HOME OF THE BRAVE Discussion Page: Help Encourage Reporting on Non-combat Deaths

Monday, January 03, 2011

Help Encourage Reporting on Non-combat Deaths

My name is John Lasker and I am a freelance journalist from Ohio. I have written for Wired magazine, Christian Science Monitor, US Catholic magazine and many, many more. I am writing to let you know about my reporting project on "Non-Combat" deaths of female soldiers. As you know this is beyond an important issue that needs loud voices. To make it happen I need your help. The good news is, you can help fund this reporting effort at NO cost to you. That's right - it's free! Just register with the site. Take a brief survey on Public Broadcasting, receive $5 credit and donate.

And If I get the funding for this project, I plan on working more Non-combat death related stories. Donna has championed your cause with me, and this story is gaining momentum. Unfortunately the mainstream media or big media has not caught-on as of yet. But the mainstream media, like CBS nightly news, Sport Illustrated, has been copying my stories for years and I know the more I write, the more they'll take. So please follow the below instructions and donate to my story Is This How We Treat Our Female Soldiers? Families seek answers in daughters' "Non-Combat" deaths". Look for the picture of Private Lavena Johnson.

Step one: Just find my pitch on Spot.Us: http://spot.us/pitches/724

Step two: Click "Free Credits" login and take the quick questionnaire.
Step three: Confirm that you want to give the credits you just earned to my pitch.
Step four: Click "Free Credits" again if it's still there (sometimes there is more than one questionnaire available).

Step five: If you found steps 1-3 painless - share them with a friend.

We need to find 100 people who are willing to take a few moments out of their day to fund this story. If we can - then this important work can be produced and published so more people will know about TK.

If you'd like to read some of my work, here is a link to an feature story I had in US Catholic in 2009. This story focuses on the Pentagon's need of Catholic chaplains, and
the debate on how they can serve God and in a war zone at the same time.

http://www.uscatholic.org/chaplains

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Historical Fact

"Of the more than 274,000 officers and men who served in the army during the Spanish-American War and the period of demobilization, 5,462 died in the various theaters of operation and in camps in the a U.S. Only 379 of the deaths were battle casualties, the remainder being attributed to disease and other causes."

Source: Encyclopedia of American History by Richard Morris

In 1898, thousands of soldiers got food poisoning from meat packed by Armour and Company and sold to the Army. There are no figures on how many of the five thousand noncombat deaths were caused by this.

The Oxford Companion to American Military History estimates that between 2 percent and 25 percent of the casualties in America's wars are attributable to friendly fire.