Wall Street Journal Carries C-123 Veterans' Response to Their Editorial

Last month, former Secretary of Veterans Affairs submitted an editorial which ran in the Wall Street Journal. Principi attacked the VA policies of providing medical care to all eligible veterans, and he suggested coverage is best restricted only to more recently wounded personnel.

The Wall Street Journal kindly published our brief response challenging his editorial:

The VA, in any response to Mr. Principi's article, must realize that many of the Agent Orange-related illnesses strike in a veteran's later years. In the case of highly aggressive prostate cancer, for instance, the rate among older veterans exposed to Agent Orange is double that for other men and clearly related to their earlier military exposures.

Maj. Wesley T. Carter, USAF (Ret.) McMinnville, Ore.

To emphasize his point about the supposed injustice of lines of deserving combat veterans having to wait behind undeserving and uncaring old guys who don't notice the suffering behind them, a cartoon was provided (below)

Although a veteran himself, Principi suggests that not a single man ahead of this veteran on crutches would fail to move aside. Principi seems not to realize that today's combat veterans are offered a virtually seamless integration from DoD care to the tender mercies of the VA. Principi seems not to realize that everybody in the line cares deeply about everyone else...and especially that last guy.

In other words, former Secretary Principi's op-ed attacks a problem which doesn't exist. The real problem, is delaying care for too many veterans not brought into VA channels via Dod. These "older" veterans face years of delay in normal processing of disability claims. Given the VA's determination to deny, deny, deny, these veterans then face three to five years of waiting for action by the Board of Veterans Affairs...and even more if the claim is simply routed back to the regional board for reconsideration rather than a decision being made by the BVA.

Why the Secretary's article, then? Simple...he encourages VA to save money by denying veterans' claims, by delaying veterans' claims, by denying veterans' benefits earned through honorable service. 

Benefits promised by a grateful nation to those who have borne the burden. Though a dedicated public servant, Anthony Principi is simply wrong-headed and a slave to VA's anti-veteran policies!

C-123 Veterans' Response to Secretary Principi - Wall Street Journal, August 28

 (this is our Association's response to former VA Secretary Anthony Principi's Wall Street Journal editorial, in which he argued for greater restrictions on veterans disability claims)
C-123 Veterans' Response to Secretary Principi:

Mr. Principi's suggestion that one group of veterans (in his editorial, Vietnam veterans) should step away from the VA's benefits application line as the solution to make room for another, more current group of veterans is ridiculous. The solution instead is to move that application line along faster, easier and less expensively than the VA does today. The

solution most definitely is NOT to deny any one group of veterans their earned benefits in favor of another group equally worthy.

Secretary Principi is correct that that veterans may turn to the VA for what could be diseases of age, but as the IOM and studies by researchers like Dr. Mark Garzotto MD (VA Portland OR) continue to show, diseases like highly aggressive prostate cancer are directly linked to doubling the rate among Agent Orange-exposed veterans as they age....clearly a situation deserving of VA attention regardless of a veteran's age when care becomes needed. And there are other similar situations surfacing only in later life.

Very fortunately, the VA and the Department of Defense have recently overhauled the separation of troops who are ill or injured, arranging their disability ratings before separation and also packaging essential care such as years of extended medical care and a wonderfully conceived "wounded warrior" program. Thus, troops leaving active duty don't face the desperate years of VA claims process addressed by the Secretary's article.

The Secretary shows yet another example of the VA mindset determined to resolve budget and other issues on the back of the veterans who earned these protections the hard way..not by being in the line, but by being On The Line!

------Wes Carter