Indiana soldier is first to die of toxic exposure in Iraq

Indiana soldier is first to die of toxic exposure in Iraq


By Daniel Tencer
Monday, December 7th, 2009 -- 12:57 pm
If Lt. Col. Jim Gentry and his doctors were right about the cause of his cancer, the Indiana National Guard officer didn't die for his country -- he died for defense contractor KBR.

Gentry's death from lung cancer last week is being recorded as the US's first fatality from exposure to a cancer-causing toxin in Iraq, according to the Evansville, Indiana, Courier & Press.

In 2003, Gentry commanded a 600-strong force providing security for KBR's refittal of the Qarmat Ali water-pumping plant, which provided water needed for oil extraction. Gentry and others claim that during that time they were exposed to hexavalent chromium, a cancer-causing toxin that the Iraqis who had built the plant had used as anti-corrosive material.

In a lawsuit filed last year, Gentry and 15 other plaintiffs said KBR, at the time a subsidiary of Halliburton, was aware that soldiers and civilian contractors were being exposed to hexavalent chromium months before they told the people working at the site.

Researchers have linked hexavalent chromium to lung cancer and leukemia, as well as a variety of liver and kidney problems. It's the same compound that poisoned residents of Hinkley, California, in a case that was made famous by the movie Erin Brockovich.
read more here
http://rawstory.com/2009/12/soldier-toxic-exposure-iraq/

Bikers Ride Through Brevard County With Toys, Donations

Bikers Ride Through Brevard County With Toys, Donations
Monday, May 18, 2009 2:46:51 PM

Thousands of bikers, many of them dressed as Santa, hit the streets of Brevard County Sunday to once again show their Christmas spirit in the 26th Annual ABATE Motorcycle Toy Run.

Approximately 5,000 motorcycles started off on Merritt Island and drove through the county.

Each bike had at least one toy on their bikes, but most had more.

All of the toys went to needy kids.

People involved said in addition to helping out children, the toy run helps change perceptions about bikers.

"They love it. Everybody asks if I'm really hot in it. They want to know what I've got on underneath. It's just fun. Kids love it. People love it. It's worth the smiles," said biker Rick Skauge.

This was the event's 26th year.

Last year, about 6,000 motorcycles took part in the event, donating $4,000 and several truckloads of toys.

It's the largest ride of its kind in Florida.
Bikers Ride Through Brevard County With Toys

Shinseki Says VA's Home Loan Program a "Continued Success"

Shinseki Says VA's Home Loan Program a "Continued Success"

Veterans More Likely to Avoid Foreclosure with VA-Backed Loan



WASHINGTON (Dec. 7, 2009) - Despite problems in the nation's housing
market, mortgage loans backed by the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA)
had a lower foreclosure rate than any other type of home loan in the
industry, as of the end of the last fiscal year.



"The dedication of VA's loan professionals, the support of our partners
in the mortgage industry and most importantly, the hard work and
sacrifice of our Veterans have made this possible," said Secretary of
Veterans Affairs Eric K. Shinseki. "VA is making good on its promise to
help Veterans buy homes, and Veterans are achieving their dreams."



Currently, about 1.3 million active home loans were obtained using VA's
Home Loan Guaranty Program. The program makes home ownership more
affordable for Veterans, active-duty members, and some surviving spouses
by protecting lenders from loss if the borrower fails to repay the loan.




More than 90 percent of VA-guaranteed loans are made without a
downpayment. Despite this, VA has the lowest serious delinquency rate
in the industry, according to the Mortgage Bankers Association.
Furthermore, VA's percentage of loans in foreclosure is the lowest of
all measured loan types-lower even than prime loans, which require high
credit scores and a 20 percent downpayment by the borrower.



Much of the program's strength stems from the efforts of VA employees
and loan servicers nationwide, whose primary mission is to help Veterans
stay in their homes, avoid foreclosure and protect their credit lines
from the consequences of a foreclosure, Shinseki said.

