Bob Cesca's article can be read here. This is a really good read! Bob Cesca is a writer, director and producer, and the founder of Camp Chaos, an animation studio based near Philadelphia. He's written and produced hundreds of animated shorts as well as music videos for Iron Maiden, Meat Loaf, Everclear, Yes and Motley Crue. After 9/11, Bob directed the independent feature film, The War Effort: a mockumentary satirizing the nation's post-9/11 knee-jerk patriotism. He's also the creator of the animated sketch show "ILL-ustrated" which aired for two seasons on VH1 and MTV2. Bob grew up in Northern Virginia and graduated from Kutztown University with a degree in Political Science. His latest animated project is KUNG FU JIMMY CHOW. Another piece you might want to read from Bob is "The Democrats Could Learn A Lot From Larry Craig's Balls."
VANDENBERG AIR FORCE BASE, Calif. - A ground-based missile successfully intercepted a target missile Friday in a test of the nation's defense system, the Missile Defense Agency said.
An intercontinental ballistic missile interceptor blasted out of an underground silo at Vandenberg Air Force Base shortly after 1:15 p.m., and tracked a target missile that had lifted off from the Kodiak Launch Complex in Alaska, the Boeing Co. said in a statement.
The Missile Defense Agency said initial results show the interceptor's rocket motor system and kill vehicle performed as planned. Boeing said the warhead was tracked, intercepted and destroyed.
Boeing is the prime contractor for what is formally known as the Ground-Based Midcourse Defense system.
The MDA expects to invest $49 billion in ballistic missile defense development and fielding over the next five years.
Two operational interceptor missiles are currently based at Vandenberg and there are 11 deployed at Fort Greely, Alaska.
Army plans to increase size of the force more quickly
WASHINGTON (AFP) — US Defense Secretary Robert Gates said Thursday he would probably approve a plan to expand the army by 74,000 troops in four years instead of five to ease strains on the force.
Gates said still he had questions about whether the army could accelerate the expansion without lowering the quality of its recruits, or spreading its cadre of mid-level officers too thin.
"They are confident they can do that; they've put together some programs to try and do it, and I'm probably going to recommend that they go ahead and give it a try," he said.
In one of his first acts as defense secretary, Gates set in motion plans in January to increase the size of the active army to 547,000 by 2012 in large part by adding seven thousand troops a year over five years.
Army Secretary Pete Geren told reporters the army now believes it can accomplish that in four years.
"We concluded that we could expedite the growth by a year and that would help relieve stress on the force," Geren said.
He said accelerating the plan would cost an additional 2.7 to 2.8 billion dollars, and require recruiting more than 80,000 troops a year.
But it would add 74,000 troops to its active force and to the army national guard and reserves.
"There are some who have expressed concerns that in this recruiting climate we wouldn't be able to accomplish it. We believe that we could," he said.
Geren said another means of expanding the force is through re-enlistments, which have remained high despite the stress of repeated deployments to Iraq and Afghanistan.
But Gates said he wanted to see improvements in the percentage of army recruits who were high school graduates, which he said has slipped to around 76 percent, compared to around 95 percent in years past.
"I have been very explicit that, at least as long as I'm here, I will not allow them to lower the standards," he said.
The army, meanwhile, has struggled to meet the demand for troops in Iraq, particularly as some 30,000 additional troops were sent over as part of the US surge strategy.
The army had to extend combat tours in Iraq and Afghanistan from a year to 15 months earlier this year to ensure that all units would have at least a year at home between deployments.
General David Petraeus, the US commander in Iraq, said earlier this month that he plans to shrink the number of combat brigades in the country from 20 to 15 by mid-July.
Even so, Geren said it was not yet clear how much the force in Iraq must shrink before it reaches a sustainable level over the long term.
Even as the number of combat troops go down, the number of support troops and trainers could go up as the US military shifts to a new mission of training and supporting Iraqi security forces, he indicated.
One unresolved issue, he said is whether bringing down the brigades "will that require more or less soldiers ... (in) various types of training teams and support teams," he said.
"It's a mosaic of assignments over there that will determine what is sustainable," he said, adding that the the mix of forces would be up to Petraeus.
But the levels of combat troops versus support forces "don't necessarily move in tandem -- one could go up and the other could go down," he said.
"I think it's important as we think about the demand on the resources of the army we have to recognize the possibility that we could have them move in different directions," he said.
Geren said the active duty army was on track to grow to 519,000 this year.
The 74,000 troop increase that Geren referred to included an immediate permanent increase of 30,000 troops in the army's authorized end-strength from 482,400; 35,000 active duty troops to be added over five years; and 9,000 national guard and reserve troops to be added by 2013.
CNN) -- A federal court on Wednesday struck down two provisions of the Patriot Act dealing with searches and intelligence gathering, saying they violate the Fourth Amendment protection against unreasonable searches and seizures with regard to criminal prosecutions.
Brandon Mayfield, left, and public defender Steven Wax tell of the dismissal of the case against Mayfield in 2004.
"It is critical that we, as a democratic nation, pay close attention to traditional Fourth Amendment principles," wrote Judge Ann Aiken of the U.S. District Court for the District of Oregon in her 44-page decision. "The Fourth Amendment has served this nation well for 220 years, through many other perils."
The Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court of Review, set up to review wiretap applications in intelligence cases under the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, or FISA, "holds that the Constitution need not control the conduct of criminal surveillance in the United States," Aiken wrote.
"In place of the Fourth Amendment, the people are expected to defer to the executive branch and its representation that it will authorize such surveillance only when appropriate."
The government "is asking this court to, in essence, amend the Bill of Rights, by giving it an interpretation that would deprive it of any real meaning. The court declines to do so," Aiken said.
The Justice Department was reviewing the decision, said spokesman Dean Boyd.
The ruling was a response to a lawsuit filed against the federal government by Brandon Mayfield, a Portland, Oregon, attorney who was wrongly arrested for alleged involvement in the 2004 Madrid train bombings.
The federal government later apologized to Mayfield and settled part of Mayfield's lawsuit for $2 million. But Mayfield was permitted to keep pursuing the portions of his lawsuit challenging the constitutionality of the Patriot Act.
Mayfield claimed in the suit that his home and law offices were secretly broken into by the FBI, his clients' files at his office were searched, his business and personal computers were secretly copied, his telephone was wiretapped and his home was bugged.
Mayfield said he was "excited and happy" with the ruling.
"This, to me, is not so much personal," he said. "I think it's just the right thing to do. It was the right thing to continue to challenge the constitutionality of the Patriot Act."
"This is an example of the judicial branch doing what it should do, and that's to be a check and balance for the legislative and executive branch of government," he said. "I feel wonderful today, because the Fourth Amendment has been restored to its rightful place, and the balance between liberty and security is balanced again."
Mayfield's attorneys -- Gerry Spence, Elden Rosenthal and Michelle Longer Eder -- lauded the ruling.
"Judge Aiken, in striking down the challenged provisions of the Patriot Act, has upheld both the tradition of judicial independence and our nation's most cherished principle of the right to be secure in one's own home," they said in a written statement. "We are relieved that the Bill of Rights can be honored and preserved even in times of perceived crisis."
Aiken ruled that FISA, as amended by the Patriot Act, permits the government to conduct surveillance and searches targeting Americans without satisfying the probable-cause standard in the Fourth Amendment.
"Prior to the amendments [to FISA], the three branches of government operated with thoughtful and deliberate checks and balances -- a principle upon which our nation was founded," Aiken wrote.
But the Patriot Act, she said, eliminated "the constitutionally required interplay between executive action, judicial decision and Congressional enactment."
"For over 200 years, this nation has adhered to the rule of law -- with unparalleled success. A shift to a nation based on extra-constitutional authority is prohibited, as well as ill-advised," she wrote.
Aiken noted that FISA does not require that the subject of a search be notified, although the Fourth Amendment ordinarily does. In addition, she said, the Fourth Amendment requires particularity -- authorities seeking a search warrant, for example, must list what they are looking for and where they are looking for it.
Named to the bench in 1997 by President Clinton, Aiken is considered one of the more liberal judges on the federal bench in Oregon.
SEATTLE - What began as a simple idea to say thank you to soldiers he passed on the street, has blossomed into a full scale campaign for Seattlite Scott Truitt.
He says many Americans want to express their gratitude to members of our military, but most aren't really sure how to proceed.
"I think there's a lot of politics wrapped around the military and that can get confusing for a lot of people," he said.
Both Truitt's father and father-in-law spent decades in the military, but even so, he realizes approaching strangers can be a little awkward at times.
"For several years I've been walking up and saying thank you to them when I've see them and sometimes its a really comfortable situation, and sometimes its not so comfortable," he said.
