By: Marti Oakley (c)copyright 2010 All Rights Reserved

_ ______ ________________________________________

I came of age in the ‘60’s’ when the country was in the throws of fighting to end the Viet Nam war.  We marched on Washington; held protests and burned draft cards along with our bra’s in some cases, but the fact was we were out there; passionate, fired up, ready to take on the establishment for what we saw as egregious wrongs perpetrated by the rich and powerful who would have willingly sacrificed any one of us as long as they could be assured to profit and didn’t have to get their hands dirty….or their kids hands either. 

I was a newly married young woman at the time all this was happening, my husband a Marine in the 5th Reconnaissance.  The man I married came home from that war suffering from horrendous nightmares and the lifetime effects of Agent Orange along with multiple other injuries which have afflicted him for all these years since.  They gave him a bronze star and several other medals; I can only assume this was the reward for the sacrifice he made in yet another war that was waged for corporate profits but sold as another of those that had to be fought to save some country that didn’t want us there to begin with.  We weren’t there to save anyone, not even our own.  There was money to be made and if our military had to be sacrificed for those profits; so be it. More