Thanks for helping bring this story to light, Vanessa. I just sent a letter to Sen. Dole, who is on the Senate Armed Services committee.

I don't have much hope that the GOP members of the committees, especially Sen. Dole, will do much, however. It's amazing how quickly the "support our troops" mantra becomes irrelevant when it comes to supporting actual people serving in uniform. LaVena -- and the thousands of women serving in uniform who are victims of unprosecuted, often unreported sexual and physical assault -- deserve better.

I was going to say the same thing, Fr. Chris.
"Support the troops" is nothing but a catchy bumper-sticker slogan to those people. They couldn't care less about actual soldiers. When push comes to shove, they're more interested in protecting "the military" (but not those who serve) than seeking truth and justice.

Yup. It's all about saving their own butts...just like with that Air Force case that recently came up. The military is also full of rules that serve no purpose other than for them to be able to say "See, we did our part, don't blame us".

On a related note, Feministing ran a story a couple of weeks ago about the female Air Force cadet who is being court-martialed for her own rape. I wanted to let y'all know I wrote to Gov. Rick Perry here in Texas. One of his staffers sent me back a note saying that Gov. Perry supports our troops, but that he has no jurisdiction over military matters. :^/

Is anyone else having technical difficulties with the petition?

I tried to sign the petition but couldn't do so without a code.

The code is at the bottom of the blurb, before you fill out your information.

VERY disturbing. Look to the bottom right for the code.

Thanks so much for giving this story more attention, V.

The Johnsons need all the support you can give them. Let EVERYONE you know hear about this story. Lavena's father, Dr. Johnson, has not given up on her case and was just at a press conference held at the Vets for Peace convention in St Louis. Don't let this story fade out.

Thanks RockStar and Grace for pointing out the code. Petition signed and forwarded!

Just keeping it going.

For field events, the results recording official was associated with an Army orderly who telephoned results simultaneously via a multiple connexion to field headquarters and mobile arena Scoreboard. .Final results were collated and passed to the teleprinters for onward transmission. Progress results from control points along road event routes were similarly handled. Connexions required for telephoning these results were established via the "event control" switchboard, the switching cords being pre-set each morning and afternoon for the combination of event positions and Scoreboard locations required to be connected to field headquarters.

Photo-finish controller, camera room and the three photo-processing rooms were linked by a loudspeaker intercommunication system. The results room at the Main Stadium was the central point for dissemination of all official results. Results, transmitted to this room by teleprinter or telephone, duplicated in quantity, were distributed to officials, press and broadcasters. Results telephoned from minor venues were received via the Main Stadium administrative switchboard, the telephones in the results room being fitted with double-receiver headsets. Results from major venues were transmitted by teleprinter over direct lines to the results room.

Two circuits were also provided to the Village and two multipled from results room to Arena Manager and main Scoreboard. One spare teleprinter machine was available at each of the distant venues and two at the results room. Results received via teleprinter were stencilled directly by the receiving machine. In the event of failure of any part of the teleprinter network, results could be telephoned over the direct links between the venues and the Main Stadium switchboard. The results service was operated by Army Signal Corps personnel. A teleprinter maintenance technician from the Post Office was available full-time.