Strange case of Pvt. Jeremiah W. Carmack

Details surrounding soldier’s death emerge
GI’s odd behavior, procedural errors revealed in report released by Army
By Kevin Dougherty, Stars and Stripes
European edition, Saturday, May 31, 2008


His relationship with the girl of his dreams was on the rocks. He attempts suicide, but fails. Then he learns his own roommate is dating his dream girl, and things are serious between them.

"I’m going to kill you," Army Pvt. Jeremiah W. Carmack reportedly said to the pair March 8 as they prepared to drive away from him and the Bamberg PX.

Five days later, Carmack is standing in his dream girl’s home, in the shadows, brandishing an Army rifle. She doesn’t notice him until she is on the phone with her new beau. The boyfriend hears her pleading, and then the line goes dead.

In an Army 15-6 investigation report released Friday, the Army said Carmack acted with premeditation when he took a weapon off post in Schweinfurt and drove to his former girlfriend’s house. After briefly taking her hostage, German police fatally shot Carmack in a nearby field a few hours later when he leveled his gun at them.

The purpose of the report was to investigate the facts and circumstances surrounding Carmack’s death, particularly how he managed to smuggle the M-4 carbine and ammunition off of Conn Barracks. While not a criminal investigation — that is being handled by German authorities — the investigating officer determined that Pvt. Carmack acted in a premeditated manner," according to a V Corps news release.

"The investigation also revealed procedural errors in the unit’s arms room and in the management of Pvt. Carmack’s personal information," the release stated.

Citing current Defense Department policy, the report does not identify the investigating officer by name, or anyone else for that matter, including Carmack and the more than 20 people interviewed.

According to his uncle, Carmack evidently struck a superior, which probably explains why he left with the rank of private in January 2003.

Last July, Carmack was allowed to enlist a third time, despite a previous finding that found him "not qualified for continued service." The report indicated a doctor with the U.S. Army Recruiting Command granted Carmack a medical waiver. There was also mention made of Carmack attending anger management courses.

go here for more
http://www.stripes.com/article.asp?section=104&article=55215

Rep. Steve Buyer kills bill to protect deployed in child custody cases

Bill would safeguard child custody rights

Measure dropped from ’08 defense act
By Rick Maze - Staff writer
Posted : Friday May 30, 2008 16:50:39 EDT

A controversial measure that would protect deployed service members from losing custody of their children because of their military service was approved by the House in a pile of veterans-related bills passed in a pre-Memorial Day rush.

The bill, HR 6048, is a response to several cases in which state courts changed service members’ child custody arrangements, sometimes without notice, while the members were deployed.

“Many cases have come to light where service members who have been deployed have had their military service used against them in custody hearings,” said Rep. Michael Turner, R-Ohio, the chief sponsor of the bill, which would amend legal protections in the Servicemembers’ Civil Relief Act.

“Recently, my office learned about a service member who, during her custody proceeding, was told by a judge that the mere possibility of her deployment weighed against the best interests of the child in denying her custody,” Turner said.

“Much is asked of our service members, and mobilization can disrupt and strain relationships at home,” he said.

His bill, he said, would provide them “peace of mind that courts will not take away their children” while they are deployed.

Other bills passed by the House would:

• Provide the annual cost-of-living adjustment in veterans benefits in December.

• Authorize construction and renovation of veterans facilities.

• Expand substance-abuse treatment and counseling for veterans.

• Ensure the housing needs of disabled veterans are met.

• Study the effectiveness of vocational rehabilitation programs.

• Authorize the Department of Veterans Affairs to advertise in national media to inform veterans about benefits for which they may be eligible.
go here for more
http://www.armytimes.com/news/2008/05/airforce_vabills_053008p/

Camp Pendleton Marines deserve better

BRETT: Shutting out help at Camp Pendleton
By BRIGID BRETT
For the North County Times Friday, May 30, 2008 2:27 PM PDT

In a June 19 interview, Camp Pendleton's Lt. Gen. James Mattis described what Marines experienced in Iraq as being "the most morally bruising kind of combat you could ever be in."

Yet in July, base officials claimed that less than 1 percent of its troops were suffering with post-traumatic stress disorder.

In August, I interviewed Dr. Dennis Reeves, retired Navy commander, neuropsychologist and former head of mental health at Camp Pendleton's Naval Hospital, who spoke about a "human tsunami" of men and women returning with undetected and unreported post-traumatic stress disorder.

