Most of us are waiting eagerly for the report from General Petraeus on the status of the war in Iraq, to be presented to Congress sometime this week.  I really hope that the highly regarded general will give a solid military assessment.  Then the poliltical aspects of the "situation" will have to be included.  All of us need the facts as unvarnished as possible so that we can more accurately assess what needs to be done.  I don't pretend to have any idea about that, for I do not have access to very many facts; none of us does.  That's what makes the climate in our country so scary right now.  It reminds some old timers of  the Vietnam War and how the country turned against the war and those who fought it.  We don't want to repeat that.  But what do we have to go on?  Are we going to get accurate information, or are we going to play politics, or what?

Christian citizens have a responsibility to keep informed about the war and about other things, also.  We need to listen, reflect,discuss, evaluate, and then communicate to our elected representatives how we feel.  That is the way our system works.  Then we must continue to support all of those who wear the uniform.  That is also how the system works.  We don't withdraw support just because we don't agree with the President or with General Petraeus or with others. We support those who are working for all of us.  The tragedy of Vietnam was that those who came home felt betrayed by their country.  Today many of them still haven't gotten over this feeling of betrayal.  We must not let that happen again.  We lost 58,000 plus casualties in Vietnam.  That number is only 3800 or so today in Iraq.  Still, we have been in Iraq a long time.  If we expect our people to function overseas, then we must continue their support.  Fair enough?