11 Temmuz 2012 Çarşamba
10 Temmuz 2012 Salı
8 Temmuz 2012 Pazar
Naturalization Ceremony for Active Duty Service Members
And from all the way across the pond, NOT in France nor that pond, but the DC reflecting pool, we bring you the 4th of July's new citizens:
July 04, 2012 10:50am edt
President Obama Speaks at a Naturalization Ceremony for Active Duty Service Members
As the teabags spread the rumor of 'O' vacationing in France on this forth, most of them of course being our very own already American Citizens and Unlike these new members have not nor are serving this Country, especially the Joe Walsh's of with their in the ready 'purple heart bandages' as their convention approaches!!
Note: How many of you all ever hear citizens of, especially peoples representatives, slander, or better known as verbally spit on, their military personal or veterans of in other countries?
Yet here, and for decades, it's part of the game played called political ideology!
Helping Veterans: The Dumbed Down U.S. Business Mentality
And especially their new term for hiring, Human Resources single or full departments of so called hiring specialists. Who frankly not just don't understand the Military Community but even the experiences of the civilian workforce that new hires may bring to their companies, they get paid to just pick a few resumes and the companies hope for the best in training costs and turnovers.
The veterans of WWII, as well as the quickly trained workers that didn't serve but built up the needs for those serving overseas and quickly innovated as the war needs progressed, came back and built the economic, industrial and education growth that gave rise to the rapid advancing middle class and profits for the business owners and investors, capitalism in it's most clear ideology sharing in the labors, as well as brought needed common sense and critical thought to quickly improve on products and much more. That has always been, as the numerous military skills of each individual were well embedded, up till the late 20th and now into the 21st century where the higher education industry sells, and the business minds buy into, one needs a very expensive piece of paper to become a part further advancing society thus pushing aside any who educate as they grow and add to their experiences, life and work. The military, and veterans of, is a total society that can function on it's own doing much of what any society does, especially to keep it running smoothly, as it also performs it's own R&D in partnership, which also once was, between public and private, financing and development!
July 2, 2012 - Malcolm Byrd got out of the Marine Corps in 2003 and found work, first in a General Motors factory and then with a nonprofit group. But four months ago, he lost his job because of government budget cuts and has been job hunting since.
Telling potential employers that he was a Marine supply clerk who managed millions of dollars in Kevlar helmets and folding cots does not seem to have helped him find the management job he is seeking.
“I could run a warehouse, but they don’t put that on your DD-214,” said Mr. Byrd, 38, referring to the official document troops receive upon leaving service. “You do get skills in the military, but people don’t seem to understand that.”
As government and veterans groups work to bring down the high unemployment rate for recent veterans, they are finding a major problem in translating the work of war to peacetime jobs.
In a widely cited recent study of veteran hiring, researchers from the Center for a New American Security, a research organization based in Washington, found that the No. 1 obstacle to hiring veterans was matching military skills with civilian work. read more>>>
Didn't send your kid to war?
Well what do ya know, a novel idea from a citizen of the country served, told to go shopping with the tax cuts and rubber stamped funding, all borrowed and off the books till the now executive branch, for both present wars and years of occupations, wonder why the country and their representatives in congress as well as state legislatures never thought of it before!! Not only the past decade but those prior to, but especially the past one and still counting into the next!!
5 July 2012 - If you have military-age children who have not served in this decade's wars, then you owe a debt — meaning money — to those who did. That's the premise of a new fundraising effort by three wealthy American families who want to help U.S. veterans of the conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan.
Every non-military family should give something, they said. The affluent should give large sums. No one should think of it as charity, but rather a moral obligation, an alternative way to serve, perhaps the price of being spared the anxiety that comes with having a loved one in a war zone.
"We have three able-bodied, wonderful, wonderful children, all of whom are devoted to doing very, very good things around social justice; and we could not be more proud of them," said Philip Green, a local businessman who devised the fundraising idea. "We're also delighted that none of them had to serve in Iraq or Afghanistan."
Green says he and his wife came to look at that as unfair: read more>>>
Yep!! It's called 'Sacrifice', by the whole country served, which hasn't been done by the country since Korea, rather the Veteran is Ignored, think PTS, think Agent Orange, think Gulf War Syndrome for just a few and can be found on issues from these two wars already and throughout both!!!
