Book Review: Skin in the Game

"Skin in the Game: Journey of a Mother and Her Marine Son"

{From Friend Lietta Ruger}Recommending this newly published book; please share. My friends who well remember that time may appreciate the first hand account from another mother of a Marine deployed in Iraq.

Peggy Logue is mother of a returning Iraq veteran (Marine) who was with the Lima Company 3rd Battalion, 25th Marines. 20 killed in one week in first week of August 2005 in Iraq in what then Pres. Bush termed a 'noble cause'.

You remember what came next - Camp Casey at Crawford in Aug 2005; Bring Them Home Now tour Crawford to DC in Sept 2005. I met Peggy on the BTHN tour on our stops in Ohio. I not only met them, they put us up, the traveled with us through the state of Ohio and yearned to go with us all the way to D.C. The Books Face Book Page to Join

Description from Facebook Site Page

It’s an age-old axiom: if you don’t support the war, you don’t support the troops. And Peggy Logue couldn’t disagree more.

When Peggy’s nineteen-year-old son, U.S. Marine Michael Logue, is deployed to a volatile area of Iraq, Peggy suddenly faces an alarming challenge to her anti-war sensibilities. Should she remain silent or give voice to her feelings? Despite being called a “coward," Peggy takes to the streets for her anti-war protests in a determined attempt to understand the reasons for her son’s duty to his country and the politics of war.

Peggy’s protests, her stress over Mike’s deployment, and her fierce pride in her son hurtle her along an emotional roller coaster for the entire year of Mike’s tour. Yet not once does she compromise her beliefs, but instead asks the tough questions and demands answers. What she discovers, however, is human nature’s predilection for violence. Only by becoming warriors for peace will war cease to exist.

Intense, raw, and profoundly honest, Skin in the Game illustrates the human side of war and the daily struggle for peace. But even more, it is the story of the struggle of an anti-war mama bear and her son in combat listening, respecting, and always loving each other.

Indictment Against rumsfeld To Proceed

Judge Approves Suit Against Former Defense Secretary

A U.S. District Court judge Friday told two former U.S. contractors in Iraq that they could go forward with a suit that seeks to hold former U.S. Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld responsible for their torture, by the U.S. military.

Attorneys for Donald Vance and Nathan Ertel allege that the only crime the men committed was reporting to the FBI on payoffs to local sheiks and other illegal activities by their employer.

Judge Wayne Andersen said that Vance and Ertel had alleged enough specifics to keep their suit against Rumsfeld moving forward, although he did not say that the contractors had proven their claims. >>>>>

Torture memos resemble Clarence Thomas' way of thinking

The Supreme Court justice has a history of dismissing prisoner brutality. And it's his former law clerk who was investigated for authorizing harsh interrogation tactics as a Justice Department lawyer.

According to Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas, a prisoner who was slammed to a concrete floor and punched and kicked by a guard after asking for a grievance form -- but suffered neither serious nor permanent harm -- has no claim that his constitutional rights were violated.

Snip

Thomas' consistent record of dismissing claims of prison brutality, most of them joined by Justice Antonin Scalia, shows that Yoo's view of torture was not that of a rogue lawyer. Instead, it represents a strain of conservative thinking that looks back in history to define cruelty and torture, rather than toward what the court has called the "evolving standards of decency." >>>>>

The article shows his, and this new so called U.S. conservatism, total lack of concern as to our soldiers and the civilian population. Doing what we've consistently condemned others as doing opens the soldier to the exact treatment if captured and brings blowback on any civilian anywhere, And We Cannot Voice Any Outrage When It Occurs, for no one will listen! Torture, as to our once supported friend, was just one of the many reasons given to invade and destroy an innocent country,Iraq!

Beyond Duty

Irish American Iraqi war vet Shannon Meehan running for PA state congress

Decorated Iraqi war veteran Shannon Meehan has announced that he is running for the Pennsylvania State congressional seat in the 163rd State House District.

Former Army Capt. Meehan, a married father of one, was seriously injured by an IED in Iraq, and he penned a memoir with Roger Thompson of his time at war entitled "Beyond Duty: Life on the Frontline in Iraq"

In 2007, Meehan suffered a traumatic brain injury in an IED explosion, and has been treated for Post Traumatic Stress Syndrome.

During his service Meehan, a tank commander, called in a strike on a house, not knowing that an Iraqi family was inside. The family was killed in the attack.

In the CNN interview he was upfront about how the Iraqi family's death has affected him. >>>>>

Military Wives

Wives of deployed soldiers are more depressed, says study

A recent University of North Carolina study published in "The New England Journal of Medicine" confirmed what most people in Fayetteville already knew: Army wives with deployed husbands received more diagnoses of depressive disorders, sleep disorders, anxiety, acute stress reaction and adjustment disorders than women whose husbands were not deployed.