Depending on the situation, VA's loan specialists can intervene on a
Veteran's behalf to help pursue home-retention options such as repayment
plans, loan modifications and forbearance. Additionally, under certain
circumstances, VA can refund a loan, which involves purchasing the loan
from the mortgage company and modifying the terms so the Veteran can
afford the new mortgage payment.



Since 1944, when home-loan guarantees were offered under the original GI
Bill, through the fiscal year that ended Sept. 30, VA has guaranteed
more than 18.7 million home loans worth $1.04 trillion.



To obtain more information about the VA Home Loan Guaranty Program,
Veterans can call VA at 1-877-827-3702. Information can also be
obtained at http://www.homeloans.va.gov

Marine Corps Vietnam veteran now serving in Iraq

Marine Corps Vietnam veteran now serving in Iraq
December 6, 2009 by Jackson NJ Online
By Lance Cpl. Melissa A. Latty, Combat Logistics Regiment 27 (FWD)



AL ASAD AIR BASE, Iraq — From the battle at Belleau Wood, where Marines earned the name Devil Dog, to the iconic image of the flag-raising at Iwo Jima, Marine Corps history is embedded in every Marine from their initial training at boot camp and continues to provide inspiration to those who continue to serve. Some veterans of past wars, like Vietnam, are not only holding on to the memories of that time, but are also making new ones while they serve in support of Operation Iraqi Freedom.

The company first sergeant for Transportation Support Company, Combat Logistics Battalion 46, 1st Sgt. Viriato B. Sena, is one of the few Vietnam veterans still left among the ranks of currently serving Marines.

Sena, who joined the Marine Corps in 1973, participated in the evacuation of Vietnam and is now deployed to Iraq during the responsible drawdown of U.S. forces and equipment in Iraq. The military drawdown from Iraq has been noted to be the largest operation of its kind since Vietnam.

In April 1975, Sena, who was attached to Battalion Landing Team, 1st Battalion, 4th Marine Regiment, participated in the evacuation of Saigon, Vietnam while working as part of a security team aboard the ships USS Midway and USS Enterprise.
read more here
Marine Corps Vietnam veteran now serving in Iraq

Agent Orange in generations and in need of justice

The next generation
Children of male veterans face a tougher fight for help from government

By Tim Jones

Tribune reporter

December 6, 2009


HAUGHTON, La. - Ted Hutches is hobbled by leg-swelling cellulitis, cancer and nerve disorders that have left his hands and feet numb and prevented him from working for the past 30 of his 71 years.

His two adult daughters, Mary Beth Hoffman and Sherrie Hutches, are hampered by the same nerve maladies as well as hip and knee joints that pop out of place, causing each woman to fall down with disturbing frequency. Born without a completely formed left hip, Hoffman has undergone 18 knee surgeries since 1992 and cannot work.

Hutches, who was exposed to Agent Orange in Vietnam in 1965, was declared 100 percent disabled by the U.S Department of Veterans Affairs in 2002 and receives compensation.

His daughters get nothing.

"I was told I'd be wasting my time," Hoffman, 41, said of her inquiry about filing a disability claim with Veterans Affairs.

Hutches' daughters represent an ongoing argument over the extent to which serious health problems in the children and grandchildren of veterans can be linked to Vietnam-era defoliants.
read more here
The next generation

PTSD, the change you can believe in

PTSD, the change you can believe in
by
Chaplain Kathie

While you can never return to the way you were before, you can end up coming out of this darkness better than you were before. Sounds impossible? It isn't impossible at all. Traumatic events change all of us.

No one is ever the same after a terrible car accident. We seem to always be on alert while driving after worried about it happening again. When once we were able to enjoy driving, we end up being angry, frustrated with the carelessness of other drivers and driving becomes something we have to do instead of what we want to do. We find excuses to stay home.

We are not the same after someone we love dies. We long for the days when they were still here, remembering what they looked like sitting in their favorite chair, the twinkle in their eye, the sound of their laugh and time we spent with them, We end up wondering who will be next to leave us especially when we've experienced the death of someone we consider "too young" to die.

