A 20- Year Bear Market?

A 20-Year Bear Market?
By David Galland, Casey Research
In November of 1997, my partner and co-editor of The Casey Report, Doug Casey, wrote an article titled "Foundations of Crisis," which leaned heavily on the research of Neil Howe and the late William Strauss.
Howe and Strauss have written many books on how generations determine the course of history and how they will shape America's future. Their forecasts on a wide variety of indicators have turned out to be amazingly accurate. They were among the first to predict (back in the late 1980s) the rise of Boomer-driven culture wars and the simultaneous rise of Gen-X-driven free agency and distrust of government. And they were completely alone back then in predicting, for the post-X "Millennial Generation" (a label they coined), a decline in youth crime and risk taking and an increase in youth civic engagement that would first become apparent around the year 2000. Guess what? For the last ten years, everyone has been noticing exactly these trends among teens and 20somethings.
Howe and Strauss also made extensive predictions, based on generational aging, on how America's entire social mood would likely change, in dramatic fashion, during our current 2000-2010 decade. To quote Doug's prescient 1997 article, which was reprinted in Outside the Box late last year...
"... an excellent case can be made the U.S. is approaching another time of secular crisis, a Fourth Turning, with an expected due date of 2005 – seven years from now – plus or minus a few years in either direction.
The Stamp Acts catalyzed the American Revolution, the election of Lincoln catalyzed the Civil War, the Crash of '29 catalyzed the Depression/WW II era. What might precipitate the elements now floating in solution? The answer is practically any random event that's sufficiently traumatic. Any of the theses of current disaster/action novels and movies will do nicely. Perhaps the accidental or intentional release of a super plague vector. The crashing of an airliner into the Capitol during a joint session. An all-out assault on the IRS computers by an armed group – or perhaps the computers just melting down due to the Year 2000 Problem. Perhaps a financial disaster that cascades into the Greater Depression. In any of these, or a hundred other scenarios, the federal government would almost certainly act precipitously and with a heavy hand, which would bring on a whole other set of consequences.
There's no way of telling where the Crisis will lead, or how it will end. That's going to depend not only on exactly who's in control, but what they do, who they're up against, and a hundred other variables we can't even anticipate.
One thing that seems certain is that real crisis brings out strong leadership. Because of its age and size, it will come from the Boomer generation, and it will be in the mold of Roosevelt or Lincoln – both very dangerous precedents. The boomers in elderhood will be dogmatic, harsh, puritanical, and quite willing to burn down the barn in order to destroy whatever rats they see. Admix that attitude to a time resembling the Revolution, the Civil War, or WW II, overlain with today's ethnic strife, urbanization, financial overextension, and powerful, compact new weaponry in the hands of foreign fanatics out to teach the Great Satan a lesson and it's a real witch's brew.
As eye-opening as Doug's predictions were, they brought us only to the onset of the current crisis. Consequently, we thought it both timely and important to check back with the source of much of the research he relied on. And so it was that I spent several hours talking with Neil Howe, co-author of the seminal work on generational cycles, The Fourth Turning, and, just recently, the subject of the DVD "The Winter of History." Howe is not just an historian, but also a Washington DC-based economist and demographer. While our conversation covered a great many topics, the overriding focus was on how things are likely to unfold from here.
Many bullish readers won't be thrilled to hear Howe's latest findings about the future, but given his predictive track record, dismissing them out of hand could be a costly mistake.
The summary outlook, according to Howe, is that we are in the very early stages of a 20-year period of economic and institutional upheaval – an era denominated by a crisis during which we'll likely witness the tearing down and reconstruction of many aspects of society as we know it.
As individuals, understanding Howe's views and taking some reasonable precautions makes a lot of sense. As investors, those views also have the potential to make us a lot of money.
Following is my high-level recap of my long conversation with Neil Howe, along with some general thoughts on the investment implications of a 20-year bear market.
Remember the Sixties?
If you're old enough -- or possess even a rudimentary sense of history -- think back to the 1950s, with roller-skating waitresses, crew cuts, and nuclear families of the sort represented by the iconic Leave it to Beaver. Fathers worked, while many mothers stayed home. Life had a certain predictable quality and, as far as anyone knew, would continue along the same lines for time immemorial.
But then something happened... the 1960s. Literally no one saw it coming. It was as if someone had flipped a switch that electrified America and, quickly, the world. Most everything changed, and a society accustomed to conformity was blown away with a fierce individualism expressed with long hair, sex, drugs, and rock and roll, topped off with civil disobedience and bloody riots in the streets.
What happened?
According to Neil Howe, in the mid-1960s, generational change pushed society around a dramatic corner as idealistic, individualistic young Baby Boomers (born 1943 to 1960) rebelled against the midlife leadership of their G.I. Generation parents (born 1901 to 1924).
These periods of transitions are part of a larger cyclical pattern made up of four distinct eras, or "Turnings," each lasting approximately 20 years. It can be helpful to think of the four turnings as you might think of the four seasons, repeating predictably in their own natural rhythm. A full cycle of turnings takes place over a period of about 80 to 90 years -- roughly the span of a long human life. A new turning begins as a new youth generation comes of age, bringing a new social ethic that compensates for the excesses of the midlife generation then in power.
While we don't have the space here to go into the full details of Howe's research, it's important to the topic at hand that we quickly recap the Four Turnings.
The First Turning is referred to by Howe as a High. As this follows a period of crisis, one of the hallmarks of a First Turning is a heightened sense of community and collective optimism, driven in part by the fact that the society has just come through a difficult and challenging time. Consequently, during First Turnings, societal institutions tend to be strong while individualism is weak. The post-World War II "High" of the mid-1940s through early '60s is the most recent example of a First Turning.
