Blue Water Vietnam Vet cut off after Agent Orange took over

VA ceases benefits for veteran suffering ailments linked to Agent Orange

By Will Doolittle will@poststar.com
Posted: Saturday, June 4, 2011

Editor's Note: This is the first of a three-part series on blue water veterans, and part of a larger series on the struggles of veterans to collect benefits from the VA.

The benefit checks from the Department of Veterans Affairs were a lifeline for Charles and Dolores Cooley, as critical to their financial health as the oxygen tube Charles wears is to his physical health.
But that lifeline was severed last year when the VA determined that awarding Cooley benefits for exposure to Agent Orange during the Vietnam War had been an error.

Having their benefits cut off has set the Cooleys down a slope to financial ruin. She is 66; he is 67. They live in a double-wide trailer on a grassy lot in the Drifting Ridge subdivision off Durkeetown Road in Fort Edward.
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VA ceases benefits for veteran suffering