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Don’t Thank Me for My Service, by Camillo Mac Bica

Nana’s Commentary:

All my life I loved fireworks. I would go to the 4th of July display every year that I could. I would lie down on the ground and just take it all in. Then I read about the impact that they have on some veterans. I stopped going.

I think that veterans should be given every single thing they need to make it back to civilian life and then given anything they ask for. They go off and fight a rich man’s war and come back to very poor treatment and little consideration for their PTSD. High rates of domestic abuse, drugs and alcohol use, homelessness, poverty and suicide should not even be mentioned in the same sentence when speaking of a Veteran.

I am totally against the barbarism of war, but if these folks are going to go out there and cause all kinds of devastation to themselves and others for the benefit of the elite, then the elite should take care of them to the utmost degree!! Any country that does not take care of its veterans is truly degenerate and completely lacking of empathy, gratitude or compassion. And that’s what I have to say about that!!

 Don’t Thank Me for My Service

Sunday, 03 June 2012 08:23By Camillo Mac BicaTruthout | Op-Ed
I do not want to appear disrespectful or ungrateful, but should we meet on the street one day, do say “Hello,” or “Fine day” or other such nicety, but please do not thank me for “my service” as a United States Marine. I make this request because my service, as you refer to it, was basically, either to train to become a killer or to actually kill people and blow shit up.
Now, that is not something for which a person should be proud nor thanked. In fact, it is regrettable, and for me a source of guilt and shame, something I will have to live with for the rest of my life, as the past cannot ever be undone. So, when you thank me for my service, it disturbs me … a lot. First off, it brings to mind my wasted youth and lost innocence, and the horrible and unnecessary deaths of good friends and comrades. Second, it reminds me of my responsibility and culpability for the pain and suffering I caused innocent people, again something I would rather forget, but cannot. Third, it reinforces my belief that you have absolutely no idea about the nature and reality of the wars in Vietnam, Iraq and Afghanistan, because if you did, you would understand that thanks are inappropriate. Fourth, it reminds me that many of those who feel the need to offer thanks were apathetic about – or even supportive of – the war, while they refuse to participate themselves or did little or nothing to end it. And lastly, I have to admit that I doubt the sincerity of these expressions of supposed gratitude, as “Thank you for your service” is just something to say not because you care about what I did or sacrificed, but only to demonstrate your supposed good character, or patriotism and/or “support” for members of the military and veterans.

In making this request not to be thanked for my service, I am, of course, expressing only my opinion, and, perhaps, my idiosyncrasy, and I make no claim to be speaking for other veterans. I would wager, however, that many, perhaps even most, who have experienced the horror of war and have the courage and presence of mind to think about and evaluate what the war they served in was truly about would understand and probably concur with this request. Those veterans, however, who may not agree, who cling to the mythology of heroism, glory, honor and nobility of war, do so in large measure from fear that acknowledging war’s reality would somehow diminish their sacrifice and the sacrifices of those whose lives were lost. Perhaps understandably, they view such sacrifices and loss as difficult enough to live with when they had value and purpose, and as intolerable if they were misguided and unnecessary. To these brothers and sisters, I would offer the following questions and observations for them to ponder.

First, what was accomplished by your sacrifice and by the waste of lives and treasure in Vietnam, in Iraq and in Afghanistan? Where is the honor, glory and nobility in killing and dying for greed, incompetence, and paranoia? Second, the mythology you cling to for comfort is a tool of political leaders to make war palatable, to garner support for their militarism and abandonment of diplomacy. It is what motivates future idealistic, perhaps naive, young people to “heed the call,” to seek honor and glory, by enlisting in the military to fight for a cause they have been deceived into believing is right, just and necessary, but which is, in reality, a string of wars for corporate greed, power and hegemony. All who are touched by war are tainted and require readjustment, perhaps even rehabilitation, but in order to truly come home from war, to make the perilous journey of healing, one must face the realities of one’s own war experience head on, as no healing is possible from fantasy, myth, rationalization and distortion of truth.
So, in the future, if you really insist on thanking me for something, do not thank me for

the eight years I spent as a Marine, but for the 45 or so years following my discharge from the military that I have spent as an activist fighting for human rights and social justice and to end the insanity of war. Frankly, however, I would prefer that you just say hello, or fine day or other such nicety. You see, my activism all these years warrants no praise or merit, as it is not something I choose to do. Rather, I do it because I must, perhaps as penance for my culpability for the sacrilege of war. And if you truly want to demonstrate your good character, patriotism, and support for the troops and veterans, rather than merely mouth meaningless expressions of gratitude for something you don’t truly understand or care much about, do something meaningful and real. Do what is truly in the interest of this nation and of those victimized by war.

Make some demands.

“how can we still have troops in other countries and we celebrate with “bombs”… it would be lovely if we decided not to do them in honor to our troops… That would be a great way to say THANK YOU!”

Demand, for example, an immediate end to the corporate takeover of our “democracy” and to the undue influence of the military-industrial-Congressional complex. Demand sanity in Pentagon spending and a reallocation of finite resources to people-focused programs such as health care, education and jobs rather than to killing and destruction. Demand an immediate end to wars for corporate profit, greed, power and hegemony. Demand that we adhere to the Constitution and to international law. Demand accountability for those who make war easily and care more for wealth, profit and power than for national interest or for the welfare of their fellow human beings. And finally, demand the troops be brought home now, and that they be adequately treated and cared for when they return. So, should we meet on the street one day, do say Hello, or Fine day, and as you talk to me about your efforts to make this country and the world a better and more peaceful place in which to live, I would be happy to thank you for your service.

CAMILLO MAC BICA, PhD, is a professor of philosophy at the School of Visual Arts in New York City. He is a former Marine Corps officer, Vietnam veteran, longtime activist for peace and social justice, and the coordinator of the Long Island Chapter of Veterans for Peace.


Links: 
The Things They Cannot Say

More Than Human? The Ethics of Biologically Enhancing Soldiers

Fireworks, Triggers, PTSD, and Veterans

Ebola, AIDS Manufactured by Western Pharmaceuticals, US DoD? | The Liberian Observer

Ebola, AIDS Manufactured by Western Pharmaceuticals, US DoD? | The Liberian Observer

