Steve Israel: “tonight I rise to urge my colleagues to participate in the E-mail Our Troops Project, a vitally important endeavor that…”

“tonight I rise to urge my colleagues to participate in the E-mail Our Troops Project, a vitally important endeavor that is good for our military personnel and also good for our children. This program allows people to send e-mail messages to men and women serving in very dangerous places around the world. It boosts the morale of our service members, it alleviates their loneliness, but it is also very helpful to children in particular. For young children, news of war can be overpowering. It can leave them with a sense that they are not connected, they have no control; frightening news controls them. Giving them an e-mail connection to our Armed Forces is one way of creating a positive connection, letting them voice an opinion, ask a question. Mr. Speaker, I learned that just yesterday when I visited the J. Taylor Finley Middle School in Huntington. I went there to talk to the youngsters about their opinions on what is happening in Iraq and to teach them how to e-mail our troops.”