"It is impossible to return from multiple deployments and not be seriously affected," he said. "Their nervous system is drastically altered, their emotions are out of control and a variety of symptoms begin to emerge: a need for high-risk activities, self-medicating with alcohol to take away some of the anxiety; or they're isolated, depressed and numb and wanting to recapture the adrenaline rush of combat."

That same week, when I learned that 19 Marines had died in motorcycle crashes during the year, I asked Camp Pendleton's base safety officer Charles Roberts to what he attributed the sharp increase in Marine motorcycle fatalities. "No one knows why the number of motorcycle fatalities is going up," he said.

When I asked whether it might be linked to troops returning from combat, he said the base had no way of tracking it. Neither is there any way of tracking how many Marines have been involved in motorcycle accidents that have ended in serious injuries, he said.

With this reluctance to either disclose or face the truth, perhaps it should come as no surprise that a letter from a base chaplain was circulated to his colleagues last year, strongly discouraging the attendance at the 15th Annual International Civilian and Military Combat Stress Conference founded by Dr. Bart Billings, a retired colonel who served in the first Persian Gulf War.

The reason: Billings' "advocacy" for Critical Incident Stress Management, the letter said, "runs contrary ... to USMC combat stress control practice." Despite the discouragement, the conference ran and I was able to attend part of it. I gathered a wealth of information from a wide range of speakers and experts, not only about combat stress but traumatic brain injury, domestic violence, substance abuse and other issues facing today's service members and their families.

go here for more

http://www.nctimes.com/articles/2008/05/30/
opinion/brett/doc484071115a840837255531.txt

I left this comment

I am posting a link to this on my blog. I've been working on PTSD for over 25 years and tracking just about everything going on with it all this time, as well as living with my husband. He's a Vietnam vet with PTSD. He's the reason I got into all of this.

I am also a Senior Ordained Certified Chaplain with the International Fellowship of Chaplains. I can tell you that CISM, Critical Incident Stress Management, is one of the pieces of training Chaplains receive that is highly regarded. It is used when we work with police officers, firefighters, emergency responders and individuals after trauma. All of the organizations use it because it works. Even the Army is using it in Iraq and Afghanistan when they rush in response teams after hard fought battles. The problem is there are not enough of them to go around.

To read about a Chaplain discouraging this is appalling and removes a critical tool from their efforts to alleviate the suffering that will follow when this is not done. All experts agree the sooner trauma is addressed the wound is stopped from getting worse. The Marines deserve better than this kind of attitude.

How is this possible? Given what the rest of the crisis responders know across the nation, what the emergency responders know, the police departments know and what the fire departments know, how can it be the military does not have a clue? How can a Chaplain even think it's a good thing to discourage CISM? It's what we train with! It's part of who we are to be able to respond to traumatic events in order to minimize the wake of effects on the survivors and care givers.

Some of us work with the victims. Some of us work with the responders. Each one of us are able to provide the assistance as we are called to do. I'm beginning to think the military brass needs a few training lessons in this to be able to understand how important it is. The Marines at Pendleton deserved so much more than this kind of response to their needs. This is a time when every resource at our disposal needs to be in place yet attitudes and rules get in the way of healing.

These are the requirements for a VA Chaplain,,,needless to say, I would not qualify even though I've been doing this work for 25 years!

INFORMATION FOR APPLICANTS FOR VA CHAPLAINCY ABOUT CLINICAL PASTORAL EDUCATION (CPE)


To qualify for VA Chaplaincy, you must have completed 2 units of CPE, or have equivalent training. Units of CPE completed and certified by The Association for Clinical Pastoral Education, The National Association of Catholic Chaplains, and The College of Pastoral Supervision and Psychotherapy count toward this requirement.

Equivalent training is not less than 800 hours of supervised ministry in a health care setting, such as a hospital or nursing home, which incorporated both ministry formation and pastoral care skills development.

To be considered equivalent to CPE, training must include the following components:

1. It must be a formal educational program, with curriculum, theological reflection, and evaluation components, which includes a component of performing health care ministry.

2. The program must include 400 hours of supervised education, training and ministry for equivalency to one unit of CPE.

3. The educational supervisor(s), preceptor(s), teacher(s), or coach/mentor(s), responsible for the program must be qualified to provide the supervision.

