Missing Sailor’s Body Found in Afghanistan

Missing Sailor’s Body Found in Afghanistan
July 27, 2010 - 7:41 AM by: Conor Powell
KABUL- The body of one of the two U.S. sailors missing in Afghanistan has been found, according to U.S. officials.

A NATO press release said that the body was discovered in Eastern Afghanistan Sunday.

U.S. officials vowed to continue searching for the other missing sailor. A Taliban spokesman claims insurgents have captured the other sailor – whom U.S. officials have not identified.

According to the Associated Press, the Navy sailor killed was Justin McNealy, 30.
read more here and please don't forget there is still another sailor missing.
Missing Sailor Body Found in Afghanistan

New program rebuilding faces of soldiers, veterans

New program rebuilding faces of soldiers, veterans
By MICHELLE ROBERTS (AP) – 2 hours ago

SAN ANTONIO — The wars in Iraq and Afghanistan have brought a new kind of patient to the facial prothestics lab at the Lackland Air Force Base in San Antonio: wounded warriors, who have recently suffered heavy burns and multiple traumas.
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New program rebuilding faces of soldiers, veterans

What scientists know about PTSD in war veterans

Whenever I am talking about experts the DOD and the VA need to listen to, this is one of the reasons. I track this every day of the week and that makes me painfully aware of just how little the people making decisions really know about PTSD. I pointed out back in March what I learned from attending Mental Health First Aid when we talked about the way the mind "grows up" along with the age of the men and women entering the military. Paula Schnurr VA’s National Center for Post Traumatic Stress Disorder should be heard loud and clear.

Saturday, March 6, 2010

Are the troops just too young to go?
For the last few years I've been brining up the fact about re-deployments and the increase risk, along with screaming my fool head off there was nowhere near enough being done.

Well,in this one report you have it all and it's a wonderful thing. Now if the DOD and the VA would only come up with programs that work best and the cities and towns these veterans return home to step up, then we can really be proud of all we've learned through all these years.

EarthSky Health Interviews
Paula Schnurr on what scientists know about PTSD in war veterans

Post traumatic stress disorder, or PTSD, is an anxiety disorder that affects up to 30% of soldiers returning from Iraq. That’s according to a June 2010 study by Army medical researchers. Its results were that: “Prevalence rates for PTSD or depression with serious functional impairment ranged between 8.5% and 14.0%, with some impairment between 23.2% and 31.1%.”

If you or someone you know is troubled by PTSD, go to The National Center for PTSD for help.

For the latest on what scientists know about PTSD, EarthSky spoke with Paula Schnurr. She’s deputy executive director of the VA’s National Center for Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. She said PTSD involves changes in a person’s psychological state and their neurobiological state

Paula Schnurr: That is, their brain changes. The systems in the brain that help us deal with stress and regulate fear and emotional responding are changed as you might expect in response to the extreme trauma of combat.

Paula Schnurr: One factor is the person’s age. Up to early adulthood, the younger a person is, the more likely they are to develop PTSD. The more education they have, the less likely. If they’ve had childhood stressors and trauma, they’re more likely. The way that I think about it, at least, is that part of what a person has to do when a person has experienced a trauma is to try to make sense of it. And a person who’s had more education, who is a little bit older, would have greater cognitive abilities to try to make meaning out of this horrible event.

Another thing scientists know, said Schnurr, is that the more severe the exposure, the greater the risk of PTSD.

Paula Schnurr: One of the more significant findings of this war is how multiple deployments matters. So we’ve had some military personnel who’ve been deployed three, perhaps even four times. These individuals are at particular risk because they’ve essentially experienced more and more severe trauma.

read the rest here

Paula Schnurr on what scientists know about PTSD

Re-Branding the VFW's

Goodbye/Hello 19 "Re-Branding the VFW's"

Patt Cottingham
Patt Cottingham has been working as a brand communication strategist for the past ten years.
Posted: July 26, 2010
In World World I, World War II, and Korea returning veterans used the VFW's as clubs to meet socially, have a drink, and contribute to the communities they were in. They were
at Memorial Day ceremonies, Fourth of July parades, and Veterans Day functions. They also served to help returning veterans get their needed benefits. All well and good.