The research team went through 250,000 electronic medical records of wives whose husbands are on active duty in the Army.

They found that the longer the soldiers were deployed, the more likely their wives were to be diagnosed with a mental health condition.

And while military officials aren't surprised by the findings, they are taking them seriously, said Col. Charles Engel, an epidemiologist and associate professor of psychiatry at Uniformed Services University. >>>>>

Deployment and the Use of Mental Health Services among U.S. Army Wives

ABSTRACT

Background Military operations in Iraq and Afghanistan have involved the frequent and extended deployment of military personnel, many of whom are married. The effect of deployment on mental health in military spouses is largely unstudied.

Methods We examined electronic medical-record data for outpatient care received between 2003 and 2006 by 250,626 wives of active-duty U.S. Army soldiers. After adjustment for the sociodemographic characteristics and the mental health history of the wives, as well as the number of deployments of the personnel, we compared mental health diagnoses according to the number of months of deployment in Operation Iraqi Freedom in the Iraq-Kuwait region and Operation Enduring Freedom in Afghanistan during the same period.

Results The deployment of spouses and the length of deployment were associated with mental health diagnoses. In adjusted analyses, as compared with wives of personnel who were not deployed, women whose husbands were deployed for 1 to 11 months received more diagnoses of depressive disorders (27.4 excess cases per 1000 women; 95% confidence interval [CI], 22.4 to 32.3), sleep disorders (11.6 excess cases per 1000; 95% CI, 8.3 to 14.8), anxiety (15.7 excess cases per 1000; 95% CI, 11.8 to 19.6), and acute stress reaction and adjustment disorders (12.0 excess cases per 1000; 95% CI, 8.6 to 15.4). Deployment for more than 11 months was associated with 39.3 excess cases of depressive disorders (95% CI, 33.2 to 45.4), 23.5 excess cases of sleep disorders (95% CI, 19.4 to 27.6), 18.7 excess cases of anxiety (95% CI, 13.9 to 23.5), and 16.4 excess cases of acute stress reaction and adjustment disorders (95% CI, 12.2 to 20.6).

Conclusions Prolonged deployment was associated with more mental health diagnoses among U.S. Army wives, and these findings may have relevance for prevention and treatment efforts. >>>>>

This Months Featured Book

The Untold War: Inside the Hearts, Minds, and Souls of Our Soldiers

Synopses & Reviews

Publisher Comments:
Philosopher, ethicist, and psychoanalyst Nancy Sherman explores the psychological and moral burdens borne by soldiers. By illuminating the extent to which wars are fought internally as well as externally, this book expands the national discussion about war and the men and women who fight our nation's battles. With close-up looks at servicemen and -women preparing for, experiencing, and returning home from war, Sherman probes the psyche of today's soldiers-examining how they learn to kill and to leave the killing behind. Bringing to light the moral quandaries soldiers face-torture, the thin line between fighters and civilians, and the anguish of killing even in a just war-Sherman bares the souls of our soldiers and the emotional landscape of soldiering.
At the heart of the book are interviews with soldiers, from the current wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, but also from Vietnam and World Wars I and II.

Synopsis:
This unique analysis of the moral weight of warfare today filters complex problems through the lenses of philosophy and psychology.

The Collapsed Middle Class

When Talking About The Economy Now And The So Called 'Capitalism Practiced' Start Calling It Exactly What It Is, "Reaganomics", i.e. 'trickle down' 'free market'............, there's a hole host of meme's used that sold this Con of what must be in order to advance? which when implemented was forecast by many then and over the years, last couple of decades, to do Exactly What It Did, Collapse The Once Growing and Proud Economic Reality That Was!!

Have no idea why those who are supposed to represent the working people don't use the reality and voice it over and over, do know why th media don't, they profit from not reporting the reality!

'Real Time': The Middle Class Is Crumbling

While Maher railed against the show "Undercover Boss" for its condescending prince-and-the-pauper approach, Arianna argued that there's a reason that people connect with the show: it shows people working hard and not being rewarded.

"Thirty years ago, the CEOs that are in 'Undercover Boss' were making 30 times as much as their working people. Now, they're making 300 times as much! We're about to become Venezuela, or Brazil, you know where the people at the top are basically behind they're gates with guards to protect their kids from kidnapping. The middle class is crumbling and that's the country we're going to become... if we don't fundamentally change where we're going."

>>>>>

The following cartoon clip fits well into this issue. Few workers at the top in the corporate office, cutting workers who actually do work and forcing work loads on those left, at either stagnant or collapsing wages and more work under less hours, for bigger bottom lines instead of gradual company and investor growth and quality product!



This just happened to be the cartoon on the Non Sequitur calendar for this weekends dates, March 6th and 7th.

