It can't be posted enough: these 41 Senators just blocked veterans' benefits

[JayhawkSD]

45. Some of this makes very little sense.

For instance, Sen Richard Burr complains that "We have veterans dying from long waits for basic, necessary tests like colonoscopies,” but this bill would "expanding several veterans benefits, including dental and medical care ... that currently apply only to post-Sept. 11 veterans." But the bill does not, apparently, create more facilities, so the Senator wants to actually make waithing times longer and cause more veterans to die while waiting for care.

If you think about it, adding pre-9/11 veterans to the post-9/11 veterans means that combat veterans will get less care so that noncombat veterans can be cared for. That is a nonstarter for me, and I am pre-9/11 and a noncombat veteran. I have avoided the VA like the plague because I am not going to inject myself into a queue of men and women who are vastly more deserving of the VA's limited resources than I am.

The bill would have exceeded the "VA spending limit established under the budget Congress and President Obama approved in December," so the money is supposedly coming from "savings from reduced overseas contingency operations, formerly known as the global war on terrorism," otherwise known as the war in Afghanistan, except that this money is off-budget money and is currently being paid for with borrowed money.

I applaud the 41. This bill should not pass. It reduces benefits for combat veterans, and it spends more money than was agreed to by both sides in the budgeting process.

A seperate bill which reverses the pensions cuts should pass.