• AMY GOODMAN: That was Michelle Obama speaking on the first night. In fact, she was introduced by a mother who had a number of children in the military, saying—I think it was five kids she had, four in the military. And she’s hoping that her high-school son will also choose the military. Chris Kromm, the significance of this?
  • CHRIS KROMM: Well, you know, what they say is, if you live in the South, somebody you know is in the military. There’s no question that this is the home of the military-industrial complex, is the South. From what we had looked at, about 56 to 60 percent of the troops are based in Southern states. About 45 percent of the troops come from Southern states. So, this really is the home. And in North Carolina, really it’s an advertising point, that it’s the most military friendly state in the country.
  • So what you have is two issues here. One is, you see, on the level of rhetoric and theater at the Democratic convention, trying to reach out and associate with those, identify with those families, by really playing that big-time about the connection to military families and what they’re going through. That kind of chafes against the reality of—that this administration has been slow to really shift course on a lot of aspects of foreign policy, and so a lot of people who are most affected by our current foreign policy are really wondering how fast this is going to change. Now, clearly there has been some change. I don’t want to undersell that. I think that’s clear. But in terms of what military families are really going through, you can see that this is something—and it was surprising to see, that usually it’s the Republican convention, right? where you see that rhetoric really amped up to the 10th level. And so, it was interesting to see that it was Democrats really trying to seize the initiative in speaking out to that constituency. But I think the question on the ground for those families most affected by it is, what’s changing?
  • KEVIN ALEXANDER GRAY: And you noticed that at the Republican convention they didn’t talk about war and the military. And what Chris said is so true. I’m a former military officer. My father served 27 years in the Navy. I have three brothers; all of them served in the Army. Most of my nephews now, because I asked my son, "Don’t" — when he asked me, "Should I go in the military?" "Don’t go." But most of my nephews have been in the military on multiple tours. And when you ask them—I had one that did two tours in Afghanistan and one tour in Iraq. "That $4.5 million that they spent on you, what could you do with it now?" He said, "Well, I could pay for my education," because that kid is unemployed. All this boosting of the military and boosting of the empire, and using the soft face of Michelle Obama to build empire and to take it from the weakest segments of society, to say that that’s the only economic opportunity that you can have, people ought to question that.