people to war then don't hide them, you know...and have some... have some news coverage where people are sitting and talking to these guys and seeing how they are and seeing their spirit and its just... I just... I think its a crime.
C-Span Moderator: When you were up here for your farewell concert earlier this month, is that when you went to walter reed?
caller: Yeah.
C-Span Moderator: Ok well thanks for your time this morning, thanks for watching.
caller: Oh I have to tell you I watch you every day and I really appreciate it because I go all over the world and I must say that the news we get in America has nothing to do with the news that you get outside of this country And I think that's why people don't..people don't understand why so many of the allies did not...you know, our usual allies did not join us because if you get outside the United States you hear a different kind of news you know and so...
C-Span Moderator: What's your favorite news source outside the US?
Caller: Well there's a source that I really like inside the US that gives you special documentaries called WORLDLINK but I think my favorite source outside the US is BBC because they are our allies but you still get...on the nightly news you get...you know, much more coverage and I think much more honest coverage...I dont know, I guess they're not...well...they're independent so they're not owned by any of the major corporations that are... you know, have vested interest in this war.
C-Span Moderator: thanks for your call this morning.
caller: ok, thank you!