By the way, I didn't say, above, that the statements from this wealthy individual made much sense, especially as to his and his neighbors and friends kids. Just said it was a 'novel' idea and you would think much more would have thought of it, like the whole magnetic signs, lapel flag pins, flag wavin super patriotic country, but alas we didn't get that with Vietnam neither, nor did the Desert Storm soldiers!!
'I've Never Claimed To Be A Hero'
07/06/2012 - Democratic House candidate Tammy Duckworth responded to attacks by opponent Rep. Joe Walsh (R-Ill.) on Friday, telling MSNBC's Michael Smerconish that she "never claimed to be a hero" and that Walsh's charges were "irresponsible."
During an appearance on "Hardball," Duckworth, a double amputee veteran of the Iraq War, said that Walsh's suggestion that she wasn't a "true hero" because she addresses her military service during campaign events is an unfair, although not unfamiliar, line of attack.
"This is not the first time he's attacked my military service," Duckworth said of the Tea Party-backed congressman. "I've never claimed to be a hero. The heroes are walking point in Afghanistan or laying in their hospital beds at Walter Reed right now. It's unfortunate he chooses to go down this route, but it's typical of his irresponsible way of conducting himself, and it's just not appropriate for a member of Congress." read more>>>
And of course who should come to the rescue of a scumbag like walsh, for that's the 'patriotic' that they do!
7 July 2012 - Fox News contributor Laura Ingraham lent Rep. Joe Walsh (R-IL) a helping hand as the congressman sought to do damage control on his recent attack on wounded veteran Tammy Duckworth.During a July 1 campaign speech, Walsh claimed that Duckworth, his opponent, was unlike "our true heroes" because her military service is "all she talks about": read more>>>
And their flock eat it up, including some veterans who are easily swayed in that phony 'support' they preach and only means for those who walk in lockstep behind them!!
March 30 2012 - Joe Walsh, who never served in the military, is running against Tammy Duckworth, decorated combat veteran who lost both legs as an Apache pilot in Iraq in 2004. Walsh has denegrated Duckworth’s service, not unusual for what we call a “chickenhawk,” but is best noted for the following video: read more>>>
New Homes for Veterans in California Sit Empty
Welcome once again, DeJa-Vu all over, to the Country that just loves "Support the Troops" cheap symbols and them same words that flow out, as cheap as the politicians, strong on national defense so they claim for their defense industry controllers huge benefits, lapel flag pins. Who really hate bearing their own "Sacrifice" after they cheer on the wars, and long occupations of others, they send others into. And when those sent return they quickly ignore, costs too much as to the results as to what the next decades bring, let alone even pay for the wars they were sent into, hint: added to the deficits from rubber stamped fully borrowed billions, no bid private contracts, buying coalitions, upon billions upon billions!
This isn't only happening in California, at least they tried, and once again DeJa-Vu, it's all over this Country and on many issues related to the veterans. There are a few, real minority numbers within the huge majority of this society, who do understand and really try to make up for the Countries, mostly in the federal but also each state, total lack of responsibility, apathy, as their representatives, federal and state, lay blame on the Agencies, to fully fund for those coming decades as they have failed for the previous decades!
7 July 2012 - Two years ago, 64-year-old Air Force veteran Cheryl Stewart began gathering books and blankets to donate to a state-run nursing home for veterans, which was scheduled to open this spring.
But though it finished building the 300-bed facility in April, the California Department of Veterans Affairs said this week the state budget crunch means no veterans will be able to move into the Fresno veterans home until October 2013, more than a year from now. The same is true for a new 150-bed facility in Redding that the department recently finished building, said Jaime Arteaga, a spokesman for the agency.
“Right now, they're just empty buildings. They don’t even have furniture,” Arteaga said, “so we are running the air conditioner, running water through the pipes, maintaining the grounds and making sure that everything is in good repair.”
The state budget signed last week by Gov. Jerry Brown sets aside $4.2 million to operate the homes over the next year, enough money to “ramp up” staffing, Arteaga said, but not enough to serve any residents.
Those funds are in addition to the $280,000 a month the agency spends simply to keep the homes from falling into disrepair while the buildings sit vacant.
snip “These are Vietnam, Korean and World War II veterans,” she said. “We signed on the dotted line to do anything for our country including giving up our life, and they promised us health care for the rest of our lives, but they don’t take care of us.” read more>>>
And same country, at least those who will attend, just love those flag wavin for a few hours events, they think those along with the wars and everything else come free of charge, makes them feel all patriotic inside!