The Second Turning, called an Awakening, typically starts out feeling like the high tide of a High, with signs of progress and prosperity everywhere. But just as everything seems to be going along swimmingly, large swaths of society begin to chaff under the social conformity of the High, beginning to gravitate to more individualistic pursuits and demanding that their personal interests come first. You may recognize the "Consciousness Revolution" of the mid-1960s through early 1980s, correctly, as the Second Turning.
Next up, the Third Turning, which Howe calls an Unraveling, is much the opposite of a High. To wit, individualism dominates, while institutions are increasingly weak and discredited. Quoting Howe on the Unraveling...
"This is a time when social authority feels inconsequential, the culture feels exhausted, and people feel bewildered by the number of options available to them. It is a time of celebrity circuses and a tremendous amount of freedom and creativity in our personal lives, but very little sense of public purpose.
The most recent Third Turning began in the mid-'80s with Morning in America, and continued through the '90s. Previous periods of Unraveling in American history were also decades of cynicism and bad manners. Think of the 1920s, the 1850s, the 1760s. And history teaches us that the Third Turnings inevitably end in Fourth Turnings.
Finally, there is the Fourth Turning, called a Crisis. The recent Third Turning appears to be winding down, and we are currently on the cusp of a Fourth Turning. This is a time of great turmoil, when society's basic institutions are torn down and rebuilt, and seemingly insurmountable problems are addressed. During Fourth Turnings, America engages in a struggle for its very survival and redefines its identity as a nation. Large wars are often a part of this process. The American Revolution, Civil War, Great Depression, and World War II were all features of past Fourth Turnings.
In sum, Howe's research has shown that, with remarkable predictability, history is not a straight line extending toward a better and brighter (or increasingly awful) future, but rather a repeating cycle of the four distinct social eras. These four turnings have recurred with remarkable consistency throughout Anglo-American history, as Neil Howe outlines at length in Generations and The Fourth Turning. It is therefore no accident that America has experienced great cataclysms or "Crises" about every 80 years. Travel back eighty years from Pearl Harbor Day, and you land in the middle of the Civil War. Eighty years before that takes you to the Revolutionary War. If the rhythms of history hold, America is now poised to enter another Fourth Turning.
Bad News, Potentially Good News
You don't need me to tell you that the United States and in fact the world are now facing a plethora of intractable problems. The world's former powerhouse economy, the U.S., is now the world's largest debtor nation – and by a wide margin. The nation has trillions in unpayable liabilities coming due on Social Security and Medicare, to name just two of many broken government programs weighing on the country. And our much vaunted democracy is increasingly dysfunctional – rotten to the core, truth be known – thanks largely to entrenched special interests and a voting public clamoring for their own piece of the pie, while trying to hand the bill off to somebody else.
Meanwhile, the economy – despite rigorous jawboning by the government and its many friends in the large banking institutions -- is in serious trouble, with the housing market buffeted by tsunami-like waves of defaults, foreclosures, overvaluations, historic levels of personal debt, and tight credit that has left the U.S. government as the sole lender in many markets.
Bernanke and his ilk may see green shoots, but what they're really seeing is the deep, green sea rising up once again to bury the economy.
That's the bad news.
The potentially good news, if you credit Howe's research, is that the Crisis we're now entering will change pretty much everything. While this change will entail a great deal of pain and a reduced standard of living for a large number of people, by the time the Crisis subsides, society will have pretty much remade itself in ways that no one can predict at this point.
Put another way, today's intractable problems will be solved... one way or another.
What's Next
When discussing what's likely to follow next, Neil Howe turns to his generational profiles and points out that the rising societal power today belongs to the generation he calls the Millennials, individuals born between 1982 and 2004. They are a "Hero" generation, just like the G.I. Generation that coped so well with the turmoil of the Great Depression and World War II -- the last Fourth Turning. Coddled as children, the G.I.s were ultimately called upon to help society through a dark and dangerous period and rose to the occasion. Again, quoting Howe on the Millennials...
"These are today's young people, who are just beginning to be well known to most Americans. They fill K-12 schools, colleges, graduate schools, and have recently begun entering the workplace. We associate them with dramatic improvements in youth behaviors, which are often underreported by the media. Since Millennials have come along, we've seen huge declines in violent crime, teen pregnancy, and the most damaging forms of drug abuse, as well as higher rates of community service and volunteering. This is a generation that reminds us in many respects of the young G.I.s nearly a century ago, back when they were the first boy scouts and girl scouts between 1910 and 1920.
Unlike the Baby Boomers, who are largely individualistic and anti-establishment, the Millennials are good team players. We hear a lot these days about working together for a common cause, volunteerism, and the need for stronger government institutions, largely because these are the new priorities of the Millennial Generation.
As you may recall, out of the devastation of World War II, a spate of transnational political and economic institutions were born, including the United Nations, the World Bank, the World Health Organization, and the International Monetary Fund. By the time the current Fourth Turning is over, expect more of the same -- but probably even bigger and more ambitious.
What Does This Mean to You?
Most importantly, if Howe is right, this crisis is far from over. In fact, when I asked him where we are today on a scale from 1 to 10 -- with 10 representing as bad as the crisis will get -- he replied that we are at either 2 or 3. In other words, the worst is very much yet to come. And, per above, he expects this period of turmoil to take 20 years to play out. Thus, if nothing else, you may want to continue approaching matters of personal finance cautiously.
Secondly, if you're the type of individual that tends to get steamed up by larger and more intrusive government programs, you may want to take a few deep breaths and resolve yourself to the fact that this phenomenon is likely to get far worse before we see a return to celebration of individual rights. (And the cycle shows that we will see such a return -- about 40 to 50 years from now, when the next Second Turning comes around.)
