here many of those conversations during season two of c-span's podcast, presidential recordings. >> the nixon tapes, part five it conversations, part deliberations, and 100% unfiltered. >> let me say that the main thing is it will pass and my heart goes out to those people who with the best of intentions are overzealous. if i could have spent a little more time being a politician last year and less being president, i would kick there butts out but i did not know what they were doing. >> on the c-span mobile app or wherever you get your podcasts. >> saturday evening, a series of discussions on public trust in media. a number of reporters and other media professionals, including fox news commentator tucker

colson take part, subjects include bias in social media. watch the global news event saturday at 9:00 p.m. on eastern. -- 9:00 p.m. eastern on c-span. s morning by jason kander he is the author of this new book, "invisible storm." was elected to the missouri state legislator in 2008 making you the first -- you nearly unseated republican senator roy blunt. our viewers may be thinking i remember this guy. let me show them one of your ads that got national attention. [video clip]

i am jason kander and senator blunt has been attacking me on guns. in the army i respected my rifle. in afghanistan i volunteered to be an extra gun. in the state legislator i supported gun rights. i approve this message because i would like to see senator blunt do this. host: that was when you ran for statewide office in missouri and as we said, you nearly unseated the incumbent senator, roy blunt. you wrote this book about your political journey and also, the aftermath of living in afghanistan. i want you to take us back to your first visit to the kansas city medical affairs center. it was october 1, 20 18. what was happening at that time

and take us back to the day you decided to visit there. guest: proceeding that i was gearing up to run for president of the united states as one does. i didn't know at the time it was ptsd. i made this decision that i would go back home to kansas city, my family has been there a long time. i am generation. i was going to go there and run for mayor. i said to myself, i can see progress in my home town it will feel this void. the other promise i said to myself is that i would go to the v.a.. i started running for mayor. when you go from running from president, to going to running from mayor, it should be going

well. the symptoms from ptsd, it'd been 11 years of dealing with it and i was having suicidal thoughts. that had scared me. i found myself walking into the v-8. it was time to go get help. i show up at the v.a. and everybody is recognizing me. you can tell everybody is taking double takes and i don't look good. i am pulling by fall cap down trying to hide my face. i answer a few questions about why i am there ahe know, i am oe watch. i am in the suicide hold room they have taken away my belongings and put me in scrubs. they put me in an isolated room

and put me in suicide watch. the whole reason i got checked in, people are recognizing me. it is kind of humiliating. the next thing i am laughing. the story is funny, it is well, i am here. then this young site resident has no idea who i am. at first, that was a big relief because it was not embarrassing. we talked for about a half hour i told him about my symptoms. things i had only told my wife at that point. i had nightmares, i was constantly on guard, i felt like i was in danger all the time. i was self-loathing, and shame and guilt.

i'd tell him all the stuff and he says to me, do you have a particularly stressful career? and i said well, i am in politics. and he asked what that means and i explain briefly. and i said i was going to run for president and now i'm running for mayor. and he said, president for what? and you have to member i am in a psych ward and told him i was a presidential candidate. he said, who told you you could run for president? at this point i had gone from excited to irritated that he did not believe me. i spent one .5 hours with obama

and he seemed to think it was a good idea. this guide took a be and he said , how often do you think you hear voices? that was my first day of the v.a.. host: before you talk to this young man who did not recognize you. he asked you if you are having suicidal thoughts. you are answering yes. he asked you how long are you having these thoughts? and you said 10 years. to which you said? guest: yeah 10 years. i spent years as an intelligent officer. i know i did dangerous and traumatic stuff.

i was meeting with people who i could not know their allegiances. i was frequently outnumbered. i was virtually by myself with a translator. i can recognize that could be term attic for anybody. at the time, i thought i never had to fire my weapon so there was no trauma because that is what i had learned from movies in the army. i didn't even consider myself a combat veteran. in the second part of it was, i always had a story i could tell myself as to how i was getting better when i was actually getting worse. my nightmares would change and evolve into something more dangerous and i would say, things are changing, they are getting better. and on top of that i was in politics. i was pursuing the presidency.