Scientists allege deadly diseases such as Ebola and AIDS are bio weapons
being tested on Africans. Other reports have linked the Ebola virus
outbreak to an attempt to reduce Africa’s population. Liberia happens to
be the continents’s fastest growing population.
By: 
Dr. Cyril Broderick, Professor of Plant Pathology
Dear World Citizens:
I have read a number of articles from your Internet outreach as well as articles from other sources about the casualties in Liberia and other West African countries about the human devastation caused by the Ebola virus. About a week ago, I read an article published in the Internet news summary publication of the Friends of Liberia that said that there was an agreement that the initiation of the Ebola outbreak in West Africa was due to the contact of a two-year old child with bats that had flown in from the Congo. That report made me disconcerted with the reporting about Ebola, and it stimulated a response to the “Friends of Liberia,” saying that African people are not ignorant and gullible, as is being implicated. A response from Dr. Verlon Stone said that the article was not theirs, and that “Friends of Liberia” was simply providing a service. He then asked if he could publish my letter in their Internet forum. I gave my permission, but I have not seen it published. Because of the widespread loss of life, fear, physiological trauma, and despair among Liberians and other West African citizens, it is incumbent that I make a contribution to the resolution of this devastating situation, which may continue to recur, if it is not properly and adequately confronted. I will address the situation in five (5) points:
1.    EBOLA IS A GENETICALLY MODIFIED ORGANISM (GMO)
Horowitz (1998) was deliberate and unambiguous when he explained the threat of new diseases in his text, Emerging Viruses: AIDS and Ebola – Nature, Accident or Intentional. In his interview with Dr. Robert Strecker in Chapter 7, the discussion, in the early 1970s, made it obvious that the war was between countries that hosted the KGB and the CIA, and the ‘manufacture’ of ‘AIDS-Like Viruses’ was clearly directed at the other. In passing during the Interview, mention was made of Fort Detrick, “the Ebola Building,” and ‘a lot of problems with strange illnesses’ in “Frederick [Maryland].” By Chapter 12 in his text, he had confirmed the existence of an American Military-Medical-Industry that conducts biological weapons tests under the guise of administering vaccinations to control diseases and improve the health of “black Africans overseas.” The book is an excellent text, and all leaders plus anyone who has interest in science, health, people, and intrigue should study it. I am amazed that African leaders are making no acknowledgements or reference to these documents.
2.  EBOLA HAS A TERRIBLE HISTORY, AND TESTING HAS BEEN SECRETLY TAKING PLACE IN AFRICA
I am now reading The Hot Zone, a novel, by Richard Preston (copyrighted 1989 and 1994); it is heart-rending. The prolific and prominent writer, Steven King, is quoted as saying that the book is “One of the most horrifying things I have ever read. What a remarkable piece of work.” As a New York Times bestseller, The Hot Zone is presented as “A terrifying true story.” Terrifying, yes, because the pathological description of what was found in animals killed by the Ebola virus is what the virus has been doing to citizens of Guinea, Sierra Leone and Liberia in its most recent outbreak: Ebola virus destroys peoples’ internal organs and the body deteriorates rapidly after death. It softens and the tissues turn into jelly, even if it is refrigerated to keep it cold. Spontaneous liquefaction is what happens to the body of people killed by the Ebola virus! The author noted in Point 1, Dr. Horowitz, chides The Hot Zone for writing to be politically correct; I understand because his book makes every effort to be very factual. The 1976 Ebola incident in Zaire, during President Mobutu Sese Seko, was the introduction of the GMO Ebola to Africa.
3.    SITES AROUND AFRICA, AND IN WEST AFRICA, HAVE OVER THE YEARS BEEN SET UP FOR TESTING EMERGING DISEASES, ESPECIALLY EBOLA
The World Health Organization (WHO) and several other UN Agencies have been implicated in selecting and enticing African countries to participate in the testing events, promoting vaccinations, but pursuing various testing regiments. The August 2, 2014 article, West Africa: What are US Biological Warfare Researchers Doing in the Ebola Zone? by Jon Rappoport of Global Research pinpoints the problem that is facing African governments. 
Obvious in this and other reports are, among others: 
(a) The US Army Medical Research Institute of Infectious Diseases (USAMRIID), a well-known centre for bio-war research, located at Fort Detrick, Maryland; 
(b) Tulane University, in New Orleans, USA, winner of research grants, including a grant of more than $7 million the National Institute of Health (NIH) to fund research with the Lassa viral hemorrhagic fever; 
(c) the US Center for Disease Control (CDC); 
(d) Doctors Without Borders (also known by its French name, Medicins Sans Frontiers); 
(e) Tekmira, a Canadian pharmaceutical company;  
(f) The UK’s GlaxoSmithKline; and 
(g) the Kenema Government Hospital in Kenema, Sierra Leone. 
Reports narrate stories of the US Department of Defense (DoD) funding Ebola trials on humans, trials which started just weeks before the Ebola outbreak in Guinea and Sierra Leone. The reports continue and state that the DoD gave a contract worth $140 million dollars to Tekmira, a Canadian pharmaceutical company, to conduct Ebola research. This research work involved injecting and infusing healthy humans with the deadly Ebola virus. Hence, the DoD is listed as a collaborator in a “First in Human” Ebola clinical trial (NCT02041715, which started in January 2014 shortly before an Ebola epidemic was declared in West Africa in March. Disturbingly, many reports also conclude that the US government has a viral fever bioterrorism research laboratory in Kenema, a town at the epicentre of the Ebola outbreak in West Africa. The only relevant positive and ethical olive-branch seen in all of my reading is that Theguardian.com reported, “The US government funding of Ebola trials on healthy humans comes amid warnings by top scientists in Harvard and Yale that such virus experiments risk triggering a worldwide pandemic.” That threat still persists.
4.    THE NEED FOR LEGAL ACTION TO OBTAIN REDRESS FOR DAMAGES INCURRED DUE TO THE PERPETUATION OF INJUSTICE IN THE DEATH, INJURY AND TRAUMA IMPOSED ON LIBERIANS AND OTHER AFRICANS BY THE EBOLA AND OTHER DISEASE AGENTS. 
The U. S., Canada, France, and the U. K. are all implicated in the detestable and devilish deeds that these Ebola tests are. There is the need to pursue criminal and civil redress for damages, and African countries and people should secure legal representation to seek damages from these countries, some corporations, and the United Nations. Evidence seems abundant against Tulane University, and suits should start there. Yoichi Shimatsu’s article, The Ebola Breakout Coincided with UN Vaccine Campaigns, as published on August 18, 2014, in the Liberty Beacon.
5.   AFRICAN LEADERS AND AFRICAN COUNTRIES NEED TO TAKE THE LEAD IN DEFENDING BABIES, CHILDREN, AFRICAN WOMEN, AFRICAN MEN, AND THE ELDERLY. THESE CITIZENS DO NOT DESERVE TO BE USED AS GUINEA PIGS! 
Africa must not relegate the Continent to become the locality for disposal and the deposition of hazardous chemicals, dangerous drugs, and chemical or biological agents of emerging diseases. There is urgent need for affirmative action in protecting the less affluent of poorer countries, especially African citizens, whose countries are not as scientifically and industrially endowed as the United States and most Western countries, sources of most viral or bacterial GMOs that are strategically designed as biological weapons. It is most disturbing that the U. S. Government has been operating a viral hemorrhagic fever bioterrorism research laboratory in Sierra Leone. Are there others? Wherever they exist, it is time to terminate them. If any other sites exist, it is advisable to follow the delayed but essential step: Sierra Leone closed the US bioweapons lab and stopped Tulane University for further testing.
The world must be alarmed. All Africans, Americans, Europeans, Middle Easterners, Asians, and people from every conclave on Earth should be astonished. African people, notably citizens more particularly of Liberia, Guinea and Sierra Leone are victimized and are dying every day. Listen to the people who distrust the hospitals, who cannot shake hands, hug their relatives and friends. Innocent people are dying, and they need our help. The countries are poor and cannot afford the whole lot of personal protection equipment (PPE) that the situation requires. The threat is real, and it is larger than a few African countries. The challenge is global, and we request assistance from everywhere, including China, Japan, Australia, India, Germany, Italy, and even kind-hearted people in the U.S., France, the U.K., Russia, Korea, Saudi Arabia, and anywhere else whose desire is to help. The situation is bleaker than we on the outside can imagine, and we must provide assistance however we can. To ensure a future that has less of this kind of drama, it is important that we now demand that our leaders and governments be honest, transparent, fair, and productively engaged. They must answer to the people. Please stand up to stop Ebola testing and the spread of this dastardly disease.
Thank you very much.
Sincerely,
Dr. Cyril E. Broderick, Sr.

