information about women unemployed saying there were nearly 22% unemployed as of december 2011, iraq and afghanistan female veterans. >> it's really tough to get good numbers on female veterans. on an average the number is about the same, 12% for women, 12.4 for women. that's averaged over a year. the problem is the sample size is so small when they collect data -- think about this. iraq and afghanistan veterans less than 1% of the population. about 11% of those are women. so an even smaller population of an extremely small population. when they take sampling, a difference of two or three or four in a given month can swing it 5, 10 percentage points. this is something we need to work harder to get. we need an accurate picture of what's happening with our female vets. they a growing and critical sector of the veterans population. they need services that are on

par with their male vets, they need not just job placement but health care and benefits. this is something iava has been aggressive on in the last few years. the next step is to figure out an accurate snapshot of where employment and health care are and with a small population it makes it really, really challenging. >> because of things like post traumatic stress disorder, do those serve as stigmas for those potentially higher? >> yes. the vast majority have adjustment issues. it's a process for everyone. you have -- first of all, you have this -- the crazy vet stigma, which frankly just isn't true. it doesn't bare out. the incidences of someone going to extremes with post traumatic stress are actually incredibly low. i would venture far less than in the average civilian population.

but what we have to do is educate the workforce. we have to let them know that, look, post traumatic stress is is a wound. it's like getting shot in the chest. if i -- i tell this to vets all the time, if you got shot in the chest, you're not going to walk around with a hold in your chest, you're going to get treatment. we have to reach out to nonprofits and community mental health to train them to understand what combat mental health looks like. >> maryland is next for our guest, tom tarantino. tom, governments line. >> thanks for your service and commitment to our country. following what you just said, learning more about the stand down movement where nonprofits and companies come together and try to coordinate jobs and need social services and shelter and others for vets who have

returned. what's your perception about the stand down movement? do you think it's a valuable as tote help vets that need services or we need more of that? what's your take on stand down? >> yeah, stand down is great. it has been highly effective. i think as a first step, you know, having that day where you have all the services in an easy access area where especially homeless vets who typically aren't counted, aren't treated, don't have access can't necessarily get into a v.a. very easily, where they can get into progra programs, where vets who need help and are there most importantly with other vets. one thing that we found, the key to helping vets get what they need is make sure they're around other vets, make sure they have a community. and one. really powerful things about stand downs, it's people offering services but it's large crowds of vets who need help,

who get what they need or are there to help their friends get what they need. it's a great first step. i think we need to take that model and expand it. we need to create this network of support, not just within the v.a. and government sector but within the community sector. there are a lot of community based nonprofits that aren't engaged on vets. we have to come together and figure out how to integrate all these operations and break down thestop pipes between the d.o.d. and v.a. and state and local governments so we can reach out and catch people who need services and need help. >> augusta, maine. jake, good morning. go ahead. ja jake from augusta, maine. one more time. >> yes, go ahead. stop listening to the tv and go ahead. >> caller: you guys have a great show. i appreciate it very much.

i thank you for having such a great show but unfortunately i think it is more propaganda than anything else. i disagree that -- i know there are a lot of veterans who hear a calling and follow their hearts and i appreciate those, but i feel that many do it to line their pockets, to call a soldier a public servant i think is a little bit silly. you don't get paid when you serve. you serve good, you do it out of love. >> you can respond if you wish. >> okay. look, nobody joins the military for the great pay. and for the easy access to awesome benefits. anyone who has dealt with the department of veterans affairs knows the headache. anyone who has tried to deal with, you know, the military, especially mental health service knows that it's difficult. and the pay is certainly a lot lower than you would be getting if you were doing an equivalent job in the civilian world.

it is impractical and frank lly ridiculous to say we need a military and to ask them to serve for nothing is insane. the fact is that military service is a calling. it's not a job, it's a mission. it is is a way of life. when you join the military, you don't do it for a paycheck, you do it because you want to be part of something big arer than yourself, you have a love of country and you feel it's important to serve your fellow americans and you're willing to lay down your life if necessary to do that. that's really the core of military service. you don't do it for the wealth and the fame and the glory because we get neither. >> pensacola, florida. rita, republican line. >> caller: good morning. i just want to thank you for the opportunity to say something that i think needs to be said. my son is an 18 delta, which is a special forces medic. he's been in the service almost 30 years and is evidently very

