This ain't Hell, but you can see it from here

Category: Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America

  • Hiring Heroes Act

    Just A Grunt sends us a link to an Atlanta Journal Constitution article about the new Hiring Heroes Act now winding it’s way through Congress;

    Robinson is one of thousands of veterans returning from Iraq and Afghanistan struggling to find work, the reason U.S. Rep. Sanford Bishop, D-Ga., introduced the Hiring Heroes Act last month.

    “Bottom line, we’ve got too many homeless vets and a high percentage of veterans who are unemployed or unemployable,” Bishop said.

    The legislation will provide all veterans leaving service with individualized career assessment, matching up military personnel skills with civilian occupations, as part of the Defense Department’s transition assistance program.

    The bill will make available an additional two years of vocational rehabilitation — restoring injured or disabled vets to the level of work or skills they had prior to being hurt — and employment services once federal and state financial assistance has been exhausted. The bill will also create a program giving vets paid work experience with civilian employers and contractors.

    The Bureau of Labor Statistics says that Gulf War II veterans unemployment was 11.4% in 2010 – higher than the national unemployment rate which is 9.1%. The article says it’s higher this year;

    The legislation comes at a time when the employment rate for returning service members ages 20 to 24 stands at 27 percent, according to the U.S. Labor Department.

    Of course, a lot of the reason for this disparity is that veterans have to overcome the Hollywood stereotype of veterans on the verge of a violent breakdown. I’ve dealt with that in my own workplace. Some of my workmates have no problem telling me to my face that all veterans are crazy.

    From the Chicago Sun Times;

    In decades past, there were greater numbers of veterans in the civilian workplace, including in hiring positions, who understood military language, life and the skills gained there, said Tom Tarantino, senior legislative associate with Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America. But today, with an all-volunteer military and a smaller percentage of Americans in the workplace that have served in the Armed Forces, that understanding often isn’t there, he said.

    This sounds like something Paul Reickhoff and his IAVA should get involved in if he can stop perpetuating the myths that come out of Hollywood for a minute.

  • WTH does that say?

    Maybe I’m showing my age, but what the hell is that? Actually, it’s the new brand for Paul Reickhoff’s Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America.

    The new brand, distinctly different from the previous, captures the energy, youth and diversity of the more than 2.2 million veterans who have served in Iraq and Afghanistan since 9/11. The new brand was designed pro bono by world-renowned branding agency Landor Associates, which has worked with major companies such as Blackberry, Citi, FedEx and MillerCoors. To help unveil our new brand, IAVA asked members and supporters nationwide to share in one word what IAVA’s mission means to them.

    Energy? Youth? Diversity? It looks like zebra stripes and zebras are the pussies of the savannah – always galloping away from something.

    “Pro bono” must be Latin for “still not worth it”.

    One word to describe what IAVA means to me? “Bald”. “Cueball”. Those are the words that jump into my mind when I think of IAVA. Is “Fuckstick” one word?

  • Another reason to doubt the 1st Lady’s intentions


    I know the Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America does some good work, generally, but I shy away from anything that connects to them. Seein’s how they began as Paul Reickhoff’s Bush bashing OpTruth website and started sending out a purely partisan scorecard for Congress, every election season, they’re not the non-partisan group they pretend to be.

    Now, I see they’re supporting the First Lady’s and Jill Bite Me’s sudden interest in military families;

    “Today, the First Lady and Dr. Biden have issued a challenge to America and initiated a new movement to support military families. This is a great first step. We’re encouraged to see them leverage their powerful platform to rally Americans around these important issues. Their leadership in this space starts a long overdue dialogue at dinner tables across the country about the mounting challenges our military families face every single day,” said IAVA Founder and Executive Director Paul Rieckhoff.

    There are no details for this “program” but Reickhoff gloms onto it for the name recognition alone. That name recognition is part of the reason I’m skeptical in the first place. With Bullethead involved, I’m definitely stepping back until it blows up or fizzles out.

  • VA takes on Reichoff

    Our buddy, Alex Horton, recently chosen to be the social media guru at the Department of Veterans Affairs got a little angry at Paul Reickhoff the Executive Director of the Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America, who, by the way, is NOT our buddy, no matter how hard he tries to buy me off. Reickhoff did an interview at the Huffington Post during which he said;

    “I would also argue the VA does a pretty crappy job of outreach. They’re not really using social media. They’re not really active on places like Facebook. So they’re not going to where the Vets are. It’s kind of an old bricks and mortar system.”

    Alex responded;

    In reality, over the past year, VA has made a serious investment to methodically reach Veterans where they are online. Looking at the numbers, we see that while IAVA has a single Facebook page with over 205,000 fans, VA has 87 Facebook pages—with a combined subscribership of nearly 220,000 fans. VA’s main Facebook page alone has 100,000 subscribers—making it one of the largest in the federal government.

    I have to agree with Alex; the DVA has been successful at reaching out, it was probably the worst-founded criticism Paul could have made about the DVA. If Reickhoff was going to make the most of his interview, he could have complained about the total incompetence which results in veterans getting screwed out of their benefits instead of complaining about stupid shit like “outreach”.

