The mom in me wants this war over. I have all boys and I selfishly want them to have to never go to war. The woman is me wants crimes against families, women, and children ANYWHERE they are committed to stop. The wife in me is so darn grateful that my husband does not have to go over and fight. It's easy to sit and judge when it's not our ass on the front line. I live right next to Hill AFB. We see troops coming and going all the time. And over and over again we hear the same thing from American Soldiers. "If the American public is so damn worried about us and if we should be fighting this war, then maybe they need to put up or shut up." If you are against the war for whatever reasons, so be it. But don't think you are defending our soldiers or the Iraqi citizens. The soldiers I know have the most respect for the ones they are defending. It's the ones that are sitting here safe on american soil with their antiwar and anti Bush views they are ashamed of. And you can quote me on that. Tammy

I've got to say, this is a very one-sided view.

The following are some small excerpts from the investigative report titled DEAD MEN WALKING from the most recent issue of Discover: IMO, it highlights how Bush wants to keep the troops in a futile war with an unacceptable price, and yet, he, himself, will not support the troops by insuring the money will be there to treat the wounded. At the same time he tries to shame Americans who advocate pulling our troops out with the rhetoric that if we want to cut and run then we don't support the troops. I think his new budget proposal that cuts funding for the care of our war heroes makes it perfectly clear how he doens't support our precious troops. _________________________ "In a flash, the blast incinerates air, sprays metal burns flesh. Milliseconds after an improvised explosive device (IED) detonates, a blink after a mortar shell blows, an overpressurization wave engulfs the human body, and just a quickly, an underpressure wave follows and vanishes. Eardrums burst, bubbles appear in the bloodstream, the heart slows. A soldier - or a civilian - can survive the blast without a single penetrating wound and still receive the worst diagnosis: traumatic brain injury, or TBI, the signature injury of the Iraq War. "Blast related brain injuries can deliver multiple TBIs. First there is the barotraumas, in which the body suffers the same magnitude of pressure felt deep underwater. It's theorized that portions of the brain swell and decompress almost instantly during this stage, causing a host of cellular defect throughout the brain. Objects like shrapnel and gravel penetrate the skull, ping-ponging within the cranium walls. The force of the blast then blows and individual up against an object like a wall or a roof, causing blunt trauma to the head. Finally, in response to these injuries, the brain releases a metabolic cascade of neurochemicals that have a toxic effect on the brain tissue. "But in the same instant that the blast unleashes chaos, it also activates the most organized and sophisticated trauma care in history. Within 13 hours, a soldier can be medivaced to a state-of-the-art field hospital, placed on a flying intensive care unit, "NO OTHER WAR HAS CREATED SO MANY SERIOUSLY DISABLED VETERANS." "Soldiers are surviving some brain injuries with only their brain stems unimpaired. "While the Pentagon has yet to release hard numbers on brain-injured troops, citing security issues, brain-injury professionals express concern about the range of number reported from other military related sources like the Defense and Veterans Brain Injury Center, The Department of Defense and the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA). One expert from the VA estimates the number of undiagnosed TBIs at over 7,500. Nearly 2,000 brain-injured soldiers have already received some level of care. But the TBIs - human beings reduced to an abbreviation - - keep on coming." "The moment an injured soldier hits the helipad at Balad (Air Base), he's swept into a whirlwind of critical care.... Amid the cramped bustle, doctors are pushing the boundaries of medicine. They're going through crates of the hemophilia drug Factor VII, yet to be approved for trauma but a wonder drug in stopping bleedouts. At $3,000 a vial, two vials per dose, the price is a drop in the bucket compared with the expenses incurred during the critical phase of recovery, which can easily exceed a million dollars in the coming weeks. The lifetime cost of care for brain-injured troops could reach $35 BILLION, according to a Nobel Prize-winning economist and a Harvard University budget expert." "...Marilyn Price Spivack... is innately tenacious, bold, and energetic. The availability of cognitive, neurobehavioral, and mental health services is sorely lacking, Spivack explains....'The military is doing an extraordinary job in saving young soldiers and treating them through the ACUTE rehabilitation phase' says Spivack, who works with the brain-injured population at Spaulding Rehabilitation Hospital in Boston. In the early 1980s she founded the Brain Injury Association, today7 the foremost advocacy organization for TBI survivors... 'Now the government must make a commitment to help them in their recovery, but where are the resources going to come from? As brain-injury professionals, we know that TBI services aren't available in many places across the country and we are aware of huge holes in the system,' she says. 'Frankly, I'm frustrated and angry about the government's refusal to give the TBI population the support it desperately needs.... Many states do not have a single brain injury rehabilitation center, and of the states that do offer some level of TBI treatment, few actually provide enough assistance to acquire even the most basic level of specialized care. At rates that can exceed a thousand dollars a day for POST ACUTE TBI rehabilitation, there aren't many American families that that can afford a month's worth of treatment, much less the recommended MINIMUM of 90 days." "As recently as mid-July 2006, the VA Office of the Inspector General admitted that patients and families were dealing with major inadequacies. The reality is that a fundamental level of care is simply absent in most states.... Problems experienced by patients and families include inadequate or absent communication with case managers, lack of follow-up care, and being forced to pay out of pocket for necessary treatments and medication."

Kimanne, Are you still happy that Bush got 4 more years???? I'm guessing you haven't lost any one dear or near to you in this useless war. As far as getting happier and more positive with the onset of the New Year...well, look at at the news and see how it's going. We're NOT winning nor will we ever win in such a situation.

Cassandra, You are right about the time line. It did start on Clinton's watch and was once again ignored/put on the shelf but Iraq has NEVER been in the main focus in the war on terror until the current administration "fibbed" about Weapons of Major Destruction. There was intel info on the Muslims that were taking flying lessons in the US that was totally ignored....there is no excuse for that. We were warned and we ignored it. I live in the suburbs of Houston and when Hurrican Rita (this was right after hurricane Katrina) was supposed to hit our area, Sugar Land, TX, there was NO ESCAPE. The roads were so jammed with cars that no one could move. People died waiting to get out; no gas; the list goes on and on. That event made me realize, even more than ever, that we CAN NOT depend on our government to take care of us. We are on our own. Survival of the fittest is the phrase that comes to my mind. Look at all that is happening as we type, insurgents from other countries being shipped into Iraq to fight the US. Don't be naive and think terroism won't happen again in the US; it's a matter of when, where & how. I believe that Houston is No. 5 on the list because of our oil refinories. Our government can not protect us...we are on our own. I'd rather try to be a bit more on the "peace making" side than sending in more troops that will stand in harms way. I was brought up in Scandinavia and have lived in several foreign countries so when I say that other countries think that they are the best.....I know of what I speak. I really have always believed that it takes an exceptional person to say "I screwed up...". I do it with my 3 teens at timest and hope they remember their mom being sorry when she was wrong. Bush digs his heels in and won't budge. Well, guess what, any of us that are parents, and/or mature adults, know that life changes in a second and we have to adjust. Clinton didn't do this part of his job properly but Bush went way off base by what he did. My 21 yr. old daughter has gone to 3 funerals of Soldiers that she knew. That's 3 too many young people that died. Again, when there is $$$$$ involved we get lost. The sheer fact that Haliburton/Cheney/Bush (?) are profitting off this war is disgusting. The rules are different for the rich than the "middle" class. We, the people, really have to take back control of the future of this country. I dread what is going to happen if we don't take the power back that our forefathers so intelligently gave us.