Helping The U.S. Troops At Christmastime

Resources For Donating To Organizations That Help Troops And Wounded Veterans

(CBS)  Billy Joel is back with a brand new song for a very special cause. “Christmas in Fallujah” was inspired by letters the piano man received from troops serving in Iraq and Afghanistan. You won’t hear the 58-year-old rocker sing it, though. He gave that honor to a young singer named Cass Dillon, a man Joel felt was closer to the age of the troops themselves.

All the proceeds go to a group called Homes for Our Troops, a non-partisan, non-profit organization that provides specially adapted homes for severely wounded troops and veterans.

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Click here to visit Homes for our Troops Web site.
And if you’re feeling inspired by Billy Joel’s effort, you can get into the act.

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As Americans celebrate the holidays with friends and family, nearly 200,000 members of the U.S. Military are serving in Iraq and Afghanistan. The war won’t take a break for Christmas, but there are ways to make a soldier’s day a little brighter and to say thanks for his or her service.

John Hanson, spokesman for the United Service Organizations (USO), reminded us that the military no longer accepts packages addressed to “Any Soldier” or “Any Wounded Soldier.” That practice was discontinued after 9/11 and the anthrax attacks that followed in 2001.

Hanson encourages people to go to their local church or civic organization and obtain a list of men and women from the community who are serving abroad. Packages addressed to specific soldiers will be delivered. Even a holiday card or a note with a friendly message is appreciated.

Another option is to simply donate some time or money to an organization that sends care packages and gifts to the troops.

Other Ways To Help

Check out the Web sites of the following groups to see where your help can be best used.

USO

America Supports You

Operation Home Front

Army and Air Force Exchange Service

Operation Military Pride

HOOAH!!!! Radio - Operation "Rip The Knob Off!"

[coolprophet]

RON PAUL IS THE NEW WAY
What we need is a President who will show us the way. Not the old way. Not the same way, but a NEW way. Think about this for a minute. What if we pulled all of our troops out of South Korea? They''ve been there for 50+ years. What if we quit worrying about Iran, but instead, realized that its having a nuclear weapon will not mean the end of the world? What if we pulled all of our troops out of the Middle-East, and brought them all home? What if we realistically addressed the National Debt, and paid attention to REALLY DOING SOMETHING about stopping illegal immigration? These are the ideas of Presidential candidate, Ron Paul. He''s a ten term Congressman and a physician who has delivered over 4,000 babies. He''s an intellectual who''s published four books, three of which are devoted entirely to sound economics and one to foreign policy. He was raised on a dairy farm in Pennsylvania as a pious Lutheran, but now he attends a Baptist church. Paul is given to mulling things over morally. Whenever he recollects the helicopter pilots he treated as an Air Force Flight Surgeon (Captain) during the Vietnam War, a war which he now says was "totally unnecessary and illegal," he laments, "They were gung-ho. I''ve often thought about how many of those people never came back." Candidates with the high level of personal integrity and proven track record of adherence to The Constitution, Congressman Paul has always demonstrated only come around once in a lifetime

[mattcbsmatt]

thies donation web sites really suck i was going to donate money to iraq or afgan soldiers and i get thies stupid web sites. i have the freedom and liberty and money to do this. but thies web sites have taken this away from me. ha

[kennedy7955]

The best way to help and support the troops is to bring them all home and not just from Iraq but from all around the world. It is time we demilitarized and spent our bloated defense budget on our crumbling infrastructure.

[mattcbsmatt]

i would like a camo baseball cap or something then i will donate more