My wife and I strolled downtown this evening to absorb the wonderful summer evening La Placita Cinema. We met in La Placita 3 decades ago, so it is always a special experience for us. The movie “Mr Smith Goes To Washington” was the billing tonight, creating a fascinating backdrop to the pre-show activities of the Tea Party folks.
I am not impressed with these thugs. I understand they were there to mess with Congresswoman Giffords, who wisely did not grace this cacophonous group of self appointed narcissistic patriots, with her presence.
The individual with the sign reading; ” 1 Black Pres Leads U.S. Into Slavery,” is right on the edge of a hate crime. Not one of these folks would make it one day in my mans Marine Corps. The subconscious bigotry is leaking out of their pores, and their tactics are nearing laws that address the inciting of a riot. The conversations I overheard were at the 2 digit IQ level. Their blatant, in your face, interruptions and rudeness to the classy movie crowd were nearly intolerable. Kudos to the movie fans who booed them to oblivion.
Curiously the movie starring Jimmy Stewart is chock full of courtesies, and a reverence for the process of government, even when in disagreement. The movie ends with a showing of potency that lends a message to this transitory movement known as Tea Party.
The fact that this extremist movement, along with its partners at Freedom Works, are funded by Swift Boat like 527’s tells you how easily it is to lead the masses. That is the scary part.
Too bad none of them stayed to watch Mr. Smith Goes to Washington. I suppose it did not have enough fuel for their aberrant needs. God Bless America. ONE– Nation under God.
All posts by Michael Brewer
The New GI Bill
Combat can be complicated. Paying for college when you get home shouldn’t be.
Effective August 1, 2008, our military has a new GI Bill for servicemen and veterans, including reservists, who have served at least 90 days combat duty since 9/11.
Now that bill is going into effect, there are lots of questions and the VA’s system to claim GI Bill benefits is complicated.
IAVA wants to make sure all veterans know how to maximize their new benefits. That’s why they’ve launched a public outreach campaign anchored by the innovative website, www.NewGIBill.org.
IAVA intends to follow up with more updates on applying for the benefits.
Spin Codes on Veterans DD-214
Back in March of 1976 a lawsuit was filed in the US District Court, Northern District of New York. A veteran named Edwin Cosby discovered that he even though he had an Honorable Discharge he had a derogatory spin code in his separation papers known as the DD-214.
Virtually unknown to all veterans of Armed Forces, the D.O.D. began inserting these descriptive, cryptic codes as far back as June of 1956. Instruction Memo 1336.3 ordered the military departments to insert a coded number on the documents used for employment references.
In 1974 the D.O.D testified at a Congressional hearing that only a couple hundred thousand documents had a code number and that the Spin coding system would be abolished. That never happened and by 1977 over 20 million veterans with Honorable Discharges had a spin coded number which they were never aware of and mostly likely are not to this day.
Congress attempted to pass a law regarding the use of spin codes, yet all proposed legislation has failed. Big Brother is alive and well.
The use of these codes can seriously hamper the veterans efforts to find gainful employment, obtain a loan, or procure insurance. Banks, life insurance companies, State and Federal agencies, and major corporations use these codes. Lists of the codes have been sent to Federal Aviation Administration, Housing and Urban Development and the Office of Personnel Management.
And we are worried about socialism!
Veterans can, however, ask to have spin codes removed from their DD-214.
To examine a list of the codes go to “http:www.landscaper.net/discharge.htm” or visit “http://veterancourtcodes.com”
The Power, the Force and the Love of the Patriot Guard Riders
So again I say, make a friend of a Patriot Guard Rider, and you have a pal for life. Semper Fi men!
Subject: Update on The Michael Gares Military Honors Flag pony express to Florida
At 31 Jul 2009 4:34 PM a message was posted to a thread you were tracking.
RE: CA needs your help
by Old School
Well folks here is the schedule I have set up so far for ARIZONA. I received word from Ca that we are on for Tuesday. Times are approximate.
All times are on Tuesday 4 Aug.
