Will Veterans Lose if Mitt Romney Wins?

UPDATE Just to show that my fears for the VA are not unfounded.

An Insult to Veterans
Posted: 07/25/2012
Richard Klass Colonel, USAF (ret.)

He asserts that the sequester cuts would weaken the Veterans Administration and that he would not let that happen. But President Obama has already ensured that the sequester, if it comes to pass, will not affect the VA. Gov. Romney did not mention his flirtation with replacing the VA with vouchers, a move that would decimate the VA's world class hospitals and research into veteran injuries such as loss of sight or limbs, Traumatic Brain Injury (TBI) and Post Traumatic Stress. He also seems to have ignored the fact that the GOP budget of Rep. Paul Ryan (R-WI), that he supports, would cut $11 billion from next year's VA budget. And of course, he would not give the Obama Administration credit for the largest increases in the VA budget in 30 years and for the expansion of care for women, mental health services and ending the shame of veterans' homelessness.

Veterans For Common Sense has a great article taking a look at what this country would be like for veterans if Romney takes over as President. Sadly the truth is, veterans will lose if Romney wins just as they lost under other Republican presidents, especially under Bush.

It is not that Republican politicians are bad people but when you put business first, veterans are usually last on the "to do" list. Bush took advantage of the loyalty of the veterans just as McCain tried to do.

This was one of the happiest days of my life!

JULY 17, 2007
VA Chief Nicholson Resigns
By TERENCE HUNT
The Associated Press
Tuesday, July 17, 2007; 12:17 PM

WASHINGTON -- Veterans Affairs chief Jim Nicholson, a onetime Republican Party chairman was forced to defend his agency's performance after revelations of shoddy health care at Walter Reed Army Medical Center, announced Tuesday he is resigning.

Nicholson, who is returning to the private sector, has been head of the VA since February, 2005. Before that, he was U.S. ambassador to the Vatican and chairman of the Republican National Committee.

It wasn't just what happened at Walter Reed but most of what is adding to the suffering of our veterans since the troops were sent into Afghanistan in 2001 happened because no one planned for the wounded coming home and what they would need. No one was held accountable as veterans suffered because veterans are loyal people. The last thing they want to think is that another veteran betrayed them. It happens all the time.

Most the veterans I spend my time with are Republicans. I've written often how I wouldn't want to be around anyone else because I know them. I know how humble they are, how much they care about others, especially other veterans, and it breaks my heart when I have to tell them the truth.

I see the pain in their eyes when I have to tell them that someone they trusted betrayed them.

When McCain was running against Obama, they didn't know that McCain voted against them most of the time. He thought the GI Bill, among other bills, was "too good for them" even though this bill was not good enough, as we've seen over the last few years with problem after problem. Yet McCain, who fought tooth and nail against it along with Bush, managed to take credit for it passing.

Now they are face with Romney. A man with a career of making money for himself first and his partners second. His record on veterans has not been good when you consider who really benefited and that was businesses. I doubt he'd change as President when considering going to war and having to choose between the lives of the men and women he sends against the defense contractors he owes favors to. We saw that with Bush and paybacks of no-bid contracts.

Too many politicians on both sides have the same debt to corporate backers but veterans are the last to know where their politicians loyalty really is and they trust too much. Their loyalty really prevents using their power as veterans to hold politicians accountable for what they do as much as what they don't do.

Romney won't fix the VA. He'll destroy it so that his rich pals will finally get what they want. Turning the care of veterans and their families over to private corporations putting profits ahead of taking care of them.

Imagine calling the VA for an appointment and the voice on the other end is an outsourced employee in India instead of Indiana. You would see a hospital treating civilians and veterans together and then close down because they lost money leaving veterans with having to go without care. You'd see all the VA hospitals being controlled by corporations after taxpayer money built them, turned into luxury condos for turkey vultures because CEO's cut their losses and left.

Here's the issue in a nutshell. If Romney wins, veterans will lose but if Obama is re-elected, they have to hold him and every other politician accountable instead of just assuming any of them will be as loyal to the veterans as veterans are to the country they were willing to die for.

Will Veterans Lose if Mitt Romney Wins?
Posted on July 7, 2012
by VCS

VCS Executive Director quoted extensively

What would a Mitt Romney Administration really mean for America’s veterans?

On Tuesday, Romney named former President George H.W. Bush and former Sen. Bob Dole as honorary co-chairmen of his Veterans and Military Families for Romney. But perhaps more significantly, the group’s national co-chairs, who will advise Romney on veteran policy if he is elected, include James Nicholson, former secretary of the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) under President George W. Bush.

Some veterans advocates say Romney’s decision to tap Nicholson, who abruptly resigned from the VA in 2007 amid controversy, as well as Anthony Principi and James Peake, who also presided over the VA during George W. Bush’s two terms in the White House, could signal that Romney will embrace some of the policies of the Bush years, which were widely considered to be tough times for veterans.

“A Romney presidency would be a disaster for veterans, as evidenced by whom he’s chosen to advise him,” says Patrick Bellon, executive director of Veterans for Common Sense, a veterans’ advocacy organization. “I think these choices should give all Americans pause. How can voters support a candidate who is showing so clearly that he learned nothing from Bush’s failures? It would be a mistake to trust people like Nicholson who failed veterans in such epic fashion.”

Nicholson, a wealthy attorney, decorated Vietnam veteran and former chair of the Republican National Committee who served as VA Secretary from 2005 to 2007, said in a statement on Romney’s website, “Veterans have served our nation proudly for decades. They deserve not only our respect and admiration, but top quality care for the rest of their lives. Mitt Romney will work tirelessly to ensure that veterans and military families are always cared for. That is why I am proud to join him in his campaign to keep America strong and prosperous.”

But the “top quality care” to which Nicholson refers was reportedly hard to come by when he ran things. A cover story in Newsweek in March 2007 reported that the VA under Nicholson was an overloaded bureaucracy that was unprepared for the onslaught of troops returning from war and was failing America’s wounded.
read more here