Words from John Murtha

[Downthestretch55]

Originally Posted by boldruler

That op-ed was about raising the gas tax 5 cents per gallon and using the billions raised to help soldiers and their families. Before it ran I had to change a paragraph, or rather include one that sort of gave Bush a little credit. Stars and Stripes is owned by DoD and they have freedom but you won't see anything criticizing the administration on their pages.

The americans we polled were willing to do it, but the WH refused to raise the gas tax. It actually got a little ugly with them. One of the many reasons I can't stand them.

BR,
You and I are on totally different planets.
Of course I know that "Stars and Stripes" is the propaganda tool for the armed forces. Paid for by the Department of Defense (previously called Dept. of War).
A nickle a gallon to help families???
Get real!
Wouldn't it be better to have those that serve come home and live with their families, support them themselves, rather than be flown back in flag draped coffins that aren't seen on network news, or mangled bodies at Walter Reed?
A nickle a gallon???
Why not just bring them home to be with their families rather than perpetuate the charade? The "real" costs will be huge!
As Murtha said, it's time to re-deploy. And he does care about our military, and so do I.
The question that Murtha asked is "how"?
I continue to ask "why"?

Originally Posted by Downthestretch55

BR,
You and I are on totally different planets.
Of course I know that "Stars and Stripes" is the propaganda tool for the armed forces. Paid for by the Department of Defense (previously called Dept. of War).
A nickle a gallon to help families???
Get real!
Wouldn't it be better to have those that serve come home and live with their families, support them themselves, rather than be flown back in flag draped coffins that aren't seen on network news, or mangled bodies at Walter Reed?
A nickle a gallon???
Why not just bring them home to be with their families rather than perpetuate the charade? The "real" costs will be huge!
As Murtha said, it's time to re-deploy. And he does care about our military, and so do I.
The question that Murtha asked is "how"?
I continue to ask "why"?

It wasn't that simple. The op-ed partially had to do with increasing the death benefit, but also had a little to do with trying to put the president in a box of raising the tax or looking like he didn't support the troops. The real point was to get the death benefit raised and it worked.

Send me a private message with your e-mail and I will send it to you . There were numerous political angles to it and I had to fight with some of the lower staffers at the White House over getting it in the paper. The death benefit was raised though and now families can get up to $500K with their policy and the $100K benefit combined.