Hulan Roberts, WWII Veteran, Has Wish To Return To Battleground Granted By Mississippi Middle Schoolers (PHOTOS)
By Sarah Medina
Posted: 12/25/2012
A World War II veteran's dream of returning to the land he fought in is finally being granted, thanks to the generosity of middle school students in Mississippi.
According to the DeSoto Times-Tribune, Hulan Roberts, who was aboard a B-17 bomber during the Battle of the Bulge in 1944, wished to return to the Belgian countryside. He wanted to see the towns and villages from the ground rather than the air.
"I'm as interested as anyone to go back and see it," Roberts said in a ceremony at DeSoto Central Middle School. Now, he will get his wish.
read more here
Wednesday, December 26, 2012
Soldier's body found Christmas in Alaska
UPDATE December 27, 2012
Anchorage Daily News
Soldier who died of gunshot in barracks was 25-year-old infantryman, Army says
Published: December 26, 2012
The soldier found dead in a barracks at Joint Base Elmendorf-Richardson on Christmas morning was a 25-year-old private first class who'd been stationed here since September, the Army said on Wednesday.
Pfc. Grant W. Wise, of Fairport, N.Y., "was found in another soldier's barracks room with a single gunshot wound and declared deceased at approximately 7:45 a.m.," said a statement Wednesday from Lt. Col. William Coppernoll, a spokesman for the U.S. Army in Alaska.
read more here
Alaska-based soldier found dead Christmas morning in military barracks
Eric Christopher Adams
Dec 25, 2012
A soldier was found dead Christmas morning in barracks on Joint Base Elmendorf-Richardson, a military base for the U.S. Army and U.S. Air Force located in Anchorage, Alaska.
The soldier appeared to have died from a gunshot wound, according to the three-sentence statement (PDF) from Lt. Col. William Coppernoll, a spokesman for the U.S. Army in Alaska.
The Army did not make clear whether the soldier died from a self-inflicted gunshot or homicide.
read more here linked from Huffington Post
Disabled Firefighter Saved by Afghanistan Meatball
Dog rescued from Afghanistan returns favor by helping save owner’s life (With Video)
Published: Wednesday, December 26, 2012
By JOHN KOPP
CLIFTON HEIGHTS — The first time Meatball met Joe McCarty, the Afghan Kuchi puppy welcomed his new owner by peeing on him.
Five months later, McCarty and his wife, Kim, laugh at the story. That’s because Meatball and Joe now share a bond so tight that the 9-month-old dog knows when Joe isn’t right. That keen awareness might have saved Joe’s life earlier this month.
Kim said she was upstairs preparing to fall asleep one night when she heard Meatball begin barking incessantly. Meatball, Kim said, is not known for barking.
Joe, who served as a firefighter for the Sharon Hill Fire Department for 15 years, has suffered four strokes and is paralyzed on his left side.
read more here
Published: Wednesday, December 26, 2012
By JOHN KOPP
CLIFTON HEIGHTS — The first time Meatball met Joe McCarty, the Afghan Kuchi puppy welcomed his new owner by peeing on him.
Five months later, McCarty and his wife, Kim, laugh at the story. That’s because Meatball and Joe now share a bond so tight that the 9-month-old dog knows when Joe isn’t right. That keen awareness might have saved Joe’s life earlier this month.
Kim said she was upstairs preparing to fall asleep one night when she heard Meatball begin barking incessantly. Meatball, Kim said, is not known for barking.
Joe, who served as a firefighter for the Sharon Hill Fire Department for 15 years, has suffered four strokes and is paralyzed on his left side.
read more here
Tuesday, December 25, 2012
Christmas is a lesson in forgiving too
Christmas is a lesson in forgiving too
by Chaplain Kathie
Pointman of Winter Park
December 25, 2012
"Tragedy the tragic element of drama, of literature generally, or of life." Greeks know a few things about tragedy as well as trauma. They use "trauma" to explain wounds. There is trauma a disordered psychic or behavioral state resulting from severe mental or emotional stress or physical injury, but there are also two more that should be discussed when trying to explain what PTSD is.
