Congressional Record, Volume 150 Issue 88 (Wednesday, June 23, 2004)

[Congressional Record Volume 150, Number 88 (Wednesday, June 23, 2004)]
[House]
[Pages H4882-H4886]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]

CARING FOR OUR VETERANS AND THEIR FAMILIES

The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under the Speaker's announced policy of
January 7, 2003, the gentleman from Maine (Mr. Michaud) is recognized
for half the time until midnight as the designee of the minority
leader.
Mr. MICHAUD. Mr. Speaker, we are here this evening to discuss an
issue that I believe should be one of the highest priorities in the
budget, one of the highest priorities for Members of Congress and one
of the highest priorities for our government. We are here this evening
to discuss caring for our veterans and their families. We are here on
the floor to show them the respect they deserve.
Since the beginning of our Nation's history, our veterans have
answered the call to duty with dignity, with courage and with great
honor. These brave men and women have never flinched in the face of
danger and as we speak on the floor this evening, a new generation of
veterans is being made in Iraq and Afghanistan. Like all Members of
this body, I pray for their safety and hope that they may return home
to their loved ones as soon as possible. Like the veterans before them,
these brave men and women deserve our respect, our gratitude and our
care, not just while they are in harm's way but also when they come
home and take off the uniform. There are so many issues facing our
veterans community now that we must address so that the VA can care for
the needs of our newest generation of heroes. I believe we must
encourage all veterans to enroll within the VA so they can fully
understand the need within our communities. There is a program in my
home State of Maine called Operation I Served which is working to
identify and enroll as many veterans as it can. I believe this is a
noble effort and one that I fully support. I personally ask all
veterans to enroll in the programs.
Mr. Speaker, one of my greatest concerns when I came to Washington
was to give over 150,000 veterans in my State a stronger voice on the
issues that are important to them. I have been honored with being
ranking member on the House veterans benefits subcommittee. During my
time on the Committee on Veterans' Affairs, I have learned a great deal
from the full committee ranking member the gentleman from Illinois (Mr.
Evans) and from the gentleman from New Jersey (Mr. Smith), the
chairman. The bipartisan effort of our committee has resulted in the
passage of good legislation, including improved veterans education
benefits, the enhanced self-employment opportunities and improvement in
home loans and adapted housing benefits. The housing veterans' affairs
committee has achieved a great deal for veterans because of the
bipartisan spirit with which it pursues issues important to veterans
and their families. Unfortunately, that bipartisan desire to care for
veterans does not reach into the administration's budget request.
Veterans in this country are all too aware of the growing mismatch
between the demands for veterans services and the funding allocation to
supply these services. Some would have us address this issue of
mismatch by decreasing the demand for VA services by limiting access to
certain veterans or by increasing copayments to those veterans. I
believe this is absolutely the

[[Page H4883]]

wrong policy to pursue. If we truly value the sacrifice our veterans
have made for this country, we will work to ensure that all veterans
have access to high quality care. We must make caring for our veterans
a priority, not only in words but also in our budgets and we should
give the VA the mandatory funding that it needs to take care of our
veterans.
I look forward to discussing this issue further this evening with my
colleagues here. I yield to the gentleman from Ohio.
Mr. STRICKLAND. It is great to be here with the gentleman from Maine
(Mr. Michaud), the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Ryan) and the gentleman
from Maine (Mr. Allen). The fact is that we are here because we are
concerned about veterans and the fact that this administration is
woefully underfunding VA health care. The truth is that since President
Bush came to office, he has sent to this Congress budgets which ask for
greatly increased costs to our veterans. The President has asked that
the cost of a prescription drug be increased from $7 a prescription to
$15 a prescription. The President has asked in his budget that a $250
annual user fee be imposed upon our veterans. The President has asked
that the cost of a clinic visit be increased. And the President through
his administration has created a new category of veterans which they
call priority group 8. These are veterans who are told that they can no
longer participate in VA health care. These people can be combat
decorated veterans and still be told by this administration that they
cannot participate in VA health care.

