a sadistic milestone

Today, a car bomb killed seven Marines near Falluja. This brings the total of US servicemen and women who have been killed in the sands of Iraq to 993 (854 since the "Mission Accomplished" photo-op on the USS Abe Lincoln), just seven people away from an even One Thousand. This does not include the 133 soldiers who have died in Afghanistan. This does not include the approximately 149 civilian contractors from around the world that have been killed, the 23 still missing civilians, the 65 British troops, or the 66 troops from other members of the so-called "Coalition of the Willing" that have died. It does not include the 6497 American troops that were listed as wounded in action by the Pentagon by August 14, 2004. It does not include the approximately 12,000 or so Iraqi civilians -- whose only crime was living within the boundaries of Saddam's Iraq -- that have perished since the United States started with the whole "Shock and Awe" crap. It doesn't include the countless thousands of Iraqi soldiers drafted into the military under fear of reprisals against their bodies and their loved ones, used as fodder under the military machine of our military.

No, the cost of life of this war is already thousands...tens of thousands (the cost in dollars is in the hundreds of BILLIONS). And for what? To catch one madman and kill his sons because he might of could have wanted to do something bad with weapons he didn't have? Oh, my head.

In any case, the United States is seven troop-deaths away from reaching the 1000-mark.