In churches around the world the story of Christ's birth was retold but there was a part that is usually left out of the sermons.
Is it because there has been no proof that what Matthew wrote actually happened? No, because if that had been the case then much of what is preached would be left out as well. The reason it is left out is hope always triumphs over the evil that men do.
In October of 2007 when news came out a year following the children murdered in a tiny school house that Amish Forgive School Shooter, Struggle with Grief it was very hard to understand how that was possible after 10 girls were shot and 5 of them died but the families forgave the shooter and tried to comfort the family he left behind.
11 days ago more children were killed by a gunman in school called Sandy Hook. 20 of them died along with 6 of their teachers. The day after the shooting one of the girl's parents forgave the shooter.
Love has more strength than hate. One man decided to kill but families decided to think of others while grieving. One man decided that others must suffer for his own pain but people around the world decided they would show love to people they would never meet and grieve with them for the loss they felt.
Trauma is not something we are born with. It is something that happens to us that we had no control over. We are wounded but we can heal. We feel pain but we can overcome it.
by Chaplain Kathie
Pointman of Winter Park
December 25, 2012
"Tragedy the tragic element of drama, of literature generally, or of life." Greeks know a few things about tragedy as well as trauma. They use "trauma" to explain wounds. There is trauma a disordered psychic or behavioral state resulting from severe mental or emotional stress or physical injury, but there are also two more that should be discussed when trying to explain what PTSD is.
an emotional upset "not living up to his own expectations"
an agent, force, or mechanism that causes trauma
In churches around the world the story of Christ's birth was retold but there was a part that is usually left out of the sermons.
Matthew 2:16-18
New International Version (NIV)
16 When Herod realized that he had been outwitted by the Magi, he was furious, and he gave orders to kill all the boys in Bethlehem and its vicinity who were two years old and under, in accordance with the time he had learned from the Magi.
17 Then what was said through the prophet Jeremiah was fulfilled:
18 “A voice is heard in Ramah, weeping and great mourning, Rachel weeping for her children and refusing to be comforted, because they are no more.”
Is it because there has been no proof that what Matthew wrote actually happened? No, because if that had been the case then much of what is preached would be left out as well. The reason it is left out is hope always triumphs over the evil that men do.
In October of 2007 when news came out a year following the children murdered in a tiny school house that Amish Forgive School Shooter, Struggle with Grief it was very hard to understand how that was possible after 10 girls were shot and 5 of them died but the families forgave the shooter and tried to comfort the family he left behind.
11 days ago more children were killed by a gunman in school called Sandy Hook. 20 of them died along with 6 of their teachers. The day after the shooting one of the girl's parents forgave the shooter.
Father of "Emilie Parker", Sandy Hook massacre victim, offers forgiveness to shooter's family
Love has more strength than hate. One man decided to kill but families decided to think of others while grieving. One man decided that others must suffer for his own pain but people around the world decided they would show love to people they would never meet and grieve with them for the loss they felt.
Newtown faces its first Christmas since Sandy Hook school shooting
Hundreds attend Christmas Eve services in Newtown, Conn. as visitors and volunteers arrived from out-of-town to support a community in mourning.
THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
TUESDAY, DECEMBER 25, 2012,
NEWTOWN, Conn. — Newtown observed Christmas amid snow-covered teddy bears, stockings, flowers and candles left in memorial to the 20 children and six educators gunned down at an elementary school just 11 days before the holiday.
The outpouring of support for this community continued through Christmas Eve, with visitors arriving at town hall with offerings of cards, handmade snowflakes and sympathy.
"We know that they'll feel loved. They'll feel that somebody actually cares," said Treyvon Smalls, a 15-year-old from a few towns away who arrived bearing hundreds of cards and paper snowflakes collected from around the state. And on Christmas Day, out-of-town police officers were on duty to give police here a break.
