NO ROOM ON PLANET 3 FOR RELIGIOUS NUTS AND BIGOTS
CHAPLAINS CORPS VICTIMIZES SOLDIERS LEAVING THEM VULNERABLE TO PTSD AND SUICIDE
By Gordon Duff
Earlier this year, I met with Christian and Islamic leaders in Iraq. Prettymuch everyone in Iraq is persecuted. Christians are on the bottom, then Sunni’s followed by Shiites. They suggest an interesting solution. It is better to keep your personal beliefs to yourself rather than see your house burn down around you. Not everyone there sees things that way, but every intelligent and progressive Iraqi does, every patriot, everyone that loves that country the way so many Americans claim they love this one.
Too many blindly ignorant and genuinely asinine people miss the glaring point that folks who "talk" religion, especially when that talk includes pointing fingers or asking for money, are, at heart, not good people. With millions, perhaps billions, believing that bad people who talk about "faith" must be good and good people who don’t are "bad", it isn’t hard to see how trillions of dollars can disappear or the world can be dotted with unending wars.
"Believers" voted in the least Christian and least decent, least righteous government America has ever had. We have had more sex scandals, more corruption, more lying, more torture than any time since the Middle Ages, when Christianity ran everything. Oops. 
The vast majority of people I live around and work with publicly espouse they are Christians but admit they only say that so people will leave them alone. I have a few, "I go to church in case it turns out there actually is a G-d," one "I believe in Christ but think religion is idiocy," and a couple real bible thumping church goers as friends.
The real point is, who do you trust more, someone who doesn’t kill and steal because he is afriad of G-d punishing him or someone who does good because it is good? Since, for many many Christians, Jews, Hindus, Muslims and others, their version of god seems to only tell them to kill, steal, rape, pillage and vote funny, religion has become to anyone with eyes to see, the least reliable indicator on who you can afford to have watch your kids or take care of your money.
Harping on the current election is a waste of time. The result, barring massive fraud, something I suspect we saw in the last election, McCain is dead in the water. His every action reflects it. I now get ROBOCALLS from people I actually know. This defines "sad."
The crazy talk about Muslims and Obama is meant to be lies made up for elections. In this case, Republicans, again, have hired a cynical and utterly dishonest pack of gangsters to use the same methods to motivate evangelical Christians with the same rhetoric they use on skinheads, Nazis and the Klan. What does this tell you?
One of my friends, Congressman Mark Siljander (R) MI (Ret.), wrote a book (please buy a copy immediately at www.amazon.com or go to www.adeadlymisunderstanding.com to learn about the book) showing how similar Christianity and Islam are and how important Jesus is to both religions. His reason, of course, is that people "talk" religion but know so little about it. He is aiming at two groups of idiots, I call them "Christians and Muslims." He would, of course, dispute my use of the term "idiots" although I stick by it.
Mark, a Reagan Republican and evangelical Christian has spent much of the last 20 years on charitable works in Africa and the Middle East. He is now under indictment by the Bush Administration. Yes, he is really that good a person.
I live within an hours drive of up to half a million Islamic Americans. Some of them support the Hezbollah or Hammas. Most of them support Bush. Many are McCain supporters and many are Obama supporters. Some hate Israel. The vast majority love America and thank Allah every day that they can raise their children here.
This doesn’t mean we shouldn’t keep our eyes on them. They could form terror cells and start blowing up family planning clinics, shooting doctors or blow up a federal building anytime much as evangelical Christians have done. Anyone can turn bad.
You don’t see any of them out painting "KKK" on political signs or shouting assassination threats at political rallys. Yet millions of Americans hate them and the very idea that one of their children, as stated by Gen. Colin Powell, would consider wanting to run for president someday should be considered unthinkable. This is, of course, exactly the way some "Americans" talked about slaves 150 years ago. 500,000 Americans gave their lives to bring this evil to an end. Now that we see it all over again, wouldn’t it make more sense to fight this "enemy within" than worry about foreign terrorists?
The worst Islamic countries, the ones that persecute Christians and advocate religious war on the US and Israel, are the ones who most reflect the beliefs and values of Americans who go to Palin rallys. Please dispute this if you can. Is what Palin believes much different from what only the worst and most extreme Islamic extremists believe? In fact, is Islamic extremism only spread by radicals who point to "lunatic fringe" extremists in America as an example of our hypocracy?