    But this is the guy who attacks teenage girls with specious charges.

    On edit: Oh for crap’s sake. That post at the DVA was written by Beeker and not Horton. I didn’t even know that Beeker could write.

  • IAVA and the GI Bill 2.1

    Y’all remember that Operator Dan warned about the GI Bill that Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America rammed through Congress last year with their cohorts in the Democrat Party. Well, it seems that IAVA has finally seen the error of their ways. of course they blame Congress, but it was nothing that the keen eyes of Operator Dan hadn’t spotted.

    For hundreds of thousands of veterans across the country, the New GI Bill is an amazing benefit. However, without swift action from Congress, vets currently enrolled at some private schools may find their tuition coverage coming up short. We’ve heard from a number of IAVA Member Veterans about this problem, and we’re sharing your concerns with Congress.

    This loophole is unacceptable, but there’s an easy fix. And that’s why IAVA is pushing Congress to secure a provision that restores the interval pay (“break-pay”) between the fall and spring semesters and grandfathers in veterans currently attending the small number of private schools who are impacted.

    Here’s a little history for those just tuning in; Republicans had questions about the new GI Bill and no one was willing to answer those questions, so Republicans voted against the GI Bill in 2008. IAVA manufactured a “scorecard” on Congressional voting records which centered around the GI Bill and, of course, Republicans came up short – from that sprang stories about how good Democrats are for veterans and the military. Then came the 2008 elections and Republicans lost.

    As soon as Democrats took over the White House and Congress, Paul Reickhoff started making noises about capping the new GI Bill because Veterans Affairs couldn’t roll out the program fast enough and they were having trouble finding money for it. So Reickoff’s solution was to cap benefits and cut veterans out of the program, so DVA could look like they were doing their jobs.

    Lo and behold, there was massive confusion, tuition wasn’t getting to the student-veterans and DVA launched some stop-gap programs and money was flying back and forth in such a confusing manner that I lost interest It was just more satisfying to make fun of Shinseki.

    So last year, IAVA shoved this GI Bill 2.0 through Congress despite the warnings. Even the fricken DVA warned us about it. But it got passed any-damn-way because the Democrats had to show us how much they care about veterans, and Republicans got reamed in 2008, they weren’t about to “vote against veterans” again.

    Now this new bill creates new loopholes and IAVA is trying to get them plugged…they created the damn things. But this is their way to screw over the Republicans in the next reportcard if the Republican Congress can’t act on it while all of these balanced budget balls are in the air.

    In the meantime, we know you need answers. And we’ll do our best to help.

    Help? Please stop being helpful, Paul Reickhoff and Tom Tarantino.

  • Are the New Changes to the GI Bill Really An Overall “Win” For Vets?

    Lost in all the noise about the repeal of DADT was news that the lame-duck Congressed passed a bill that implemented major changes to the GI Bill. Of course since this bill was passed by a Democrat-controlled Congress, IAVA considers it a win but the American Legion considers it a positive as well (Strangely, I haven’t seen anything on VoteVets about it).  Here are the changes to the GI Bill that will take effect Aug. 2011 according to IAVA:

    In 2008, historic New GI Bill legislation was signed into law.  Since then, IAVA has been fighting for critical upgrades where the benefit was lacking. These upgrades, which were passed last week, will impact 400,000 Iraq and Afghanistan veterans within the first year.  These include:

    • 85,000 full-time National Guardsmen who will become eligible for the New GI Bill
    • 58,000 students at private and graduate schools will have increased?tuition benefits
    • 25,000 distance learners will receive a monthly living allowance
    • 21,000 disabled vets using Vocational Rehab will receive additional allowances
    • 19,000 Active Duty service members will receive an annual book stipend
    • 6,000 vocational students will receive tuition/fees and a?monthly living allowance
    • 6,000 On The Job training/Apprenticeship participants will get access to an?expanded program
    • 6,000 schools will receive increased fees for processing vets’ paperwork
    • 180,000 new recruits will not have to pay $1,200 to buy into the old GI Bill

    Sounds great right? Well of course thats not the whole story. Here are some of the other changes this bill makes to the GI Bill from the Marine Corps Times (emphasis is mine):

    Living stipends, based on military housing allowances, are now fully paid to a student who is taking a course load that makes them more than a half-time student. This means that someone taking a full load is getting the same living stipend as someone taking fewer credits. The bill would change this by prorating living stipends based on the number of credits, which means people taking less than a full course load would be receiving less money.

    Distance learning students, currently ineligible for living stipends unless they are taking at least one class at a traditional school, would be eligible for the monthly payment equal to one half of the national average for military housing allowance for an E-5 with dependents. That is less than sought by distance learning schools but more than they are getting now.

