Thanking the Vets

Of course saying thanks is just a start. We're in two wars and both the prior vets, the returning veterans, and active duty armed forces personnel, as well as their families, need our support. From an older post:

Here's more ways to give thanks:

Anysoldier.com.

USO

Toys for Troops

And ways to demand thanks:

Contact your US Rep and Senators (you might want to tell them to have a pen and paper handy):

• Demand that they stop the military branches from discharging soldiers for purely pre-existing conditions when they have service connected injuries and ailments... cutting them off from their earned benefits and often resulting in them getting a bill for their earned bonuses.

• Demand they review cases where this is believed to have already occurred.
  

• Demand that they standardize the DoD disability rating system so that service connected injuries deserving of retaining military benefits earn at least a 30% rating so our wounded vets get them.

• Demand that they do more to staff the VA bureaucracy so that claims of disabled vets can be decided faster and more accurately... no more skimming do to meet quotas while short on staff.

• Demand they address States with historically low ratings for veterans claims to ensure no more vets get told their shrapnel isn't service connected or other absurd excuses for low ratings.

• Demand they make mental health care more accessible to vets with appropriate staffing and allowing private care when VA facilities aren't nearby.

• Demand they do more to facilitate claims by homeless veterans with a claims process that is almost entirely done through the mail and taking a more pro-active role with shelters and other homeless advocates to ensure they are both aware of and able to get to the services available to them.

• Demand that if they're going to continue our operations in Iraq, whether they support it or not, that they increase the size of the military so our men and women in uniform do not have to endure extended and multiple tours with little leave. For both them and their families.

• Demand they thank the troops in more than words... but with actual support.

Don't just say thanks. Give thanks. Demand thanks.

The elections are over, but work still has to be done to make it happen. One good way to do that is happening right here in our local community:

Toys for Troops, run by a local blogger and soldier mom, is getting ready for Thanksgiving Day care packages and Christmas gifts. From a recent mailing:

Holiday Care Packages Good Day!

I have only 2 items on the agenda today: a quick reminder, and update on our Christmas event.

1

The THANKSGIVING CARE PACKAGES FOR SOLDIERS will be packed at Lincoln Trail Elementary School next Tuesday, November 11, and mailed the next day. If you're interested in making a donation of care package items, cards, or homemade cookies, now is the time to do it...

2

We have a location for the CHRISTMAS GIFTS TO SOLDIERS event!

Village Inn Pizza Parlor

Corner of Springfield and Mattis, Champaign

Sunday, December 7, 2008

1 p.m. to 4 p.m.

We are hoping to send "gifty" items for Christmas--stuff you'd like to find under your own tree: CDs, DVDs, clothes, games, gourmet foods, gloves, pocket knives, electronics.

This event will be open to the public. Anyone can stop by with a gifts, cards, cookies, candy, and/or sugarplums. Grab some paper and tape, and start wrapping! Bring your kids, your friends, your grandmother, your scouting groops.

Help out in whatever way you can. Locally, nationally, volunteering for the VA, or helping our current soldiers... down to harassing your politicians to do the right thing and not capitulate on the issues that mean the most to our veterans and those still in the fight. Voting is just the first step. The next is demanding action from them and taking action ourselves.