Working in construction as a multi tradesman, carpenter by profession, I've watched over the last two to three decades a trend that I've also seen in other companies especially the ones that have grown larger on what once was or those that buy out others increasing size and bottom line and leading for many to go public. In construction once General Contractors that used to employ in-house trades, thus more control over product, and sub out only what might be needed as to other major needs for a contract, commercial or residential, have now added more and more office personal under a growing list of titles and not from the ranks of the long time experienced worker but those who have little experience in actual building but do have degree's from colleges and universities, the higher education industry, only some needed before. Each one of those positions takes the place of at least a couple of tradespeople who actually used to do the work under contract. Of which their time is taken in meetings or now more surfing on the net then actual work. A great example of this is the following:



They now sub out all the work or hire from temp agencies for short time, no benefits, but hard push on the actual contract completion which causes not quality work but continued mistakes and rework or problems arising quicker in the finished product, thus costing more to fix as well as added problems over a shorter time and not from age. These subs are squeezed hard to preform the work cheaper and cheaper causing them to cut their own workforce and pushing for more and faster work out of who they do employ in order to make a decent living themselves for all they have to do to function as a small business. This is across the board in the last couple of decades of what is still termed as 'capitalism' as to not only our economy but interconnected worldwide economies.

We have those who preached the new capitalism loudly complaining about the Government having to come forward with investment into the economy trying to avoid total collapse. Some of those screaming are prifitting well off that needed economic infusion of capital, others are are the bottom rungs who need it to keep their jobs or to get hired to new positions because they lost jobs and are now long or short time unemployed with few new positions coming online for rehire.

Why are there few positions or few new company startups especially in green growth like there should be? There isn't any Private Capital being brought into the economy as invest or growth as was sold the new economy would do and much of that private capital is in the hands of those who were selling the new capitalism who would rather spend millions to defeat a return to bottom up growth, as well as millions in political campaigns, then to invest what was promised as top down economics!

Unemployment Rate Holds Steady, but Minorities Still Worse Off

AIR DATE: March 5, 2010

SUMMARY
The nation's unemployment rate held steady at 9.7 percent in February, but jobless rates for blacks and Latinos remain high. Judy Woodruff talks to two financial and policy experts about the disparity. Transcript

'I will continue to serve'

CNN's Barbara Starr talks to an Iraq veteran who is overcoming PTSD and running for state representative in Pennsylvania.

Young Army Sergeant, Shannon Meehan to stand for Pennsylvania Elections

Shannon Meehan, a young Army Sergeant suffering from TBI and PTSD, fighting to find a meaning in his life after being involved in the killing of Iraqi Civilians amidst war has decided to stand in politics now. Shannon Meehan will be standing for the state legislature from Pennsylvania. >>>>>

Coming forward taking the stigma out of the equation. Showing to be no different then any in the numorous communities except for the knowledge that's now embedded from the experience of war and occupation and what it is and does. With talking about and treatment, along with those who experienced same, will be much more wiser then most about life and needs of, especially those who run in the political fields to continue to serve and honor their oaths as others but in many different ways.

Good luck Shannon, and people really listen to him when he meets you and speaks to you, you might learn something.

The Mission Continues

"The Mission Continues is not a charity; it's a challenge."

The idea behind The Mission Continues was born on the streets of Fallujah and in the recovery wards of Bethesda Naval Hospital. In 2007, my friend Eric Greitens was wounded in Iraq, and returned home to find many of his fellow wounded eager to continue serving their country. Shortly after Eric's return, I visited with injured Marines recovering at Bethesda Naval Hospital. One of them said this: "I lost my legs. That's all. I did not lose my desire to serve, or my pride in being an American." Together, Eric and I founded a new kind of veterans organization. >>>>>

Project New Hope: Stories of Hope Part 1 & 2

Retreat Helps Veterans, Families Deal With PTSD and More

Stories of Hope: Part One

For some of our war heroes, the pain and suffering doesn't always go away after returning home from combat. In some cases that can lead to a very tragic end. But now families of veterans who have committed suicide are turning their tragedies into stories of hope. >>>>>

Stories of Hope: Part Two

One in eight veterans returning from war suffers post traumatic stress disorder. Grim statistics show a significant percentage of those men and women end up with severe emotional distress and more often than you might think end up killing themselves. With that in mind there is a desperate effort underway to intervene before it's too late. >>>>>

Project New Hope - Military Family Retreats

The rove Being rovian

Rove Protects the Rear {and I'll bet he really likes the rear}

Mar. 4, 2010

The scumbag little man, turdblossom, apt name as it goes along with the butt cyst rush

In a new book, the ex-Bush aide contends W. didn't knowingly mislead the nation into the Iraq war. Here's the history he leaves out.

