Whenever a lot of things are going on I can't make sense of there's something in the back of my mind that starts to gnaw at me. This has happened ever since my Vietnam War days.
At the impressionable age of just 19 I experienced my first gnawing feeling. I had a lot of things going on around me that didn't make sense. Back then they all revolved around the Vietnaminization Program; the grand scheme that convinced the American people we were winning the war and laying the groundwork for achieving "peace with honor" to allow for our eventual withdrawal from the war. I started investigating and putting the pieces of the puzzle together. To make a long story short let's just say that as a result I went from being totally supportive of the U.S. war effort to being an active member of the Vietnam Veterans Against the War while still stationed there.
Lately that gnaw is back. It came back about the time all the political oxygen started being sucked up in the government shutdown/default saga. I have been feeling it increase in intensity as the shutdown days have rolled on. Please read on below the fold to allow me to explain.