When we lose everything we have in a fire, tornado, hurricane or lose our home because of a foreclosure, it becomes very hard to ever feel safe again. Our home is supposed to be the one place where we are supposed to feel safe and secure. This isn't supposed to be taken away in the blink of an eye. It is also especially hard when we are robbed and strangers have been walking around our homes, touching our things, taking what they want without regard to family heirlooms of sentimental value over cash value or how hard we had to work for the other things they decided to just take. Every sound we hear from that point on reminds us of the day our home was invaded.

Civilians face all of this in our lives but we manage to dismiss the aftermath of traumatic events when the person needing help is supposed to be facing traumatic events for a living. Firefighters are not supposed to be affected by what they see when they rush into burning homes. They are not supposed to be devastated after finding a child's body even if that child is the same age as one of their own. Police officers are not supposed to be devastated when they find the body of a child someone kidnapped and murdered. We expect them to be able to just do their jobs and get up the next day to do it all again just as we expect all emergency responders to be at their best when we need them.

When it comes the military we expect them to just do their duty and then get over it. What is worse is they expect it of themselves. They want to avoid the fact they are just like the rest of the humans on the planet.

No one is ever the same after traumatic events no matter how well they are trained, conditioned to rise above it and are prepared to face whatever danger comes their way.

A young Marine wondered why he survived when one of his friends did not. All he could see was the image of his friend's body as he stood there looking at it wondering why he was still alive. Why didn't that bomb blow him up instead since his Humvee passed over the area first? All he could remember was the aftermath and then blamed himself because he could not change the picture in his own mind. He could not see the fact he was not able to do anything to prevent it from happening. He was not able to see he did not cause it but the person deciding to put the bomb in the road did cause it.

In the case of innocents being killed the soldier will blame himself when in the chaos of the moment, it was not his intent to kill innocent people. He may have tried everything to prevent it but snap decisions putting the lives of the men he was with forced him to take action. He is left with the memory of what the outcome was, unable to see what happened before that, what was in his mind and what his intent was.

A National Guardsman wonders why his buddy right next to him was killed by a snipers bullet. Why did the sniper take aim at his friend instead of him? His friend had a wife and kids back home. He cannot see there is nothing he could have done to prevent it and he did not cause it.

What comes next after trauma depends entirely how we "see" it all. Our attitude when we remember what was determines how we heal after it or continue to grieve.

We can hang onto the anger. Anger is safe to feel. We do not think of ourselves as weak when our blood boils. We think we are in control as wanting revenge takes over our thoughts. Thinking we can do something about what happened and that will make the pain we feel go away. We want it so badly it is all we can think about. We plot and plan how to protect ourselves from ever feeling close to another human because they may die too. We put up walls around our emotions so that no one can ever become that much a part of our lives ever again thinking we can avoid this pain the next time.

No more friends to die or walk away from us. From now on they are just someone we know. No more people in our lives to love because they only bring us pain. They walk away. They refuse to understand that we are not the same in front of their eyes but are still the same trapped deep inside ourselves. We scream for help to let "us" out from behind the wall but they get angry instead. They tell us to get over it. They tell us they don't deserve the way we are treating them, but they never stop to think we don't deserve to be in the hell we are in, suffering while they want to just find blame. In the process, we in turn, cannot see the pain we are inflicting on them just because they cannot understand what we will not tell them.

Days after a traumatic event, there is some kind of predetermined time limit on what we are allowed to feel. After that, the event is supposed to be filed away in the past and we're just supposed to get on with our lives. Then instead of being a survivor of something pretty horrific, we are "milking" it, wallowing in self-pity or any number of abuses we are accused of. The stack of events in our lives this last one was stacked on top of is not supposed to factor in at all.



Giles Corey, during the Salem Witchcraft trials, had been pressed to death by stones. He asked for more weight to be added so that he would succumb quicker. He was an innocent man. As each stone was added more and more pain shot through his body. The pain was so great, he wanted to end his agony by the very same thing killing him. Pain from being piled on top of pain caused him to want to just get it over with. He saw it as his only way out of pain in this life. This is what some of our veterans go through. No matter where they turn, pain is added to pain, relief is out of their reach and hope evaporates.

