Looking behind the reality of Memorial Day celebrations

Let's celebrate Memorial Day by doing something for the veterans who are still alive, not just the deceased ones. Lots of people love parades. I do too. Lots of people like to put flags on graves. I do too. But when it comes to asking those same people to change our government policies in a way that would actually help veterans, they scream "Don't raise our taxes." My God, we can't even raise the tobacco tax in Missouri even though it's the lowest in the nation and over a dollar less than the national average. I just read in Saturday's Post Dispatch that Illinois is going to raise their cigarette tax from 98 cents a pack to $1.98 in order to fund "the state's struggling Medicaid system." The Missouri legislature not only won't consider raising taxes, they are fighting any attempts by citizens to do it themselves. Meanwhile, who suffers from this stubborn grandstanding by tea party "leaders" in Jeff City? The poorest Missourians, the ones least able to fight the corporate influence in what passes for a state government. Let's set aside for now the fact that people who smoke should pay more for health care for the poor than people who don't smoke because smokers drive up the cost of health care. That's a debate worth having at some point. Step back from the whole "we honor our heroes" thing and take a good look at exactly how we honor them. Parades don't feed them when they are homeless. Yes, there is a "feel good" moment for them and for us, but, wouldn't we give them more support by paying for their needs after we've sent them "into harm's way"? The May 28 issue of Newsweek has an article about the epidemic suicide rate among veterans. The estimate is that 18 veterans kill themselves every day. Especially alarming is the number of veterans from recent wars who have killed themselves. In fact, the "number of U.S. soldiers who have died by their own hand is now estimated to be greater than the number who have died in combat in Afghanistan and Iraq." One scholar who has studied this horrible reality describes in the Newsweek article how soldiers suffer "a moral injury" when subjected to repeated deployments overseas. Dr. Jonathan Shay says "a moral injury occurs when a soldier's concepts of trust and right and wrong do not survive the heat of battle." They return to civilian life "hypervigilant and trusting no one - a difficult way to live." This certainly aligns with testimony from family members who describe a son or husband who comes back from war a totally changed person. And this epidemic is not just among male veterans. One study found that female veterans are three times as likely to kill themselves as their civilian counterparts. Let's think about that concept of "moral injury." When someone suffers through an experience that completely changes his sense of right and wrong, how does he get that back? How does he put away his fatigues and change back into civilian clothes and civilian thinking? I don't know. I do know that everyone who suffers an emotionally devastating experience is never the same again. We can multiply the damage caused by our worst experiences and maybe get a tiny glimpse into the "moral injury" that soldiers have to carry with them the rest of their lives. Do we have the guts to ask ourselves who caused that "moral injury" to the 18 veterans a day who kill themselves? Who sent them to Iraq based on false information? Who stuck yellow ribbons on every tree and lamp post? Who enjoyed those first heady days of "shock and awe"? And who lost interest when the thrill was gone? Polls show that the majority of Americans don't think the Iraq war was worth the cost in lives and treasure. We also don't really care what happens in Afghanistan anymore either. The Newsweek article quotes a grieving family member as saying, "We pretend the vets don't even exist." Let's face it. Having homeless and desperately unhealthy veterans hanging around in plain sight really puts a damper on our Memorial Day festivities. We want to believe there are programs enough to help them if they'd only seek them out. We want to push the guilt away by using twisted logic and finding self-congratulatory, feel good ways to spend the holiday. Even though a recent study by the Kaiser Foundation shows that veterans would benefit greatly from the new health care reform law passed by Congress in 2010 (derisively referred to as Obamacare,) we would rather fight for our "freedom" not to have to buy health insurance than make sure veterans get all the help they need. So we'll listen to military bands playing patriotic music on TV this weekend. We'll fly our flags and pretend we care. But, heaven forbid, don't ask us to pay more in taxes to open more mental health clinics. Don't ask us to rally in support of the few brave do-gooders who are calling attention to the plight of homeless veterans. Don't ask us to demand that ROTC programs are banished from high schools where young kids get pulled into something they are not mature enough to understand. And when the Pentagon budget is raised again and again to buy weapons systems even the military says we don't need, let's join the "strong military - support our troops" nonsense because it feels so good to think we're "the greatest nation on Earth." If reading this makes you angry or upset, good. That's just a tiny sample of what many veterans feel every day, all day, all night until they don't have to feel anything anymore. Susan Cunningham May 27, 2012