it is hard to imagine you can convince people to vote for you when you are stuck in your house with the pistol. i was hiding for myself in the world. host: i am going to read from your book, diana spent a decade next to a husband with nightmares. who would bellow with rage and anger and was convinced white supremacists were coming to murder her and her son. she was forced to bear her terror alone. guest: i was a real picnic to live with. one of the important parts of the book is that in every chapter, at least once, diana comes in with a first-person

perspective of what it was like for her. that is important for two reasons. when you are a narrator, if it was just me you don't get the full picture. i wasn't actually in danger when i was at home. the more important reason was, my wife and i did not know about secondary posttraumatic stress. diana did not go to afghanistan but living with me all those years and emphasizing safety, relay my terrible nightmares to her while she was half asleep. that soaks in and eventually,

she ended up with secondary postarrest disorder. the book in that way is a love story more than anything else. it is about our marriage surviving this fight with this monster of ptsd. host: knowing what you know now, what is the level of surprise and shock? guest: we have been best friends since we were 17. if you asked her, i think she would say she is pretty surprised. i have always had an irrational confidence even when i had ptsd. i told her that i loved her first when we were 17 and her response was, i'll get back to you.

and my response was, you love me. i am not shocked, she may be more surprised. host: why did you to write this book, what are you hoping for? guest: this was the book i needed 14 years ago when i got back home from afghanistan. this is for everybody, anybody who has been through anything. i believe that if i had had this book available to me i would've gotten help then. instead, i waited and i tried to walk it off. ptsd is an injury and when i went into the army i had to get physical therapy. and what i did to my mind is

like an injury. that's what i did with my brain after i got out of the army. i said i am going to walk it off, time will heal it but it gets worse. trauma is not like wind, it does not age well. it is like an avocado, it does not age well. host: does your brain feel useless? guest: my mind does not feel useless, my mental health felt useless. it was driving me to feel like i needed to seek redemption and that redemption was that i had to be elected president and save the world. that and not wanting to want to die prompted me to get help. host: i want our viewers to join

us in this conversation. for eastern and central parts of the country (202) 748-8000, mountain pacific (202) 748-8001 and for active military (202) 748-8002 you can also text us at (202) 748-8003. for those in the military or retired we would like to hear your story as well. when you sought the therapy, your experience at the v.a. and where are you now in this journey? host: in the book i bring people inside my therapy sessions, i want their p2 feel very accessible for people who read this book. i literally got my therapists note and use them to outline the chapters about therapy. i did two types of therapy, both

with the same arabist. cognitive processing therapy and exposure therapy. cognitive therapy is like getting a masters in yourself. i would explain to my therapists what i was feeling and he would stand up from his chair and like a professor draw it out on the whiteboard and aligned to what was going on in my brain. he was teaching me about my brain, helping me understand why i was feeling why i was feeling and why i got stuck in certain places. that was interesting to me, i went to law school in d.c.. i have had an academic background and found that interesting. it was great, easier to do then prolonged exposure therapy.

prolonged exposure therapy was sitting in a chair across from nick, closing my eyes and recording a voicemail on my phone as i relayed to him traumatic memories from afghanistan and he asks questions as if he is never heard the story. we record that and my homework in between sessions was every day, we would do this for about 45 minutes. every day, i had to put in the headphones and i had to listen to myself recounting the story. i was not allowed to do anything else, had to close my eyes and listen. that caused me to access other parts of the memory and i would have to do it every day. every time i would i would reexperience it. my heart would race, i would get a little sweaty but then eventually, i got to the point where i was not having that reaction. i went into nick, and i asked

him if i could do a new memory because i am getting bored with this. and he said, boredom is the goal. we would move onto the next memory. the other part of exposed -- prolonged exposure therapy. you put in headphones and listen to something because before that i had to be alert at all times and doing things like try to go of block without looking behind me. a lot of activities like that that were about trying to round out my coping mechanisms. to your questions about where i am now, i am doing very well now. i am in a phase of my life that i refer to as posttraumatic growth. i want people to understand that post about a growth is a real thing and worth pursuing.