4. The educational model must include an action/reflection component (that may vary from one program to another) that may have included but not be limited to: verbatims, case conferences, worship seminars, spiritual assessments, theological reflection, and group process.

In describing supervised ministry that you would like to be considered as “equivalent training” please include the following information for each period of training

• The beginning and ending dates of training

• The name and location of the institution(s) in which the supervised ministry was performed

• The name(s) and title(s) of the educational supervisor(s)/instructor(s)

• The total number of hours of performance of ministry, classroom or didactics, and individual meetings with the supervisor/instructor

This is a sample of what is required for Police Chaplains
Police/Fire Chaplains Requirements

For Chaplaincy Applicants
Download application for ecclesiastical approval or endorsement in the following ministries:

Institutional/Occupational Chaplaincy Application

These forms (in PDF format) require the free Adobe Acrobat Reader to view, fill-in, and print the forms. Please sign and return completed forms, discussion materials, $45 application fee and a current professional quality photo (4x6 or 5x7). Remember to have official transcripts from all colleges and seminaries sent to us as well.

Police/Fire Chaplaincy Requirements

Chaplains serving with fire and police departments often work alongside the fire fighters and police officers they minister to in situations that threaten their own safety. These chaplains also minister to victims and families of those in trauma situations. Today, more than ever, these people need spiritual guidance, counseling for themselves and their families, and assistance coping with stressful occupations.

Ecclesiastical Endorsement

Ecclesiastical endorsement is the written acknowledgement by a faith group/denomination that an individual is in good standing and meets the qualifications for clergy credentials with their faith group/denomination. Generally speaking, major institutions, federal/state correctional systems, and healthcare facilities require that chaplains and pastoral counselors have the endorsement of their respective faith group/denomination. At the May 2004 meeting of the Commission on Chaplains adopted the following criteria for endorsement.

ADVANCED CHAPLAINCY ENDORSEMENT Ordination
2 years pastoral experience
MDIV (or its equivalent) with an institution accredited with Association of Theological Schools (ATS)
4 Units of CPE preferred, amount determined by hiring agency
Active, full-time paid chaplaincy position
Eligible for certification with professional organization
References including one from their District
Background check
Credit check
Approval by Endorser
Interview with the Commission on Chaplains

SPECIALIZED CHAPLAINCY ENDORSEMENT Ordination
2 years pastoral experience
Education as required by hiring agency
CPE as required by hiring agency
Be an active, paid chaplain working full or part time in a chaplaincy ministry.
References including one from their District
Background check
Credit check
Approval by Endorser
Interview with the Commission on Chaplains

BASIC CHAPLAINCY ENDORSEMENT General Council or District level credentials
Ministry experience
Education as required by hiring agency
References including one from their District
Background check
Credit check
Personal interview with a representative of the Department
Approval given by endorser
Ratification by Commission on Chaplains


Police and Fire Chaplaincy

Police and fire department chaplains should generally meet the following requirements. However, it is understood that all police and fire departments do not require their chaplains to meet these qualifications.

Credentialed by the Assemblies of God.
Two years of ministry with experience in conducting: baptisms, communion services, weddings, funerals, and death notifications.
Willingness to provide spiritual support for individuals of all faiths.
Make application to the National Chaplaincy Department for Endorsement. Level of endorsement is determined by the Chaplaincy Department and is based upon education, ministerial credentials, and employment status. (See Endorsement Levels.)
Interview with Commission on Chaplains or Chaplaincy Representative, depending on Endorsement Level.

War-zone nurses put their skills on the front line

Sunday, May 25, 2008
Angels of the battlefield

War-zone nurses put their skills on the front line

By Andi Esposito TELEGRAM & GAZETTE STAFF
aesposito@telegram.com


Severely injured with a tunneling wound through his liver, the Marine lay sedated, clinging to life, in the intensive care unit at the 399th Combat Support Hospital in Al Asad, Iraq, under the care of U.S. Army Reserve Lt. Melinda A. Nekervis of Sterling.

“He ended up getting well over 100 different blood products,” said Lt. Nekervis, a soft-spoken Army ICU and flight nurse who returned in October from Mosul and Al Asad, Iraq. When everything but whole blood was exhausted, Lt. Nekervis asked if the Marines keeping vigil would donate their own.