What the President has already done is harmful enough to veterans,
but just recently a memo surfaced from this administration from the
Office of Management and Budget. It outlines what the President will
likely do if he is reelected when it comes time to create the budget
for 2006. In that memo, we find out that the Bush administration plans
to cut about $900 million out of VA health care funding in the 2006
budget. The reason that is so bad is because we are already
underfunding VA health care. We are already imposing additional costs
on our veterans. Veterans are waiting months just to see their doctor
for the first time in many cases and in many places around this
country. Yet the President wants to fund VA health care at an even
lower level for the 2006 budget period. What would that mean in Ohio?
Ohio is a big State. We have 1,069,132 veterans in Ohio. These are men
and women who have served the country with great honor. If the
President's proposed cut were to happen, that would result in a cut of
$36 million beneath the current levels of funding just for the State of
Ohio alone. We cannot let that happen. That is why I think it is
important that we meet as we are meeting here on the floor of the House
tonight to discuss this issue, to inform not only our colleagues but to
inform the American people and especially America's veterans as to what
is being planned by this administration.
Mr. MICHAUD. I yield to the gentleman from Ohio.
Mr. RYAN of Ohio. Mr. Speaker, it is an honor to be here with the
gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Strickland), the gentleman from Maine (Mr.
Allen) and the gentleman from Maine (Mr. Michaud). Maybe we can get a
two-on-two basketball game going here, the Ohio guys against the Maine
guys. I just want to say what an honor it is and how terrific it is I
think that the gentleman from Maine became the ranking member on a
subcommittee in the Committee on Veterans' Affairs in his freshman
year. I think that speaks volumes of how he has been approaching the
issues and how important it is to him. But the one issue I wanted to
just touch base on for a few minutes, and I know it is getting late and
our time is limited, about the mandatory funding. We have an
opportunity to make sure that our veterans are funded every single year
through the mandatory funding provisions that we want to implement.
Right now it is discretionary funding, it is up to the whims of
Congress on whether or not our veterans should get their health care.
The request from the Secretary of the VA is completely underfunding the
needs.
Everyone keeps saying, ``Well, we're spending more on veterans now
than we ever have. We are spending more. We have increased by X percent
over the last few years.'' And the one point that continues to get
ignored is that we have thousands of more veterans entering into the
system. So although there is an increase, if you increase it by 5
percent and the numbers of veterans coming in increases by 10, 15 or 20
percent, then the money you have in the pot is not big enough to handle
the needs for our veterans.

{time} 2300

And what has happened under the current system, under the
discretionary funding system, is that we have failed to keep pace with
the medical inflation; we are rationing care to our veterans; we are
denying services to some, as the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Strickland)
said; we are foregoing a lot of the modernization techniques and
investments.
And the one point that I really wanted to bring up because I think it
is so appropriate given the state of war that our country is in,
reducing the funding for research and development for prosthetics. The
VA was award winning in the country for the kind of developments and
the research that they would put in and the kind of advances that they
have had regarding amputees and trying to help amputees who come back.
In this war we have seen more amputees than we ever expected because we
do not have the armored Humvees, and just the way this guerrilla war is
being fought, we have a lot of veterans who are losing their arms,
losing their legs, and now back at home we are cutting the investment
for trying to improve on prosthetics.
Not only that, but when we take a step back and we look at the big
picture, this is about choices and we can say we do not have enough
money to fund all these programs for our veterans. That is a shame in
itself if one has to say that, but at the same time they will not
reduce the tax cut for millionaires.
We are not asking to reduce the tax cuts for anyone that has made
under $300,000, $200,000. In fact, Democrats want to increase the child
tax credit and increase the breaks for middle-class people. But when
one says that they are not willing to repeal any portion of the tax cut
for people who make more than $1 million to pay for this veterans
funding, we have a problem in this country.
Mr. STRICKLAND. Mr. Speaker, will the gentleman yield?
Mr. MICHAUD. I yield to the gentleman from Ohio.
Mr. STRICKLAND. What the gentleman is describing here are the values
embraced by this Congress, and some people seem to think it is more
important to give tax cuts to people who make over $200,000 a year than
it is to put sufficient resources into caring for our sick and disabled
veterans. That is an argument we can have, but I think the American
people are going to side with us. Especially during this time of war,
and the gentleman from Maine (Mr. Michaud) knows this, as he visits his
district, as I visit my district, as the gentleman from Maine (Mr.
Allen) visits his district, we hear from people that they honor and
revere the service that our veterans have given to our country, and
they want us to put the needs of our sick and our disabled veterans at
the top of the list. They do not want them to be at the bottom and get
the leftovers. They want them to be at the top.
Sadly, this administration has decided that it is more important to
take the resources we have and give those resources to the richest
people among us in the form of tax breaks than to put sufficient
resources into our health care.
Mr. MICHAUD. Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentleman from Maine (Mr.
Allen).
Mr. ALLEN. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding to me.
This is a Maine/Ohio event tonight. I am not sure we are ready to
play basketball with Hoosiers, but we are happy to talk with them
tonight about the problems our veterans face.
We have 150,000 people over in Iraq and Afghanistan doing their level
best to carry out an extraordinarily difficult assignment. And it is
simply astonishing, it is a disgrace, that President Bush and the
Republican leadership in this Congress have made tax cuts for the
richest Americans a higher priority than funding health care for our
veterans.