If it is any consolation, the Millennial Generation places a great deal of weight on teamwork and the notion of doing things "smart." That doesn't mean, of course, that the various programs that are kicked off in an attempt to fix the many problems now confronting society will in fact turn out to be technically smart. But they will almost certainly be better thought out than some of the numbskull initiatives we've seen over the last 20 years.
You can also take some comfort in the fact that Millennials are builders, not destroyers. By contrast, the individualistic Boomers that dominate today's aging political class are world-class dissenters, radio talk show aficionados always ready to scrap it out for their beliefs. Millennials want to skip the philosophical debate and get straight to fixing things.
Other insights about Fourth Turning periods gained from my conversation with Neil Howe...
Government grows powerful, and sweeping new legislation is enacted. The old 1990s rule was: just compete and stay off the state's radar screen. The new 2010s rule will be: better have a presence in Washington so you're not dealt out of the "new" new deal. One political party tends to dominate. The Democrats under FDR during the last Fourth Turning offer a good example. While Neil Howe doesn't think it will necessarily be the Democrats this time around, they are certainly in the pole position at this point.
While public history speeds up, personal life slows down. Families will spend more time together, like in the old Frank Capra movies. Ever more households will be multi-generational, a trend now spurred by Boomers with large, empty McMansions and Millennials without jobs. There will be a blanding of the pop culture, with the entertainment of the young (put Miley Cyrus or "High School Musical" on fast forward) increasingly regarded as tamer than the entertainment of the old.
Innovation tends to stagnate, while a few new technologies will be chosen to be adopted on a large scale. We will see the equivalent of canals or railroads or interstates being built across America. To borrow from Carlotta Perez' four-stage description of technological revolutions, we are moving from the "innovation" to the "implementation" stage.
New laws and regulations will do less to referee a free market and more to pursue one or another national priority. They will increasingly favor the large producer over the retail buyer, investment over consumption, planning over risk, debt over equity. Businesses will hustle to reposition themselves. Anti-trust legislation will weaken.
The authority and obligations of community will strengthen at all levels, from local to national and possibly beyond (if our alliances prove durable). Personal reputation and membership will matter more. A "new localism" will reshape town and urban planning. A global slide toward national or regional protectionism will loom as a real danger.
It is too early to tell whether the crisis will ultimately be inflationary or deflationary, though we at Casey Research come down on the side of inflation for the simple reason that the government possesses the means to inflate. Due to the gold standard, that was not the case early in the Great Depression.
In the past, Fourth Turning periods have always resulted in the nation redefining who we are in some essential way. That was certainly the case during the American Revolution, when we transitioned from a British colony into a collection of independent states -- and the Civil War, when those states were hammered into a single nation. And, again, after World War II, when the U.S. went from being a relatively isolated nation to a global empire. A wild card, for instance a terrorist nuke going off in a city anywhere on the planet, could similarly take the country, and the world, into unforeseeable new directions.
Baby Boomers will continue to be respected for their cultural achievements (it's not a fluke of history that Boomer music and other entertainments are still wildly popular among the young), but will be increasingly ignored in the political debate. The term "senior citizen," already in decline, will disappear entirely. And if push comes to shove, Boomer's financial interests – including Social Security – will be subjugated "for the greater good."
There will be a growing push to rebuild the middle class. The wealthy and the impoverished alike will both come under pressure thanks to new pro-middle class initiatives. If you are a high-income earner, it's a certainty your taxes are going up, and likely by a lot. If you want to make a fortune, don't pursue the niche or the "long tail." Invent the next big brand that will appeal to Everyman.
Don't Worry, Be Happy
That is, at best, a sketch of my long conversation with Neil Howe and doesn't do justice to his research. If nothing else, however, I hope I've succeeded in giving you at least some sense of the man and his unique research and encouraged you to think outside the box about the nature of today's crisis.
A couple of final observations.
First, Neil Howe is not a negative person, nor a professional doomsayer. Rather, he is a social scientist and historian with decades of experience in the social sciences. As you speak to him, you get the sense that he doesn't view the world through any particular philosophical bias, but rather is simply reporting what his research is telling him about the current players on the global stage, and which act we are currently in.
Secondly, speaking as a Baby Boomer and someone with a lifelong distrust of government and its meddling institutions, talking to Neil left me feeling oddly relaxed -- letting go, if you will, of some of the frustration that has been building within me as I watch the nanny state grow more and more bloated.
That is not to say we won't continue to speak out against government waste and prolificacy. We will. But it seems increasingly clear that we're now caught up in a powerful trend toward bigger, not smaller, societal institutions -- and that these institutions will, over the period ahead, change the world as we know it.
Of course, being active investors, at the same time we raise our voices in protest, we'll deal with the reality of the situation by strategically positioning our portfolios to profit from the coming changes.
And so, like the Rockefellers and J.P. Morgan during the Great Depression, we'll make the trend -- to matter how negative -- our friend. You may want to consider doing so yourself.
Making the trend your friend is more important than ever, if your assets are to make it through the Fourth Turning intact. The Casey Report discovers and analyzes budding economic trends and turns them into hands-on, actionable recommendations for its subscribers. Read the latest report from Casey Chief Economist Bud Conrad about our favorite investment of 2009... a play on an all but inevitable economic development. Click here to read more.
John F. Mauldin johnmauldin@investorsinsight.com
If you would like to reproduce any of John Mauldin's E-Letters or commentary, you must include the source of your quote and the following email address: JohnMauldin@InvestorsInsight.com.

