As usual, Grunts will pay for war crimes, but the big boss's will escape.

[Philosoraptor]

While the few G.I.'s who've been caught torturing or murdering civilians go to prison, the generals, Bush, and Cheney and the boys will skate, retire as billionaires and go into the history books as great heroes.

This is one of the unfairest things about war. Rich old men in mansions removed from the horror and suffering, escaping any punishment in this life for their atrocities.

Rich old men ordering patriotic young men to kill and be killed while sipping martinis in luxury.

[Selatius]

1. Not all soldiers are willing combatants. Some know the score very well

Gen. Smedley Butler was no fool.

"War is a racket. It always has been. It is possibly the oldest, easily the most profitable, surely the most vicious. It is the only one international in scope. It is the only one in which the profits are reckoned in dollars and the losses in lives."

"A few profit – and the many pay. But there is a way to stop it. You can't end it by disarmament conferences. You can't eliminate it by peace parleys at Geneva. Well-meaning but impractical groups can't wipe it out by resolutions. It can be smashed effectively only by taking the profit out of war."

-- War Is A Racket

[MSgt213]

2. I hope I'm not going off point, but you see this every where in this

country now days. Leaders and higher ups never take responsibility when some thing goes wrong, never accept blame when a plan they themselves come up with goes south. Murtha is completely right when he says our troops are on edge and stressed out. Some of these people are on their third and fourth tours in Iraq.

How many times can you tempt fate and get away with it. They are seeing their friends get killed and maimed and are thinking when is it going to be my turn? What the fuck is the plan to get out of here? What is the plan while we are here, just driving around and getting blown up? They see how the wives and children of those killed before them are cast over board once the service member dies in combat. How the wounded are treated. They know if they are wounded in combat and survive their own government and service will eventually abandon them once they handed out the required purple heart and done the photo op. You have no limbs son or young lady so...see ya. We don't want you and we don't know what civilian company is going to want to hire you. Already there are signs that returning war wounded are going jobless and homeless.

Look at what happens to the war vets that try to run for office. While they were good enough for the photo ops while in uniform they are some how single issue candidates now. Some are even severely wounded, but it does not stop their patriotism from being called into question.

But on your larger question look at the greedy corporate executives as a prime example of where this attitude comes from. Every major corporation is asking its rank and file to take less pay, work more hours and give up more benefits. The CEOs give up nothing. If fact they ask for and usually get more. They take all the credit when things go well there by justifying an even larger bonus or retirement package. They take none of the blame when their stupid decisions cost the company money. If that does happen, they go back to the employees and ask them to give up more. Ken Lay and Jeff Skilling during their trial would not accept a single ounce of blame for what went wrong at Enron. But would have been the first in line for more money if things had gone well despite their stupid and illegal decisions.

These big salaries are justified by the boards because the company needs this big vision guy. I'm all for big vision, but every time I deal with a company I deal with rank and file employees and that's how I judge the company. I never see the CEO when I go into a business. I don't get the CEO on the phone when there is a problem. I take my frustrations out on someone making not much more then minimum wage. And if they solve my problem or give me really good service, that's who I thank. I don't tell them to tell the CEO what a fine job he or she is doing.

The Exxon retiring CEO got a bonus for being such a big vision guy when the money was actually just rolling in Exxon's door. I could have been the head of Exxon in the last couple of years and the company would have still made money for christ sake.

Every time I hear someone running to the defense of Bush when there is an incident reported involving low ranking troops I want to scream, BUT WHO PUT THEM IN THIS POSITION IN THE FIRST PLACE? Fine send the troops to jail who broke the law, but also fire their bosses.

[brokensymmetry]

3. Yep.

Worse still - those rich old men are making big profits from
the war.