In combat, these events can be so frequent they become normal as the mind tries to make sense out of all of it. Imagine being in a car accident every time you drive. While we know the risk of getting behind the wheel, getting into an accident is not something we experience every time. The accident is the exception to the "normal" day even though it is a possibility everyday.

For the troops, especially in Iraq during some of the worst times, their "normal" was facing death with each breath. It became normal to drive down a road and have an IED blow up. It became normal to be in Afghanistan on an outpost and be attacked by the Taliban. It became normal to walk into a village in Vietnam and have kids come up to you with one hand reaching out for candy while in the other they had a grenade to give you. This "combat normal" changed them.

At the same time they thought they would return back home to pick up the lives they had before, they do not want to face anything that had to do with where they were. If they don't think about it, it will go away and they can go back to the civilian normal, safe and sound at home. But the road they drive on is not safe. The driver in the car behind them is not some young kid driving too damn fast. The trash bag on the sidewalk is not just stuff someone is throwing out. It is all out of get them. Anger is fed. Trust vanishes. People they thought they could trust walk away while they hold it all in as if telling anyone would make them want to leave. They cannot understand not telling them is already making them leave.

Giles Corey is what they become when they do not seek help to heal and most of the time they do not seek it because everyone around them thinks they are guilty of some kind of witchery. After all, they are acting like they are possessed by some kind of evil changing into uncaring, self centered jerks. No one can see pain because all they see is anger coming out.

The aftermath of combat trauma is much like the aftermath of civilian trauma. Survivors walk away wondering. Why did "I survive" but someone else didn't? Even if they come to terms with that part of the event, they end up wondering where God was. Their entire lifetime of beliefs are on trail as they question everything they thought they could trust. If the God they knew as good really was good then why did He let it happen? If doing the right things for the right reasons were what God wanted, then why were they suffering?

All of this comes when they do not understand the changes within them. They believe they deserve to suffer even though they are supposed to know there is nothing they cannot be forgiven for. They believe no one will love them if they let their deepest darkest secrets out not remembering all the times in their lives when the people they loved the most were able to forgive them for everything else they did and still loved them no matter what. They believe its easier to just push them away and less painful with no one in their lives.

When they understand they are human and changed by all events in their lives, they expect to be able to heal and overcome. They rationalize the fact if they had a broken leg they would need something to lean on to walk, so leaning on someone to help them heal inside is not that unusual nor does that make them weaker. It just means they are stronger than they would be on their own and when they heal, they will help someone else walk.


It was not sent to them by God as punishment nor was it what has been often said after traumatic events "God only gives us what we can handle." God doesn't do it to us but He does give us what we need to cope with it and if we are willing, will also make us stronger. Considering the second we are born is traumatic, pushed from the safety of our mother's body, the rest of life is a series of overcoming trauma. We can come out on the other side of darkness more compassionate, more patient, more loving and yes, even more optimistic. Just as a car accident can make us more cautious driving and a better driver, we are not the same as we were before, but better.

After the death of someone we love, we can be more loving to the rest of our family treating them better than before. After we lose every possession we have, we realize that things can be replaced but the friends we have standing by our side, helping to take care of us when we need them have no price tags. Instead of wondering why you survived, you can begin to wonder what you'll do with the time you have left on this earth and stop asking why.

A very wise Chaplain turned the why asked by a hurting soul "If God Himself came and told you why it happened, would it change anything?" We cannot answer why a two year old child will die and someone else will live to over 100. Why someone dies of cancer but someone else getting the same treatment makes a full recovery. Honestly, none of us would really want to know the exact second we will die or why it will not be one second more or less. We certainly wouldn't want to know when someone we love will die either no matter how many TV shows they come up with. As for the movie 2012, if that ends up making us think more about what we do with the time we have on this earth, then that would be a good thing only if we do things for others instead of to them.

