Republican Vote Suppression Goes On

I confidently reported a few week ago that the Veterans Administration had rescinded its policy against allowing voter registration drives in VA hospitals and care facilities.

Guess what? They were lying. The VA has a new policy: anyone trying to register voters has to be screened. Guess what? That screening won't be completed in time to get these veterans registered to vote. Because they might vote Democratic.

Alternet: VA Voter Suppression Continues
Despite a new policy, the Department of Veterans Affairs is still blocking voter registration efforts.

Just because victory is declared in Washington does not make it so.

One week ago, the Department of Veterans Affairs announced a new policy to allow voter registration drives on VA campuses, responding to pressure by lawmakers and the media that the VA was suppressing the vote of wounded former soldiers. That new policy was greeted with 'mission accomplished' press statements by members of Congress who have been pushing the VA to change its policy for several years.

But on Monday, as the Senate Rules and Administration Committee held a hearing in Washington on a bill to ensure veterans living at VA facilities could be helped with voter registration, a legal motion was being filed in federal court in California alleging the VA was still blocking efforts to register voters in time for the 2008 presidential election.

Following last week's announcement of VA's new voter registration policy, a VA facility in San Francisco blocked a non-profit group, Veterans for Peace, from registering voters, the legal motion said. The filing said the VA was seeking to require Veterans for Peace members to go through the process of screening VA volunteers, a process that would delay registration efforts. In contrast, the VA does not require screening for most other visitors.

"The VA has disenfranchised veterans and interfered with the freedom of political parties and nonpartisan groups to associate with their members and with other citizens who reside on VA campuses," the motion said. "This Court should prohibit further interference with voter registration at any VA campus for the imminent federal election."

Scott Rafferty, the Washington-based attorney who filed Monday's motion on behalf of a California labor organizer who in 2004 was blocked from registering voters on another VA facility in California, said there were political reasons behind the agency's refusal to register veterans.

“Veterans’ experience in war gives them a powerful voice," Rafferty said. "The VA wants to stop them from using their right to speak out and to vote. The VA knows that many veterans oppose the Administration’s conduct of the War, the overextension of the military, and its inadequate support for returning warriors.”

Despicable ratfuckers.

Good News

The Veterans Administration, under pressure from citizens, Congress, veterans groups, and state election officials, has reversed its ban on voter registration in Veterans Administration facilities.

WaPo: V.A. to Allow Voter Signup for Veterans at Facilities

John McCain's Daily Bald-Faced Lie

McCain has a new campaign ad out attacking Obama. It's getting a lot more attention in the media than he's paid for, as it is only running in a few markets:

“Barack Obama never held a single Senate hearing on Afghanistan,” the ad’s announcer says. “He hadn’t been to Iraq in years. He voted against funding our troops. And now, he made time to go to the gym, but cancelled a visit with wounded troops. Seems the Pentagon wouldn’t allow him to bring cameras. John McCain is always there for our troops. McCain: Country first.” It concludes with the candidate’s voice: “I’m John McCain and I approve this message.”

Of course, Obama has attended more Afghanistan subcommittee meetings in the last two years than McCain.

Both McCain and Obama have voted against troop funding bills that contained provisions they didn't like.

It was McCain came out against the new GI Bill and its increased educational benefits for veterans, then didn't bother to vote when the final bill passed, while Obama made a special trip in from the campaign trail to vote for increased funding for veterans.

McCain voted against improved health care for disabled veterans.

McCain is against the very concept of VA healthcare and wants to shunt veterans into the private healthcare system where they will stand in line with (or behind) the rest of us.

Obama only canceled the hospital visit at the last minute after the Pentagon said at the last minute that he could only go with Senate staff (nothing was said about cameras, and Obama had visited wounded troops a couple of weeks ago at Walter Reed -- with no cameras present.). Since Obama was on a campaign visit and traveling with campaign staff, that was impossible.

(And on a related note, when John McCain was in Europe in March, he didn't go to the hospital in Landstuhl either, even though he was just as close to the hospital as Obama was.)

On the whole, the lowest point yet of a very low campaign.

hat tip to
Carpetbagger Report: When the going gets tough, McCain gets disgraceful where I got a lot of these links.

An actual truthful headline from the corporate media: New McCain Ad Bashes Obama for Not Visiting Troops Using Footage of Obama Visiting Troops (credit where credit is due, it's Jake Tapper of ABC News).

Sue the Bastards

In the ultimate "fuck the troops" decision, Bush's VA doesn't want veterans receiving care in VA hospitals to be able to vote. Disgraceful. I hope Connecticut sues their asses and all other states join in.