talented. he's had many commendations and bronze star for his duty and things that he's done. in fact, one of the things that attached to the commendation medal said he was the lead surgeon. my problem is when he gets out of the service next year, what kind of opportunity does he have because he says he can't get a job as a physician or anything like that at the v.a. hospitals or anywhere. seems to me all this talent is being wasted. so i would like you all to comment on what other options a person who is good at what he does and evidently likes it, how he can continue on. thank you. >> wow. thank you and thank you for your service as a military mom. i know my mom would appreciate that. you know, you're absolutely right. you are 100% right and that's what frustrated us so much about the way we handle military vof

ca -- vocations. you have medics, especially special forces medics, which some describe as medical school in six months. it's intense. these guys, i've seen them in the field, they're amazingly talented. it's true their skills don't translate into any certification in the civilian world and that is insane. we worked with the house and senate to pass a bill that is going to be able to quantify that. probably not in the next year but maybe in the year after that we'll actually able to figure out what standard medic training, what forces medic training training means, whether it's equivalent to a p.a., to an emt, we don't know. so people like your son will be able to get out of a military and walk into a job. ahead of that i know that the office of professional management in the government sector is actually starting to

do that internally so that people like your son could continue to work in the dod as a doctor or pa or a medic or within the v.a. system and then, you know, just kind of continue their school so -- or their education so they can get the last few bits that they need to become whatever level they want to do. so things are moving, things are happening. i suspect over the next year we're going to see a lot of movement in this and we're going to see this changing quite significantly by the end of 2012 or 2013. >> is there any relations to the president's plan to cut portions of the military button and the veterans coming out of iran and afghanistan to go back into the pentagon to fill jobs there if those budgets weren't cut? >> i have not seen a direct correlation with that. some of the proposals coming out of the white house are about changing health care and changing retirement and, frankly, you know, i'm slightly opposed to those. there's been nothing that's been a direct correlation of cutting

the workforce or preventing veterans. the administration over the last three years has overhauled the way we hired in this country. that's going to hire even more so the preference system is fixed so eight little bit more manageable so veterans preference isn't simply five points and good luck. they've made a concerted effort through executive order in 2009 so every government agency can hire vets, they can hire them, train them and bring them on so they continue their service in government. >> tuscaloosa, alabama. john, democrats line. >> caller: i'm a vietnam veteran and i have a son who just returned from iraq twice and deployed. he's having a problem readjusting. i'm able to mentor him somewhat.

the local v.a. at one time had a program that was peer led and that did a lot for me, just listening to other vets and how they attacked and solved their problems. i think if we can keep the lines of communication open and somehow address the skitsoid double mindedness of the people when they need the armed forces they are for them but once they finish, there's some laws that do not consider what the person has gone through. my son was incarcerated in washington for something that i really think was just out of proportion due to the nature of their laws up there. >> yeah, well, thank you for your service and welcome home, sir. you actually touched on a couple really big issues. the fact is mental health care in the v.a. is not where it needs to be. it's nowhere even close and

there's been a lot of press over that in the last year and there are a lot of efforts to figure out how to fix the v.a. system or allow the v.a. to reach out to state and local resources and community based nonprofits to have adequately timed mental health care. you're right, peer support is the key to almost everything. vets don't necessarily want to open up to civilians. i've dealt with this myself when i've gone to the v.a. in terms of the justice system, you're right. what's happened is you've started to see a lot of vets who have not had access to adequate mental health care, who can't get to the v.a. or the v.a., they go to the v.a. and they say we'll see you in six weeks. and what happens is they get into trouble and they interact with the local justice system. so what we've seen in response to that, understanding that these crimes are due to readjustment issues, due to their combat-related issues, there have been 72 veterans courts that have sprung up

across the country. they understand these aren't people who made a conscious choice to live a criminal lifestyle, they're dealing with readjustments and have fallen into trouble. we can treat them and deal with it in a peer network and what we've seen is the recidivism level lower. we need to have every community have the ability to do it and we're not there yet. >> jan asks aren't there equivalency tests they can take to fast track careers? >> yes and know. the problem with equivalency and transferability of skills, is there's no set national standards. the military has certain systems where you can, you know, get credits for your service but the problem is most institutions don't take them. the american council on

