War / Peace

Former navy public affairs office Lt. John Oliveira told Democracy Now! that he didn't realize how stressful his military oath would be for him when aboard the USS Theodore Roosevelt last year. "I had to get on television every day to talk to the American people and the international public and continue to sell them on the administration's policies, which I did not believe in," Oliveira said. He oversaw embedded journalists on the aircraft carrier, which at the time was in the eastern Mediterranean. "I'm [now] doing what I can to support our troops.

"When they need people, they keep them. When they don't, they implement their policy of discrimination," said the director of the Servicemembers Legal Defense Network. The group found that "the number of gays dismissed from the military under the Pentagon's 'don't ask, don't tell' policy has dropped to its lowest level in nine years as U.S.

"The Army has abandoned plans to outsource nearly one in six of its jobs to the private sector, a move that could have resulted in the loss of thousands of public affairs positions worldwide and a windfall of contracts for private PR firms," PR Week reports. "The outsourcing plan, first announced in late 2002, was part of President Bush's directive to trim the government by farming out all work not 'inherently governmental.' The Army also cited an interest in directing more of its resources to national security and the war on terrorism.

"The Pentagon took another step in distancing the media from US casualties of war last week with the announcement of new restrictions on funeral coverage at Arlington National Cemetery (ANC)," PR Week's Douglas Quenqua reports. "Any reporter wanting to cover a soldier's funeral at the Virginia cemetery will now be required to stay within a distant, roped-off area. This 'bullpen' is described as an area far enough away from the proceedings that a clergyman or family member's words cannot be clearly heard.