"You don't go to war without being changed by it," says Geoff Millard, former Chair of the Board of Iraq Veterans Against the War. From sky-high suicide rates for veterans at home to horrific stories of "kill teams" in Afghanistan, we're hearing stories every day of the traumas that going to war inflicts on our young men and women. Millard and IVAW, though, have been working both at home and back in Iraq to bring about some sort of reconciliation, both for soldiers and for Iraqi civilians.

It seems odd to quote Bill Clinton when it's Obama's recycling of Clintonite politicians that has helped get us into this mess, but there it is. “It's the economy, stupid.” Americans are angry with the Obama administration, and the Obama administration is angry with—bloggers? The left-leaning media? What's wrong with this picture?

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Laura's latest appearance on MSNBC's Ed Show with Ed Schultz.

"We talk about this fault break between war and peace, and it doesn't work that way for women," notes Ann Jones, longtime journalist, author and humanitarian. Women, she points out, are often victims of sexual violence long after the official peace agreements are signed, and they often become the victims of abuse when soldiers come home traumatized and unable to deal with what they've seen and done.

We hear a lot about "post-racial" politics these days--the election of Barack Obama supposedly has led us into a post-racial age, but have we really seen anything change? Not much, notes Kimberle Crenshaw, co-founder of the African-American Policy Forum, and it's not really new either. But a lack of a sense of history is another symptom of today's politics, and Crenshaw notes that even black elected officials and candidates sometimes fall victim.

We hear a lot about "post-racial" politics these days--the election of Barack Obama supposedly has led us into a post-racial age, but have we really seen anything change? Not much, notes Kimberle Crenshaw, co-founder of the African-American Policy Forum, and it's not really new either. But a lack of a sense of history is another symptom of today's politics, and Crenshaw notes that even black elected officials and candidates sometimes fall victim.

The Obama administration is frustrated with the Pakistani government's inability to quell the Taliban. Who are the US to be frustrated? The answer to the frustration's apparently a stepping up of the pilotless drone campaign. The term CIA drone campaign has embedded itself in the coverage. You know the one -- this last month's been the heaviest for attacks -- and civilian deaths -- from drones. It's the war we haven't declared and only have tacit Pakistani approval to be waging.

Richard Trumka has a message for all the so-called progressives who don't actually look out for working people: "We can't be a world-class economy unless we make things." It's the key to rebuilding our infrastructure after years of neglect, after what he notes was "the party the rich had that we didn't get to go to," to helping to stabilize the climate and most importantly, to digging us out of the economic hole we're in. Creating jobs, green jobs, innovative manufacturing jobs, he argues, could solve all of that.

This past week saw protests against mountaintop removal and strip mining around the U.S.--GRITtv coal correspondent Jeff Biggers attended one in Illinois, while around 100 people were arrested in front of the White House, including climate scientist James Hansen. There's no enthusiasm gap, Biggers notes, when it comes to the anti-coal protesters, many of whom have been fighting the destruction of their communities for decades.