How well has terrorism and hatred served Bush? This week, Al Qaeda announced support for McCain based on their prediction that he would further destroy America’s economy. This was not a joke. They have little fear of him as they have no fear of Bush. They have dozens of countries to hide in, some professing to be our close friends and allies. As the war on terror has been so profitable for Republicans, it is more than a good guess that, if the chance to destroy Al Qaeda was there, we might "choke." Think…Tora Bora.
For 8 years, long long years, the lunatic fringe in Washington and Tehran have had their hands on the steering wheel and have driven both nations over a cliff. They have money and no freedom and we have no money and much less freedom.
Writing on extremism and intolerance in America without mentioning the military would be remiss on my part. Over the past 30 years, the US military, all branches, have fallen under the control of political and religious extremists, in the officer corps and especially in the Chaplains Corps.
The Chaplains Corps has become a dangerous extremist cult of ignorant or half educated and self serving officers continually, not only abusing their officers oaths but the Constitution as well, with a great many coming from "holy roller" and "snake handling" sects, speaking in tongues and openly "bad mouthing" American freedoms.
This fanatical group and thousands of second and third rate officers, the kind of ‘unemployables’ who find a haven as military leaders from time to time (until caught and forced to resign) has been at the heart of the incompetence, corruption, torture and tactical idiocy that has plagued what would otherwise be the greatest military in world history.
Spending taxpayer dollars, wearing the honored uniform of the American soldier, these "Limbaugh spewing" redneck preachers prey on our young soldiers, instilling in them unAmerican and unpatriotic values and manipulating them into a constant state of fear and anger.
This atmosphere of constant isolation, alienation and suspicion to the point of paranoia, promulgated by extremists who run the US military as a religious and political cult has left many of our combat troops easy victims to PTSD, suicide and has pushed them toward a jobless and homeless future upon leaving the "fairyland cult" our military has created.
Young soldiers returning to America believe they are surrounded by terrorists and traitors. They are taught to feel betrayed, alone, friendless and to be suspicous of family members, wifes and even their own children.
Cynical manipulation meant to garner votes for GOP causes and turn our military into a "Crusader" army against Islam has destroyed the lives of thousands of our troops.
One of my friends is dealing with a young former Ranger who had fallen victim in this way. Constantly spouting threats against Muslims, "liberals" and an endless stream of imaginary enemies, this young combat veteran is violent, angry, suicidal and destined for a life in prison or no life at all. Rather than seek treatment from the VA, he has been taught that anger and isolation are part of the "warrior creed."
A major component of PTSD in many is living under difficult or abusive circumstances as a child. Our own military recreates these circumstances, even if they never existed otherwise, by instilling the almost identical syndromes a child sexually abused or beaten by an alcoholic parent would suffer, all in the name of religious patriotism.
It would be funny if not tragic that a common excuse for denying compensation to PTSD victims of our wars is that their problems were "preexisting." With the military led, in large part, by extremists and cult (and occult) religion advocates, the epidemic of serious psychiatric disorders we are seeing should not be difficult to understand.
These powerful extremist cults, protected by the Bush Administration, have had a significant role in, not only the incidents of torture and abuse in Iraq, but the national disaster we currently are suffering as more and more returning veterans "melt down" in record numbers.
In the early days of World War II, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, George C. Marshall, architect of the US victory in World War II, fired 10,000 incompetent officers. He didn’t get them all, but every little bit helps. We need to do the same again.
Religion involvement in politics, government and military affairs, despite Bush era pronouncements, is unConstitutional and illegal in the US.
History has proven beyond a doubt, reinforced by our 8 year disaster at home, that people who only do good because of fear of punishment or promise of reward are willing to believe anything they are told.
Too often they hear this message:
G-d wants you to kill your neighbor and steal his land.
This messaage is thousands of years old and crosses every religion and creed.
It is now the voice of evangelical America, Bush and his McPalin puppet.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR: Gordon Duff is a Senior Staff Writer for VeteransToday.com. He is a U.S. Marine Vietnam Combat Veteran and regular contributor on social and political issues. He holds a United Nations diplomatic post.
Gordon Duff posted articles on VT from 2008 to 2022. He is a Marine combat veteran of the Vietnam War. A disabled veteran, he worked on veterans and POW issues for decades.
Gordon is an accredited diplomat and is generally accepted as one of the top global intelligence specialists. He manages the world’s largest private intelligence organization and regularly consults with governments challenged by security issues.
Duff has traveled extensively, is published around the world, and is a regular guest on TV and radio in more than “several” countries. He is also a trained chef, wine enthusiast, avid motorcyclist, and gunsmith specializing in historical weapons and restoration. Business experience and interests are in energy and defense technology.
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