Politics turn deadly for veteran and neighbors

I wish I could say this is as bad of a political season as it gets, but it isn't.

There are times when I am at a gathering of people committed to veterans as much as I am, but they make me feel uncomfortable when they start to talk about their political views. There is so much anger in their voices and the hateful words they use convince me that they would probably hate me as well. I walk away from them because their views cannot be reasoned with because they have set their thoughts in stone.

Because I am involved with so many groups, on group email lists, I end up reading what they have to say about this politician or that one no matter how anyone else feels. These are not passive emails. They are overblown rants someone else wrote but hey, it supports their views, so they make sure everyone they know reads it.

Most of the time they are also filled with lies. They just pass them on without ever once making sure what they send is the truth or not as much as they don't make sure what they believe is true or not.

Now we have a Vietnam veteran facing charges for killing two friends when it seems as if they only time they argued was when they were talking about politics. After the debate, this veteran returned to his best friend, the man he shared his pain with after his wife died five years to the day before this shooting.

Vallejo man allegedly shoots friends dead
Justin Berton
October 4, 2012

Residents in a tight-knit Vallejo subdivision knew Martin Hohenegger, 65, as the former Marine, a neighborhood fixture who spent every day hanging out in the garage across the street with his best friend, Mike Scally, 58.

On Wednesday evening, the daily routine turned tragic.

Shortly after the televised presidential debate began at 6 p.m, police said, Hohenegger got into an argument with Scally and another man, Doug Kahley - neighbors said it was possibly over politics - stormed home and returned with a gun, shooting his two friends dead in front of Scally's house.

The front-lawn killings on the 300 block of Foulkstone Way left neighbors in shock Thursday.

"It's insane to think about," said Jamie Dowd, who lives two doors from Scally's garage. "They were so similar."

"I just can't see Martin shooting anyone," she added.

Apparently Scally couldn't either.

Just before the shots rang out, Dowd said, neighbors heard Scally tell Hohenegger: "You're not going to shoot me, Martin. You'd go to jail."

One area where Hohenegger and Scally differed and sometimes argued, Dowd and other residents said, was over politics.

Dowd said Hohenegger identified himself as a proud Republican while Scally leaned Democrat. But it was impossible to tell what their final argument was over, she said, because the two men "bickered about everything. That's just what they did."
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Neighbors stunned by best friends fatal confrontation

I have political views but have learned to keep them to myself and share facts while forcing myself to hit the delete button when I start to type what I really think. I refuse to fall into the same trap I was in 5 years ago.

If you only turn into 24-7 cable news or the talk shows, you'd think that everyone is consumed with politics just like you, because that is all you hear. You'd be convinced everyone else is an idiot without ever once contemplating they are thinking the same of you.

Like minded people on one subject do not always agree on everything but they manage to get along on a human level with a common goal. That is until politics make enemies out of friends. Think about that the next time you forward an email to people you know and wonder how much you may be hurting someone you'd otherwise care about.

How much military can you buy for $720 billion a year?

How much military can you buy for $720 billion a year?
By JAMES JAY CARAFANO
Foreign Policy
Published: October 6, 2012

Even though the first U.S. presidential debate was not about national security, the military made a brief but striking appearance, with candidate Mitt Romney lamenting what he charged were President Barack Obama's "dramatic cuts to our military." He said: "I do not believe in cutting our military. I believe in maintaining the strength of America's military." Obama, for his part, countered that Romney wanted "$2 trillion in additional military spending that the military hasn't asked for."

The stark contrast raises the question: Is the United States investing adequately for its future defense?

Obama's long-term plans place defense last among the major priorities of federal government spending. His proposed budgets would shrink the Pentagon's purse -- not just slow the rate of growth. In fact, under Obama's proposal (even without the mandatory cuts required by the Budget Control Act of 2011), defense would not return to fiscal-year (FY) 2010 spending levels for the entirety of his 10-year budget projection. Even before the Budget Control Act became law, Defense Secretary Leon Panetta reported that defense spending would be reduced by $487 billion over 10 years, with $259 billion of these cuts applied over the next five years.

