FIEST OF THE HOLY INNOCENTS COMES EACH DECEMBER 28TH, WILL AMERICA CONTINUE TO MISEDUCATE ITS CHILDREN ABOUT REAL COSTS OF WAR????
By Kevin Stoda, lifelong American Educator and Patriot
I came across this recent article and relevant year-beginning topic on how the U.S. government, the USA military leadership, and Americans in general continue to neglect American veterans--while failing to educate its populace about the real costs of wars.
The articles was in Stars and Stripes and on several NPR news programs. It is entitled, "Brain Wars: How America's Military is Failing its Wounded". It was written/compiled by ProPublica's T. Christian Miller.
A few years back, I wrote a lengthy blog on how the USA always fails its youthful soldiers and then asks the future, current, and older generations to keep paying the costs--over and over. That article was called, " SOME PARENTS OF VETERANS COMING HOME FROM IRAQ AND AFGHANISTAN ARE HAVING TO GIVE UP RETIREMENT TO TAKE CARE OF THEIR BRAVE OFFSPRING ."
My piece was originally a four part piece that I spliced together to create a sense of connectedness--where I, as a lifelong educator--have found society, media, and schools--and even America's AARP--failing to connect issues properly as costs and burdens of war incapacitate my homeland.
As part of the run-up-to the annual FEAST OF THE HOLY INNOCENTS (December 28), I will reprint the 4 parts in more bite-size pieces. Then I will ask you if things have improved or gotten worse over the past 2 1/2 years, America!
If you do not know what Childermas or the Feast of the Holy Innocents is, just recall that at the time of Jesus' birth day--as these legends and the Bible note--there were killed 2000-plus children and babies by one King Herod and his military lackeys in and around the town of Bethlehem in Judea.
The day of December 28 is when the mass is under taken and it is a good day to march around military bases and ask soldiers and their family to rethink their life choices. As Americans are part of a tribal family, we need to reflect and educate ourselves to think differently.
This becomes more-and-more pertinent as there has been a war on good educators for the last few decades. (I reveal part of this story in my own biography, but it will revealed in coming weeks as school districts lay off teachers to pay for our war-economy again in 2011.)
LESSON I: AARP ARTICLE ON VETS & STATUS OF FAMILIES 2008
In one 2008 from American
Association of Retired Persons (AARP) on the burdens that veteran victims of
war are importing home to their families, the author, Barry Yeoman, notes that
it is "estimated 10,000 recent veterans of these conflicts now depend on
their parents for their care. Working unheralded, these parents have quit jobs,
shelved retirement plans, and relocated so they can be with their injured sons
and daughters. Many have become warriors themselves, fighting to make sure this
new wave of injured veterans gets the medical care and rehabilitation it
needs."
In this main human interest tale--which introduced the topic of war burdens
falling back on the older generations of America--the AARP author shares the
frustrating tale of a women name Cynthia and her son.
In the AARP
piece, it was noted that the main
character's son had entered the military only because in the two years prior
this signing-up, the economy in her family's region of the USA was doing
so poorly, i.e. jobs were lacking, the young man had little choice.
I understand this.
My own brother
joined the navy during the Reagan recessions of the 1980s.
On the other, I came to understand decades ago how many American young
unemployed (or underemployed young Americans) will be coming home from America's endless wars injured -"and
often injured for the long-term.
I also wonder how many of those still entering national military service in
2010-2011 will feel that between (1) joblessness, (2) entering the U.S.
military or (3) joining its private military contractor, signing the
recruiter's paperwork is a no-brainer?
In short,
acceptance of a bad American economic system seems to be teaching American
youth that they have no option but to die or suffer, like the infamous Lt. Dan
in the movie FORREST GUMP.
LESSON II: MANY, MANY, MANY ARE COMING HOME NOW--INJURED
The AARP article (mentioned above) stated, the "Theater
Hospital in Balad, Iraq,
has [or had] a 96 percent chance of survival. He or she can sometimes be
stateside within 36 hours of the injury. As a result, there are just 6 deaths
for every 100 injuries in Iraq
and Afghanistan, compared
with 28 deaths per 100 in Vietnam,
and 38 in World War II, according to Linda Bilmes, a researcher at Harvard University's Kennedy School of
Government."
This means that many more vets will be making it home alive-albeit in bad
condition in the hot wars America
has volunteered to send its sons and daughters into this decade-and for decades
to come according to Republican leadership in the White House and in Sen. John
McCain's camp.
A lot of American and international press have shown interest in recent weeks as
to the topic of how many mental and brain related injuries Americans will have
suffered since 2001, i.e. till all the troops come home, i.e. after all
the Wars on Terror end in Afghanistan or
wherever. In April 2008, the RAND corporation
put out a monograph on psychological problems cause by armed conflict. One
recent document was entitled Invisible Wounds of War," Rand
Center for Military Health Policy Research, 2008.
That RAND monograph declared, "Since October 2001, approximately 1.64 million U.S. troops have been deployed for Operations Enduring Freedom and Iraqi Freedom (OEF/OIF) in Afghanistan and Iraq. Early evidence suggests that the psychological toll of these deployments - many involving prolonged exposure to combat-related stress over multiple rotations - may be disproportionately high compared with the physical injuries of combat. In the face of mounting public concern over post-deployment health care issues confronting OEF/OIF veterans, several task forces, independent review groups, and a Presidential Commission have been convened to examine the care of the war wounded and make recommendations. Concerns have been most recently centered on two combat-related injuries in particular: post-traumatic stress disorder and traumatic brain injury. With the increasing incidence of suicide and suicide attempts among returning veterans, concern about depression is also on the rise."
In 2008 that
was the case. Since 2009, President Barack Obama has upped-the-anti (overall
cost to Americans and other victims of war) by increasing the USA commitment in
Afghanistan
Meanwhile, there are other long lasting physical wounds from these Wars on
Terror that will become--if they aren't already-- the main cause of stress for
families and the soldier's care-givers for decades to come. There are paralyzed
veterans. There are those who have lost eyes and limbs-not to mention certain
potential job prospects and earnings in certain areas of the global and US
economy.
LESSON III: JOHNNY COMES MARCHING HOME should be Required
in USA Schools
As many young people did during the Vietnam War-era, I (as I was a high school
student) once picked up the then-classic WHEN JOHNNY GETS HIS GONE. JOHNNY
was written by the Coloradan, Dalton Trumbo, who was one of the original 10-blacklisted
writers in Hollywood history.
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