A VETERAN’S PERSPECTIVE: LOOKING BEYOND WALTER REED

[babylonsister]

(His son will soon be deploying on his 4th rotation in Iraq:-( )


http://www.californiachronicle.com/articles/viewArticle.asp?articleID=22097

A VETERAN’S PERSPECTIVE: LOOKING BEYOND WALTER REED
Charlie D. Brown


Lt. Col. Charlie Brown, Ret., lives in Roseville, CA, and spent 26 years in the U.S. Air Force. He served as a rescue helicopter pilot at the end of the Vietnam War, and has flown reconnaissance missions in support of military operations around the world. In 2006, he was the Democratic Nominee for Congress in California’s 4th District.


Charlie D. Brown
March 14, 2007

Beneath the troubling revelations about the deplorable state of affairs at Walter Reed Army Medical Center lies something even uglier: a pattern of chronic neglect of veterans and their families by Washington politicians who will stand in front of any group of soldiers during an election year, but will stand behind none of them when it counts the most.

The Walter Reed scandal is only the tip of the iceberg.

Skyrocketing rates of homelessness, incarceration, substance abuse, suicide and divorce that have long plagued the veterans community—frequently the result of lasting psychological scars like Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder---are a national disgrace. And with more than a third of recently returning vets showing symptoms of PTSD, experts already predict that these disturbing trends will get worse in the decades to come.

Meanwhile, wait times at VA hospitals and mental health clinics, VA user fees and co-pays, and the backlog of veteran’s benefits claims are all increasing at exponential rates.

There’s no question that the staff at VA and DOD facilities do the best they can with the limited resources allocated. The negligence illustrated by the Walter Reed fiasco is systemic, and a direct result of caring for war veterans on the cheap.

Since 2002, leading veteran’s advocates have warned of a coming storm of demand for veteran’s mental health and medical services (VA caseload has increased from 6 million in 2001, to 8 million in 2006). To date, the federal response has been Hurricane Katrinaesque, at best. VA health services were under-funded by more than $2 billion in each of the past two years, and per veteran mental health spending is down nearly 30% over the past decade. And earlier this year, the Bush Administration proposed cutting VA spending again in 2009.

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[BOSSHOG]

1. Wow, LCOL Brown is quite the whiner

Doesn't he listen to fair and balanced news outlets?

- None of those kids have PTSD. They are all faking just to get out of their jobs.
- They are all volunteers
- More people die in car wrecks, so legless soldiers should be grateful
- The VA and Military Hospitals are not welfare for those who want to lounge around
- Soldiers ate in their rooms at Walter Reed, of course there was cockroaches

Yeah bubba, you going to the support the troops rally? I hear they are gonna have two kegs, yeeehaw! Looky my new yellow magnet

[babylonsister]

2. You ole sarcastic so-and-so, you.

I thought it was quite a thoughtful opinion. :)