So he decided it would be nice to simply have a gesture to say thank you quickly and comfortably.
"The sign language sign for thank you starts at the chin and we thought geez, if you don't know what this means, you might not take it kindly. And that's certainly not the message we wanted to send," he said.
After a little research, he came up with a new idea.
"The gesture starts with your hand on your heart as if you're about to do the Pledge of Allegiance. And then you just bring the hand down and out in front of you. It actually means thank you from the bottom of my heart," he said.
Truitt hopes his Gratitude Campaign will spread across the country, and says even if soldiers don't know exactly what the gesture means, they'll realize if it originates on the heart, its got to be good.
Truitt hopes his video will continue to be shown at the start of every home Seahawks game this season
CORPUS CHRISTI, Texas — Retired Lt. Gen. Ricardo Sanchez said Saturday there is a "crisis in national political leadership" and that partisanship is preventing a strategy that would help the U.S. take on the threat of Islamic extremism.
Sanchez, who spent a tumultuous year as the top U.S. commander in Iraq, made the remarks at a veterans summit sponsored by U.S. Rep. Solomon Ortiz, a Corpus Christi Democrat.
About 200 veterans and their families attended the event. They gave Sanchez a standing ovation and mobbed him afterward for autographs.
"My assessment is that we have a crisis in national political leadership," Sanchez said. "When will America recognize the danger we face? When will the corrosive partisanship of American politics end and allow for a bipartisan solution to arguably the most dangerous threat our nation has faced in over 60 years?"
After his speech, Sanchez wouldn't name names, but told The Associated Press he was referring to "the most senior leadership in our nation."
"We have failed as a nation to bring together a grand strategy and that is creating a large part of the difficulty we face in this current war effort," he said.
Sanchez became the senior U.S. commander in Iraq in June 2003, two months after the fall of Baghdad, and held the post until June 2004. He retired in November 2006 after 33 years.
Sanchez was faulted by some for leadership failures in the Abu Ghraib prisoner abuse scandal. He was not accused of any misconduct but was criticized by some for not doing more to avoid mistreatment of Iraqi prisoners.
Sanchez said Saturday he is not surprised that the U.S. still has a presence in Iraq, nor is he surprised at current troop levels. But, he said, focusing on troop numbers will not end the conflict.
"We can't focus on the military element of power to solve this war," he said after his speech.
During his address, Sanchez said "tremendous work" has been done for veterans, but he also pointed out the challenge of post-traumatic stress disorder, which he said service members must think of as an injury and not as a "matter of manhood."
"We must not abandon today's warriors," he said. "This must become a matter of national priority."
Nearly 1 million people have died in combat or combat-related events.
This year, an estimated 88,000 veterans will be laid in honored rest at National Cemeteries.
There are more than 578,800 surviving spouses, children, and parents of deceased veterans.
The largest number of living veterans served during the Vietnam War: 8.2 million. Veterans make up the majority of all men in the U.S. population ages 65-85.
National Guard Sgt. Chuck Rice shows some classic symptoms of post-traumatic stress disorder. As a veteran, he's eligible for free counseling. But he hasn't gone.Rice, 37, just doesn't want to deal with the bureaucracy and the 40-minute drive to the nearest VA counseling center. His wife, April, said he views seeking help as a sign of weakness.
PTSD is one of the most common mental disorders arising from combat. With 1.5 million having served in Iraq and Afghanistan, as many as 300,000 could have some form of PTSD, health experts say.
The Observer found that the VA, the main agency responsible for treating veterans, is understaffed, underfunded and unprepared for the wave of returning service members.
Rice served on about 50 convoys as a turret gunner, one of the most exposed and dangerous duties in Iraq. Every car, dead dog, or cluster of trash could hide that bomb with his name on it. In his year in Iraq, Rice walked away from three roadside blasts. Such bombs account for 38 percent of the 3,466 U.S. casualties.
The danger "didn't bother me over there," he said, finishing a Bud Lite at Chili's in Gastonia. What bothers him now are crowds, traffic and noises -- loud, sudden noises.
Here is a list of symptoms:
Symptoms
Symptoms can include general restlessness, insomnia, aggressiveness, depression, dissociation, emotional detachment, and nightmares. A potential symptom is memory loss about an aspect of the traumatic event. Amplification of other underlying psychological conditions may also occur. Young children suffering from PTSD will often re-enact aspects of the trauma through their play and may often have nightmares that lack any recognizable content.
