Congress doesn't want to talk about veterans paying debts

Congress doesn't want to talk about veterans paying debts
Wounded Times
Kathie Costos
December 29, 2013

The Defense Budget for 2001 before 9-11 was $329 billion. 2002 it was A $350.7 billion. 2003 $396.8 billion was requested. The money for two wars went up after that. No one thought to pay for any of it. No one thought about the men and women they would be sending to fight these wars or taking care of them when they became veterans. It was all borrowed money along with the lives borrowed to fight.

The VA budget has gone up but what Congress doesn't want us to think about is the simple fact. 22,328,000 veterans in the US as of 9-30-12. As of March of 2013 the VA had 8.76 million veterans in their Health Care System but were only compensating 3.61 disabled veterans.

What happened to the others? What happened to veterans serving this country but do not seek anything in return? Do they get sick? Do they deal with wounds no one can see like PTSD and TBI on their own refusing to go to the VA?

We don't want to talk about military/veteran families on food stamps when Congress cut the budget.

About 900,000 veterans and 5,000 active duty troops face cuts in their food stamp benefits beginning Thursday as $5 billion is automatically trimmed from the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) program for low-income families.

"The coming benefit cut will reduce SNAP benefits, which are already modest, for all households by 7 percent on average, or about $10 per person per month," according to an analysis by the Center for Budget and Policy Priorities.

We don't want to talk about veterans being long term unemployed when Congress cut them off. In a report from May of 2013 the Bureau of Labor Statistics had 18-24 year old veterans at over 20% followed by 11% "Post 9/11 veterans" with many of the "long term" unemployed.

We don't want to talk about millions of veterans needing true affordable healthcare insurance when Congress was doing all in their power to kill the Act instead of doing all in their power to make sure it worked.

When members of Congress shut down the government over health insurance, some went to memorials to stage scenes of pretend outrage over them being closed. As we look at the facts of what the Congress does not want us to remember, it is clear the damage done belongs to them. Now they want to make it even worse.

They decided that aside from the cuts they have already done, it was necessary to go after one more. Military Retirement.

That item would produce some $6 billion in savings by shaving a percentage point off annual cost-of-living adjustments, and it would apply only to military pensions. Not all military pensions — just the retirement paid to veterans younger than 62.

First they sent troops into Afghanistan and then into Iraq but didn't fund the wars. Now they don't want to fund what these men and women thought was part of the deal. Why did congress do it? Because the debt was so high and someone had to pay for it. So yet again, it is the citizens of this country stepping up to fight the battles and veterans paying the price for doing it.