War-Ebola-Environment-Health

It makes you wonder what the real agenda is when something so simple as “refraining from war” can really help impact the environment thus keeping people healthier and stronger so that their immune systems can do what it’s supposed to do.

If you look at the countries hit hardest by this disease, you can see they have had periods of war and devastation. Classically Liberia and the Congo both have been ravished. Imagine the psychological impact and then the health impact. The weakening of the immune system can be catalyzed by simple stressors, not to mention war, killings, rapes, bombing, destruction of infrastructure etc.

I would imagine that a comparable outcome is to be expected in the middle east.  In addition to the obvious results of war, the long term effects that manifest as extreme psychosis and paranoia, birth defects, destabilization of habitable areas, farms and livestock being destroyed, and the wounded in need of emergency hospital care. Not to mention the bodies (and body parts) that need to be discarded as they too can cause an outbreak of some virulent disease. Couple that with the amount of fossil fuels used to  deploy these munitions and the amount of toxic smoke emitted after these munitions have been deployed. Are we looking at other forms of respiratory diseases in folks on the ground, the ones who survive?
On and on we can state the many consequences of war and then we could equate the impact on the health of the world… and not even by being a scientist, or doctor, or nurse, just someone with a bit of common sense and introspection. Again, it really makes you wonder what the agenda is, for we are certain that our so-called leaders are not that ignorant. I am sure they have at some point in their lives experienced some type of illness and its impact on their health, if from nothing more than a simple allergy.

No, they are not ignorant, they are not stupid, and they are not unable to see. It is by choice that they turn their heads away from the fact that they have blood on their hands from the present catastrophic decisions they have made over the lives of others, thousands of miles away. Undoubtedly, they will play with their toys and weapons of mass destruction in the air, on the ground and through their military prowess, and refuse to connect the dots. The agenda is almost unspeakable. The outcome is quite certain. And they are doing the bidding of the Overlords who control them.

People will die in numbers and this will fulfill the contract that has been made.
We can speak on this for days and more days to come, but until an awakening happens in the hearts and minds of those who pass the legislation for endless war… we will remain in this cycle of destruction till all is lost. There will be no safe haven for anyone…. I believe that is one point that is sorely missed as the ink dries on another imposition of hegemony and imperial hubris.
What’s Behind the Ebola Crises and are U.S. Americans at Risk? http://ow.ly/CfIOq

 What’s Behind the Ebola Crises and are U.S. Americans at Risk?

In an interview with Telesur’s The Global African, Johns Hopkins Infectious Disease Program co-director Taha E. Taha discusses the roots of the Ebola crisis and what can be done about it. Courtesy of Telesur –   2 hours ago