Absolutely we do......to protect ourselves from those

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We were younger and had went out to a party. A guy was drinking and mixing it with pills. He was totally out of it. He tried to pick a fight with my husband, saying he was big and bad enough to whip the biggest guy there. My husband was 6 foot 6 inches and about 225. Anyway, my husband wasn't going to fight with him, and we left and came home. We live in a rural area. About 1/2 hour later the guy is standing out in front of our house, near the road, screaming for my husband to come out and fight or he's going to start shooting! The next sound we hear is a shotgun racking and then he fires a shotgun blast off into the air. OMG!! I was terrified. My husband shoved me off the couch and into the floor. Then he crawled across the floor and pulled the cord on the lamp and turned off the TV, so it was dark in the house. I had no idea what else he was doing. I was lying on the living room flooor and had dialed 911 and was screaming for help. Next thing I know, the guy out front fires another shot and it hits the picture window and the window shatters!

What I didn't know was my husband had went through the house, grabbed his gun out of the closet, and went out the back door. He shot back, shooting into the air at a pear tree that guy was standing under. It was late August and when he hit that pear tree, it rained down pears on the guy outside! He fired one more over the guy's head as a warning and then lowered the barrel of the gun towards the guy. The guy decided my husband was serious and ran to his truck and took off. Luckily the police caught him about 2 miles down the road. I had given them a description of his pickup and he passed them as they were on their way to our house.

They came to the house and talked to us. They saw the shattered window and the shots were heard on the 911 tape along with my frantic call for help. They told my husband they didn't blame him, they would have done the same thing, he was defending his home and family. The guy was convicted and went to jail. What the guy at the party didn't know was my husband was an ex-Marine trained for combat and had marksmanship medals from Marine competition. He picked the wrong guy to try to scare with a gun! But it was scarey. I was scared to death. It was the most terrifying thing that has ever happened to me. I couldn't sleep for weeks afterwards and was a nervous wreck. I don't wish anything like that on anybody!

WASHINGTON (March 16) - Halliburton Co. failed to protect the water supply it is paid to purify for U.S. soldiers throughout Iraq, in one instance missing contamination that could have caused mass sickness or death, an internal company report concluded.

The report, obtained by The Associated Press, said the company failed to assemble and use its own water purification equipment, allowing contaminated water directly from the Euphrates River to be used for washing and laundry at Camp Ar Ramadi in Ramadi, Iraq.

The problems discovered last year at that site - poor training, miscommunication and lax record keeping - occurred at Halliburton's other operations throughout Iraq, the report said.

Countrywide, all camps suffer to some extent from all or some of the deficiencies noted, Wil Granger, Theatre Water Quality Manager in the war zone for Halliburton's KBR subsidiary, wrote in his May 2005 report.

AP reported earlier this year allegations from whistleblowers about the Camp Ar Ramadi incident, but Halliburton never made public Granger's internal report alleging wider problems.

The water quality expert warned Halliburton the problems will have to be dealt with at a very elevated level of management to protect health and safety of U.S. personnel.

Halliburton said Wednesday it conducted a second review last year that found no evidence of any illnesses in Iraq from water and it believes some of its earlier conclusions were incomplete and inaccurate. The company declined to release the second report.

The company said it has worked closely with the Army to develop standards and take action to ensure that the water provided in Iraq is safe and of the highest quality possible.

Halliburton was headed by Vice President Dick Cheney for several years before he ran for vice president. Its KBR subsidiary, also known as Kellogg Brown & Root, works under contract to provide a number of services to the U.S. military in Iraq, including providing water and purifying it.

The contaminated, non-chlorinated water at Ar Ramadi was discovered in March 2005 in a commode by Ben Carter, a KBR water expert at the base. In an interview, Carter said he resigned after KBR barred him from notifying the military and senior company officials about the untreated water.

A supervisor at Ar Ramadi told me to stop e-mailing company officials outside the base and warned that informing the military was none of my concern, Carter said. He said he threatened to sue if company officials didn't let him be examined to determine whether he suffered medical problems from exposure to the contaminated water.

Granger's report cited several countrywide problems:

A lack of training for key personnel. Theatre wide there is no formalized training for anyone at any level in concerns to water operations.

Confusion between KBR and military officials over their respective roles. For instance, each assumed the other would chlorinate the water at Ar Ramadi for any uses that would require the treatment.

