Which is Worse Veterans awaiting Medical or Earned Disability?

Matthew Daly of the Associated Press penned an article about the Senate and House Committee finally reaching an agreement regarding the emergency bill to help relieve the very large number of veterans waiting on VA doctor’s appointments.  In it he reports “After more than six weeks of sometimes testy talks, House and Senate negotiators have agreed on a compromise plan to fix a veterans health program scandalized by long patient wait times and falsified records covering up delays. The chairmen of the House and Senate Veterans Affairs committees have scheduled a news conference Monday afternoon to unveil a plan expected to authorize billions in emergency spending to lease 27 new clinics, hire more doctors and nurses and make it easier for veterans who can't get prompt appointments with VA doctors to obtain outside care.  Louis Celli, legislative director for the American Legion, the nation's largest veterans group, said the deal would provide crucial help to veterans who have been waiting months or even years for VA health care.  "There is an emergency need to get veterans off the waiting lists. That's what this is all about," Celli said Sunday.  Tom Tarantino, chief policy officer of the Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America, said the agreement was good news.  "It's about time they're doing their jobs," he said of Sanders, Miller and other members of Congress. "You don't get a medal for doing your job." Veterans waiting two months for medical appointments "don't care about all this back and forth" in Congress, Tarantino said. "That's what should be driving decisions."

My question is how come we can’t get this type of work toward those of us still waiting on our disability payments, or those of us who are expected to survive on $130.00 per month after 9 plus years of service.  Can’t some of this money be used to increase those claim workers for the VA to help speed that effort along as well and why does it have to be one thing and one thing only.  Congress is always attaching amendments to bills for their pork projects, why not attach one to this bill that help fund more processors of veteran’s claims.  If you pay veterans what they are truly worth, you would not need more doctors at the VA because many of those veterans on that list will be ineligible because of the recent imposed “means testing” that some brilliant congress person dreamed up.

Sometimes life is much simpler than others make it out to be and often times it is to keep the status quo as is because those who can make the change are afraid of change.  Wonder how they would have survived in the position that many of us veterans found ourselves in to earn the title VETERAN?