Anyone wanting to ride with me to Ehrenberg Tues morning, I’m leaving from the Pilot south of I-10 on 99th Ave at approximately 1000 hours. Want to get there early so we can cool off and rest up for trip back. Don’t want this to turn into an Iron Butt run and need to keep it respectful by not pushing it. So we will be stopping more often and also want as many as we can to be able to carry the flag. Questions or comments give me a call or email me………
1300. Obtain flag from CA folks at the Flying J in Ehrenberg. Its just inside the AZ side of the border with Ca., on the south side of the freeway. Will leave approx 1330.
1545 arrive the Pilot south of I-10 at MP 133, 99th Ave. We may stop at a rest stop between Ehrenberg and Avondale. There are a couple, depends on how things are going. Depart 99th Ave at approximately 1615.
1745 arrive Pilot Truck Stop/Iron Skillet Restaurant, MP 200 Casa Grande. Depart at approximately 1800 hours.
Arrive Marana, MP 236, Chevron Gas Station at approx 1830 hrs. and hand flag off to Tucson PGR folks. The Flag will remain with Larry B Tuesday night.
Larry B will depart the Houghton Road Park and Ride, MP 275, at 0530 Hours Wed/Aug 5th on its way to New Mexico. Park and ride is on North side of freeway.
T Hank Oase
PGR
Tucson, AZ
—— End of Forwarded Message
Never Again Will One Veteran Leave Another Behind.
The incredible networking skills of the Patriot Guard Riders never cease to amaze me, They are always, and I do mean always there when you need them. This act of compassion by these men and women is good for indulgences in Heaven in my mind. Ride on!
Michael Alan Gares, USMC, Vietnam vet passed away recently in CA. His family lives in Florida and cannot attend his burial. We in CA have a Vets Without Families program where we act as the family for vets that have passed without families for whatever reason. We are burying Michael tomorrow, Wednesday July 29, 2009 at Riverside National Cemetary in Riverside, CA. A PGR brother from PA thought it would be a GREAT idea to hand deliver Mr Gares flag and shell casings from his Military Honors to his daughter in Florida. The idea is for each state between CA and FL to carry the flag across their state and hand off to the next state. HELP!
Here is the beginning of a wonderful journey:
RE: CA needs your help
by hdpgsusnavyvet
OK Arizona PGR, it’s official. The Michael Gares Military Honors Flag pony express to Florida is starting Tuesday August 4. We / the CA PGR will be in Ehrenberg AZ that day about 1 pm at the gas station on the south side of the freeway as outlined in Pat Eagan’s email to pass the package to you. You will be passing off the package to Jack / Roadrunner 847-710-1471 in San Simon, AZ for the New Mexico leg.
Several have asked if I will riding all the way from California to Florida. The concept for this endeavor has always been a ‘pony express'; ride your leg and hand off the package to the next rider(s) / state. I will be riding the first leg from CA to AZ on Tuesday August 4 with many of my SoCal PGR brothers and sisters but I would love to ride to Florida tho if for no other reason than to shake each of your hands and tell you how grateful to and proud of you I am for the noble work that is getting done here insuring that the Military Honors Flag of a USMC Vietnam vet gets to his family as it should . . .
Respectfullly submitted
Buz Sawyer, proud US Navy Vietnam era vet and SoCal PGR member
Ride procedure:
NUMBER ONE. Ride safe and stay hydrated! No illiness or accidents allowed!
2. Communicate with the rider(s) / state ahead of you. Each state will have the state contact ahead of them and should insure every rider has his or her handoff info too.
3. Pick a safe and as well know as possible transfer point to maximize the turnover
4. If you carry the package, sign the plaque
5. Try to stay on schedule
6. When you get home, file a post mission report on your state or region PGR forum about this event so we can track the progress of the package across this fine country
7. If you have any media contacts, let them know what we are doing
8. Flordia is planning a BIG presentation so let’s all do our part to insure this happens
To view the complete thread and reply, please visit: http://www.patriotguard.org/ALLForums/tabid/61/view/topic/postid/1206501/ptarget/1208852/Default.aspx
Veterans Memorial Stadium:Where Did It Go?