JULIO CORTEZ/APOut of the traumatic tragedies love will prevail as it always has and we learned much from those willing to forgive. Christ asked for God to forgive the hands that nailed Him to the cross as much as He asked for those who abandoned Him to be forgiven. Most of us wonder how people are able to do that. How do you forgive someone that did so much evil on the earth especially to innocent victims? To look at those who do forgive is a lesson we can all learn from. With so much grace within them, maybe, just maybe, we can find grace within ourselves to forgive others for what they did to us and forgive ourselves in the process.
Christmas stockings with the names of shooting victims hang from railing near a makeshift memorial near the town Christmas tree in the Sandy Hook village of Newtown, Conn.
Trauma is not something we are born with. It is something that happens to us that we had no control over. We are wounded but we can heal. We feel pain but we can overcome it.
Charles Durning: war hero and character actor
Charles Durning: war hero and character actor
Celebrity deaths
posted by halboedeker
December, 25 2012
His death Monday, at age 89, brought back a flood of movie and TV memories. He played confusion beautifully as Jessica Lange’s father in “Tootsie.”
Durning racked up impressive credits: ”Dog Day Afternoon,” “The Sting,” “Dick Tracy,” “Starting Over,” “The Best Little Whorehouse in Texas,” “Oh Brother, Where Art Thou?” and the remake of “To Be or Not to Be.”
read more here
Celebrity deaths
posted by halboedeker
December, 25 2012
He was awarded the Silver Star and three Purple Hearts. He will be buried in Arlington National Cemetery.The life and art of Charles Durning are inseparable. He drew on what he had seen to enrich his acting. He had seen a lot as a soldier who survived the D-Day invasion.
His death Monday, at age 89, brought back a flood of movie and TV memories. He played confusion beautifully as Jessica Lange’s father in “Tootsie.”
Durning racked up impressive credits: ”Dog Day Afternoon,” “The Sting,” “Dick Tracy,” “Starting Over,” “The Best Little Whorehouse in Texas,” “Oh Brother, Where Art Thou?” and the remake of “To Be or Not to Be.”
read more here
Vietnam Veteran Chuck Hagel Would Be First Former Enlisted Soldier To Run Pentagon
Hagel Would Be First Former Enlisted Soldier To Run Pentagon
by TOM BOWMAN
December 24, 2012
Former Republican Sen. Chuck Hagel of Nebraska is said to be on President Obama's short list to be the next defense secretary. But even the possibility of his nomination has stirred up opposition — particularly from members of his own political party.
If Hagel can survive a political ambush in Washington, he would be the first Pentagon chief who saw combat as an enlisted soldier.
The blunt-spoken Hagel favors deeper cuts in military spending and is wary of entangling America in long overseas missions.
In January 2007, Democrats on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee were fighting President Bush's plan to send more troops to Iraq. Hagel was the only Republican to join them, and he blasted those who refused to take a stand.
"Why are you elected?" Hagel asked. "If you wanted a safe job, go sell shoes. This is a tough business. But is it any tougher, us having to take a tough vote, express ourselves, and have the courage to step up, than what we're asking our young men and women to do? I don't think so."
Lessons From Vietnam
Hagel knew better than most what America was asking of its young men and women. Forty years earlier he'd fought in Vietnam with his brother Tom.
They served in the same unit. On patrol one morning in 1968, Chuck was hit by shrapnel in the chest, and Tom rushed to help him. A month later, Chuck saved Tom, pulling him from a burning vehicle. Between them the two brothers earned five Purple Hearts.
read more here
by TOM BOWMAN
December 24, 2012
Former Republican Sen. Chuck Hagel of Nebraska is said to be on President Obama's short list to be the next defense secretary. But even the possibility of his nomination has stirred up opposition — particularly from members of his own political party.
If Hagel can survive a political ambush in Washington, he would be the first Pentagon chief who saw combat as an enlisted soldier.
The blunt-spoken Hagel favors deeper cuts in military spending and is wary of entangling America in long overseas missions.
In January 2007, Democrats on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee were fighting President Bush's plan to send more troops to Iraq. Hagel was the only Republican to join them, and he blasted those who refused to take a stand.
