Thank you

First off, thanks to all those veterans who remain with us, and a moment of thought to all those who gave their lives in service to this country.

I'll be honest, I spent today relatively quietly. We caught the Cubs game around midday and then went out to eat, then did some food shopping and took Mono out for a bit to get some treats and run around. I may yet grill tonight but with the late lunch that may be awhile down the road. So yeah, not too stressful of a day.

I have some military related links I have been saving up for the day and I'd like to share those now.

Bush's latest defense secretary states the obvious: the our troops have done a disservice to our troops. There isn't much time for this pack of douchebags to fix the problems they caused, but I would at least like to see them try.

In 2004, when the Bushites were running around Iraq giving out Bush-Cheney stickers to troops and actively telling them to push a pro-Bush attitude, the Pentagon had no issues with it. This year, with a very pro-Democratic response from our soldiers in the field, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff is banning ANY political leanings. Curious, no?

Essentially, our troops are fighting to be censored.

"It seems difficult to believe or comprehend how John McCain could say the G.I. Bill of Rights that Jim Webb wrote was too generous....Not only that, he didn't even bother to come and vote. He was against it, said he was against it. He should have come and at least stood up and voted, but he didn't do that."

- Sen. Harry Reid, D-NV

Meanwhile, the New York Times calls out Bush for being against the New GI Bill sponsored by Jim Webb and Chuck Hagel. It won with large bipartisan support, but Bush plans to veto it. His clone, John McCain, couldn't even be bothered to show up and vote against it. He had a fundraiser instead.

Essentially, the vet in the presidential race doesn't want to fund benefits for our soldiers and is too chickenshit to vote against our soldiers. Instead he just ignores them until he needs them for a photo op.

The happy response to the bill's passage by the IAVA's Paul Rieckhoff.

How did YOUR senator vote? Find out here.

At least our states are trying to step up in giving care to our troops.

In more sobering news, Iraq War vet suicides may end up claiming more lives than the war itself.

Meanwhile, a glimpse into how a fallen soldier comes home, from the writer of a recent Esquire article, plus another interview with the writer.

These are the things we should know about what happens to our troops. Bush hides the reality to us and we all suffer for the loss of knowledge, whether we are aware of it or not.

Something else we should know: Bush and Cheney's pet contractors, KBR (a division of Halliburton), are giving our soldiers contaminated water. We should have asked for clarification on what "taking care of our troops" meant to these assholes.

But how would we know ANY of this. The mainstream media either under-reports or just plain spreads the lies of the Bush administration when it comes to the war, domestic spying, illegal detention and torture, and every other blunder related to our so-call War on Terror.

As of this morning, the total for those who lost their lives in Iraq is 4,083. In Afghanistan, the count is 507.