Late in 1997, prior to the completion of the Baseball facility known as Tucson Electric Park, it was still officially known as Veterans Memorial Stadium. That is the name that was sold to the voters. That is the name that was promised to the voters of Pima County. That is the name that was used to promote the sale of the bonds and effectuate the taxing mechanism to pay for the joint. That is the name that was used to form an entity known as a Stadium District, which is shorthand for Sports Socialism.
And that is the name; Veterans Memorial Stadium that was surreptitiously removed in the middle of the night, with no voter input, and handed over to Tucson Electric for an amount never to be published.
Now 11 years later with three ‘Dear John’ letters from our spring training mistresses, we have a vacant ballpark and a bankrupt stadium district that had to borrow $6.5 million dollars from the General Fund to simply keep the lights on. Might one of the readers suggest who will be repaying that loan to the taxpayers? True Socialism is more egalitarian and immensely more beneficial to its citizens. Tucson Electric Park, and the structure of the Stadium District could well be defined as tainted sports socialism as it has only benefited a protected class—baseball and its assigns. The power company being one of those assigns.
I was the Executive Director of the Pima County Sports Authority in those days. It was an assignment that I was told by the late Dan Felix would be akin to “bringing peace to the middle east”, as the City and County officials could not even sit in the same room, because of the immense enmity between the municipalities. The promises that were made to the broad base of youth and amateur sports were abound; all to win their hearts and minds for their support of the new stadium. The promises were made by the ruling class- Baseball Spring Training; a prima facie superior entity that imagined itself to be able to perform salvific acts of economic development were we to just allow them to tax RV rentals in Pima County. Had they consulted with the RV folks in advance they may not have expired of terminal sports narcissism. The RV community was insulted at such arrogance and lack of basic courtesy to give them a “heads up” of what was to be a financial mugging. They brought in their in house attorneys from the national association and squelched the plan, leaving the Stadium District without a collateralized revenue stream. All three major league teams knew this and had a sense of angst about Tucson from the very beginning of the first season.
The Veteran community was not sought out either prior to the perfunctory removal of the name Veterans Memorial Stadium.
In the fall of 1997, I was on a goodwill bus tour to Nogales,Az to promote the new stadium. I sat next to the Architect who had the uncomfortable duty of removing the name “Veterans Memorial Stadium” from the blue line architectural building plans. The name was sold to Tucson Electric to help pay the bills. He was deeply embarrassed, as he remembered how proud his father and uncle, both WWll veterans, were of this new project.
I have no beef with naming rights. They are a financially prudent revenue instrument. It is the process that was slimy and a breach of faith to those whose hearts and minds were persuaded to vote for the project known to them as Veterans Stadium.
Insulting Veterans and winter visitors may not be considered good karma. Tucson Electric Park was star crossed from the beginning. From the marginally ethical eminent domain of church property;(Jim Click bailed them out), to the promises to create jobs for South Tucson youth,(not!), its entire history is streaked with operational confabulations and outright PR efforts to marginalize all other sporting entities in Tucson, so as to monopolize the leisure time sports dollar.
Any new Sports Commission that if formed for the sole purpose of saving baseball is a Trojan Horse- then and now. The lip-service they render to other amateur,youth and semi-pro sports is pure poppycock, then and now. Many of the organizers of the newly formed Sports Authority are the same hombres, and they do not have a track record of giving a hoot about anyone but themselves and job security in the industry. Ask them for any prepared documents they have outlining the actual commitments, not plans, they have for supporting “other” sports. You will quickly note how vacant the promise is and the lack of collective will to be anything but a baseball commission. All else is as slick as the public relations department of the power company. I do not blame them however for wanting to salvage their good name.
My informal but broad based demographic poll of Tucson and Pima County residents, is that there is a near zero tolerance for another tax for baseball.
