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
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In the Vietnam era, stories like this and television reporting on the war contributed to the end of the Vietnam 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.
KABUL — Seventeen years into the war in Afghanistan, American officials routinely issue inflated assessments of progress that contradict what is actually happening there.
More than 2,200 Americans have been killed in the Afghan conflict, and the United States has spent more than $840 billion fighting the Taliban insurgency and paying for relief and reconstruction. The war has become more expensive, in current dollars, than the Marshall Plan, which helped to rebuild Europe after World War II. That investment has created intense pressure for Americans to show the Taliban are losing and the country is improving.
But since 2017, the Taliban have held more Afghan territory than at any time since the American invasion. In just one week last month, the insurgents killed 200 Afghan police officers and soldiers, overrunning two major Afghan bases and the city of Ghazni.
The American military says the Afghan government effectively “controls or influences” 56 percent of the country. But that assessment relies on statistical sleight of hand. In many districts, the Afghan government controls only the district headquarters and military barracks, while the Taliban control the rest.
On paper, Afghan security forces outnumber the Taliban by 10 to 1, or even more. But some Afghan officials estimate that a third of their soldiers and police officers are “ghosts” who have left or deserted without being removed from payrolls. Many others are poorly trained and unqualified.
Putin and Rouhani ignore Turkish efforts to avoid mass casualties as US warns of possible chemical weapons attack
Syrian children at a camp for displaced civilians near the village of Sarman in Idlib. Photograph: Omar Haj Kadour/AFP/Getty
An all-out assault on the rebel enclave of Idlib in north-west Syria drew closer on Friday after Russia and Iran rejected a Turkish call to back a ceasefire. The move, at a stormy summit in Tehran, left the three countries to paper over their differences through a broadly worded joint statement calling for all sides to back a political settlement to end Syria’s civil war.
The outcome of the summit led to warnings from the west that Russia was pushing Syria towards the edge of an abyss, while US officials claimed it had evidence that the Syrian government was preparing to use chemical weapons.
At a closing press conference, Russia’s Vladimir Putin and Iran’s Hassan Rouhani openly clashed with Turkish president Recep Tayyip Erdogan. Putin insisted that the removal of terrorists from Idlib was the first priority.
Erdogan at the last minute urged his fellow leaders to include a ceasefire in the text of the final communique, but Putin said the armed opposition groups, including those designated terrorists, were not present at the talks, so no such commitment could be made.
It is unclear whether Russia will now order Syrian government forces to pause in the face of Erdo?an’s resistance, and growing warnings from the west of a humanitarian disaster if a full-scale military escalation goes ahead.
The UN special envoy for Syria, Staffan de Mistura, urged Putin to allow more time for efforts to separate UN-designated terrorists from within the the population of Idlib. de Mistura said this was feasible if Turkey was given time to mobilise civilians in Idlib to send a message to the fighters to evacuate the towns and villages. He held up candles to symbolise the wishes of the civilian population.
GENEVA (Reuters) – Yemen’s Houthi movement failed to attend peace talks, but the U.N. Special Envoy said on Saturday that it did not represent a “fundamental blockage in the process” and that he would meet soon with their representatives in Sanaa and in Muscat, Oman.
“They would have like to get here, we didn’t make conditions sufficiently correct to get them here”, U.N. envoy Martin Griffiths told a news conference, declining to elaborate.
Agreement has been reached for medical evacuations from the Houthi-held Yemeni capital of Sanaa, to start in a week with a flight to Cairo, he said.
BASRA/ERBIL, Iraq (Reuters) – Civil unrest fueled by anger against perceived corruption and misrule by Iraq’s political elite intensified across the south of the country on Friday, as protesters stormed the Iranian consulate in Basra while others briefly took workers hostage at a nearby oilfield.
Source BBC
AP Photo/Nabil al-Jurani
After five days of deadly demonstrations in Basra in which government buildings have been ransacked and set alight, protesters broke in and damaged the consulate’s offices, shouting condemnation of what many perceive as Iran’s sway over Iraq’s political affairs.
Security sources said the consulate was empty when the crowd burst in. Iraq’s Foreign Ministry said the storming of the consulate, which it deeply regretted, had nothing to do with protesters’ demands.
“The targeting of diplomatic missions is unacceptable and detrimental to the interests of Iraq,” said ministry spokesman Ahmed Mahjoub.
Iran, however, blamed Iraq for failing to protect its embassy and said it expected Baghdad to “identify and punish the attackers quickly,” Bahram Qassemi, the spokesman for the ministry, told journalists, according to state media.
TEHRAN (Reuters) – The presidents of Turkey, Iran and Russia on Friday failed to agree on a ceasefire that would forestall a Syrian government offensive in the rebel-held Idlib province which the United Nations fears could cause a humanitarian catastrophe involving tens of thousands of civilians.
Turkey’s Tayyip Erdogan, Russia’s Vladimir Putin and Iran’s Hassan Rouhani, meeting in Tehran for a summit of key foreign players in Syria’s war, agreed in a final statement that there could be no military solution to the conflict and it could only end through a negotiated political process.
But as Syrian government and Russian warplanes mounted air strikes in Idlib on Friday morning in a possible prelude to a full-scale offensive, Putin and Rouhani pushed back against Erdogan’s call for a truce.
The Turkish leader said he feared a massacre and Turkey could not accommodate any more refugees flooding over its border.
Russian war planes have launched fresh strikes on the Syrian province of Idlib, a monitor says, as talks in Tehran failed to stop an impending military offensive there.
The raids targeted rebel-held positions in Idlib’s south-west, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said.
Syrian forces, backed by Russia and Iran, are poised to attack the last major rebel stronghold in Syria.
Turkey and others have warned of a pending humanitarian disaster.
In the province itself, thousands of people staged street protests after Friday prayers calling for international protection.
In footage circulating on social media, one protester in the town of Al-Dana said they were demanding that the UN “stop the killing of Syrians”.
What is the latest military action?
The observatory said Russian jets hit positions of the jihadist alliance Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) and the Ahrar al-Sham group on Friday.
“The aim was to destroy rebel fortifications,” observatory head Rami Abdel Rahman said.
MADRID — Shipbuilders are blocking roads in southern Spain amid fears that Saudi Arabia could scrap a $2.1 billion-purchase of warships in retaliation to a move by Madrid to halt a shipment of bombs to Riyadh.
The new center-left Spanish government said earlier this week that it was not planning to deliver the 400 laser-guided precision bombs over worries they may be used to target civilians in Yemen.
Formal cancellation of the order, which dates back to 2015, is expected at a ministers meeting this month.
Saudi diplomats in Madrid declined to comment on whether that could lead to Riyadh canceling a July deal to buy five navy corvettes from Spanish company Navantia.
The Department of Defense announced today the death of a soldier who was supporting Operation Freedom’s Sentinel.
Command Sgt. Maj. Timothy A. Bolyard, 42, from Thornton, West Virginia, died Sept. 3, 2018, of wounds sustained from small arms fire in Logar Province, Afghanistan. The incident is under investigation.
Bolyard was assigned to 3rd Squadron, 1st Security Force Assistance Brigade, Fort Benning, Georgia.
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 Program Locator 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.
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