When I read this article online this morning, for some reason it made my antifreeze blood boil. First, in order to avoid a draft that would spread the pain among more Americans and thus lessen support for the war and occupation in Iraq, this administration has chosen to resort to extended tours of duty for these National Guardsmen. Then, after returning home from 22 months of fighting in Iraq, they have to fight their own government for what should rightfully be theirs.
Do you want to reduce crime in this country? Then get rid of the Bush administration.
National Guard Troops Denied Benefits After Longest Deployment Of Iraq War
MINNEAPOLIS, MN (NBC) -- When they came home from Iraq, 2,600 members of the Minnesota National Guard had been deployed longer than any other ground combat unit. The tour lasted 22 months and had been extended as part of President Bush's surge.
1st Lt. Jon Anderson said he never expected to come home to this: A government refusing to pay education benefits he says he should have earned under the GI bill.
"It's pretty much a slap in the face," Anderson said. "I think it was a scheme to save money, personally. I think it was a leadership failure by the senior Washington leadership... once again failing the soldiers."
Anderson's orders, and the orders of 1,161 other Minnesota guard members, were written for 729 days.
Had they been written for 730 days, just one day more, the soldiers would receive those benefits to pay for school.
"Which would be allowing the soldiers an extra $500 to $800 a month," Anderson said.
That money would help him pay for his master's degree in public administration. It would help Anderson's fellow platoon leader, John Hobot, pay for a degree in law enforcement.
"I would assume, and I would hope, that when I get back from a deployment of 22 months, my senior leadership in Washington, the leadership that extended us in the first place, would take care of us once we got home," Hobot said.
Both Hobot and Anderson believe the Pentagon deliberately wrote orders for 729 days instead of 730. Now, six of Minnesota's members of the House of Representatives have asked the Secretary of the Army to look into it -- So have Senators Amy Klobuchar and Norm Coleman.
Klobuchar said the GI money "shouldn't be tied up in red tape," and Coleman said it's "simply irresponsible to deny education benefits to those soldiers who just completed the longest tour of duty of any unit in Iraq."
Anderson said the soldiers he oversaw in his platoon expected that money to be here when they come home.
"I had 23 guys under my command," Anderson said. "I promised to take care of them. And I'm not going to end taking care of them when this deployment is over, and it's not over until this is solved."
The Army did not respond to questions Tuesday afternoon.
Senators Klobuchar and Coleman released a joint statement saying the Army secretary, Pete Geren, is looking into this personally, and they say Geren asked a review board to expedite its review so the matter could be solved by next semester.
Minnesota National Guard spokesman Lt. Col. Kevin Olson said the soldiers are "victims of a significant injustice."
Warning: If you have recently lost or buried a loved one, I would suggest that you not read the words of this folksong.
Did you ever think As the hearse rolls by, That sooner or later You're goin' to die,
With your boots a-swingin' From the back of a roan, And the undertaker Inscribin' your stone?
The men with shovels All stand around They shovel you in To that cold, wet ground
They shovel in dirt Then they throw in rocks They don't give a hoot If they break the box.
Oh, the worms crawl in, And the worms crawl out, They give a little squirm And they turn about;
Then each one takes A bite or two Of an arm or a leg Or another part of you!
Oh, your eyes drop out, And your teeth fall in, And the worms crawl over Your mouth and chin;
They bring all their friends, And their friends' friends, too, And you're chewed all to bits When they're through with you!
As a child, I learned the words to this folksong, which deals with the gruesome subject of decomposition of the body after burial. Like most folksongs, this one has several versions--some shorter; some longer; some more gruesome; some less. The song’s origin goes back at least 150 years. The words allow one to address humorously the ugly side of death, and in doing so to weather the fear of death that faces us all.
Many years ago when I was visiting my parents back East, my father, still a fairly young man, took me to a mountaintop where he had made an advance purchase of two burial plots--one for himself and one for my mother. As we gazed into the distance, he exclaimed, “Just look at that view! Trees as far you can see! Look at the meadows with the wildflowers in bloom. What a beautiful setting for us.” I was thinking, “Wow! A tomb with a view. But I wonder if a spaceport might be built here in another 100 years.”
