Bernie Sanders gets real
It is about time that those that are so vociferously calling for the ouster of Eric Shinseki be called out. Senator Bernie Sanders (I-VT) did just that on Politics Nation. He called out Republicans for filibustering a bill that would have according to The Huffington Post,
Sanders’ legislation addressed everything from making more veterans eligible for in-state college tuition to providing fertility or adoption services for some wounded troops left unable to conceive.
The VA would have been given more tools to eat into its backlog of 390,000 benefit claims awaiting action for more than 125 days. The bill also would have bolstered programs for veterans who suffered sexual abuse, and would have increased dental care and provided more alternative medicine, such as yoga for stress.
In a two-year test program, some overweight veterans living more than 15 minutes from a VA gym would have been given memberships at private health clubs.
Benefits for some spouses of deceased veterans would have improved, and aid to relatives caring for a wounded veteran would have been expanded to include those who served before the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001.
These are Americans that have spilled their blood, have given up family time, and have given up their limbs, and given up their lives for our freedoms. Is this not the least we could provide to those that have served us so well?
“If you are not prepared to take care of the men and women who put their lives on the line to defend this country,” Bernie Sanders said in the video clip. “who came back wounded in body, wounded in spirit, if you’re not prepared to help those people then don’t send them to war in the first place.”
Senator Bernie Sanders was asked to comment on Dr. Ben Carson’s inhumane statement as he called the VA scandal a gift from God. The senator had the answer that very few are aware of.
“I asked all the veterans organizations at the hearing — tell me about the quality of care in the VA once people get in to the system,” Bernie Sanders asked. “What they said without exception, and what independent survey after survey backs up, is the quality of health care in the VA is good to excellent. The problem that we’re having is getting people into the VA in a timely manner. The VA established very aggressive goals. It may well be that with two million new people coming in to the VA in the last four years that in certain parts of the country they can’t achieve those goals. We’ve got to help them be able to do that.”
It is imperative that no politician is allowed to get away with claiming they support the veteran even as they block policy and legislation that helps veterans. Not calling them out is a disservice to every veteran and implicitly our democracy.
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