Expensive gas - dead pets

Two tragic realities in the United States drive home why we are playing with Third-World status. Travel is another word for freedom.  Pets are the last line of happiness in an increasingly happyless appearing society.

The Marginal Class (those that used to be Lower Middle Class) is further driven to quasi-Third-World status by simply making it hard for them to travel.  I have noticed people in Vietnam a new-and-improved Third-World county, define us in America as rich simply because we can travel at the drop of a hat.  

I don't know whether to be mad at the oil players or at us rabble for letting the constant raising fuel pricing happen to ourselves without a whimper.  I can see with my own eyes it is causing people to curb their travel (freedom). I struggle to hold back the cynicism that says, "we are getting what we deserve."

As far as I can tell from my work in Vietnam, the Vietnamese don't trust the Chinese (currently the People's Republic of China) - apparently never have trusted them. This is something we did not pick up on during our Vietnam War.  Is it not poetic we learned nothing to relate to Iraq from our long war in Vietnam and now as quasi-friends with Vietnam we learn nothing from their thousands of years dealing with the Chinese? We don't believe them when they warn in subtle innuendos, "sleep with the Chinese - bury your pets." 

Today's comments inspired by blogs "Waxing America" and "Rocknetroots."

This week's soldier to remember is Specialist Paul J. Sturino, 21 of Rice Lake who died on September 22, 2003 from a non-hostile gunshot wound.  He was assigned to the 101st Airborne Division and was in an area south of Mosul in northern Iraq.  He was in Battery B, 2nd Battalion, 320 Field Artillery Regiment, 101st Airborne Division.  Sturino was the fourth Wisconsinite killed during military operations in Iraq.  Originally with a tank detail based in Lawton, Oklahoma, Paul transferred to the 101st Airborne in Fort Campbell, Kentucky to be a paratrooper.  He went to Iraq in March 2003.  Sturino had re-enlisted for another year as a member of the 101st but his tour of duty was subsequently extended because of the war.

3,355 Americans have been killed in Iraq since Spring 2003.

25,090 U.S. troops have been wounded in action in Iraq since Spring 2003.

72 Wisconsin soldiers have been killed in Iraq since Spring 2003.

Soldier of the week and military casualty information sources: cnn.com; and, Milwaukee Journal Sentinel.