Senator - and DOCTOR - Tom Coburn Stalls Veterans' Caregivers Bill!!
By anniepa
@anniepa (27955)
United States
November 16, 2009 2:35pm CST
The bill in question is a $3.7 billion packet of health care initiatives called the Caregivers and Veterans Omnibus Health Services Act of 2009. The bill’s centerpiece is unprecedented support for family caregivers of severely wounded veterans, those injured since 9/11. They would be paid a stipend based on hours and level of care. VA also would pay for replacement caregivers when family members seek respite from their care obligations.
The idea is to give more very severely wounded veterans an option other than institutional care.
Source: http://www.vawatchdog.org/09/nf09/nfnov09/nf110609-5.htm
Here's more from the article:
But Coburn has refused to allow it to come to a floor vote. His spokesman, John Hart, said the senator’s biggest concern is that the Senate doesn’t intend to pay for the bill with an offset of current spending or higher taxes, so its passage will add to annual budget deficits and the national debt.
Coburn “believes strongly if we don’t start paying for things we’re not going to have a country left to defend,” Hart said. “He says we are waterboarding the next generation with debt and somebody has to stand up and say, ‘Let’s cut it out.’ ”
(End of excerpt)
It's interesting that Senator Coburn never seemed to be so worried about "paying for things" when he voted for the very wars that are the source of these veterans' need for care!
Any thoughts?
Annie
2 people like this
3 responses
@lilwonders456 (8214)
• United States
16 Nov 09
Well I am a little torn here. Yes I think the bill is a good idea. But I also wonder how we will pay for it. It can be the best idea in the world....but if you don't have the money...you don't have the money.
A lot of them on both sides voted for the wars that now regret it. Hopefully they will learn from that mistake.
We are facing a finaical crisis in this country. We have record debt. We have got to start looking at things practically. How will we pay for the programs we want? What programs need to be cut all together or handed over the states to handle?
Those are hard questions to answer. They will effect real people. But they are real questions that must be asked and answered. We don't have a bottomless pit of money. In fact we have a bottomless pit of debt. How are we going to pay for it all? Where is the money going to come from? We can't keep adding more and more debt without a way to pay it off. We will end up like Russia and wake up one day bankrupt completely. What do you think that would do to our country or the people in it? I don't agree with pushing these bills off on the next generation or generations. We made the bills. We should pay for them and not make our children and their children burdened by them. It is not fair to them. They did not cause the problem so why should they pay for it? IT would be wrong and irresponsible of us to even ask them to do it.
1 person likes this
@anniepa (27955)
• United States
16 Nov 09
First of all, let me try this link again: http://www.vawatchdog.org/09/nf09/nfnov09/nf110609-5.htm
Let's hope this one works!
I think a bill like this should be passed. Nobody CARED about paying for the wars and sending so many of our young men and women to risk their lives. NOW when they need help and their families need help, suddenly we have some in Washington that are worried about how to pay for their care?
Personally, I never wanted my tax dollars going to fight an immoral and unnecessary war in Iraq but I had no choice. Now, we have people all up in arms that they don't want their tax dollars to pay for health care for those who are less fortunate than they are, even our veterans'! Unfortunately, we don't always get what we want - or do NOT want, do we? I just believe some of our lawmakers in Washington have their priorities all mixed up!
Annie
@lilwonders456 (8214)
• United States
17 Nov 09
We the people should not have allowed our elected officials to vote for the war. We should not have let our elected officials put us in this much debt. We should have done a lot of things.
But what is done is done. We can't take it back.
But what we can do is make sure from this point on that we make them be responsible with our money and pay off our debt.
1 person likes this
@anniepa (27955)
• United States
18 Nov 09
The time to be "responsible" shouldn't come on the backs of our veterans who went and risked their lives and came back with permanent, life-changing injuries. THAT is a debt we've already incurred by allowing them to be sent to war and yes, the majority of the people had no problem with going to war in the beginning and didn't care how much it cost. Taking care of our veterans is part of that cost.
Annie
@Rollo1 (16676)
• Boston, Massachusetts
16 Nov 09
You neglected to give the rest of the story:
"The Senate Veterans Affairs Committee acknowledges that money hasn’t been found to cover at least $2.8 billion of the bill’s $3.7 billion projected cost over the next five years.
Sen. Daniel K. Akaka, D-Hawaii, chairman of the committee, argues that the Iraq and Afghanistan wars also haven’t been “paid for” and proper care of wounded veterans is just another very necessary cost of war.
Another reason Coburn blocks the bill, Hart said, is that it isn’t fair to extend caregiver benefits to wounded from Iraq and Afghanistan but not to those severely injured in the Persian Gulf War, Vietnam or earlier conflicts.
Finally, Coburn believes VA isn’t “making smart use of existing benefits and therefore avoiding duplication,” Hart said. “This is legislation very popular for politicians to put forward for Veterans Day. But we need to produce a higher quality of care rather than press releases.”
He said Coburn will introduce alternative legislation because he supports the goals of the bill."
No one thinks there is money to pay for this and Coburn supports the "bill's centerpiece", that is, support for family caregivers. He intends to introduce BETTER legislation to provide that support - legislation which will be more inclusive and provide for veterans from wars prior to Iraq and Afghanistan.
So, what's the problem?
1 person likes this
@anniepa (27955)
• United States
16 Nov 09
I didn't "neglect" to tell anything. My link still won't work, however, even though I did take away the symbols following the "htm". Anyway, as is often the case we'll have to agree to disagree! I'm in total agreement that this should include all of our veterans from all of our past conflicts. However, Coburn is REALLY speaking out of both sides of his mouth; he's blocking the bill because it's not paid for AND he's blocking the bill because he wants more people to benefit from it.
Annie
1 person likes this
@Rollo1 (16676)
• Boston, Massachusetts
17 Nov 09
The link worked for me after I deleted the html tags.
The point here is about passing good legislation. Why not be in favor of someone crafting a bill that is not only going to be funded but will do more instead of just do something? This is a real problem as I see it. There's a rush to pass legislation simply for the sake of passing legislation.
It's the same as Bill Clinton telling Congressmen that they shouldn't worry about what was in the health care bill, just pass it because it's better to pass something than to pass nothing.
There's so much wrong with that philosophy. We don't need a bunch of bad laws on the books. There's no good side to passing bad legislation that may require years of more passing of more legislation to fix or in the worst case, legislation that causes more harm than good.
Why would you be opposed to better legislation for a program that would be funded and provide more benefits to more people?
@kdhartford (1151)
• United States
16 Nov 09
I am a Veteran and I told my Senators to not pass this bill. It is a good idea, but it does need to be paid for. I would be willing to pay for it, by selling the Government's share of General Motors; since the Government shouldn't be involved with that anyways.
