Tag: veterans

Yesterday I received an e-mail from the Communications Director of the House Committee on Veterans’ Affairs, Kristal DeKleer. Thank you Kristal for sending this out to the e-mail list, will be passing the information on as I’m sure others will as well.

Also yesterday I used the following in a few posts as related to recent Veterans Administration press releases:

Let me tell ya folks, if the so called repubs, still haven’t met one true one in a couple of decades, pick up Any Seats let alone take the House what Shinseki and his Great Admin have been doin will come to a Screeching Halt on many and curtailed on others! This is the Most Pro Active VA in my lifetime!

When they’ve had to re-act, what with trying to move everything into the 21st century as well as catch up to What Wasn’t Done Nor Mentioned As Two More Wars Were Waged, they’ve been Spot On and Quick, pretty much getting up to speed in a very short time span or getting rid of the contractors holding it back and bringing in new!

And I would suggest, strongly, that any and all Democratic Candidates running in this election download, print out, study them and start using the points made as this Op-Ed is suggesting as to the lack of mention in this election cycle.

This type of reporting, especially on the popular blog sites of this new technology, should be what more of the posts are about, especially leading into an Election cycle. As to Congress, and especially the Veterans Administration but also all others, these types of advances, and much of what has been done since the 110th Congress, who have been finally holding hearings and over site into what wasn’t done during the 108th and 109th Congress, as War was waged, will come to a screeching halt if republicans are once again given the reigns to do more damage, or actually nothing at all!

VoteVets sent out an E with three new ads they’ve started running and over at their Vet Voice site have a couple of posts up with explanations of.

View the ads and then give them a hand getting them out or passing them on especially to residents of the states representatives targeted.

An important report on a Europeans review of Veterans, U.S. Veterans Courts, PTSD and Justice and Help for!

This is the type of lead the rest of the World used to look to the U.S. for, we were never perfected but working that way, and many here were once so good at it. Sadly this issue is another that comes out of our recent failed policies of destruction and terror waged on others, DeJa-Vu all over again. But shows that those who deplored our actions recently, and have been turning their backs to us in many area’s including economic, are finding some of the old America and it’s once Leadership Role in the World Community as we try to rebuild what we’ve lost and move back in the right direction!!

The above, without the ‘wow’, was the title of a Congressional Hearing in the House Committee on Veterans’ Affairs: 30 September 2010.

In this hearing, opening statements to the give and take talk back and forth from the Representatives to the Participants, it lays out Very Clearly how this Country has Failed it’s Veterans not only as to these two present occupations but the long term as we older vets already know, from Korea and Vietnam forward. There was a Support the Veterans since after WWII and all the positives that brought us, even then they got caught up in the lack of funding and obstruction to veterans issues as to care and much more.

There’s another Very Important House Committee on Veterans’ Affairs hearing taking place Today. As important as all that have in both the House and the Senate since the 110th Congress, covering issues that weren’t even mentioned nor as the many complaints rose, over a number of issues, were meaningful Congressional Investigations nor Hearings held, as two invasions and still ongoing occupations were started and only grew over these last close to a decade now!

It wasn’t only with the do nothing politicians, it also came from those that supported them and these wars. As they slapped magnetic ribbons on their vehicles, quickly to disappear and not be replaced and claimed they were the true patriots who really supported the troops. It’s carried into the last couple of years under a label that shows the total hypocrisy of these same citizens, the so called TEA Party, outraged at everything Government with no mention of their own complicity. They use the Military and Veterans in their false patriotism, in word and symbol, but Never Once Demading that they even start ‘Sacrificing’ themselves after all these years, quite the opposite is their stand!

We had a great time last night in a Q+A with John Waltz, a disabled veteran and Progressive who’s running for Congress in Kentucky’s 4th district. This answer cracked me up and at the same time made me yell out.. RIGHT ON!

Spandan Chakrabarti John, another question about the military, specifically defense contractors. I understand some are needed, but how do you view the Bush era explosion in defense contracting and contractors who operate outside the UCMJ, and is there a way to rein them in?

John Waltz  When you privatize military functions, you’re creating an incentive, specifically a profit, to go to war and stay in war. Use of military contractors should be kept to an absolute minimum. Maybe cafeteria services and that’s about it.

The full Q+A is below the fold

Crossposted to the Daily Kos and Progressive Electorate

Iraq, Rapidly becoming the Forgotten War!!

There have been 4,733 coalition deaths — 4,414 Americans, 2 Australians, 1 Azerbaijani, 179 Britons, 13 Bulgarians, 1 Czech, 7 Danes, 2 Dutch, 2 Estonians, 1 Fijian, 5 Georgians, 1 Hungarian, 33 Italians, 1 Kazakh, 1 South Korean, 3 Latvian, 22 Poles, 3 Romanians, 5 Salvadoran, 4 Slovaks, 11 Spaniards, 2 Thai and 18 Ukrainians — in the war in Iraq as of August 4 2010, according to a CNN count. { Graphical breakdown of casualties }. At least 31,897 {31,860 last month} U.S. troops have been wounded in action, according to the Pentagon. View casualties in the war in Afghanistan

Record number of Army suicides in June

7/15/2010 Officials have been grappling with how to identify, treat soldiers at risk

The U.S. Army on Thursday reported a record number of suicides in a single month among active duty, Guard and Reserve troops, despite an aggressive program of counseling, training and education aimed at suicide prevention.

Suicides for the first half of the year are up 12 percent over 2009. In June, 32 soldiers are believed to have committed suicide, including 21 on active duty.

The June report came as the Army also released a 20-minute training video on suicide prevention titled, “Shoulder to Shoulder – I will never quit on life.”  Continued

Iraq, Rapidly becoming the Forgotten War!!

There have been 4,729 coalition deaths — 4,410 Americans, 2 Australians, 1 Azerbaijani, 179 Britons, 13 Bulgarians, 1 Czech, 7 Danes, 2 Dutch, 2 Estonians, 1 Fijian, 5 Georgians, 1 Hungarian, 33 Italians, 1 Kazakh, 1 South Korean, 3 Latvian, 22 Poles, 3 Romanians, 5 Salvadoran, 4 Slovaks, 11 Spaniards, 2 Thai and 18 Ukrainians — in the war in Iraq as of May 5 2010, according to a CNN count. { Graphical breakdown of casualties }. The list also includes 13 U.S. Defense Department civilian employees. At least 31,860 {31,839 last month} U.S. troops have been wounded in action, according to the Pentagon. View casualties in the war in Afghanistan