With his soon-to-be-released book, Karl Rove is trying to mount something of a rear-guard action in the war over George W. Bush's legacy. According to the AP, which has obtained a copy of the book, Rove

blames himself for not pushing back against claims that President George W. Bush had taken the country to war under false pretenses, calling it one of the worst mistakes he made during the Bush presidency. The president, he adds, did not knowingly mislead the American public about the existence of [weapons of mass destruction]

.

And The New York Times reports that in the book, which will hit stores on Tuesday, Rove writes that his failure to counter the narrative that "Bush lied" was "one of the biggest mistakes of the Bush years." Rove adds, "did Bush lie us into war? Absolutely not."

Here we go again: Did Bush grease the way to war with lies? Having written two books on the subject-The Lies of George W. Bush: Mastering the Politics of Deception and (with Michael Isikoff) Hubris: The Inside Story of Spin, Scandal, and the Selling of the Iraq War -I have some skin in this game.>>>>>

Funny how the rove keeps trying to be rovian with his revisionist history just like the cheney's, to escape the jaws of eventual indictments, those better be on in this lifetime and not their next, no virgins where they're goin!!

But just remember what the whittle bush was saying, "We don't listen to focus groups!" who were millions strong and saw right through the coming and into extremely failed policies, that now have created the National Unsecurity for the coming decades!!

Turd Blossom

In Denial of Democracy

State Crimes Against Democracy

New research in the journal American Behavioral Scientist (Sage publications, February 2010) addresses the concept of "State Crimes Against Democracy" (SCAD). Professor Lance deHaven-Smith from Florida State University writes that SCADs involve highlevel government officials, often in combination with private interests, that engage in covert activities for political advantages and power. Proven SCADs since World War II include McCarthyism (fabrication of evidence of a communist infiltration), Gulf of Tonkin Resolution (President Johnson and Robert McNamara falsely claimed North Vietnam attacked a US ship), burglary of the office of Daniel Ellsberg's psychiatrist in effort to discredit Ellsberg, the Watergate break-in, Iran-Contra, Florida's 2000 Election (felon disenfranchisement program), and fixed intelligence on WMDs to justify the Iraq War.1 >>>>>

Abstract: February 2010

In Denial of Democracy: Social Psychological Implications for Public Discourse on State Crimes Against Democracy Post-9/11

Laurie A. Manwell

University of Guelph, Ontario, Canada,

Protecting democracy requires that the general public be educated on how people can be manipulated by government and media into forfeiting their civil liberties and duties. This article reviews research on cognitive constructs that can prevent people from processing information that challenges preexisting assumptions about government, dissent, and public discourse in democratic societies. Terror management theory and system justification theory are used to explain how preexisting beliefs can interfere with people's examination of evidence for state crimes against democracy (SCADs), specifically in relation to the events of September 11, 2001, and the war on terror in Afghanistan and Iraq. Reform strategies are proposed to motivate citizens toward increased social responsibility in a post-9/11 culture of propagandized fear, imperialism, and war.

Key Words: state crimes against democracy • terror management • system justification • government • media

American Behavioral Scientist, Vol. 53, No. 6, 848-884 (2010)
DOI: 10.1177/0002764209353279 >>>>>

Veterans Courts are Only Part of What's Needed

This isn't rocket science, if the country had paid attention as we were returning from Vietnam and recognizing what that did to many of our brothers, thousands then, as we tried for decades to push the issues into the public conscious we'd be much more advanced in the understanding of what war and extreme trauma does to the human mind, especially from wars of choice. And it wasn't only as to our brothers! There also would have been a better understanding as to the civilian populations of these conflicts as well as those anywhere who live through the extreme trauma's, of many descriptions, that affect individuals in their own lives

AIR DATE: March 3, 2010

Veterans Suspected of Crimes Swap Guilty Pleas for Rehabilitation

Transcript

TOM BEARDEN: Nic Gray was a sergeant with the 1st Infantry Division, based at Fort Riley, Kansas. He was part of the Iraq troop surge in February 2007. >>>>>

New veterans court to open in Philadelphia

Philadelphia's newest specialty court is specifically aimed at military



The criminal court operates Wednesday afternoon at the Criminal Justice Center, and includes a representative of the Veterans Administration to help provide additional services for the men and women who have served their country.

Supreme Court Justice Seamus McCafferty is the driving force behind the court. The veteran and former Philadelphia Police officer says the court offers special treatment for those who have served. >>>>>

Veterans court program applauded

March 02, 2010

Bob Donaldson/Post-Gazette: Common Pleas Judge John Zottola, right, testifies on Allegheny County's experience with a veterans court program before U.S. Sen Arlen Specter's Senate Judiciary Committee hearing Downtown on Monday. At left is state Supreme Court Justice Seamus McCaffery, who also testified.

Southwestern Pennsylvania is home to more than 300,000 veterans, and Allegheny County has the highest concentration in the state.

