Two injured soldiers on top of a snow-capped mountain, out of ammunition, pinned down by enemy fire know they will not make it. The more injured soldier tells his long-time buddy to go, climb down. The buddy replies, “Not even if there was a ladder!” WOW! When was the last time any of us had the dedication to anyone, anything or even a principle to stay knowing we would face death? Or have any of us ever had the kind of dedication to stand by a friend, stand up for an idea or principle without even threat of bodily harm? That scenario is from a movie but it does not change importance of the questions or better yet the answers to the questions.
I want to change the E.R.I.S.A. law of 1974 and have asked for help from my readers. It has not helped my cause much because so few took any action – most climbed down the ladder over a simple request to send an e-mail on my behalf. So now let me take the effort off of my goal of changing a bad law to something broader – bringing our troops HOME! There should be more support for this idea.
2,977 Americans were killed in the 9/11 attacks. In Operation Enduring Freedom/Afghanistan, Operation Iraqi Freedom now re-branded with an even friendlier sounding name Operation New Dawn; more than 5,880 (*1) American soldiers have died as of January 11,2011. When another 114 die, it will be double the number killed in the 9/11 attack. When will we as Americans have the outrage for the deaths of our soldiers? They are sons/daughters, husbands/wives, brothers/sisters, and friends of ours as well as the ones killed in the original attacks. Are their lives less valuable?
The U.S. military is made up from volunteers. These young men and women fight for our liberties and freedom, but who is fighting for theirs? I even ask who are they fighting? A war on terror is quite ambiguous. The longer we are there, the more terrorist we are creating!
Why are we so disliked by the people we “liberated”? In Afghanistan 8,813 civilians have been killed and 15,863 have been seriously injured. (*2) Even worse in Iraq 864,531 Iraqis have been killed with 1,556,156 seriously injured! (*2) That is 2, 445,363 people and their families that have been hurt because of our “liberating” them. 821 times more people than were killed in 9/11. We will never defeat terrorist while innocent Afghan and Iraqi civilians continue to be killed as we so call “protect America”.
I HATE this image of America and our troops!! They are so much better than this!
We will never be 100% safe and there will always be terrorist – it is time to BRING OUR TROOPS HOME!! The United States needs to stop using our money for war and use it to save our economy and HELP the world not FIGHT the world!! I will not use the ladder and stop fighting the injustice of the E.R.I.S.A. law but I will also fight to help our troops! We need to have the same determination that our troops have and say “Not even if there was a ladder”, we will stand up for our troops to bring them safely home.
Our troops need to be brought safely home to fight for more meaningful and better causes!
*1 – http://www.defense.gov/news/casualty.pdf
*2 -http://www.unknownnews.net/casualties.html#fn3
Thomas Johnston 