Support for Military Families

Pres. Obama Remarks on Support for Military Families

January 24, 2011 - President Obama announced new efforts to support military families across the federal government during a White House East Room event. Agencies including Health and Human Services, Education and Agriculture will be working with the Pentagon to improve services for military families. The President was joined at this event by First Lady Michelle Obama and Jill Biden, the wife of Vice President Joe Biden. Video with remarks from Jill Biden, Michelle Obama and the President at site, or now watch just below.

Obama touts steps to support military families

Jan 24, 2011 - In a wide-ranging report announced Monday, the White House outlined about 50 commitments from federal agencies to help military families, including a review of compensation for some service members, caregivers and survivors.

The report is the results of a presidential study directive last May that called on all cabinet secretaries and other agency heads to find better ways to support military families in areas such as spouse employment and education, youth employment, suicide prevention, families’ psychological well-being, and protection from predatory lending practices.

At President Obama’s direction, Defense officials are also evaluating compensation levels for service in a combat zone, compensation and benefits for reserve and National Guard members, benefits for caregivers and surviving families, and incentive pay for critical career fields such as mental and behavioral health professionals. This is part of the 11th Quadrennial Review of Military Compensation, which will be completed in May and will compare military pay levels with civilian counterparts.

Some of the commitments in the report reinforce ongoing efforts, such as the My Career Advancement Accounts program that provides financial assistance for two-year degrees, licenses, and certifications for portable careers, for spouses of members in the ranks of E-1 to E-5, W-1 and W-2, and O-1 and O-2.

Others address long-standing needs. For example: {continued}

Military Suicides: For the Second Year in a Row

The Military now is long over stressed, serving a Nation, while occupying others, that shows no concern for it's well being as well as the combat veterans it's producing! End these occupations and implement a 'War Tax' on the citizens so they finally 'Sacrifice', to care for our brothers and sisters. Not another DeJa-Vu of ours Vietnam!!

More troops lost to suicide

For the second year in a row, the U.S. military has lost more troops to suicide than it has to combat in Iraq and Afghanistan.

The reasons are complicated and the accounting uncertain — for instance, should returning soldiers who take their own lives after being mustered out be included?

But the suicide rate is a further indication of the stress that military personnel live under after nearly a decade of war.

Figures released by the armed services last week showed an alarming increase in suicides in 2010, but those figures leave out some categories.

Overall, the services reported 434 suicides by personnel on active duty, significantly more than the 381 suicides by active-duty personnel reported in 2009. The 2010 total is below the 462 deaths in combat, excluding accidents and illness. In 2009, active-duty suicides exceeded deaths in battle.

Last week’s figures, though, understate the problem of military suicides because the services do not report the statistics uniformly. Several do so only reluctantly. {continued}

Photojournalist captures soldiers' hardships

Photojournalist captures soldiers' hardships during Afghan war

January 24, 2011 - Photojournalist Bill Putnam spent most of the summer embedded with soldiers from the 101st Airborne in the Bermel district of Paktika Province of Afghanistan.

His goal was to document the agony of the Afghan war, the longest in U.S. history.

Putnam's photographs of American soldiers on the front lines, "Faces of Battle Afghanistan," will be on display at St. Vincent College from Thursday through Feb. 20.

"It's an incredibly stressful environment," Putnam, 36, of Silver Spring, Md., said of the conditions for the soldiers of Abu Company, 1st Battalion, 187th Infantry Regiment.

There was not much sustained conflict, Putnam said, merely the day-to-day grind of living in dangerous, uncertain circumstances. Many of the soldiers were on their second, third or even fourth combat tours of duty, he said.

Putnam described soldiers looking much older than their age. One 19-year-old, he said, could have passed for a 30-year-old. The company's 38-year-old commander looked like a man of 50.

Putnam said in a post in July from Afghanistan that "the grunts" of Abu Company were "tired and dirty after a day." {continued}

"Support the Troops Tax"

Retired Capt USAF, Myles Spicer, USAF 1954-57 retired from reserves, lays out the long over due 'Support' for those we send into occupations theaters and then forget about. The so called (T)'s {oh the fun with the 'purple heart bandages' as the wars raged}, once long ago (R)'s and even conservative, won't like this, they want but don't want to pay for, and not just war, as most of them were the ones that remained silent for over a decade, still ongoing silence, as to Real Support but very loud as to support of the failed policies and related lies and costs.

The impelling case to impose a "war tax"

January 21, 2011 - I admit I get somewhat frustrated when I see these innocuous little bumper stickers: "Support our Troops". It's not that I am anti-military (actually I am an honorably discharged veteran myself, Capt, USAF) - the point is that the raging war in Afghanistan, and the Iraqi action (which is now mostly in our rear view mirror) are hardly "wars" at all to most Americans. So, putting on a bumper sticker is just about the most involvement most of us have on these tragic, expensive, and possibly specious ventures. And that has a number of downsides worth discussing.

Deficits {continued}

snip

The imposition of a "Support the Troops Tax" would have many benefits, and should gain the favor of both liberals (who want to revisit the Administration's strategy of continuing the wars); and conservatives who favor a reduction of the deficits and "pay as you go" policies. Today, most Americans are disconnected from the violence and suffering from the small minority of our nation's fighting men and women who are carrying the entire brunt of sacrifice. A tiny bumper sticker...patriotic slogans...holiday political speeches...and other miniscule efforts are insufficient to formulate our goals and achieve them in the battle for homeland security. A "Support the Troops Tax" would be a strong move in the right direction. {continued}

Veterans from Korea right through our conflict Vietnam and into the first Gulf War, on the twenty year mark and not one of the leaders, who gave the orders, even mentioning Gulf War Syndrome, to the still ongoing occupations of Iraq and the allowed to crumble into another extremely dangerous and costly quagmire Afghanistan are owed plenty from their service to Country in it's wars of choice. What this Country ignores as to their and their families sacrifice for service while still ongoing and for long after. Till the next one finds the need for lip service as we send another generation to invade and occupy others!

"When We Come Back: A Veteran’s Perspective”

Afghanistan vet talks about life after war

D.C. Faber gives a talk Friday in the Wyoming Union Family Room about post-traumatic stress disorder. Andy Carpenean/Boomerang photographer

January 23, 2011 - Before July 2007, D.C. Faber was just a regular guy. He was easy going, enjoyed spending time with his family and was emotionally connected to past events and the future.

All that changed when Faber, a major in the Wyoming Army National Guard, was deployed to Afghanistan, where his unit was thrust into a war zone to train Afghan police officers.

“We only had a little team of 12 guys in four humvees out in the middle of nowhere,” he said. “We were in combat from the first day down range and for many days consecutively thereafter.”

snip

Faber, 47, who retired after more than 20 years in the U.S. Army and Wyoming Army National Guard, gave a two-hour lecture Friday in the Wyoming Union Family Room called “How and Why We Are Different When We Come Back: A Veteran’s Perspective.”

The lecture was based on a post-trauma model he is developing.

Faber shared what he has learned from his own experience and listening to other veterans’ stories on dealing with life after war. More than 100 people attended on the final day of the 2011 Martin Luther King Jr. Days of Dialogue.

Being present and emotional intensity

Faber said living in a war zone forces people to live in the moment, which he calls being present emotionally focused based on attachment theory and emotionally focused therapy principles. {continued}