[[Page H4884]]

Just to put these numbers in perspective, Secretary Principi asked
the administration for $1.2 billion in next year's budget that he could
not get. He asked for $1.2 billion. That seems like a lot of money. How
much are we spending every week in Iraq? A little over $1 billion. We
spend $1 billion a week in Iraq, and we cannot find, the administration
cannot find, $1 billion extra a year to fully fund veterans' health
care in this country. It is just unbelievable.
In Maine we are doing better in some respects because we have got
some additional clinics. We have got the CARES report that has been
done and offers some hope that we are going to do a little better in
the future. But nationally we are underfunding veterans' health care.
There is no doubt about it. What is really going on, I think, is
because the cost of health care, particularly the cost of prescription
drugs, is rising so rapidly that more and more veterans are coming into
the system, flooding the system, asking for help. And where is the
United States Government, where is the United States Congress, when our
veterans need extra help? Sadly, missing in action is where we have
been.
The gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Strickland) was just talking about the
White House budget memo for the next fiscal year, not the one we are
debating this year but the next fiscal year. That is a cut. In fiscal
year 2006 President Bush's proposal is to cut VA health care by another
$910 million, almost $1 billion, 1 week's worth of spending in Iraq.
And if they succeed in driving veterans' health care down by that much,
they will have cut veterans' health care to below the 2004 level, below
the level that we are spending this year. And I find this proposal just
absolutely shameful, especially when our servicemen and women and their
families are sacrificing so much in Iraq, Afghanistan, and around the
world.
We should be at this time showing renewed appreciation for our
veterans, and that is why I support the gentleman from Wisconsin's (Mr.
Obey) resolution, H. Res. 685, that would reorder the Nation's budget
priorities to increase the investments in veterans' health care. This
House will vote on the resolution tomorrow, and H. Res. 685 would
increase funding available for VA health care for fiscal year 2005 by
an additional $1.3 billion, just slightly more than Secretary Principi
asked the President for and did not get.
The resolution would be paid for by limiting unfair and
disproportionate tax breaks for people making $1 million annually. And
think about this. That would save just under $19 billion. In other
words, here we are, the conflict going on in Iraq and Afghanistan, and
in 1 year alone, people earning $1 million a year or more are going to
take home $18.9 billion that they would not have had without these tax
breaks. And we cannot find, the administration cannot find, the
Republican Congress cannot find, $1.3 billion a year to help our
veterans. If we were not in Washington, we would not believe it. What
is happening is just absolutely unbelievable and needs to be changed.
Mr. STRICKLAND. Mr. Speaker, if the gentleman would yield, I want to
comment on what the gentleman from Maine (Mr. Allen) has said. The fact
is that we are more concerned about millionaires getting a few dollars
in tax breaks than we are in providing health care to our veterans. It
is a simple fact. The President and the leadership of this House can
argue otherwise, but it is true. If we would just simply not be so
concerned about giving millionaires more money in tax breaks, we could
take care of America's sick and disabled veterans. These people who
have fought the battles, paid the price by shedding their blood, losing
their limbs. Some have been blinded, disfigured, and horribly wounded
in a variety of ways. But this administration cares more for
millionaires in terms of getting more money through tax breaks than
caring for our veterans.
Mr. MICHAUD. Mr. Speaker, I agree with the good congressman. And I do
not know what it is going to take because both the gentleman from Ohio
(Mr. Strickland) and the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Ryan) also sit on the
Committee on Veterans' Affairs, and I do not know what it is going to
take, because in earlier years, as they know, we have got this
independent budget for fiscal year 2005 where they spell out the money
that they need to take care of our veterans here in this country, and
it was unanimous. Then the President's own task force reported earlier
the final report in 2003, Improved Health Care, Delivering for our
Nation's Veterans, it says right in there that there is a significant
mismatch in the VA between demand and available funding.