i am not cured of ptsd but i am at a point where it does not disrupt my life. i manage it, i know how to manage it. i noted is, i have the tools necessary and there is nothing i cannot do because of ptsd. i just have to make sure that like any other injury i have the tools to manage it. host: we have a call from alexandria, louisiana. caller: good morning mr. kander. i salute you for your service and i want to thank you for your service. thank you for writing this book. i was a military police officer from 1979 to 1994 and you said you were an intel officer.

what do you think our military needs now? nobody is joining the military now. what do you think -- to try to get people to join the military? i happen to be a republican, you're a democrat. what can we do nationally to get people to join? and god bless c-span. guest: thank you cornelius for your service as well. i don't know if there is a recruiting issue right now. i tell you what i think the military should be doing for folks like yourself and me as they go in. that they don't do now, we should be educating people about

ptsd when they come in. when you are in basic training, you get all sorts of different training. indoctrinated into basic markman ship, sexual harassment policy, all sorts of stuff that you're supposed to know as a soldier. we don't teach them what ptsd is. we don't even give them basic information. i was checking into the hotel two nights ago and i was talking to the clerk and she had just finished basic training and i was talking to her about mental health, i gave her a copy of my book and she said i learned about some of this in basic training and i said, oh great are they teaching about this now? and she said no, no, no but most of my drill instructors were

talking about it and i learned about it from that. that is not the way we wanted teach people about this. what we do instead is we do this necessary form of brainwashing is when we got off the bus for the first time the service, the first message you get is what you are doing is no big deal. all the way through your service there is some version of that in the air. this is no big deal compared to what these people are doing. if not that, if we did it, it's nothing compared to what these other guys in this war did it. if they had not done this, i am not walking into rooms over and over again with people who could kidnap me and cut off my head. i am not doing that if i am not

convinced if what i am doing is no big deal. that is all fine. you have to do that to get people to do frightening things and doing those frightening are important to the country. however, when people get out of the military, nobody sits you down and says, actually, that was crazy stuff. i know we told you that was no big deal, actually it was quite a big deal and most people are not doing this kind of thing and you might need some help for it. you go into civilian life and start to experience symptoms that you did not expect and instead of having a context with which to understand those things you are making evaluations. you don't think i earned ptsd and then it feels like if i

claim the mantle of ptsd and get help, that feels like stolen valor. that's like claiming a metal i didn't receive. i will not be doing that because i have integrity. then it is 11 years later and you are on suicide watch in the kansas city psych ward. the last thing about this i'll say is that when i did a change of station from one unit to another, there was a readiness sergeant on duty at both of those places, there was a call that was made. the guy you sent, we got them. we got him to his room, his unit has him. there was a handoff. when you leave the military, they know where you are going. nobody does a handoff where you

are going. it should, when you leave that you are as a soldier, you understand that your last job is to check in at the v.a. so that you can report that you made it there. you don't go all this time without having enrolled so that it is insurmountable. host: is this the work that you are doing? guest: the veterans community project is a nonprofit in kansas city. i am the president of expansion. the way that i got there is an interesting story. the story about the v.a., the other part of that story is that they said it was four or five months before i could get enrolled in the system. six weeks before that i headed toward the veterans community project.

