The 2008 Presidential Elections - Chapter 2

[Frankie's Market]

Re: The 2008 Presidential Elections - Chapter 2

Frankie, just before 2PM today I was sitting in my car in front of our veterinarian's office and talking on my daughter's cell with her hubby from Iraq. My other son-in-law leaves for Iraq end-of-year time frame. While they and we all appreciate your concern for our troops a lot, I am able to report to you that most of our troops are upbeat,

Hmmm, I wonder if this assessment of US troop morale includes a consideration that the VA estimates about a thousand suicide attempts are made among veterans PER MONTH!

http://www.huntingtonnews.net/column...ansuicide.html

Specifically, Dr. Ira Katz, the VA’s head of mental health, insisted in a CBS interview, “there is no epidemic of suicide.”

The VA and Katz provided the network showing 790 attempted suicides in 2007.

Yet two days afterwards, Katz told a media adviser in an e-mail labeled: “Shhh --- not for the CBS News Interview Request” that “our suicide prevention coordinators are identifying about 1,000 attempts per month among veterans we see in our medical facilities.

CBS reported an epidemic of 6,200 veteran suicides in 2005. Katz attacked the report, yet in an email said , “there are about 18 suicides per day among America’s 25 million veterans.” That would be 6,570 per year.

Interestingly, these stats do not include reports about suicide and suicide attempts among soldiers still on active duty.

[Karen]

Re: The 2008 Presidential Elections - Chapter 2

Hmm..Frankie I dunno about numbers...LOL dang govt. reported numbers, I mean they're so...."reliable,"

What I am sure of is that my son-in-laws, one in Iraq right now and one headed there report that their peers, friends, relatives and my other friends that are there all are in very good spirits. Homesick? wanting to be home? hell yeah, but their morale is very good.

I know people in every phase of war deployment. Hubby just took a dear friend out to lunch last week that's on his way to Kuwait as I type, one son-in-law will be home on leave in a couple of mos., the other is heading for some pre-deployment school shortly, dear friend's wife is over there again....sheesh, guess it's just a coincidence that all of our people are upbeat and not suicidal, nor are any of their closest people.

These are all active duty people. Suicide among vets? I wouldn't doubt that a bit. We have a ton of homeless vets and then many that were traumatized during the various wars. From the people I know personally, it's the Veterans of Viet Nam that are the most screwed up. My hubby is a veteran of that same war and from everything I've heard about it, it was a much more horrible war than anything to do with Iraq.

As I said, the people I regularly hear from including a young man I talk with on Yahoo IM sometimes from Iraq, they are upbeat and just will be glad to get home which is true even not in wartime, of deployments. What I learn when people close to me get back is that we have made progress in Iraq and yes, it's time that country not only pays for it's own rebuilding, but time they take control with their own police and military.

In other words, we have helped give them back their country.
Can they Keep it?


Rut row.....depends upon what newssource you trust, as usual! Dig this....Frankie...
(New York Post)
"CBS' BOGUS VET-SUICIDE STATS
ITS 'SCANDAL' NUMBERS DON'T ADD UP
By MICHAEL FUMENTO

November 19, 2007 -- THERE'S "startling" and "stunning" news of a "hidden epidemic" of veteran suicides. So claimed CBS News in two reports last week.

Most of the airtime went for heart-rending interviews with wives of vets who had killed themselves. But CBS also provided statistics that it said showed that "veterans were more than twice as likely to commit suicide in 2005 than non-vets."

Problem is, we have absolutely no way of verifying the CBS data nor how the network claims it collected the info. CBS News admits to collecting the data itself, rather than relying on an independent outside party. It also concedes its rate is "much higher" than that in an uncompleted Department of Veterans Affairs study.

So somebody isn't telling the truth. And the evidence is overwhelming that it's CBS."

[craigwatanabe]

Re: The 2008 Presidential Elections - Chapter 2

Just being in the Military even during peacetime brought on suicide attempts. The fact that there are suicides is a given when having worked in some of the toughest jobs you can do. Heck in Basic Training we were marching to class when one guy jumps off of one of the four-story 1000-man dorms and kills himself about 20-feet away from us on the cement walkway. The week later another guy does the same thing but hits the grassy area instead and snaps his neck on impact. Both never saw military action as both were still in Basic Training! Guess who had to clean up the mess.

