Showdown Approaches--Obama Versus Veterans
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President Obama has made a number of unprecedented moves since taking office, that of wielding his authority to alter just about everything he comes to without dialogue with those affected by them. He came into office with an abnormally high popularity rating with the people. His presumptuous approach has whittled that down in 60 days to about the average for new presidents at his stage, lower than his predecessor, George W. Bush at the same point.
He now has moved into the arena of veterans benefits. I wonder if he realizes that approximately 25% of the American people are eligible for those benefits. I am a veteran of the Korean War, and I'm eligible for certain benefits although I do not receive any at this time. I applied for and received a monthly expense check towards tuition and books for college upon my release from the military in 1953 in the amount of $130. per month, for four years. Then in 1972, I applied for and received a government insured (GI) loan to buy a home, which has long since been repaid, costing the government nothing. So, I am not complaining for myself. But those men and women who have willingly joined (I was drafted and taken yelling and screaming!) our military services and served honorably, laying their lives on the line for us, deserve any benefit they can possibly be given.
What Obama's administration is proposing is to stop paying private insurers for their coverage of service related injuries and illnesses of their covered veterans. Heretofore, veterans have had to furnish their own insurance for non-service related health treatments, but the insurers were reimbursed for coverage of service related care.
The administration claims that this would save the Veterans Administration as much as $550 million dollars per year. But who would absorb it? Certainly not the insurance carriers. The veterans themselves would shoulder the burden of higher premiums for their insurance. I know the government needs to cut spending, but not at the expense of our men and women military veterans. We spend more than that on excesses for our glorious leaders pleasure. We waste it on multiple millions going to our pseudo scientists who are milking the natural global warming for all they can. Our priorities just aren't in the right place.
The way this new administration has begun throwing billions into the shredder, without the least clue as to what the result will be, certainly one half billion to our veterans should not be considered pork barrel spending. The president has shown a disdain for our military and former military, with at least a ho-hum attitude. He can rest assured that to continue with this type approach to our military readiness and care for our veterans will bring his popularity rating down to the depths of that which his predecessor enjoyed. And he cannot say that he "inherited" that.
Article submitted Wednesday, March 18, 2009 & read 68 times.
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» left by Gary W. Halsey Sr. (2 years 324 days ago.)
I agree with you Joel, and I, as well as you, am a veteran as well, only in the Vietnam era, and our veterans need this care. Does this mean that the budget for the VA hospitals would be cut as well? I am somewhat concerned abou that, as I have, in the entertainment industry, visited our local VA hospitals, and they are packed with WW II veterans, Vietnam Veterans, as well as your own era of veterans of the Korean war. What is to become of them? I would really appreciate knowing, as I would be the first to step up, and throw this out to the president in protest. Where can I read where they are proposing such a cut? Your friend in pen....Gary. Great article by the way, and informative.
» left by Anonymous (2 years 324 days ago.)
Hi Gary, I agree with you. If any group needs and deserves our gratitude, it is our veterans. Not me, I feel that the experience was worth a fortune to me and I consider they owe me nothing more. But, if I were disabled with a service connected disability from injury or sickness, I would feel that I was deserving of care on taxpayer's money. I have known personally , fellows who cme home (during the Korean War) who, though uninjured, weere physicalloy and mentally broken.
A boy, whom I served with during training, came home and he would walk downtown and sit down on the sidewalk leaning against a building, and spend he day there. I tried talking to him several times, but he could not talk without crying. I don't know just what was wrong physically, but he died about a year after he returned.. Lots of those old boys witnessed things so horrible they could not put them behind. I am perfectly happy to see my tax dollars used on their behalf.