As Doc Holliday once said, “my hypocrisy knows no bounds”. During the City Budget hearings, the hotel industry rolled out their impassioned testimonies about the apocalyptic effects of an increase in bed tax. Yet, they will roll over for baseball. Wassssup?
Now let me qualify this rant. I love baseball. I love its entrenchment in our culture. I was a bat boy for the Cleveland, Indians. I managed a project in Tucson that was owned with Cleveland sports management money gained from baseball players. I was raised playing American Legion Baseball in Dixon, Illinios, the hometown of Ronald Reagan who was a sports announcer and role model for my uncle Bill who also announced baseball. My uncle Bill used to take me to the Cubs games as often as we could get into Chicago. He told me the story of the National Anthem first being sung in a public arena, at the 1918 World Series between the Cubs and the Boston Red Sox, as the whole stadium crowd rose to their feet in honor of WWl veterans. I imagine that day in my mind each time I stand to sing the National Anthem. I am a combat veteran of the United States Marine Corps. We remember things. That is the reason I tell you now of the rudeness of the actions of baseball organizers and their empty promises to our community.
Give us back the name Veteran Memorial Stadium, and you may earn some goodwill.
How Military Serivice Has Changed My Life
Members of the American Legion have many common bonds, and the Legion would like to hear from you about the nature of those common threads. A passion for community service, patriotic voices, and a bent toward caring about national security. From the trenches of France to the sands of Afghanistan we all have a common bond of having served our nation in time of need.
No one who served in the Military comes out unchanged, be it a two year hitch or a 20 year career.
The American Legion wants to know in 200 words or less how your service in the Armed Forces impacted your life. Was it the discipline,the teamwork, the mission oriented life, or simple fellowship that colored your life today.
Send you submissions to’ “myservice@legion.org” or snail mail to;
American Legion Magazine
PO Box 1055
Indianapolis,IN. 46206
We can also have some fun on this post by hearing from our readers about your Military experience. Would you want your children to serve in the Armed Forces?
Update on Agent Orange
I say, God bless the work of VVA and its diligent band of advocates. Without these tireless men and women, the doors may well have never opened for like kind claims.
Institute of Medicine (IOM) releases Agent Orange research results
PRESS RELEASE
VIETNAM VETERANS OF AMERICA
IMMEDIATE RELEASE
July 24, 2009
No. 09-24
Contact:
Mokie Porter
301-996-0901
VVA to VA: Don’t Wait for Us to Die: Grant Association to Agent Orange Exposure For Parkinson’s, Heart Disease, Hypertension
(WASHINGTON, D.C.) – After reviewing scientific studies of the past few years, the Institute of Medicine of the National Academy of Sciences has determined there is “limited or suggestive evidence” of an association between Parkinson’s disease and ischemic heart disease with exposure to Agent Orange.
“We thank the IOM for their efforts and applaud them for their conclusions,” said John Rowan, National President of Vietnam Veterans of America (VVA). “Now, we urge the Secretary of Veterans Affairs to immediately make Vietnam veterans with either of these conditions eligible for disability compensation as well as health care, and we will petition him to do precisely this.
“We also urge the Secretary to reconsider hypertension, which the IOM, in its 2006 report concerning Vietnam veterans and Agent Orange, also found elevated evidence of an association,” Rowan said.
“We do believe that the IOM must focus on what we consider to be the very real association between a veteran’s exposure while serving in Southeast Asia and the birth defects, learning disabilities, and cancers, not only in his children but in his grandchildren as well,” Rowan said. “We continue to get far too many calls from the children of veterans who wonder if their father’s experiences in Vietnam-and along the demilitarized zone in Korea in 1968 and 1969-has any connection with their health issues and now those of their children.
“Let’s not wait until we die, and for our children to be forgotten,” Rowan said. “The time for real action is now.”
More On Lou Gehrigs Disease/ALS/ Widows Benefits
SEE NOTE IN PARAGRAPH 4. In all my years as a Veterans Benefits Counselor, I have never had a experience of fulfillment and joy like the last 72 hours.
