The Forgotten People of America

 Renovations or rather a complete rebuilding of Pope Army Air Field are on the books.  Senator Thom Tillis was a major proponent of this construction contract.  Why has it been postponed until now?  Keeping Pope operational is crucial to national defense, and with the longest war in American history still tooling on...  President Biden has put a stop to that.  If American troops don't leave their equipment behind, which is likely, after it returns to Fort Bragg a two year period of runway reconstruction could begin.  When Donald Trump spoke Saturday evening in Greenville, North Carolina, his introduction consisted of accolades for "rebuilding" the military and the two largest pay increases for military personnel.  That makes sense since we are surrounded by military families with many children and wives who do not work.  The homes in which they live are in the $300,000.00 range.  Those must have been some substantial pay increases.  Trump himself often touts the eight hundred billion dollar figure for "rebuilding" the military.  Since Operation Desert Storm, which in our lifetimes was the founding military maneuver which moved an entire fighting force and their equipment across the Atlantic, this logistical mode of transport has flourished.  Military trains packed with expensive equipment load at Fort Bragg and travel to Military Ocean Terminal Sunny Point, the east coast's largest deep water shipping port.  Domestically except for the bi-annual Marine exercise at Fort Bragg and various other miscellaneous training exercises in Louisiana and other places, hauling American gear into the Middle East has been the protocol.  We have spent billions, eight hundred billion dollars to be exact "re-building" the United States military.  We put the equipment on munition trains, then on massive commercially contracted cargo ships, and sail them to an American base in Germany.  Readiness in light of the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor seems prudent, but the last major attack on America was in downtown Manhattan.  Tactical methodology necessarily has changed, and moving fighting equipment around the world seems passe.  With the massive amount of technology infused into the G.I.'s sphere of existence, this seems antiquated.  The worst insult resulting from abandoned American military gear  became ISIS.  We didn't feel it was necessary to bring back the equipment from the Iraq invasion under George W. Bush, so we left it.  Militant Islamic Extremists were more than happy to assume the responsibility for its care and maintenance.  Then they turned it against us.  In the near future the American people need to be able to view a manifest of tax payer purchased military equipment and where it is.  Ironically the "Arms Room" which is tasked with this responsibility, cataloging every munition at Fort Bragg, once resided less than a mile from our house.  It was a high profile Department of Defense gated facility, and only a stones throw away was L3 (now L3/Harris) with their array of satellite transponders.  Where are they when you need them?  With a global disease pandemic still active that has killed over half a million Americans, hauling expensive fighting gear to the Middle East seems selfish.  Yes, we need to train our fighting forces, but we shouldn't try to imperialize oil rich countries on different continents.  We have sold the American people so short.  Capitalism cannot work, unless there is a clear plan for the types of processes that will provide adequate jobs for citizens.  We are urged to work, but the opportunities to do so have become base.  We work for slave wages at Walmart and apply for food stamps to bridge the income gap for the increased cost of living.  Most good paying manufacturing jobs have been outsourced to India and China, because environmental regulations there were weak.  Now that we have exploited both of these economies and their relatively inexpensive work forces, the pollution has grown to an almost inconceivable level.  Greenhouse gas emissions drastically were reduced during the pandemic, but we have more CO2 in the environment than any other time in recorded history.  No one cares about America.  No one cares about the little guy.  No one cares about our children or our schools.  No one cares about a mainstream or "Main Street."  It is domination of the wealthy who live in lofty towers with servants and  manufactured air and water.  America, the land of America, today only is a desert upon which to lay steel rail and using dirty diesel brute force haul shit around the country.  This is what America has become.  Travel to Jacksonville, Florida.  You think it is a tourist destination?  It has four major rail yards which control all of the goods flowing into south Florida.  It is about the money, not the people.