Another Soldier Comes Home to North Carolina

Pfc. James McClamrock
(unidentified photographer, taken from the Herald on line)
Less than one week after I watched the President speak to the Nation for just over eighteen minutes declaring the end of combat operations in Iraq and letting us know that it was time to turn the page, 22 year old Pfc. James McClamrock, a Rifleman in the United States Army's Hawaii based 25th Infantry Division was shot to death by an enemy north of Baghdad. He was one of two combat infantryman killed in the incident as reported by yesterday's Charlotte Observer. McClamrock lived in Concord North Carolina, less than twenty miles from where I sit here this morning drinking a small cup of warm tea. My deepest sorrow and respect goes out to James' family and the life loss that they are feeling right now. Someone once told me that what is real can never be taken away.

When I did my follow up research last week about the end of the combat operations in Iraq that the President had announced, I remember thinking to myself in the discovery that there is no way combat was over in Iraq, nor will it ever be until the end of time. What a farce we are led to believe as always. The news which is sometimes avoided by the American public, as it should be for constantly throwing out the decoys for us to forget about anyway is not telling the truth. The United States Embassy in Baghdad opened last May and is ten times bigger than any embassy we have ever laid claim stake to in the world. This installation alone employs over 5,000 active duty infantry trained soldiers and has mobile rocket launchers connected to multiple satellites raised high on all four corners. It is there proudly facing Iran and points east to represent a protection base of what is often labelled or understood as our interests in the region and the world. Although we both know that the referred to interest is affordable fuel prices to keep the dream alive for four more yards in the same direction, the strategy of a nation at war is apparently still not wanting to face the truth. There is no end to combat in Iraq as evident by the latest tragedy.

Besides the overland physical proximity to where Pfc. McClamrock will be coming home to soon, I feel an almost overwhelming connection viscerally. That is as an American citizen tax payer and former military fellow I feel ownership to the present situation. I mean, I am paying for it and all but my issue is that unlike most of the avoidance culture here I cannot stop feeling how real it actually feels to be part of it. Yes, I do not like slinging words around that have no meaning or just fill my head with the illusion that God has a plan and everything is going to be fine as long I continue the perpetual mental technique of looking away and replacing what is really happening with an illusion ultimately created by the Corporate Agenda. According to the title of a New York Times article yesterday on page A12, 'The US', there's that us again, not an individual says that the incident that killed McClamrock and his fellow soldier will not deter the mission in Iraq, clearly the lengthy future continues.

Maybe there is no irony at all, only synchronicity and consequences. Seriously what are you thinking right now?