One patho-psychological way of explaining PTSD is by viewing the condition as secondary to deficient emotional or cognitive processing of a trauma.[13] This view also helps to explain the three symptom clusters of the disorder:[14]
Intrusion: Since the sufferers are unable to process the extreme emotions brought about by the trauma, they are plagued by recurrent nightmares or daytime flashbacks, during which they graphically re-experience the trauma. These re-experiences are characterized by high anxiety levels and make up one part of the PTSD symptom cluster triad called intrusive symptoms.
Hyperarousal: PTSD is also characterized by a state of nervousness with the patient being prepared for "fight or flight". The typical hyperactive startle reaction, characterized by "jumpiness" in connection with loud unexpected sounds or fast motions, is typical for another part of the PTSD cluster called hyperarousal symptoms and could also be secondary to an incomplete processing, similar to a reflex.
Avoidance: The hyperarousal and the intrusive symptoms are eventually so distressing that the individual strives to avoid contact with everything and everyone, even their own thoughts, which may arouse memories of the trauma and thus provoke the intrusive and hyperarousal states. The sufferers isolate themselves, becoming detached in their feelings with a restricted range of emotional response and can experience so-called emotional detachment ("numbing"). Many Veterans with PTSD may also use avoidance as a technique to avoid losing control and harming others. This avoidance behavior is the third part of the symptom triad that makes up the PTSD criteria.
Dissociation: Dissociation is another "defense" that includes a variety of symptoms including feelings of depersonalization and derealization, disconnection between memory and affect so that the person is "in another world," and in extreme forms can involve apparent multiple personalities and acting without any memory ("losing time").
Ninety-nine U.S. soldiers killed themselves last year, the highest rate of suicide in the Army in 26 years of record-keeping.
Nearly a third of the soldiers who committed suicide did so while serving in Iraq or Afghanistan, according to a report released Thursday. Iraq accounted for most of those - with 27 of the suicides coming from that conflict and three from Afghanistan. Also, there were 948 attempted suicides, officials said, adding that they didn't have a comparison for previous years.
The report said the 99 confirmed suicides among active duty soldiers compares with 87 in 2005 and is the highest number since 102 were reported in 1991, the year of the Persian Gulf War, when there were more soldiers on active duty.
Investigations are still pending on two other deaths.
In a half million-person Army, last year's suicide toll translates to a rate of 17.3 per 100,000, the highest since the Army started counting in 1980, officials said. The rate has fluctuated over those years, with the low being 9.1 per 100,000 in 2001...
Senate passes VA spending bill in near-unanimous vote
The Senate passed the Military Construction/Veterans Affairs Department spending bill for fiscal 2008 in a near-unanimous vote, which will likely compel President Bush to sign it despite a previous threat to veto it. The appropriations are $4 billion more than the president requested, which led the White House to raise the threat.
The bill includes $64.8 billion for discretionary spending and $41 billion in veterans’ disability benefits.
The Senate passed the bill by a 92-1 vote Sept. 6. Sen. Jim DeMint (R-S.C.) made the lone vote against it. The Senate bill mirrors the House version passed in June.
The bill increases VA health care by almost 10 percent, or $3.2 billion. That’s in addition to $1.3 billion that Congress added for health care to the Iraq funding bill passed in May.
“Congress has a responsibility to provide for important veterans programs, especially during a time of war,” said Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.).
”The VA has consistently underestimated the resources necessary to meet the growing needs of veterans returning from Iraq and Afghanistan, resulting in dangerous budget shortfalls that have imperiled the availability of quality health care for all veterans,” said Sen. Robert Byrd (D-W.Va.), chairman of the Senate Appropriations Committee, in a statement...
Two years ago, the administration’s estimate for health care fell far short of veterans’ needs. Earlier this year, revelations about mismanagement and poor living conditions for wounded soldiers and follow-up care for veterans drove the Bush administration and Congress to improve military and veterans health care as a cost of war. VA continues to lag on resolving and delivering veterans’ disability benefits in a timely manner.
“This funding bill provides the resources needed to improve and strengthen health care for our brave veterans, and wisely directs key investments to areas in the greatest need,” Byrd said.
The bill provides for $1.8 billion for information technology systems, $684 million more than this year’s enacted level and $38.8 million more than Bush’s request. Funds will go toward IT programs, including information security, the Financial and Logistics Integrated Technology Enterprise, and the HealtheVet-Vista Electronic Health Records system.
