Free Republic

Republican presidential candidate Jeb Bush says he's "fine" with transgender people openly serving in the military – as long as it doesn't compromise morale, Yahoo News reports. Bush's view – echoing that of Defense Secretary Ashton Carter, the Washington Post has reported – marks the first time he has commented on the issue. And it comes in the wake of the Defense Department decision this week to issue two directives bringing the Pentagon closer to rescinding its ban on open service by transgender people. Carter ordered a 6-month review to examine how allowing transgenders to serve openly in the military...

The Defense Department is naming a combat ship after former congresswoman and gun-control advocate Gabrille Giffords this weekend. Giffords was shot in the head at a constituent meet and greet during her third term. She resigned from Congress in 2012 to focus on her recovery, and started a gun-control PAC called Americans for Responsible Solutions in 2013. She and her husband, astronaut Mark Kelly, have also advocated for gun-control measures in congressional testimony. The Navy’s tenth littoral combat ship will be christened USS Gabrielle Giffords on Saturday in Mobile, Ala. “The christening of the future USS Gabrielle Giffords marks the...

Law enforcement officers at Washington, D.C.’s annual Police Week tell The Daily Caller that the anti-police climate is taking its toll on the men and women in uniform and that morale is low in departments across the country. One source told TheDC Monday night that officers have stepped back from engaging in proactive policing, because they often see the same violent criminals they arrest immediately released on to the streets. http://dailycaller.com/2015/05/12/police-officers-morale-is-low-in-departments-across-the-country/

Too many missions and too few pilots are threatening the ‘readiness and combat capability’ of America’s unmanned Air Force, according to an internal memo. The U.S. Air Force’s fleet of drones is being strained to the “breaking point,” according to senior military officials and an internal service memo acquired by The Daily Beast. And it’s happening right when the unmanned aircraft are most needed to fight ISIS. The Air Force has enough MQ-1 Predator and MQ-9 Reaper drones. It just doesn’t have the manpower to operate those machines. The Air Force’s situation is so dire that Air Combat Command (ACC),...

A new survey finds only 26 percent of those in the military community approve of the performance of Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel. But the blame for this low approval rating extends higher up the chain of command. Retired Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta, the latest former Obama loyalist to write a tell-all exposé, knows this all too well. In his memoir, Panetta describes how he warned the President (to no avail) that allowing Iraq to slide into violence would create “a new haven for terrorists to plot attacks against the U.S.” This revelation should come as no surprise, but regrettably,...

Navy sailors harbor “widespread mistrust” in the admirals who command them, complaining of poor leadership and a disciplinary environment that tolerates absolutely no mistakes, says a survey of the fleet. The disgruntlement runs deepest in the officer corps, where scores of commanders have been relieved of duty in recent years.

Reports out of Gaza have the IDF finding a surprising level of sophistication and breadth of scale in the Hamas tunnel network... besides getting them under the border for rocket launches against Israeli territory, the system connected the mosques, schools, and such that the terror-government uses to shuttle around weapons, terrorists, and supplies... Alas, the Israeli Defense Force is proving a bit too much for these Jihadi boneheads to deal with on the battlefield: Hamas morale is reportedly already in the toilet, and recent raids find no terrorist/fighters left attempting to hold the position... they leave their weapons behind...

State and university employees may see a temporary 2.5 percent salary reduction solidified into a permanent pay cut. Gov. Brian Sandoval’s budget director Jeff Mohlenkamp told a legislative committee Saturday that the administration may amend a bill to make those salary reductions permanent. As written now, Senate Bill 483 extends current 2.5 percent salary reductions until June 30, 2015, at which time they’d go away and employees would get 2.5 percent of their salaries back. “We would seek to modify that bill to make the pay cut permanent, and then we would make the affirmative decision to restore the pay...

During a Senate hearing on immigration reform Tuesday, Republican Sen. Jeff Sessions and Department of Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano had a testy back-and-forth over the performance of Immigration and Customs Enforcement officials. Sessions challenged Napolitano on whether she had met with leader of the ICE employees’ union in the wake of reports of low morale among ICE agents. Napolitano replied that she had not. “I think you should have met with them,” Sessions said. “I think there’s a real problem there. We have a very real problem. In December of 2012, a few months ago, a survey of federal...

I was checking my 8-yr old son's classwork assignment grades. He was so demoralized that he was getting C, D and F on many assignments. I was shocked and delved deeper. Turns out he is assiged a letter grade on these assignments even though he is "making progress" getting up to 70 or even 80 percent of the questions right. Worse, he was assigned an F grade on an assignment because he did not get the meaning for terms "Human Rights" and "Tolerance". WTF is an 8-yr old supposed to know this shtuff? Damn....I am seriously considering pulling him out...