So it made sense to start a program for veterans facing legal trouble in Pittsburgh.

On Monday, U.S. Sen. Arlen Specter, D-Pa., hosted a congressional field hearing looking at the potential benefits of implementing veterans courts across the state and country. >>>>>

Attorney proposes veterans courts

March 02, 2010

An attorney representing an Iraq War veteran suggested Tuesday that the Cambria County Court consider setting up a veterans court with special programs to assist defendants such as hers.

Lisa Lazzari, chief public defender, asked that all charges - including bank robbery - against John Fletcher be continued while he undergoes a forensic psychiatric exam at the Veterans Justice Outreach program at the Altoona VA Hospital.

Snip

Fleming said that any attempt to set up a veterans court here would not be in time to help Fletcher. But the defendant said that he wanted it "for other veterans in the future."

Fleming previously had entered guilty pleas in several cases, including felony robbery. >>>>>

Helping those who served us

March 03, 2010

We support the concept of setting up a special veterans court system to deal with the needs of those who have seen time in combat.

We do not support softer sentencing for those veterans convicted of violent crimes. But more can be done to address the problems some veterans face.

And we oppose the Veteran Administration's practice of pulling access to evaluation and therapy for veterans convicted of crimes.

The issue arose locally in connection with the struggles of Iraq war veteran John Fletcher, who is accused of various crimes - from criminal trespass and a bomb threat to bank robbery.

Snip

"There is some research that jail is not a solution to what vets are suffering," Lazzari said. >>>>>

There is a timebomb that's already started to explode as some of todays Veterans return from not one tour year of duty in not one but two theaters of conflict but multiple tours many having served in both theaters, over and over. There's nothing wrong with these Veterans if recognized what the stresses of war an the trauma have caused, if they can get the help needed quickly, if they don't the communities they return to as well as themselves experience the results from that lack of quick intervention. Thankfully there's a better understanding but because of the decades lost, as this has always been there and not only from wars, it will take decades to help and not condemn, it's never to late but it must be a priority! And it should be a major part of any counties policies as some attempt to start wars and occupations and not as an absolute last resort when all else fails!

Veterans Courts come to late for some, the greater majority of veterans who find themselves in criminal trouble weren't criminals prior to nor while serving, but still in time to get them help as opposed to just locking them up and making their issues worse and worse for the communities they return to once time is served. The recognition and help needs to start, for some, while still in the military and others once out, for even some years after they've served.

These aren't the only issues, but it is way long past time that societies of intelligent beings recognize what their actions and policies towards others not only do to themselves but the others around them and elsewhere on this planet, way past time!

Dreams of Kirina

The Playing For Change Foundation is building a new music school in the Village of Kirina, Mali. Kirina is a village of musicians, some of whom can trace their musical ancestry back over 75 generations! In this very special episode West African music legend Baaba Maal and friends perform for the village elders in honor of the new "Playing For Life" music school that is just beginning construction. >>>>>

Yoo's E-Mails

Keeping the pressure on the DoJ as well as John Yoo. CREW continues to get to all that is there or possibly destroyed as our Government joined those we Condemn in Torture and Human Rights violations. Not only leaving our Military Troops wide open to the same leaving us with no ability to condemn nor brings charges on the World Court venue, but opening up same for our own citizens anywhere with same results!

It also greatly weaken our National Security as it was one more of the many Failed Policies, of the previous decade, that has created greater hatreds, not just as to our government done clandestine but also the citizens of our country as we all share the guilt of those policies and leave that wide open with no accountability for crimes committed by those who approved and ordered!

CREW Sends FOIA to DOJ Seeking Copies of Torture Memo Author John Yoo's Emails

3 Mar 2010 // Washington, D.C.

Today, CREW sent a follow-up Freedom of Information Act request to the Department of Justice's Office of Legal Counsel seeking copies of all of John Yoo's emails, whether in paper or electronic form. Through this request CREW seeks to ascertain the extent to which Mr. Yoo's emails were destroyed, as referenced in a recently released report from the Office of Professional Responsibility, and whether that destruction was limited to emails on a particular subject, suggesting willful conduct by Mr. Yoo or others.

Click here to read CREW's FOIA request. {four page pdf-page one below}

Page One

Related Documents

* 3/3/10 - CREW FOIA to DOJ (John Yoo's Emails) // 1.8 mb

* 2/26/10 - CREW's Request for Expedition (OLC FOIA) // 3.8 mb

* 2/26/10 - CREW FOIA to OLC // 3.8 mb

In John Yoo's words:

National security, executive power and the war on terrorism

Wednesday, March 3, 2010

John Yoo, law professor at the University of California at Berkeley, former Justice Department deputy assistant attorney general and author of "Crisis and Command: A History of Executive Power from George Washington to George W. Bush," was online Wednesday, March 3, at 1 p.m. ET to discuss his book, which explores the relationship between the three branches of government and the rules of war, including surveillance, detention, interrogation and trial. The Discussion Continued at Link

What the U.S. can learn from John Yoo's mistakes R. Jeffrey Smith, THE WASHINGTON POST

'Do we know if Boo Boo is allergic to certain insects?"

