Cant Keep Quiet!

Once again we’ve reached a milestone that should not be looked at with pride.

The U.S. military on Tuesday announced the deaths of seven more American soldiers, pushing the U.S. military death toll since the beginning of the Iraq war in March 2003 to at least 2,978 — five more than the number killed in the Sept. 11 attacks in New York, Washington and Pennsylvania. - MSNBC

These deaths occurred during another day of violence in Iraq which saw the deaths of 44 more Iraqi’s.

So when will Bush announce his new policy toward the war in Iraq? That announcement is not expected until his State of the Union address on January 23rd.

How many more will have to die while Bush “decides” on a new policy? And just how many more will die if Bush pushes through the only option getting any play lately (sending in more troops)?

Sadly, we’ve been given the time to find out.

Cross posted on Bring It On!

Here’s the situation: your local public airport (or library, or courthouse, or city hall, or. . . you get the idea) has a display of lighted “Christmas trees.” Your local airport (or whatever) decides to call them “Holiday trees” and figure that will be enough to keep all cultures happy. It works for several years and then a local rabbi asks that the local airport (or whatever) put a menorah beside the trees. The rabbi doesn’t ask for the trees to be taken down. He only wants to menorah added to the display to make it more culturally diverse. He also asks for the menorah to be included in the display back in October.

Your local airport (or whatever) doesn’t respond to the rabbi. Maybe they think if they ignore him the rabbi will go away. Maybe they don’t think at all. Maybe they decide to “research” the issue. In any case, having received no response to his request, the rabbi threatens a lawsuit.

Remember, the request was simply to add a menorah to the display. Add something, not take something away.

Your local airport, to ensure cultural sensitivity, responds by taking down the display completely. And by making sure that the implication is that the rabbi forced them to take the trees down. Hoping to hide their inability to make a decision or admit to their actions, your local airport tries to have the trees taken down after midnight.

If you live in Seattle, this really is your local airport. Instead of making a decision anytime between October (when the request was first made) until December 9, 2006 about including a menorah in the display, the port authority decided to take their ball and go home.
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There are many reasons why I feel that capital punishment is wrong. I could write about the ways that the death penalty is racially unjust. For example, how 50% of murder victims are white, but 80% of death penalty cases involve white victims. I could also write that since 1973 over 100 people have been released from death row. Between 2000 and 2004 alone, 35 people were freed from death row and exonerated.

I could also write about how the death penalty is not a deterrent. After all, the South is responsible for 80% of all executions since 1973. If the death penalty was a deterrent then the South should have the lowest murder rate. Instead it has the highest murder rate. The Northeast has the lowest murder rate and it is only responsible for 1% of all executions.

The death penalty has been banned in more than half the countries world-wide. Some of the countries that still permit the death penalty include Iraq, Iran, China, Korea, Vietnam, and Liberia. And, of course, the United States.

I could write about all of that but I’m just going to write about one aspect of the injustice of the death penalty, the execution of the mentally ill.
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I was surprised by the one-line summary of the story in the Washington Post that read

3rd Infantry Division Will Be the First Deployed for a Third Year-Long Tour

To be honest, I thought we already had divisions sent in for a 3rd tour. That’s why I was surprised by the summary. What I went on to read, though, didn’t surprise me. It sadden me.

The 3rd Infantry Division has already lost 317 soldiers in Iraq. Now they are being deployed to Ramadi in the western Anbar province, a very volatile place.

But this story wasn’t just about the 3rd Infantry Division going to Iraq for a 3rd year long tour. It was also about what happened to the families of the 3rd Infantry because of their year in, year out rotations to Iraq.

According to the WaPo article, the year in Iraq, year home lifestyle effects many decisions for these families

They mandate when troops can marry and have children. They sever relationships that cannot sustain the stress of absence or danger. And they lead some couples to pray for the war to end.

Soldier’s families wanting to have children have to decide when they want to time the pregnancy and birth. Should the child be born while dad is away in Iraq? Or should the child be born while he is home but spend its first year away from its father? An additional concern for these families, if the soldier is seriously wounded or killed, how will the child grow up to know their father?

Single soldiers worry about finding a spouse. If they’ve met someone while on their tour stateside, some rush to wed while others hope that the girlfriend or boyfriend will still be there when they get back from Iraq. A hasty wedding often leads to a divorce when the relationship can’t hold up under the distance and worry of a soldier in Iraq. The divorce rate since 2001 is up for members of the Army.

Cross posted on Bring It On!

Here’s a very funny take by Stephen Colbert on what could happen if men could have babies.

Here’s Keith Olbermann reporting on a memo from a Fox News Senior Editorial Vice-President telling employees “what to say and how to say it.”

You can read more about the memo from Fox News at The Huffington Post

Cross posted on Bring It On!