In contrast, Romney has repeatedly stated that he thinks annual defense spending should rise to about 4 percent of GDP -- or about $720 billion a year. In practical terms that would return the Pentagon budget to a little more than what it was in FY 2010, though the 2010 figure includes the cost of fighting in Iraq and Afghanistan, while Romney's number refers only to base spending. Under Romney's plan, it looks like for the most part wars cost extra.
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Presidential debate not worth watching

On the debate last night, before I get asked, I have only one question.
How do you debate someone with so many changing positions he makes the Kama Sutra look like beginners training? I watched reruns of Frasier.

I hope someone learned something but after tracking all these reports I didn't think I'd hear anything new. Today I'll hear the recap talked about all day long. So far, I didn't miss much.

Pastor Joel Hunter of Northland featured in CNN report

Florida Evangelicals a different breed of voter than brethren in Iowa, South Carolina
By John Sepulvado, CNN

(CNN) – Conservative Christian activist Ralph Reed has called the Bible Belt home for decades, but he grew up in Miami in the 1970s, when the city was emerging as a diverse megalopolis.

Among his middle school friends were Jews, Catholics and Methodists.

Then, at age 15, Reed's family relocated to the sleepy mountain town of Toccoa, Georgia, so his dad, a doctor, could take a better-paying job.

“It was very conservative,” says Reed, who now lives outside Atlanta. “At first – as would be true of any 15-year-old – I didn’t like it. I think it was a culture shock.”

Ultimately, the mostly evangelical residents of Toccoa shaped Reed’s faith, helping lead him to Jesus in his 20s. But in terms of his faith-based organizing, the well-known activist drew more on his experiences in hyper-diverse Miami.

"Later on in life, when I became a leader in the Christian Coalition, I had a greater appreciation [for] ethnic and religious diversification,” Reed says.

That could be good news for Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney. The former Massachusetts governor is looking to regain momentum from chief rival Newt Gingrich, after the former speaker’s upset in South Carolina, in Florida’s Tuesday primary.

A more centrist evangelicalism

As a percentage of GOP voters, there are fewer evangelicals in Florida compared to South Carolina and Iowa, where Rick Santorum won the presidential caucuses, according to CNN exit polls from 2008.

In that year, evangelicals accounted for 40% of Republican primary voters in Florida, compared to 60% in the Iowa caucuses and South Carolina primaries.

And compared to those other early primary states, Florida is much more religiously diverse. In the 2008 primary there, Catholics were nearly a third of the Republican vote, with other kinds of Christians, Jews and those with no religious affiliation each claiming a chunk of the vote.

Still, evangelical Christians claim a bigger share of the Florida Republican vote than any other religious tradition. There also are signs they may be more tolerant of a Mormon candidate than born-again Christians in the Bible Belt and Midwest.

In the South Carolina primary, Romney claimed 22% of the evangelical vote, compared to 44% for Gingrich, according to CNN exit polls.

Florida’s evangelicals are “more open” to the idea of a Mormon in the White House, according to Orlando area pastor Joel C. Hunter.

“Our nature, of being a fairly mobile state, with a lot of tourism and a lot of transcultural and transnational interaction really makes us boundary spanning, rather than sticking to our own affinity groups,” Hunter says.

He leads a congregation of 15,000 at Northland, a Church Distributed, a nondenominational megachurch of the kind that are more popular in Florida than in Iowa or South Carolina.

“For any independent church, you’re going to be open – necessarily open – to non-ready made boundaries, open to other religious groups,” Hunter says. “You’ll be more likely to partner with groups that aren’t necessarily like your own.”

The pastor cites his church’s partnerships with local synagogues and mosques to help local homeless children. For Hunter, teaming up with different religious traditions follows the example of Jesus.

“Jesus talked to the people, the religious leaders others wouldn’t talk to,” he says.

