18-Year-Old Soldier Killed In Iraq (Female)

[bluestateguy]

Maybe I'm wrong to feel this way, but every time an 18 year old is killed in Iraq I am really just floored.

http://www.kold.com/Global/story.asp?S=3227527

Sam Huff, 18, was killed this weekend in an explosion while driving in a convoy around Baghdad. She was a member of the military police.

Huff graduated from Mt. View High School less than a year ago. Students knew her for her leadership as a drum major in the band.

Friends and teachers say even though she had a commanding demeanor, she was also warm and friendly.

"Even though she was tough, she'd start smiling afterward," said Mt. View junior Courtney Neuman, who knew Huff through the band. "Her smile was contagious."

more

[mike_c]

1. so many wasted lives, pointless deaths....

Over 100,000 Iraqi civilians, over 1,500 American soldiers. :nuke:

[Cha]

2. If you're in Iraq ..it's

a crapshoot!

[w4rma]

3. If not for fraud's war she'd probably have lived an extremely happy life

bringing joy to many many people who were around her.

That won't happen, now. Thanks to Republicans.

[Stand and Fight]

8. And Democrats.

Democrats were right there in bed with the war hawks. Democrats voted right along side the criminals who hold a majority in both houses of Congress and control the Whitehouse. Democrats are not blameless in yet another untimely and dismal death. The more this goes on the more I hate anyone who voted for this fiasco, this cluster-fuck.

[PartyPooper]

12. Amen. So many are guilty in this fiasco.

:-(

:cry:

[NVMojo]

4. I want the Chimp's daughters over there in the sand and wind and

without appropriate armor. That would be a sick type of justice.

I'll never forget that stupid repuke college girl who was interviewed after one of the presidential debates who said she supported the war but said she wouldn't go over there when she was asked if she supported it enough to go over there and serve. I hate these types of idiots.

In honor of this young life, rate this up for a front page spot ...

[Stand and Fight]

9. I'd like to wrap my hands around their stupid little necks.

God damn pricks vote for this bastard in office over-and-over and one the call goes out, they're not around to answer it.

[AlCzervik]

5. How many will be enough?

[Athame]

6. This just makes me ache

I want to wail and scream and somehow just MAKE IT STOP!

Rest in peace, Sam Huff, and may your death not go unnoticed.

[MADem]

7. Even when they are old, they are too young to die like that

You can see her picture here, in a photo accompanying an article from the Tucson Citizen: http://www.tucsoncitizen.com/index.php?page=local&story_id=041805_iraq_death

[all.of.me]

14. it always tugs at me to see photos of the soldiers who've died.

a name is one thing, but a photo makes me really sad. and nauseous. and angry.

[acmejack]

23. Another bright young life extinguished

By someone else's war. I am too sick of this shit, no more need die for these power drunk fools. It is painful to read of our children dying every day in a needless war fought for a worthless cause. May damnation find all those who caused and abetted this vile fiasco.

[esvhicl]

10. Wild goose chase ends in death

The really sad thing is that these trips around in convoys are not to serve any purpose. They just have them drive from point A to point B, so that the american presence will be felt. I heard this from a friend of a young Marine who just returned from Iraq, they don't know what the h*** they are doing...

[Stand and Fight]

11. Good God...

More blood! And for what? Lies, lies, and dammed lies. The American people will not care until it affects them personally. Being young myself, I hate the fact that chicken-hawks in Washington can so easily waste the lives of youth. And what is being done about it? Absolutely nothing -- the issues are steroids, Terri Schiavo, and a wide assortment of mundania...

[NEOBuckeye]

17. The Pain Threshold

We seem to have collectively forgotten (if we even ever really knew) as a nation what war, pain, suffering and death mean, and what they are.

We will have to remember. And we WILL eventually remember. I know that much.

But I wish I could tell you how many more young boys and girls like Sam Huff are going to have their lives' blood spilt upon desert sands and perish before they have ever truly begun to live. How many more of our youth -- our future -- will have to sacrifice their lives and die before the American people wake the hell up to the lies and the deception???

It must end somewhere, sometime. But when, and where??

[Stand and Fight]

18. I'm a Veteran.

I know that we've a long way to go before "the land of the free, and the home of the brave" wake up and put an end to this nonsense. Pray it is not over the graves of tens of thousands like Vietnam. No matter what, the lives lost in Iraq are inexcusable. Rather it is one, 1500, or more.

[pansypoo53219]

13. and lyndie england

is still alive and had a baby with another shit.

