Taken from What Are You Doing On Memorial Day? by Jane Bright:
Memorial Day weekend is a 3-day weekend so there will be backyard barbecues, memorial parades and a lot of flag waving. That's how the average American, untouched by war and its devastation, will celebrate the holiday that launches summer.
Memorial Day, originally Decoration Day, is a day of remembrance for those who have died in our nation's service. Who, besides the families and friends of the fallen, really remember our war dead? Most Americans know little of the two declared wars occurring in Iraq and Afghanistan, the covert, undeclared war in Pakistan and the soon-to-be war in Yemen. Roughly a 1/2 percent of our population has fought in OEF/OIF since they began with the 2001 invasion of Afghanistan.
President Obama lifted the ban on press coverage of returning war dead early in 2009 yet very little attention is paid to those returning home in transport tubes. Even less attention is paid to our war wounded.... Read More
