Monday, November 30, 2015

Wounded Warrior Project

I was listening to Canadian talk radio on my satellite radio the other day.  There were three people on a panel.

I'm a little foggy on all the details, but they were discussing a large donation from a big multi-national corporation to help Canadian war veterans deal with Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD).

The first person who talked was concerned that such a donation might have been made to gain some political favor or advantage.  The second person rebutted, stating that PTSD is too large a problem to turn into a political beanbag.  He stated that "We are not in a position to refuse this donation."

Where it got interesting was the third person.  Rather emphatically, he said "How come?  Why is that that we're not in a position to refuse this donation."  He went on to ask why the government hasn't taken care of this already.

This is a very Canadian response.  Americans are used to their government failing to address important issues and having those issues fall to charity.  Canadians are not.

This says a lot about how we look at the world.  I was telling a friend about my experience listening to this program he looked at me with a sort of fire in his eyes and questioned why, in America, we have something called the "Wounded Warrior Project".  Why is the care for our wounded veterans a matter to be left to the whim of charity?

He has a point.  We've always had a Wounded Warrior Project, I told him.  We just used to call it the Veteran's Administration.

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