Reply #60: Thanks for the hug. Don't get many of those these days.

[patrice]

Yep. Money - Money up there at Cheney's level AND money down here at my level.

This war, with all of the private contracting (read that War Profiteering), is an attempt to root Death and Destruction (with - forgive the reference - cannon fodder from the Lower Classes) in the Middle Class jobs base. So, I heartily agree ". . . including, but not limited to. .).

I know, from personal experience, all of the nostrums about the death of a loved one are pretty much BS. Three have passed-on from my life, including my husband of 30 years. Maybe you can understand when I say it is possible to let the pain carve your heart and change you for the better, so I don't think it is such a good idea to hide from it.

My Dad, to whom I referred above in the present tense, passed-on a little over a year ago. He was a MSgt. airplane engine machanic, who was among the first to enter the liberated Concentration Camps. He never would tell us kids the details, but he for sure told us several times how horribly sad War is even when you're in the Right (something that used to puzzle me quite a bit, but I think I understand better now, having seen how bad it is when it is Wrong). Daddy also helped organize the first Pipefitters Union in Kansas. He was a Labor guy through and through and he named me after a fire-breathing Populist priest, Fr. Patrick OBrian, who preached Labor rights from the parish pulpit in the little Kansas town where I was born. It is to Dad that I dedicate my activism; that's part of why I still refer to him in the present tense. He sends his hope and best wishes to you and your friends to fight the good fight in the face of hate and bigotry.

:hug: