Milestone Tragedy

The Pentagon now reports that 1,000 of our sons and daughters have died in Afghanistan. This is not a good milestone and certainly not one to celebrate. I only ask what benefit we will gather for this high price?
I'll steal a paragraph from Derrick Crowe at FDL:

Here is this wide altar, Afghanistan, on which our empire leaves its tribute to the true god of all empires. One thousand of the young, blown apart by rough-made bombs buried on roads to nowhere, shot by snipers, or worse, by their own. One thousand sons, daughters, mothers, fathers, brothers, sisters, neighbors, mentors, students, friends, husbands, wives, lovers. A thousand goats led into the wild to appease the spirit of the wilderness, the maker of weapons, sent to the desert for our impurities.

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