Unintentional Hilarity

Marine Son, who is currently serving in Iraq, is being promoted tomorrow. It was supposed to happen in October, but for whatever reason has been moved up.

In this technologically advanced age, my daughter-in-law and baby grandson will be "attending" the ceremony via some form of broadcast.

I sent him congrats today, and I wanted to send another set of congrats to reach him "tomorrow," whenever that might be in Iraq. So I did a Google search to find out what time exactly it might be there right now.

The site I chose to click offers its information in exchange for hawking services. I'm sure they use the same language for all places and just insert the name of the city or country the site visitor has chosen. Hence, this unintentionally ironic howler, emphasis mine:

Traveling to Iraq soon?
Start planning your trip with VirtualTourist.com! You'll find travel guides and reviews with real traveler tips and photos on hotels, restaurants, nightlife, shopping and things to do (or not do). You can even meet locals in Iraq and make friends with them before your trip!

Long Distance Phone Call

...from Iraq, this morning.

Marine Son is doing fine. He had a little downtime and thought he'd call his mother.

A nice boy, that one.

Update on Marine Son

I haven't said much about Marine Son, because I don't know much, and some of what I know I must keep to myself. However, I can say this: he's actually based in Kuwait (unless that has changed), flying in and out of Iraq. (He's a back-of-the-helicopter guy, not the pilot.) I am led to understand that he has a roof rather than a tent over his head when he's on base and access to shopping for the basics, like razors and snacks. I have most of my info from his wife, Indian Princess.

Soon (I forget when she said), he will be allowed to teleconference with Indian Princess for ten minutes.

He's working 16-hour days, with one day off a month. Apparently, even though he's only supposed to be there for 6 months, they plan to get a year's worth of work out of him.

No more complaining from me about my workload.

People visit my blog. Who knew? And some self-pity, too.

This is kind of a shock. I'm barely reading my own blog, and four people showed up today.

Thanks, guys.

I wasn't going to blog any more for a while. I really don't have time, but here goes anyway.

I find myself in an odd position of having to keep my mouth shut about how I feel about having my son leave to risk his life for an immoral rich man's misadventure.* I'm not being silenced by neocons, although living in the red section of my red state, that's often how I feel about other issues -- silenced. Instead, I feel muzzled by what I can only think to call my own sense of decency. Except for talking to my friends -- bloggy and face-to-face -- I have to hold my silence. And I'm holding my silence with the people that I'd most like to talk to.

Let's start with Daughter. She's the most likely person I would talk to about such things, but this is her brother we're talking about. She's at least as invested in this as I am. Worse, her husband leaves for Afghanistan in a few months. So when we speak of this, I only say about a tenth of what I'm thinking.

Then there's Tall Son. Again, it's his brother, and it would be unfair of me to dump on him.

Then there's Indian Princess, Marine Son's wife, pregnant and with a not-quite-five-month-old at home. Enough said.

Mostly importantly, I have to remain silent with Marine Son. I'll be talking to him this weekend (by phone -- we're on opposite coasts). I have to say goodbye to him -- knowing that it might really be goodbye. (Of course, this is theoretically true of every goodbye, but usually we're not seeing people off on their trip into a circle of hell.) In such a conversation, it's not good form to express fury at the waste of it all. Not good form to complain. Not good form to say what I really want to say, which is I am terrified you won't come back -- or won't come back the same person. I am terrified you won't get to raise your children, you who have waited your entire adult life to have a child who could live with you. I am terrified for your younger children -- that they might never know you. I am terrified that you, who are one of the funniest, cleverest, noblest, most loving people I have known, will not

---it took me three minutes to type this word --

survive.

Anyway, that's a conversation I'm not allowed to indulge in. I know there are many people who do, but I can't be one of them. Except with a few friends. And except here.

What makes me uncomfortable is that this situation forces me to be dishonest, to be someone other than who I am.

But for the sake of other people's feelings, that's how it has to be.








*and if someone wanders in here and lectures me about the dangerous world we live in, that we have real enemies, etc. etc. etc. etc. etc. -- I know that. I am referring to our vanity war, which has done nothing whatsoever to mitigate those problems.

Justice for Pfc. LaVena Johnson

Go here.
(I'm keeping this post at the top.)

Pfc. LaVena Johnson

I'm way overdue posting on this, although I assume that most of the four people who visit my blog already know about this. Still -- it's worth mentioning if only one new person becomes informed and does...something. At least sign the petition to the Armed Services Committees.