“They were more than willing to do that,” she said. “We transfused the buddies’ blood into the patient. It was quite a moving experience. We were very lucky not to lose him. He was pretty sick. They had to do surgery right at the bedside, and he survived.”


Stabilized, the Marine was later sent to Germany aboard an Air Force medical evacuation flight.

“I know that the doctors, from the extent of his injuries, didn’t know if he would make it and what his deficits would be,” said Lt. Nekervis, 32, who in civilian life is a registered nurse working in intensive care at UMass Memorial Medical Center — University Campus.

“I had him for four long days,” she said. “I will never forget him, but he will never remember me.”

Military nurses in Iraq and Afghanistan are a critical link in a chain of medical care that has enabled more soldiers to survive injury than ever before in the nation’s history of warfare. In World War II, about 30 percent of soldiers died from wounds, a rate that fell to 24 percent in the Vietnam War. Since the start of combat seven years ago in Afghanistan, and since 2003 in Iraq, more than 32,000 service members have been wounded in action. Statistics recently released by the Department of Defense show that 4,579 have been killed in action or died under non-hostile conditions during Operation Iraqi Freedom and Operation Enduring Freedom.

But the survivability rate — the portion of people dying from wounds on these fronts — has fallen to about 10 percent.

“We are doing such a good job saving soldiers that there is a much higher rate of survival,” said Col. Andrea J. Wallen, chairperson of the Department of Nursing at Worcester State College and chief nurse with the 804th Medical Brigade at Devens, which oversees the 399th and 12 other medical units.

Nurses and military medical experts say the survival rate is higher because soldiers wear more and better equipment, and because medical help has been pushed closer to the battlefront and dispersed into smaller teams reaching more locations. More people are being trained in lifesaving procedures, specifically in response to trauma; surgery is done earlier; and better communication has allowed medical equipment and supplies to be quickly sent where needed.

But most important is the speed at which the wounded are attended.

People are moved in record time by helicopters, aircraft and specially fitted flying hospitals — in C-17s and KC-135s — to higher-level or more specialized care in Germany and the United States, including Brooke Army Medical Center in San Antonio, known for its burn center.

“The goal was to get the critically injured to Landstuhl (Regional Medical Center) in Germany within 72 hours,” said Lt. Nekervis, who also logged 50 hours of retrieving and nursing the wounded aboard a Blackhawk helicopter medevac air ambulance and earned a Bronze Star Medal for her service.

Much as Civil War soldiers called Oxford’s Clara Barton, founder of the American Red Cross, “angel of the battlefield” for care she gave the injured in makeshift hospitals close to the battlefront, military nurses, often working under fire, help make the difference between life and death. Most are in the National Guard or Reserve on deployment from hospital and health care jobs. These weapons-carrying nurses, wearing Kevlar body armor, helmets and dressed in desert fatigues, are combat-ready professionals who, faced with the terrible consequences to flesh and bone of roadside bombs, guns and rockets, save lives under challenging conditions and at risk to their own safety.

Many have been deployed several times; most would go again in a moment.

“Battlefield nursing is about service, and if you can serve your country, make a difference and be a powerful force on the battlefield helping people, that is life-changing,” said Col. Bruce A. Schoneboom, a nurse anesthetist and acting dean of the Graduate School of Nursing of the Uniformed Services University of the Health Sciences, Bethesda, Md. The school specializes in military and public health medicine and trains people for battlefield medicine in Iraq and Afghanistan.
go here for more
http://www.telegram.com/article/20080525/NEWS/805250617/1116

500,000 PTSD cases? Not even close but half way there.

Report: More Army Troops, Vets Committing Suicide


The following is a transcript of a report by medical editor Marilyn Brooks that first aired May 29, 2008, on WTAE Channel 4 Action News at 5 p.m.


Disturbing details released by the Pentagon show the number of U.S. Army troops committing suicide is at a 20-year high.


Pentagon reports said 108 soldiers took their own lives in 2007, which was six more than 2006. About a quarter of those deaths occurred in Iraq, too.

But its not just active duty soldiers that are taking their own lives. National Guard and reserve troops are as well.

The need for help in the emerging mental health crisis is high, but the military is short on therapists and must rely on outside help

"We've deployed a million and a half men and women to the global conflicts around the world," said Dr. Mary Davis of the American Psychiatric Society. "Maybe up to 500,000 individuals are going to have mental health issues when they return."

