Soldiers Killed in Valor, Buried in Shadows: Margaret Carlson

[Purveyor]

July 17 (Bloomberg) -- We all think our jobs are hard. Even though I can pop out freely for school plays and doctor appointments, I go around thinking mine is a doozy. It's not, and neither are those of the loudly suffering hedge-fund managers, who work in climate-controlled offices on ergonomically correct chairs and get outsized rewards.

Any garbage man, meter maid or retiree flipping hamburgers would trade places with us.

I raise this because I discovered the two hardest jobs in the world over the July 4th weekend while lounging on the beach: First is the person who notifies NOK (next of kin) that a loved one has been lost in combat, immortalized in a new book, ``Final Salute: A Story of Unfinished Lives'' by Jim Sheeler.

Second is the public affairs officer for Arlington National Cemetery. The Washington Post's Dana Milbank reported that officer Gina Gray was trying to ease new restrictions that went beyond Army regulations in keeping the media away even when a grieving widow or fatherless child wanted the final goodbye to be recorded.

For her efforts, Gray was demoted, hit with petty requests like notifying her supervisor every time she left the office. At the end of June, she was fired. Gray, who served in numerous war zones and still has hearing loss from a roadside explosion when she was working with the 173rd Airborne in Iraq, is fighting the expulsion.

Unequal Sacrifice

Without a draft, sacrifice isn't spread randomly across the populace. Some give everything, others nothing. This is the first war not financed by new taxes. But the Pentagon and Bush White House exacerbate our distance from the human cost of war by keeping us from bearing witness to the burial of the dead, the sacred pageantry of the bugler playing taps, the 21-gun salute, an American flag folded precisely.

President George W. Bush himself rarely attends a funeral. He's honored the troops by giving up golf since the war in Iraq started. Perhaps for the mounting casualties in Afghanistan, he will give up mountain biking.

The administration did publicize one funeral when it orchestrated a nationally televised memorial for Corporal Pat Tillman and awarded him a Silver Star, although officials had been alerted that the former football player's death was probably a result of friendly fire.

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BLOOMBERG: http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601039&sid=aZmQyONchIqk&refer=columnist_carlson

[niyad]

1. these soldiers weren't killed in valour, they were killed in an unjust, illegal, and immoral war of

lies. there is absolutely nothing valorous about their useless sacrifice, and the pain and suffering of their families and friends.

[The Liberal Thinker]

2. They were killed in vain.

But their service was valorous. There's something honorable about serving your country and fighting evil even if the reasons you're doing so are sketchy at best.

[roody]

4. Why does serving your country have to involve

killing people of color?

[DeepModem Mom]

3. K&R

[BridgeTheGap]

5. the person who notifies NOK (next of kin) that a loved one has been lost in combat

I remember the U.S.M.C. car pulling into our driveway and the sinking feeling that came with it. I believe it was a Captain & Sargent that got out. I went to get my dad and listened as they informed him that his son (my brother) had been killed in action a few days before in Vietnam.
Yeah, I remember the looks on the guys faces. Not a job I would want.