This Time of Year

I’m leaving Saturday for my tenth consecutive year of riding my motorcycle from California to Washington, DC for Memorial Day weekend. In years past including the year I started the ride, 2000- the year my father died: I rode partly to be in DC to honor him and to ride in the longest running protest against the United States of America ever held. It’s now in its 22nd year. It’s called Rolling Thunder, Inc. Ride for Freedom. Maybe you had to be somehow affected by the Vietnam era to understand the deep fire that still burns in the hearts of military families and those who served during that era to fully appreciate the meaning that the POW/MIA issue holds for those of us who participate there.

Although it has become a party for many of the 500,000 motorcyclists who gather in the Pentagon parking lot for the demonstration; the POW/MIA issue is the watermark of the betrayal that is a fact of life for all who have ever served or are proudly serving now in the US military as well as their families who wait.

The truth is that betrayal of soldiers, sailors, marines and airmen is really nothing new. Everyone knows that the English navy defeated the Spanish Armada. No one knows that the Queen ordered all the ships to stay at sea rather than allow a seaman to touch shore in England for having done so English law would demand that they be paid. Few know that over 50% of the sailors in the navy that defeated mighty Spain died aboard ship from disease and starvation rather than be paid the wages which were due to them. Not much has changed.

They say that all politics are local; well I say that all causes are personal. When my father retired as an E-8 (Senior Master Sergeant) after 29 ½ years of service in the United States Air Force he had served at Pearl Harbor, World War II in the Pacific, Korea and Vietnam. He came home from Vietnam when I was 16. I know better than most as it has been in the conversation my whole life, what concurrent pay, disability ratings, and long waits for health care and endless forms for benefits mean to a military family. I also know now what it means to have been raised by someone who is afflicted with Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. PTSD is the gift that keeps on giving, generation to generation.

Easily defined, difficult to diagnose perhaps, simply PTSD is the continuing effect of trauma not expressed in a timely manner. Being raised by someone so affected by uncontrollable anger has its own consequences on a family and on that family’s children. The kids most often begin to act out their own PTSD.

For my father, who we absolutely knew loved us enough to unleash one hell of an ass whupping if he was angered, PTSD was controlled by staying in the club. After WWII he just stayed in the military where everyone understood or at least tolerated an old sergeant and expected nothing less. For the rest of us, though, life has been a series of difficult choices.

After retirement the old man then fought the VA Medical system for 32 more years for 100% service related disability. They finally granted it to him 6 months before his death at the age of 90. I’m quite sure that it was an accomplishment about which he was most proud. He was certainly more proud of having finally won that war than he was of any medal he ever received.

The rest of us grew weary of the constant updates of his battle with the VA, much like hearing a list of new medicines and treatments from someone elderly, but not really listening. I suppose we should have listened more closely. In the end they killed him by treating his heart disease for 9 months with allergy medicine. And I went to DC with the rubbing from his marker on my bike. That year I found the group Rolling Thunder and discovered that I’m a Blue Star son.

What I was not prepared for having found some like minded in the group run by an old sergeant with his own PTSD issues, is that upon studying the POW/MIA issue I found that the shoddy medical care and all out war my father fought for his benefits after retirement really goes all the way back to the seed of that betrayal. I’ve always wondered, “Why?” How can a country that owes so much to its fighting men and women virtually turn a blind eye to them all the while exclaiming, “We Support the Troops”?

To be fair, most people had no idea how shoddy the facilities are at Walter Reed until they were recently exposed. All were quick to point the blame, but really is it the fault of a government run health care program or is it our fault? Yes, the VA Medical System is the only real government health care program in the US. And it sucks- ask almost any military family member that has driven hours only to be told to make another appointment- 12 months from now.

VA Med is overburdened, understaffed, underpaid, under funded and in some cases dealing with ancient facilities. Has it improved? Gosh yes, just ask anyone lucky enough to have survived their care long term. Is it good enough? That’s so tragic as to be almost humorous. The VA Med can’t possibly serve a country at war let alone a country with a history of continuous wars, conflicts, and police actions all over the globe, all of the time.

