Some Gold Star families feel disconnected
By Gregg Zoroya - USA Today
Posted : Wednesday Jan 4, 2012 9:37:22 EST
COLLINSVILLE, Okla. — Jane Horton wears a small Gold Star pin honoring her husband, Army Spc. Christopher D. Horton, who was killed by Taliban gunfire four months ago.
“It’s like an outward expression of a burden carried deep inside,” Jane says about an emblem Congress created after World War II for those who lost loved ones to war.
Except that no one today seems to know what it means.
“I’ve never been asked about it. Ever,” she says.
As the 26-year-old widow of an Oklahoma guardsman killed in combat, it is another reason Jane says she feels a world apart from other Americans.
She sensed it standing on an airport tarmac as her husband’s body was unloaded from the belly of an aircraft. She could see the faces staring down from the jetway windows above, parents holding children and pointing.
“I definitely feel there’s a disconnect,” she says.
National leaders and advocacy groups say they see a widening rift between a military at war and a public at peace, distracted by a sputtering economy and weary of hearing about Iraq and Afghanistan.
“Not every American knows what a ... Gold Star family is,” first lady Michelle Obama said recently when she unveiled a Gold Star Christmas tree at the White House.
“Americans ... often don’t realize that these people are right here among us,” says Ami Neiberger-Miller, a spokeswoman for Tragedy Assistance Program for Survivors, a non-profit that helps military families who lose loved ones.
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Sadly, I echo Mes. Horton's words so few know what Gold Star means. I submitted a NATIONAL Gold Star program outline to my Senator and continue to pursue it until EVERY American is well versed of its meaning!
ReplyDeleteRespectfully,
Judy C. Campbell
Wilmington, DE
There are times when I am stunned by how many actually do care but then again, stunned as well when people remain clueless.
ReplyDeleteI see both sides. Organizations I belong to care deeply but attending college, it seems most have no clue what is going on.
Keep up the fight for the good. Change only happens when average Americans do something about it.