I honor and respect the service of your family.

My comment concerning Max Cleland is based on my understanding of the facts available, official and non-official. You are free to disagree and I’m sorry that you were offended as that was never my intention. I have a habit of speaking what I have every reason to believe is the truth even if it might offend someone. I would hate to think that a disagreement would be enough for you to stop communicating. That would be a detriment to us both.

My age doesn’t really have anything to do with my experience. I’ve known 10 year olds in China that had more life experience than 40-year-old Americans. It’s not always how long you’ve been around, but what you’ve been through in the time you have been around.

I was born in Communist China where the men have few rights and the women and girls have even less. If we hadn’t gotten out my sisters and I would have been prime targets for the sex trade. My parents smuggled my older sisters and I out of the country in suitcases and then we made our way to the United States. My parents sold their wedding rings and a few family heirlooms to rent an old beat up store that had a small 2-bedroom apartment above it. Our parents slept in one room and the three of us girls slept in the other room. Later our 2 younger sisters came along and then a brother. My parents worked 16-hour days with us kids pitching in after school and on weekends. By working themselves to the bone they were able to house, clothe, and feed us and then eventually buy a small house. When the immigration rules were eased in China we brought the rest of our family over. I didn’t have a piece of clothing that was new until I was 13. My parents were able to pay off the mortgage on the store, buy a second store, and then pay off their house. My daughters currently do the same job my sisters and I did when we were their age. I started modeling at 13 and was able to save up enough by the time I was 20 to start my own business. I am where I am because I worked my butt off to get here.

I am proud of myself because I know I earned what I have, but smug does not apply, as I am quite humble. My husband and I donate 20% of our annual income to our church community service center which includes a food bank, separate shelters for men and women with or without children, showers, soup kitchens, hygiene bank, clothing bank, and free counseling for anyone that wants it. We receive referrals from the feds, the state, and the county as well as walk-ins. By law we can help walk-ins for 3 days in order to give them enough time to make it to a referral center. Nobody is ever-turned away hungry or cold or in danger. The church is a designated safe house.

I am happily married because I love my husband and I picked a very good one that is a wonderful husband and father that loves our children and I. I can count on him to uphold his end. I wish a spouse like him on everyone.

Military service in my family:

I currently have 3 sisters serving in Iraq. My older sisters and I went down to enlist right after the attacks on 9/11. They made it, but was designated 4-F because of my height (4’9”). After that I decided to stay home and raise my children. When my 3rd sister turned 18 she enlisted. My husband served in the USMC during Desert Storm and the beginning of the Afghanistan War before he was honorably discharged as a Gunny. He is subject to recall. My father served with the People’s Liberation Army Air Force in China from 1969 to 1986 when my parents defected from China and smuggled my older sisters and I out of the country. My grandfather served in the National Revolutionary Army of China fighting against Imperial Japan during the Second Sino-Japanese War. My uncle-in-law served 3 tours as part of the 101st airborne special forces green beret and earned 2 purple hearts, bronze star, and silver star. My grandfather-in-law served in the 101st airborne during World War 2. He stormed the beaches at Normandy as a part of F Company and fought with his company all the way to Berlin. He died in combat saving 3 of his fellow soldiers from a bullet to the back as he was carrying the 3rd guy away from the area.

I had planned on going into politics and I had a position waiting for me in Oregon before I decided that I would rather work from home so that I would be able to spend more time with my family. Having one parent working outside of the house is ok, but I don’t like the idea of both.

Since you asked I will turn 26 in October. I was 18 in 2000. By then I was a wife, mother, owned my own home and car.

My parents were in China during the Vietnam War and China was actively supporting the NVA and Viet Cong. I have talked to them a great deal about the Vietnam War and other conflicts. Their version is very different from the liberal American version. My grandparents echoed my parent’s opinions. The Vietnam War was the right thing to do. We won every battle, but we lost the war because of inept leadership in Kennedy and then Johnson. Eisenhower was a military genius and he had laid out the plans for how to handle North Vietnam. He wanted to reinstate the military draft, build up and train our forces, go in with everything we had to utterly crush the North, help the South take over, build up their boarders to keep the surrounding countries from coming in, and then leaving in victory. Unfortunately Kennedy was a follower rather than a leader and he listened to his liberal advisors. As a result he went in with insufficient manpower, insufficiently trained personnel, and he severely handicapped when and where our military could attack. He fought to not lose rather than fighting to win, which is a plan to fail. Johnson simply continued and escalated Kennedy’s mistakes. By the time the conservative Nixon came along it was FUBAR and the American people were no longer behind the war. Kennedy/Johnson took too long to get it done. Nixon had to try and figure out a way out of it without leaving our allies too badly off and in the end they were crushed anyway. If Nixon had won the election in 1960 instead of Kennedy the Vietnam War would be remembered very differently than it is now.

If my parents read what I said about Max Cleland they would want to know why. I would show them what I know and they would form their own opinions. They would not be ashamed of me for forming an opinion regardless of whether they agreed with me or not. My parents raised me to think for myself and encouraged me to never accept anyone’s word for anything concerning history. They encouraged me to always look things up and check for myself. I have passed that lesson on to my own children. I never expect anyone to take what I say for granted. If I say something that sounds like BS to you then look it up from several sources. If I’m wrong (and I am as often as most people) then I want you to show me when, where, and how. I will look at your evidence and if I agree with you I will retract my assertion. I was not trying to offend you and I apologize for doing so.

Every Memorial Day, Veterans Day, and 4th of July we raise the American flag on our pole on the front lawn. Since 1993 we have gone to Tahoma National Cemetery in Kent, Washington to place flags. My family personally knows and is friends with around 40-45 veterans of World War 2, the Korean War, the Vietnam War, and both Gulf Wars.

I am not a fan of Dick Cheney and I was not happy to see him on the Republican ticket. I agree with some of Rush Limbaugh’s views, but I do not like him as a person. I believe that Bush II is an average president. I would never make jokes about anyone as I consider such behavior to be distasteful. I understand that I have offended you, I can understand why you’re upset and I thank you for keeping your language polite. Again, I apologize. I am a very kind and empathic person and if you knew me personally you would know that.

I wasn’t with John Kerry during his military service either, but from what I’ve been able to find the information is correct. My main problem with him is what he did after his discharge. He either threw away his medals or someone else’s (the complete story has never come out and he’s said more than one version). He met with the enemy in Paris (North Vietnamese) without government sanction, which is an act of treason. He was a founding member of the VVAW, which was a domestic terrorist group that committed numerous acts of treason, harassment, vandalism (throwing feces and urine on government buildings and monuments), and theft of government property. After the end of the war they concentrated their efforts on securing amnesty for domestic terrorists and dissidents. They were on the run until 1980 when Jimmy Carter granted all of them amnesty. This is all a matter of public record.