However it was the Vietnam Veterans where the VFW started to lose membership. One returning veteran from Vietnam remembered it this way "When I returned from Viet Nam we were not exactly welcomed with open arms at the VFW. I was actually mocked that I really didn't serve in a "real war" as the stalwarts of the post claimed. Needless to say there has been a huge disconnect between the VFW and me. I still smart from that remark."

Here are some statistics that illustrate the daunting challenges the VFW's are having nationwide. Today the VFW posts have 1.6 million members. Of that number 495,000 are older than 82, 300,00 are older than 72 (and younger than 82). Less than 10 percent are younger than 50. The numbers are setting a coarse for oblivion unless the VFW's become more relevant to the returning soldiers of Iraq and Afghanistan.

Fast forward to the soldiers fighting in Iraq and Afghanistan.We now live in the era of YouTube and Facebook. Soldiers can upload videos, share stories on social networking sites. Talk with family and friends and capture images to send back home via cell phones. These wars have become more up close and personal than ever before. The other difference in these wars is the women who are serving. About 200,000 women have now served in Iraq and Afghanistan. These women are front-line, rifle-carrying combat personnel. Which means they are now suffering the same devastating mental and physical wounds of male soldiers.
read more here
Re Branding the VFW

How You Can Use Crises to Transform Your Life

We've all had one crisis or another. For my family it was my husband and PTSD taking over, the loss of the twins I was carrying, deaths of all our family members, job loss, accidents and health problems. The list seems to never end. Right now it is a financial crisis, but we've had many of these hard times before.

It's really hard to get through hard times when things don't seem to be getting any better. Yet when you look back at other hard times you've faced, one thing stands out, those bad days didn't destroy you because you're still here.

Looking back, faith gave me hope and hope got me from one day to the next no matter what the crisis was. I turned the heartache of watching my husband suffer with PTSD and all that did to my family, into something positive. Helping veterans and their families get through their own pain. What you see on this blog is part of what I do. Tracking reports across the country makes it impossible for anyone to think this is not a national problem. The videos are part of it. Putting in my two cents on essays is part, but then there are the emails and heartbreaking stories leading up to emails when other families come thru the worst of times just like we did.

If you measure success by money, then I am an absolute failure, but if you measure it by lives saved, families held together and proving hope to other people, then I guess you could say I have succeeded. On the grand scale of things, I'm just a nobody, ignored by a lot of powerful groups no matter how hard I try to get them to just listen. Yet on a human level, I talk to some of the most magnificent people you'd ever want to meet.

Right now there is a couple involved with a ministry. He is a veteran trying to heal from PTSD and the wife is a Godsend to him, standing by his side and trying to do whatever she can to help him heal better. All they want is to take what this crisis has done and turn it into a positive outcome by helping other families and especially veterans.

There was a Vietnam veteran, outcast from everyone he knew yet all he wants to do is get better and stronger so that he can help other veterans.

These people are simply amazing. They didn't want to give up and they certainly didn't want to give in. Neither do I. Reading the advice from Tony Robbins may seem like just publicity for his new show but when you think of the gift he has to offer, let him publicize it all he wants because he's giving a lot more than others have.

A Chance to Break Through: How You Can Use Crises to Transform Your Life

Arianna Huffington and Tony Robbins
Posted: July 26, 2010

A month ago, when Tony Robbins was passing through New York, we met for a drink. In the course of our conversation, we realized that -- from our different perspectives -- we both had been thinking about a similar problem: how can people faced with enormous challenges carry on without collapsing under the burden?

I had just finished my upcoming book on Third World America in which I write about the millions of middle class Americans who are suddenly finding themselves without a job, or without a home, or without the possibility of giving their children a better future. By the end of the book, I found myself consumed with identifying practical solutions and sources of help that those struggling could use right away -- instead of anxiously waiting for government to act. And I recognized that it all starts with each individual's inner strength and resilience.

Tony, meanwhile, had been working on "Breakthrough with Tony Robbins," a series of primetime TV specials for NBC focused on the stories of people who had been dealt an incredibly bad hand by life. He showed me a clip and I was not just deeply moved but, more the point, I was struck by how these people were able to find the strength to transform their lives -- even in the most extreme circumstances.

