Thank you and all the others for your service to our country. I served in Vietnam and Korea and had similar experiences, but I love this country and get very upset with those who send mixed messages like "We support the troops, but are against the war" What????

Please, everyone thank a veteran on July 4th and if you run across an active duty soldier, sailor, marine or coast guardsman - thank them buy them dinner or breakfast and then thank them again.

God Bless America!

We have disagreed on a number of occasions and agreed on others.

But one this issue we stand solidly shoulder to shoulder.

Thanks for your service.

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Keeping it real and to the core of the issue, not the peripherals.

So what did you do in the wars?

Please explain what you don’t understand about supporting our troops but not the war.

I have no doubt that this “war” on terror is doomed to go the way as the “war” of drugs did. Costing billions of dollars, and American lives and to what end?

No amount of money or blood is going to change the radical Muslim way of thinking. Did it change the way the drug cartels sell coca?

I for one will ALWAYS support an American service man/woman because they are protecting me and my family. That’s the way I was raised. Do I support the “war” on terror? No. Only because there is no way to win it.

American service men and woman didn’t start this thing. They didn’t have any choice as to fight or not to fight. They are honorable and did as their commander and chief ordered them to do.

I fully understand and agree that “something” has to be done. I just don’t see, and neither does the current administration, how we can win this damn thing.

To answer the question I know you have, no I was not in the service. When I tried to enlist the Dr. checked my eyesight and just laughed. But if it counts for anything my father was a B17 squadron commander in WWII and retired from the service working for Sec. McNamara. (Talk about having fun as a military brat, we got away with murder) My brother was a fighter pilot in Nam.

Yes, GOD Bless America!

Thanks, but you prove my point about why it is impossible to separate the two. And there is a way to win all wars, including this one and even Vietnam - just as there is a way to lose them by unreasonable dissent at home which forces the politicians to hold back resources and go overboard protecting civilians - which costs American lives. That's your contribution, dude.

Follow the latest short war that Isreal is involved in this weekend. Anyone doubt who wins? Anyone over there "supporting the troops, but not the war?" No wonder people laugh at Americans.

You are right, Robert, that wars can be won, but conflicts are not.

North and South Korea are still at war (seriously, North Korea and South Korea are technically still at war. No peace treaty was ever signed) and the U.S. failed to meet its objective there (and look what's happening now). It was a conflict.

Viet Nam was also a conflict, and again the U.S. failed to meet its objective.

Iraq and Afghanistan are conflicts.

Since this century began in the year 1900 there have only been three wars for the USA. They were World War One, World War Two, and the first Persian Gulf War (TV name: Desert storm).

Everything else was a conflict with no clear objective and, therefore, became a mess: Iraq, Afghanistan, Viet Nam, Somalia, etc.).

If we had been serious, we would have declared war, and then the entire country could get behind the effort. Instead, Congress passed the buck (illegally) to the president, who is only authorized (legally) to use the military if there is "Clear and present danger."

Well, they TOLD us there was clear and present danger, but that turned out to be a load of BS, and so technically (and again, legally) we should have immediately pulled out and let the UN go in as a peacekeeping force.

But, hey, what's the law? Like the Geneva Convention, it's all just a little "quaint".

So, Robert. We CAN, in fact, support the troops but not the conflict.

By the way, did you notice over the past six years how much "support" the troops received from the Bush Administration? Cuts to the VA, and no exemption for bankruptcy due to combat service, plus much more shows that not only does the administration not support the troops, it apparently kicks them when they're down.

But, hey, when a Democrat runs the Whitehouse, we'll see how you feel when another "war" (conflict) starts up. Did you support the troops AND the war in Somalia, Bosnia, Waco, Texas?

I support the troops, but not the conflict.

We got a sheriff that has his own airforce financed w/ drug money. You'll find little understanding from the "4" 'Old Maids' for this type thinking. Failed Drug Policy? No, we need more cops.

If the Sherriff wants buy an F16 with "his" drug money, it's okay with me. I’ll be the first to sign up for the “ride-a-long” program.

And somebody, tell the County Council he needs a place to park it, now!

I'd like to at least see someone get something out of all this. Billions are being spent to sweep against the tide. People are being criminalized for only hurting themselves. If it were so bad you would think Amsterdam would have fallen under the sea a long time ago.

If worms had shotguns birds wouldn’t mess with em.

We need to engage the younger generation so that they don’t try and follow in our footsteps. Many of us would not have been the greatest role models if our kids knew what we did when we were 18.

The trick is to do it in such a way that they don’t realize that we were just as crazy then as they are now.

I can’t think of a single one of my friends that didn’t do something incredibly stupid, me included.

The best we can do is to chip away at our own regrets and attempt to do better for our kids.

When holidays come around honoring our Vets, both dead and alive, why to blazed cannot people shut their yaps on one or two days and just honor the Vets.

Leave the politicians out of it!

Those who mix the issues are joining Vets to politicians over and over.