In final deliberations, the Senate added an amendment requiring VA to develop the capability to anonymously report online waste, fraud and abuse to the inspector general through a link on VA’s home page. The VA is to create the link 30 days after passage of the bill.
The Senate also added $100 million to the spending bill for security at the 2008 political conventions in St. Paul, Minn., and Denver.
One of the most searing events in German history occurred soon after Hitler took office. On February 27, 1933, in what easily could be termed the 9/11 terrorist attack of that time, German terrorists fire-bombed the German parliament building. It shouldn’t surprise anyone that Adolf Hitler, one of the strongest political leaders in history, would declare war on terrorism and ask the German parliament (the Reichstag) to give him temporary emergency powers to fight the terrorists. Passionately claiming that such powers were necessary to protect the freedom and well-being of the German people, Hitler persuaded the German legislators to give him the emergency powers he needed to confront the terrorist crisis. What became known as the Enabling Act allowed Hitler to suspend civil liberties “temporarily,” that is, until the crisis had passed. Not surprisingly, however, the threat of terrorism never subsided and Hitler’s “temporary” emergency powers, which were periodically renewed by the Reichstag, were still in effect when he took his own life some 12 years later. Is it so surprising that ordinary German citizens were willing to support their government’s suspension of civil liberties in response to the threat of terrorism, especially after the terrorist strike on the Reichstag? During the 1930s, the United States faced the Great Depression, and many Americans were willing to accede to Roosevelt’s assumption of massive emergency powers, including the power to control economic activity and also to nationalize and confiscate people’s gold. During the Cold War, the fear of communism induced Americans to permit their government to collect massive amounts of income taxes to fund the military-industrial complex and to let U.S. officials send more than 100,000 American soldiers to their deaths in undeclared wars in Korea and Vietnam. Since the 9/11 attacks, Americans have been more than willing for their government to infringe on vital civil liberties, including habeas corpus, involve the nation in an undeclared and unprovoked war on Iraq, and spend ever-growing amounts of money on the military-industrial complex, all in the name of the “war on terrorism.” It is a sad day in the history of our great nation that our elected congress would not restore habeas corpus to the people. History repeats itself again.
VFW Announces "Honor a Veteran" Online Video Contest
KANSAS CITY, Mo., Sept. 18, 2007--Just in time for Veterans Day on November 11, the VFW has unveiled a new online contest to honor veterans.
All members of the public are invited to participate by creating a video honoring any U.S. military veteran. Prizes include a trip for two to Orlando, Fla., courtesy of Southwest Airlines Vacations, two Nintendo Wii systems, and gift cards to national retailers.
"Millions of Americans have a friend, family member, or loved one who is a veteran," said George Lisicki, VFW national commander. "With the 'Honor a Veteran' contest, they can now share that respect and love with the world. Regardless of a person's stance on politics or the war, our veterans deserve to be honored for their sacrifice and bravery. This contest gives everyone the chance to do just that."
The deadline for the contest is Nov. 3, 2007. Winners will be announced on Veterans Day. Videos will be judged on creativity, originality and how well they honor our nation's veterans.
The contest is being produced and promoted through the AIMS (Accelerated Interactive Media Saturation) program offered by SiteEDGE Agency, an interactive marketing firm located in Kansas City.
Janice Thompson, managing director of SiteEDGE Agency said, "We are honored to be a part of helping the VFW with this important project. We hope to raise the profile of veterans and the VFW in the online world by hosting and promoting this historic event."
Well I sure am glad to see that our justice system does work and works well. America is great with its system of checks and balance.
For every negative there is a positive. Sleep well my Left wing friends not all is lost. =
NEWARK, N.J. - Two students in northern New Jersey can wear buttons featuring a picture of Hitler youth to protest a school uniform policy, a federal judge ruled Thursday.
U.S. District Judge Joseph A. Greenaway Jr. sided with the parents of the students, who had been threatened with suspension last fall for wearing the buttons. However, the judge added in his ruling that the boys will not be allowed to distribute the buttons at school.
Citing a 1969 case in Iowa involving students who wore black arm bands to protest the Vietnam War, Greenaway wrote that "a student may not be punished for merely expressing views unless the school has reason to believe that the speech or expression will 'materially and substantially disrupt the work and discipline of the school.'"
