Vets on Sleds

I just watched an amazing segment on HBO's Real Sports program about this program that gets disabled vets on the ski slopes. I absolutely love skiing and I love my country, so this story just about brought me to tears. Here is HBO's description of the segment (although it doesn't do it justice);

"Kirk Bauer understands better than most the pain and discouragement felt by soldiers now returning from Iraq and Afghanistan with a permanent disability. As a young infantryman in Vietnam, Bauer lost a leg in an explosion. He found himself lying in a veterans' hospital pondering a hopeless future when a group of veterans who were fellow amputees encouraged him to try snow skiing. That first confidence-inspiring experience on skis changed his life. Today, Bauer is executive director of Disabled Sports U.S.A., a non-profit organization dedicated to improving the lives of disabled veterans by offering them the same motivating experience that got him out of his own hospital bed 36 years ago. Mary Carillo follows Bauer as he visits severely injured soldiers at Walter Reed Medical Center and takes them on all-expenses-paid ski trips that include their equipment and instruction."

Now, those of you who know me, also know that I am a huge critic of the justification for going to Iraq and then the utter lack of planning for the stabilization of country after we assumed control of it. But I hold the soldiers who went there with the utmost esteem and respect. Modern technology has developed better body armor to protect the lives of our soldiers, however, explosions that would have killed soldiers in the past are now leaving them without arms and legs. So the program the Kirk Bauer runs aims to get the disabled soldiers on the ski slopes where they can experience freedom and speed unlike any other place. They are no longer held back by a disability, but able to fly down the slopes. It was amazing to see the reactions of the soldiers after they had had made a few runs down the mountain.

Now the federal government doesn't give a dollar to this program. In fact, the government has even become more stingy with veteran benefits in the past four years. So I am encouraging those of you who read this to give to organizations that support our troops and veterans, such as Disabled Sports U.S.A., Disabled Veterans Corporate Center, or Disabled American Veterans.