The clip I saw was about a newlywed who jumps into a swimming pool on his wedding day, hits his head, and instantly becomes a quadriplegic. When we first encounter them in Tony's special, premiering tomorrow night, he and his wife are trapped in their house -- the wife feeling depressed and angry; the husband feeling guilty and at a loss for what to do. The transformation in this couple's lives that we see by the end of the hour is stunning -- and I knew it would be really inspiring for anyone going through difficult circumstances of their own (most of which, of course, would pale in comparison to becoming a quadriplegic).

By the end of our meeting, Tony and I had decided do something on HuffPost that would focus on solutions instead of problems. The result is Breakthrough: The Power of Crisis, which launches today.
read more here

How You Can Use Crises to Transform Your Life

President Obama to speak at disabled veterans convention

Obama to speak at disabled veterans convention

By Rick Maze - Staff writer
Posted : Thursday Jul 22, 2010 16:30:22 EDT

President Obama will speak Aug. 2 in Atlanta at the national convention of Disabled America Veterans, an election-year appearance where he will point to a long list of accomplishments made by his administration in improving veterans’ programs, White House officials said Thursday.

Obama’s appearance will come on the third day of the four-day annual convention of one of the nation’s biggest veterans groups. DAV has worked closely with the administration on many issues, but it remains critical of difficulties facing veterans who are trying to receive benefits and treatment for service-connected disabilities.

Testifying in June before the House Veterans’ Affairs Committee about problems with processing veterans’ disability claims, DAV’s national legislative director, Joseph Violante, gave the Obama administration credit for trying to improve things even though the backlog of claims continues to grow.

“There are reasons to be optimistic,” Violante said. “Over the past six months, with mounting pressure from DAV and other veterans’ service organizations, there has been a welcome increase in attention from Congress and the administration” to problems with claims, he said.

Obama will not be the first president to appear before DAV. President Clinton spoke to the group in 1996 in New Orleans, and President Ford spoke in 1976 at the dedication of DAV’s national service center and legislative headquarters in Washington, D.C.

read more here

Obama to speak at disabled veterans convention

Gold Star family group no one wants to have to join

Linda Faulstich said "It's an exclusive club that no one wants to be eligible for." but she is thankful for the support from other families. No one knows what it is like to be one of these families and when family and friends turn away or don't want to talk about it anymore, there is a lot of pain piled on.

As hard as it is for most of these families, the families left behind because of suicide find it ever harder to find support from people they depend on the most. Gold Star families can be their lifeline.

Event connects Gold Star Families, kin of those who died in military service

By Rick Rojas
Washington Post Staff Writer
Sunday, July 25, 2010

An indescribable pain consumes two Maryland mothers as they approach the anniversaries of their entrance into a network of families they hoped never to join: those with children killed in war.


On Aug. 5, 2006, Deborah Higgins buried her first-born son, Lance Cpl. James W. Higgins, 22, after he was killed in Iraq days shy of returning home. Two years earlier, on Aug. 5, Linda Faulstich received word that her son, Army Spec. Raymond J. Faulstich Jr., 24, died in Iraq that day after his convoy was attacked.

The deaths forever altered their lives. Faulstich, 60, of Leonardtown said she often wondered whether there would come a time when she could be happy again.

When her son died, Faulstich said, friends stopped calling. People tried to avoid talking about her son. She even fell out of touch with her mother, who told her that talking to her dredged up memories of Raymond.

"I had a feeling people thought I was going overboard with it," Faulstich said.

What helped her cope were other parents in the same situation. She found that the only ones who could understand her plight were the mothers and fathers who had been through it themselves, losing a son or daughter to war.

Gold Star Family is a generic term to describe relatives of military personnel who died during service. When Faulstich would pick up the phone and call another Gold Star mother, there was no pretense, no emotions to struggle to explain.

"It's an exclusive club that no one wants to be eligible for," she said.
read more here
Event connects Gold Star Families

Wounded soldier surprises hometown at fundraiser for him

Wounded Soldier Surprises Hometown
Sgt. Brendan Ferreira Makes Trip Home From Walter Reed
Taunton -- A local soldier, wounded in the line of duty, surprised his local community Sunday when he came home for a fundraiser in his honor.

