Broadside Blog - Military Times

Project Valour-IT video

Military bloggers are in the midst of a friendly competition to help raise funds for Project Valour-IT, sponsored by the Soldiers’ Angels. They have been invited to create videos to help the cause. This one is from Steeljaw Scribe, a retired Navy Captain (a Hawkeye man). Click on the image.

Veterans Day Prelude

The following story was pulled from the YouTube information panel about this video. But the message resonates, no matter what country you live in. Honor our veterans on November 11th.

On November 11, 1999 Terry Kelly was in a Shoppers Drug Mart store in Dartmouth, Nova Scotia. At 10:55 AM an announcement came over the store’s PA asking customers who would still be on the premises at 11:00 AM to give two minutes of silence in respect to the veterans who have sacrificed so much for us.

Terry was impressed with the store’s leadership role in adopting the Legion’s “two minutes of silence” initiative. He felt that the store’s contribution of educating the public to the importance of remembering was commendable.

When eleven o’clock arrived on that day, an announcement was again made asking for the “two minutes of silence” to commence. All customers, with the exception of a man who was accompanied by his young child, showed their respect.

Terry’s anger towards the father for trying to engage the store’s clerk in conversation and for setting a bad example for his child was later channeled into a beautiful piece of work called, “A Pittance of Time”. Terry later recorded “A Pittance of Time” and included it on his full-length music CD, “The Power of the Dream”.

Video was brought to my attention by Steeljaw Scribe (creator of the Immelman Turn video).

17th Annual Service Salute

If there is a better run, more effective service organization anywhere in the world than the USO, I would like to hear about it. This is a video of a service salute hosted by USO Europe recently. It coincided with the first anniversary of the new Warrior Center at Landstuhl. If you’re looking for a place where you can send a donation, the USO is a worthy candidate. You can make a donation right here.

Soldiers’ Angels

Bad news is all around us. Just open a newspaper or watch the news on TV. If it bleeds it leads, like they say. But scratch the surface and underneath the veneer of sensationalism is a whole world of good – organizations who work behind the scene, with little fanfare, to spread their own special benevolence to those who need them.

One such organization is Soldiers’ Angels. Begun in 2003 by the mother of a deployed Soldier, the Angels exist for one reason – “to demonstrate active care and concern for veterans, the wounded, deployed service members and their families.” Their motto: “May No Soldier Go Unloved.”

From a meager beginning when a few friends and relatives got together to write letters for deployed troops, Soldiers’ Angels has grown into a multinational organization with around 200,000 volunteers. Its members not only send letters and packages to deployed servicemen and women, they also provide support and supplies to wounded warriors and their families back home. Their volunteers are scattered all over the world, and can always be found at all the major military hospitals in the United States and abroad.

As one of their many initiatives to make life easier for men and women in uniform, they have provided over 3000 laptops to wounded troops recuperating from their injuries, to allow them to stay connected while confined to a bed or wheelchair. Those who can’t use their hands are given voice activated devices.

Right now, and continuing through Veterans Day, Soldiers’ Angels is raising funds for more laptops in an effort called Project Valour-IT. This is your opportunity to donate to a cause that has a direct, immediate effect on those who have sacrificed for you. They need your help. I have donated already, and I hope you will too. (Click on the image to donate.)

And hey, if you want to volunteer to be a Soldiers’ Angel, go to their volunteer page.

Greenside of the Week – Nov 4, 2009

(The Marine Corps birthday is November 10th)

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Pearls Before Angels

Stephan Pastis losing to Jeff Keane in Tikrit

What do Ping Pong and a comic strip have to do with a fundraiser to purchase laptops for wounded warriors?

A lot.

Because today I had planned on telling you all about Soldiers’ Angels, who are raising money to purchase high tech equipment for wounded warriors. Guys who can’t get out of bed easily need laptops. Those who can’t use their hands need voice controlled equipment. The Angels are holding an event called Project Valour-IT, running until Veterans Day, and they really need your support. (Click on the image and you’ll go right to the donation site.)

I have seen the Soldiers’ Angels in action, at military hospitals like Walter Reed, Bethesda, Brooke Army Medical Center, and Landstuhl Regional Medical Center. They provide comfort to our troops and take my word for it, their name fits. They really are Angels.

I was going to tell you all this, but then I got a call from Stephan Pastis, creator of the popular cartoon strip, “Pearls Before Swine.” Stephan is a big supporter of our troops too. He has traveled with other cartoonists across three different continents to visit wounded troops and active duty personnel. His affection for the men and women in uniform is palpable. He is a friend and a patriot.

Here’s a picture of us flying to Kuwait.

See? We’re buds.

So it came as quite a shock when he told me to read his latest post, “Saddamapalooza, Day 3; or, Stuck Inside of Kuwait With the Baghdad Blues Again.”

Go ahead. Read it. I’ll wait.

I mean, this is one of the guys I flew to Southwest Asia with. We drew cartoons for over 1500 troops on our last trip. We were in Iraq together, for cryin’ out loud.