What the system is now trying to contend with shouldn’t be a surprise when you stop to realize that we have veterans who have served on our orders and deserve the benefits we promised them from World War II, Korea, Vietnam, the Cold War, Somalia, Grenada, the Gulf War, the War on Terror to just name a few favorites spanning almost 75 years. That’s a lot of people vying for benefits in a system that is fatally flawed: it’s government run, single payer health care. It just doesn’t work unless you don’t expect much for care.

How will the VA Medical system then provide for the now 1,000,000 children that have been affected by deployment, disability or loss of a parent or parents serving in Iraq, Afghanistan or any number of police actions anywhere in the world? These are abandoned kids in many cases; high risk of acting out the trauma they have no way of expressing because they are alone with the ghosts that hide in their minds.

Think about the impact on a family of deployment after deployment after deployment that stretch years not days or weeks. Think about the impact of disability. Think about the shear terror of waiting days, weeks, months and then doing it again with your dad in harms way and mom sitting glued to 24/7 news feeds, websites all the while crying her eyes out once again. Do you really think that the kids are “adaptable”? Do you think that the terror they imagine in their not knowing is any less terrible than the terror that their mom or dad is dealing with ‘over there’? Yes? Then you would be wrong.

But, that view is often shared by vets who will tell me that no one can imagine the horror of war. My response is that yes you’re right; I can’t imagine that horror any more than you can imagine what is going on in the mind of a child attempting to fend off the horror of his imagination. How do you explain to a five year old that not everyone dies in war?

Do you know that family grief counseling is new to the VA Medical system? It’s available to any family member who wants to throw the kids in the car and drive to wherever the meeting is held. Try that sometime when you’re scared out of your mind and hoping against hope that the kids are ‘fine’. But, you may know a VA center nearby… right?

In the end we have now come full circle to the seed of the betrayal of the American POW/MIA issue and the consequences of the attitude that G.I’s are expendable. They are to quote a general speaking to the Blue Star and Gold Star families at one of our fundraisers, “Precious Resources.” He had no idea how crushed some of the Mom’s were on hearing that their sons are “Precious Resources’. One of them said to me, “He looks at my son like a fox looks at the chicken coop. Except for him it’s another star on his shoulder instead of a meal.”

It’s been quite a lesson to learn and we’re learning it too slowly. When we brought the torch to the Navajo and Hopi reservations to light it in honor of the Lady Warrior, Lori Piestewa for whom Squaw Peak in downtown Phoenix was renamed as Piestewa Peak: We were shocked at the reception. The people from both reservations lined the highways for miles. They still do every year when we return. There is an attitude of honoring the warrior in celebration and ceremony for their return and caring for their family in their absence that is shared by the entire Native community. We renew that spirit of honor, celebration and ceremony every year when our ride returns to the Navajo and Hopi Nations. As a country we have so much to learn from our Native people about honoring the warrior.

For 10 years now I have read every single book on the subject of the POW/MIA issue. I’ve given 15-20 speeches a year; ridden hundreds of thousands of miles, spoken to the experts in person and listened to them speak from Washington DC to the telephone in my office. One thing is clear: We left live prisoners after every single war we’ve ever fought. That mindset is finally changing, but the deep wound of betrayal can only be healed with the truth. That truth has been poignantly revealed by our unique experience in Vietnam. In the end our POW/MIA’s left in country at the end of the Vietnam conflict were deemed expendable. Demands by the new government in North Vietnam for the war reparations promised by Nixon/Kissinger at the Paris Peace Accords were finally refused by President Reagan. Reagan was followed of course by President George H.W. Bush who was Director of the Central Intelligence Agency in the years immediately following the end of the war in Vietnam and further negotiations for the release or our POW’s were moot.

Did Reagan do the right thing? Did Carter or did Bush I? Or for that matter did Eisenhower do the right thing and avoid further conflict with the Soviet Union after WWII? It’s above my pay grade, but the issue was put to rest publically and forever by Senators Kerry and McCain who ran the 1991 Senate Committee investigation on the POW/MIA issue during the Bush I years. All efforts by those who knew the truth were squashed in a political sleight of hand; confidential record declarations and debunk mindset. We simply refused to pay for our POW/MIA’s. Maybe we should never have agreed to have done so from the beginning. It was Watergate and the end of the Nixon era that derailed any chance we ever had of seeing them returned. Nixon/Kissinger promised, but Watergate and Nixon’s resignation sealed their fate.

So why do I say, then that this was a betrayal and that the betrayal of the fate of those who serve on our orders continues today? Because the benefits that are promised to those who serve our country in the Armed Forces of the United States exist in an unending labyrinth through the VA system; and it is subject to constant change. From the effects of Agent Orange exposure to Gulf War Syndrome to PTSD without Veteran Service Officer assistance a Veteran applying for benefits practically needs a Philadelphia lawyer to be successful and the VA has all the time in the world. The Vet is on the other hand mortal; often suffering and all too often denied the very benefits they were promised. My dad often said that his hole card was that he was too tough to die.

America is deaf to the suffering of military families. There is little to no provision to the effects of war on them and they are many. Throughout our history these families have suffered in virtual silence. Mothers have hoped in complete denial that their children are ‘fine’. Families have been afraid that loud, vocal in- your- face protests might jeopardize their loved one’s chances for earned and needed benefits. And the list of reasons goes on and on. Maybe, just maybe if we all had someone serving, and we enforced the law with regard to caring for them as well as their families we would finally come to the realization that in the end we just can’t afford to keep doing it the way we’ve always done it.