The Wounded Soldier Day Fundraiser Jeep Run was held at the P.A.C.C. in Taunton in honor of Sgt. Brendan Ferreira, 23, of Assonet.

The fund raiser was on the same weekend Ferreira was supposed to come home on leave from Afghanistan. Those plans were changed back in March when Ferreira was critically injured during a suicide bomb attack. Two of his fellow soldiers were killed.
read more here
http://www.thebostonchannel.com/mostpopular/24385897/detail.html

The Secretary’s War on Homelessness

We can talk all we want about how bad it is for average Americans out of work, losing their homes and suffering in an economy that has left them behind the eight ball, but as bad as it is for us, we need to understand when it comes to our veterans, they were willing to die for us. We don't stand a chance of getting help if we allow them to suffer after they served this country.

We have problems with health insurance and the struggle to pay for care. They come home and then have to fight for care from the VA, when they wouldn't need it if they didn't serve.

We have problems in our own homes with relationships, our kids, bills, the list goes on, and so do they, but they have another problem too often fought in silence against PTSD.

When they end up homeless after all they did for the sake of this country, it is a testament of how shallow our words are when we say we support the troops or claims we are a grateful nation. Our veterans are a minority in this country. We have about 24 million veterans out of this nation of over 300 million, even less are combat veterans. If we can't take care of them, what does that say about the rest of us?

The Secretary’s War on Homelessness
Shinseki vows to get America’s veterans off the streets within five years. Even the homeless aren’t sure it can be done.
BY JAMES V. CARROLL - August 1, 2010

Three strangers approach a slender man curled up on the sidewalk. They ask his name. He squints into the early-morning sunshine.

"I'm Paul," he quietly replies, rising to his feet, his finger stuck between the pages of a hardbound book he's been reading. He offers his other hand. "And you gentlemen are ..."

Paul, the men soon learn, is a veteran, a former sergeant in the U.S. Air Force. He stands out among the others living on this particular Las Vegas side street. His clothing is clean, his hair neat, his face shaven, his fingernails dirt-free and trimmed. He is soft-spoken and articulate.

He appears to be here by some kind of mistake. Paul is one of hundreds of homeless veterans living and sleeping on the streets of Las Vegas, and one of the tens of thousands of former military men and women across America seeking shelter at night under bridges or in cardboard boxes, tents, sleeping bags or abandoned cars.

Recent VA surveys estimate that more than 100,000 U.S. military veterans are homeless on any given night - a situation VA Secretary Eric Shinseki has vowed, like no other Washington official before him, to correct. "The current estimate for 2010 is that 107,000 veterans remain homeless - a decrease of 18 percent from 2009, and down from 195,000 six years ago," Shinseki said at the 50th American Legion Washington Conference in March. "It's a start, but that's not good enough. We need a full-court press to keep driving those numbers down. It is unacceptable for a single veteran to spend the night on the streets of America."

Shinseki unveiled an ambitious plan last November to eradicate homelessness among veterans within five years. Speaking to more than 1,200 service providers at a VA summit in Washington, the secretary backed up his promise with a pledge to spend $3.2 billion during fiscal 2010 in a move toward fulfillment of the goal. Of that, $2.7 billion would be earmarked for medical services and $500 million for housing programs.
read more here
The Secretarys War on Homelessness

WikiLeaks: Evidence of war crimes in papers

WikiLeaks: Evidence of war crimes in papers

By Kimberly Dozier and Raphael Satter - The Associated Press
Posted : Monday Jul 26, 2010 10:05:36 EDT

LONDON — WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange said Monday he thinks there is evidence of war crimes in the thousands of pages of leaked U.S. military documents relating to the war in Afghanistan.

The remarks came after WikiLeaks, a whistle-blowing group, posted some 91,000 classified U.S. military records over the past six years about the war online, including unreported incidents of Afghan civilian killings and covert operations against Taliban figures.

The White House, Britain and Pakistan have all condemned the release of the documents, one of the largest unauthorized disclosures in military history.

Assange told reporters in London that “it is up to a court to decide really if something in the end is a crime. That said ... there does appear to be evidence of war crimes in this material.”
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WikiLeaks Evidence of war crimes in papers