A community mourns.....

[H2O Man]

I live near a small town in rural upstate New York. Eight days ago, the first serviceman from this area was killed in the war in Iraq. He was 20-year old Isaac Nieves from Sidney. He was married to "the girl next door," Amy Holdrege Nieves.
Both of my sons were friends with Isaac and Amy. The family and community are devastated. It is an incident that forces us to move beyond being democrats and republicans, capitalist or socialist, black, brown, red, yellow, or white, male or female.
Proof of this is found in the editorials of several area newspapers. The Sidney Tri-Town News, the Oxford Review-Times, and the Binghamton Press & Sun-Bulletin are all conservative papers, with republican editors. Yet all have wrote editorials about Nieves' unnecessary death, and compare the war in Iraq to Vietnam. So I could vomit when I hear President bush question the patriotism of those who question him, or make the Vietnam comparison.
A hamlet near here, Sidney Center, lost 7 sons to Vietnam in a short period. Sidney Center has a population of 425. Soon after these deaths, several draft-aged boys from the area died in DWI-related accidents. My boys' 2nd cousin died in Vietnam; the day his school-aged brother got the news, he commited suicide. A year to the day later, their father commited suicide. There are many victims of war who are not listed on "the Wall."
We must unite to remove bush & friends from any positions of power.

[SCDem]

1. My father was a Vietnam Vet

before Vietnam... boy next door raised Catholic good work ethic etc.,... after Vietnam... alcohol and marijuana. He died in a car accident seven years later.

[Paradise]

2. And another community mourns...

Long Island native killed in Iraq
A third generation Marine, Cpl. Kevin T. Kolm, from Hicksville, New York
was killed by enemy fire in Iraq on Tuesday.

http://www.newsday.com/

[NewYorkerfromMass]

3. Mourn at this freaking contrast

BTW H2O, I know that area well. Beautiful area the Upper Delaware is.