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The Vietnam War was not like WWII. Literally everyone was doing what they could to stay out of it. If you start condemning folks who avoided it, you won’t have many people left from that period that you can support.

You're missing the point, D1. If we can't blame Cheney for avoiding fighting at war in Nam -- and I don't don't -- (1) why then has he been such a robust chickenhawk? (2) Could it be his questionable conflict of interest between the military-industrial complex?

1 One man's chicken-hawk, is another man's simple patriot. There is a group that thinks we shouldn't be involved in ground wars in Asia. There's others who think we must take some military action when our nation is attacked, otherwise you look pretty much the paper tiger. The attack on September 11th, 2001 was of a level that I supported the ground war. I didn't care for how it was executed in the early years, but they did turn things around in due course in Iraq, and I think that was about as much as we could hope for. As for Afghanistan, this ass hat we have right now doesn't know which end of a gun the bullet comes out of. It is sad our men ultimately answer to a man like that. He and his crew don't have the slightest idea what good rules of engagement are. They are overburdened with having to be nice to terrorists. Obama's main objective is to homosexualize the armed services to the extent he can. Obama seems prepared to surrender any gains we made. It's a sad situation. To the extent he manages to make it look like we're leaving with our tail between our legs, he will have destroyed most of the positive aspects our efforts there may have gained us. He'll also bring over thousands of Afghanis of a questionable nature that we'll have to deal with for eternity.

2 I have mixed thoughts on the Military Industrial Complex. Our suppliers make lots of money. They don't always do the best job, or provide the best tools for your men. We do need them. I think they could be managed better. There are going to be advocates on their behalf. Someone will be the contact person our government has to deal with. Cheney made a lot of money working for Haliburton. I believe it was in the neighborhood of $20 million per year. On the one hand we want capable people in the White House, and on the other we get upset if they make too much money because they are so qualified. I happen to think Cheney had the most gravitas of any vice president we've ever had. You look at guys like Carter and Obama, and it's clear he ran circles around them both.

I don't believe Cheney advocated for a ground war based on his idea that his old buddies would make lots of money if there were one. Others may disagree.

There is also a mindset that we need to be able to launch and execute military operations every so often, in order to keep our tactics updated and sound. I believe our armed services learned a lot from the operations on the ground during these operations. That is a good thing. I don't believe there is a better desert fighting nation on planet earth right now. The terrorists took a heavy hit in Iraq and Afghanistan. I believe we spoted thousands if not tens of thousands of potentional problematic people by being on the ground in both nations. We will keep tabs on those people for the rest of their lives. I don't think it will be easy to quantify all the benefits we obtained over the last eleven years.

Moreover, (3) it can be argued that Dick (5) (CFR) Cheney was instrumental in NOT securing the US border post-9/11 as Mexicans were given a free reign to invade. We are paying the price for that legacy (4) as well as an over-intrusive government.

3 Cheney hasn't just started doing things I haven't liked. I thought the idea to allow Islamic Clerics to officiate at the 09/11 memorials was absolutely unforgivable. It was as if the Tate family (victims of Charles Manson and clan), had been forced to attend services where Mom and Pop Manson and all Charlie's siblings had stood up and recited what a nice family they had, and how Charlie had been the apple of their eye for as long as he was with them. Somewhere along the line, these clueless bastard missed the part about terrorism, and sensitivity to families. They also got so confused, they thought decent hard working U. S. Citizens (grandmas included) were the ones who needed to be rousted at the airports.

Yes, sure, Cheney played into the open border situation too. It's devistating what has happened to our nation at the hands of the Left in both parties.

4 Part of the Patriot Act is being gamed against us. They ramroded through new super-powers, and those powers are being used on citizens, NOT TERRORISTS. It's infuriating. We shouldn't have to wonder who is listening in on our converstations. They can put saran wrap on it and call it anything they want, it's still a s--t sandwich for U. S. Citizens.

5 I'm not a big fan of the CFR, but I don't get as worked up over them as others do. It used to be folks were really upset that Kissinger was a puppet of the "Blank" family. (insert family name here, I'm drawing a blank at the moment). There's the Bilderbergers, the Illuminatti, a few others. I gave up trying to keep tabs on what these groups were doing to us.

If we could pull Reagan out of the group and put him in the White House, we can do it again. It's going to take a well grounded charismatic who isn't afraid to rub some people the wrong way, but it can be done.

So far, nobody seems to want the job.