{time} 2310

Something has to be done to take care of our veterans, and it is a
matter of priority.
I served in the legislature for 22 years, and a lot of those years I
served on the appropriations committee and we had to make the tough
decisions. We had to live within a balanced budget because the
Constitution of Maine requires that.
So we had to prioritize. That is what this is all about, is
prioritization. I do not think the priorities of this Congress and this
administration are set in the right places. I think definitely the
veterans are a top priority and we ought to take care of them.
The gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Ryan) talked about the cutting of some
of the research funding for our veterans. I had a chance to go visit
Walter Reed hospital and went into the amputee ward. I am glad I did. I
had a chance to talk to a lot of the soldiers that were there, and it
really opened my eyes.
That is one area we definitely should not be cutting back, because
the war in Iraq and Afghanistan will be over with eventually and people
will tend to forget about it, but the people who will never forget
about the war in Iraq or Afghanistan are those who lost a loved one or
a veteran who came home and is missing a limb or two. They will never
forget. That is always going to be on their minds.
That is why it is incumbent upon this Congress to make sure that we
have adequate funding. And as stated by my good colleague the gentleman
from Maine (Mr. Allen), actually when Secretary Principi came before
the Committee on Veterans' Affairs to talk about his budget, he
admitted they cut him back $1.2 billion. That is wrong, and that is not
where my priorities are.
Mr. RYAN of Ohio. Mr. Speaker, if the gentleman will yield further, I
want to share with the American people, because it is easy to say that
the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Ryan) or the gentleman from Ohio (Mr.
Strickland) or the gentleman from Maine (Mr. Michaud) are the ones
saying we need to do this.
Almost every major veterans organization has backed the mandatory
funding proposal. The American Legion, the AMVETS, Blinded Veterans
Association, Disabled American Veterans, Jewish War Veterans of the
USA, Military Order of the Purple Heart, Paralyzed Veterans of
American, Veterans of Foreign Wars, Vietnam Veterans of America, these
are veterans organizations who are saying this is something that we
need and we are willing to put our names on it. I think that is
important.
It is the same with mental health, homelessness and all the other
issues that we talk a lot about in committee.
So I just want to thank the gentleman again for the opportunity to be
here. It has been great over the last few weeks and months to watch all
of the history of the World War II veterans and everything that has
been shown on TV and on the history channel and the dedication of the
monument and everything else.
I think when we are talking about values and talking about
priorities, and as the gentleman from Maine said, as a legislature, you
have to make these choices, and they are not always easy choices. But
when you compare what we are doing and how many trillions of dollars we
are giving a way to the top 1 percent of the people in this country, at
the expense, it is not free money, it is at the expense of veterans,
and where would those people be if these veterans did not protect the
system, the economic system, the democratic system that we have in
place right now that enables them to create the kinds of wealth they
have created. God bless them. We are not here to say they should not
make their money, but we are saying society has an obligation to treat
these people fairly, and right now they are not.
Mr. MICHAUD. Mr. Speaker, reclaiming my time, I thank the gentleman.

