Why are we fighting again?

[mahina]

I don't know anymore.

Is there any chance left that we aren't just being used? Are there any good guys?

Somebody who knows, please fill me in. Our men and women deployed over and over again. Vietnam was hard as hell on my family, and that deployment was only one year long. I know the people in Afghanistan and Iraq are suffering, badly, and my heart breaks for them. If I knew what to do to help them, I would do it. But are our families paying a cost that is really helping those folks?

If we don't know why we're fighting, then we should bring them home.

[Vickers]

1. For the right to party.

Love,

Beastie Boys

[FiveGoodMen]

2. "Is there any chance left that we aren't just being used?"

None whatsoever.

[mahina]

3. We've got a lot of vets on this board,

Somebody help me understand. I've argued for years that we need to stay to protect those who would be lost, keep the schools going, that educating the women is the key, all the stuff we know from reading Three Cups of Tea.

I remember how heartbroken my father was watching the fall of Saigon on the news, as he had just been home from Vietnam a short while, and that war cost him personally so dearly. That our country would walk away after so many lives had been lost on all sides was to him an unthinkable waste of life. I often wonder what he would think about this current conflict- or should I say, these conflicts.

[FiveGoodMen]

6. But no matter how many more trillions we spend, how many of our troops die or lose a limb,

how many innocent civilians get caught in the crossfire over there...

The culture in that region will remain the same.

And we will help keep it the same by giving the most anti-western voices in the land just the ammo they need to keep their populace riled up and turning to them for deliverance.

Then, eventually, we will have to leave -- perhaps because we are broke, or because we actually have to defend ourselves -- and none of the problems will be solved.

But we can keep killing, being killed, spending ourselves into the poor house as long as we wish.

(I'm not a vet, but I don't think that I'd wish to see our troops wasted like this even if -- or especially if -- I were.)

[Taverner]

4. No more fighting. All Miles' Kind of Blue here....

Let's all be blue stat...

[grilled onions]

5. Nam Re Dux

But at least during that era many did not go quietly into the night. There were protests every day. From teachers to preachers and students of all ages they complained loudly and often. Students had a huge reason to protest. It was called the draft. But along with the cost of lives they realized a cost of millions to future generations. How many are thinking that today? We have one side who are spending a majority of their time trying to find loopholes in the Constitution to their gain. Few seem to worry about the constant loss of jobs, spiraling down of wages,benefits, nor the homeless,the hungry. The endless conflicts(do they ever call them wars anymore?)in other countries just doesn't seem too important.
This includes many on Capitol Hill. The status quo is the way to go. As long as THEIR jobs are intact. As long as THEIR wages are stable or increasing, they don't seem too concerned about the rest of us. It's very frustrating.

[msongs]

7. corporate profits and keeping paramilitary outfits like blackwater/ze in business nt

[snot]

8. I posted that question after we first heard Obama was escalating in Afghanistan

and got gang-flamed.

But no one gave me a good answer.

[FiveGoodMen]

9. Amazing how the same actions that were bad when undertaken by Dubya

and okay coming from "our" guy, isn't it?