Alternet: Fight Over the VA's Ban on Voter Registration Heads to Court

The state of Connecticut may file a federal lawsuit to force the Department of Veterans Affairs to allow voter registration drives, Secretary of State Susan Bysiewicz said Friday.

"Time is of the essence," she said. "We have 109 days left before the election. The (Connecticut) Attorney General and I are looking at possible legal action. It is fair to say that is very likely."

Bysiewicz' comments came a day after she was notified by U.S. Secretary of Veterans Affairs James Peake that the VA would not permit voter registration drives at its campuses and was imposing new restrictions on who could contact veterans at VA facilities to help them register to vote.

"It is a disguised no," Bysiewicz said, referring to the VA's new policy that only "Voluntary Service" officers at VA facilities would be allowed to register the former soldiers. "It is legal mumbo-jumbo that appears to grant something but really takes away everything."

Anytime a person moves they must update their voter registration. This includes former soldiers who are receiving care at VA facilities.

In recent weeks, Bysiewicz has lead a bi-partisan effort among top state election officials to pressure the VA to become a voter registration agency like motor vehicle departments, which ask clients if they want to register during its regular course of business. More than 20 of these officials have signed a letter to the VA, urging a change in policy.

The Connecticut secretary of state is especially angered by the VA policy because the reasons cited by the VA for opposing voter registration drives -- they would interfere with its medical mission and be partisan -- have never been an issue at Connecticut's state veterans home in Rocky Hill.

Disgraceful Treatment of Veterans By Bush Administration

Bush's Veterans Administration is banning voter registration at federally run nursing homes, Veterans Administration hospitals, shelters, and rehab hospitals. This is the ultimate insult, to those who served their country to ensure democracy and are now disabled as a result, to be deprived of the franchise. A complete disgrace, but what can you expect from a bunch of constitution-hating chickenhawks?

NYTimes: V.A. Ban on Voter Drives Is Criticized

Shameful

And because of the policies of rich Republicans like UBS Swiss Banker Phil Gramm and Private Plane McCain, things like this are happening in the richest nation in the world:

Bloomberg.com: Foreclosures in Military Towns Surge at Four Times U.S. Rate

Military families were targeted as customers during the boom in subprime lending because their frequent moves, overseas stints, and low pay meant they were more likely to have weak credit ratings, said Rudi Williams of the National Veterans Foundation in Los Angeles. In 2006, at the peak of U.S. subprime lending, the number of VA loans fell to barely a third the level of two years earlier, according to VA data.

VA loans totaled 135,000 last year, its fourth consecutive annual decline.

An Army or Marine Corps sergeant with four years of experience makes $27,000 a year, plus combat pay of $225 a month, according to the 2008 Military Authorization Act, which increased basic pay rates 3.5 percent from a year ago.

Soldiers authorized to live off-base also receive a housing allowance that this year starts at about $500 a month, 7.3 percent higher than in 2007, paid even when they are deployed. Counting the stipends, they still fall short of the 2007 median U.S. household income of $59,224 as measured by the National Association of Realtors in Chicago.

Memorial Day: To Be Remembered

courant.com: Hushing Up Crisis Of Suicide, Mental Scars

CBS News did its own extensive research, finding that more than 6,250 American veterans took their own lives in 2005 alone. That comes to slightly more than 17 suicides every day.

Anchorage Daily News: Female soldiers know: Sexual assault can lead to PTSD

Last month I attended a presentation on Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder, or PTSD, at the Anchorage Veterans Administration Clinic. PowerPoint slides provided a definition of PTSD and common causes of this disorder: IEDs, seeing the bodies of dead children, experiencing serious bodily injuries, and others.

I asked the briefer, a VA psychiatrist, whether the VA also considered Military Sexual Trauma an experience that can lead to PTSD. He replied "no."

I looked at the physician with amazement. Many peer-reviewed journal articles assert that Military Sexual Trauma, or MST, is especially associated with PTSD. That the Veterans Administration continues to disassociate MST with PTSD is remarkable.

Bob Geiger, HuffPo: Dead Troops Remembered By President Who Had Them Killed

Yes, that's a harsh headline for this piece.

But I'll ask you to forgive me because, as a Veteran, there isn't a day on the calendar that causes my hatred -- and I do indeed mean hatred -- of George W. Bush to bubble over the top more than Memorial Day.

"On Memorial Day, we honor the heroes who have laid down their lives in the cause of freedom, resolve that they will forever be remembered by a grateful Nation, and pray that our country may always prove worthy of the sacrifices they have made," reads Bush's official Memorial Day proclamation, issued by the White House on Thursday.