education has an amazing translator where you can put in all your military schools and skills and then it gives a suggested amount of credit that you can get at community college or a university. the problem is it's totally voluntary and not everyone takes them. so, yes, there are smaller individual programs but what we need to do, especially for military families and the active duty military that move every two to three years, we need to find a way to transfer credits from institution to institution that a two-year degree doesn't take five or six years because you have to keep taking classes over. >> caller: thank you for having c-span. you're a voice in the dark. so anyway, i want to say that as far as this is concerning the iraq war where i believe that congress laid down to bush when he came out with that yellow

uranium thing that there was no question -- it showed there was no back bone in congress. and another thing is that with this private enterprise, these people that complain about or always say we should have -- everything should be private enterprise, newt gingrich is one of them, he made over a million dollars over of fannie mae and freddie mac, which is government money coming into his coffers and how many historians, i'd like to see how many historians at these -- which he claimed he was get paid the kind of money that he gets paid. >> your question for our guest, sir? >> well, one of the questions is that, you know, i believe that these -- that a lot of these wars have been perpetuated from, you know, there has been no real basis for them to do what they

do and they've squandered our national wealth. >> leave it there. let our guest respond. >> i think it is a testament to the service of this generation of veterans. you know a lot of vets who felt exactly like you did, who felt we should have gone into iraq years before. at the end of the day it didn't matter. it didn't matter how you felt, whether you loved or hated the iraq war, you had a job to do, you had a mission. when i went, i didn't go because of some political belief. i went because they were sending my soldiers and i'll be damned if anybody sends my soldiers into combat without me. i had a mission and that was part of my service. you don't join the military bass -- because of your political beliefs. you join the military because you want to serve your country and that type of service is really, really difficult. that's a this generation is and how great

all generations that have chose kren to serve in the military are, that they were able to do this, serve their country and come home and try to become leaders. >> an iraq vet from augusta, georgia. >> caller: how's it going, tom. joe santos. >> wow. >> caller: i was flipping through a channel and thought i'd call in. i appreciate what you're doing and i totally agree. you kind of levelled the playing field out there because my father was a vet and when he retired, it was more about who you knew than what you know. so what you're doing is great. i appreciate, i know just about less than 36 months out from retirement myself, i'm definitely going to use your services and i appreciate that. >> well, jeff and i were platoon leaders to the in iraq and he's an old friend of mine and, god, it's great to hear your voice,

man. they're your services, bro. you earned them. we were there together. go ahead and give me a call, shoot me up on facebook and we can talk more, man. it's good to hear your voice. congratulations on almost retiring. >> one more call, margaret republican line, arkansas. >> caller: thank you for your service, sir. i apologize for the american people, for the two absolutely despicable calls that hurt the military. oh and also on the one newt gingrich didn't get the million, the companies got that. he got 3$35,000. it's not polite to lie. >> on the head injuries and the post traumatic stress, sir, dr. janet mccarol, you could get her online, maccaro, the problem that is in this is natural health and the military isn't using it.

i called fort campbell, kentucky and told them about it. they're doing it already in san antonio. pain stress center.com. when you're under stress, it depletes the amino acids in your brain. that's what makes your neurotras mitters work. it's that simple for the most part. you can take amino acids in capsules. to make it plain, they're already working with them in san antonio and this is urgent for our troops. >> there's a lot of things the dod and v.a. need to do to look outside the box for treatment. weep need to cast a wide net and figure out how to treat. overall this generation of men and women, you know, they need -- they don't just need to be welcomed home, but they need a job, they need to be welcomed

on the campus, they need to be helped integrating back into society. the biggest problem that we've had with a lot of people with coming home is we come home to a lot of indifference. we come home to after having, you know, extreme sacrifice in the military community, coming home to an american community attention to veteran's issues. we have come home with a lot of respect and handshakes, and we thank you for that. we need to understand that there are are men and women out there who have spent the last decade fighting a war, and they need to come home, they need a job, they need to be -- they need to get an education, and they need to be reintegrated back into society. these are the men and women who are going to be our next men and women in congress. i want to thank the american people for everything they've done for us thus far, and we have a long way to go to keep forging this greatest generat n

generation. >> thank you for your time. >> thank you. >> on friday morning's "washington journal" we'll talk with david stevens about bank foreclosure practices. then former washington post reporter thomas edsall on his new book "the age of austerity." and then chris savage and chad moutray of the national association of manufacturers. over the next couple of hours here on c-span 3 two discussions on the u.s. mayor's meeting last week in washington. and then mayors and police chief on efforts to combat youth and gang violence. >> april 15th, 2010 i arrived in paris, walked into the hotel

