3/04/2005
Good News
Reported in this thread at THR and with further coroboration for WashingtonVotes.org, the proposed Washington state AWB, along with all of the other GFW nonsense bills, died in committee at 1730 hrs (PST), on March 2nd, 2005.
One of the good things about having a part-time legislature: if they don't get it done quick, they don't get it done. Thank the Lord for the 105 day session.
UPDATE: The death of almost all of the gun control bills has been confirmed by GOAL Post 2005-9. The lead shot excise tax bill (which I haven't discussed at all-I'll have to fix that soon) is the only one still alive.
Permalink
|
3/03/2005
Personal Musings
This post has been brewiing for a bit. I've got some really mixed up feelings running around in my head on this issue, in a couple of different areas. A moral conundrum. Guilt feelings. It's all there.
For those of you who don't know, I'm an Army officer, in the Infantry. I've been in for a bit over 8.5 years, and I'm currently stationed at Ft Jackson, SC, where I command a basic training company. Despite being on active duty the entire time since Sept 11, 2001, I have never been on any sort of operational deployment in the Global War on Terrorism (GWOT, as the army calls it) combat or otherwise. I'm getting close to getting sent to a new assignment, and looking at where I'm likely to go, I'm not likely to get deployed anytime soon. As in, not at least until the latter half of 2008.
That's where the guilt comes in. I feel like I'm shamming out, like I'm not doing my fair share. Intellectually, I know the basic training is a critical job, one of the most important in the Army. I help turn civilians into the soldiers, soldiers the Army desperately needs, and I make sure they are as well equipped to not only survive, but fight and win when they get into combat. But I still feel like a sham artist. Almost all of my Army buddies have been in combat in either Irzq or Afghanistan. One, Captain Chris Seifert, God rest his soul, has been killed, in the fragging incident in the 101st early in the Iraq campaign. While they've been in mortal danger, separated from their families, living in tents, wearing body armor every day, I've hanging out fat, dumb, and happy back here stateside.
Which leads to on of the moral, or at least ethical, conundrums. I could volunteer to be deployed, late next year. Central Command has openings for all ranks and branches, one year tours. I could just send them an email. But what about my duty to my wife and son? Can I look my wife in the eye and say that I just volunteered to go endanger my life just so I won't feel like a sham artist?
Other moral issue is why I want to go, besides feeling like I'm shamming. I won't mince words: I want to go kill hajjis, mujis, Islamofascists, whatever you choose to call them. I want a chance to see some of them through my rifle sights and pull the trigger. Maybe that's bloodthirsty, and immoral, and maybe I should go see a pshrink. But that's how I feel. I've wanted to opportunity to do so ever since Sept 11th. That day I spent 2 hours sitting in my car, waiting to get through the front gate of Ft Lewis,listening to news reports on the radio, then 12 hours that night in post operations center, watching footage replayed on CNN over and over, interspresed with occasional shots of Bin Laden and that Krinkov of his. And I wanted to kill them then, and I still do. And thus far, despite being an Army Infantry officer, I haven't gotten the chance. And by the time I do, I'll be senior enough that the only time I'll see the outside of the basecamp wire is coming from the main airfield when I arrive and going there to go home.
When my grandkids ask what I did in the GWOT, I'll have to tell them "I pushed paper." Grrrr.
Permalink
|
|
|