what we are best known for, is creating villages and tiny houses for homeless veterans to transition people out of homelessness. i was knocked out by this when i went to see it. six weeks after that tour at the v.a., i called the cofounder and ceo and i said i am making this announcement to go to the v.a. and they told me it was five months before i get in. so six months i walked into the outreach center and they handled my paperwork for me, i start hanging around the place. i am getting therapy, it is going well. meanwhile, in kansas city and

communities around the country are asking them to help replicate their model. finally, brian said you are not working, you are growing a beard and going to therapy. how about you come here full-time and that is how i become president of national expansion. host: is there a virtual component now that we live in this pandemic world? guest: not yet, so much of what we do is hands-on. the goal is to get to every population center in the country because our services are needed. if people are interested in it they can go to the website. or they can get my book. chris and kansas city, we will

go to you. caller: i just want to thank you for your military service but also for the great service that you are doing for our community in the kansas city area because like you were saying, there was nothing. i have annexed brother in law who's ptsd was terrible. he had done tours in iraq and afghanistan with something similar to what you had. i am also a ptsd survivor. once i could get out of my head so much and got some guidance and help, i also started a nonprofit. it really helps to pay back and give back, you have just done wonderful work. the tiny house villages incredible. i just wanted to thank you not only for your military service, but the great service that you are doing for folks in kansas city and we miss you and state politics but i know that is not

the right place for you now, especially here. host: let's asked that question chris? any more political runs from you? guest: the politics question, look, i have a very complete answer to this in the book. you should buy it. here is what i would say and i because i'm really not. the short answer to the question is i don't know. that is fine. that is really difference -- the difference between me now and before. when the presence was intolerable for me, when i had intrusive thoughts and memories and inside my own head, that was the last place i would did -- i wanted to be.

i was going from endorphin high to endorphin high and that is what would get me by. meeting with president obama, a big donor meeting, an interview with high stakes, giving a -- pre-much announcing the most legal way you can announce for president without announcing for president and those requirements, those were endorphin highs and i would go from high to high. i would think constantly about the future and would play in the future all of the time. because if you're not enjoying the present, you can live in the future and it can get you by. my goal when i went into therapy was there were a couple things, one was to be able to be happily -- happy without external validation and to be present in my life and with my family. i did a lot of really cool things over that 11 years. i got to do great stuff.

i met a lot of really famous people and some of them lived up to expectations and exceeded them and some of them you were like ok i met that person. i got some incredible experiences but i did not get to participate in any of it. what the worst part was, i had a son during that time and was married to my best friend as i am now but i was not really there. now i am there. i am present. everything i get to do now, i'm here for it, if that makes sense. the answers of the question, i don't really think about the future that much, not in the way of politicians, i'm not thinking about that all right now. i'm actually not thinking about that right now. i have a job i love, the best job i've ever had. i am a little league coach and i'm pretty good at it. my dad was my little league coach, my grandpa was his little league coach. it is a thing we do in our family and now i get to do it.

i play old men baseball. i'm on the kansas city hustlers of the national men's adult baseball league, play centerfield with a group of guys i really like, not softball, baseball. i am hurt all of the time but i love it. i really like where my life is. the answer to the question is, one day i may get the desire to run for mayor or president, i don't know, but i might not. i am fine with either of those because i like where things are. host: when you think back to those adrenaline highs you are seeking, this 11 years being on this political journey, do you -- what do you think that was? was that self-medication? guest: yeah. yes. it was a couple things. here is a term i learned in therapy, it was avoidance. i was avoiding myself and my emotions because they were deeply unpleasant.

it was self-medication. but it was also -- the only time i felt fully present was when i was doing that because when you are -- the job i did in afghanistan, to go in and sit down with people who might want to kill me, i had to know where all of the exits were at all of the times, i had the peripheral view of who had a webbing, where were they standing, did i have the drop on them or they on me? is my translator fully exposed? would he be able to help? these are the thoughts you have to run through. which is scary, but you are also fully utilized. there is no other human experience like that. it is easy to be a little addicted to that. when you are in front of a crowd in new hampshire and you know you are auditioning to be somebody's candidate -- the party candidate for president at the beginning of that, that is an adrenaline high and only other time i can feel fully present or the only thing that quiets the invisible storm in my

