The Dirty Secrets About Our Wars

America has purchased our wars at a high price.  Next time you hear a politician speak about "big government," ask him if he means the tens of thousands of contractors we have conducting our wars for us. Ask him at what cost have we given war fighting to private business.  In Iraq private contractors protect our diplomats.  In Afghanistan over 100 thousand contractors perform all manner of work and war that most Americans would think was done by our military.

These contractors and their contracts cost the American tax payer tens of billions of dollars.  Is this the capitalism we think of when we think of our free market system?  We have 100 thousand American troops of every stripe in theater plus all these contractors.  When is enough enough?  Our money and our might consume these small countries where we find ourselves.  Our presence by its very nature corrupts the culture and twists economic activity in an unhealthy way.

Yet we persist with pretence that we are doing good and if we leave... No, the mere thought we might leave, throws the whole world out of whack.  We must begin to lift the vale of our belief in our inherent goodness and see what we have wrought for what it is.