Bush, Republicans losing support of retired veterans

WASHINGTON - President Bush and his Republican Party are facing a political backlash from an unlikely group - retired veterans.

Normally Republican, many retired veterans are mad that Bush and the Republican-controlled Congress are blocking remedies to two problems with health and pension benefits. They say they feel particularly betrayed by Bush, who appealed to them in his 2000 campaign, and who vowed on the eve of his inauguration that "promises made to our veterans will be promises kept."

"He pats us on the back with his speeches and stabs us in the back with his actions," said Charles A. Carter of Shawnee, Okla., a retired Navy senior chief petty officer. "I will vote non-Republican in a heart beat if it continues as is."

"I feel betrayed," said Raymond C. Oden Jr., a retired Air Force Chief Master Sergeant now living in Abilene, Texas.

Many veterans say they will not vote for Bush or any Republican in 2004 and are considering voting for a Democrat for the first time. Others say they will sit out the election, angry with Bush and Republicans but unwilling to support Democrats, whom they say are no better at keeping promises to veterans. Some say they will still support Bush and his party despite their ire.

While there are no recent polls to measure veterans' political leanings, any significant erosion of support for Bush and Republicans could hurt in a close election. It could be particularly troublesome in states such as Florida that are politically divided and crowded with military retirees.

Registered Republican James Cook, who retired to Fort Walton Beach, Fla., after 24 years in the Air Force, said he is abandoning a party that he said abandoned him. "Bush is a liar," he said. "The Republicans in Congress, with very few exceptions, are gutless party lapdogs who listen to what puts money in their own pockets or what will get them re-elected."

One is a longstanding complaint that some disabled vets, in effect, have to pay their own disability benefits out of their retirement pay through a law they call the Disabled Veterans Tax.

Since 1891, anyone retiring after a full military career has had their retirement pay reduced dollar for dollar for any Veterans Administration checks they get for a permanent service-related disability. However, a veteran who served a two-or-four-year tour does not have a similar reduction in Social Security or private pension.

A majority of members of Congress, from both parties, wants to change the law. A House proposal by Rep. Jim Marshall, D-Ga., has 345 co-sponsors.

But it would cost as much as $5 billion a year to expand payments to 670,000 disabled veterans, and Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld earlier this month told lawmakers that the president would veto any bill including the change.

The proposal is stuck in committee. A recent effort to bring it to the full House of Representatives failed, in part because only one Republican signed the petition.

"The cost is exorbitant. And we are dealing with a limited budget," said Harald Stavenas, a spokesman for the House Armed Services Committee.

The second complaint is over medical care. After decades of promising free medical care for life to anyone who served for 20 years, the government in the 1990s abandoned the promise in favor of a new system called Tricare. The Tricare system provides medical care, but requires veterans to pay a deductible and does not cover dental, hearing or vision care.

A group of military retirees challenged the government in a class-action lawsuit, won a first round, then were seriously disappointed when Bush allowed the government to appeal. Government won the next legal round.

"I voted for the president because of the promises," said Floyd Sears, a retired Air Force master sergeant in Biloxi, Miss. "But as far as I can tell, he has done nothing. In fact, his actions have been detrimental to the veterans and retired veterans. I'm very disappointed about the broken promise on medical care."

Stavenas said House and Senate negotiators were working this week on proposals to address the veterans' two specific complaints. He added that Congress has increased spending for veterans' benefits, including a 5 percent increase next year for the Veterans Health Administration.

Christine Iverson, a spokeswoman for the Republican National Committee, said: "The Bush administration and the Republican Congress have taken and will continue to take steps to enhance benefits for our veterans."

Not all military retirees will vote against Republicans, of course. Some, like retired Air Force Lt. Col. Gene DiBartolo of Tampa, will vote for Bush again gladly.

Though he believes his fellow veterans have a just complaint, he said the government simply cannot "do everything."

"It would take a lot more than this issue to dissuade me from my support of this man."

