No point in blogging to give voice...

...and not use it.

You're a soldier, you just completed the longest deployment of any unit in the GWOT Long War, 22 months, you're home, and you're thinking you'll take advantage of some of that GI BIll money you've earned, right?

After all, you're a National Guardsman, who just spent more time in a combat zone than any Regular unit, and you'd like to finish up that degree, right?

Wrong. Your orders are one.day.short of the required amount of time on active duty (no matter if it's hot duty or not) to qualify. One... day. Mebbe it's *not* on purpose. But based on how I say Guardsmen and Reservists treated during my career, my nose is twitching.

So - go read this story.

Well, no point in having spent the time building the blog to what it is and to have gained the access to people I've gained and *not* use that access.

So, I forwarded that article to Congresswoman Nancy Boyda, my federal representative. Actually I sent it to her staff with this note:

The Lieutenant in the article is exactly correct. We routinely used to do what he describes to them for that purpose... which in peacetime is at least understandable.

In wartime, it's inexcusable.

Please pass this to *my* Representative and ask her to moot this about the HASC.

I had a response in about 15 minutes.

Consider it done. I’ll ask the staff director of the Military Personnel subcommittee about this tomorrow. Unbelievable. I think it’s also ridiculous that soldiers are getting discharged for a “pre-existing” personality disorders after returning from a deployment, thus denying them the opportunity to seek mental health care.

The Minnesota delegation is already on this, I'm just attacking it from within the committee structure. There may be regulatory guidance that forced this. It may be a more venal attempt to save money. Regardless, it's going to get looked at, and drug out into the open, where the leadership can take whatever action they deem needful.

A smart Army PAO once told me about how the Army looks at "getting out the message" - and he observed that more often than not, the Army's target for public information was Congress, and they weren't going to take blogs seriously until we showed we could influence... Congress.

Okay. Army PAO is getting ready to have a global conference.

Lessee, I got this note back from Congressional Staff... and a couple of weeks ago, I had a chat with the President.

Hmmmm. Izzat good enough? 8^ )