[Name removed]

15. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[Stand and Fight]

19. You heartless bastard.

That's not the point of the post. If you would care to engage your brain before you start your mouth, maybe you would understand that the point of the post is the fact that this young woman would not have died if Bush and his cronies had not lied. Take your mad rabbles, your harsh and cynical rhetoric elsewhere... Support the troops? Yeah, I bet you do! It's a life lost -- no matter what. How in the hell do you have the temerity to be so coy, so cynical, so idiotic?

[atreides1]

25. Calm Down

The poster was just expressing an opinion, and that's what this is supposed to be all about, right?

I'm from Tucson, and they did a report on her on the local news last night. All of the people that knew her said she wanted to go into the military. She just graduated from high school, so it's not as if she didn't know what could happen.

It doesn't make her death any less tragic, but her death isn't any more tragic then the deaths of the others that have died.

This girl would still be alive today, as would many others, and we can no longer only lay the blame on BushCo., the Dems who voted for his IWR, and now the voters who helped to re-elect him, have blood on their hands as well.

This is no longer Bush's war, it's now America's war, so the next time you run into a friend or family member that voted for Bush, remind them, tell them that for every 18 year old that is killed in Iraq or Afghanistan, that they are responsible. If you can find one of the photos of a dead Iraqi child and a flag draped coffin, and show it to them, remind them every day that this is what they voted for.

I'm a veteran too, my friend, and this lost life was a waste, as are they all. There is no nobility or honor in fighting for a cause based on lies. All the men and women who have lost their lives in this war, have died for nothing, and that is the saddest thing of all

[Stand and Fight]

40. No, I won't "calm down."

That's why these bastards have been able to get away with their little misadventures in the Middle East. People are discouraged from being outraged and that in itself is outrageous. NO, I WILL NOT CALM DOWN.

[TacticalPeek]

16. remember those who are shortening their lives

A Poem That I Wrote In A High Fever

You who are lengthening your lives
with the best doctors and the best medicines
remember those who are shortening their lives
with the wars
that you in your long lives are not
preventing.

You who are again screwing
the younger generations
and winking at each other
the winking of your eyelids
is like the chill of the swinging shutters
in an empty house.


-- Yehuda Amichai

(Translated from the Hebrew, by Leon Wieseltier.)

[Erika]

20. May she be remembered well.

The Iraqi war is another class thing. You don't find Jenna or Barbara over there. As W's mother taught them, why waste their beautiful minds on death. The elitist pig.

[SKKY]

21. You know, when this stuff happens, it reminds me of what Rumsfeld...

...said. "You go to war with the Army you have. Not the army you wish you had or might like to have." I'm wondering who, in their right minds, thinks this Army was ready for this war.

[saigon68]

22. "BRING EM ON" shouted the AWOL CHIMPANZEE

The same craven coward who dodged the DRAFT

[bemildred]

24. RIP soldier. Very sad. nt

[katinmn]

26. Sad. Wonder when they are going to get armour on the vehicles.

I wish the soldiers would go on strike.
Sitting in jail would be better than being sent out for a death ride.

[hack89]

41. She WAS driving an armored vehicle..

according to the Tucson newspaper account linked in msg 7.

[jukes]

27. terribly sad, & the dead

are the lucky ones. many more will come home physically & emotionally crippled for life by this insane, booty-driven war of aquisition. their's is the REAL tragedy.

[malmapus]

28. Another loss for words

She was a band geek like I was in HS, and felt the call like I did to serve her country. I'm just sorry that her country let her and her buddies down by having them be there in the first place.

I hope she has found peace now, and that her family will find it too again some day.

[GoldenOldie]

31. Her name was Sam, just Sam

My daughter called me in tears last night. She had the local news on while preparing dinner when she heard that an 18-year old girl from Marana had been killed in Iraq. Because her son is just about to turn 18, her senses became alert and she then heard the girls name, Sam Huff. They then reported Sam's mother and fathers name and she recognized all of the names.

My daughter told me that she had worked with Sam's mother 19-years ago and that they were both pregnant at the same time, and she also knew Sam's father. She knew the story of why they called her Sam. Sam was born a few months prior to my daughters first child and my first grandchild/son who will be 18 in May.

I have 2-daughters and now both of them have individually experienced knowing 2 of the young victims of this war.

My youngest daughter( a highschool teacher), learned of the death of one of her favorite former students Jeff, last summer. He died from a roadside bomb in Fallujia, age 22 yrs old.

My eldest daughter, learned last night of Sam, a beautiful young 18-year old girl, close to the age of her own son. Sam had to have been 17 when she enlisted.