Give those who gave their lives, bodies and many other such things a day of respect. Stop soiling it with politics.

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Keeping it real and to the core of the issue, not the peripherals.

First of all I don’t honor Vets just one or two days a year! It’s a lifetime comment.

To answer your question; as you well know, it's the politicians that sent them.

Can you not have a special day or two a year when you can just focus on the Vets and LEAVE the politicians out of the equation?

I, for one, get sick of people never able to speak of what vets do without attacking politician.

Many of us resent you trying to make us pawns in your poltical issues.

Is it too much to ask you to just focus on the Vets who died, where disabled and gave in other ways, and stop connecting them with politics for just two or three days a year?

You got the rest of the year for the poitical diatribe. All vets are fully aware of the political issues. They have strong feelings that vary Vet to Vet.

But on those special days they see the Vets, not the politicians, in the vast majority.

I guess not. You are unable to separate vets from the politics that send them places, ever.

You do not get it.

From what I did in the service I saw too many death tallies, too many reasons why many died needlessly and know the ins and outs better than most ever will.

And for that I will separate Vets and politicians on those special days and focus on the ones who died and suffered in combat.

OK. I have vented enough. Nothing more to say on this issue.

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Keeping it real and to the core of the issue, not the peripherals.

PTC Guy

No offence intended but please don’t attempt to explain to me what it is to honor service people. You have no idea what I do for a living and if I continue to do my job well, you never will.

The sign on our office door reads, "Claude Rains works here".

Because I’ve been serving my country for over 23 years I pretty much think I can say anything I darn well please.

You are new here. He's always right. His gods right. His opin. is right. He's right. ALL topics. ALL the time. I believe Support the Troops / Bring'um Home Alive.

Proud "Nam Protester here. They also serve who point out the errors of our frail leaders. Nowhere is it written, "My Country right or wrong." Hope All have a good 4th.

That does not suprise me at all bladderq.

Especially after hearing all your hate filled attacks on Christians, anyone who disagrees with you and especially all who show you don't know what you are yapping about all the time.

Actually, it would not suprise me to find you were one of those jerks that tried to run us down with their car for being in uniform.

You represent exactly my point. Total inablity to distinquish between a Vet and politics. You hate us as if we were the politicians who made the decisions. Or were too stupid to know better.

Bye, on this topic.

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Keeping it real and to the core of the issue, not the peripherals.

Yep, you have the right. Never said differently.

What you do? Having work ntk myself, I would not even ask.

Nor would I tell you or anyone else what I did.

But your right to say what you want does not make it right to say whatever comes to your mind.

Apparently you do not understand the distinction.

Now, I will close with, as you have the right to say what you want, I have the right to find your inablity to not speak of Vets and politicians in the same sentence, for any reason, offensive.

What I did gives ME that right.

Bye.

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Keeping it real and to the core of the issue, not the peripherals.

Gay, green or Hindu, I really don’t care. I told you this before.

Don’t judge me before you know me. Be advised, I may turn out to be someone you don’t want to know. I understand and appreciate that point of view.

That some of us are paid to do things for our country that the majority may not be comfortable with, so be it. Like most, I have my orders.

I have no doubt that if given the “correct” support this country can accomplish anything. The question you have to ask yourselves is, “Do I want to know?”

Would it surprise you that most Americans don’t want to know what it takes to provide safety and piece of mind in this world?

PTC Guy, please forgive some of us if we need to vent. But in the same light, don’t think for one minuet that we don’t LOVE this country and what it stands for.

Have a wonderful 4th.

I don’t know if any of you have had the fortune to be on a airline flight and some young kid in his/her greens get’s on and four of five people in first class get up and offer him or her their seat.

It’ll bring a tear to your eye when the whole plane load of people stand up and applaud the service man/woman.

The poor kid just wants to crawl under the seat at that point or take the bus.

Anyway, that’s one of most enjoyable things I’ve seen in a long time.

Nam Era here.

When I came back from 3 years overseas covering Russian and Far East Theatres I was warned to get out of uniform as fast as I could.

I could not imagine a military guy being unsafe in his own country.

But I learned fast when two jerks in a car came flying up on the side walk, barely missing me and a buddy in uniform. They were screaming, "Baby Killers!!!"

But NEVER did my fellow military people, no matter what branch, fail to help and back each other, regardless of where we were in the world.

Yea, when alone, the squid, grunt, ground pounder and such stuff flew between us. But that was ONLY between us.

There will always be those who desert and protest wars. The Loyalists of the Revolutionary war, Zuit Suiters, Korean protestors and Nam protesters are those types with different names and tactics.

But, as Mr. Epps points out, vets can almost always count of vets, regardless of what war they came from.

Think what you will, but on days like the 4th and Vets day, drop the politics and remember, be you vet or not, what vets now and then stood for. They don't set the policy, they do their duty.

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Keeping it real and to the core of the issue, not the peripherals.