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Support the Troops? LIke this?

Discussion in '2007 Archive' started by The Galatian, Feb 18, 2007.

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  1. The Galatian

    The Galatian New Member

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    If even half of this is true, it's a screaming outrage.
    http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/17160574/

    Just one of the many billions we let slip away in corruption by contractors and others in Iraq would fix the problem.

    I'm sening the link to my congresspeople, and the WH. I'm not naive enough to think it will do any good, but I need to vent; I'm making it clear my vote depends on getting this fixed.
     
    #1 The Galatian, Feb 18, 2007
  2. Terry_Herrington

    Terry_Herrington New Member

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    This is just one more area where the Bush administration has failed!
     
    #2 Terry_Herrington, Feb 18, 2007
  3. Ps104_33

    Ps104_33 New Member

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    Ever since the Viet-Nam war I always thought that it was a disgrace how we treated out disabled veterans who return from war. This has been a problem no matter what party is in power whether Democrat or a Republican. We treat illegal aliens better than we treat our veterans
     
    #3 Ps104_33, Feb 18, 2007
  4. El_Guero

    El_Guero New Member

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    While we do not treat Mexican illegal aliens (if you are arguing about treatment of Cubans, Muslims, and Chinese - I have little or no knowledge of them) better than we do disabled veterans.

    But, we do treat our DAV's disgracefully.

     
    #4 El_Guero, Feb 18, 2007
  5. El_Guero

    El_Guero New Member

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    Galatian

    If only half of that article was true, the VA would be shining for once.

    Fixing the outrage of the VA will take moral courage, lots of money, and sending thousands of these government leaches to JAIL.

    IMHO and experience. We get too many 'professionals' in the VA system that would struggle to succeed in any field of endeavor. Needless to say, they fail miserably in the VA system . . . only to get rewarded with a significantly bigger paycheck than most DAV's get in financial support when they (we) cannot work from our injuries.

    I estimate that it would take a 30% to 100% increase of the VA budget to begin to right most of the 'wrongs'. The easiest way to do that is to FIRE the VA and just send Vets to the champus program if they are more than 40% disabled . . . and pay them true disability.

    If I vote to eliminate an entire agency of the Federal Government - it will be to vote out the VA. If a party campaigns on eliminating that waste of God's oxygen - they got my vote.

    http://www1.va.gov/opa/pressrel/pressrelease.cfm?id=941



     
    #5 El_Guero, Feb 18, 2007
  6. carpro

    carpro Well-Known Member
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    http://www.defenseindustrydaily.com...ed-national-military-medical-center/index.php

    BRAC Fallout: Walter Reed National Military Medical Center
    Posted 01-Feb-2007 05:20

    EXCERPT

    The 2005 BRAC Commission's recommendation to realign and consolidate facilities in the USA's National Capital Region, in order to meet the medical and security needs of the 21st century, includes the realignment of all tertiary medical services currently located at Walter Reed Army Medical Center in Washington, DC to the National Naval Medical Center in Bethesda, MD. The new joint operational medical facility will be named the Walter Reed National Military Medical Center, and will be staffed by personnel from the Navy, Army and Air Force. The existing Walter Reed main installation is mandated to close by 2011 according to the BRAC law.

    Specific changes at the realigned Bethesda campus will likely include construction and renovation of approximately 800,000 square feet of clinical space, plus additional alterations and construction of support facilities. About 1,000 Army and Air Force personnel will join the staff at WRNMMC, and depending on the final decisions made at the end of the Environmental Impact Statement process, as many as 1,500 additional personnel could join the campus workforce. Those employees would work at supporting facilities such as barracks housing and the Navy Lodge. The project has now issued its first contract, and we thought this was an interesting BRAC initiative to cover going forward...
     
    #6 carpro, Feb 18, 2007
  7. The Galatian

    The Galatian New Member

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    If we told Halliburton that their field technicians would just have to tolerate 2-star hotels, we could have provided these wounded soldiers with clean rooms and plumbing that worked.

    It Bush and Co. had insisted that contractors and agencies had to account for the money to which we entrusted them, we could have built an entire new system with the money that would have otherwise been lost to corruption.

    Matter of priorities, I guess.
     
    #7 The Galatian, Feb 18, 2007
  8. Timsings

    Timsings Member
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    This reminds me of an old M*A*S*H episode.

    GENERAL: "Nothing is too good for the men."

    HAWKEYE: "Maybe that's why they get so much of it."


    Tim Reynolds
     
    #8 Timsings, Feb 18, 2007
  9. El_Guero

    El_Guero New Member

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    Oh the long lost days of decent (& actually funny) political satire.



     
    #9 El_Guero, Feb 18, 2007
  10. Jeff Weaver

    Jeff Weaver New Member

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    Actually Walter Reed is not a Veterans Administration facility, it is active Army. I was treated at Walter Reed in the 1980s and at that time it was an excellent facility. I am currently treated by the Veterans Administration Hospital near where I live and the treatment is excellent. The problem with the VA is that there arent enough resources to go around, and if you are not a current patient in the VA Hospital system it is very very difficult to get in.



    Most veterans I know would disagree. CHAMPUS was nothing but a pain when I was on active duty. The VA is much easier to navigate if you can get in.
     
    #10 Jeff Weaver, Feb 18, 2007
  11. El_Guero

    El_Guero New Member

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    Jeff,

    Thank you for your service.

    As a DAV, my experience has been that the VA has a few good men and women and a whole bunch of bad ones.

    Getting in the system was easy. Getting treated has been difficult at times. At other times it has been easy.


     
    #11 El_Guero, Feb 18, 2007
  12. Ed Edwards

    Ed Edwards <img src=/Ed.gif>

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    The same bureaucrats will work there under a Democratic
    Administration. As with all bureaucrats, these bureaucrats
    are interested in the continuance of their bureaucracy.
     
    #12 Ed Edwards, Feb 18, 2007
  13. El_Guero

    El_Guero New Member

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    Yep . . .

    They were really bad under the Democrats . . . and they are just as bad under the Republican leader . . .

     
    #13 El_Guero, Feb 18, 2007
  14. carpro

    carpro Well-Known Member
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    23 More VA Vet Centers Coming

    Week of February 19, 2007


    "The Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) vet center program, which provides readjustment counseling and outreach services to combat veterans, is expanding into 23 new communities across the nation in the next two years. New vet centers will open in Montgomery, Ala.; Fayetteville, Ark.; Modesto, Calif.; Grand Junction, Colo.; Orlando, Fort Myers, and Gainesville, Fla.; Macon, Ga.; Manhattan, Kan.; Baton Rouge, La.; Cape Cod, Mass.; Saginaw and Iron Mountain, Mich.; Berlin, N.H.; Las Cruces, N.M.; Binghamton, Middletown, Nassau County and Watertown, N.Y.; Toledo, Ohio; Du Bois, Penn.; Killeen, Texas; and Everett, Wash. during 2007 and 2008. All vet centers provide counseling on mental health and employment, plus services on family issues, education, bereavement and outreach, to combat veterans and their families."
     
    #14 carpro, Feb 20, 2007
  15. The Galatian

    The Galatian New Member

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    Veteran's groups have consistently assailed the Bush administration for proposed and real cuts in VA services. Ironically, Clinton, who expressed scorn for the military, was far more careful to keep our promises to veterans than Bush & Co.

    Why should anyone be surprised? Considering the way Bush disgraced himself by walking away from his commitment during the Vietnam war, why wouldn't he resent the men and women who served honorably?
     
    #15 The Galatian, Feb 20, 2007
  16. billwald

    billwald New Member

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    Boggles my mind that anyone would enlist. I would rather see my kids go to Canada. I'm thinking about buying property in Canada in case the draft returns.
     
    #16 billwald, Feb 20, 2007
  17. carpro

    carpro Well-Known Member
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    Hollow post with more historical revision.
     
    #17 carpro, Feb 20, 2007
  18. The Galatian

    The Galatian New Member

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    Barbarian observes:
    Veteran's groups have consistently assailed the Bush administration for proposed and real cuts in VA services. Ironically, Clinton, who expressed scorn for the military, was far more careful to keep our promises to veterans than Bush & Co.

    carpro chants his usual generic protest:


    That's a testable claim.

    But any optimism the VA budget would pass muster was quickly dispelled. Proposals to boost prescription drug co-payments for some veterans from $8 to $15 for a 30-day supply of medicine and charge medical enrollment fees, up to $750 annually, for wealthier veterans without service-connected disabilities met stiff opposition.
    "I think it's dead on arrival," declared House Veterans Affairs Committee Chairman Rep. Bob Filner, D-Calif.
    While noting that the budget calls for a spending increase for medical care, Filner said, "I strongly believe that more resources are needed to properly fund the VA."
    He and veterans groups want more money for mental health services, assistance to military personnel leaving the armed forces and research.
    http://washdateline.mgnetwork.com/i...ction=article.main&ArticleID=9370&GroupID=213


    Veterans Groups Critical of Bush's VA Budget
    In a statement issued shortly after the budget was released, Edward S. Banas Sr., commander in chief of the Veterans of Foreign Wars, called the VA's health care spending proposal "a disgrace and a sham."
    http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dyn/A24665-2004Mar2?language=printer

    You want a chilling bit of news? Here you go:

    WASHINGTON - The Bush administration's budget assumes cuts to funding for veterans' health care two years from now - even as badly wounded troops returning from Iraq could overwhelm the system.

    Bush is using the cuts, critics say, to help fulfill his pledge to balance the budget by 2012.

    But even administration allies say the numbers are not real and are being used to make the overall budget picture look better.

    After an increase sought for next year, the Bush budget would turn current trends on their head.

    Even though the cost of providing medical care to veterans has been growing rapidly - by more than 10 percent in many years - White House budget documents assume consecutive cutbacks in 2009 and 2010 and a freeze thereafter.
    http://www.theledger.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20070213/NEWS/702130393/1039

    A little bit of make-believe, so Bush can crow that he balanced the budget. What it will do, is effectively prevent many veterans from getting the care they need.

    The proposed cuts are unrealistic in light of recent VA budget trends - its medical care budget has risen every year for two decades and 83 percent in the six years since Bush took office - sowing suspicion that the White House is simply making them up to make its long-term deficit figures look better.

    "Either the administration is willingly proposing massive cuts in VA health care," said Rep. Chet Edwards of Texas, chairman of the panel overseeing the VA's budget, "or its promise of a balanced budget by 2012 is based on completely unrealistic assumptions."

    A spokesman for Larry Craig, R-Idaho, the top Republican on the Senate Veterans Affairs Committee, called the White House moves another step in a longtime "budgeting game."

    "No one who is knowledgeable about VA budgeting issues anticipates any cuts to VA funding. None. Zero. Zip," said Craig spokesman Jeff Schrade.
    There's a lot more. Do you need more?

     
    #18 The Galatian, Feb 20, 2007
  19. El_Guero

    El_Guero New Member

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    In my experience, Clinton was not better than Bush in his treatment of Veterans.

    And it was specifically a democrat that refused to take care of this veteran.

    Oh well, at least the administration of the VA came to help me - even if elected Representatives would not represent a DAV . . .


     
    #19 El_Guero, Feb 20, 2007
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