Pfc. LaVena Johnson, 19 years old, died in Iraq. While she's not alone in that, the circumstances of her death -- and what happened afterwards -- deserves the attention and action of every person in this country, regardless of political affiliation, who claims to "support the troops." Other than to ask you to sign the petition and write your congresspersons (if you're in Florida like me, a lot of Floridians sit on the Armed Services Committees), I'll turn the rest over to Phil Barron, who has been tireless in his devotion to getting this story out and who spearheaded the Johnson petition (follow the link to get the links imbedded in this story, including the TV news report):

Once upon a time lived a young woman from a St. Louis suburb. She was an honor roll student, she played the violin, she donated blood and volunteered for American Heart Association walks. She elected to put off college for a while and joined the Army once out of school. At Fort Campbell, KY, she was assigned as a weapons supply manager to the 129th Corps Support Battalion.

She was LaVena Johnson, private first class, and she died near Balad, Iraq, on July 19, 2005, just eight days shy of her twentieth birthday. She was the first woman soldier from Missouri to die while serving in Iraq or Afghanistan.

The tragedy of her story begins there.

An Army representative initially told LaVena's father, Dr. John Johnson, that his daughter died of "died of self-inflicted, noncombat injuries," but initially added that it was not a suicide. The subsequent Army investigation reversed this finding and declared LaVena's death a suicide, a finding refuted by the soldier's family. In an article in the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, Dr. Johnson pointed to indications that his daughter had endured a physical struggle before she died - two loose front teeth, a "busted lip" that had to be reconstructed by the funeral home - suggesting that "someone might have punched her in the mouth."

A promise by the office of Representative William Lacy Clay to look into the matter produced nothing. The military said that the matter was closed.

Little more on LaVena's death was said until St. Louis CBS affiliate KMOV aired a story last night which disclosed troubling details not previously made public - details which belie the Army's assertion that the young Florissant native died by her own hand. The video of the report is available on the KMOV website.

Reporter Matt Sczesny spoke with LaVena's father and examined documents and photos sent by Army investigators. So far from supporting the claim that LaVena died from a self-inflicted gunshot wound, the documents provided elements of another scenario altogether:

Indications of physical abuse that went unremarked by the autopsy
The absence of psychological indicators of suicidal thoughts; indeed, testimony that LaVena was happy and healthy prior to her death
Indications, via residue tests, that LaVena may not even have handled the weapon that killed her
A blood trail outside the tent where Lavena's body was found
Indications that someone attenpted to set LaVena's body on fire
The Army has resisted calls by Dr. Johnson and by KMOV to reopen its investigation.

We have seen in other military deaths, most infamously that of Army Ranger and former professional football player Cpl. Pat Tillman, that the Army has engaged in an insulting game of deny and delay when it comes to uncovering embarrassing facts. Only when public and official attention is brought to bear on the matter - as happened, eventually and with great effort, with the case of Cpl. Tillman - do unpleasant truths come to light.

Astonishing as it seems, it takes that level of outrage to compel the Army to find the truth and tell it, to honor its own soldiers. No such groundswell has yet emerged in the case of LaVena; not enough voices have demanded that someone in the military, anyone, speak for her. At first glance, the contrast between the cases of Pat Tillman and LaVena Johnson seems vast, but at the core the situations are the same. In each case, the death of a young soldier in a dangerous place and time was not explained to the families they left behind, the families that gave them up so that they could serve us. An honest accounting of their passing is all the dead ask of us.

The mother of Pat Tillman put the matter in stark and honest terms:

"This is how they treat a family of a high-profile individual," she said. "How are they treating others?"

In the case of Private First Class Johnson, we know the answer.

How to get out of Iraq

Barbara Ehrenreich posted 15 Steps Toward a Happier, Healthier America in 07, and while they're all priceless, the last line of her first step inspired an out-loud laugh from me. It's not all that often that I can muster up a laugh about Iraq:

Get the troops out of Iraq. Of course this is easier said then [sic] done, since conditions on the ground have become far too dangerous to allow for an orderly exit. Outward bound truck convoys, for example, would attract roadside bombs and other unfriendly send-offs. The best plan is to find out how thousands of Iraqis are managing to flee the country every day and take the same route.

This leaves me with the uneasy realization that Iraqis have a good deal more freedom than we do in terms of getting out of Iraq.