The Chickenhawk-in Chief says a lot of things that make this Vet's blood boil but stuff like saying that he prays "...that our country may always prove worthy of the sacrifices they have made" is almost vomit inducing.

This statement comes from the same man who himself began dishonoring the sacrifices of all Veterans in such huge ways in March of 2003, when he invaded Iraq behind a veil of lies and deceit and started spilling barrels of military and civilian blood to start a war with a country that posed no threat whatsoever to our national security.

Meteor Blades, dailykos: Forgotten on Memorial Day

My great-great-great-great-great uncle was killed by U.S. soldiers during the Second Seminole War. Other distant relatives were killed during the Third Seminole War. Killed for trying to hold onto freedom, land, the right to self-determination.

Whether they killed warriors and women on the banks of the Pease River in Texas, the Washita River in Kansas, Sand Creek in Colorado, or Wounded Knee Creek in South Dakota; whether they fought Shawnee in Indiana, Asakiwaki in Wisconsin, Lakota and Cheyenne in Montana, Chiricahua in Arizona, Nez Perce in Idaho or Modocs in California, the men in blue who were killed in the Indian Wars are among those who will be honored Monday.

But the thousands of warriors they killed – the ancestors of us original Americans – aren’t counted for the ultimately futile but unhesitating sacrifice they made for the freedom of their people. On Memorial Day, they are invisible. Monuments to the Rebel dead can be found in practically every town of the Confederacy. Memorials to Indian resistance are next to non-existent.

Brandon Friedman, dailykos: Senator[Ted Stevens], VA Secretary [James Peake] Disrespect Troops on Memorial Day

On Memorial Day weekend, Senator Ted Stevens (R-AK) and VA Secretary James Peake stood side-by-side in Fairbanks, Alaska to showcase their opposition to--and lack of respect for--today’s newest veterans.

Speaking at the Disabled American Veterans’ 19th Annual Department Convention, Senator Stevens told the majority of America’s most recent war veterans that they had not yet sacrificed enough to have earned a GI Bill that would cover the full cost of their educations.

Sen. Ted Stevens warned of a "mass exodus" from the military Saturday if the so-called 21st Century GI Bill goes into law without major changes.
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"There are worries that people who are already in for two years will serve one more and leave, and there’s really no incentive to stay," Stevens said.

What Stevens is really saying is that today's troops are unpatriotic--that they're only in it for the money and the college. And while Stevens’ "mass exodus" theory has been thoroughly discredited by the Congressional Budget Office, the true irony of the situation lies in the fact that Stevens earned his own college degree after World War Two by using the same GI Bill he’s aiming to prevent today’s veterans from receiving.

At the same convention, VA Secretary James Peake--who is already under fire for the cover-up of an extraordinary number of veteran suicides and for overseeing an organization that may not be taking PTSD seriously--showed a stunning lack of situational awareness by discounting recent media reports and think tank studies by suggesting that fewer returning vets actually had PTSD than is commonly thought.

Despicable Treatment of Disabled Vets

The Ground Truth (2006)

By the Bush Administration, of course. They ordered the VA to stop helping disabled veterans with their paperwork applying for disability benefits, because too many veterans were getting the disability payments they deserved. Despicable, but entirely predictable from the shallow chickenhawks sending others to die, for profit, for legacy, for ideology, but for no good reason.

NPR: Army Blocks Disability Paperwork Aid at Fort Drum

Army officials in upstate New York instructed representatives from the Department of Veterans Affairs not to help disabled soldiers at Fort Drum Army base with their military disability paperwork last year. That paperwork can be crucial because it helps determine whether soldiers will get annual disability payments and health care after they're discharged.

Now soldiers at Fort Drum say they feel betrayed by the institutions that are supposed to support them. The soldiers want to know why the Army would want to stop them from getting help with their disability paperwork and why the VA— whose mission is to help veterans — would agree to the Army's request.

'A Worn Pair of Boots'

One disabled soldier, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because he fears retaliation from the military, says it feels like a slap in the face.

"To be tossed aside like a worn-out pair of boots is pretty disheartening," the soldier says. "I always believed the Army would take care of me if I did the best I could, and I've done that."

At a restaurant near Fort Drum, the soldier described his first briefing with the VA office on base. According to the soldier, the VA official told a classroom full of injured troops, "We cannot help you review the narrative summaries of your medical problems." The official said the VA used to help soldiers with the paperwork, but Army officials saw soldiers from Fort Drum getting higher disability ratings with the VA's help than soldiers from other bases. The Army told the VA to stop helping Fort Drum soldiers describe their army injuries, and the VA did as it was told.

hat tip to Jimstaro at dailykos.