You think I care much about all this crap over AIG bonuses? Read on.

[The Straight Story]

My Son is on his way to Ft. Hood. Just called me a little while ago from St. Louis. His unit is in Iraq right now and chances are he may be there soon (I was thinking Afghanistan before but appears it is Iraq). I saw him and the grand-kids on Sunday. For all I know it could be the last time I see him. I hugged him good-bye and had a hard time letting go.

He is 22 with a wife and 2 kids. My youngest boy is going to boot camp in June.

Maybe neither will die. Maybe neither will get injured. Maybe both will not get shipped out to a war zone. Maybe I am just trying to help myself through the night.

I did not, and do not, expect both wars to just end overnight. It is more complex than that when it comes to ending wars and moving our people out. We went in and removed governments and changed how people lived, we can't just bail on them. I would not want or expect Obama to do so. He did not create this situation but he is the President now and must deal with it.

I hear conflicting things on all this - he is reducing troops, but not until later, we are shifting troops from Iraq to Afghanistan, we are going to withdraw but not until 2011 or later, and so on.

My oldest and youngest sons are now a part of all this and I want to understand what it all means. I want to understand that if they go away to another country and come back maimed, etc, that it meant something - and that if it didn't then I want to know why, what excuse our leaders have, we put our kids in harm's way and kept them there.

If my son shells a home in Iraq I want him to know why he killed the people there at the request of our government. I don't want him losing sleep and falling into depression over doing the job our leaders told him to do.

We have hearings about AIG and bonuses, about damned money. All the while we are sending our kids to kill others and to be killed and we just gloss over it.

My oldest son will be at one end of a very big gun shooting, maybe, at people in Iraq. He might kill someone's mother, a child, a father, a mother. He might be killed or hurt himself.

I don't care what some idiot on wall street made - yet that is all we see on the news now it seems. People are dying, our kids are shooting people, and our outrage is over some bonuses paid out?

I am all for us calling people on the carpet over this whole debacle and the money we are spending for it, but there are bigger things we are just passing over.

rant off for now.

[knowbody0]

1. rant on, my friend

I weep for you and what you are going through. I cannot imagine. Nothing compares.

[Uzybone]

2. Well said

but you are not asking for Geithner to be fired, so this will probably sink.

[WannaJumpMyScooter]

3. I know, what happened to the anti-war movement?

Trusting that the USG... any USG... will do the right thing will burn you, because they never will.

[Why Syzygy]

4. I was shocked tonight to read that "stop-loss" isn't expected to end until 2011?

According to Gates :hurts:

Surely we can do better than that. What a huge disappointment.

I'm sorry you're living this. My son is expecting his first child in early May. His next deployment will be some time later this year, AFAIK. He's fortunate that his terms are shorter than the Army.

You don't say if your son has been over before? I've had five years to adjust. There was a lot of anger expressed to him after he came back the first time. But, that was when we weren't "allowed" to oppose the war.

Most of them do believe they are getting the bad guys. That's probably for the best. Keep in touch with him as best you can.

[Luciferous]

5. K&R

[specimenfred1984]

6. You could rant about hating code pink and loving camaros

Oh, and don't forget the 800-rec'd posts about Pelosi or Hillary being traitors, all rants are permissible, all hate is accepted. So your kid is going to kills some "evil islamofascists" and you expect anyone to care? After the 8 years of war crimes we've just been though and your closest loved one is off to join them, nice.

Oh, and now you've got more important things to worry about rather than us. OK, fine, seems about right.

[Hekate]

7. What? Are you sure this is the right thread for you?

[Hekate]

8. Hey, TSS, may they both come home safely and soon. Thank them for their service from DU....

... most of us, anyway. You know who we are.

:hug:

Hekate

[Booster]

9. You have every right in the world to rant. Your son will be in

my thoughts until I read your post that says "he's home". God bless him and keep him safe.:hug:

[amandabeech]

10. Thanks for posting.

You put things in perspective.

I hope that your sons return home safe and sound ASAP.

[BuyingThyme]

11. In the case of AIG, some powerful people in government conspired

to provide tax money to their friends.

The same thing happened with Iraq.

[The Straight Story]

15. Indeed - and while AIG and such is in the news a lot, the wars get little mention

24 hour news, you think they could cover it all.

[pacalo]

12. I can understand the way you feel because I'll never forget the angst

I felt during the run-up to the Iraq invasion -- with nowhere to turn to talk it out. I was the mother of two sons, a senior & a junior in high school who were vulnerable to military recruiters at school.

You have every right to feel the way you do about the priorities of topics discussed, but there are those of us whose life savings were cut in half because of the financial crises -- money that we were counting on for retirement. There are those who have to scrimp & cut corners just to make it to the next payday, whose tax dollars are being used for those outrageous bonuses -- the kind of money most people could only dream of having saved through years & years, given in one full swoop to people who deserve to be fired rather than rewarded -- the ones who mismanaged & lost (or stashed away) our money.

I'm sorry that you have to endure the worry for your son that I can only imagine, so I don't blame you if you want to ignore the threads that bemoan the little people having to pay for corporate bonuses that should be going to those who lost homes & savings due to the mismanagement of those who caused the losses.

Take care, Straight Story, because I know you've had a lot on your plate. You deserve a big break.

And a hug. :hug:

[babylonsister]

13. Yes, this AIG thing is taking up valuable space for more valuable issues.

I also want to know about what specifically is our plan in Afghanistan.

And I'm sorry your kids are involved.

[dkf]

14. Yeah I gotta admit I expected more on this front.

It is not right that people are still exposed to danger over there.

Even Dick Cheney says its done. We need to go home ASAP.