Thousands of private counselors are offering free services to returning troops. They said America's armed forces and veterans need help coping with depression, family, marital and job problems and suicide on a scale not seen since Vietnam.

"We must expand mental health services for both military and dependants for their spouses, for the families," said Dr. Richard Harding of the American Psychiatric Foundation. "It's something we just have to do."

go here for more
http://www.thepittsburghchannel.com/health/16427400/detail.html
500,000? Nope, not even close. Try double it. They need to use the data from Vietnam and then increase it to cover the redeployments and then they may come up with the right number. By 1978 a DAV study had already reached 500,000. The numbers went up after the study was published, as they predicted it would. Last year alone, a report came out that there were 148,000 Vietnam veterans seeking help for PTSD in an 18 month window from 2006-2007. In 1986 a report came out that 117,000 Vietnam veterans had committed suicide. Other studies put the number between 150,000 and 200,000. The experts need to start using what we already know so history will not be repeated.

Sgt. First Class Jason Dene "was in no shape to return to the war."

Family Mourns Loss Of Soldier From Vermont

The Department of Defense said Thursday Army Sgt. First Class Jason Dene died in his sleep Saturday while serving his third tour of duty in Iraq.

His aunt and uncle told Newschannel Five the soldier was in no shape to return to the war. They say Dene was depressed after being injured by a roadside bomb last summer.

His uncle, Patrick Farrow, published a letter in the Rutland Herald expressing his anger with the Bush administration.

Dene is also the nephew of actress Mia Farrow, who wrote on her web site about Dene and her disatisfaction with the war.

go here for more
http://www.wptz.com/news/16429955/detail.html

PTSD:Fix Tri-Care or hire more VA doctors

Military Insurance Falls Short on Mental Health Care

Halimah Abdullah


McClatchy Newspapers

May 29, 2008
May 28, 2008, Washington, DC - Across America, soldiers, veterans and their families are running into red tape and roadblocks when they try to use their military insurance to get treatment for ailments such as post traumatic stress disorder.

Since 2003, some 40,000 troops have been diagnosed with PTSD. The number of cases rose by roughly 50 percent in 2007, according to Pentagon statistics released Tuesday.

The deployment of hundreds of doctors and therapists to Iraq and Afghanistan and the shortage of military health care providers has forced patients at U.S. installations to wait for months for appointments — and longer if they need to see a specialist, according to advocacy groups for members of the military and their families.

Meanwhile, civilian doctors and psychiatrists say they're often faced with tough decisions about whether to turn away patients on Tricare, the Defense Department program that insures 9.2 million current and former service members and their dependents, because its reimbursement rates are low and its claims process is cumbersome.

Others volunteer their time and services rather than navigate Tricare's red tape for what may ultimately prove to be a small reimbursement for services.

"We do have a lot of doctors who are seeing Tricare patients almost on a pro bono basis because they care and for the love of their country. But it's easier to do that if it's a dozen patients than if there are 100 patients," said Steve Strobridge, the director of government relations at Military Officers Association of America.

Tricare's reimbursement rate are linked to Medicare levels. Health care providers who treat patients on both programs will take a 10 percent pay cut on July 1 and a second, 5 percent, pay cut on Jan. 1, 2009.
go here for more
http://www.veteransforcommonsense.org/ArticleID/10238

Clinton not first woman to run, that happened in 1870

“There is no escaping the fact that the principle by which the male citizens of these United States assume to rule the female citizens is not that of self-government, but that of despotism…

King George III and his Parliament denied our forefathers the right to make their own laws; they rebelled, and being successful, inaugurated this government. But men do not seem to comprehend that they are now pursuing toward women the same despotic course that King George pursued toward the American colonies”

Victoria Claflin Woodhull, from her speech And the Truth Shall Make You Free: A Speech on the Principles of Social Freedom, 1871

The first woman to declare herself as a candidate for president, Woodhull announced her run on April 2, 1870, by sending a notice to the New York Herald. This was an absolutely astounding thing to do: women only recently received the right to vote in the two relatively obscure territories of Wyoming and Utah, and it would be another fifty years before the ratification of the 19th Amendment that assured the ballot to all American women. Moreover, she took this step without contacting any leading suffragists, who by then had been well organized for more than two decades. Susan B. Anthony and others were stunned by the action of this controversial woman, whose “open marriage” was the talk of New York City.