First, it's Disabled Veterans Tax, not concurrent pay, because any other disabled veteran working for the government gets both VA disability and federal retirement with no deduction. Only those who serve until retirement have to give up the dollar for dollar offset; thus it is clearly discriminatory to one selected group. It can only be made equal or right by passing the repeal of the Disabled Veterans Tax or making a law to decrease the other government pensions dollar for dollar too.
Most veterans don't vote? Bull. Most veterans are also teachers, lawyers, laborers, politiians, men, women, all ethnic groups, and all other divisions or classifications in the USA. They vote--it's just that no one has ever taken the time to single them out as veterans and really see how many vote. Get rid of the stereotype that those veterans leaning on the bar in vets clubs, drinking, telling stories, and do not generally do anything are typical of the veteran. That's as accurate as saying all cats have 3 legs after seeing a 3 legged cat.
Finally, most of this article is true but downplays all the problems vets go through. Retired disabled vets almost always live at the edge of or below poverty because of this law. Promised free medical care was a major enticement to keep people in the service until 1995, even being printed in brochures and supported up to & including the President & Congress. Funny, though they embraced and encouraged it, Congress never passed a law to give it. The vets lost on a technicality (see the Supreme Court ruling where they agree that we were promised and encouraged at all levels and deserve it, but can't have it because Congress failed to pass the law.) Other problems not mentioned are the lack of funds for VA medical & other care. VA Sec Principi sent his 100% disabled, wheelchair bound aid to 7 VA facilites in different locations. He found the same thing that an 83 year old vet with cancer and many thousands like him already know. Even though he had top priority, he could not get into 5 of the 7 facilities and was put on a minimum 6-month waiting list. (With veterans dying at 1200-1700 a day, I guess that's how the are able to fit those waiting in.) In one case, an elderly vet with 80-99% occlusion in the heart had to wait in the waiting room over 8 hours because there was no room in the ER. VA programs are mandatory. VA funding is left to Congress & the President who always give less than the cost of living, and often take away what they have just given. They agree the VA is in terrible shape but refuse to either appropriate enough funds to alleviate the crisis or make the funding mandatory so the VA can plan and meet its mission. That does not even touch the problems of SBP, DIC, Ageng Orange, and Sec. Rumfeld's proposed rollback of the death gratuity benefit, hazardous duty pay, separation pay, and denial of Tricare to families of the guard who are getting wounded or killed daily in Irag and other places. The author, ironically, left out one of the main reasons Sec. Rumsfeld gives for this. In addition to the "bust the budget" argument, he argues with the same fervor that the monies saved from this need to go to pay raises for those on active duty and to improve the living standards of their families.
Bush has done a masterful job in Iraq and the war on terror, but he is not perfect. To really hear what veterans think and will do you need to go to the Vets-Voting-Bloc@yahoogroups.com, MRGRG, and many new groups of veterans and their families. These groups are ad hoc groups with no dues, officers, or any purpose but to see that the veterans finally get what has been promised and denied for many years, and voting out those who do not actively support us and voting in those who will. (E.g. the bill to allow retired disabled veterans has been introduced by Republicans for 10-12 years now, been co-sponsored by both parties to the point that any veto could have been overridden, the Senate has passed it several times, but the House Republicans always do something to keep it in committee, kill it, or come up with some wierd substitute that has little or no meaning & is a monster to administer. Last year we were promised a compromise of those with 60% disability up being allowed to have both with the program phased in over 5 years--a compromise we were willing to live with until the others could be addressed. Two days after they got our vote, the met in a late-night session, subsituted CRSC which helps less than 35,000 and is a nightmare to prove, to get accepted, and to administer; obviously a ploy to delay payment while claiming to do something. Again, go to VVB, MRGRG, FireFire, and the multitude of new groups being formed daily, working together, and representing several hundred thousand vets and active duty (one of VVB's first members was an active duty soldier who emailed from Afghanistan during a break inthe fighting to include him). Yes, some are for Bush & will always be die-hard Republicans, but that wall is crumbling fast due to the failure of the current administration and House to follow up on their promises, provide what we were promised and earned, and make us equal to all others.
ljmar

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