Hurt Troops Often Denied Pay, Benefits

[Crunchy Frog]

Guard and Reserve soldiers injured in combat face financial and medical 'friendly fire' once back in the U.S., officials say.
By John Hendren, Times Staff Writer

http://www.latimes.com/business/careers/work/la-na-wounded18feb18,1,1040789.story?coll=la-headlines-business-careers&ctrack=1&cset=true

WASHINGTON — Hundreds of Army Reserve and National Guard troops returning home after being wounded in Iraq and Afghanistan have gone months without pay or medical benefits they were entitled to receive, military officials and government auditors said Thursday.

Because of a bureaucratic mistake, about 1,000 reservists and Guard members were removed from the active-duty rolls once home, even though their wounds entitled them to extended care, according to a Government Accountability Office study released Thursday. <snip>

Defense officials and the GAO blamed the wartime crush of wounded part-time troops for overburdening a military health system that has not seen such an onslaught since World War II. <snip>

Lawmakers said they were fielding many calls from wounded Reserve and Guard troops who might have been wrongly denied their benefits. In one GAO sample of 38 wounded reservists who had trouble getting the Army to recognize them as being entitled to benefits, 24 went weeks or months without pay and benefits, according to the agency, the investigative arm of Congress. They confront a "convoluted and poorly defined process" to obtain benefits, the GAO said.

(Hope this isn't a duplicate.)

[havocmom]

1. But if wingers fly a little flag from their car antenna and slap

a magnetic yellow ribbon on there somewhere, they are supporting the troops :eyes:

Hey, wingers, how 'bout you pay attention to what the fuck is REALLY going down and start holding your anointed one responsible instead of making excuses each time he is exposed for the criminal he is?

[Crunchy Frog]

3. As Randi Rhodes has pointed out,

the wingers actually believe in supporting the war and not supporting the troops. "Support the troops" has actually just become code for "support the war".

I actually have one of those yellow ribbons on my car, but it's juxtaposed with anti-Bush and liberal bumperstickers, so I feel that in my case, it actually is an expression of support for the troops. I even got a hate note on my windshield last week from a freeper type.

[Roland99]

2. This is the most telling part of that article

Defense officials and the GAO blamed the wartime crush of wounded part-time troops for overburdening a military health system that has not seen such an onslaught since World War II.


This is huge! Our men and women are being injured at astounding rates and these injuries aren't just cuts and scrapes.

[NYC]

7. More injuries than Vietnam?

The same sentence jumped out at me:

Defense officials and the GAO blamed the wartime crush of wounded part-time troops for overburdening a military health system that has not seen such an onslaught since World War II.

Why do we have more injuries now than during Vietnam?

[indepat]

4. Supporting the troops, neocon-style

[struggle4progress]

5. kick

[geniph]

6. If the military health-care system is already overburdened,

then why in the holy hell are they proposing more cuts to the VA budget - including hospital cuts - when they just keep ramping up the number of troops involved in their Forever War?

:mad: