26 August 2005

Ain't Too Proud to Bleg for a Worthy Cause

For those who may not have yet heard of the group, Soldiers' Angels is a very worthy cause indeed. The foundation is dedicated to providing aid and comfort to military personnel and their families and "to ensuring that our military know they are loved and supported during and after their deployment into harm's way". From their website:
In the summer of 2003, [Sgt. Brandon Varn] wrote home expressing his concern that some soldiers did not receive any mail or support from home. Being a caring and loving mother, [his mother, Patti Patton-Bader,] decided not to allow a situation like that to continue. She contacted a few friends and extended family to ask if they would write to a soldier or two.

Within a few short months, The Soldiers' Angels Foundation went from a mother writing a few extra letters to an Internet Community with thousands of angels worldwide and growing stronger with the addition of new members daily. With more and more merchants donating services, money and items for packages, the Angels reorganized as a 501 c 3 non-profit so all donations would be tax deductible.

Soldiers' Angels currently supports thousands of American Service Members stationed wherever we raise our Country's Flag and the number is growing daily. We also work tirelessly supporting our Wounded Soldiers, with transitional backpacks, personal visits, phone calls, etc. Additionally, we send our thanks via letters and email to the military of Great Britain, Poland and Australia who serve by our soldiers side in Iraq.

The group supports a number of intiatives, including providing care packages and long-distance calling cards to deployed personnel, airline frequent-flyer miles to their families, and Kevlar-armored protection blankets to provide extra shielding for Humvees in combat zones.

Now, in addition to those and other projects, Soldiers' Angels has begun a new initiative -- Project Valour-IT:
provides voice-controlled software and laptop computers to wounded Soldiers, Sailors, Airmen and Marines recovering from hand and arm injuries or amputations at major military medical centers. Operating laptops by speaking into a microphone, our wounded heroes are able to send and receive messages from friends and loved ones, surf the 'Net, and communicate with buddies still in the field without having to press a key or move a mouse.

I have posted a donation link at the top of Infamy or Praise's sidebar; please join me in supporting Project Valour-IT and the many other outstanding Soldiers' Angels efforts.

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