mind. i do not feel i need that anymore. now when i do things like this, i thing i'm good at it, it is fine, but the difference is when this is over, i will not be like i need it again. i will be like that was good. hopefully we sold some books. host: what is your warning to other veterans about methods of self-medication and what they should watch for? guest: what i learned about avoidance and therapy is there are things that you like and prefer to do and then there is avoidance which are things you feel you have to do. for me, for instance, like last night, i had a booking here in d.c. but before that i went to dinner with a friend and afterward strings with a friend. the dinner beforehand, i set -- i did not sit with my back facing the door. it was a crowded restaurant. i probably could have but i prefer not to. i could've but i was like i will just relax here.

make it where i can see the door. afterwards, without thinking about it, i sit down with my back to the door. my cousin said your back is to the door and i said i'm getting pretty good at it. that is the difference, that i would rather be able to see the door, but i do not have to see the door. i like doing this, i like doing media, doing interviews, but i do not have to. i like coaching little league just as much, probably more. you know? and that's when it is an activity that you have to do -- you feel you have to do to avoid yourself, that is when it should cause concern. host: anthony in arizona. caller: hey. welcome. good morning from the edge of the frontier. in case you hadn't heard, a major general emphasizes that we are at the edge of the frontier,

which puts us in that invisible storm. i do not know if you recall when the army had a marketing campaign and the theme song went like "we were needed, we were there." if you look that up on the internet, it is interesting because it talks about how we accept being part of something bigger than ourselves and that is the military. two thirds of what we communicate is nonverbal whether most people realize it or not. you can talk all you want, but what people see when you are talking really is what they are hearing. one of the things i do, for me, i write a lot of quotes. i have just been writing my whole life since i can remember. i enjoy writing and reading.

i have a quote here, when sharing resources, it is valuable to communicate, this will not hurt my bottom line however it should help your topline. that is so essential to the connection between ptsd, the v.a., and any service member. for instance, when a service member signs up for any service, why can't they be dual enrolled at the v.a. at the same time? so what if they do 180 days they are technically a veteran. if they don't do 180 days, they are still in the system because they may come back in at some point but the bottom line is, when i was a commander for louisiana, one of things -- one

of the things i learned to do, every soldier that came into my unit, i treated them like you're coming in but one that you will leave, and i will start with your awards, your awards being started, your evaluations are being started, a year from now. you might get one earlier than that. we have the opportunity to say we need you. as you mentioned, we want to wear some of the shortfalls with recruiting dollars as far as the numbers but i am a retired veteran, don't have to work anymore but i have been working since i was six. do you realize it is a challenge now to not have to work, have all of the money you may want to spend, and have to put some value on your life each day? guess what i do with it, i go on to the military installation and

i show them what it feels like and what it looks like to still be healthy of sane mind as best as i can recall and show them the military does not break you, you break yourself because you did not share your resources, you kept your bottom line to yourself and you did not help someone else elevate to their topline. host: all right, anthony. jason kander. guest: i appreciate anthony's call. he is from where i went to intelligence school. his point about the v.a. is a good one. when you exit the military, it is kind of staggering years later when you go to the v.a. and you go, wait a minute, isn't this the same government that just knew about me and now i

seem to have to introduce myself to the v.a.? you can literally separate from the military on a friday but when you do, you can take your little id card and put it into the computer and bring up your records while you are active duty and reserve ended will have red, yellow, or green for every readiness statistic they have for you. almost down to the molar. because they need to know how deployable are you so they will know is your dental up-to-date, everything. i could be your last day. monday you show by the v.a. on they are like, you are? that is disorienting because you are like isn't this the same government that just knew everything about me last week? that's what he's talking about. that's right, you should be dual enrolled when you start. the reason you're not is another stupid thing, that the federal government has a ridiculously narrow definition of what a veteran is. we are sitting here and i can see the capitol from here, there

