echoraven: serving your country isn’t a lefty or rightie thing, though chickenhawks seem to me almost always “righties”. I DID tell my son that if he joined The Air Force or Navy, okay, but if he joined the Army or Marines, I’d disown him for stupidity, as I didn’t want him around the folks I was (the slightly crazy ones.) He went nuke with the Navy, then SEABEE, and spent five years with the teams, as a SEABEE, those same crazies (actually the most intelligent folks in the military), and he had “interesting” experiences there with them. He did what they did, plus fixed the showers. He’s also a disabled retiree from those experiences.
btw: I’m socially liberal, fiscally far more conservative than anyone a Republican “conservative”, anti-stupid war, but not by any means a pacifist. We just need to stop running around looking for people to screw with, and causing far more trouble than we’d have had if we’d been smarter, and not let Pentagon and the MIC thinking run things.
Yes, "Nam was indeed a lesson plan, on how it is also our DUTY as citizens to speak out AGAINST stupidity and American hegemony when it’s against our, or other folks, best interests.
“Liberal” means thinking things out, and demanding facts, not fictions and lies, and fully analyzing situations BEFORE jumping in, not after. Diplomacy also is a much more powerful, and lasting, tool, than an over-reactive military response.
echoraven: serving your country isn’t a lefty or rightie thing, though chickenhawks seem to me almost always “righties”. I DID tell my son that if he joined The Air Force or Navy, okay, but if he joined the Army or Marines, I’d disown him for stupidity, as I didn’t want him around the folks I was (the slightly crazy ones.) He went nuke with the Navy, then SEABEE, and spent five years with the teams, as a SEABEE, those same crazies (actually the most intelligent folks in the military), and he had “interesting” experiences there with them. He did what they did, plus fixed the showers. He’s also a disabled retiree from those experiences.
btw: I’m socially liberal, fiscally far more conservative than anyone a Republican “conservative”, anti-stupid war, but not by any means a pacifist. We just need to stop running around looking for people to screw with, and causing far more trouble than we’d have had if we’d been smarter, and not let Pentagon and the MIC thinking run things.
Yes, "Nam was indeed a lesson plan, on how it is also our DUTY as citizens to speak out AGAINST stupidity and American hegemony when it’s against our, or other folks, best interests.
“Liberal” means thinking things out, and demanding facts, not fictions and lies, and fully analyzing situations BEFORE jumping in, not after. Diplomacy also is a much more powerful, and lasting, tool, than an over-reactive military response.