- Stumbled on an article written by Elizabeth Warren posted on Huffingtonpost.com. " America without a Middle Class ." 

    So now the elite media finally grudgingly validates what we working schelps have known for five years. 
    
    At the very end of her article, Professor Warren's last caveat is, "America without a strong middle class? Unthinkable, but the once-solid foundation is shaking." 

    Oh really Doc?  Not in your house apparently.  In my house the Middle Class is dead. Dead and long buried. Mission accomplished facilitators of economic misery.  This was not an accident.  We now live a Second World life, worshiping at the troth of Third World China's smelly, techno-communist-fascist, cheep and dangerous product canard.  

    We make nothing any more in America.  At some point China and India's neo-middle-classes will buy their own products.  Then we are even more irrelevant.  Until America and Wisconsin come up with new products to manufacture like has happened in so many other decades of change, I fear this “new normal” of bottom feeding is here for a long, long time. And, even if we reinvent ourselves with a new miracle product for the world, the Chinese will most likely steal it. 

    What the hell are we going to do if we have to go into another large war with one of these techno-communist-fascist super states? We couldn't build an aircraft carrier if we had to - all the material would have to come from the...enemy state. 

                              Wisconsin Military Service Person Special Mention of the Week
          (each week Cooldadiomedia mentions a Wisconsin service person killed in Iraq or Afghanistan) 

    This week's Wisconsin military service person to remember is Marine Lance Corporal Ryan J. Cantafio, 22, a Marine Reservist from Beaver Dam. Cantafio was killed on November 25, 2004 in an explosion in Iraq. Lance Corporal Cantafio was with Company G, 2nd Battalion, 24th Marine Regiment, 4th Marine Division, Marine Forces Reserve, out of Madison, Wisconsin. He died in during enemy action in Anbar province, Iraq. Ryan was the second former Beaver Dam High School student killed in Iraq. Cantafio had been in the Marine Reserve for four years and shipped out to Iraq in September, 2004 placing him in the country only two months at the time of his death. The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel mentioned Ryan was married and he and his wife had their home in Beaver Dam. At the time of his death, Ryan was survived by his father Joe, a step mom, and wife Amanda. Lance Corporal Ryan Cantafio was the 30th Wisconsinite killed in Iraq since Spring, 2003. 

                                               As of this blog entry's posting date:

    94,554 Iraqi civilians have been killed in Iraq since Spring, 2003.
    
    9,316 Iraqi Security Forces have been killed in Iraq since Spring, 2003.

    4,370 Americans have been killed in Iraq since Spring, 2003. 

    927 Americans have been killed in Afghanistan since October, 2001.

    317 Coalition soldiers have been killed in Iraq since Spring, 2003.

    598 Coalition soldiers have been killed in Afghanistan since October, 2001. 

    31,575 U.S. troops have been wounded in action in Iraq since Spring, 2003. 

    4,606 U.S. troops have been wounded in action in Afghanistan since October, 2001. 

    101 Wisconsin soldiers have been killed in Iraq since Spring, 2003.

    16 Wisconsin soldiers have been killed in Afghanistan since October, 2001.

    139 journalists (several nationalities) have been killed in Iraq since Spring, 2003.

    17 journalists (various nationalities) have been killed in Afghanistan since October, 2001.

Wisconsin military service person special mention of the week, military casualty, and journalist casualty information sources: Committee to Protect Journalists; cnn.com; Milwaukee Journal Sentinel; washingtonpost.com; thehighground.org; Wisconsin Department of Veterans Affairs; iraqbodycount.org; and, icasualties.org.