If we take our survival as more time to live, then we can think about what we can do with that time for the sake of others. With walls built to protect our emotions, good feelings were prevented from getting in. We can take that wall down brick by brick as trust returns. With nightmares we can learn to see past that image and look into what was before it then find peace with it. With flashbacks, they can lose strength as we understand the strength they have over us comes from anniversary dates and other remembrances trapped in our subconscious. We cannot change what was but we can change what is so that what will be can be better. PTSD does not have to be the end of you because you survived but can be a new beginning for a better you.

Marines thinking outside of the box on PTSD, Thank God!

When you think that the Marines are supposed to be of a different breed of human, this is an amazing thing! The leadership has finally come to terms with just how human Marines are. Are they tough? Yes. Are they physically tough? Yes. Are they mentally conditioned to do what is asked of them? Yes. What they cannot be trained for is to become machines. They are thinking, feeling, loving humans and nothing can change that. So now the Marines are seeing them as humans much is asked of, but still only human.

Marines are not supposed to grieve.
Marines are supposed to get over it.


No matter what they face, these thoughts have been drilled into their brains. How would these thoughts translate into daily civilian life? Are they supposed to just get over it when someone in their personal life dies? Are they allowed to grieve? When we have natural disasters here and some of their family members are in danger, are they allowed to worry about them? Car accidents happen all the time. Are they allowed to face the same emotional crisis when they are over there and their family member is here? These things the Marines managed to understand. When it is about their military family, the brotherhood of the Marines, they cannot suddenly shut off being human.

Civilians get crisis teams rushing in to help them recover from traumatic events. Thank God the Marines are finally doing the same thing and treating them like humans instead of machines.

Mental health teams embedding to fight stress

By Trista Talton - Staff writer
Posted : Saturday Dec 5, 2009 8:56:23 EST

The Marine Corps is sending more mental health teams to the front lines in hopes of better treating an emotionally strained force.

Operational Stress Control and Readiness, or OSCAR, teams will soon be assembled at the battalion and company level, putting mental health support services much closer to combat troops, according to Marine Administrative message 667/09, signed Nov. 23.

These teams include mental health professionals such as Navy psychiatrists and corpsmen trained as psychiatry technicians. They were requested by operational commanders and have served previously as part of a pilot program to train and deploy mental health professionals with Marine regiments and groups. Embedding mental health support down to the company level will make it easier for Marines, especially those leery of seeking help, to get the services they may need, officials said.

Through prevention, early identification and intervention with stress-related problems, OSCAR teams will help “keep Marines and sailors in the fight,” according to the message.

The program creates full-time billets within Marine divisions and infantry regiments, positions that will be filled by psychiatrists, psychologists, social workers, mental health clinical nurse practitioners and psychiatric technician corpsmen on loan from naval hospitals.

The teams also will include battalion and company personnel, such as chaplains.

They’ll work with Marines on identifying combat stress and developing techniques to relieve it.
read more here
http://www.marinecorpstimes.com/news/2009/12/marines_oscar_120509w/

AMVETS launches new stolen valor Web site

AMVETS launches new stolen valor Web site

By William H. McMichael - Staff writer
Posted : Friday Dec 4, 2009 18:30:38 EST

A leading veterans group has launched a special Web site aimed at raising awareness about the growing number of false claims of military service, medals and awards, and helping the general public report such claims to authorities and the media.

“We’ve seen the news stories, and we have a lot of anecdotal evidence — people calling us and asking us about the issue,” said Jay Agg, national communications director for AMVETS. “ ‘What is it? How do I report it? What are the punishments? What constitutes a violation of the Stolen Valor Act?’ That is really … the genesis of this project.”

“Veterans have a special place in American society,” said Duane Miskulin, AMVETS national commander. “The brave men and women who answered our nation’s call to serve are revered for their tremendous self-sacrifice and courage in the face of daunting odds. Stolen valor is a serious offense — one that cuts into the core of what it means to be a veteran.”

Miskulin said the 2005 Stolen Valor Act, which makes even false claims of an undeserved medal a federal misdemeanor punishable by up to year in prison and a $100,000 fine, has not stemmed what he said is a rise, even in recent months, of such false claims.
read more here
http://www.armytimes.com/news/2009/12/military_stolen_valor_amvets_120409w/