In mid-2002, Justice Department lawyer John Yoo posed that question to a fellow attorney about captured al Qaeda operative Zayn al-Abidin Muhammed Hussein, better known by his nom de guerre, Abu Zubaida. It was one of many odd moments in secret deliberations by the government's top lawyers over how far CIA interrogators could go in pressing captives for information that they hoped would save lives.

The fruits of that dialogue were, in part, the two notorious 2002 Office of Legal Counsel memos justifying waterboarding, wall slamming, extended sleep deprivation, the use of insects and similar interrogation methods. Career Justice Department lawyer David Margolis recently described those documents as "an unfortunate chapter in the history" of that office.

The memos - one of which Yoo internally called his "bad things opinion" - were treated as soothing gospel by many of the attorneys privy to the CIA program. But after their public disclosure in 2004, they were rewritten by new Bush administration appointees. >>>>>

"What can the U.S. Learn?" Nothing!, as long as we don't seek accountability, but we will see the results of that inaction on the most heinous possible crimes and extremely failed policies followed, very similar to reasons given for sending our military into invasions and occupations of others, on those in and out of our government at the time committed and ordered!

"The Planes They Fly!"

Greatest danger to America is the enemy within

Almost daily I talk with a good attorney friend about the pressing political, social and sometimes mundane local news of the day.

He usually initiates the early morning calls while on his way from his home in Tarrant County to his Dallas office or the Dallas County Courthouse. And he most often starts the conversation with a provocative question.

The other day he began by asking, "What is the difference between an al Qaida terrorist and a misguided American terrorist?"

Before I had a chance to respond, he gave the answer:

"The planes they fly." >>>>>

"The Rise and Fall of the Great Powers"

Is the U.S. the Latest World Power in Decline?

AIR DATE: March 2, 2010

SUMMARY
As part of his continuing series of reports examining the country's economic future, Paul Solman sits down with Yale historian Paul Kennedy to discuss the rise and fall of the U.S. and other great economic powers. Transscript

The Rise and Fall of the Great Powers

VA-Bringing in Enough 21st Century Technology

Not just upgrading what already should have been but adding to the needs the Veterans Administration has.

VA kicks off huge multimillion-dollar buy for up to 600,000 PCs

VA said in its request for information for its enterprisewide PC Refresh contract that it plans to award one indefinite delivery-indefinite quantity contract on a purchase or lease basis, with plan to release a request for proposals within three months.

The department owns about 240,000 PCs. The new contract will provide an additional 360,000 computers to supply recently opened clinics and to support VA's mission, officials said in a statement of work, which described the department's requirements. >>>>>

Gulf War Syndrome Late Help

Another lesson not learned by the Country who quickly forgot about the issues that were developing in the Gulf War Vets, as they did with our brother 'Nam Vets and defoliants as well the always PTSD. Why? Because they don't want to fork out the needed costs to help after the soldiers come home!

VA task force gives hope to Gulf War syndrome sufferers

March 2, 2010

If the victims of Gulf War syndrome are ever to be treated justly by the Department of Veterans Affairs, the first step came last week.

The VA said it would review potentially thousands of disability claims and update regulations affecting veterans, suggesting that some may finally get the compensation they deserve for service to their country. Roughly 200,000 veterans claim to suffer from various combinations of fatigue, sleep disorders, headaches, memory loss, rashes and joint and muscle pain - but many have been denied adequate medical care and benefits.

The first Gulf War has been over for 19 years, but many veterans are still living with the debilitating effects. Their stories are tragic, told by formerly vigorous fighting troops who now take handfuls of pills every day to function. >>>>>

The triggers can come out of nowhere.

None left behind

February 28, 2010 Veterans' safety net now requires many threads

The Midwest Shelter for Homeless Veterans in Wheaton opened in 2007.
(Jonathan Miano/Sun-Times Media)

It's often said that dying on the battlefield is the ultimate sacrifice that can be made for one's country.

There is little disagreement that the adage holds true in the country's current wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. But many of those serving on those faraway fighting fields also are giving up treasured parts of the lives they used to lead once their deployments end and they at last come home.

After more than a dozen years of working with returning veterans, Bob Adams of Winfield has watched the issue change substantially in recent times and has developed some understanding of how and why.

The Vietnam War vet and licensed clinical social worker sees a litany of differences between his service era and the current one. Today's battles, for example, often are being waged in urban settings, with civilians all around.

Snip

By the numbers

230

Active U.S. military members who committed suicide during 2008.

