Free Republic

Dorothy Oxendine presides over American Gold Star Mothers Inc., a national organization of women whose sons and daughters have died in military service to the nation. (Photo by Mark Abraham) AMERICAN IDENTITY With the Iraq War, a New Generation of Gold Star Mothers BY DELIA M. RIOS More stories by Delia M. Rios WASHINGTON -- As Dorothy Oxendine knows, the most dreaded words a parent can hear are "We regret to inform you ..." She lost her only son, Pfc. Willie F. Oxendine III, to a land mine in Vietnam on May 30, 1968. His death at age 21...

he night before her son left for Kuwait, Ruth Aitken argued with him on the telephone for nearly three hours. From her living room in State College, Pa., she told him that a war with Iraq made no sense, that it was really a scuffle over oil. Her son, an Army captain based at Fort Stewart, Ga., countered that America needed to be protected from terrorists. "Mother," he finally told her, "it's my job." The argument — a "major confrontation" in Ms. Aitken's memory — was by no means their first debate over the war, but it was their last....

Names of the four US Marines who died in yesterday's helicopter crash: Maj. Jay Thomas Aubin, 36, of Waterville, Maine Capt. Ryan Anthony Beaupre, 30, of Bloomington, Ill. Cpl. Brian Matthew Kennedy, 25, of Houston, Texas Staff Sgt. Kendall Damon Watersbey, 29, of Baltimore, Md. The Pentagon has just released the names of two more US Marines who were killed in Iraq. I'll post as soon as I find that.