"Why are you elected?" Hagel asked. "If you wanted a safe job, go sell shoes. This is a tough business. But is it any tougher, us having to take a tough vote, express ourselves, and have the courage to step up, than what we're asking our young men and women to do? I don't think so."
Lessons From Vietnam
Hagel knew better than most what America was asking of its young men and women. Forty years earlier he'd fought in Vietnam with his brother Tom.
They served in the same unit. On patrol one morning in 1968, Chuck was hit by shrapnel in the chest, and Tom rushed to help him. A month later, Chuck saved Tom, pulling him from a burning vehicle. Between them the two brothers earned five Purple Hearts.
read more here
Firefighters shot because shooter "liked to kill"
They risked their lives to save people and the shooter took advantage of how much they care about others to take their lives.
The dead men were identified as police Lt. Michael Chiapperini, 43, the Webster Police Department's public information officer; and 19-year-old Tomasz Kaczowka, also a 911 dispatcher.
Pickering described Chiapperini as a "lifetime firefighter" with nearly 20 years in the department, and he called Kaczowka a "tremendous young man."
Kaczowka's brother, reached at the family home Monday night, said he didn't want to talk.
The two wounded firefighters, Joseph Hofstetter and Theodore Scardino, were in stable condition Tuesday at Strong Memorial Hospital, the chief said. Both were awake and alert and are expected to recover.
Hofstetter, also a full-timer with the Rochester Fire Department, was hit once in the pelvis, and the bullet lodged in his spine, authorities said. Scardino was hit in the chest and knee.
Cathy Bartlett was at a vigil Monday night with her teenage son, who was good friends with Kaczowka. Bartlett's husband, Mark Bartlett, has been a firefighter there for 25 years but missed the call this morning.
One of the guns recovered was a military-style .223-caliber semiautomatic Bushmaster rifle with flash suppression, the same make and caliber weapon used in the elementary school massacre in Newtown, Conn., Pickering said.
click link at top for the rest of the article.
Two firefighters are dead, two more wounded in ambush
Schools, churches, court do what they can to ease soldiers' burden
For families with a deployed member, Christmas can be hard, but for too many, it isn't the first hard Christmas they endured. For many others, even with their family all together, it isn't easy.
That quote is from the article below on how a community steps up to take care of the soldiers and their families. If we are ever really going to defeat PTSD, the whole family must be taken care of.
Please read this whole story, about 6 pages long but well worth it.
"Just a few years back, they hid problems out of fear they’d never advance. Last summer, Fort Campbell’s top-ranked enlisted man, Command Sgt. Maj. Alonzo Smith, released a video about treatment for the psychological trauma he faced after nearly losing his leg to an explosion."
That quote is from the article below on how a community steps up to take care of the soldiers and their families. If we are ever really going to defeat PTSD, the whole family must be taken care of.
Oct 30, 2012
October is National Depression Awareness Month, the 101st Airborne Division Command Sgt. Maj. Alonzo Smith talks about his personal experience after his military vehicle was hit by a rocket propelled grenade during his deployment to Afghanistan in 2010.
Depression is a devastating illness that can impact anyone regardless of age, sex or race. The good news is, clinical depression is treatable. If you know someone who is suffering from depression, please urge them to seek treatment. Remind your fellow Soldiers, Family Members and co-workers that seeking treatment is a sign of strength, not a weakness.
Please read this whole story, about 6 pages long but well worth it.
Tenn., steps up for its Fort Campbell soldiers
Schools, churches, court do what they can to ease soldiers' burden
Dec 24, 2012
CLARKSVILLE, TENN. — Sometimes the kids at Minglewood Elementary gather in a conference room to talk, green-clad stick-people drawings decorating the wall behind them.
How many get to talk to Dad on Skype?
All six raise a hand.
How many will have Dad home for Christmas?
Two.
How does that make them feel?
Silence for a moment. Then Evelynn Johnson takes a deep breath and adjusts her little purple glasses. Like so many of her classmates, she’s seen too much to sound like the fifth-grader she is.
