RESPECT THRU EXPERIENCE

Any butter bar LT will tell you they're not fully prepared for the amount of responsibility bestowed upon them in their first couple of years. It's understandable; ROTC cannot simulate being in charge of 50-60 people and sometimes being the face of an organization, with a Colonel or General to answer to. In these cases, the LT usually has a seasoned enlisted person as training wheels until they get the hang of it. Even though the LT may out-rank the enlisted person, knowledge and experience demand respect. There's no substitute for experience. No degree is worth a damn if you can't apply it.

Experience is a level of truth. What we do molds us into who we are. That's why most people prefer on-the-job training compared to classroom instruction. Personally, I think the classroom instruction would be far more effective AFTER some time on the job, but that's another topic. The point is that experience exudes confidence, which breeds leadership. There's nothing more powerful than the aura of a great leader. I've yet to experience this outside of the military. Civilians tend to have "bosses."

Last week, Mr Bush SAID he got some "FIRSTHAND EXPERIENCE" of shooting at insurgents in Baghdad. WHAT?!? A FUCKIN' VIDEO GAME?!? I'm sorry George, but a couple minutes on a video game is not firsthand experience of WAR. You get NO RESPECT for that experience. In fact, you lose ANY that you may have had. Add that to the "possibility" of his draft-dodging escapade, and you see what kind of coward this guy is. He did everything in his power to avoid GOING TO war. What kind of confidence you must have in the greatest military EVER not to even go.

The man has NEVER had to start at the bottom and EARN his way up the ladder. There's NO experience that can garner my respect for this man. And the worst part about that is HE DOESN'T CARE. I doubt if he even knows OF people of my stature. The closest he's probably ever come was when he was THE TEXECUTIONER.

My plight, like millions of others like me, is FICTION. It doesn't exist, except for in statistics. There are no REAL programs to uplift us. There are EXCEPTIONS who prosper, like a rose from the concrete. Usually there's no looking back though. Get out and stay out. The people who control the quality of our lives have no connection to them. They vote based on dollars, not effects of the laws. S-CHIP is a prime example; that's not real money. And it's paid for! For God's sake, it's a program that will pay for itself. Taxing cigarettes for children's healthcare makes PERFECT sense to me.

IF BUSH KILLS ALL OF OUR KIDS, DOES THAT MEAN NOBODY WILL HAVE TO PAY THE BILL FOR THIS WAR?