lobby, met general mcchrystal for the first time. he looked at me and said, so you're the "rolling stone" guy. >> michael hastings wrote about general mcchrystal in the january 2010 version of "rolling stone." >> i said, sir, i think it's between you you and lady gaga. just put me and lady gaga in a heart shaped tub. i thought, this is going to be a different story. just several months later, general mcchrystal had been fired and michael hastings continues will the story and talks about the operators. >> i do believe that the west

for all of its historical shortcoming shortcomings. for all of these shortcomings, the west still today represents the most acceptable and workable university -- >> in 1991, the united states was the only global superpower. today, counter restored status in the world. from former national security advisers on his strategic vision, saturday night at 10:00 eastern. also this weekend on book tv, did fdr use world war ii as a cover to create a more powerful executive branch. that's saturday at 11:00 p.m. and sunday night at 10:00, the new privacy is no privacy. lori andrews on how your rights are being eroided by social networks. book tv every weekend on c-span 2. the u.s. conference of

mayors held its 80th annual winter meeting in washington last week. one discussion focused on reintegrating combat veterans into society. this is an hour. >> good morning, welcome to the u.s. mayor's task force on military relations. i know we just our session. hopefully people will be coming in and out. i wanted to introduce myself. i'm mayor joy cooper, one of the co chairs of this task force. we're here today to address some very krit ccritical issues conc our partners and veterans with all the agencies with our federal government and how we can bring resources to our returning veterans.

we often get involved with brac and military installations, but we understand the men and women returning back home will need resources, will be looking for jobs and have a different type of critical needs that we hopefully can partner with social services, jobs and making sure their t goes smoothly. we're lucky today, fortunate to have a distinguished group of speakers from the white house, the department of defense and verans who will discuss a various group of services that they've been working on to assist our military families men and women with job training, job placement, and a number of supported services for witt ran treatment courts. so i want to welcome you all. i want to also welcome my colleague mayors and i'm really excited about not just talking about bricks and mortar and

infrastructure today, but actu resource, our citizens and our veterans. with that, i'dtrode my co chair, mayor mcmelvin. >> i'm joe mcilvene. >> i'm sorry. >> we're home to armymman what we're talking about today is something that is extremely important to me as it is to any mayor who has a military facility, because at the end of the day, it's the people that are our neighbors that we worry so much about and appreciate so much moving right along, our first speaker this morning is captain brad cooper. he's the executive director of joining forces, a broad outreach office of the white house office of the first lady, michelle obama to assist military men and women and their families.

he finish ed if '89 -- i though he was 20 years old when i looked at him. he's a little older than that. when you look at brad's history as an officer in the navy, it emphasizes what we're doing today. he was explaining to me that we have six combat areas in the world or regions. and in his career, he served in every one of them. if you look at the places where he has served and in the interest of time, i'm not going to read all of them, although i probably should, because it really emphasizes what we try to do as mayors when we have military presence in our community whether it's a base, veter veterans, retirees, whatever. he started in desert shield and desert storm and has actually served in afghanistan more than once.

he's been all over the world, and has been in every hotspot that our military and our country has had since he's been serving. and brad, we're proud to have you here today because of your service, and we're also very interested in hearing what you you have to say about the first lady's program, and how we can participate. >> thank you so much, mr. mayor. ma'am, thank you, and for the group, we appreciate you joining today. and thank you for the kind words. one small clarification, consistent with my core beliefs, i went to the naval academy, not the united states military academy. important, because after ten years of football wins this is something you have to really bring to attention at any meeting with any group. of course, the good thing about streaks is, when they go on, they're good, when they stop, it's a tough year. thank you you so much, sir, i appreciate it. and as a citadel graduate ur service as well.

so i've been -- had the great privilege of working with the first lady for the last six months in her campaign, along with dr. joe biden's campaign called joining forces. this is their effort that you've seen in probably public and more private venues to recognize, honor and really support our nation's veteran service members and their families, and give them the support that we believe they have earned. i think most people would agree they've earned it after more than ten years in war. we're doing it in such a way to energize action above and beyond what is already going on with the federal government. this is really an engagement with the private sector, this is energizing action with individuals, businesses, communities, faith based institutions and nonprofits, and asking each of them to honor an americans who have served