"The facts are stark and the facts are real...Our men and women in
uniform love their country more than their comfort. They have never failed
us, and we must not fail them. But the best intentions and the highest
morale are undermined by back-to-back deployments, poor pay, shortages
of spare parts and equipment, and rapidly declining readiness."

"...these are signs of a military in decline and we must do something
about it. The reasons are clear. Lack of equipment and material.
Undermaning of units. Overdeployment. Not enough time for family. Soldiers who
are on food stamps, and soldiers who are poorly housed. Dick Cheney
and I have a simple message today for our men and women in uniform, their
parents, their loved ones, their supporters: Help is on the way!"

"A generation shaped by Vietnam must remember the lessons of Vietnam.
When America uses force in the world, the cause must be just, the goal
must be clear, and the victory must be overwhelming."

"To build morale in today's United States military we must keep faith
with those who have worn the uniform in the past. We must keep faith
with America's veterans. . .And keeping faith also means giving our
veterans first-rate health care and treating the veterans with dignity. . .So
chaotic is the process there is now a backlog of nearly one
half-million claims. This is no way to treat any citizen, much less a veteran of
our armed forces. The veterans health-care system and the claims
process will be modernized, so that claims are handled in a fair and friendly
way."

"In my Administration, the Department of Veterans Affairs will act as
an advocate for veterans seeking benefit claims, not act as an
adversary. Veterans who once stood in the line of fire to protect our freedom
should not have to stand in the line of a bureaucracy that is unwilling
to help them in their claims."

---George W. Bush VFW Speech - August 21, 2000

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Could it be, given the quality and intelligence of our all-volunteer army, that coed troops are a dangerous and untenable 'innovation'? Chauvinistic Iranian fundamentalists would agree that women deserve protection from men and have no place as warriors. Which side is the more socially primitive?

The Selective Service draft of a cross section of the populace is the only way to ensure a democratic distribution of rational personnel and any semblance of non-animal culture. As long as we have an Army of desperate, no-option dim-witted recruits, anomie will be converted to the vicious cruelty that we have experienced in the extra curricular and officially sanctioned torture, rape and plunder (corporatism) that are exemplified by the terms, Abu Graib, Halliburton, Blackwater, Hillary Clinton AIPAC, Dick Cheney and, yes, Pat Tilman & LaVena Johnson.

As we reinstitute the draft in order to man the new battles in Iran, we can also change the induction ages from 18-36 to 46-65 and call it 'affirmative action' for the promoters of War for Dollars. Then we can truly honor our troops.

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OK, fair enough.

1. We are all sick of the yellow flags, of course. Why should we all pretend to "honor' our troops when each soul has the moral (in the case of Christians who claim obeisance to the New Testament, read Matt. 5-8) or ethical (in the case of agnosticism) obligation to opt out of war. Even for those who ascribe to the 'just war' doctrines of Augustine, it is high time that they were called on the rug for their sins of commission in regard for support of a patently absurd and corruptly vicious and hateful, racist war. (This leads your question #2 of axiom69)

2. Hypocrisy in all forms need to be addressed. The want of women to share in an illegitimate pie, that began about the time of the proposed ERA, should not leave anyone off the hook. If one accepts the evil of war, then women who do accept the evil of war are no more legitimate than the men in uniform and they deserve the equal right and derision due to be apart of the apostacy. Please google up corporatism and then Christian Zionism and discover how exploited (and ignorant) the individuals are who are active in the military. So lets get this straight. Being a part of a Semper Fi, esprit de corps group; well, Einstein put it this way:

Albert Einstein
"He who joyfully marches to music rank and file, has already earned my contempt. He has been given a large brain by mistake, since for him the spinal cord would surely suffice. This disgrace to civilization should be done away with at once. Heroism at command, how violently I hate all this, how despicable and ignoble war is; I would rather be torn to shreds than be a part of so base an action. It is my conviction that killing under the cloak of war is nothing but an act of murder."

And so, Ciara Durkin, the woman soldier who got shot in the head had put herself in harms way; and as a woman did not deserve to be blindsided and betrayed by murderers this way. I cry for her. Lets all hope that more women will not to join her in the folly of combat. Who lives by the sword, dies by the sword.

3.The draft. I was a Viet Nam activist and resister to the draft. When the draft was put on a lottery, the resistance lost almost all those who drew favorable numbers. Accountability is about sharing the consequences of allowing a war to continue without protest. Conscription as well as recruitment targets 17-18 year olds. These are boys and girls who have never called a moral judgement for themselves. The political realm knows full well the ease of switch and baiting parental authority with military authority and keeping maturity in animated suspension. It is the individual who is accountable to God, not the authority of the military, Congress, the President, the Church or any corporate pseudo-soul. It is the individual that I challenge to be accountable.

The draft of mature men who have the experience of making moral choices for themselves is the advocacy. Then we will not be called to 'honor' our troops who are damn well aware of what they do. Let the war profiteers, fight their own battles, men or women.

And please forgive my stridency, but it is long past time for protest of this, our fascist regime.

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The US Army has reported that Juan Torres Jr. died at Bagram Air Force Base on July 12th, 2004 due to a single gunshot wound to the head. ...
check out his story.

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