No title good enough ... a flight of ideas

I just a pair of Veteran's Day themed-television movies/documentaries. The first was "Area 60," an HBO documentary which was about the location in Arlington National Cemetery where those military persons killed in Iraq and Afghanistan now rest. The second was the movie “Taking Chance” with Kevin Bacon. It’s an HBO movie, a true story of Lt. Col. Michael Strobl (played by Bacon), who volunteers to escort the remains of a 19-year old Marine, Chance Phelps, who was killed in Iraq in 2004. Chance enlisted from Strobl’s home town, so he decided to volunteer to escort Phelps’ remains home. Pehlps’ hometown was actually Dubois, Wyoming, several hours from Billings, Montana, the nearest large commercial airport

With today being Veterans’ Day, and the crap our president is pulling with his indecision about his little war in Afghanistan, I guess this documentary and the movie touched me deeply. I am sitting here crying.

Over the past several weeks, there have been violent crimes such as gang rapes, the attempted murder of two pre-teen boys because one was wearing shoes favored by a Mexican gang, another boy murdered in his back yard within 2 miles of where I live. Then there was the massacre of good military people in Ft. Hood by a Muslim wackjob who was an enlisted military psychiatrist. I honestly have come to the conclusion that what is wrong with this nation is our tolerance ad our desire to think everyone deserves to live like we do in America, with plenty of freedoms (that our current government wants to take from us).

Why do we allow people who live in America to do un-American things? Why do we let Mexican (and black) gangs do what they do? Why do they deserve the freedom to be alive at all? And why are American youth fighting in the Middle East, supposedly fighting for freedom that isn’t even a way of life for the people who live there. Do they even want us there? What is the United States getting out of it? We aren’t even taking their oil—we pay for a war with our tax dollars and young American lives and what is the reward?

Do we honestly expect people in Iraq and Afghanistan to ever thank us for helping them be more like us? They don’t want to be! They have been killing each other for hundreds of years. It's their way of life, and they could stop it anytime if they really wanted to. It’s not going to stop.

If you choose to live in the U.S., you live like an American. Period. You don’t embrace little violent subcultures and expect people to sit by and understand that what you are choosing to do is cultural. If you don’t fit in, you don’t belong here. Deport what’s deportable (of course make damn sure the border is secure), and throw the rest in prison. Or send those big bad gangstas to fight in the Mideast if they are really so badass tough and like to kill.

If the U.S chooses to be in a war, fight it to win, and fight it for people who want to be like us. Period. Either our troops are given the assistance they need to win a war over there (and then annex whatever territory into something and call it the U.S. annex or something). And if they aren’t going to be given the best equipment and the manpower to win a war, then get each and every one of them out there now, all at the same time. No cautious withdrawal, Americans leave immediately and let those people kill each other.

Bless the family of Pvt. Chance Pehlps for letting Lt. Col. Strobl share your story.