What’s needed now is the light of truth. This travesty has spanned every single administration. It is not a partisan issue. Eisenhower knew that the Soviets had grabbed all of the American POW’s held by Germany at the end of WWII. He knew that they used them as human guinea pigs in medical, drug and mind control experimentation, vivisection and other crimes too big and horrible to contemplate. The Kerry/McCain committee had eye witness testimony to it and what did they do? They classified it.

In a poetic, karmic piece of justice neither Kerry nor McCain who fell on their swords in the 1991 Senate Committee for the right of future political power; who used political maneuvering and bureaucratic sleight of hand to hide the truth in Vietnam was able to fulfill their lifelong ambition as Commander in Chief.

Of course none of the foregoing will ever be made up to a child whose father or mother began being deployed in 2003 and after five tours is no longer the person who left. The child then 5 is now almost 12 and the 10 year old is now almost 17. They and their families have quietly suffered with the pain of deployment, disability and the thought or the reality of the loss of one or more their parents in Iraq and Afghanistan for their entire childhoods. They will deal with it their entire lives unless something is done and done now.

But, to where and to whom do they turn for help? If the VA Med spent only $100 per child the $100,000,000 would swamp their budgets. Even the highest of risk kids are tough to identify unless families can drop the cloak of denial and actually seek help. What would we do if these kids had been exposed to tragedy at their schools? We’d send in a bus load of grief counselors and at least attempt to make sure that they had a chance to express what is going on in their heads. Right now we just hand out pamphlets.

That’s a travesty and it has to stop. When I started this charity run called Carry the Flame, I knew only that I was a Blue Star son and that war and warriors can have a tragic effect on the lives of those close to them. That someone somehow needed to reach out to our Blue Star and Gold Star families and let them know that their quiet trauma has not gone unnoticed and unappreciated. That was in 2002 before the beginning of the War on Terror and the tragedy of 9/11. That was before the size and scope of the trauma metastasized after 7 long years to include over 1,000,000 kids.

When we started we thought we could provide grief counseling courses to school counselors, now I’m sure that the problem is too huge to possibly begin to make a reasonable dint in the amount of money needed to help provide for them through private fundraising. What we can do now is support the organizations attempting to identify highest risk kids and use our visibility to raise the awareness in America that we have over 1,000,000 of our Precious Resources at severe risk of acting out a very angry PTSD of their own.

It’s time to put an end to the denial of the effects on these military families and their kids. It’s time to really put up or shut up about how you “Support the Troops”. If nothing else buy a magnetic bumper sticker from a Blue Star Mom and display it to tell others that you put your money where your mouth is. Do it not as a political statement, but as a statement of compassion.

Some time ago I realized that this betrayal is not a POW/MIA issue. This is an American families’ issue that knows deceit and betrayal- not political party or persuasion- all too well. After all, we may publically humiliate, detain and prosecute the American soldiers charged to guard the prisoners at Abu Ghraib; the lawyers who wrote in defense of ‘enhanced interrogation techniques’; contractors who unconscionably shot into crowds, etc. etc. etc. But, do you know that we have never, not one time ever arrested, investigated, prosecuted or sentenced anyone for crimes perpetrated on our POW/MIA’s under the laws provided under the Third Geneva Convention? So we’ll gladly use the laws against our own troops, but never apply the law on their behalf. “Betrayal”, you ask? “In broad daylight”, say I.

Saturday it will be raining here when I leave. That beats the last 3 years of snow by a country mile. I hope the Mojave Desert is warm, but not too hot and still winds so we miss the sand storm we rode through last year. I hope the Midwest hail and thunderstorms are ahead of our riders instead of barreling down on them as they did 4 years ago. I hope that the pollen count of the sweet smell of honeysuckle in the South is survivable without the antihistamine pills that may make our riders drowsy. I hope that the bikes run well and that each rider makes safe, sane decisions about risk. I hope that the Flame brings some tiny amount of healing and hope to the Gold Star and Blue Star families that will greet us on the way.

This year, having split from our association with Rolling Thunder, Carry the Flame Across America will hold its own ceremony at the World War II Memorial on Saturday, 23 May at 5:00pm. Volunteer Blue Star and Gold Star Moms and Wives will read the names of the fallen from Iraq and Afghanistan in unison from each of the 50 state posts of the WWII Memorial in unison. At the same time we will pass the Flame of Hope that will have been blessed in the name of every religion through the prayers and hands of thousands as it makes its way from Barstow, Ca to Washington, DC.

Marine SSgt Tim Chambers who for the last 6 years has held a salute while standing in the middle of the road on Constitution Avenue until the last motorcycle has left the Pentagon parking area (usually over 5 hours) will stand at salute before the upturned rifle, boots and helmet while the names are read and the Flame is passed.

Please consider this to be your invitation to join us. Please consider this letter a challenge to you to help us continue to spread the word that these kids and these American military families deserve much more. We know what is right; you know what is right, now get out your checkbook and do the right thing. You can go to www.carrytheflame.org for our route information and contact address.

Then get out your pen and write to your Senators and Congressman and tell them that while we’re spending billions to bail out spoiled bankers, incompetent business leaders and crooked politicians; you think it might be a really good idea to help these kids and these families with a resolve to provide the medical, educational and mental health benefits they and their parents have earned.

