the fact of my service and qualifications as a former Vet disqualifies me from HR's locally who can't or won't pay me a liveable wage, about 27 dollars an hr if you can put it into 40hr work week.  anyone who joined the service knows it's more like 80 to 90 and often times days mix together, with birthdays and holidays, family time out the window

my education level is mid college and in order to get a decent wage I have to take entry level jobs or move to big cities with high cost of living...I want simplicity and just to exist...after 6 tours of middle east beginning in 91 I've had it

anyone else still want to join and now face Iran can have it

in my area you have very low paying servile type jobs, and then you have the military with beginning salaries more than double as a Fed employee working as a soldier

I don't think Stephen King was too far off base

I have known people from all walks of life join the Army, not because of illiteracy or that they were uneducated, but because of their pride in the country and the fervor of patriotism that energized America after the 9/11 attacks.  I have witnessed co-operate vice-presidents and even professional athletes walk away from the money and power to enlist in the Army and ultimately give their lives for the country.  I have served with privates, sergeants, and 2nd lieutenants, with master degrees and doctorates.  Does this sound like illiterate or uneducated people?  I think the following is what an uneducated person sounds like.  

I don’t want to sound like an ad–a public service ad on TV–but the fact is that if you can read you can walk into a job later on. If you don’t then you got the Army, Iraq, I don’t know, something like that. It’s not as bright. So that’s my little commercial for that.

My wife completed her undergraduate degree in business management in 2001.  She was hired as the Director of Economic Development for a national non-profit organization.  After completing her MBA in 2006, she joined the Army.  Again this does not imply that she joined because she was illiterate, but to serve her country.  I have three degrees.  In college I was a double major, graduated with a 3.906 GPA and was the number one graduate in the School of Technology at the university in 1998.  I obtained my MBA in 2006.  I am currently attending the Intermediate Level Education (ILE) Course at the Army’s Command and General Staff College at Fort Leavenworth, Kansas.  My staff group consists of 14 officers from different service and countries.  Five of the 14 already have graduate degrees and the other 9 are 50% to 70% complete with their graduate degrees. After graduating ILE, if I am selected for School of Advanced Military Studies (SAMS), a very competitive Army school in which the average work load is reading 120+ pages a night, and graduate, I will obtain another graduate degree.

Finally, I’m happy to learn from Stephen King himself that I stopped reading his books,   because I’m in the Army and not because his books are intellectual trash.  The beauty of America is that the sons and daughters of the American people sacrifice their lives for the freedoms that Americans enjoys.  

So although, as a Soldier I find Steven King, his views, and remarks reprehensible, I, my wife, and all the others who serve this great nation, do freely give our lives so that he and every other American can languish in the freedom we provide, to insult those that pay for him his freedom in blood.