Thomas Paine's version of "you didn't build that":
"Separate an individual from society,and give him an island or a continent to possess,and he cannot acquire personal property. He cannot be rich. So inseparably are the means connected with the end,in all cases,that where the former do not exist the latter cannot be obtained. All accumulation, therefore,of personal property,beyond what a man's own hands produce, is derived to him by living in society; and he owes on every principle of justice,of gratitude,and of civilization,a part of that accumulation back again to society from whence the whole came"
Submitted by Leah
Privacy & Cookies: This site uses cookies. By continuing to use this website, you agree to their use.
To find out more, including how to control cookies, see here:
Cookie Policy
In the Viet Nam era, stories like this and television reporting on the war contributed to the end of the Viet Nam War in a time frame of much less than 17 years.
As deployment of the last 17 years only came to a sub set of young people, and TV and news rarely covered the searing violence of war, eschewing such content for minor content (Kardashians, Tweets, outrageous behavior), the daily violence and futility went “off stage”.
One is invited to read the daily post, “United States Wars, News and Casualties” and then watch the daily news on the U.S. TV Media.
The absence of U.S. War News is atrocious.
We need this daily report of our wars in our face………..Daily.
The McGlynn
Damn The War Criminals,Bush,Cheney,Rice,Rumsfeld, Wolfowitz, Powell and Blair from England.
How many Iraqis have died as a result of the invasion 15 years ago? Some credible estimates put the number at more than one million. You can read that sentence again.
The invasion of Iraq is often spoken of in our country as a “blunder,” or even a “colossal mistake.” It was a crime.
Those who perpetrated it are still at large. Some of them have even been rehabilitated thanks to the horrors of a mostly amnesiac citizenry.
We condemned children to death, some after many days of writhing in pain on bloodstained mats, without pain relievers. Some died quickly, wasted by missing arms and legs, crushed heads. As the fluids ran out of their bodies, they appeared like withered, spoiled fruits. They could have lived, certainly should have lived – and laughed and danced, and run and played- but instead they were brutally murdered. Yes, murdered!
The war ended for those children, but it has never ended for survivors who carry memories of them. Likewise, the effects of the U.S. bombings continue, immeasurably and indefensibly.
If the 54-minute recording is verified, it will be the first by the Islamic State leader in almost a year
Islamic State has released a new militant audio recording, purportedly of its leader, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, his first in almost a year.
In the audio, Baghdadi – whose whereabouts and fate remain unknown – urges followers to “persevere” and continue fighting the group’s enemies everywhere.
The 54-minute audio, entitled: “Give Glad Tidings to the Patient”, was released by the extremist group’s central media arm, al-Furqan Foundation, on Wednesday evening.
The audio’s authenticity could not be independently verified and there were no clues as to where it was recorded.
The question of whether Baghdadi is dead or alive has been a continuing source of mystery and confusion. The extremist group has lost around 90% of territory it controlled in Iraq and Syria in 2014, when IS declared its so-called “caliphate”.
He is believed to be hiding somewhere in the desert that stretches across the Syrian-Iraqi border region. His last audio message was on 28 September 2017 in which he called on his followers to burn their enemies everywhere and target “media centres of the infidels”.
WASHINGTON (AP) — The United States has rejected an invitation to join Russia-led talks on Afghanistan because they are unlikely to help bring peace, a State Department spokesman said Wednesday, as the Trump administration prepared to appoint a diplomatic veteran as a new special envoy for the war-battered nation.
Russia said that the Taliban will be joining the Sept. 4 talks in Moscow, along with representatives of several neighboring countries. It will be one of the insurgent group’s biggest diplomatic forays since the 2001 U.S.-led invasion of Afghanistan.
Afghan Foreign Ministry spokesman Sibghatullah Ahmadi told The Associated Press in Kabul that the government will not attend the meeting in Moscow, saying the peace process should be Afghan-led. He also said that “a peace process without the cooperation of the Afghan government would not be successful.”
