On two consecutive days this week, disaster visited Fort Meade, an Army facility located north of Washington, D.C.  On Thursday, two people died when a small plane crashed nearby and Friday, a six-alarm blaze struck one of the facility's buildings.

The chances of such a convergence must be remote. Still, the events might have drawn little notice beyond the local community were it not that Fort Meade is home to the Army's largest counter-intelligence unit, criticized for its domestic surveillance of peaceful activist groups. This fact, irregularities in accounts of the incidents, and evasiveness by government officials invite closer scrutiny of the unfortunate events.

The military marching through the children's playroom.The Pentagon and its corresponding military branches have been trying for years to interest young people for military service, however it is rare to find a recruiting officer who is capable of filling his proscribed quota.

In order to reverse this trend the Pentagon engaged itself in a campaign against the perceived lack of heroism. The strategy for this involved changing focus to a new social group, now it is not just adults being targeted but also teenagers and children.

Waterflake

This morning I was awake at 0230 hours EST, and found an editorial about the War in Iraq, and how it was wrong. Understandable, what wasn't was the citizens responses to it, the venom they had to the writer. They believe he is a "flaming liberal" he is just like all the other "talking heads" and just does not understand how W is standing alone in trying to "protect" America. http://www.theheraldbulleti n.com/opinion/local_story_0 80233940.html  /....

The responses are an eye opener, and that should say a lot since I spent 14 years in the Army, playing "follow the leader" but there do come times where you say wait, this is wrong and I just can't do it, in my opinion Iraq is one of those times. Afghanistan was the right use of our military forces, and Iraq was an idealogues quest, and the public is paying the price, in blood and deficits. More  Below the fold
 

The U.S. Army has proposed the development of a database to track sexual assault in the military that will violate victim privacy and will have a chilling effect on the reporting of sexual assault.

TAKE ACTION: http://www.stopfamilyviolen ce.org/211

The proposed database will include specific identifying information including victim names, social security numbers, dates of birth, service data, rate/rank, demographic information, along with information about the rape, including police reports, DNA processing data, as well as medical and counseling information from not only military but also civilian victims of sexual assault by military personnel.

Here is what one service member had to say about the proposed database:

The right-wingers are attempting to fight back, but the links I got from their sites only strengthen the damning evidence against Bush and his decision to use Phosphorus in Iraq. First and foremost, the Pentagon approved the use of Phosphorus in heavily populated areas even though there has been no research done on the effects of Phosphorus on large populations. Next, the New York Times pointed out that the Pentagon covered up the extent of the civilian deaths by seizing the hospital in Fallujah early. Third, every technical manual on White Phosphorus that I found has backed the findings of the people in the RAI documentary that Phosphorus can burn through to the skin, but leave the clothes intact.

(originally posted at Hoot at the Dark.)

Daily Press has a must read Special Report:

"The Army now admits that it secretly dumped 64 million pounds of nerve and mustard agents into the sea, along with 400,000 chemical-filled bombs, land mines and rockets and more than 500 tons of radioactive waste - either tossed overboard or packed into the holds of scuttled vessels."