Like everyone, Cindy Sheehan has her "flaws." Hers seem to come from a profound anguish about what she believes to be the truth: That her son died in a war that was not necessary, and in fact was based on falsehoods. She appears to be in pain, serious pain, a pain I can't fully appreciate, not having children myself.

That she seems to have fallen in with partisans, more interested in embarrassing Bush than in her plight seems unfortunate but true. That doesn't especially trouble me, and doesn't diminish her core message.

However, not unlike Michael Moore and his work, in their passion to speak the truth as they know it, they sometimes overstate their case, making hysterical-sounding and false charges. They sometimes say things about Bush 43, for instance, that are simply unfounded conjecture on their part. As a fellow anti-Iraq War person, I find this unfortunate and, ultimately, injurious to the cause of peace. Those on the margin about the war are repelled by such loose talk. It feels like conspiracy theory run amok, even to me, and I'm a sympathizer.

Shouting expletives about Bush, claiming he's in cahoots with the Saudis, etc., only serves to alienate and separate, rather than include and heal, which this country sorely needs, IMO.

To me, Sheehan would be better served and be more effective to her cause if she stuck to the facts about the war, and her heartfelt grief about her sons and other sons and daughters, then the tack she seems to be on now.

The case for the war was overstated, I'd suggest wildly so. Mistakes were clearly made, some of them understandable, like the "evidence" of WMD, which many believed at the time to be the case. Let's get out as tactfully and expeditiously as possible, so that more Casey Sheehans don't die, not to mention more Iraqis.

-Robert Capozzi