"The Traveling Taps Bridgade"

Memorial Day. Remember how we used to call it "Decoration Day"? It was a time of true remembrance and honor for our nation.

But times change. Now, the Department of Defense (DOD) policy calls for keeping the deaths of our soldiers, lost in the Afghan War and the Iraq Occupation, a secret. No pictures are allowed at Dover, DE's airbase, the place that our fallen sons and daughters first touch soil in their caskets.

It's a very sad thing, certainly because of the loss each family and our country faces when we lose an individual soldier and also a loss for our democracy as a whole, i.e., it's also a sort of "catch 22", i.e., our sons and daughters are sent to war, or volunteer to go to war, to defend democracy.

But DOD's secrets, as required by President Bush and supported by John McCain, actually result in a weakening of our democracy, since voters ... in order to make wise decisions at the polls ... must arm themselves with all kinds of information about how our nation is doing, including why the wars began, why they continue and more. Without accurate information or at a minimum the ability to access both the good and the bad, it means that voters have a tougher time making the wise decisions necessary to protect our great democracy.

One person who has felt the call to make the news public and to honor our almost 4000 lost soldiers is Joe Baldo of Maryland:

"At the age of 71 ... retired and in the twilight of his life, he shuttles from cemetary to cemetary across Maryland. And
everywhere he goes, he takes three pairs of white gloves, his meticulously pressed Air Force uniform and, in the back seat of his car, his 1933 Bach Stradivarius trumpet. For 27 years, Mr. Baldo devoted his trumpet to his country ... day after day sounding taps at Arlington Memorial Cemetary for soldiers funerals. "

Now, every day -- all across Maryland, he spends his days driving from funeral to funeral, playing his trumpet for our nation's fallen soldiers. Read more of the Washington Post's story here.

We each need to do our part, too. One way to do it is to make your own personal pledge to learn more about the decisions that paved the way to more than five years of war for our nation and the undue burden our rural sons and daughters are carrying in the war, so today -- Memorial Day 2008, in honor of our rural soldiers, we share the following "extra" reading.

• "Rural Death Rate Higher Among Soldiers from Rural Areas" -- by the Carsey Institute, University of New Hampshire. Also available in podcast from the Center for Rural Strategies.
• George Bush's Deep Reasons for War in Iraq: Oil, Petrodollars and the OPEC Euro Question
• Reasons Not to Invade Iraq by George Bush, Sr.
• US Military to Probe Propaganda Effort
• Honoring OurVeterans on Memorial Day by the Center for American Progress

This last story is a critical read. It tells the story by the numbers -- who our veterans are, how many new veterans we have, and more about how they live with disabilities and how our nation meets their challenges on mental health and homelessnews.