[[Page H4885]]

Another issue I would like to discuss, and it is an issue that has
plagued our veterans community for over 100 years, it is the issue of
concurrent receipt, also known as the disabled veterans tax.
H.R. 303 which would address this issue has 382 bipartisan
cosponsors, but this bill has not been brought to the floor by
Republican leadership. My good friend the gentleman from Georgia (Mr.
Marshall) has filed a discharge petition, but has only been able to get
206 signatures as a result of this action. And the grassroot movement,
the veterans around the country, we were able to actually take a small
step to address this issue in the national defense authorization.
But it is a crying shame, because when you look at in my State of
Maine alone, two-thirds of the military retirees were left out of this
provision, and I fully support total elimination of the ban on both the
disability and retirement pay. I do not think we should stop until we
get the full repeal of it.
Mr. STRICKLAND. Mr. Speaker, if the gentleman would yield, I think
some people do not fully understand what is meant by concurrent
receipt. Some people do not really understand what we mean when we talk
about the disabled veterans tax. But it is a discrimination against
veterans.
If a veteran is an individual who has served the country and has
qualified to receive a pension, they get a pension. But if they have
become disabled in some way and they qualify for disability benefits,
they get disability benefits, or they qualify for disability benefits.
But the tragic fact is, for every dollar that a veteran, a disabled
veteran, gets in disability benefits, $1 is subtracted from their
pension.
So, in other words, the disabled veteran is actually paying for his
or her disability, and it is a discrimination, it is an injustice that
needs to be corrected.
We would have corrected it. The Democrats in this House have been
trying for months to correct this injustice, and the President fights
our attempt to get rid of this disabled tax.
Mr. McHUGH. Mr. Speaker, will the gentleman yield?
Mr. STRICKLAND. I will not yield right now, but I will as soon as I
finish my statement.
The fact is that we have been trying to get rid of this disabled
veterans tax, and it is the Republican leadership in this House and the
president of the United States who has fought our attempts to get rid
of this terrible injustice. And it will not change, I believe, until
the veterans of this country understand what is going on and speak out
and speak up and demand change.
You know, talk is cheap, and it does not cost us anything to salute
the flag or to appear with veterans in a parade. But the real
reflection of our values as a people and as a Congress is seen in how
we spend our money, those things which we are willing to support with
our budget.
The fact is that this Congress has failed disabled veterans, and I
just call upon the President, upon my colleagues in this House, to
change their attitudes and change their minds and step up to the plate
and allow the Republican Members to come down here and sign this
discharge petition. Let us bring this bill to the floor, so that all
Members of this Chamber can have a recorded vote, a public vote, so
that the veterans know where we stand; not just what we say, but what
we are willing to do with our vote to get rid of this injustice.
Mr. Speaker, I thank my friend for yielding.
Mr. MICHAUD. Mr. Speaker, reclaiming my time, talking about the
disabled tax, that has been a very discouraging thing. I have heard a
lot of veterans in Maine who do not receive much funding at all.
Mr. McHUGH. Mr. Speaker, will the gentleman yield?
The SPEAKER pro tempore. Does the gentleman from Maine yield?
Mr. MICHAUD. Not at this time, Mr. Speaker.
Mr. Speaker, the biggest problem I see when you talk about veterans
benefits and health care, sometimes those in the administration really
do not understand the distance veterans have to go to get their health
care.
The issue I want to bring forward is we have a lot of BSOs, and I
hear a lot of complaint in the State of Maine. If a veteran in the
northern part of the State has to get health care services and they go
to Togas and then they have to get shipped to Boston, they stay
overnight in Togas, then another day they go to Boston; they stay
overnight in Boston, then they come back to Togas, then back up to the
northern part. It is a 4-day trip.
That is wrong. I do not think veterans should have to go through
that. It is wrong. We have to make sure they are taken care of, not
only their health care, but this disability tax is another issue that I
think we definitely should be voting on.
Mr. McHUGH. Mr. Speaker, will the gentleman yield?
Mr. MICHAUD. I yield to the gentleman from New York.
Mr. McHUGH. You will yield. I thank the gentleman.
Let me from the outset, Mr. Speaker, say that I deeply appreciate the
two gentlemen's comments about the concerns with respect to veterans
benefits. I think both sides of the aisle, Republican and Democrat,
share that concern.
What troubles me is the comments the two gentleman have made with
respect though the Republican majority in this House as it relates to
concurrent receipt.

