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MMA REPUBLICANS IN THE OCTAGON

December 22, 2015 by

Who can take a hit best? Read MMA Republicans in the Octagon. The Sunday Oregonian ran a column by E.J. Dionne of the Washington Post titled ‘GOP plays at being television tough guys.’ Not to pick to closely but that’s the only place most of us will ever hear them. On television. Maybe you’ve heard […]

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HIGH GROUND TO VIETNAM VET MEMORIAL: a photo essay

November 12, 2015 by

“The high ground is good.” That’s what the old timer said. “And there’s not so many people.” I found him under the Vietnam Veterans of Oregon Memorial bridge, sitting in a lawn chair and handing out pamphlets on Veteran’s Day. Had his car parked on one side of a flowerbed and a walkway without a […]

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SUICIDE WALL BY ALEX PAUL

September 20, 2015 by

You know a Vietnam Veteran who knows someone on the wall. They all know someone. It’s a teammate or high school friend who never made the Christmas letter list. The men who adjusted to a post-Vietnam War life have friends who remind them of a missing someone. If you talk to them long enough you’ll discover […]

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LETTING GO. HOW HARD CAN IT BE?

January 24, 2015 by

It’s Easy Until You Try. Portland baby boomers, Oregon baby boomers, or what the hell ALL baby boomers, know how to let go. We’ve doing it for years. Sometimes with help we don’t ask for. Think of the era boomers grew up in. Let go of the old and embrace the new. We were young […]

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DON’T MEAN NOTHING? OR EVERYTHING?

December 9, 2014 by

The Torture Report. All war anniversaries, from WWI, to Pearl Harbor, to closing the operational command in Afghanistan, feel the same. It’s all Vietnam. That war played out on the nightly news through junior high and high school for my classmates. It was the war older brothers were drafted for, the war that robbed another […]

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FURY: BRAD PITT GOES TO WAR…AGAIN

August 2, 2014 by

Taking A Shot At The Great American War Movie. World War II is the biggest war canvas for the biggest stories. It’s that big. War stories from every other conflict miss the moral certainty, the celebration, of wiping evil off the earth. There’s nothing like a Nazi, or an Imperial Japanese soldier, biting the dirt […]

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To: COMMANDER, NATIONAL HEADQUARTERS, VETERANS OF FOREIGN WARS

May 28, 2014 by

Baby boomers know how to move on. We’ve seen hippies turn into businessmen, radicals to politicians, yippies into stock brokers. We’ve seen our soldiers come back from Vietnam and work to regain missing years. The following two letters come from an American veteran. He served on the Korean DMZ. Thomas Lucken, like thousands of other […]

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AGENT ORANGE VS BABY BOOMER VETERANS

May 9, 2014 by

The Last One Standing? Seasoned travelers hit the road hoping for an “ah ha” moment, the one that can’t be explained. You stand in awe and let emotions run unchecked where words and reason have no meaning. The Grand Canyon has that reputation. The Columbia Gorge draws people from around the world and they go […]

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The Best Medicine Not In The Cabinet

December 27, 2013 by

When the New York Times posts on Facebook you know it’s an important subject. Newspapers in the digital age can’t afford to waste print. Is it war in the Middle East? Famine in Africa? Economic doom in America? Is sweating good for you? It’s all of the above, but the last one is tricky.

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The Car, The War

October 23, 2013 by

What’s the difference between a mobile society and a mobile war? You find out when the warriors hang up their guns. It’s how they drive down their familiar town road after trailing an IED blast in Iraq. Drive faster? Slower? Don’t drive?

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