If the homeland’s security were dependent on employee morale, we’d be in big trouble. Fortunately, the men and women of the Department of Homeland Security are committed to the agency’s mission, even as the agency fails to inspire them. You know things are bad for workers when a bipartisan congressional hearing is called to examine a department’s drooping spirit. It ranks 31 among 33 large agencies in The Best Places to Work in the Federal Government survey published by the Partnership for Public Service. (The Partnership has a content-sharing relationship with The Washington Post.)

Palestinian terrorists are not happy. Last August, terrorist groups in Gaza thought they had come up with a way to get around the new Israeli Iron Dome anti-rocket system. They thought that all you had to do was fire at least seven rockets simultaneously at the same area being guarded by one Iron Dome battery. Islamic terrorists did this last August. One rocket got through, and killed an Israeli civilian. This “saturation” tactic is a problem with all air defense systems. But the saturation attacks turned out to be no more effective than firing many more rockets over an extended...

U.S. troops are losing confidence in the military's long-term chances of success in Afghanistan, a new poll has revealed. The Military Times survey found less than half of serving soldiers believe the U.S. is 'very likely' or 'somewhat likely' to succeed in Afghanistan. The number is down from 2007, when more than 75 percent of those polled said the U.S. was 'very likely' or 'somewhat likely' to succeed. Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2038887/Under-50-U-S-troops-believe-Afghanistan-winnable.html#ixzz1YN2SeV1W

A new report says American troops in Afghanistan are suffering with the highest rates of mental health problems since 2005 and that morale has plummeted. The report, released Thursday, furnished the first detailed glimpse of the psychological cost of a campaign commanders and officials say has reversed the momentum of the insurgency. Among other things, it says the dramatic increase in fighting there is one of the key factors affecting the mental health of the uniformed forces. For instance, some 70 to 80 percent of troops surveyed for the report said they had seen a buddy killed or wounded.

A new military survey obtained by USA Today shows that U.S. troops fighting in Afghanistan are reporting record levels of acute stress and low morale. The problem is most severe in servicemen and women who have been deployed multiple times. A third of them reported depression, anxiety or another serious mental health problem. Meanwhile, those reporting medium to very high morale dropped to 46.5 percent from 65.7 percent in 2005. Seventeen percent reported acute stress, compared to 6 percent in 2005. The survey also painted a bleak picture of the intense combat troops in Afghanistan engage in. More than 75...

Nurse leaders will warn this week that poor morale and job cuts threaten to derail the government's reform programme of the NHS in England. The issues, along with wider concerns about the overhaul, will be key themes of the Royal College of Nursing's annual conference in Liverpool. RCN leader Peter Carter has said nurses were being pushed to the limit, working extra hard to keep services going. The health secretary is not expected to give a speech but will meet delegates. It is understood Andrew Lansley is attending the conference as part of the government's "listening exercise" over its shake-up...

President Barack Obama and US Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner sought to downplay fears that unrest in the Middle East would negatively impact the US economy by hailing a Virginia man’s invention of a rainbow-making machine as a harbinger of a brighter future for America. The device is the brainchild of Michael Jones McKean, an assistant professor at Virginia Commonwealth University. It uses a large scale sprinkler system and the light of the sun to create rainbows averaging about 1,000 feet in length. Each device can produce a rainbow of 15 minute duration twice a day. A prototype is currently being...

WASHINGTON, July 8 (UPI) -- A survey seeking U.S. troops' views on the impact of ending a policy barring homosexuals from openly serving in the military is being sent, the Pentagon said. The more than 100-question survey was being sent to 200,000 active-duty troops and 200,000 members of reserve forces, CNN reported Thursday. Among other things, the survey asks about issues such as how morale or readiness may be affected if a commander is thought to be gay or lesbian, the need to maintain personal conduct standards and how a repeal may affect one's willingness to serve in the military....

Airman 1st Class Jill Diem serenades Senior Airman Luis Murillo during a concert April 17, 2010, at Bagram Airfield, Afghanistan. Airman Diem is a vocalist with the U.S. Air Forces Central Band Reserve Generation and Airman Murillo is assigned to the 455th Expeditionary Civil Engineers Squadron Force Protection Flight. (U.S. Air Force photo by/ Staff Sgt. Richard Williams) BAGRAM AIRFIELD, Afghanistan (AFNS) -- The sound of music filled the air as members of the U.S. Air Forces Central Command Band Reserve Generation performed here as part of a two-month tour of the U.S. Central Command area of responsibility April 15 through 20....

KANDAHAR AIRFIELD, Afghanistan (Reuters) – Fast food joints where soldiers wolf down burgers and pizza will soon be a thing of the past at bases in Afghanistan, as the U.S. military reminds soldiers they are at war and not in "an amusement park." In the sprawling military base at Kandahar, the fast food outlets facing the axe include Burger King, Pizza Hut, and the U.S. chain restaurant T.G.I. Friday's that features a bar with alcohol-free margaritas and other drinks -- all set along the bustling "Boardwalk" area of the base. ---SNIP--- The U.S. military says its beef with the burger...