I can sorta respect that, redbus – well stated.

But I have to ask one question prior to absolute approval (not that you are looking for MY approval mind you):

Is it truly the same to mourn the death of an innocent, as it is to mourn the death of a non-innocent?
Yes, death is death. But you tend to feel differently when a loved one dies in a car accident than when they die of a long bout of cancer. Likewise, if a baby is killed, the feeling would be different than if a convicted cold-blooded murderer were killed.

Perhaps I'm wrong. Regardless I do respect your opinion.

While heartfelt, the loss of Velez and the little soul inside her, particularly for her family, I feel it necessary nonetheless to say something about the underlying politics. The issue of whether or not one believes in the need/right for a woman to decide and the question of when, if ever, that should/could be done– colors the way one reads the story. I know plenty of mothers/fathers who have, for a variety of reasons lost the little life and all its promise, and who set out to mark their hearts and mark the ground of their existence and their passing. It is thought of more normally as a personal matter, and they do this with ritual, photos, drawings, prayer and meditation, among other ways individually determined. The newspapers, however, and large institutions, the military are operating under a different set of rules……….I guess we might call them what science has determined about a new life……I don't think it would hurt us to completely adopt and embrace a new way forward where all life is honored from conception………but be sure and involve the coroner, the funeral director, the doctors, nurses, insurance companies, etc., etc……

What we are really taking about here is honoring and protecting innocence ………and if you go there with open eyes and open heart you will be crushed to realize what we do to each other as human beings is irreconcilable……….so we don't, we justify– some killings MUST be done, we say, softly, regrettably……

I wonder if the innocence of the Major's family and friends should be preserved…..and I wonder if any American soldier of Arab/Muslim descent can ever be trusted again. And I wonder of this loss of innocence which I don't believe exists in the mind of the military, but in the mind of that Arab/Muslim soldier who thought, just for a minute, and maybe longer, that they/we trusted him, that he wouldn't have to look over his shoulder at every turn……..I wouldn't say it is complete, but how could the soldier not be aware of his birthmark, his origins, and the suffering of his own people, often at the hands of the military he is now serving under.

This post was mentioned on Twitter by TMV: 14 Killed at Fort Hood, Not 13 As Reported. Why?:
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Dorian

It does show the inconstancy society has for the classification of unborn children, i.e., sometimes they are persons, sometimes they are not.