The military can do what they can for military fitness but nothing can train you effectively for what you will see or do when in battle. The military really changes a person, some good some not so good. But it comes down to the individual soldier on how they respond to trauma or societal displacement.

My brother was a Vietnam vet, I'm a vet that has seen way too much in human sacrifice and destruction but both of us came out without any ill effects...okay we both ended up driving and wrenching Fords but hey everybody has vices right?

[Frankie's Market]

Re: The 2008 Presidential Elections - Chapter 2

Hmm..Frankie I dunno about numbers...LOL dang govt. reported numbers, I mean they're so...."reliable,"

The topic of veterans attempting/committing suicides and concerns over their receiving proper mental health care elicits "LOL" from you?

Well, that pretty much says it all.

[Karen]

Re: The 2008 Presidential Elections - Chapter 2

Frankie, you have a need to "gainsay" me, apparently, and that's the best you can do?! Ahem...

go back and read the word in context....the "LOL" was because of dang govt. NUMBERS...oh yeah, every time we watch presidential debates, any prez gives his state of the union address, etc...we are actually supposed to believe "the numbers."

No, I won't be apologizing or backtracking cuz of the "lol" I used.

Seems "CBS" still stands for "see B.S."

[Frankie's Market]

Re: The 2008 Presidential Elections - Chapter 2

Frankie, you have a need to "gainsay" me, apparently, and that's the best you can do?! Ahem...

go back and read the word in context....the "LOL" was because of dang govt. NUMBERS.

Still, this is a serious topic. If you want to debate numbers, statistics, and their implications, then fine. But to laugh or find humor about statistics dealing with the number of vets committing suicide, well,.... your explanation is duly noted.

[Karen]

Re: The 2008 Presidential Elections - Chapter 2

No, there is no "well," to it.

I am very close to several vets and you are either being too sensitive or just trying to find fault with my post. The vets themselves would not find offense with a person laughing WITHIN a serious post about their issues, about something peripheral.

However, I defend your right to take issue, grasp at straws and/or just argue for the sake of it.

[Karen]

Re: The 2008 Presidential Elections - Chapter 2

Future President Obama's pastor has been "all over" Foxnews this AM. He is trying to claim that the media has taken him out of context.

Yeah, I don't doubt that cuz they do that to us all, and gotta watch the media cuz taking anyone out of context can throw a certain light on someone...much, not ALL of the time.

SOME...statements are so radical and wrong that NO context can "clean them up" and make them anything but nutty things to say.

However, that's not my only point about the Rev. Wrong....he says he's been taken out of context, in trying to get the voting public to not shrink back from him and from Obama for having this guy as his own daughters' pastor. Problem is we haven't had to rely on just what the media "says he said."

Most of us have seen this nutty preacher in video, in context and have seen him, his demeanor, attitude, body language etc.....for ourselves.

He's a nut. Obama brings honor and some good things to the oval office, but this is one huge, red flag....this nutty preacher has been Obama's choice of spiritual advisor, etc.....and in fact Obama has "voted for" this preacher with his feet, by attending his church for many years and lastly....

the love we parents have for our kids....what we provide for them, teach them and lead them to, and into.......tells a ton about us, and this man is even who Obama allowed, heck, CHOSE to baptize his own precious daughters.

That's one thing I'll not be happy about.....when I repeatedly say "Pres. Obama."

EDITING.....news just found...
With Bingaman Endorsement, Obama Takes Senate Support Lead
By Jonathan Weisman
Sen. Barack Obama officially pulled ahead today in the scramble for endorsements from colleagues in the U.S. Senate, thanks to Sen. Jeff Bingaman of New Mexico.

Never one of the Senate's most high-profile members, Bingaman now has a claim to political fame: He put Obama over the top after his long slog to catch Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton, who had a head start in winning the support of her peers. Obama now has 14 endorsements to Clinton's 13.

Obama will also get the vote of Sen. Russ Feingold (D-Wis.), who has not officially endorsed him but said he will support Obama at the convention in deference to his state's voters. Clinton has a similar pledge from Sen. Barbara Boxer of California."

rest of article here.....

http://blog.washingtonpost.com/the-t...ment_obam.html


"

[Frankie's Market]

Re: The 2008 Presidential Elections - Chapter 2

If anyone decides not to vote for Obama based on the few offensive comments by Rev. Wright, then they shouldn't vote for McCain either, since he has actively sought the endorsement of controversial Pastor John Hagee. A man who has blamed the Catholic Church for the Jewish Holocaust and said Hurricane Katrina was God's punishment against the city of New Orleans.

http://www.thepresidentialcandidates...ohn-hagee/280/

I can imagine it now. People end up voting for Hillary Clinton to the most powerful political office in the world because she had the least offensive pastor of all the major candidates.

