Associated Press – November 8, 2007:
Veterans make up one in four homeless people in the United States, though they are only 11 percent of the general adult population, according to a report to be released Thursday.
And homelessness is not just a problem among middle-age and elderly veterans. Younger veterans from Iraq and Afghanistan are trickling into shelters and soup kitchens seeking services, treatment or help with finding a job.
After being discharged from the military, Jason Kelley, 23, of Tomahawk, Wis., who served in Iraq with the Wisconsin National Guard, took a bus to Los Angeles looking for better job prospects and a new life.
Kelley said he couldn’t find a job because he didn’t have an apartment, and he couldn’t get an apartment because he didn’t have a job. He stayed in a $300-a-week motel until his money ran out, then moved into a shelter run by the group U.S. VETS in Inglewood, Calif. He’s since been diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder, he said.
“The only training I have is infantry training and there’s not really a need for that in the civilian world,” Kelley said
#19 – Do those shelters verify veteran status? I bet not, it mean the shelter had fewer people in it, and more clients mean more money and more status.
You will not hear that from the workers there. The workers get told that checking veteran status would “alienate” the clients, “make them think we don’t trust them”, and “it’s cruel to question them that way”.
/shrug
#21, Phillep
It is so much easier to just deny there is a problem then it is to do something to fix it.
Conservatives are such cowards… it’s always easier to attack victims than to attack the problems the create victims.
Mustard, I am a veteran. This “veterans are more prone to be losers and nuts” is an insult to me and to all veterans.
Run those polls again, and this time verify veteran status.
Right Mustard… You can’t judge all veterans by Phillep’s posts!
My youngest son is thinking of joining the military. Why? Because he doesn’t know what else to do. He’s jacked around in school, is immature, and has no idea what he should do with his life. He’s not a bad kid, he’s just lazy and immature.
With these skill sets, it’s hard to find a job. But, you can be trained to kill. The military is always hiring. It wouldn’t be all bad, he would mature a lot, if he doesn’t get killed. Being a teenager, he doesn’t think that can happen to him.
And then there’s the whole moral issue of occupying foreign countries for political and profit reasons, and the killing that goes with it. Is it really a surprise that the US doesn’t take care of their soldiers? Look how they’re used? They’re a tool to be used for the state’s benefit. They’re hardly ever used for defensive reasons today.
All that said, there is a demand for infantry in civilian life. The cops are more like the military today then they are like cops. I’m sure he could be hired for riot control and turned lose to bash some heads in. LA or Boston must have some openings.