When we fail to value the warrior

Three Local Homeless Vets Laid to Rest



DALLAS (WBAP) - Three homeless Vietnam-era Army veterans were buried with honors Tuesday morning during three separate services at Dallas-Fort Worth National Cemetery.

Army veteran Macklin James Walker, 55, died on November 15, 2007. He asked for a ride to a homeless shelter and died on the way.

On October 22, 2007, Retired Army veteran Edna Lou Nolan passed away. The 69-year-old was dropped off at a local hospital and died the next day.

Army veteran Gilbert Hermes Mixon, 55, was found dead in White Lake Creek in Dallas in Sept. A family friend had to identify him.

None of the three homeless veterans had any family members present at their burial services, but one woman did come to support Mr. Mixon.
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http://www.wbap.com/Article.asp?id=530067&spid=6051

Senator Joe Biden said in a debate "My father told me, don't tell me what you value. Show me your budget and I'll know what you value." In this case it is apparent this President does not value the warrior close to the wars, which are in fact occupations. Bush has never once requested any kind of emergency supplemental funds for the veterans or for the wounded under the Department of Defense, despite the travesty of what they are coming home to with claims backlogs, understaffed departments, sporadic resources, geographic areas with little or no facilities at all, veterans centers opening under media spotlight closing down suddenly without any warning. The list goes on. This nation has once again proven they do not value the warriors they send to risk their lives.

Veterans die from neglect. They die waiting for their wounds to be treated and taken care of. They die suffering financial hardships none of them would have to go through had it not been for the wounds they received in service to this nation. They die at their own hand because combat wounds brought back in their minds were treated with indifference.

Active duty forces die from neglect. They are treated with the same apathy the discharged receive. You could hold a parade everyday of the year and place monuments to their sacrifices from Boston to San Francisco without doing one damn thing for any of them when they are living monuments needing care and attention. None of the parades and monuments really mean anything in their lives. Do we think we are doing anything at all for them with these things? Or is it a matter of easing our own conscience because we do so little for them?

Budget of the United States Government, FY 2007
Provides $439.3 billion for the Department of Defense’s base budget—a 7-percent increase over 2006 and a 48-percent increase over 2001

This is what this government values. Not the veterans needing help for the wounds they receive.

Employees
235,000+ (2006)
Annual Budget
$73.2 billion (2006)

It was formerly called the Veterans Administration, also called the VA, which was established July 21, 1930, to consolidate and coordinate government activities affecting war veterans. The VA incorporated the functions of the former U.S. Veterans' Bureau, the Bureau of Pensions of the Interior Department and the National Home for Disabled Volunteer Soldiers.

Long Beach VA medical center
On October 25, 1988, President Reagan signed legislation creating a new federal Cabinet-level Department of Veterans Affairs to replace the Veterans Administration effective March 15, 1989.
In both its old and new forms, the VA drew its mission statement from President Abraham Lincoln's eloquent Second Inaugural Address. The specific phrase quoted by VA is: "...to care for him who shall have borne the battle, and for his widow and his orphan...".

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Department_of_Veterans_Affairs

Consider how much money is spent in a single year deploying the warriors and then think of all the veterans from the current occupations added to the wars of the past. When you look at the budget you need to see the faces of all veterans in the VA system and then you begin to understand how tragic this all is and how telling what is really valued in this nation.

"At a time when he says he wants to "rein in spending" the President has submitted a budget that includes an eye-popping request of $726 billion in new spending for the Department of Defense and for war-related costs for 2007-2008.
This includes $245 billion ($235 billion for Department of Defense) in new spending for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan-including a $100 billion supplemental request for FY 2007 and a $145 billion request for FY 2008."

http://majorityleader.house.gov/docUploads/BushBudgetIraq0708.pdf

"To care for him who shall have borne the battle, and for his widow and his orphan..." If we managed to come close to living up to this, do you think we would have so many homeless veterans? So many suicides? So many trapped in a system wounded and waiting? We have so few veterans compared to the general population. With over 300 million people we do not even have 30 million veterans and only about 17 million of them are combat veterans. We don't take care of them but we can if we ever really wanted to live up to the "grateful nation" title we love to use during their funerals when the flag is folded perfectly for the widow or the orphan left behind. Or in the case of these three homeless veterans, no one was there to receive the flag or the "gratefulness" of this nation.

Kathie Costos
Namguardianangel@aol.com
http://www.namguardianangel.org/
http://www.namguardianangel.blogspot.com/
http://www.woundedtimes.blogspot.com/
"The willingness with which our young people are likely to serve in any war, no matter how justified, shall be directly proportional to how they perceive veterans of early wars were treated and appreciated by our nation." - George Washington