7 Temmuz 2012 Cumartesi
Big Dip in Veterans Unemployment in June 2012
Jul 6, 2012 - The jobless rate for Iraq and Afghanistan veterans fell dramatically in June despite an overall economy that produced few jobs and left the national unemployed rate unchanged.
The unemployment rate for Iraq- and Afghanistan-era veterans fell to 9.5 percent, down from 12.7 percent the previous month and from 13.3 percent in June 2011, according to the employment situation report released Friday by the Labor Department’s Bureau of Labor Statistics.
For veterans of all generations, the June jobless rate was 7.4 percent, a slight improvement over the 7.8 percent rate for May.
The national unemployment rate remains 8.2 percent in a sour economy that produced just 80,000 jobs last month.
snip More programs are coming.
More than 25,000 unemployed veterans, aged 35 to 60, have signed up to take part in the first phase of a two-year job training program, the Veterans Reemployment Assistance Program or VRAP, that provides one year of monthly GI Bill benefits to those enrolled in education or vocational training programs that should qualify them at the end for a job in a high-demand skills.
There is still room in the program, which can sign up 45,000 veterans now and another 54,000 veterans beginning in October. read more>>>
No matter what group takes a dip in employment, especially these veterans and this past decade plus though, be they veterans, manufacturing, even lower wage, and shouldn't be, service sector employee's, across the economic job sectors, brings with the ability to boost their communities needs. Thus real business personal hire with the rise in those needs, unlike the reagan capitalist, who are supposed to according to their new capitalist mantra, continue hoarding any monetary gains and force the workers they have to work harder while complaining, or are used by the media and those of same ideology in same, they don't know what Washington will do so they don't hire in their business needs until frankly it might be to late and they've lost customers or services etc..
Thousands of veterans sign up
Jul 05, 2012 - Unemployed veterans may be heading back to school in mass under a federal program to get out-of-work veterans trained and back in the job market.
Officials at the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs say there has been an enormous response to a new skills-based program that pays for up to a year of education toward an associate degree or a non-college-degree or certificate.
In fewer than seven weeks since the VA began accepting applications for the Veteran Retraining Assistance Program (VRAP), 27,080 unemployed veterans have applied.
That’s more than half the maximum amount the VRAP program will allow in its first year, VA spokesman Randal Noller said this week. read more>>>
Veterans excel on another front
6 July 2012 - As a staff sergeant in the Marines, Branden Gray received two Purple Hearts for wounds suffered in Iraq and Afghanistan. In Baghdad, a 7-year-old boy he thought wanted a Snickers candy bar stabbed him in the back. During a raid in Afghanistan, a piece of shrapnel from an improvised bomb severed an artery in his right leg.
"I was in a medically induced coma for a while,” Gray said. “I woke up one day thinking I was in still in Afghanistan, but I heard German voices. I was in a hospital in Germany.” He later was moved stateside to a hospital in Dallas.
After recuperating and fulfilling his four-year contract, Gray, 25, worked on earning his bachelor’s degree in psychology from Columbia College. But he yearned for a job with the pace he was accustomed to in the special forces of the Marine Corps.
So he joined an elite U.S. Forest Service firefighting crew called the Laguna Hot Shots based in Descanso, Calif., near San Diego. The Hot Shots are friendly rivals of the Smoke Jumpers in fighting wildfires — “the best of the best,” said Gray. read more>>>
'I've Never Claimed To Be A Hero'
During an appearance on "Hardball," Duckworth, a double amputee veteran of the Iraq War, said that Walsh's suggestion that she wasn't a "true hero" because she addresses her military service during campaign events is an unfair, although not unfamiliar, line of attack.
And of course who should come to the rescue of a scumbag like walsh, for that's the 'patriotic' that they do!
7 July 2012 - Fox News contributor Laura Ingraham lent Rep. Joe Walsh (R-IL) a helping hand as the congressman sought to do damage control on his recent attack on wounded veteran Tammy Duckworth.During a July 1 campaign speech, Walsh claimed that Duckworth, his opponent, was unlike "our true heroes" because her military service is "all she talks about": read more>>>
And their flock eat it up, including some veterans who are easily swayed in that phony 'support' they preach and only means for those who walk in lockstep behind them!!