“As an evangelical, I should be ready to talk to a lot of people that aren’t like myself, because that’s what I see in the life of Christ, and I’m looking to build relationships.”
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Presidential candidates need to stop lying to veterans

Presidential candidates need to stop lying to veterans

by
Chaplain Kathie

A long time ago I promised a young Marine I would not post on political issues unless it had something to do with them. This is one of those times.

CNN reported on what was said during the debate to replace Obama by GOP candidates. Either Santorum does not know what the facts are or he was just lying. Not sure but either way, he's been in congress long enough to know how bad things were and how much has been done since the current President was elected.

I get furious when smart people I know say stupid things that are not based on facts but something they heard someone say. Most of the time they end up making claims that Obama has been bad for the military and veterans but the facts are the facts and this is simply not true.

That's why I felt the need to post on this report from CNN. It is one thing to say something that is not true but worse when they are talking about veterans and the military. These men and women should never be used to score some points by either side.

Truth Squad: 4 checks on Thursday's GOP debate
CNN examines statements by Republican presidential candidates during Monday night's CNN Southern Republican Debate in Charleston, South Carolina.

Rick Santorum on President Obama's budget cuts

The statement: "We have the president of the United States who said he is going to cut veterans benefits, cut our military, at a time when these folks are four, five, six, seven tours, coming back, in and out of jobs, sacrificing everything for this country. And the president of the United States can't cut one penny out of the social welfare system and he wants to cut a trillion dollars out of our military and hit our veterans, and that's disgusting."


The facts: The Obama administration has struggled to bring down a staggering - and growing - budget deficit since taking office in 2009. Depressed tax revenues due to the 2007-2009 recession, spending on the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, increased aid to the unemployed and the last of Obama's 2009 economic stimulus bill helped the deficit swell to a projected $1.3 trillion for the fiscal year 2011.

The 2010 election put added pressure on the administration as anti-tax, anti-spending Republicans took control of the House of Representatives, resulting in three budgetary standoffs between Congress and the White House in 2011.

Obama has in fact proposed a series of budget cuts, to the dismay of many of his own supporters. In September, he proposed wringing more than $300 billion from Medicare and Medicaid - the federal health-care programs for the poor and elderly - as part of an effort to reduce the deficit by $3 trillion over the next decade. In August, his budget chief warned government agencies to brace for cuts of 5% to 10% for 2013. And in January 2010, the administration proposed savings of $250 billion by freezing all nonsecurity discretionary spending for three years.


The departments of Defense, Homeland Security and Veterans Affairs were exempted from that proposal. But the administration projects it will save $1.1 trillion on defense in the coming 10 years - largely because the war in Iraq is over, and U.S. troops are being pulled back from Afghanistan.

And Obama has proposed increases in federal spending on veterans. Its 2012 budget request was up 10.6% "to meet increased need" by Americans who have served in the military over the past decade, and a 3.5% increase is projected for 2013.

One cloud on the horizon is the $1.2 trillion in automatic spending cuts now hanging over the heads of Congress. Half of that will fall on the Pentagon unless negotiators come up with a different plan.

But that won't happen until 2013 and can be averted if lawmakers can cut projected deficits by an equal amount.

The verdict: False. Santorum is wrong on two counts. Obama has proposed cuts to significant portions of the U.S. safety net, while adding spending on veterans benefits to accommodate the large number of returning American veterans. And a big portion of the planned defense cuts come from the end of two long-running wars.
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Joe the Plumber? What About Jim and Jane the Veteran?

Really think about this.

Joe the Plumber? What About Jim and Jane the Veteran?
Paul Rieckhoff
Posted October 16, 2008


First it was Main Street. Then it was Joe Six-Pack. And last night, Joe the Plumber took center stage. After three presidential debates between Senators McCain and Obama, our nation's veterans can't help but be left wondering: What about us?