    So clearly there are some changes to the post-9/11 GI Bill that IAVA didn’t discuss on their website (along with other Veterans groups) that will have a detrimental impact on some veterans, especially those attempting to work or do internships which limit their ability to take a full course load. In regards to my own situation, I know my last semester I am planning on doing an internship (which I cannot receive credit for since I would have already received the maximum amount of credits for an internship) and taking only three classes since I don’t need to take a full load to graduate. Under the current rules, I would receive a full BAH stipend, but under the new rules I will be receiving less money. I can think of  ten other veterans I either served with or know at Arizona State that will be negatively impacted by this rule change as well. I guess using some people’s math, thats a “win” for me and other vets.

    Also, the reason why the GI Bill originally didn’t offer a stipend for online-only students and why in the future that stipend will only be half of regular students’ stipends is because the Democrats who have controlled Congress declared war on for-profit online universities. Now granted some of these institutions have pulled some shady stuff in the past but many state-schools and private colleges offer online degree paths. Again using a personal example I could complete both of my degrees completely online at Arizona State and then get real experience by doing an internship or working fulltime in addition to saving the VA about 1000 dollars a semester since the online programs are cheaper at ASU (as is the case for many state-schools). But instead I am forced to go sit in a classroom and wish I was back in Iraq (Yeah, thats how much I hate going to class). Online programs are also better for veterans with families or other work commitments since its more time-flexible. If anything, in some cases, the VA should be encouraging vets to do online-only programs.

    Now, obviously there are some good parts to this bill. It expands educational benefits for the National Guard and sets aside more money for wounded Vets in addition to making it easier for Vets to attend private schools. However, I think it is a bit disingenuous of IAVA  and other vet groups not to highlight the downsides to this bill, especially considering it will effect a lot of veterans currently using the GI Bill.

  • IAVA’s Paul Rieckhoff: This Senate sucks a lot

    Remember all of the shit we went through with IAVA’s scorecard the last two election cycles (2008 and 2010 and interim the 2009 post about “nonpartisan IAVA“)? Well, Executive Director Paul Rieckhoff writes in the Huffington Post today;

    So how much does this Senate suck?

    A lot.

    This has definitely been a year of incredible frustration and stagnation in Washington. Without a doubt, it’s the worst I’ve seen it in my short time working as an advocate on Capitol Hill. But in the last week, the inaction and incompetence in Congress was taken to a whole new level. This Senate is so backwards, so ineffective, so lacking in leadership, it’s almost hard to put it into words. Unless you use a term that comes from the military: FUBAR.

    Hey, um, fuckstick, you helped put them there. All of that bullshit “nonpartisanship”, stacked and manipulated vote rating got you the current cluster of mental midgets in Congress. And it’s only going to get worse, Paul. The Blue Dog Democrats have been replaced by hardcore Republicans – and the morons like Jim McDermott and Nancy Pelosi who you gave high ratings are only going to get more hardheaded. Yeah, I know they’re not in the Senate, but you get the gist, right?

    That’s why when you sent me a personal invitation to your latest IAVA social circle jerk, I didn’t even bother to answer. You might want to reach out, but I’d rather cut your stupid dick off. I hope you enjoy your cows coming home to roost or some other stupid mixed metaphor. Dick.

  • The worst persons in the world

    Jon Soltz tells Keith Olbermann why he won’t be living in Keith’s studio broom closet any longer. Soltz milks the sympathy of the four people in Olbermann’s audience and has a real hang-dog expression like he’s been sentenced to death instead of called to serve his country;

    Soltz claims in the video that he’s always separated his military service from his activism. When was that? If you go back over the countless videos in which Soltz appears, every other word out of his mouth mentions his four months in Iraq as a member of the military until recently, a picture of Soltz in a desert landscape and in a combat pogue uniform (no LBE, no helmet, only a weapon) appeared on VoteVets. How is that separating service with political activism?

    Soltz continues that his four months in Iraq led him to oppose the war. HTF did that happen? Four months dispatching vehicles and supervising motor pool police call disillusioned him?

    Soltz’ temporary replacement will be J. Ashwin Madia;

    Interim Chairman of VoteVets.org, J. Ashwin Madia, joined the U.S. Marine Corps and moved to Quantico, Virginia for 6 months of basic training, after Law School. He served in Iraq from September 2005 to March 2006. Madia was lead attorney in over one hundred trials, including thirteen jury trials. He is most proud of his work successfully defending a gay Marine from administrative discharge in 2005, when it was clear that commanders were using disparate standards in their treatment of this Marine compared to other Marines. Madia was a long-time Republican, who supported Bob Dole for President in 1996, and Senator John McCain in 2000, before running as a Democrat for Congress in Minnesota in 2008.

    Yeah, I was a long-time Democrat until VoteVets came along and I switched parties, you doofuses. It’s as if they don’t even hear how stupid they sound when they say stupid shit like that.

    I wish Jon Soltz luck and I hope he comes back safely. At least he’s not a complete pussy and avoiding the call. But I also hope he appreciates that he gets to reap the benefits of the surge which he so adamantly opposed.

    The word is that IAVA’s Paul Reickhof is taking advantage of the new space in the MSNBC broom closet that he and Soltz shared over the last several years and buying a new beanbag chair.