The buttons bear the words "no school uniforms" with a slash through them superimposed on a photo of young boys wearing identical shirts and neckerchiefs. There are no swastikas visible on the buttons, but the parties agreed that they depict members of Hitler youth.
After the suspension threat, the boys' parents filed a federal lawsuit claiming the district stifled the children's First Amendment free speech rights.
District lawyers asserted that the image of the Hitler youth was abhorrent because it conveyed intolerance and racial inequality represented by Nazism.
It is a mistake to think that early in a fascist shift you see the profile of barbed wire against the sky. In the early days, things look normal on the surface; peasants were celebrating harvest festivals in Calabria in 1922; people were shopping and going to the movies in Berlin in 1931. Early on, as WH Auden put it, the horror is always elsewhere - while someone is being tortured, children are skating, ships are sailing: "dogs go on with their doggy life ... How everything turns away/ Quite leisurely from the disaster." As Americans turn away quite leisurely, keeping tuned to internet shopping and American Idol, the foundations of democracy are being fatally corroded. Something has changed profoundly that weakens us unprecedentedly: our democratic traditions, independent judiciary and free press do their work today in a context in which we are "at war" in a "long war" - a war without end, on a battlefield described as the globe, in a context that gives the president - without US citizens realising it yet - the power over US citizens of freedom or long solitary incarceration, on his say-so alone.
They say eyes are the window to the soul, but I think music would be a better medium. Just my opinion, and I know that everyone out there has heard something that has moved them. In my opinion there's always a song that moves you. Or how do I say reflects your state of mind. We relate a song to a lost friend, or a point in our lives that meant a lot to us. Or a lot of other things I'm to lazy to write about, but you know where I'm coming from. I think that music moves our soul. It's one of the things that make this life a more interesting place.
I'm sure a lot names pop into your mind, but let me tell you about who I'd like to party with Neil deGrasse Tyson. Click the link to find out who he is. I first seen him on the Daily Show. If there is someone who can get you interested in the universe it's this man. What got me hooked today, was GRB's (Gamma ray bursts) . In the life of our planet there is a 1% chance that one will hit our little house on the prairie. Do you want to know what a GRB is then go here. If not the I'll give you the short of it. When a super star goes super nova or hyper nova, and collapses upon itself to form a black hole. A tremendous amount of energy is released through the compression process. Sorta like squeezing a grape in the palm of your hand. It squirts out both sides of your hand. The energy released is 1 million trillion times the energy of our sun, and that's not a typo! To put it into terms that we can have some type of way to gage it. Every second our sun produces more energy than the human race has used since we came into being. It boggles the mind. The short of it is, that if one these Gamma Ray Bursts happened to hit they earth, it would be a quick end. A GRB moves at the speed of light, so we wouldn't see it coming. If it was within 1000 light years of our planet it would burn off our ozone and atmosphere, delivering radiation 100x the lethal dose to humans, and causing all life to start decomposing at the cellular level. Not good! NASA launched the SWIFT probe in 20 November 2004. If you are interested in real time information the Swift mission data it can be viewed here. accessed here. It's very cool, but only interesting if you're above the level of a wife beater t-shirt. Now for Mr.Neil deGrasse Tyson I give you a couple videos that I hope you will enjoy.
I was going to publish this long string of things that wouldn't keep people interested, but I decided against it. We have a Bill of Rights and a Constitution . These apply to all Americans! We know what is written in these documents, but do we really understand what it means to us as a people. They are the basic principles that make us Americans. They are the building stones of our nation. It is the principle that the people have the power, and the men and women we designate are to carry out our will. It now seems the people we designate feel that we are small children who don't know the big picture. That fear will make us complacent. Enough we must say! Many persons try to speak for the people, our elected representatives ignore the will of the people that have sent them there, and we sent them with a clear mission. End the madness of war. It's not happening. We as Veterans should be at the for front of protesting a war that has no meaning. To see what this war really is doing to us, we only need to see how protesters and free speech is being brutally snuffed out. Our oath demands that we demand something better from our leaders. If you have the nerve you should check out this clip.
What is wrong with America? WE don't care! We let this shit happen, and then bitch about China and North Korea. We have lost our way. It's time we wake up and start to make our voices heard.
Corruption is a general concept describing any organized, interdependent system in which part of the system is either not performing duties it was originally intended to, or performing them in an improper way, to the detriment of the system's original purpose.
