Finler:Stop talking and start doing

This is what I've been screaming about!!!!!

“The VA can set up five commissions – yet the real problem goes unresolved. We all know that convening meetings to study an issue in order to formulate a report to offer recommendations IS NOT ACTION. I strongly encourage the VA to proactively reach out to all our returning veterans now. Veterans cannot wait – and should not have to wait – for a blue ribbon panel to come out yet again with another report.

“We KNOW what needs to be done. Each and every service member, Reservist and Guardsman must be given a thorough and mandatory medical evaluation by competent medical personnel when they separate from military service for PTSD and TBI. The VA Secretary was asked to do this weeks ago.

“The time for panels has past. I expect immediate action to address the immediate needs of our veterans.”
go here for more
http://www.vawatchdog.org/08/nf08/nfMAY08/nf052408-7.htm

Hearing after hearing, listening to one heartbreaking story after another has accomplished more heartbreaking stories following all of the ones already heard. That's it. What good does it do to already know we failed in taking care of our veterans to hear more of them we failed? Does it make the problem go away to listen to the stories of these shattered lives? How many hearings does it take before they actually do something about any of this?

There is nothing new about PTSD. Humans have not changed and war is still war. What good does it do to listen to the new kids on the block when they already have several generations of older ones who have been there and done that and lived to tell their own stories? What good did it do to call on people who just stepped into this landmine and expect solutions from any of them? It accomplished a gigantic waste of time and in the process, more lives that could have been saved if they acted on what was already known.

I apologize to some of the people who have been testifying to congress on this, but the truth is, they can only talk about the problems the new generation of veterans have but they can offer nothing in the form of answers. I've heard all the hearings. I've read the transcripts and it is just rehashing what was already known in the 80's. The names have changed but that's just about all of it. The numbers are coming in sooner than they did after Vietnam, but most of that has more to do with outreach work (thousands of us have been doing since Vietnam) and the fact the redeployments increase the risk of developing PTSD by 50%. We have the numbers in from Vietnam and they are devastating,but we need to understand that as bad as those numbers are, they will be repeated faster simply because so little has been done to deal with it. Talking about it is not dealing with it and fixing the problems, helping them heal and compensating them for their wounds. It's all just more of the same.