Our Opinion: A persuasive argument for veterans courts

News Tribune editorial

Wednesday, July 11, 2012

A persuasive argument in favor of veterans’ courts was advanced in a story published Saturday.

In a story by News Tribune contributor Jeremy P. Amick, an assistant prosecutor and military officer pointed out the potential difficulty of transitioning from military to civilian life.

According to a quote from Bill Harding, a Pulaski County assistant prosecutor and a combat engineer officer with Missouri National Guard, “veterans are trained their entire military careers to do things as part of a team. When they return from deployment, they often become isolated from that team.”

His observation is instructive.

Military service involves more than teamwork; it involves discipline and an established chain of command.

Civilian life can be the antithesis, particularly if the veteran has no spouse, family or employment after leaving the military.

For them, a life of order can become chaos, and consequences may include alcoholism, drug addiction, and antisocial and criminal behavior.

Specialty courts already established to deal with addiction and DWI offenses have proven their merit.

Legislation to extend specialty courts to veterans was sponsored this year by Rep. Jay Barnes, R-Jefferson City.

Although it was approved overwhelmingly by a 149-1 vote in the House, it languished and ultimately died in a Senate committee.

Barnes said he intends to pursue the legislation next year. We encourage him to do so.

Our military veterans deserve an opportunity and assistance to get their lives on track.

In Harding’s words: “If they are hurting, it is important that we are able to come together as a community and provide them with a team of resources to get them back on the path to recovery.”

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Graceful 10 months, 2 weeks ago

The court aren't supposed to be there to help people that are "hurting." If they need help they can go to the VA. If the VA can't help the courts certainly can't. The whole idea is an example of government out of control due ro "compassionate" politicians.

viktorkowski 10 months, 2 weeks ago

and how well has the current form of punishment been working out for the american people? you now have a higher percentage of the population locked up than communist china. That would tell me there is something wrong with your system. it needs correcting. you have more and larger jails/prison being built. Have you people not figured out yet the end game is to fill them? It's time the business of corrections for profit ended in this country

JCLifer 10 months, 2 weeks ago

The liberals have turned prisons from terrible places of punishment into taxpayer paid county clubs, complete with three hot meals, cable: television, video games, gyms and workout facilitues, free education, free healthcare, etc. If prisons were returned to old cold, uncomfortable places of day-long backbreaking hard labor and long terrible nights of fear, maybe there wouldn't be so many lazy people so eager to do a crime to get back in. Liberals have truly wrecked this once great nation. 1 We never had all the crybaby veterans from WW I and II or the Korean War. Those guys manned up and did what they had to do without complaining. The liberals of the 60s created a bunch of candyasses who whine and cry. I am not saying all service persons are this way, but there are several who are.

dokeus6 10 months, 2 weeks ago

Maybe the service people that you know are Candyasses were Candyasses in the first place. The liberals from the sixties saw what the government was doing and stood up for their rights. (They just happened to get a little off stride with the drug culture but that's another story) but why shouldn't we learn from what they were doing and stand up to the government not by overthrowing it but changing the way we do things.

JCLifer 10 months, 2 weeks ago

Veterans of the Greatest Generation were tough and served with selfless honor. They didn't ask for therapy and special programs to help them with their feelings like some of today's vets.

Sequoia 10 months, 2 weeks ago

Lifer, I hope you meet one of our Iraq veterans one day, so you can tell them face to face the same things you post anonymously online. Maybe you'll get a taste of that pain and fear you wish on other people.

John 10 months, 2 weeks ago

JCLifer: Ever heard of a little thing away back called the "Bonus Army" or the "Bonus Riots"? If not, you need to read up a little bit. Please make note of a military hero [sic] by the name of McArthur. It is interesting that he order (agains orders, by the way) a cavalry charge with drawn sabres and a tank attack against UNarmed vets of WW I AND THEIR families. You really should study history a bit.

kentheco 10 months, 2 weeks ago

There's a problem with your statement. While the figures I found (CIA) showed that China had over 1.4 billion incarcerated, compared to the USA's 1.6 billion, China's information is from 2001 while the USA information is from 2009. China’s information also only includes those sentenced, not political prisoners, those awaiting trial, or those exterminated without benefit of trial. You also stated, “You have more and larger jails/prison being built. Have you people not figured out yet the end game is to fill them?” As a past employee of a “correctional facility,” (Missouri doesn’t have prisons) I watched the same individuals rotate through the system multiple times. The “system” has taken punishment out of being confined and now ensures that those confined are entitled to a long list of “free” benefits (medical, dental, room and board) while incarcerated and provides benefits for their dependents too. I also had to wonder what the “system” had in mind when they starting incarcerating those that have not paid/are delinquent on child support payments. Instead of making them work and pay; they give them room and board and let the state take over paying. Just doesn’t seem right to me.