Beyond the fact that there was no real talk (straight or otherwise) at all about the war in Iraq and Afghanistan, foreign policy or military affairs, Iraq and Afghanistan veterans are facing unbelievable challenges when they come home. More than 300,000 new veterans are suffering from a serious psychological injury, and less than half are receiving the care they need. Tens of thousands of troops have suffered disabling physical injuries, new veterans are also facing high rates of unemployment, and almost two thousand brave men and women who served in Iraq or Afghanistan have already wound up homeless. And all the economic issues hitting the average American are hitting our military folks even harder. Millions are wrestling with the mortgage crisis, rising food costs, and the high price of gas. Now imagine dealing with all that while being deployed to a war zone for 12 months for the third time in five years. This is what our servicemembers are facing.

But not once during the presidential debates did we hear any substance from the candidates about how they plan to support our veterans.

We've been bombarded with talking point after talking point on the economy, healthcare, and energy. Joe the Plumber even had his name repeated more than a dozen times last night. But Jim and Jane the Veteran have been left behind.

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We can talk all we want about getting government out of our lives when it comes to our money, but when we do, we limit our view to "self" and cannot see beyond. Our taxes go to the roads we drive on and bridges we cross over expecting them to be safe and well maintained. Taxes pay for checking the food we eat, air we breathe, what we drink, medications we take and products we use so that we can trust they are safe. Taxes pay for the education of our children. Taxes pay for the police and fire departments. We can complain about the fact we are supporting people who have fallen on hard times, the ill who cannot pay for medical care or the elderly.

We can simply forget about all of this because it is just so easy to say government needs to get out of our lives so that our tax burden can be cut but when we are honest we know that sooner or later, it all has to be paid for. With all the talk about tax cuts and how McCain doesn't want anyone to pay more, no one is talking about common sense. McCain and the GOP seem to have no problem just borrowing money this nation cannot afford so they can take care of the rich, just expecting them to do the right thing and take care of those with less. They expect the money to just flow down but after all these years, it hasn't.

We have food that has been contaminated by chemicals imported from China. We have medications that were supposed to be safe, sent into the homes of millions only to discover they are harmful. Roads fall apart and bridges collapse. Schools across then nation leave our children unable to compete with the rest of the world and if you go into any establishment, young cashiers cannot do simple math unless the cash registers tell them exactly how much change to give back. Yet some will simply shut their eyes to what our taxes do.

Another part of what our tax dollars do is to supply the nation with defense. From the citizen soldiers of the National Guard and Reservists to the Coast Guard, Army, Navy, Marines, Air Force, CIA, FBI and all the other branches, our money pays for them. It is also supposed to be paying for those who have served when they need to be taken care of with medical expenses and compensation if they are wounded in the process.

The man who becomes our next president has to have his mind in the right place. He cannot be one who ignores all that is required of him. Far too little has been said about all of this. It's been about cutting taxes, either for the rich or those who have less. It has not been about doing the right thing or wiser use of the tax dollars collected. What is the most telling of all is that the men and women who served in the military have been forgotten. We have two active military campaigns producing wounded everyday, being added into the system and in need of being taken care of.

Families are living on food stamps, being foreclosed on because their husband or wife has been sent to Afghanistan or Iraq multiple times. We have wounded coming back, faced with having to fight to have their wounds taken care of and compensated for the incomes they are no longer able to obtain. Why is it no one is talking about the fact we owe them?

I listen to people like Ron Paul talking about the evil of taxes but never hear him say what good our tax dollars do. I hear McCain say that he wants people making the most money in this country to not have to suffer for making more, but never hear him mention how he has voted against the veterans needing to be taken care of, especially if it is tied to any kind of corporations having to pay their share. I hear Obama talk about the middle class but not about the poor or the needy or the fact we have to be smarter with the money we do have. None of them have talked about the debt we owe those who serve or the suffering they are going through.

When you hear them talk, notice what they are not talking about and then demand they address the things you are concerned about. If you are not concerned about anything listed here, then please look in the mirror when you read about it all falling apart or another veteran who has committed suicide or see another veteran you pass by on the street because that has become his home. You'll have only yourself to blame because you didn't want to pay taxes and refused to hold them accountable for the taxes you did pay.