The State Department official said that as a matter of principle, the U.S. supports Afghan-led efforts to advance a peace settlement. And, based on previous Russia-led meetings on Afghanistan, the Moscow talks are “unlikely to yield any progress toward that end.” The spokesman was not authorized to be quoted by name and requested anonymity.
That decision comes as the Taliban escalates attacks across Afghanistan. It has refused direct talks with Kabul, even as it seeks to raises its diplomatic profile in the region and calls for talks with the U.S. which it views as the real power behind the Afghan government. The insurgent group has yet to respond to President Ashraf Ghani’s offer earlier this week of a conditional cease-fire for the duration of the Eid al-Adha religious holiday that began Tuesday.
LALITPUR, Nepal — Man Bahadur Thapa cannot sleep. At home in Lalitpur, a Nepali city of ancient temples, the pricking pain from the shrapnel lodged in his body keeps him awake.
Mr. Thapa struggles to walk, so he drags himself out of bed, inching forward on his elbows. Many times, he gives up and sobs in his tiny bedroom. “Death would be a respite,” he said.
His thoughts often drift to the morning two years ago in Kabul, Afghanistan, when a Taliban bomber blew himself up near an unarmored minibus. It was carrying Mr. Thapa and other South Asian security contractors to the Canadian Embassy, where they earned about $3 an hour.
Fifteen of his fellow contractors from Nepal and India lost their lives, in one of the deadliest attacks on foreign workers in the Afghan capital. Mr. Thapa was so badly mutilated that doctors could not initially identify him.
Pramila Koirala, left, and her sister Kabira at their home in Kathmandu. Their father, Madhu Sudan Koirala, died in the Kabul bombing, little more than a year after earthquakes in Nepal killed two of their siblings.CreditLauren DeCicca for The New York Times
The contractors, with their backgrounds as Gurkha soldiers, thought they were valued fixtures at the embassy. But after the June 2016 bombing left them permanently disabled, five survivors said that they heard almost nothing from Canadian officials, and that representatives from Sabre International, a private security firm contracted to manage the guards, stopped communicating with them.
While they underwent painful, expensive treatment for broken bones and head injuries, the men learned their insurance benefits from Sabre had been cut from a cap of $300,000 to $30,000. The men said they found out only after the bombing.
In June, dozens of survivors and relatives of the dead filed a lawsuit against the Canadian government and Sabre. They seek millions of dollars in insurance benefits outlined in the original employment contracts, and recognition that newer policies, apparently valid at the time of the bombing, lumped Nepali and Indian workers into a discriminatory and poorly compensated category, “third country nationals.”
The Afghan Commandos have stormed a hideout of the Taliban group which was used as a headquarter by the Taliban militants in northern Faryab province.
The 209th Shaheen Corps of the Afghan Military in the North said the Afghan Commandos on Tuesday night stormed the Taliban hideout in the vicinity of Khwajah Sabz Posh district.
The source further added that ten militants were killed during the operation and some weapons, munitions, and military equipment were confiscated.
The security situation in Faryab province has deteriorated sharply during the recent years amid growing insurgency activities by the anti-government armed militant groups.
This comes as at least one hundred and two militants including some leaders of the Taliban have been killed in the airstrikes conducted in this province on Sunday.
MOSUL, Iraq (Reuters) – Iraqi grandmother Sana Ibrahim al-Taee has a full-time job feeding and clothing her 22 grandchildren after Islamic State killed their fathers – her sons – a struggle in a cramped flat with little help from the state.
An Iraqi woman Sana Ibrahim al-Taee, 64, whose five sons were killed by Islamic State militants, play with her grandchildren at her home in Mosul, Iraq July 30, 2018. REUTERS/Ari Jalal
An Iraqi woman Sana Ibrahim al-Taee, 64, whose five sons were killed by Islamic State militants, buys fruits in Mosul, Iraq August 6, 2018. REUTERS/Ari Jalal
Al-Taee and her husband, who has Alzheimer’s, share their four-room apartment in eastern Mosul with the children, aged between two and 16, their daughter and two of their sons’ widows. Rent, food, clothes and schooling depend on donations and charity handouts.
