Have you served in the military?

This morning I had a nice phone conversation with my parents, complete with toddler babbling in the background, and at one point Dad and I discussed a conversation he recently had with some chums regarding our current political landscape. Some of his buddies from college are apparently quite right wing, while dad tilts precariously to the left. He isn't your stereotypical treehugging hippy commie liberal, he's more of what a Republican might have represented 50 years ago - self-sufficient, capitalist, community minded.

At any rate, he said that in a recent conversation about the war and John McCain's qualifications for the Presidency because of his military service and prisoner experience, he voiced his negative opinion about both. After that, the conversation escalated to the point where he was finally asked if he had ever served in the military. The implication was that if he had not, his opinions on any military conflict were meaningless.

I am completely sick of this limp strawman argument.

Now, perhaps my interpretation of the conversation was incorrect. Perhaps they meant that it's important for someone to have relevant experience in order to accept a position. If that's the case, I'm sure his buddies have written plenty of letters to the White House over quite a few of Bush's appointments.

If they really did mean that those without military experience should shut up about the war, however, then - wow. I mean, barring the ridiculousness of that sentiment right off the bat given that perhaps (and I'm being generous) 15% of the living population of the United States is serving or has served in the military, I'm willing to cut a deal with these folks and people like them.

I will stop expressing any opinion about the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, and I'll bet Dad would be willing to as well, if the following people with no military experience will do the same:

Rush Limbaugh
Bill O'Reilly
Sean Hannity
Ann Coulter
Ted Nugent
Laura Ingraham
Glenn Beck
Michael Savage
Michelle Malkin

Do we have a deal?