Grab a GUINNESS stout, or maybe two, and sing along.

http://www(dot)contemplator.com/ireland/gowen.html

(i was never in war). but i listen.

Did I?

I've always got your "six" and I know you've got mine. So stop worrying about it.

go to any keyboard. it's just a descending scale. cbAgfEdcEee (the caps double length) and the "new and improved" Garry Owen is getting ready to resume speaking to me!

It's past noon and a good deal of may be missed somewhere else. The morning was dealing with some complicated thinking personages.

I no like to denounce other and call them immature things like, 'cow-paddy' whilst they go thunk, 'funk-you' Glenn. A considerable number of folk need to literally Shrink they stink so.

If a quarrel ensues when I'm out on the road, i hope to Hibernate with a lover. When severely bruised or knifed, I'll get slightly wounded.

It is time to marshal people who will parade the GOP's dirty pink undies.

shilleia men have a dark-headquarters of killing Rifle-Corp in the White House.

This however, must be prevented. If not, a human can try to cross a road,

and a fly-toad's poop, flops. The ring-leaders need to disperse 'um so funky. Keep them in front of the mirror.

Send them away in straight-jacket immediately for they don't know what they are doing.

Call the World Court together.

No, the 'insurrection' can't be suppressed?

But Happily, the dreadful noon will come and go.

The confusion is preparation for peace and tranquility.

Not since the last war did so many confused people appear so damn dead.

Re: Garryowen

"I'm not sure yet about all the posts of "Gary Owen." But he has a great moniker. Garryowen was (is?) a hamlet in County Limerick."

You are correct, sir! If you use Google Earth, you can type in the Lat Long, 52 degrees, 39'37.34 North, by 8 degrees, 36'53.24 West, and you will be at the city football pitch on Garryowen Road. This is all that remains of the "Garden of Owen" where the young rakehells of the town once hung out, drinking and committing misdemeanors and causing trouble. They had a drinking song (don't they all) that was borrowed from a much older fife and drum quickstep march that they sang in rollicking glee until the wee hours. It was called "Garryowen."

And you are correct again, that Brevit Gen. George Armstrong Custer adopted the song for his U.S. 7th Cavalry Regiment out of Ft. Riley, Kansas. But he actually heard the song sung in various camps during the American Civil War by the Irish brigade of New York City who sang it for camaraderie among themselves.

The U.S. 7th Cavalry itself survived Custer's blunder and they kept the song as their un-official regimental parade aire to be played when they mounted their horses and passed in review during ceremonies, particularly those at Ft. Riley.

And my good friend, you are once again correct that in modern times "that when a trooper of the 7th salutes an officer, he accompanies the salute by saying "Garryowen, Sir!," although not in a combat zone. It is reserved for ceremony and to instill a sense of belonging to an outfit rich in tradition and history and it's mostly ceremonial.

At some point, the U.S. 7th Cavalry was absorbed into the 1st Cavalry Division. You've seen their big yellow and black arm patch on many troopers in Iraq. It's a heraldic shield with a black diagonal and a silhouette of a horse's head.

Self-deprecating troopers of the 1st Cav might tell you it symbolizes "The horse I never rode" and the black diagonal is "the line I never crossed" and the yellow background, "well that speaks for itself!" But smile when you say it.

The horse cavalry went away before WW II. The Division became the 1st Cavalry Division (Airmobile) in Vietnam. Our "horse" was the ubiquitous UH-1 D, "Huey" helicopter. After Vietnam, the concept of air mobility by helicopter was no longer applicable to the kinds of urban combat the Pentagon "thinkers" were planning for. So the Airmobile Cavalry went the way of the horse.

Today the 1st Cavalry Division is Heavy Mechanized and travels by Bradley Fighting Vehicle and by Stryker assault vehicles and still drops in unannounced by Blackhawk helicopters by "air assault."

Former Army Major Tammy Duckworth, who is now Director of the Illinois Department of Veterans' Affairs, was a 1st Cav Blackhawk pilot. She lost both of her legs while conducting an air combat assault in Iraq. She signs her email "Garry Owen!" when we correspond.

As anybody who reads my letters know, I am not a war monger. But I am proud of the men and women who go into harms way in service to this country. We are engaged in a useless and politically-motivated war of choice in Iraq and I hate it as much as anyone. But these people who serve in the military are deserving of the best we can do for them both while they are away and when they come home.

People's ya's never can figure. imagine in the way back, you know everyone. stifling. everyone in your business. but i miss it. thanks, bop, CONNECTION is the Very Best. (and interleaved with we, people are talking serious, ruling the world, but in spite of my worry, they leave us alone (smoking in the big chair), part of the family too) see what i mean? i'm a CHAMELEON! (but no veggies) pick the caps! CONNECTION CHAMELEON

Your reference to Rush Limbaugh's unpatriotic remark is right on target. Rush Limbaugh has called service members who criticize or oppose the war in Iraq, "phony soldiers." Thus, according to Rush, the numerous American soldiers who, in spite of their opposition to the war, bravely followed orders and were injured or even gave their lives there (such as Omar Mora and Yance T. Gray who wrote an Op-Ed in the New York Times criticizing the war) are "phony soldiers." I served honorably for twenty years in the U.S. military, but today I oppose the war in Iraq. I assume Rush will call me a "phony veteran." Considering the source, a man who did not served a single day in the military, I would wear such an accusation as a badge of honor.

Major Dorian de Wind (USAF, Retired)