What you need to know about ALEC

Sometimes I see myself as this crazy old lady running around the streets of downtown St. Louis in my nightgown yelling, "The British are coming." I'm no Paul Revere, and I can't ride a horse, but I am sending a warning that may be just as important when it comes to saving our republic. This is the last week (thank god) for the Missouri General Assembly. While editorial writers bemoan the waste of time and energy on stupid stuff like protecting gun owners from job discrimination that doesn't exist and stuffing Rush Limbaugh's big fat head into a Hall of Fame, no one is shining the light on the master minds behind the scenes pulling the strings. The American Legislative Exchange Council used to be a secretive, business-friendly organization hosting lavish retreats for corporate lobbyists and state legislators. But it's not secret anymore. Because of the controversy over the Trayvon Martin killing in Florida and that state's "stand your ground law," national attention and citizen activism are forcing some of ALEC's biggest corporate sponsors to cut ties with the group. The goal of ALEC and all the "free market" extremists who swear allegiance to corporate power is literally to "starve the beast" of government power and replace it with a plutocracy. They do not believe it is government's job to help individuals succeed in life. PERIOD. So why are we wasting time, energy and resources kibbitzing about taxes and the budget when we know the pot of money will continue to shrink until all public institutions are eliminated and the social safety net is shredded. Think of the "leaders" of the Missouri House and Senate as a gigantic sink hole pulling us down into the blackness of their "free market, limited government" ideology. All the committee hearings, floor debates and votes are a FRAUD. They have no intention of "doing the people's business." They are doing the business of the major corporations and a handful of families like the Koch brothers who shove money into election campaigns and offer cushy jobs once their little puppets are termed out. If you think this year was awful, wait until next year when Rep. Tim Jones of Eureka is Speaker of the House. Jones and Rep. Jason Smith are the co-chairs of the Missouri delegation to ALEC meetings. At these meetings, corporate lobbyists wine and dine state legislators and write the bills for them to take home and pass. What a great investment for companies with money to burn. Why bother spending all that money sending lobbyists to 50 state capitals when you can bring them all to a fancy resort hotel and just hand them the bills to pass. But if you read any of our major newspapers in Missouri, you'd never know about the BIG SCAM going on right under our noses. Maybe there will be an occasional article about ALEC or a tsk-tsk editorial, but this is the biggest story of our generation and it deserves banner headlines. While the "Great Recession" gets lots of attention and we read an occasional article about Wall Street gambling away our pension money, the financial pages never mention the 30 year war that has been waged against American families. If this were a salmonella outbreak, it would be the top story on the evening news. But when people die for lack of health care and family "bread winners" become so depressed that they commit suicide, they are just as dead as someone who dies from food poisoning. And the death toll is a thousand times larger. Bob Edgar, President of Common Cause, will be at the Ethical Society in St. Louis on June 8th to talk about ALEC and the damage it is doing to our public institutions and social safety net. Common Cause and the Center for Media and Democracy have been in the forefront of the effort to educate Americans about ALEC. Thanks to online groups like Color of Change, many of ALEC's major corporate members have publicly cut their ties to the organization. President Obama is laying out the stark differences between the Democratic and Republican platforms. Either the people will prevail and save their democracy or the plutocrats will continue draining the life out of us. Our enemies don't dress up in red coats and march in file down the street anymore. They hide behind their elected hatchet men and laugh all the way to the bank. Susan Cunningham