Facts About Our Veterans

[longknife]

by Bouhammer

An interesting graphic about our Veterans @

 

[waltky]

Obama a hawk when it comes to war...

Liberal in domestic issues, Obama a hawk on war
Saturday February 9, 2013 - WASHINGTON - For all of his liberal positions on the environment, taxes and health care, President Barack Obama is a hawk when it comes to the war on terror.

From deadly drones to secret interrogations to withholding evidence in terror lawsuits, Obama's Democratic White House has followed the path of his predecessor, Republican President George W. Bush. The U.S. detention center at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, remains open, despite Obama's pledge to close it, and his administration has pursued leaks of classified information to reporters even more aggressively than Bush's. "They have maintained momentum in a lot of important areas that we were focused on, and they've continued to build in those areas," said Ken Wainstein, the White House homeland security adviser and a top Justice Department lawyer under Bush. "You can see an appreciation for the severity of the threat, the need to stand up to it, and the need to go on offense at times."

President Barack Obama with Army Lt. Col. Ed Taylor at Observation Point Ouellette in the Demilitarized Zone during a visit to South Korea in March 2012. For all of his liberal positions on the environment, taxes and health care, Obama is also seen as a hawk when it comes to the war on terror.

John Brennan's confirmation hearing this week to be CIA director showed just how much Washington - and especially Democrats - has come to accept the same counterterrorism policies that drew such furor in the first years after the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001. Brennan refused to call waterboarding a form of torture but called it "reprehensible" and, if CIA director, said he would not allow it. He also said he didn't know whether any valuable information was gleaned as a result. His more than three hours of testimony was received by a mostly friendly panel of senators, and his confirmation is expected to move forward soon. In October 2007, by contrast, Bush's attorney general nominee, Judge Michael Mukasey, called waterboarding "repugnant" but also refused to say whether it was torture. His confirmation was delayed for three weeks and nearly derailed. No one expects Brennan not to be confirmed.

White House spokesman Tommy Vietor said Obama has stopped or softened a number of Bush's security tactics, including ending harsh interrogations, closing secret prisons and, overall, trying to be more transparent about counterterror policy. But he noted that Obama has delivered on his campaign promises to kill or capture Osama bin Laden, take the battle to al-Qaida in Pakistan and Yemen before its members can attack the U.S., and to end the war in Iraq. "Yes, we're still fighting al-Qaida, but I think there are very few people who would take issue with that," Vietor said Friday. "This president does what he says he's going to do, and I think that's noticed around the world."

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New push is on to give 200,000 Reserve retirees veteran status
February 7, 2013 - Lt. Cmdr. Jack Townsend, a Navy Reserve retiree in Richmond, Va., first became aware a decade ago that he wasn’t considered a military “veteran” under federal law. It’s been bothering him ever since.

Townsend was applying for a job when asked for a copy of his DD Form 214, “Certificate of Release or Discharge from Active Duty,” to prove veteran status. Townsend, who had earned his reserve commission through the U.S. Merchant Marine Academy, didn’t have a DD 214 because he never had served under active duty orders. He did have his Navy Reserve retirement letter to verify 24 years of service. But employers are schooled to ask for the DD 214, proof from a job seeker of veteran status for completing a period of active duty service. “It put me in a bad light,” Townsend said.

Roger Miller, 60, of Denver, Colo., who retired from the Navy Reserve at the same rank also after 24 years, spent six of his years as an Air Force Reserve enlistee, loading cargo on aircraft that others crewed. “I knew that to be classified a veteran you had to have 180 days of continuous active duty, not including basic training or tech school. I finished up tech school at 179 days,” Miller said, just as the Air Force intended.

Non-veteran status didn’t string Miller until years later when he applied for federal civilian positions that fit his experience well in television and mass communications. He couldn’t, however, claim veterans’ preference points and he lost those jobs to former servicemembers with active duty time. “People ask me, ‘Are you a veteran?’ I say well, yeah, I served 24 years in the Reserve so I consider myself a veteran -- even though the government doesn’t.’ That’s my answer to them,” Miller said.

Townsend said it illogical that the law denies Reserve retirees veteran status but they can draw military retirement at age 60, get military health care, shop on base and the Department of Veterans Affairs even finds them eligible for certain benefits including VA guaranteed home loans. “The only thing I’m lacking,” said Townsend, “is the paperwork.” After years of complaints by reserve component retirees, a change to their veteran status may be near. The Military Coalition, an umbrella organization for 34 military associations and veterans’ groups, is restarting a lobbying campaign for the new Congress and will push for passage of a bill to alter the definition of “veteran” for more than 200,000 Reserve and National Guard retirees.

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