160

Army suicides during 2009, a new record.

20 percent

Proportion of Iraq and Afghanistan veterans who have screened positive for post-traumatic stress disorder.

$30 billion

Disability compensation paid during 2009 to about 3 million veterans.

5,000

Estimated annual suicides among all veterans.

6,360

Coalition fatalities in Iraq and Afghanistan since 2001, of which 5,385 were U.S. military (through Feb. 25).

Sources: Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America, U.S. Department of Defense, Veterans Health Administration >>>>>

War's ghosts after two tours in Iraq

March 1, 2010 The triggers can come out of nowhere.

Marines and Iraq veterans Keith Ellis and Sarah Raby eat dinner with their children at their home in Hanover Park.
(Jonathan Miano/Sun-Times Media)

Sometimes, rolling down an otherwise unremarkable stretch of road, Sarah Raby and Keith Ellis will spot a box or other sort of container left alongside the curb. Whichever of them is driving, the car suddenly cuts a wide berth around the nondescript object. It's almost an involuntary reflex.

"It's like a muscle memory, I guess, thinking that something's going to happen," Ellis said.

The couple, former Marines who have both served two tours of duty in Iraq, can't forget that in some places, a plain-looking box can contain deadly explosives. >>>>>

No One Would Listen

Madoff Whistleblower: SEC Failed To Do The Math

On March 12, 2009, Bernard Madoff pleaded guilty to operating the biggest Ponzi scheme in history.

It was redemption of a sort for Harry Markopolos, a financial analyst-turned-investigator who spent nearly a decade on Madoff's trail - and whose warnings were largely ignored by securities regulators. >>>>>

Harry Markopolos's Book: No One Would Listen: A True Financial Thriller

The need for greed with the total lack of regulating causes the criminal element to jump right in and grab and makes those that wouldn't think about criminal activity start getting greedier and greedier thus becoming the corrupt when no ones looking over their shoulders, this causes extreme problems for any and all societies, across the board!!

Pauper? with a Private Plane!

So, Andrew Joseph Stack was angry at the IRS for his financial problems. So he got in his plane....

Stop. Stop it. Stop right there.

Do people in the media ever listen to themselves?

{Vernon Hunter, brother 'Nam Vet and carreer military and IRS worker killed in the domestic terror attack in Austin.}

We have a person who, aside from being a murderer, feels he's being unjustly treated by the taxman. And that person, who considers his woes so unbearable that he's willing to take human life, has at least one personal aircraft. I know what you're thinking: The poor man. It's like something out of Steinbeck.

A little surfing around the internet suggests that one could buy a used Piper Cherokee plane, like Stack's, for something in the neighborhood of $100,000 to $170,000, depending on how old the plane is and some other factors. So Stack, persecuted victim of the IRS, owned a pleasure craft whose resale value was either two or three times the national median income. What has this country come to? >>>>>

A 'domestic criminal terrorist', no other name or label needed, and he should be remembered as such!!

"Life Panels"

Olbermann: 'Life panels' invaluable for Americans

Canine Corps and Veterans

Canine Companions for Independence

Monday, March 1, 2010

"I thought it was pretty amazing but I didn't think that I needed the help of a dog," says Adams, a veteran who lost his left leg as the result of a roadside bombing in Iraq in 2004. Adams, who now walks with a titanium prosthetic leg, changed his mind in February of 2008 and was matched with Sharif, a yellow Labrador retriever trained by Canine Companions for Independence (CCI). Today, the two travel all over the United States and have become inseparable.

Snip

In response to the "Get my back" command a service dog positions himself at the side of a veteran facing backwards. If someone approaches, the dog alerts the handler with a certain body movement. This means that the veteran is never caught off guard or surprised from behind, which can be extremely stressful for a PTSD sufferer. >>>>>

A blessing for soldiers blinded by war

But despite a rising need among veterans, the U.S. doesn't pay for guide dog training

Ex-Army Green Beret Pete Perez with his guide dog, Lucy, a yellow Labrador retriever.

March 2, 2010

But thanks to a yellow Labrador retriever named Lucy, Perez is more hopeful today than at any time since the bomb violently jarred his brain and broke his foot.

The demand for highly trained guide dogs to serve blinded veterans is one of the little-known consequences of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, where roadside bombs are the enemy's weapon of choice, and extreme head trauma that can cause vision problems in survivors is common.

Lucy was trained at the nonprofit Southeastern Guide Dogs in Palmetto, where about one-third of the 26 graduates between July and December went to veterans such as Perez, who graduated last fall from a month-long class with Lucy.

About 140 veterans have received dogs since the program began five years ago.

