Thursday, January 14, 2021
Veterans "Continue To Serve" clean up after Washington Riot
WUSA 9 News
Jess Arnold
January 9, 2021
Navy vet David Smith founded Continue to Serve after watching federal forces tear gas peaceful protesters. Now, his group is helping to clean after the Capitol riot.
WASHINGTON — Days after pro-Trump rioters stormed the Capitol, a group of veterans is working to clean the hate out of their beloved city.
Navy veteran David Smith is still grappling with the horrific images from Wednesday's insurrection.
“It almost brings you to tears," he said. "It’s terrible.”
He said it was especially disconcerting to hear some rioters claiming to be veterans as they broke into the citadel of democracy.
“They’re yelling 'I served!' as if somehow that gives them impunity and they can just storm the Capitol, which is not right," Smith said. "To support and defend the Constitution. That’s what we’re supposed to do, not a man, not a president, but the constitution.”
Friday, December 25, 2020
Birth in the manger and the crucifixion on the Cross
PTSD Patrol
Kathie Costos
December 25, 2020
Merry Christmas! While it seems there isn't much to be merry about this year, there is if you look for it.Maybe you didn't get what you wanted, or you were not able to get what someone else wanted. Maybe you have so many worries that feeling as if you are supposed to be celebrating, seems like torture. How do you celebrate Christmas when it feels like just when you thought this year couldn't get any worse....it did?
HOPE! That is what Christmas is supposed to be all about. Listen to the Christmas songs we all grew up with. (Not the funny ones I've been putting up the last few days.) Did you notice that most of them are about hope?
Between the Birth in the manger and the crucifixion on the Cross, Jesus lived a life of awesomeness! We read all about His miracles, but we tend to forget how much He suffered.
He knew what it was like to be hungry.
He knew what it was like to be lonely.
He knew what it was like to feel abandoned.
He knew what it was like to be betrayed.
He knew what it was like to grieve so much He wept.
He knew what it was like to do the right things for the right reasons and be hated for them.
He knew what it was like to be called a liar.
Yet with even more evidence of His suffering, He lived His life serving others, preaching of God's love, performing miracles, giving hope to those who had forgotten what hope in their hearts felt like, and proving to them they were loved!
One of the greatest gifts He gave was teaching them the importance of forgiving. It was not for the sake of those who hurt Him, or those who hurt you, but more about giving yourself a gift.
Jesus didn't let what others did to Him, stop Him from being true to what He knew was right. He didn't hate those He was willing to die for, even after they betrayed them. He asked His Father to forgive them, because they had no idea what they were doing.
If we hang onto those who hurt us, the wrong done to us, then we rob ourselves of all the good that could replace what is harmful to us. Forgive others and take away the power they retain in your heart. They do don't deserved to remain there.
Understand that if you are doing the right thing, then it is their problem, not yours. If you did the wrong thing to them, apologize to them. If they accept it, then all is well. If they do not, then it is again their problem.
If you are having a hard time forgiving, then pray for the strength to do it, because Jesus knows what it is like to be you!
Cross posted from PTSD Patrol
And if you are struggling with PTSD because you did the right thing...know that it is not God's judgement.
Thursday, December 24, 2020
It is time to start believing you should be healing!
The Department of Veterans Affairs seems to imply this is good.
but the percentage went up,
and the population of veterans went down.
It is time to start believing you should be healing!
Sunday, December 20, 2020
Retired Navy SEAL Veterans for Responsible Leadership
During Plebe Summer—seven gruelling weeks of drills and instruction that precede the first academic year—Barkhuff and his classmates were drilled in P.O.W. case studies, particularly from the Vietnam War, the first major conflict since the creation of the Code of Conduct. They learned about James Stockdale, the Navy fighter pilot who became the highest-ranking naval officer in captivity. During his seven and a half years as a prisoner, Stockdale famously resisted. To avoid being co-opted for propaganda, he beat himself severely in the face, with a stool. Stockdale, having studied philosophy, believed that physical torture was nothing compared to what he cited Epictetus, a former slave, as calling the “greater harm” of “destroying the trustworthy, self-respecting, well-behaved man within you.”
The plebes learned about the tap code that Stockdale and the other P.O.W.s had used to secretly communicate. On the second or third day of Plebe Summer, the midshipmen were bused from the Naval Academy campus, in Annapolis, Maryland, to Washington, D.C., to tour the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum. Barkhuff told me, “The message is clear: ‘This is what you are here to prevent; this is what you are now sworn to prevent.’ ”
When Trump took office, Barkhuff decided to give him a chance, hoping that the President “would rise to the level of the office.” But, Barkhuff told me, Trump was “worse than I thought he would be—and I thought he was going to be terrible.” Barkhuff often expressed his dismay on Facebook, where his posts were seen only by his relatives and Navy pals. When he discovered that other veterans shared his concerns, he created a page—Veterans for Responsible Leadership—where like-minded members could vent.
Service members are trained to remain apolitical when in uniform, but veterans are free to espouse their views. The V.F.R.L. members chatted online about diversity in the military (“transgender people should obviously be allowed to serve”), athletes kneeling during the national anthem to protest racial injustice (kneeling “is NOT disrespectful to our troops”), and the President’s divisiveness (“Trump wins only by creating controversy and firing up people. . . . It’s dictatorship 101”). Most of the members were Navy vets, yet V.F.R.L. hoped to recruit from all branches and ranks. Glenn Schatz, one of the V.F.R.L. leaders and a former nuclear-submarine officer, told me that the Trump Administration’s assault on established norms called veterans back to service. “Once you’re out of uniform it’s your obligation to speak up when you see the Constitution being violated,” he said. read more here
Friday, December 11, 2020
106 members of the House want to toss out veterans votes!
All 50 states have officially certified the results of the 2020 presidential election as of this week, reaffirming what has been known for over a month now: Joe Biden will be the next president of the United States.
And yet, on Thursday, 106 Republican members of Congress signed an amicus brief asking the Supreme Court to allow the state of Texas to file a lawsuit that seeks to invalidate the election results in the states of Georgia, Michigan, Wisconsin, and Pennsylvania, all of which President Donald Trump lost.