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When it comes to military veterans, George W. Bush says one thing and does quite the opposite
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ON VETERANS’ DAY, President George W. Bush oversaw a wreath-laying ceremony at Arlington National Cemetery. He gave thanks to those who’ve served in the US armed forces. Veterans, he said, "command the respect of the American people, and they have our lasting gratitude." If Bush really wanted to show his respect and gratitude, however, he could have used the occasion to outline an exit strategy from the Iraqi quagmire; announced an end to the military’s ban on gay and lesbian service members; and expressed support for increased retirement benefits and health-care services for active-duty military personnel and veterans alike. Veterans for Common Sense, which promotes the perspective of war veterans on national-security issues in "an age when the majority of public servants have never served in uniform," according to its mission statement, sent a letter dated November 11 to Bush calling on him to actively deal with the "continued lack of security and escalating U.S. causalities in Iraq." The letter was signed by 750 veterans ranging in rank from captains, colonels, and commanders to staff sergeants, chief petty officers, and privates. To date, 394 members of the US military have been killed in Iraq; 256 of those deaths have occurred since May 1, when Bush declared an end to the hostilities. Meanwhile, no weapons of mass destruction — the reason given for the war in the first place — have been found. There’s an Orwellian feel to the Iraq situation. We are not at war, yet 35 attacks each day are launched against those on duty in Iraq. Those who are killed are returned to Dover Air Force base in "transfer tubes" — the Pentagon’s latest, and perhaps most insensitive, euphemism for body bags. And Bush, while expressing gratitude for those who make the "ultimate sacrifice," hasn’t attended a single memorial service or funeral for a serviceperson killed in Iraq — quite possibly because such a public display of mourning would remind Americans that we are, in fact, at war. None of this shows respect or gratitude. Even as the president chatters on about respect and gratitude, he’s failed to do anything to end the military’s odious ban on gay and lesbian service members, which causes the discharge of approximately 1000 active-duty personnel each year. Perhaps the most infamous example of the inanity of the Pentagon’s policy against gays occurred in the wake of the September 11 terrorist attacks, when the Army discharged 10 linguists, seven of whom were proficient in Arabic, because they were gay. Meanwhile, there are gay and lesbian soldiers, sailors, airmen, and Marines fighting in Iraq. Their families back home are excluded from the network of support services set up to help spouses cope with the terror and stress that come when a loved one is working in a war zone. The president’s continued support for the ban is anti-veteran, hypocritical, and cruel. But perhaps the most egregious dereliction of the president’s responsibility to veterans, however, is his continued opposition to increasing retirement benefits for disabled veterans. Under current law, veterans must deduct the value of their disability pay, which comes from the Veterans Administration, from their retirement benefits, which are paid out by the Pentagon. The former is based on pain and suffering, while the latter is based on length of service; one should not be affected by the other. Yet they are. And in practical terms this means that a veteran like Jessica Lynch, who was seriously injured and declared missing in action for nine days before her dramatic rescue, and a veteran like Shoshana Johnson, who was held prisoner in Iraq for 22 days and sustained lasting injuries to both her legs from gunshot wounds, will receive lesser retirement benefits than their colleagues who have returned from Iraq unharmed. There is no way to justify this unfairness. Last year, there was support in Congress to amend the law, but Bush threatened to veto any bill that made the change. A compromise was eventually approved: only veterans with 20 years of service who have also received a Purple Heart or sustained a serious combat-related disability won’t see their retirement benefits reduced by the value of their disability pay. Yet Bush claims there is $87 billion in the budget for operations in Iraq. Progressives have noted the irony in not having enough money to improve our schools or provide health care for the uninsured — even as we apparently have unlimited funds for such improvements in foreign countries, as long as they are accompanied by military activities. But what about the irony in asking for $87 billion to fight a war that you won’t say is a war, even as you claim there’s not enough money to increase retirement benefits for those who become disabled while fighting it? And then there’s the state of health care at VA hospitals, where the average wait for an appointment is measured in months, not days. There’s the scandal concerning the care of injured reservists returned from Iraq at Fort Knox and Fort Stewart. The UPI reported last month that injured troops were made to wait for months for medical care while housed in sweltering barracks with no running water, much less air-conditioning. It’s all sickening. But then, what are we to expect from a man who went AWOL from his National Guard duty during the Vietnam War and yet still has the chutzpah to dress in a combat flight suit and land on an aircraft carrier for a political event? It gives us all the more reason to make sure he loses his job in 2004. What do you think? Send an e-mail to letters[a]phx.com
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