are national guardsmen and women from maryland, virginia, up the east coast mobilized to come here and guard the building for five months. if you were here and mobilized on active duty for the entire period but never deployed to afghanistan or iraq and get out of the service after four years, the government does not consider you a veteran and you do not have access to the v.a. there's a good 30% of people who meet the standard of they served in the military, wore the uniform, but they do not qualify for the v.a. because the federal government does not consider them a veteran. that is dumb. it is an unfairly narrow definition. that is why if you raise your right hand and spend a single day on the project, you qualify for 100% of our services. we have a commonsense definition of veteran. what anthony is talking about is that everybody says they care about veterans but in order to truly care about veterans you

have to demonstrate you are caring for veterans. you have to do something. every time you turn on the tv, there is nonstop commercials were a surgical -- a soldier comes home to their dog and they say so buy this car, or whatever. military is a brand people tend to approve of. if you are going to do that, you have to back it up with something. when we work with corporate sponsors, we make sure their brand association pays off for actual veterans. they are eager to do it, their employees are helping us build houses, putting real money and proceeds into what we do. those are the partnerships i think makes sense and the federal government can make sense -- can help by widening what they consider a veteran. host: brad, are you active or retired? caller: i am neither one. i formally served. i resigned. host: ok. guest: sure. caller: i was a warrant officer.

mr. kander knows exactly what that means. guest: good to talk to you, chief. caller: i am the antiriot raw veteran thing -- rah,rah veteran thing. i understand there is a problem. i wonder and worry sometimes, particularly as it relates to ptsd. we worry about the veteran who -- it does not as you mentioned much matter whether you put the uniform on for a day or played in what i call world war forever , because i started in bosnia which turned into kosovo which turned into afghanistan, iraq, afghanistan, iraq, and that is why i'm not serving. the public -- i have worked in a lot of civil service jobs since then and i cannot help but wonder, and i would like your

input, sometimes dealing with someone who does not know or understand and you are saying, no, we've got to do it and it has to be done, and the way the military teaches you to communicate, this has to happen, and they say well, ok, maybe, but no, and that becomes a problem in and of itself. it is our instruction misdirected toward the veteran? this is your problem? or is it the public who needs the instruction. i will get off now. thank you, greta, and i will watch online. guest: i really appreciate this question. what i think he is getting at is the military civilians and their disconnect.

with her guard to ptsd in particular, one of the great problems i see is there has never been a time at which the military community and civilian community have been more disconnected. a lot of it has to do with the fact this is the longest period in american history without some form of mandatory service. but that is not the whole so very -- whole story. when you look at native american cultures for instance, they had traditions like when the warrior came home, they had ceremonies that involved the entire tribe where the warriors would get up and they would tell their stories and would watch the steam rise and the idea was that they were giving the stories over to the entire tribe. what that did is it made it so there was not a separation between the warrior and tribe. so as the warrior reintegrated into the tribe, they would not feel isolated within the tribe. they would share their full experience so people understood what they had been through. that's not what we do in america. any veteran will tell you that

they know their stories -- there are stories that they can share. they know there are stories they can sanitize and share, stories they can share, and then they learn pretty quick, i think anyway, that there are stories that people want to hear that they -- stories that they think people want to hear but they don't want to hear. i can make you feel alone. culturally, you get used to a certain level of accountability from your coworkers and that can be difficult. when i was in the legislature and people would say they did things and sometimes politicians say they will do things that they do not do, that was difficult. highly difficult for me at first understand. it sometimes made me difficult to work with. this other piece is important because as opposed to letting the warrior come back and tell their story and not feel isolated within the tribe, what we do is do things like give veterans a free chicken fajita rollup on veterans day at applebee's and expect them to be