You know yourself that it is far easier to help a child than to attempt to fix an adult.

After all it was We The People who sent them there. Thank the Heavens for the men and women who fight on our side. They’re the best in the world, the fiercest the world has ever seen and they come in peace asking only what they have been promised in return for having risked their lives as well as the peace in the lives of their families who wait another day for news of their safe return.

Losing The War

End the War on Drugs
by Ron Paul
We have recently heard many shocking stories of brutal killings and ruthless violence related to drug cartels warring with Mexican and US officials. It is approaching the fever pitch of a full-blown crisis. Unfortunately, the administration is not likely to waste this opportunity to further expand government. Hopefully, we can take a deep breath and look at history for the optimal way to deal with this dangerous situation, which is not unprecedented.Alcohol prohibition in the 1920’s brought similar violence, gangs, lawlessness, corruption and brutality.

The reason for the violence was not that making and selling alcohol was inherently dangerous. The violence came about because of the creation of a brutal black market which also drove profits through the roof. These profits enabled criminals like Al Capone to become incredibly wealthy, and militantly defensive of that wealth. Al Capone saw the repeal of Prohibition as a great threat, and indeed smuggling operations and gangland violence fell apart after repeal. Today, picking up a bottle of wine for dinner is a relatively benign transaction, and beer trucks travel openly and peacefully along their distribution routes.

Similarly today, the best way to fight violent drug cartels would be to pull the rug out from under their profits by bringing these transactions out into the sunlight. People who, unwisely, buy drugs would hardly opt for the back alley criminal dealer as a source, if a coffeehouse-style dispensary was an option. Moreover, a law-abiding dispensary is likely to check ID’s and refuse sale to minors, as bars and ABC stores tend to do very diligently. Think of all the time and resources law enforcement could save if they could instead focus on violent crimes, instead of this impossible nanny-state mandate of saving people from themselves!If these reasons don’t convince the drug warriors, I would urge them to go back to the Constitution and consider where there is any authority to prohibit private personal choices like this.

All of our freedoms – the freedom of religion and assembly, the freedom of speech, the right to bear arms, the right to be free from unnecessary government searches and seizures – stem from the precept that you own yourself and are responsible for your own choices. Prohibition laws negate self-ownership and are an absolute affront to the principles of freedom. I disagree vehemently with the recreational use of drugs, but at the same time, if people are only free to make good decisions, they are not truly free. In any case, states should decide for themselves how to handle these issues and the federal government should respect their choices.My great concern is that instead of dealing deliberatively with the actual problems, Congress will be pressed again to act quickly without much thought or debate. I can’t think of a single problem we haven’t made worse that way.

The panic generated by the looming crisis in Mexico should not be redirected into curtailing more rights, especially our second amendment rights, as seems to be in the works. Certainly, more gun laws in response to this violence will only serve to disarm lawful citizens. This is something to watch out for and stand up against. We have escalated the drug war enough to see it only escalates the violence and profits associated with drugs.

It is time to try freedom instead.

The Great Journey

To be truly challenging, a voyage, like a life, must rest on a firm foundation of financial unrest. Otherwise, you are doomed to a routine traverse, the kind known to yachtsmen who play with their boats at sea... "cruising" it is called. Voyaging belongs to seamen, and to the wanderers of the world who cannot, or will not, fit in. If you are contemplating a voyage and you have the means, abandon the venture until your fortunes change. Only then will you know what the sea is all about.
"I've always wanted to sail to the South Seas, but I can't afford it." What these men can't afford is not to go. They are enmeshed in the cancerous discipline of "security." And in the worship of security we fling our lives beneath the wheels of routine - and before we know it our lives are gone.
What does a man need - really need? A few pounds of food each day, heat and shelter, six feet to lie down in - and some form of working activity that will yield a sense of accomplishment. That's all - in the material sense, and we know it. But we are brainwashed by our economic system until we end up in a tomb beneath a pyramid of time payments, mortgages, preposterous gadgetry, playthings that divert our attention for the sheer idiocy of the charade.
The years thunder by. The dreams of youth grow dim where they lie caked in dust on the shelves of patience. Before we know it, the tomb is sealed.
Where, then, lies the answer? In choice. Which shall it be: bankruptcy of purse or bankruptcy of life?
- Sterling Hayden (Wanderer, 1973)

Sent to me from:
-- Brian Cavalier http://www.briansredcoat.com/ One of the great wanderers of all time.

Socialism Fails Them All

An economics professor at Texas Tech said he had never failed a single student before but had, once, failed an entire class. That class had insisted that socialism worked and that no one would be poor and no one would be rich, a great equalizer. The professor then said okay, we will have an experiment in this class on socialism.
All grades would be averaged and everyone would receive the same grade so no one would fail and no one would receive an A. After the first test the grades were averaged and everyone got a B. The students who studied hard were upset and the students who studied little were happy. But, as the second test rolled around, the students who studied little had studied even less and the ones who studied hard decided they wanted a free ride too; so they studied little. The second test average was a D! No one was happy. When the 3rd test rolled around the average was an F.
The scores never increased as bickering, blame, name calling all resulted in hard feelings and no one would study for the benefit of anyone else. All failed, to their great surprise, and the professor told them that socialism would also ultimately fail because when the reward is great, the effort to succeed is great; but when government takes all the reward away; no one will try or want to succeed.
Could not be any simpler than that.... -- "I REFUSE TO PARTICIPATE IN THE RECESSION!".

