Editor,

Having family at Whidbey Island, I read the News-Times article: “From service to self-made: Veteran finds strength in crystals, community and change” (Oct. 24 issue). I indeed applaud the efforts — past and present — of Braighan Buckley and “thank her for her service” to our nation. I’m glad she was a success at being a Navy police officer. I wish her the best with the upcoming birth of her child. I had to smile when she said she originally wanted to be stationed in Texas.

I am mindful of the words of a very patriotic American, Ceferino Balbin, who was Secretary-Registrar of the Scottish Rite Masonic Bodies in Tampa, Florida. On August 13, 1917, he announced that he had just been drafted and was arranging to go to the ‘front’ imminently. He had a wife and two children; was a st

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