Al-Taee is waiting to hear if the government will provide pensions of 500,000 dinars ($420) a month for her sons, who worked in the military and police.
“I hope that the authorities will give pensions and housing for those orphans, because I am not going to live for 100 years,” the 60-year-old told Reuters.
Al-Taee, who is in poor health with vocal cord paralysis, has provided death certificates for three sons but said the other two were buried in mass, unmarked graves and she has not been able to find their bodies.
That means they are classed as missing rather than dead so she has no death certificates for them and cannot apply for their pensions – a common problem for families in the north and west of the country where Islamic State controlled vast swaths of territory in 2014………………“When Daesh (Islamic state) militants seized our areas, they destroyed us. By God, the militants humiliated us. They killed our sons and nothing has remained,” al-Taee said.
The two widows living in the cramped home had been working for local civil organizations but left after not being paid. They are now looking for work as servants. ($1 = 1,186.0000 Iraqi dinars)
JERUSALEM — U.S. sanctions are having a strong effect on Iran’s economy and popular opinion, though regime change there is not part of Washington’s policy, President Donald Trump’s national security adviser said on Wednesday.
The Trump administration re-imposed sanctions this month after withdrawing from the 2015 international nuclear deal with Iran, which Washington saw as inadequate for curbing Tehran’s activities in neighbouring Middle East countries and denying it the means to make an atomic bomb.
The U.S. turnaround outraged Iran, which has taken a defiant stance, and has rattled other world powers where some businesses have been debating whether to divest from the Islamic Republic.
“Let me be clear, the reimposition of the sanctions, we think, is already having a significant effect on Iran’s economy and on, really, popular opinion inside Iran,” National Security Adviser John Bolton told Reuters on a visit to Israel.
It is estimated almost 18 million people lack access to good, nutritious food and 8.4 million are on verge of famine, as they simply do not know where their next meal is coming from.
The United Nations has described the conflict in Yemen as one of “the worst humanitarian disasters in modern times”.
The civil war has left millions struggling to afford basic goods.
It is estimated that 8.4 million Yemenis are on the verge of starvation, with many more eating just one small meal a day.
The Department of Defense announced today the death of a soldier who was supporting Operation Inherent Resolve.
Chief Warrant Officer 3 Taylor J. Galvin, 34, from Spokane, Washington, died Aug. 20, 2018, in Baghdad, Iraq, as a result of injuries sustained when his helicopter crashed in Sinjar, Ninevah Province, Iraq. The incident is under investigation.
Galvin was assigned to the 1st Battalion, 160th Special Operations Aviation Regiment (SOAR), Fort Campbell, Kentucky.
The Department of Defense announced today the death of a soldier who was supporting Operation Freedom’s Sentinel.
Staff Sgt. Reymund Rarogal Transfiguracion, 36, from Waikoloa, Hawaii, died Aug. 12, 2018, of wounds sustained when an improvised explosive device detonated near him while he was conducting combat patrol operations in Helmand Province, Afghanistan. The incident is under investigation.
Transfiguracion was assigned to the 3rd Battalion, 1st Special Forces Group (Airborne), Joint Base Lewis-McChord, Washington.
All VA Medical Centers provide PTSD care, as well as many VA clinics.Some VA’s have programs specializing in PTSD treatment. Use the VA PTSD ProgramLocator to find a PTSD program.If you are a war Veteran, find a Vet Center to help with the transition from military to civilian life.
This entry was posted
on Thursday, August 23rd, 2018 at 5:01 am and is filed under United States Wars.
You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed.
Both comments and pings are currently closed.
