Representatives From Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America – 12/31/2008

Pretty cool:

Paul and 50 Vets give the

Representatives From Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America – 12/31/2008
Representatives From Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America Ring the NASDAQ Stock Market Opening Bell

He Gets Back Up – Gets Knocked Down Again

They keep dropping.  Even when they get back up, they drop again:

via Safavian found guilty in retrial (12/19/08) — www.GovernmentExecutive.com.

For the second time in three years, a jury has convicted David Safavian, the Bush administration’s former top procurement official, of lying about his relationship with disgraced lobbyist Jack Abramoff.

Equality for Some

was once said to be equality for none…

But I guess that when religion gets in the room then something’s got to give – even common sense or fairness.

Sad.

IT guru & Whistleblower Mike Connell dies in plane crash

This isn’t suspicious AT all:

The Raw Story | Karl Roves IT guru Mike Connell dies in plane crash
“Since early this decade, top Internet ‘gurus’ in Ohio have been coordinating web services with their GOP counterparts in Chattanooga, wiring up a major hub that in 2004, first served as a conduit for Ohio’s live election night results,” researchers at ePluribus Media wrote.

A few months after this revelation, when a scandal erupted surrounding the firing of US Attorneys for reasons of White House policy, other researchers found that the gwb43 domain used by members of the White House staff to evade freedom of information laws by sending emails outside of official White House channels was hosted on those same SmarTech servers.

Given that the Bush White House used SmarTech servers to send and receive email, the use of one of those servers in tabulating Ohio’s election returns has raised eyebrows. Ohio gave Bush the decisive margin in the Electoral College to secure his reelection in 2004.

I mean – I’m just sayin’…

Bettie Page dies

The world is less pretty today:  BBC NEWS | Americas | 50s pin-up queen Bettie Page dies

50s pin-up queen Bettie Page dies

Page was one of the most photographed women of her time

Bettie Page, one of the most famous US pin-up models of the 1950s, has died in Los Angeles, aged 85.

Her provocative poses – often in bikinis – made her a cult figure and she was one of the first models to appear in Playboy magazine.

Wounds That Can’t Be Seen

Friend and supporter Madame Ferrell passed this story on from NPR:  Iraq Veteran Suffers Wounds That Can’t Be Seen : NPR  and the whole thing needs to be read.  As the casualty rate continues to climb among our deployed troops, this is the story that has to happen more often than we all know – where a Mom has to try to deal with her son or daughter’s combat issues from a remove.  We’d like to think that no one knows our child better than ourselves. In some cases this might be true – and there are plenty of parents fighting the system after accurately observing major changes in their kid.  At other times though – the child has changed to such a degree in the military that it may be hard to see where the life change stops and the combat change starts.  I work with a military health care professional, one that has had charge of probably thousands of young men and women when they were hurt, injured, and vulnerable. After watching her work up close I’ve no doubt that she did great things for most of them. But when her own son suffered in Iraq she was powerless to do much but encourage his caregivers and be on the receiving side of the phone call when he does call. Mom can’t help him with all this, she said to me one day. 

But that leads me back to the story and John Blaufus’ initial tragedy.  I was talking to CPT Murphy the other day and we both compared how we’d been shaped by strong men in the Army. For myself, I was raised mostly by my really heroic Mom (don’t get me going!) but can look back now and see course corrections in my life path that could have been applied by a more-present Dad.  But when I got into the Army – it really started with SSG Don Hollinger and 1SG Robert Griffin in the Texas National Guard – I was constantly guided and shaped by people that only became more important to me through life.  That continues to this day.  And we agreed that for many the Army or the Armed Services can provide the father-figure or big brother that is absent in many people’s life today.  Murphy and I each allowed as to how positive an affect this can have on a person’s life and that it could even be considered an enlistment bonus for some.  But when this figure is torn away from a Soldier, at close range, in a mess of chaos and grit, it can be shockingly devastating: 

“When I got to Ft. Lewis, my duty station, I met Staff Sgt. Julian Melo. He was just really like a father to me,” Blaufus says with a sigh. “We really relied on each other.”

Another friend of mine had his first sergeant shot out from underneath him in a HMMWV.  Even though my friend has been injured and wounded several times since then (he was hurt that day too) and still struggles with many, many injuries and effects from his several deployments, the single regret he expresses is the loss of his friend, compatriot, mentor, and ultimately – father-figure.  And that leaves a chink in his otherwise very closed armor that won’t be covered anytime soon. 

Uncle Ted on TV

News 10 Interviews: Col. Ted Martin

COL Martin dodges some questions but makes a decent report.  I know that he hates doing these things but he did a great job at it.

Blood Donor Rules

A local volunteer wrote this to the Killeen Daily Herald:

Blood donor rules need to be adjusted
To the Editor:
I saw in today’s (Nov. 25) paper that Scott & White was having another blood drive. When I came back from Germany in 1992 I gave blood regularly at the Scott & White hospital blood bank. Everything was fine. I never heard of anyone getting mad cow disease from my giving blood.
Then the government got the bright idea that if you lived in Europe during the time I was there, you could no longer give blood because of mad cow disease. There was no proof that you could get Mad Cow disease from a blood transfusion.
I also thought that your body continuously replaced your blood. If this is true, then the ban should be lifted after a certain number of months or years after you return. With this ban in place, the population that is eligible to give blood is greatly limited because of the number of military that have served overseas.
With the upcoming holidays, the demand for blood is greatly increased. This situation would be greatly reduced if someone in the government used some common sense … cancel this ban or at least change some of the restrictions. It could be the difference of life or death during emergencies due to low blood supplies.

So I wrote this back:

To the Editor;
Ms. De Weerd made some excellent points in her letter about blood donation but missed an important reason that people who visited Europe during certain times are deferred from donating.  The deferral was put in place because of the risk of Bovine Spongiform Encepholapathy (BSE) and its relation to variant Creuzfeld Jacob Disease (vCJD).  Although scientists are sure about the relationship, the exact time periods are not known.  In December 2003, an English person died of vCJD more than seven years after receiving a blood transfusion from a person that would die three years later. 

Regardless, the FDA rules are in place and not likely to be lifted soon so it is important for people that are eligible to donate blood do so. Only about 3-5 per cent of the eligible donors in America do donate, leaving both community and national blood centers short of blood especially at critical times like the holidays.  If even ten per cent of the eligible donors in America did so there’d be little problem.  People that are deferred can help by spreading the word, setting up blood drives, and encouraging others to give.  In this area, both Scott and White and Fort Hood, as well as Carter Blood Care from Waco operate blood drives and all three need a hand in this busy holiday season.