Inadequate or nonexistent records that could have caught problems in advance. Little or no documentation was kept on water inventories, safety stand-downs, audits of water quality, deliveries, inspections and logs showing alterations or modifications to water systems.

Relying on employees the company identified as semiskilled labor, and paid as unskilled workers in the pay structure.

The report said the event at Ar Ramadi could have been prevented if KBR's Reverse Osmosis Units on the site had been assembled, instead of relying on the military's water production facilities.

This event should be considered a 'near miss' as the consequences of these actions could have been very severe resulting in mass sickness or death, Granger wrote.

The report said that KBR officials at Ar Ramadi tried to keep the contamination from senior company officials.

The event that was submitted in a report to local camp management should have been classified as a recordable occurrence and communicated to senior management in a timely manner, Granger wrote. The primary awareness to this event came through threat of domestic litigation.

Beginning last May, Halliburton said it began using its equipment to remove contaminants, bacteria, and viruses in Ar Ramadi, and disinfect the water with chlorine. The company said KBR has worked closely with the Army to develop safe water standards.

It said its subsequent review in August-September 2005 found nonpotable water used for washing was effectively filtered to remove at least 99 percent of the parasite giardia and 90 percent of viruses. The Ar Ramadi water also tested negative for bacteria, Halliburton added.

certain he knows how to catch BinLaden and he puts country first it behooves him to tell anyone who will listen!!!!!

I think it will be all over after the first debate. Obama's poll numbers creeping up, but after debate, will skyrocket.

I should not have posted anything about myself, beliefs or opinions. I should have checked all messages from you first to make sure that I would agree with you so as not to expose your narrow-minded views to anything other than just that.

Absolutely. I just have such a strong belief in respect for one another. We need to think about what our chidren/grandchildren are witnessing us and others do and say each day. I don't care if the president is white, black, Indian, Asian, or otherwise...if he can just do his best for the country and, I know this is a long shot but, this not turn into a black/white issue. He's just a person. What does his skin color have to do with anything? We are all just people.

I keep thinking of Kennedy. I'm keeping my fingers crossed. I just hope he doesn't try to do the convertable thing. I think he mentioned doing it at one point.

I really don't think Bush will try the directive 51 thing or anything like that, although I wouldn't put it past him.

....we could keep at this for a week and never convince one another, which is fine. We don't get to vote on this issue. America has spoken. We want change. The dems will have enough votes in congress to ram this through without any input from you or me. As AL Gore says: The science is settled. The debate is over.

1. You have such a low opinion of our elected officials (what with the lobbying, bribing, the royal retirements and all) yet you want to turn your healthcare over to them exclusively?

2. If you or someone you love are denied by your insurance company, you might be grateful for the opportunity to accept charity or hock everything you own for the chance to get help. Or you could just roll over and die. Your choice.

4. If you haven't the energy to fight with WDGD (We Don't Give a Damn) Insurance, what makes you think you can take on the FBHR (Federal Bureau of Healthcare Rationing)?

5. Why should you be bankrupted by having to pay higher taxes to provide healthcare for me or my family?

Anyhow, we both need to get a life, so I'm all finished posting about this subject

what we have is a mess, but what we will get with government-controlled healthcare will be so much worse. I have no clue how to solve the inequities in our current system but I know that letting big government take over for big insurance is another step in the wrong direction. It's another example of 'we must do SOMETHING' without having a clue what that something should be. We have to do something effective and nobody knows what that is.....yet.

If you think insurance companies are difficult to deal with now, wait until you have to get approval from a government bureaucracy. The inefficiency and expense of anything the government manages is legend.

Presently, there is a monetary incentive for pharmaceutical companies to develop new drugs, for medical equipment companies to design new technology, for scientists physicians to perfect new treatments and techniques (other than having something named after them). When the government has sets profit limits and salary caps to prevent 'obscene profits from the illness of others' nobody will have much reason to break a sweat to do these things (again, other than having something named after them).

You CAN indeed murder someone and you WILL indeed be arrested. The difference is you actually CAUSED HARM to someone. You didn't do something that just went against the opinions of another person.

I have two children myself that are young now and I understand about "protecting" children, but give me a break, this world is so corrupt it's ridiculous! There is A LOT that I need to protect them from, NOT the fact that two people may love each other and happen to be the same sex.

I am not gay, so therefore I have no right to say yes or no to gay marriage, but I would never put someone down for having different beliefs than I do.