The Military and Democrats

I've posted before about how this year has a surprising surge in military veterans running for Congress as Democrats. I say surprising, because most military people I know (and I know a lot) tend to be very, very Republican. When I was growing up in my military family, I always had a subconscious feeling that this was incredibly ironic. I couldn't help but notice that this organization that had such fire-breathing anti-Communists lived in a community that was, well, socialist in its nature. I've always said from my own experience as a sickly child that I know socialized medicine can work, because I'm living proof of it. Without the military, I could very well have died young, especially if my folks didn't have medical insurance, as some 45 million or so Americans don't today.

So I was impressed and pleased today to find this post in the American Prospect by Markos Moulitsas Zuniga, of DailyKos.com fame, speaking about his own experience as a enlistee in the military and how it turned him into a democrat. There is much in this article that really speaks to me, because he comments on things I always felt as a child and adolescent gaining knowledge about the world, but didn't admit because I thought I had to be a Republican. It was only after going to college, at about the same time as Moulitsas, that I had the nerve to finally say "screw you" to the Republican party. Read it and see what you think.