HELL FROZEN OVER?

Commentary: U.S. freedoms not to blame for Mexico's drug war
By Wayne LaPierreSpecial to CNN
Editor's note: Wayne LaPierre has served as the executive vice president and chief executive officer of the National Rifle Association of America since 1991. His latest book is "The Global War on Your Guns: Inside the U.N. Plan to Destroy the Bill of Rights."

Wayne LaPierre says the Mexican drug war isn't a reason to restrict gun ownership in the U.S.
(CNN) -- Here's a summary for the time- or attention-challenged: Never surrender freedom for laws that can't affect criminals; they disobey laws for a living.
Nobody is surprised that Attorney General Eric Holder wants to make good on his promise to ban guns. We just didn't know whose tragedy he'd seize to advance his agenda.
Now we do. It's the drug-driven death and violence in Mexico at the hands of ruthless criminal cartels.
Barely a month on the job, Holder cited the Mexican cartel killings as the excuse to resurrect the Clinton gun ban.
Though a new face to some, Holder is a rabid Second Amendment foe from the Clinton administration who helped orchestrate the 1994 Clinton gun ban.
America has made this mistake already. So let's learn the lies that led to their gun ban.
Even earthworms learn from experience
Ask any anti-gun politician to define an "assault weapon," and the honest answer is, "I know one when I see one."
When cosmetics alone can infringe constitutional freedoms, we're all in trouble. But that's precisely how the 1994 gun ban came about.
The gun-ban lobby and national media lied with lockstep conformity by playing endless footage of fully automatic machine gun fire. They fooled the American people and the U.S. Congress into thinking they were banning "high-powered," "rapid-fire," "battlefield-bred" guns designed to "spray fire from the hip."
None of that was true.
Then Sen. Dianne Feinstein convened anti-gun bureaucrats to conduct a firearm beauty pageant. They browsed photos of hundreds of perfectly legal semiautomatic rifles. They picked 19 they deemed most military looking. And they banned them.
But the guns aren't designed or used by the military. They're commonly owned semiautomatic rifles that fire one shot when the trigger is pulled.
They cannot "spray fire," nor are they designed to be fired "from the hip."
Nor are they the choice of terrorists in Afghanistan or drug gangs in Mexico. They prefer fully automatic machine guns, which our soldiers use.
Congress was so doubtful about the ban's effectiveness, they limited it to a 10-year experiment. So it expired in 2004, and for good reason. It was useless all along.
As the study mandated by that Congress found, "The banned weapons and magazines were never used in more than a modest fraction of all gun murders" in the first place. The ban had absolutely no effect on gun crime.
But what about Mexico?
Of course, everyone's rooting for Mexican President Felipe Calderon's government to crush the drug cartels' stranglehold. But our rights are not what's wrong.
Nobody can substantiate claims that U.S. guns cross the border "by the thousands" or "account for 95% of weapons used by Mexican drug gangs." Because it's not true.
Replying to Feinstein in subcommittee hearings last week, William Hoover, assistant director of field operations at the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, said, "The investigations we have, that we see, for firearms flowing across the border don't show us individuals taking thousands of guns a day or at a time flowing into Mexico."
Yet reporter after politician after news anchor parrot the lie as readily as high schoolers gossip, and with equal disregard for truth.
That's how gun abolitionists claim Mexican gun laws are so strict that our "weak laws" (read: freedoms) are to blame for "fueling the violence" in Mexico.
Well, to believe that:
• You have to believe these butchers and beheaders break every Mexican law they want except Mexican gun laws, which they honor -- while they break America gun laws.
• You have to believe that Mexico's drug cartels, which possess the wealth and armies of nations, prefer American semiauto target and hunting rifles over fully automatic machine guns and any other military arms they want to crush opposition.
• You have to believe Mexican drug lords -- who make Forbes magazine's list of billionaires -- don't get large lots of weaponry on the transnational black market but instead choose to trifle with paperwork at U.S. gun stores.
• You have to believe that narco-terrorists who buy fragmentation grenades, grenade launchers, explosives, body armor, biometric security equipment, infrared surveillance technology and intelligence-grade reconnaissance gear will salute and obey a new American gun law -- if only we'd pass one.
Get real, get tough, but get away from our rights
Everything Mexico's murderous thugs are doing is already illegal. At issue is not the absence of law, but the absence of political will to enforce the laws that both nations already possess.
Even Immigration and Customs Enforcement said, "We have the laws we need. We just need to more effectively enforce them."
Those that make possible Mexico's colossal corruption wear the garb of not only drug lords and gun runners, but also of too many city mayors and police chiefs, state bureaucrats and military officers.
A $40 billion criminal enterprise could not exist without the complicity of these powerful co-conspirators. And these cartels are being abetted by American media and politicians who blame our freedoms for it.
We should seal the border. Punish the guilty. And use existing gun and drug laws against violent drug syndicates here and in Mexico.
But leave American freedoms alone.
The opinions expressed in this commentary are solely those of Wayne LaPierre.