Both Jeff and Sam had dreams of making the military their careers. Jeff in the Marines and Sam in the Army. Yes they wanted these careers but it angers me when some posters such as "so it's not as if she didn't know what could happen."

Please tell me if any 17-18 year old or any age is capable of fully understanding people being blown apart by bombs, following orders to drive your vehicles over civilian women and children, having to actually shoot to kill another human being. You may think you know or understand what happens, but listening to those returning and having to deal with their nightmares, shows that this is not true.

The military was once considered a noble career goal. The Rumsfeld, Wolfowitz, Pentagon Generals, and this so called "Commander-in-Chief (a previous AWOL/Deserter himself)," have destroyed this along with
so many other things.

[malmapus]

34. I didn't fully understand when I signed up either.

Its something that rode in the back of my mind if ever when I was in. Espicallly at that young age you still think you're immortal in a way I guess.

But you're right, the things these soldiers are seeing over there will live with them for the rest of their lives. I saw my horrors over 10 years ago and it has stayed with me, in my waking thoughts and in sleep.

Its sad, her description sounds alot like me at that age. I too had dreams of making the military into my career, and considered it noble to be serving my country.

I was 17 as well, my parents and I fought long and hard because I needed their signatures. But in the end, I told them that I was signing to got into the band, even though I knew I wanted to go Airborne (which I got in the end).

[catastrophicsuccess]

29. Her Father is proud

She died for "a noble cause," her father said.

"Thank God these kids are willing to stand up, especially in a time of war," he said. "She was willing. She's the bravest kid I've ever known. She was up and down that damned road between Baghdad and the Baghdad airport, which is notorious for those improvised explosive devices, but she knew the risks and she believed in the mission."

http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/local/aplocal_story.asp?category=6420&slug=AZ%20Soldier%20Dies

[NNN0LHI]

30. I am at a loss for words. And that doesn't happen very often n/t

[leftchick]

32. and what mission is that exactly proud father?

whatever gets you through the death of a child I guess.

[Lydia Leftcoast]

35. Thta's probably the only way he can hold together...

believing the lie that his daughter died for "a great cause." :-(

[ismnotwasm]

39. My daughter just returned safe and sound from Afghanistan

The bad news is, she reenlisted. Part of her reenlistment package is a new unit, that, according to the army is "nondeployable". It has to do more with logistics I guess. She wasn't going to do it, and she and the army played this little game with her refusal to reenlist, her promotion, and what her future would be in the army. They promoted her right before she got out, and then dangled this carrot. Anyway, she knows that I feel this war is bullshit. When she told me (she sent me flowers also)I just said that I hope soon our troops will be used in peacekeeping and humanitarian missions rather than the insanity that's happening now. She does feel we did some good in Afghanistan. If she had died, I don't know what I would have told the press. But "dying for a noble cause" or anything close, is not anything I would have said. More like, "all of you who voted for bush, fuck off". God, I don't know. My hurt is just broken for these kids and their families. I guess being deluded is one defense mechinism that works for some people.

[bushisanidiot]

33. It's not patriotically correct to discuss our war dead. Just keep

filling that Hummer gas tank and shut up!

[tinanator]

36. I've felt the same way for every Iraqi child over the last 14 years

and everyone else as well, theyre all on my love list, not just the wasted lives of youths, but the lost wisdom of the elders, the lost dignity of our country, and so much more.

[luvLLB]

37. When will it all end?

[UpInArms]

38. Lives in the Balance

I’ve been waiting for something to happen
For a week or a month or a year
With the blood in the ink of the headlines
And the sound of the crowd in my ear
You might ask what it takes to remember
When you know that you’ve seen it before
Where a government lies to a people
And a country is drifting to war

And there’s a shadow on the faces
Of the men who send the guns
To the wars that are fought in places
Where their business interest runs

On the radio talk shows and the t.v.
You hear one thing again and again
How the u.s.a. stands for freedom
And we come to the aid of a friend
But who are the ones that we call our friends--
These governments killing their own?
Or the people who finally can’t take any more
And they pick up a gun or a brick or a stone
There are lives in the balance
There are people under fire
There are children at the cannons
And there is blood on the wire

There’s a shadow on the faces
Of the men who fan the flames
Of the wars that are fought in places
Where we can’t even say the names

They sell us the president the same way
They sell us our clothes and our cars
They sell us every thing from youth to religion
The same time they sell us our wars
I want to know who the men in the shadows are
I want to hear somebody asking them why
They can be counted on to tell us who our enemies are
But they’re never the ones to fight or to die
And there are lives in the balance
There are people under fire
There are children at the cannons
And there is blood on the wire

Jackson Browne

RIP Sam :cry: