toughest job
in the military
To get a sense of how eager the White House is to expand support among the military, consider the experience of Kristina Kaufmann.
Kaufmann, who’s married to a soldier, published an op-ed in The Washington Post two months ago about the plight of military families after eight years of war. “I know that many of us feel embittered, powerless and disconnected from the Army in which we and our husbands serve,” she wrote.
Within days, her e-mail account was jammed with messages from soldiers, their families — and the Obama administration.
Staff members for first lady Michelle Obama and Defense Secretary Robert Gates sent messages offering sympathy and thanks. “Your account has helped crystallize a number of concerns [Gates] has had over how the department provides extended support to military families,” Robert Rangel, an aide to Gates, wrote on the secretary’s behalf. “It remains an area of significant interest, and he will be using your article to continue to pursue this issue.”
The e-mails also came with invitations.
Since it was published, Kaufmann has been to the White House twice, most recently to participate in a panel with Michelle Obama; Jill Biden; Gen. Jim Jones, the national security adviser; Gen. James Cartwright, vice chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff; and representatives from 25 different military family groups and nongovernmental organizations.
“I didn’t even realize how it came across until it got such a reaction from people,” said Kaufmann.
The administration’s swift and overwhelming response to Kaufmann is rooted in policy and politics.
After Massachusetts Sen. John Kerry’s Swift Boat-aided defeat in the 2004 presidential election, Democrats have been trying to reverse the post-Vietnam Republican lock on national security issues and to capture the votes of the military, veterans and their families.
Their approach in the 2008 election was twofold: highlight President George W. Bush’s mishandling of the Iraq war, and focus attention on congressional Republicans’ missteps on veterans issues, such as opposing Veterans Affairs funding increases.
Polls suggest the effort paid off. In 2004, Bush captured 65 percent of the veteran vote, according to an Edison/Mitofsky exit poll. In 2008, John McCain won 55 percent of veterans, and Barack Obama picked up 45 percent. More striking: Obama won the vote of veterans under 45, taking 51 percent.
The president is also making progress on the policy front. A recent poll by Greenberg Quinlan Rosner showed that two-thirds of likely voters approve of his handling of national security issues.
The White House now is trying to capitalize on those gains and build a more enduring constituency within the military.
A key way to do that is to reach out to their families, said Robert Diamond, the New York state chairman of Veterans for Obama. “When people think about the military, people think just about the person in uniform,” Diamond said. “But that’s only half the story.”
Military families are certainly feeling left out of the conversation. The left-leaning Blue Star Families recently studied the attitudes of families and found that 94 percent feel the public needs a greater understanding of the sacrifices they’ve made.
The burdens on military families are intense, from the logistics of moving from base to base to the challenges of parenting alone while spouses are deployed.
Even when a parent returns home, it’s often a difficult adjustment, and repeat deployments make those transitions ever more complex.
The spouses and families serve, too
Links for Military Family Members
Does it seem like you WALK alone?
Not always frenzy, but often fun
A little girl says: Daddy don't go
Military Moms "hold the fort"
Dawnyale's Army Wife Page
Helping Interracial Couples
Cinnamon Red Hots edition
Withstanding Disapproval
Collection of USMC poetry
Armed Forces Girlfriends
Helps for homeschoolers
Marine Wives POETRY
blissfully domestic
Sara Wedman Essay
Military Wives
Military SOS