FussyOno 10 months, 2 weeks ago

More vile, selfish, Republican poison. The tea party is Cancer in its worst form, I'm desperatly hoping for a swift surgical removal. Now you have shown your hate for our servicemen who did their best to assure our future.

John 10 months, 2 weeks ago

Only insofar that the president and others are not going against the constitution.

JCLifer 10 months, 2 weeks ago

Hate for what it has become and how its liberal enemies have walked all over its constitution.

JCLifer 10 months, 2 weeks ago

It is you who hates this country by dumping all over the constitution and changing this country from the land of the free to the land of the dependant and home of the indebted.

JCLifer 10 months, 2 weeks ago

When did I advocate violence?

JCLifer 10 months, 2 weeks ago

I don't owe you any answer or justification. I am not going to play your games.

I love this country. I love and honor the brave men and women who fought to preserve it. Many gave their lives for it. Do not ever doubt love for my country. I posted some words here that I regret. I wanted to delete them but could not. My intent was to discuss the topic of the article but the vultures swooped in and attacked and wild accusations and threats were made. I will not sit by and quietly watch this country be destroyed. We are in grave danger. Romney isn't going to save anything. Congress isn't going to save anything. The tea party isn't going to save anything. The only people who can save this country is we the people. I don't have high hopes for that, but we should not lay down and let it die.

asb 10 months, 2 weeks ago

The Greatest Generation. Their greatness was a result of what they went through and how they managed the spoils of victory, not any superior nature. In 1960 I went with my father to see an old friend of his who lived at the KC Veterans hospital. I wish I had a time machine and could take you there to hear the crying, see men hiding from a child, listen to raging broken heros, kept in a ward full of madmen for a lack of any way to help them. The Greatest Generation, like all others, lost many of it's best to the unrelenting memories and scars of what they'd seen and done. To post here that somehow progressive politics is responsible for modern warfare's legacy, while ignoring or forgetting the unimaginable suffering of soldiers throughout history, is pitiful and small, and predictable. Shame on you both.

JMO 10 months, 2 weeks ago

My father was a WWII veteran, serving in Europe and Africa. I was born late in his life, in 1963, many years after he saw battle. I still remember being told not to wake him by shaking him when he was sleeping because he might wake violently and I remember him having bad dreams. I remember him speaking of his service once, telling a funny story about British soldiers. Otherwise, he never mentioned it and would not watch war movies or television shows other than MASH, when it was popular. And my father was one of the strongest people I have ever known.

I remember my mother talking about boys she knew who came home shell-shocked. They didn't have the name PTSD back then, but they sure as heck had the disorder. Did they "man up and not complain"? Yes. Did they "ask for therapy and special programs to help them with their feelings like some of today's vets"? Maybe they should have. Don't you EVER doubt that they suffered. Why would you want our servicemen and women to suffer like that if they can be helped?

dokeus6 10 months, 2 weeks ago

I had the unique opportunity of meeting a Bronze Star Recipient from World War II. He defended the line by himself with a machine gun from a bunker from advancing Nazis. I was humbled by what that Man said. I listened as he talked about the scenes of the happenings around that bunker that night. He described them like he was just there the day before. He said he still has dreams about that night and the stuff he had to do to survive. I told him I wish I had half the courage in my body as what he did that night. He thanked me for the compliment but he said he did what he had to do to survive and that was all. Next time anyone ever condemns a military person for standing up for your freedoms take a second to correct them about how much Respect that person has earned by serving you and their country.

Sequoia 10 months, 2 weeks ago

This thread contains some of the ugliest thoughts I've seen on this site, and that's really saying something.

I hope everybody takes a good, hard, honest look at what the Tea Party is, and what their enablers in the Republican Party have become. It is not conservative. It is sick and wrong. I can certainly understand disliking certain "liberal" ideas, but that doesn't mean you have to support darkness like this.

This is not a liberal vs. conservative issue. It's a matter of decency.

JCLifer 10 months, 2 weeks ago

No kidding. These liberals are so twisted. We are getting exactly the kind of government we deserve.
Our founding fathers would puke if they knew what has become of this once-great country.
The U.S. of A. is over. Stick a fork in it.

Littleinvestor 10 months, 2 weeks ago

Until the day he died, one of my grandfathers had horrible nightmares about the trenches in World War I. I try never to forget to thank members of the Armed Forces for their service. Not all of them are haunted but many of them are. Asb, all of us should have to visit veterans' hospitals and nursing homes.

JCLifer 10 months, 2 weeks ago

May God bless all our veterans and their families.

RobHunterJohnson 10 months, 2 weeks ago

My Dad was in the 464th Bomb Group, Heavy, 779th Squadron. All the Veterans are Hero's. Rob

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