March 30 2012 - Joe Walsh, who never served in the military, is running against Tammy Duckworth, decorated combat veteran who lost both legs as an Apache pilot in Iraq in 2004. Walsh has denegrated Duckworth’s service, not unusual for what we call a “chickenhawk,” but is best noted for the following video: read more>>>
AmeriCorps has Our “6”
07.02.2012 - In continuing collaboration with the Got Your 6 campaign, the Corporation for National and Community Service has announced an expanded commitment to support veterans and military families at the community level with new grants awarded last week to ten organizations and more than twenty-five sub-grantees that will support more than 1,000 new AmeriCorps and AmeriCorps VISTA members dedicated to serving veterans and military families in the Got Your 6 six pillars.
From expanded grants to increased “people power” at organizations that serve them, CNCS is the federal agency that leads President Obamas National Call to Service and has made the largest investment to date in funding local non-profits and state organizations with national service solutions for veterans and their families. In making the announcement at the National Conference on Volunteering and Service, the new CEO, Wendy Spencer punctuated her remarks with the growing call to action – “With this unprecedented investment, we definitely got your 6!”
These efforts will include serious multi-year investments in each of the Got Your 6 pillars: read more>>>
5 Temmuz 2012 Perşembe
Women and the Military
2 July 2012 - The Fourth of July is just a few short days away, it's a time to reflect on and celebrate those who have served our country. It's also a time to look back on all the sacrifices made.
War and fighting for what you believe in have been around for hundreds of years..the styles and the way soldiers fight has changed…and so have the people who fight in them.
Women are not always seen as a crucial part.
However over the years, females have acquired different positions, working their way up the military ladder, but there are still a few jobs women are still not allowed to fill.
Whether it was nursing the injured, cooking for the troops or picking up the responsibilities left behind by a fallen husband…women have served in the military in some way, shape or form since the year 1775…during the American Revolutionary War, and they still are today.
According to 2010 data…there are roughly 2.6 million people enlisted and serving in the military…women make up roughly 20 percent of thatThere are 23-thousand serving in Minnesota and 15 thousand from Iowa. read more>>>
641 Mile Journey for the Wounded Warrior Project
Country Must 'Sacrifice' not just Individuals or Groups Within nor Just Non Profits Fighting for Donations!
06.28.2012 - Thursday morning, five men, who call themselves brothers, equipped with American flag running shorts started their 641 mile journey.
"You just have to think about the men and women who would love to be able to run again that would trade position with us any day," said Marine veteran Corporal Rick Geslain. "The least we can do is run for their cause."
"I'm willing to run 641 miles for my brothers," said Marine veteran Corporal Jose Isa. "For any of the servicemen thinking that people aren't out there to help, I hope they see us. We are out there to help."
Geslain and Isa along with fellow Marine veterans Cpl. Doug Meyer, Cpl. Joshua Miller and Private Anthony Caponiare are running from the Grand Strand to Ground Zero, raising money for the Wounded Warrior Project. The foundation raises awareness and aids servicemen wounded during war and who are now in need.
The five will rotate who runs while an RV carrying the others follows closely behind.
Each of the men, except Caponiare, served in the Marine Corps overseas during the recent wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. Fortunately, they all came back in good physical health to be able to run the journey. read more>>>
The new 'magnetic ribbons' the 'parades', with no demand for sacrifice get same results, but 'parades' only last a few hours on one day! Think 'Desert Storm' and 'Gulf War Syndrome', Ignored till recently, finally, after the 'Parades'!Have the 'Welcome Home Parades' but at each the one word that should be spoke and on the minds of All, 'Sacrifice', Demand It, You Owe It!
No Revenues = Still No Sacrifice = That's Called 'Support' For The Troops = DeJa-Vu all over again!!
Now a decade and counting, told to go shopping, use patriotic meme's and symbols of support and wave them flags, added to the previous decades of under funding the VA, while the peoples reps Still try and lay blame on the Agency, after rubber stamping wars and costs of and those represented cheer on these wars!
While the wealthy and other investors garner their booty, still, from both and many have the chutz·pa to call themselves more patriotic{?} then others wrapped in those false flags, using false slogans and various cheap symbols of and then seek one day events or parades to wave all that patriotism, call it "Supporting the Troops", then go home and either ignore or forget about those that actually sacrificed for the country!