Pastis in protective gear

So it hurt to see his article. But I’m not a vindictive sort, and I want to give him the benefit of the doubt. Besides, I know the last thing he would want to do is interfere with a noble cause like Project Valour-IT, because they really, really need our help. The troops the Soldiers’ Angels serve sacrificed for all of us, and now it is our opportunity to give something back. (Click on the image to donate now.)

So even though, yes, he beat me in ping pong (Editor’s note – he did, in fact, lose three straight games to Jeff Keane, and did not win a game. Nada. Zip.), that’s OK, because I hope that by writing about it he will have given more people the chance to donate to the Soldiers’ Angels’ effort to help our wounded warriors. So feel free to send this article around.

And just to show there are no hard feelings, here’s a little something I threw together for my buddy Stephan. I hope he likes it.

Broadside of the Week – Nov 2, 2009

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What makes a cartoonist laugh

Every so often, a guy hits the jackpot. Mine came this week when Rick Kirkman, the man behind the popular cartoon, “Baby Blues“, offered to contribute an article for the Broadside Blog. Rick has visited several military hospitals around the world, spreading cheer among active and wounded troops with his wit and talent. Sit back, grab a cup of joe, and enjoy Rick’s impressions of his most recent trip to Walter Reed, Bethesda, Landstuhl, Kuwait and Iraq.

This October, I traveled with nine of my cartoonist friends from the National Cartoonists Society on a USO tour to draw cartoons for the troops. During and after our trip to Washington, D.C., Germany and Iraq, several stories were written with headlines like “Cartoonists Draw Smiles For Soldiers.” It’s been mentioned before, but it bears repeating: we got as many smiles out of it as we gave, if not more.

Those service men and women–wounded and able–hospital staffs, and civilian contract workers were an endless supply of humor and goodwill. And that’s special considering the circumstances under which they live and work. Not just special, but probably necessary, because it’s humor that gets humans through a lot of terrible stuff.

I’d like to share a few of my favorite moments:

There was 21 year old William from Chicago, injured by an IED in Afghanistan, who was asked, “Are you going to stay in the army?” His response without hesitation was, “Blow me up once, that’s it!”

The soldier who joked with us and took our ribbing about his burn injuries because he was reluctant to reveal the source. We turned the whole session into a segment worthy of “What’s My Line?” In my drawing of him, he appeared on the show, “What’s My Injury?”

A soldier with an alliterative name, all J’s, who slowly revealed her name with comic timing, until we were laughing heartily with her.

Or the civilian nurse, who had been at the hospital in Landstuhl, Germany, several years and had collected so many Challenge Coins (the NCS coin was her 100th) that she had an unofficial, hidden name tag that bore her nickname, “Coin Bitch”–a name she considered more acceptable than the alternative. You figure it out.

A female soldier presented me with photos of her two children in lederhosen, twins whom she referred to as “First” and “Last.” I drew Hammie and Zoe as her kids, complete with lederhosen and the name tags “First” and “Last.”

I met a soft-spoken father of four who gently joked that he and his wife got married for all the wrong reasons: they liked the same beer and the same amount of it.

Rick’s sketch of a Soldier using his gloves as eye shades during a C17 flight to Iraq.

A navy man in Iraq joked with me about what NAVY stands for–Never Again Volunteer Yourself.

So in addition to saying thanks to all those men and women for their service to their country, I’d like to thank them for leaving me with so many smiles.

–Rick Kirkman

Rick didn’t ask me to do this, but he and Jerry Scott have a new book out. Click on the image to order it!

My brush with greatness

Greatness. It is a word thrown around with little thought. Like the word “hero”, it is used to describe athletes, political figures, artists, and just about anyone who has achieved a level of success in his or her profession.

I have fallen into the same trap over the years, but a slow awareness has grown within me that real greatness isn’t found on a marquee or in the headlines. True greatness is quiet, and humble, and dignified. I understand now, because I have seen it face-to-face.

We went on a trip to give back. To show the troops that Americans cared about them. But eventually we realized the futility of that task. Not because our country doesn’t care – it does. But because anything we could give them would pale in comparison to what they give us every day.

My real brush with greatness began with the first patient we saw at the National Naval Medical Center, and ended when the last Soldier shook our hands as we departed Kuwait for the trip home.

Greatness was the resolute look in a wounded Marine’s eyes that said, “I’ll get better, and when I do, look out because nothing will slow me down ever again.” Greatness was a Soldier on his fourth tour to Southwest Asia before his 21st birthday. Greatness was a twenty-something Blackhawk gunner scanning the arid land for signs of trouble as his helicopter shuttled a bunch of civilians to Forward Operating Bases to draw funny pictures.

Our national defense depends on a few hundred thousand Americans, most of whom are young enough to be our kids. But when you meet them, and talk to them, and see what they are doing half a world away, you’re the one who feels like a child.

When you see them, you see people who are risking everything they have for people they will probably never meet. You see dignity, and honor, and courage.

You see greatness.

Greenside of the Week – Oct 28, 2009

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