Burlington Vermont Progressive Mayor Invites Anti-War Activist to Speak as Stand-in at Local VFW Veterans Day Ceremony

Veterans Offended by Conscientious Objector-Anti-War Speech at Burlington Vermont Veterans Day Ceremony

Image from Home page of Combat Paper Project

Progressive Burlington Vermont Mayor Bob Kiss had a dilemma: Invited to speak to veterans at the local VFW Hall at a ceremony honoring veterans on Veterans Day, Kiss couldn’t attend so he picked a stand-in, a former 25-yr-old former vet turned anti-war activist whose motto is “resist”, “object”, and/or head for Canada.

Understandably, there were angry objections after the speech by many veterans who were offended. Apologies are being written by city council members. The two people who haven’t apologized to the veterans who attended the ceremony: Burlington Mayor Bob Kiss, who is a Progressive and against the “war in the Middle East” and, his anointed stand-in, 26-year-old former U.S. Army medic and anti-war activist Jon Hausrath.

According to the Burlington Free Press, veterans were deeply offended after listening to Hausrath’s speech:

“Post Commander Bob Colby said Wednesday after the event that he and many others were offended by Hausrath’s remarks.

“He was basically saying that you shouldn’t serve your country; you should avoid being in the service; and there’s agencies and people out there that will help you dodge the draft or whatever,” Colby said. “It wasn’t an honorable position to be a veteran, I guess was pretty much what he was saying.

The remarks had no place at a Veterans Day event, Colby said. “It was terrible. It was very bad.”

Kiss countered that, while he had invited Hausrath, the guy “wasn’t speaking” for the Mayor. Hausrath “stood by his comments” stating, “I was commemorating the conscientious objectors of the past, veterans who have resisted war and pretty much gone unspoken”.

According to the Free Press, Kiss stated he chose Hausrath because he was a “recent veteran”-Hausrath served less than one year at a U.S Army military hospital in San Antonio in 2004-2005. Kiss also stated:

“To have a young man who had served I thought was a good thing. It was an opportunity for him to be part of the ceremony.”

And, perhaps, an opportunity for Kiss to use Hausrath as a less than a stand-in and more as a mouthpiece as Kiss was fully aware of Hausrath’s “views”.

Kiss said he did not review the content of Hausrath’s remarks or have a copy of them. “The statement was his own, and it wasn’t anything that I had anything to do with.”

Even so, the Free Press noted that Kiss, who is firmly against the “wars in the Middle East”, contacted Hausrath at the Combat Paper Project, an organization of activists, war veterans, and artists. The CS Monitor wrote an article on the project: Shredding war’s dark memories Iraq war veterans release their angst by turning their uniforms into paper.

Burlington Councilman Clarence Davis issued a public apology via the Free Press where Davis wrote that he was “deeply disturbed” by the comments made by Hausrath, that Hausrath was speaking on his own, and that Davis felt the comments were “inappropriate”:

The Free Press reported that two Republican council members were working on a resolution that would offer a “public apology” to the veterans who attended the ceremony.

While Kiss did make comments in support of veterans-after veterans complained-and, had written a letter to Commander Colby, Kiss has yet to issue his own public apology and, instead, defended his decision by stating Hausrath wasn’t “speaking” for Kiss.

While Hausrauth may have not been “speaking” for Kiss, Kiss was fully aware of Hausrath’s “views” by way of the anti-war, “resist” the military” organization Hausrath belonged to.

By LBG

By LBG