“What helps me is to not focus on him being gone,” Evelynn says. “One time I cried because my dad was going, and he told me, ‘You are sacrificing for this country. You’re helping out this country just by being my daughter.’ ”
These are the children of the soldiers at Fort Campbell. They’ve never known life without war. And so they don’t know what it’s like to be free of the nervous-stomach cycle of parents fighting overseas, coming home a different person with every tour, calming down just in time for another call to duty.
“PTSD is contagious, as it turns out,” said Dr. Robert Begtrup, a psychiatrist who launched a school-based program for soldiers’ children. Now he’s in private practice, working with children in Clarksville and other Middle Tennessee areas.
He sees some who wake screaming at 2 a.m. because that’s what their parents do. He sees families isolating because they don’t feel understood, living a war that’s been fought without most Americans sacrificing a single thing. Even though Clarksville does all it can to support them, he said, these damaged families are being called “the new normal” by some.
read more here
Florida and Texas, more veterans, less mental healthcare
For too many veterans this is a huge problem. Too many of them do not want to go to the VA for mental healthcare help for PTSD, if they go at all, but when they decide they want help, the VA can't take care of all of them as soon as they want it. They turn to civilian mental health workers. With Texas and Florida having so many veterans, being this low on mental healthcare spending, it increases the stress our veterans face when it comes to taking care of them.
Florida 48th among states in funding for mental health services
By Skyler Swisher
STAFF WRITER
Published: Sunday, December 23, 2012
Backlogs in hospital psychiatric wards, a lack of crisis services, shortages of boots on the ground and long wait times for help are the results of funding cuts to mental health in Florida, local advocates say.
As the nation reels from the shooting rampage in Newtown, Conn., mental health service providers and advocates are urging lawmakers to commit more dollars to behavioral health services, stressing the need for additional counselors, mental health beds and school psychologists.
Far too often, the mentally ill have to endure long waits to get the help they need or might not have access to services at all, said Pattie Hunt, whose 52-year-old son has had schizophrenia since he was 19.
"There is a total race to the bottom as far as mental health funding, and Florida wins all the time," said Hunt, a member of the National Alliance on Mental Illness' Volusia, Flagler and St. Johns chapter. "They seem to take pride in cutting funding for mental health because it's not popular, and no one wants to talk about it. Our jails have become our mental health centers."
read more here
Wounded Iraq veteran gets "smart" home for the holidays
Disabled Veteran gets new "Smart" home
Posted at: 12/24/2012
By: Beth Wurtmann
AVERILL PARK - Air Force Technical Sgt. Joe Wilkinson got a first look around his new home Monday. It was custom-built to give him more independence, after becoming disabled during a tour in Iraq.
"Being here today it's truly amazing how it all came together, the community unbelievable it really hits the heart," Wilkinson said.
Paralyzed from the waist down and unable to live easily in conventional homes, a fundraising effort was launched to help.
Actor Gary Sinise, who played amputee Lt. Dan in the movie Forrest Gump, played a benefit concert at the Washington Avenue Armory. The Stephen Siller Tunnel to Towers Foundation and local contractors worked to build a 'smart home,' with wider doorways, and easy-to-reach thermostats and bathroom fixtures.
With the touch of an iPad in the kitchen, Joe will be able to lower customized shelves, and get his own dishes.
read more here
Posted at: 12/24/2012
By: Beth Wurtmann
AVERILL PARK - Air Force Technical Sgt. Joe Wilkinson got a first look around his new home Monday. It was custom-built to give him more independence, after becoming disabled during a tour in Iraq.
"Being here today it's truly amazing how it all came together, the community unbelievable it really hits the heart," Wilkinson said.
Paralyzed from the waist down and unable to live easily in conventional homes, a fundraising effort was launched to help.
Actor Gary Sinise, who played amputee Lt. Dan in the movie Forrest Gump, played a benefit concert at the Washington Avenue Armory. The Stephen Siller Tunnel to Towers Foundation and local contractors worked to build a 'smart home,' with wider doorways, and easy-to-reach thermostats and bathroom fixtures.
With the touch of an iPad in the kitchen, Joe will be able to lower customized shelves, and get his own dishes.
read more here
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