Employment: Try being a veteran
Part of the many problems causing the slow economic growth were the two wars to begin with, still yet paid for, rubber stamped costs and all borrowed and off the books till the present executive administration, and especially neither are the now decades long results from. Abandoning the Main Mission for why soldiers were sent into the region, as well as the promises once again of the country to the Afghan people. Another is the reagan capitalists hoarding their multi millions to billions, some would rather hand out multi millions to political candidates, who sold the new capitalism on the idea they would invest in economic growth, trickle down instead of up, which they also sell as to them not paying a fair share in taxes and wanting that even lower as their wealth grows and the productive labor that produces that wealth falls in sharing of. Another is blocking public funding investing in economic growth which, in partnership with private, was how we grew what we once had and others envied. And yet another is those that envied once now have our the trades and innovations from as that's where economic growth industries is where the reagan capitalist actually do invest when they do. One more of many is the almost total misunderstanding, experienced civilian workers run into same, of the many tools of experience a veteran from the self sustaining military brings to jobs applied for by those charged with hiring.
For young, male service members who enlisted after 9/11, the jobless rate is almost four times higher than the national average.
2 July 2012 - Christopher Wiers did two tours in Iraq with the Marine Corp. He got out in 2006. Finding a job since then has been, as he says, "absolutely a challenge."
Wiers was blown out of his Humvee by an IED in Iraq. Among his injuries: Two fractured vertebrae, broken left arm, and severe nerve damage from his right shoulder, so his right arm is paralyzed.
Listen to the Report "I can’t really do as much as lot of people anymore," said Wiers, who just finished his associate's degree and will start his bachelor's soon. "Just finding employers that would actually hire someone that’s not going to be able to perform as good as someone else is a bit difficult.
Wiers is 28. Among veterans his age, the jobless rate is 30 percent. Right now, the national unemployment rate is about eight percent.
Like Wiers, members of the military coming home these day have a much higher rate of service-related injuries than in past conflicts.
That’s one reason why it is hard for veterans to find work. read more>>>
Didn't send your kid to war?
Well what do ya know, a novel idea from a citizen of the country served, told to go shopping with the tax cuts and rubber stamped funding, all borrowed and off the books till the now executive branch, for both present wars and years of occupations, wonder why the country and their representatives in congress as well as state legislatures never thought of it before!! Not only the past decade but those prior to, but especially the past one and still counting into the next!!
Every non-military family should give something, they said. The affluent should give large sums. No one should think of it as charity, but rather a moral obligation, an alternative way to serve, perhaps the price of being spared the anxiety that comes with having a loved one in a war zone.
"We have three able-bodied, wonderful, wonderful children, all of whom are devoted to doing very, very good things around social justice; and we could not be more proud of them," said Philip Green, a local businessman who devised the fundraising idea. "We're also delighted that none of them had to serve in Iraq or Afghanistan."
Green says he and his wife came to look at that as unfair: read more>>>
Yep!! It's called 'Sacrifice', by the whole country served, which hasn't been done by the country since Korea, rather the Veteran is Ignored, think PTS, think Agent Orange, think Gulf War Syndrome for just a few and can be found on issues from these two wars already and throughout both!!!
By the way, I didn't say, above, that the statements from this wealthy individual made much sense, especially as to his and his neighbors and friends kids. Just said it was a 'novel' idea and you would think much more would have thought of it, like the whole magnetic signs, lapel flag pins, flag wavin super patriotic country, but alas we didn't get that with Vietnam neither, nor did the Desert Storm soldiers!!
Solar and Jobless Veterans
July 4, 2012 - The U.S. Solar Institute, a Fort Lauderdale school, has been chosen by the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs to train former military service members without jobs in how to install solar-panel systems.
An initial 15 to 20 veterans a month from across the country are expected at the school starting in August for classes that can be completed in several weeks and on-the-job training that can last weeks longer, said Ray Johnson, the institute's founder and president.
The Institute plans to expand from its current 6,700-square-foot building serving about 30 students a month to meet demand from the Veterans Administration program aimed to help jobless veterans.
"We're almost all sold out in August and haven't even started advertising yet," Johnson said.
The approval comes as theU.S. militaryplans to expand its use of renewable energy to 25 percent of its energy needs by 2025, part of a policy to slash U.S. dependence on imported fuel and boost national security. Veterans could help install solar panels at military bases as part of that plan, Johnson said. read more>>>