Despite the growing need, the federal government does not pay for guide dog training for blinded veterans. Some former service members such as Perez question whether the military and the Department of Veterans Affairs are doing enough to support guide dog programs and promote their benefits to injured soldiers and veterans. >>>>>

The VA and DoD {with it's ever growing huge Defense Budgets for It's Contractors, Friends and Politicians} are part of the Government, the Government of the People, the People that Support Wars of Choice not Need while sending a tiny fraction of the population into these occupations. It isn't the VA nor the DoD that are having a problem of caring, and paying for that care, for those who return, It's The People!!!!

Life. Unleashed.

Canine Companions for Independence provides highly-trained assistance dogs for children and adults with disabilities, free of charge.

The most advanced technology capable of transforming the lives of people with disabilities has a cold nose and a warm heart!

Veterans Courts

Soldier's Toughest Battle at Home

Mary Walsh is a producer covering National Security for CBS News in Washington, DC.

In his four years in the Marines Nick Stefanovic deployed on combat missions three times - twice to Afghanistan and once to Iraq. He survived when others didn't, including his best friend. It was a loss so grievous Nick could not find words for it.

Nick came back from war and lost his way in his old neighborhood. Rochester, NY didn't feel like home anymore. How could a guy who jumped at every loud noise fit in with the old crowd? How could he sleep when every time he drifted off there were nightmares? How could he find a way to be normal again? >>>>>

New Chance for Troubled Vets

Watch CBS News Videos Online

Soldiers often face substance abuse or crime-related issues when returning from the frontlines. As David Martin reports, one judge wants to help distressed war heroes find a second chance back home.

Military-Veterans-War-PTSD-Suicides

Military suicides are causing civilian casualties, too

Sgt. 1st Class Daniel Wimmer's daughter Alex holds her sister Mi-Na at his grave. | MCT

Sgt. 1st Class Daniel Wimmer charmed potential Army recruits with a movie star's smile, but somehow it never quite reached his eyes, even when he was cradling his newborn twin daughters.

Whenever he closed his eyes, he dreamed of his own dead body swinging from a rope, his feet dangling just above a chair.

When those nightmares eventually blurred, the Persian Gulf veteran and former Army recruiter began trying to recreate their grisly images. He tried to kill himself with pills in the woods, and a razor blade in a hotel room, and every suicide attempt drew his wife, Jennifer, and their four daughters deeper into his dark world.

Snip

The numbers don't tell the whole story. Long after the flag-draped coffins are lowered into the ground, families such as the Wimmers are left to measure their grief in a seemingly endless stretch of days marked by missed birthdays, anniversaries, weddings and babies' first steps.

"I think we need to realize that we have families that are under such great stress," Deborah Mullen, the wife of Adm. Michael Mullen, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, told more than 1,000 military and federal health care workers at a suicide prevention conference in January. "This stress is only going to continue. We need to be able to give tools to family members who are left behind."

Daniel's depression consumed the loving husband and father his family once knew and left behind a despondent phantom. >>>>>

Tough old soldier battles new enemy: Suicide epidemic

Despite prevention efforts, U.S. military suicides rise

Military Suicides

During the month of January, more soldiers committed suicide (24) than were killed by enemy fire in Afghanistan and Iraq combined (16). This is unusual, but--amazingly--not unique. In fact, the problem of military suicides is growing much worse, as Army Chief of Staff George Casey said yesterday in Hawaii.

Casey claimed to be mystified by the suicide rates:

"The fact of the matter is, we just don't know" why suicides have increased, Army Chief of Staff Gen. George W. Casey Jr. said Friday. "It's been very frustrating to me with the effort that we made over the last year, and we did not stem the tide."

Which I'm sure is a matter of discretion being the better part of valor.

Undoubtedly, the soldiers are suffering the effects of repeatedly being deployed and redeployed into a war zone that--in Iraq, at least--is only peripherally related to our national interests. The rationale for the U.S. troop presence in Afghanistan, though certainly more plausible, is becoming less comprehensible as the years pass. >>>>>

Walter Reed and Beyond

Walter Reed and Beyond follows the care and treatment of the men and women who came home from battle in Iraq, Afghanistan and elsewhere. It examines the promises made, and the reality lived, in the aftermath of war. >>>>>

Living with Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder





You can find the above video's at the link directly above them as well as another that the Washington Post put together and have posted on their site along with the Walter Reed and Beyond site.

"Tangled Up in Yoo"

By David Swanson

Early one mornin' the sun was shinin',
Prisoners layin' in bed
Wond'rin' when the guards would come
And kick them in the head.
The folks who wrote the torture memos
Sure did have it rough.
They never got enough exercise.
The new condo wasn't big enough.
One victim standin' at the side of his cell
Blood dripping on his shoes
Admitted Iraq had WMDs
Lord knows that made the news but was it true,
Tangled up in Yoo. The Rest of the Verses Found Here

The Saddam's, cheney-bush-yoo-and the rest of the cabal, of the western world and especially the United States!!