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Hahahaha, holy shit. I don't know why I'm surprised but the idea of not wearing an ISAF patch in Afghanistan is still a little surreal to me. Also in all seriousness, tactical successes added together don't automatically equal strategic success. The Afghan War was an unmitigated strategic failure, period. We lost, period. I know that's painful to hear but unless we start having an honest accounting of what went wrong (and there was a lot, both politically and militarily) we (as a nation) aren't going to learn our mistakes. Hand-waving equivocating to make ourselves feel better doesn't do anyone any good (other than the generals and politicians, who are let off the hook when we refuse to hold them accountable for the strategic failure.)

I agree with both you and Pawnman, but I don't agree that 'no one' is talking about the horrible reason as to why Garner was stopped. Link below (yes, it's from the horrible racist FoxNews) has Hannity and Rand Paul talking about this exact issue. I'm not a big fan of Sean Hannity, but I think he gets it with this issue. Unless by 'no one' you mean clowns like Sharpton, de Blasio, and other progressives on the left, then I agree. And of course they will never address this issue for three reasons: They love taxes, they love government control, and they want to make this a victim issue not an issue of Liberty (see Saul Alinksky and his rules). https://www.foxnews.com/on-air/hannity/transcript/2014/12/05/sen-rand-paul-eric-garner-didnt-need-die I don't support the protests because it is not a pro-Liberty protest. It is by and large a big group of people, fueled by race hustlers like Sharpton and Jackson, who want to feel like they're victims, regardless of the circumstances. This should not be a race issue, but a pro-Liberty issue that involves people from every race. I blame the politicians the 'second' most for these LEO's stopping, arresting, and harassing people for victimless crimes. I blame the people the most for putting these politicians into office election after election. The police, by and large, are just doing what they are hired to do. They don't make the laws, but just enforce them. The vast majority also don't get to decide on the policy by which they operate. Saying this a 'police vs black people' problem is like saying or problems in Iraq were from a 'Iraqi civilian vs American soldier' problem, which it was not. When the 'hands up don't shoot' narrative/cheer is still being supported then I refuse to listen to the nonsense. One of the few things I support coming from this whole ordeal will hopefully be States/local cities making their LEO wear body cameras whenever dealing with non-LEO when acting in a official capacity.

Totally agree. Why is no one asking the question why a victimless crime (Garner) was escalated to a violent confrontation by the PO when all that should have happened was the cop giving him a citation similar to a speeding ticket and going on his merry way? I have a few close friends and family members who are LEOs so don't think I'm a cop hater at all. But I am becoming more and more saddened by the "don't question my authority" attitude by some cops when a person stands up for their Constitutional rights. For example this video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nMlc0-LSMgA The cop gets mad when the individual, who is not doing anything illegal, refuses to give the cop his can of ice tea. There's no probable cause so the officer has no right to search the can. When his authority is questioned he tells the individual to leave under the threat of trespass. That officer is NOT the owner of that property and has no right to tell the individual to leave that property unless the property owner wants the customer to leave. But nonetheless his authority was questioned and he used that as an excuse to find something to arrest the individual on.

Talk to flight test guys who take jets up for the first time after a PDM, that would be more of a risk than a new jet.