Somewhere, P.T. Barnum is smiling.

[Vanguard]

Re: The 2008 Presidential Elections - Chapter 2

I can imagine it now. People end up voting for Hillary Clinton to the most powerful political office in the world because she had the least offensive pastor of all the major candidates.

Somewhere, P.T. Barnum is smiling.

Wow, this is least offensive? Fascinating

[Karen]

Re: The 2008 Presidential Elections - Chapter 2

Wow, Vanguard, good find and thanks for posting.

See? I ain't votin for any of 'em. I can get excited about voting against rail, but not FOR any of the three. They're like a "berumuda triangle" within which the country'll get sucked into and then its real identity will disappear in.

About McMuffin, nope...haven't paid attention to any good feelings he may have about Hagee or the things Hagee is on record saying. If I get time I'll make that my next small research project. However...I don't "need" to since I'm already decided McMuffin won't get my vote.

Editing this quote in...

""Traveling the country the past few months, I have encountered habitual Republican voters so entranced by Barack Obama's potential to lead the nation that they plan to vote for him in November. Once Hillary Clinton's defected supporters return to loyalty, Obama Republicans could produce a Democratic presidential landslide. But Obama's current missteps jeopardize their support and imperil his election."

- Columnist Robert Novak"

[Frankie's Market]

Re: The 2008 Presidential Elections - Chapter 2

Senator McCain finally comes clean. In his view, the US went to war with Iraq, not because of WMDs. Not to spread democracy. Not to combat terrorism. It was because of OIL. Here's what he said at a town hall meeting in Denver today.

“My friends, I will have an energy policy that we will be talking about, which will eliminate our dependence on oil from the Middle East. That will prevent us from having ever to send our young men and women into conflict again in the Middle East.”

Sad, sacrificing the lives of over 4,000 brave men and women to fight for oil.

So what if he's elected President and his energy policy doesn't work out? We go to war for oil again?

And for those of you who happen to concur with McCain's thinking that going to war for oil is worth it, consider this. We have now spent more than half a trillion dollars on this disastrous war. The price of oil has shot up from $22 a barrel in January 2001 (when Bush/Cheney took office) to about $120 now. That's more than a 500% increase. Gas prices are skyrocketing. Now, if there was supposed to be any consumer benefits to this war, I sure haven't seen it.

Say NO to 4 years of John McSAME!

[craigwatanabe]

Re: The 2008 Presidential Elections - Chapter 2

The Middle East was ALWAYS about oil all the way back from the days of the Carter Administration when we were told in the USAF in a special briefing before being sent to Turkey in 1979 that the Middle East was a tinder box ready to ignite and we needed to be there to keep that region stable. Then our Commander brings out this oil analyst that told us that as long as the region remains stable, gasoline back home will stay below a dollar a gallon. That was 29 years ago.

[Frankie's Market]

Re: The 2008 Presidential Elections - Chapter 2

The Middle East was ALWAYS about oil all the way back from the days of the Carter Administration when we were told in the USAF in a special briefing before being sent to Turkey in 1979 that the Middle East was a tinder box ready to ignite and we needed to be there to keep that region stable. Then our Commander brings out this oil analyst that told us that as long as the region remains stable, gasoline back home will stay below a dollar a gallon. That was 29 years ago.

An overly simplistic analysis. But let's take it at face value for a moment. If political stability in the Middle East keeps oil prices down, then why in hell did Bush invade Iraq? It's brought civil war and chaos to that country, with still no end in sight as to when the new Iraqi government can stand on its own without the intervention of US forces. And amidst all that turmoil, the price of oil has gone up and up and up and gas prices in America going higher and higher and higher.

You may not have intended it, but thanks for providing more testimony that shows Bush's administration screwed everything up, Craig.

[Ron Whitfield]

Re: The 2008 Presidential Elections - Chapter 2

These guy's havn't screwed anything up for themselves. It's all pretty much going along as planned. Maybe not to the degree as was planned, but still OK for them.
And, they ain't done yet.