Democracy for Vancouver

…[A]fter a string of damning reports and stinging congressional hearings, there is a rush to help these wounded warriors. A massive mobilization across the Defense and Veterans Affairs departments – with crucial assistance from veteran advocacy groups and nonprofit organizations – is under way to help veterans transition from combat to civilian life.

The result is a cornucopia of services that remains extraordinarily difficult to navigate, even with perseverance and the help of others who know how to work the system.
..
Better medical technology, improved treatment techniques and beefed-up armament means soldiers survive wounds that would have killed them in past wars. Using a narrow definition, the Defense Department reports that more than 28,000 troops have been wounded in Iraq, while just over 3,100 died from combat wounds.

For good order, the DoD numbers are bullshit. According to a Harvard study (pdf), as of January 2007, 152,669 servicemen had applied for disability benefits - far more than the DoD’s 28,000 wounded figure, even if half of the applicants were pure PTSD claims (which they’re not: “Some 20% have suffered brain trauma, spinal injuries or amputations; another 20% have suffered other major injuries such as amputations, blindness, partial blindness or deafness, and serious burns.”).

But, with more than 48,000 veterans from Iraq and Afghanistan diagnosed with PTSD already, whatever a vet’s recuperation progress for physical wounds, long-term issues will cost the VA billions. But even with the understanding of PTSD and its myriad causes that have come to light since Viet Nam and the first Gulf War, BushCo made no preparations for the number of disabled their little vanity war would produce:

The strain of extended deployments, the stop-loss policy, stressful ground warfare and uncertainty regarding discharge and leave has taken an especially high toll on soldiers. Thirty-six percent of the veterans treated so far — an unprecedented number — have been diagnosed with a mental health condition. These include PTSD, acute depression, substance abuse and other conditions. …

The VA curiously maintains that it can cope with the surge in demand, despite much evidence to the contrary. For the past two years, the VA ran out of money to provide health care. In FY 2006, the VA was obliged to submit an emergency supplemental budget request for $2 billion, which included $677 million to cover an unexpected 2% increase in the number of patients (half of which were OIF/OEF patients), $600 million to correct its inaccurate estimate of long-term care costs, and $400 million to cover an unexpected 1.2% increase in the costs per patient due to medical inflation. The previous year, (FY 2005), VA requested an additional $1 billion, of which one-quarter was for unexpected OIF/OEF needs and remainder was related to overall under-estimation of patient costs, workload, waiting lists, and dependent care. The GAO analysis of these shortfalls concluded that they were due to the fact that VA was modeling its projections based on 2002 data, before the war in Iraq began.

Bush has been out there all weekend whining about Congress’s failure to support the troops, and demanding that the VA funding bill be passed. What he hasn’t been saying is that, as it stands, Congress’s VA budget includes $4 billion more than what BushCo is asking for; Bush’s 2008 VA budget would:

• Nearly double the prescription co-payment for about 2 million vets;

• Impose a new VA enrollment fee on certain veterans of $250-$750 per year (the VA estimates that the enrollment fee and co-payment increases will drive nearly 110,000 veterans away from the VA system - their goal, perhaps?);

• Redirect the $492 million generated from these fee/co-pay increases to the U.S. Treasury, rather than reinvest in VA services, to help balance the budget (because we can’t cancel the tax cuts, of course);

• The the $752 million proposed by Bush to provide health care services for returning Iraq and Afghanistan war veterans may fall short by as much as 50% of actual needs;

• Reduce the VA research budget;

• Continue a ban on new “middle-income” veterans enrolling for care (since enacted in 2003 this ban has turned away as many as one million vets);

• Fail to provide enough money to recruit, hire and train VA staff to replace baby-boomer generation retirees, impacting the efficiency and quality of claims decisions.

• Freeze funding for the National Veterans’ Training Institute and the Homeless Veterans’ Reintegration Program, and decrease funding for the Veterans Workforce Investment Program.

Bush also neglects to remind us of the many times DoD, Rumsfeld, Bush’s VA administrators and Bush himself have actively shafted vets and active-duty servicemen and women with their stop-loss policy, denial of veterans benefits, and cutting benefits to the families of deployed troops.

This Veteran’s Day, I’d love to be able to hope that no more soldiers are killed or wounded for Bush’s codpiece dreams. But all I can manage is to hope that the soldiers and vets who’ve managed to survive this long can hold out another 434 days.

[emphasis added.]