A Timely Warning...

...from San Francisco:

It's not much more than a ripple right now, but a new wave of students is surging into American college classrooms: military veterans who served in Iraq and Afghanistan.
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With the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan a little more than five years old, the veterans who were discharged in the meantime are now starting to graduate from colleges and universities. At San Francisco State, 110 of the 8,200 students are military veterans.

That number may be small, but it's growing.
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Jo Volkert, associate vice president of enrollment management at San Francisco State, said most veterans don't need help with college, but the university wants to do everything possible to assist them. The university has a veterans club and offers counseling for veterans who might have trouble handling the stress of the college environment.

"They do see people who seem overly cautious as they go across campus," she said. "As veterans, they were trained to be aware of their environment and so sometimes they can be hyper-alert, and that can be a problem."

These sorts of threats shouldn't be taken lightly:

He said being a veteran hasn't caused him any problems with other students, despite the university's well-known propensity for protest and anti-war sentiment. He said he has a different perspective on the war than other students, because he met a lot of Iraqis who were glad to see the end of Saddam Hussein.

Augustis said an influx of veterans in college, and in business and society armed with college diplomas, will be good for the United States. Veterans bring with them a sense of duty and honor, he said, as well as life experiences that few others can relate to.

"I will try to take all my experiences and have a positive impact on the future," he said.

THRESHER, SCORPION ... Titanic?

Another secret in from the cold.

A mission to discover the wreck of the Titanic was actually a cover a story for examining the remains of two Cold War nuclear submarines, the man who located the liner has revealed.

Dr Bob Ballard, an oceanographer, has admitted that he had to locate and inspect the remains of the vessels, which sank during the 1960s, in a top secret mission for the US navy before he was allowed to look for the Titanic.

He said: "I couldn't tell anybody. There was a lot of pressure on me. It was a secret mission. I felt it was a fair exchange for getting a chance to look for the Titanic."

He added: "We handed the data to the experts. They never told us what they concluded – our job was to collect the data. I can only talk about it now because it has been declassified."

Sole Survivor

Forced to leave the combat zone after his two brothers died in the Iraq war, Army Spc. Jason Hubbard faced another battle once he returned home: The military cut off his family’s health care, stopped his G.I. educational subsidies and wanted him to repay his sign-up bonus. It wasn’t until Hubbard petitioned his local Congressman that he was able to restore some of his benefits. Now that Congressman, Rep. Devin Nunes, plans to join three other lawmakers in introducing a bill that would ensure basic benefits to all soldiers who are discharged under the sole survivor policy.

Community Coffee Delivers

Order four bags for delivery downrange, and they'll add four more bags for free:

"We are grateful to U.S. military service members, at home and abroad, who protect the freedoms and privileges enjoyed by all Americans. The Military Match program is our way of demonstrating support for those serving overseas, and who are away from home, family and friends during this time."

Matt Saurage
President, Commmunity Coffee

Coffee is one of the few things you can send downrange these days that you can be assured will be very much appreciated. I mean, not that we were working 48 hour days or anything like that...

Details here.