the same person before the war. that is not how it works. what we have to do instead is have to listen to people, hear their stories, and embrace that. everybody says my grandfather was in world war ii, my uncle was in vietnam, but they do not like to talk about it. i always like to say they did not like to talk about it with you because they did not think you would understand. if you have a genuine curiosity and can listen without judgment and they feel they can tell you a story and will not change the way you see them, then they are interested in talking about it. my grandfather did not talk about world war ii until i came back from afghanistan and then we talked about it because he thought he wanders to what i'm talking about. host: do you still do that today, hold back on stories you don't think people want to hear? guest: sometimes i do. not in this book. [laughter] they are in the book but when i meet a new person, sometimes you just want to give them a sanitized version and frankly

sometimes i do not want to tell the whole thing. but when i'm with other vets, everybody -- not everybody but a lot of us at the veterans can unity project are not only veterans of iraq or afghanistan but also the kansas city ptsd clinic at the v.a.. -- v.a. a lot of them are for stories, some, like card game stories from when we we're are deployed. host: the book is invisible storm, a soldier's memoir of ptsd. he tells the story, people are uncomfortable hearing it so read the book. host: also it has -- guest: also it has jokes. i don't want people to think it is unbearable to read. it is also funny. caller: our caller next from new york -- handout from -- hannah from new york, go ahead. caller: can you hear me?

guest: good morning. are you doing? -- how are you doing? caller: i'm not a veteran but i grew up with veterans and if you don't mind i would like to give two -- three incidences about posttraumatic stress disorder. because it did not exist during world war ii for my uncle. he was in patent units and he came home from the war, not injured, but he was never the same. he could never go any place he had never been before, which greatly impacted his life. because of being -- i've told the story sometimes -- being in a closed truck and he never knew where his unit was going.

therefore, his whole rest of his life he lived to be 99 years old, fortunately, but there were not any facilities like you are speaking of like the v.a. it is just amazing. the other people i know that they were vietnam vets drafted, they came home and they were my friends, never the same. never the same. they did not talk about the war, they just drink the war. -- drank the war. it was very sad to see this because don't forget this was not voluntary. you did not join, sign-up, or whatever. this was your number came up and you are in. if you don't mind, i would like to give two nonmilitary. excuse me.

my grandmother was in a factory fire way back in 1917 or someplace along that line. she was trapped in the burning factory. she was never the same again. nobody knew about posttraumatic stress disorder. she just could not get into an elevator, she could not sit in a car, she could not feel confined. there were no people at the time that dealt with this. this was ok, that is the way it is. that is the way it is going to go. it is just so wonderful that finally the v.a. is taking an interest in this and i'm just going to back up a moment. host: i'm going to jump in because we have a couple more calls for jason kander so i will have him respond to what he has heard so far. guest: it is really important

that folks talk about this as what it is, an injury. so it is not surprising that janet's uncle did not want to be in situations where he was going. sometimes these things are specific, sometimes they are harder to pin down, but the most important thing that she said is comparing her uncle to her grandmother, even though one served and one did not because we all experience trauma in life. living in america right now is traumatic, so one thing i really want to get across is you do not have to be a veteran or married to a veteran or anything like that to get a lot out of this book. this is not why i wrote it. i wrote it for the gobs of people walking around with trauma that they are not acknowledging because they think they are gaining perspective when they say "well it wasn't this." i always compare it to like if you broke your arm and then you looked around and you are like yeah, i broke my arm but i know somebody who lost their arm so i

will not treat my broken arm. eventually that arm will not work at all as opposed to i have a broken arm, i thing i will get it treated. that is what i did with my brain. i was like i have friends that got shot, what right do i have to go get treatment? that is what a lot of civilians do unfortunately because one thing is true, we have done a great job of -- we need to do better but helping veterans understand ptsd is a real thing and have legitimized it for veterans but not for everybody else. i talked to plenty of people who had a lot of the same symptoms i had from a completely different trauma that had nothing to do with the military. living in america right now can be traumatic. you don't have to have gone to afghanistan and been an intelligence officer to feel like you're may be a little uncomfortable with crowds right now. we are seeing mass shootings all the time, so it is a traumatic time to be in this country, so i