My father had a special “thing” about death. Attending funerals was an important occasion in the place where I grew up, a small community in which almost all of the residents knew their neighbors. One gained status after death according to the amount of money spent on a funeral. My father had always desired to be the center of attention when he was alive, and he hoped that would continue after his death. Accordingly, he made elaborate plans for his funeral: an expensive coffin, the viewing of the body, the best preacher in town, and the parade of cars from the funeral home to the cemetery. It would have been his delight to hear the viewers at the funeral home say, “My, but doesn’t he just look like he’s asleep? Didn’t the funeral home do a good job. Wasn't he put away in style!” After my father’s death, everything went as planned.
Three years later my mother died, and the same elaborate funeral followed. The cost of the two funerals and the burial plots exceeded $20,000.
My wife’s parents, on the other hand, chose to be cremated--with a simple memorial service attended by family and friends. My wife's mother requested that I read Alfred Lord Tennyson’s “Crossing the Bar” at the service, which I tearfully did. Following her wishes after her death, a pilot friend of ours flew us to Dana Point, her favorite spot on the Pacific Ocean, where I spread her ashes at sea while the plane circled the area. My wife’s father, a war veteran, wanted his ashes placed in an urn and buried on a hillside overlooking the sea at Fort Rosecrans Veterans Cemetery, The urn was placed in a 3x3 foot plot. The cost of the plot: free. Grave marker: free. The total cost of cremation and handling the final remains of both parents: less than $1500.
Today, when one visits the gravesites of my parents, where their bodies lie "a-moulderin in the grave", the view is the same; but real flowers no longer decorate the graves--the deer will eat them. So now one sees row after row of faded plastic and silk flowers decorating the sites. The ashes of my wife's father are still in the plot overlooking the sea, and those of my wife's mother are merged with the water of the vast Pacific Ocean--or perhaps they washed ashore on some distant tropical isle where they will remain until the end of time.
And now, as my wife and I become more aware of our own mortality, we must decide what our children should do when we cast off this mortal coil. We have decided on cremation. I like that process over burial, because it will be fast, clean, and efficient as it sends us on our way in a blaze of glory, as the 1800-degree heat consumes our bodies and cleanses our souls.
"The Cremation of Sam McGee" is one of the most famous of Robert W. Service's poems. It was published in 1907 in "The Songs of a Sourdough (The Spell of the Yukon and Other Verses." It concerns the cremation of a prospector who freezes to death in the Yukon Territory of Canada, as told by the man who cremates him.
The night prior to the death of the title character, who hails from the fictional town of "Plumtree, Tennessee," the narrator realizes that "A pal's last need is a thing to heed" and swears to McGee that he will not fail to cremate him. After McGee dies the following day, he winds up hauling the body clear to the "Marge of Lake Lebarge" before he finds a way to perform the promised cremation.
Next week I am going to call my HMO once again and schedule my annual health appraisal. One of my least favorite phases of the annual exam, as clinical as it is, concerns the female physician’s assistant squeezing my scrotum while she says, “Now, cough!” The other least favorite part of the exam is that performed by the proctologist, Dr. Rhoda Rooter.
Just thinking about the proctology test as I observe Dr. Rooter donning the latex rubber glove and applying lubricant to her raised fat index finger makes me shudder. The thought makes a certain part of my anatomy pucker in anticipation of the doctor boldly going where only other proctologists have gone before.
Proctology must be a difficult profession, because those who enter that specialty must know that they are going to be the butt of many witty sayings. And it is surprising how cruel some people can be as they stoop to ever lower levels of humor, making such remarks as "Hey, Doc, I wonder why you have such a tan, considering that you spend most of your time down where the sun don't shine."
There are many proctologists, however, who will bend over backwards to make their patients comfortable during the exam. Some will attempt to relieve the patient’s anxiety by cracking them up with such quips as, “Hmmmm, looks like you’re a quart low”, or “Nurse, would you get me that number 2 sandpaper glove, please.”