The next presidential election was two years away, and Woodhull used this time to bring attention to women’s issues, including the right to vote. Undaunted by the fact that women could not vote and that she was not yet old enough to legally become president, Woodhull traveled the country campaigning. Her speeches not only advocated the vote, but also birth control, “free love,” and other positions that were a century ahead of her time. Many listeners were surprised to find themselves more sympathetic than they had expected: her beauty, soft voice, and reasoned arguments took the edge off of such shocking statements as her belief that marriage was “legalized prostitution.”

Woodhull and her sister, Tennie C., were in jail, however, when the 1872 presidential election occurred. Because they wanted to draw attention to the era’s hypocrisy on sexual matters, their newspaper published the facts about an adulterous affair between the nationally popular Rev. Henry Ward Beecher and a leader of the women’s movement, Elizabeth Tilton. It was true, but not politically correct, and the sisters were indicted for both libel and obscenity. The charges eventually were dropped, but the scandal was enough to end Woodhull's presidential aspirations, as she spent election day in jail.

Click here to read more interesting information on Victoria Woodhull
http://www.nmwh.org/president.html

The only reason I know this is playday is today and we went to the Hall of Fame President's Museum in Clermont today. The tour guide pointed to her picture. This makes me wonder why all of the historians in the media have not mentioned her name in all of this. There were a lot of women who ran for president. Click above for more of them.

Russian army: nearly a battalion a year commit suicide

Every nation, every generation, faces traumas that cause suicide. The world needs to deal with this and it is one thing that the world can come together on.

Russian army: nearly a battalion a year commit suicide


May 29, 2008, 15:41 GMT


Moscow - The Russian army lost near a battalion, 341 servicemen, last year to suicide, the chief military prosecutor said Thursday.

'Almost a battalion of servicemen was lost last year,' chief military prosecutor Sergei Fridinsky was quoted by Interfax as saying at a news conference in Moscow.

Fridinsky called for 'urgent reforms,' saying that though the total number of suicides had fallen 14 per cent from 2006 it had risen as a proportion of non-combat losses.

'We cannot but worry that suicides make more than half of all non- combat losses,' he stressed.

Violent hazing of conscripts by older soldiers, experts say, is the main cause of high the suicide rate.

The army began addressing bullying in 2005 when the media gave wide coverage to the case of Private Andrei Sychyov, who had his genitals and legs amputated after being beaten and tortured by older soldiers on New Year's Eve.

Top military brass have repeatedly vowed to fight high suicide numbers that have caused embarrassment to the army, which flush with state money is working on reforms after being stripped of resources at the end Soviet Union.

The Committee of Soldiers' Mothers, which campaigns for the rights of Russian servicemen and their families, however, said hazing was difficult to abolish because it is tolerated by army superiors as part of the same experience they lived through as recruits.

'Since Stalin's times nothing has changed: a single soldier does not count for anything,' committee head Valentina Melnikova told Deutsche Presse-Agentur dpa.

http://www.monstersandcritics.com/news/europe/news/
article_1408274.php/Russian_army_nearly_a_battalion_a_year_
commit_suicide

Capt. Luis Montalvan PTSD for 17 years of service

After returning from two tours of duty in Iraq, Capt. Luis Montalvan is the highest ranking member of Iraq Veterans Against the War. Despite post-traumatic stress disorder, he is campaigning to expose the Iraq War's grim realities. He has been branded a coward and traitor, but this recipient of the Purple Heart is on a mission to expose what he calls "incompetent" leadership in the highest ranks of the military.
Watch the video below on the side bar of this blog.


Capt. Luis Montalvan's site

This site is created to chronicle my experiences, both in Iraq and in the United States, ever since the Iraq War began. It's also part of an ongoing effort, including recent articles in The New York Times and The Washington Post, to distinguish the truths about the War in Iraq from the demoralizing and damaging illusions that obscure its realities. Those realities include a significant number of American leaders who have compromised our national security to further their own self-serving agendas. The resources here are dedicated to the memories of Iraqi and American patriots who sacrificed all for duty, honor and country and for the many civilians who have suffered.

May we never forget that for virtue and humanism to prevail, deeds must follow thoughts and words. Citizens must stand and speak their minds to hold those leaders accountable for their actions. Indeed, that is the only way we will ever hope to have a society that reflects our principles and ideals.
http://luiscarlosmontalvan.com/


17 Years of service, medals and now he's called traitor.