Senior Chaplain Kathie Costos
Namguardianangel@aol.com
http://www.namguardianangel.org/
http://www.woundedtimes.blogspot.com/
"The willingness with which our young people are likely to serve in any war, no matter how justified, shall be directly proportional to how they perceive veterans of early wars were treated and appreciated by our nation." - George Washington

Iraq Veterans Arrested at presidential debate

Veterans arrested in protest outside debate

By Rick Maze - Staff writer
Posted : Thursday Oct 16, 2008 11:39:23 EDT

A group of Iraq war veterans opposed to that conflict got into an altercation with police outside Hofstra University on Wednesday about an hour before the final presidential debate as they tried to deliver a list of questions they wanted the candidates to answer.

Ten were arrested and several were injured, including one who received hospital treatment after apparently being trampled by a police horse, said former Army Sgt. Kristofer Goldsmith, one of those arrested at the Hempstead, N.Y., university.

Goldsmith said the 10 veterans and five other people were charged with disorderly conduct and refusal to obey a lawful order, and were released. They will appear in court Nov. 10 to face charges.

Goldsmith, who said he served in Iraq in 2005 and left the Army in 2006, said about 15 members of Iraq Veterans Against the War marched in formation to the gates of the campus with the intention of delivering questions about the war and treatment of veterans that had not been asked in the previous two presidential debates.
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http://www.armytimes.com/news/2008/10/military_veteransarrested_debate_101608w/

Veterans noticed they were not important enough last night

Veterans have noticed they have not been important enough to make it into the debates. Between what has been going on with the re-deployments, stop-loss, extra stress on the National Guards and their families, VA healthcare, attempted suicides, suicides, PTSD, TBI and all the rest the troops and veterans have to deal with, you would think that they would be one of the most important issues the candidates talk about but they don't. It's really a shame they are not asked to prove their claims on veterans issues. You would think that the report card the IAVA put out would have at least been mentioned but it didn't come up. Somehow I have a feeling that if it did, the notion about McCain being best on anything would have disolved. The question is, is it the veterans they media doesn't want to focus on or is it McCain's record?

T. Tarantino, Washington, D.C.: The last question has come and gone, and not one about veterans issues. Despite the rhetoric that we hear in speeches and around bars, I’m afraid that the issues that are being faced by the men and women who put their lives on the line for the country are just not a priority for the American people, and only a priority for candidates when it can score them a few “cool” points. Barack Obama has talked in the past about these issues, but not lately. John McCain is the most famous veteran in America, yet he chooses to not talk at all about them. They better step up their game, because veterans pay attention, and they vote.

V. Laporte, Detroit: All of the issues I had hoped would be discussed tonight were not even mentioned; though I am not surprised. It is interesting to note the Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America’s “Veteran Report Card”. Sen. Obama, garnering an unexemplary grade of “B”; still has some work to do in supporting legislation concerning veterans education and health care. Sen. McCain, in contrast to his military roots and proclaimed “affection” for veterans; garnered a failing grade of “D”. Regardless, I would have liked to hear more from Sen. McCain about his proposed privatization and deregulation of veterans healthcare.

A. Arcangel, New York City: A lot of the second half of the debate was dedicated to foreign policy yet there was no talk about veteran’s issues and issues that our troubled military face. We have pushed our military, both active duty and reserve components. Guys from my old unit have just completed their third tour in Iraq and are concerned about where we are headed next. I believe both candidates dropped the ball by not mentioning what they will to do “support the troops” both in uniform and those who have returned to civilian life.

C. Schapper, Washington, D.C.: I am still stuck on McCain saying earlier that the military is one of his top priorities; however, veterans have not been his top priority. You cannot have one without the other. How can he support the military going into the fight, but not coming out of it? His recent voting record on veterans issues can be found here.
I am glad Obama brought up the importance on diplomacy. One of the best ways to take care of our military is to do our best not to use it until all other avenues of approach have been exhausted.
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