I have often wondered what happens when proctologists go to a cocktail party and are asked what they do for a living. If you meet a financial consultant at the party, you might discuss financial matters with him or her. If it is an insurance agent, you might ask him or her about your new Homeowner’s Policy. But what do you discuss with a proctologist--your polyps? And my final thought is, “When you shake hands with a proctologist, should you first don a latex rubber glove and extend your index finger?”
A new blogger has appeared on Blogstream. His name is Rowdy and the title of his blog is "Corporal Punishment." I think you will enjoy reading his latest post titled "My Attic Asylum."
I find it a fascinating pastime to follow developments regarding oil production and oil export in Iraq, where the greatest obstacle to increasing oil production and export is providing the security necessary for foreign investors. Iraq’s parliament has been unable to pass legislation this past year that would divide the national oil wealth in a manner that favors the ethnic and sectarian interests of the Kurds, Shiites, and Sunnis.
The frustrated Oil Minister of Iraq has said that he is going to start signing development deals with Chevron, Shell, and Japex by the end of this year, regardless of what the parliament does. Meanwhile, the semiautonomous Kurds in the North have begun signing a number of oil deals which the oil minister has declared illegal.
Now comes the news. As Gomer Pyle used to say on the Andy Griffith Show - “Surprise, surprise, surprise!” The first surprise is that the most prominent of the alleged illegal deals was made with the privately-held Hunt Oil Company—one of the big money Texas donors behind the Bush family political empire—and the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG), which announced on September 8, 2007, that "they've signed a production-sharing contract for petroleum exploration in northern Iraq, the first such deal since the Kurds passed their own oil and gas law in August.
Do you want another surprise? Ray L. Hunt, the owner of the privately-held Hunt Oil Company is a member of President Bush’s Foreign Intelligence Advisory Board.
And another surprise:
WASHINGTON, Sept. 20 President Bush said he "knew nothing" about a deal between Hunt Oil, which has ties to the administration, and the Iraqi Kurdistan government.
Bush was pressed on the controversial production-sharing contract during a news conference Thursday.
"Our embassy also expressed concern about it," Bush said when asked if it undermined a national oil law. "I knew nothing about the deal."
"I need to know exactly how it happened," he added. "To the extent that it does undermine the ability for the government to come up with an oil revenue-sharing plan that unifies the country, obviously I'm -- if it undermines that, I'm concerned."
And still another surprise:
We have learned that the oil deal with the Kurds will pay huge benefits to the Hunt Oil Company, which has close links to the Bush administration. How close? When he was running Halliburton, Cheney invited Hunt Oil Company CEO Ray Hunt to serve on the firm's board of directors. Hunt, a "Bush Pioneer" fund raiser during the 2000 campaign recently donated the tidy sum of $35 million to George W. Bush’s presidential library building fund.
The new "production sharing agreement" between Hunt Oil and the Kurdistan Regional Government puts one of the administration's favorite firms in a position to reap immeasurable profits while undermining essential efforts to assure that Iraq's oil revenues will be shared by all Iraqis. Hunt's deal upsets hopes that Iraq's mineral wealth might ultimately be a source of stability, replacing the promise of economic equity with the prospect of a black-gold rush that will only widen inequalities and heighten ethnic and regional resentments.
And in all this time, I foolishly thought the US had invaded Iraq to bring democracy and stability to that nation and region.
The battle is on over who has the best erector set - Viagra, Cialis, or Levitra. Each of these companies has a different way of advertising its product with varying results, with Viagra in first place in sales. Perhaps you have seen the commercial with Rafael Palmero as he degraded himself by whipping a bat out of a bat rack as he bragged about how his low sexual batting average was replaced with, “Batter up,” thanks to Viagra. Then there is this latest “Viva Viagra” commercial:
Cialis is in second place in sales. Perhaps as a man, you cringed as poor middle-aged men are taunted by younger women in Cialis ads who can’t stop gushing about how insufficient their partners were sexually prior to taking the medication. Now there is a Cialis commercial with Cuba Gooding, Jr:
Many Blogstream members are there
already! Quotes from members: "It's like blog lite!" -- "I like the instant
gratification!" -- "Stop spectating, get in the game!"
If you have not joined in, you are really missing out!