The article I posted about the new VA findings regarding the now service-connected aspect of ALS and the consequent benefits that can be gained by the widows, resulted in calls from California, Arkansas, Texas, New York. and Florida from the spouses of now deceased veterans who passed on from Lou Gehrig’s Disease.
The sense of completion and use of talents has never been as rewarding as it has been to direct these women to the proper channels to get those benefits. I am overwhelmed at the power and reach of the Internet. If there are others, I can be reached at 520-808-3907. God speed to the widows.
Notice to all readers. I am a disabled Veteran myself, and have become a bit overwhelmed with the volume of calls to my cell phone. I love helping, but this is a bit much for one ole Marine. I have now answered 144 calls and loved talking to all of you fine folks. Yet I am going to request of any future callers to try the following first, and then call or email me with any problems you may have.
Call the VA line at 1-800-827-1000 and waltz through the voice promptings to Disability Benefits, then hit ‘0’ for an operator and they will answer in your area. Tell them you want a package for widows, DIC benefits for ALS/ Lou Gehrigs’ Disease,and they will get a package to you right away. It is self explanatory. I would then take the claim package to a local American Legion and have them submit it for you, as you then have a local advocate to check on the status your claim.
Should you have problems, you can email me at “pointmanchaplain@aol.com”
God Bless you all. Mike Brewer/USMC
Last Call/ All Hands On Deck for Arizona Combat Veterans
Tomorrow night, Saturday the 25th at Hotel Congress 6-10pm is our benefit concert supporting the Returning Veteran Program at the Merritt Retreat Center. The band “Still Cruisin” accompanied by the “Shere Delites” are performing for us. Veterans are free. Donations accepted for Merritt Center 501-C-3. See “MerrittCenter.org”
What was once known as shell shock and now as Post Traumatic Stress, has come to the foreground in recent years as veterans of war transition to civilian life. We have learned much about this gap of time that can be critical to the quality of life of the veteran. The Merritt Center four week basic training for recovery and healing was designed with great care and compassion by one woman named Betty Merritt.
The Merritt Center and Lodge is a non-profit retreat center in Star Valley, Payson, Az. It was founded in 1987 by Betty for individual or group renewal and empowerment skills. In talking to veteran friends Betty learned that “combat is nasty stuff.’ Her dream was to ease the pain and anguish of these men and women and prevent the self destructive behavior that families witnessed in the Vietnam Veteran who was seldom welcomed in polite company. The program is spread over several months and attempts to provide new structures of self and a release from the traumatic triggers and residual symptoms of combat stress. The staff are all volunteers and provide their services gratis to the vets. From professional therapists to the cooks, everyone is a volunteer. The family like setting and the freedom of the forest creates a perfect, safe setting to simply let go. The validation and trust that comes with a group of vets who all have one thing in common is the source of a level of healing that cannot be found in a traditional setting. Having been involved in the program as a graduate, and now as a Mentor for 3 years, I can attest to the efficacy of this very unique and sacred place.
With a spiritual focus the participants are able to look at what brings them solace as they drop some of the triggers that loop them into the “fight or flight” syndrome, that frequently lead to vocational and marital problems.
While the program was designed for the OEF/OIF and Afghan veteran, it was discovered that there was still some healing to be done in the general veteran population. Which is to say that the participants are coming from all wars. One evening we had 5 wars around the supper table! Where in American history has that ever occurred? It is quite clear that the effects of war are timeless and have no respect for rank or position in life. To have that experience with a band of brothers is simply transforming.
The Returning Veterans Program costs the Merritt Center approximately $150 for each of the 4 weekends. With the help of the volunteers and private donations the retreat remains free to any combat veteran of any war. We hope to keep it that way forever.
There is also a program for Women that will include the wives of the military. The woman’s program just completed their second retreat.
The dates for the Men’ Retreat beginning in 2010 are; January 15-17. March 5-7. May 14-16. July 9-11.
The dates for the Women’s Retreat are: Feb. 5-7. April 16-18. June 4-6. July 30th-Aug 1st.
Call for application at 928-474-4268. or email “betty@merrittcenter.org.”