The Way to a Man's Heart . . .

. . . they say, is through his stomach - because "if you love him, you'll feed him."

Nick told his mother that he and the men in his unit were all about 10 pounds lighter in their first few weeks in Iraq. They were pulling 22-hour patrol shifts. They were getting two meals a day and they were not meals to remember.

"He told me the two meals just weren’t cutting it. He said the Iraqi food was usually better. "

"They were going to the Iraqis and basically saying, 'feed me.’ "

When their families heard this news they responded by shipping food.

Karen started packing in that wartime tradition as old as mothers and sons. She packed a lot of the packaged tuna, not the canned.

* * *

"We sent out 51 pounds this week," says Karen. "There are customers coming in saying, 'What do you need?’ "

The credit union is paying the cost of packing and shipping.

Any packaged food is welcome. So are baby wipes because showers are even rarer than a full meal. And foot powder.

But, is THAT really what they need?

Nick Andoscia, who is 22, is due to come home later this year. He wants to study criminal justice, his mother says, then go to work for a fire or police department.

But for the next few months he will be on patrol in western Iraq, dealing with the heat and the dirt and the danger.

The last thing he should have to worry about is an empty stomach. The last thing he should have to do is approach Iraqis and ask for food.

You have to wonder what the gracious hosts must think when a fighting man from the richest country on earth comes to their door in search of something to eat.

You have to wonder why the first irony that comes to mind is that a soldier from the richest nation on earth should have to ask for food from a poor man.

Instead, why not contemplate why a poor man in a country invaded by soldiers from the richest nation on earth is willing to offer them food.

Perhaps, the ultimate irony is that one dark night, when fear and anger fill the air, the soldier may repay his gracious host with bullets.

[T]his merely underlines the great truth of this war. There is no enemy in Iraq. There never was any enemy in Iraq. The common enemies of the U.S. troops and the Iraqis are to be found in Washington DC, running their Imperial government for their own personal private profit.

Wakeup America.

These men don't need baby wipes and foot powder.

They need the TRUTH and they need to come home to fight the REAL WAR that rages in our economy and is waged from the halls of Congress.

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Thanks, WRH.