think people can draw a value out of this. host: leonard is in ohio. are you active, retired military? caller: i am a u.s. army veteran. host: ok. caller: good morning, jason. appreciate your service. i am a desert storm veteran. understand the ptsd aspect of it of it all. jumping through the v.a. hoops is a tough one sometimes. i did the self-medication thing like you talked about. i understand that as well. i do an armor union every year and listen, that is the great therapy -- greatest therapy in the world. we all understand where were coming from, it's tough jokes, all day long, so that helps a tremendous amount. we have local organizations in town that assist veterans in crisis and is a great program.

i just want to say i understand it all and appreciate your service and god bless america. i will hang up. guest: thanks, leonard. host: ken in washington, d.c.. -- washington, d.c., you are next. caller: thank you for taking my call. hello? host: we are listening. caller: living in america, it is not just a time where in, it is the history. i want to say two quick things. my father is still trying to get additional assistance for ptsd. he is a retired army sergeant major, two tours in vietnam, also served for pelham as well. the local community received a certain him money for the citizens because of the distraction and damage done to the community but none of the veterans or families that served

there, stationed there, have yet to receive anything. if you could touch on this because what we see in america, there was a racial component as well, access to veterans because in particular for black people, sometimes that public policy does not reach those communities in particular. one example is my great uncle who is a korean war veteran and he was discharged. i will allow you to explain that to the listening audience, but -- and of course he was married and had children. i'm sure you know the discharge is. host: your talking -- guest: you are talking about an outh. caller: they said he is not a blue man. host: i had never understood that term but i get it.

caller: even now getting markers , and particular black veterans that have passed, it is difficult because how they were risen when they were discharged for something they did not do and then they were thrown out so they would not have access to v.a. benefits and things of that nature. so until certain public policies reach every veteran, not just the majority of veterans but all of them, i'm not asking for anything for whatever disability i have because i still have my mind intact and i am a spiritual enough person talbot anybody in need. last week for every american dollar, nearly 45% of it, gets spent on the military. a certain percent of that amount gets detailed out to the members of the military. so until there is public policy change, it is not about

representing doing our job based on orders and not necessarily choice. if we could address that and if you could explain it the discharge, it would be health there. thank you and god bless you all. guest: i appreciate it. let's talk about what he is bringing up is something it's basically a criminal justice reform issue that no one talks about. that is that there is an awful lot of people who have had an other than honorable or dishonorable discharge and those folks served their country and cannot go to the v.a. regardless of what they did. some of that has changed but to his point that is a message that has not gotten out much either. at veterans community project, we served people -- i can thing of one guy where he had three duis so he was given a dishonorable discharge. he had four combat deployments, a dui in between each one. you don't have to be like a

forensic detective to figure out the guy was self-medicating for ptsd and so we worked on his paperwork, got him -- his discharge status upgraded so he could get access to benefits he needed. but it can be, to his point, very commander dependent. just like anything in the criminal justice system can be -- if you are a black person and you have a white judge, these statistics show you are not going to get the exact time treatment as a white person with a white judge. in the same sense, you can have some disparity with regard to how you were treated by your commander because those of the people that make the decision on how to trigger discharge, recommend how you get discharged, and i think this is important to compare to timothy mcveigh, if he had somehow lived 200 years and gotten out of prison and not been executed or anybody who served in the military and then commits a crime afterwards and ends up

eventually getting out, it is not like they are not going to qualify for medicare. somebody like that, they will get their benefits. you could be a murderer and still get medicare at 65. as you should. there is no reason you should not. if you made a mistake while you are in the military, we revoke any status you have ever had of having served. when you did serve your country. it is an underrated criminal justice reform issue that i think absolutely has to be addressed. host: danielle gilbert -- jason kander, his book, invisible storm. 100% of the proceeds go to his commission for national expansion and they are doing in cities.