It's bad enough that our military men and women are stuck in two ill-conceived wars: The mismanaged and too-quickly-neglected war in Afghanistan, where we might have actually succeeded in capturing and/or killing Osama bin Laden, if not for the fact that we took our eye off the ball and shifted our resources to the other front -- Iraq, which at the time had posed no threat to us and had nothing to do with 9/11.
Yeah, that's bad enough.
But, to add insult to injury, once our brave veterans return from these conflicts, do we give them the help and support they deserve? Au contraire.
The recent update to the G.I. Bill of Rights, which Congress passed in September, might help in some regards, particularly with regard to educational benefits. But that is merely the tip of the iceberg.
In way too many cases, our vets cannot get timely treatment for their physical and mental health issues -- sometimes not until it's too late.
Who is to blame? It's not just the White House, or the Pentagon, or even the VA. It's also Congress. And, just in time for the upcoming elections, the organization Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America (IAVA) has released its 2008 Congressional Report Card, grading each Senator and Representative on his or her voting record on the most critical issues facing Iraq and Aghanistan veterans and their families. The report card looks at votes taken in the 110th Congress (2007-2008).
Check it out at www.VeteranReportCard.org and see whether your own Senators and Representative really supports our troops.
Important tidbit: Senator John McCain, for all his talk about how he loves the vets, voted with IAVA only 3 times out of 9. Barack Obama, on the other hand, scored 5 out of 9 votes, plus 2 points for Post-9/11 GI Bill cosponsorship.
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