{time} 2320

The fact of the matter is, this concept has existed since the 1860s,
since just after the Civil War. The fact is, for the 40 years prior to
the Republicans taking the majority of this House, my friends' party
did absolutely nothing to correct the inequities, the wrongs associated
with concurrent receipt that they so rightly cited.
Mr. MICHAUD. Mr. Speaker, would the gentleman quickly make his point?
Mr. McHUGH. I am making my point as quickly as I can. If the
gentleman cares to reclaim his time, that is his right.
As the chairman of the subcommittee that has responsibility over
concurrent receipt, I would say under the Republican majority, for the
first time in more than 140 years, including 40 years of uninterrupted
Democrat majorityship in this House, we have taken steps to cut the
concurrent receipt inequities by more than half. It is not enough. We
need to do more.
Mr. MICHAUD. Mr. Speaker, reclaiming my time.
Mr. McHUGH. But for these 2 Members to say we have done nothing is
the most disingenuous comment I have heard in my 12 years here.
Mr. MICHAUD. Mr. Speaker, reclaiming my time, what was done 100 years
ago is one thing. Veterans want the problem taken care of now.
Mr. McHUGH. Would the gentleman yield? * * *
Mr. STRICKLAND. Regular order, Mr. Speaker.
The SPEAKER pro tempore (Mr. Gerlach). The gentleman from Maine has
the time.
Mr. MICHAUD. Mr. Speaker, I am a freshman Member of Congress. I was
not here to deal with this issue in the past. I am here now, and it is
an inequity, and I think it should be taken care of.
Mr. McHUGH. * * *
The SPEAKER pro tempore. The gentleman from Maine has the time.
Mr. MICHAUD. Mr. Speaker, I am not here to put blame on the past
Congresses. I am in this Congress, and this is an issue where we have
over 380 some odd Members of Congress signing it, and it is
disingenuous for those Members of this body who signed it to be
cosponsors and refuse to sign the discharge petition, and refuse to
bring it out.
Mr. McHUGH. Will the gentleman yield?
Mr. STRICKLAND. Will the gentleman yield to me?
Mr. McHUGH. Will the gentleman yield?
Mr. MICHAUD. I yield to the gentleman from Ohio (Mr. Strickland).
Mr. STRICKLAND. Mr. Speaker, the issue is this: a vast majority of
the Members of this House have signed on as sponsors of a bill to solve
this disabled veterans problem, to get rid of it. The leadership of
this House will not allow that bill to be brought to the floor so that
all of us; you, sir, as well as every other Member of this body, will
have a chance to cast a public vote so that the veterans of this
country know where we stand.
Mr. McHUGH. Mr. Speaker, will the gentleman yield?

[[Page H4886]]

Mr. STRICKLAND. I will not yield.
The fact is that we deserve a chance to have a public vote so that
the veterans in your district and in Mr. Michaud's district and in my
district can look at the record and see how we vote.
Now, why will not those who are sponsoring that legislation walk down
here and sign their name to the discharge petition and allow that bill
to be brought to the floor? All we are asking for is a public vote.
Members can vote however they choose to vote. But the people of this
country, especially the veterans of this country, deserve to know where
we stand.
Talk is cheap in this chamber. It is the vote that counts.
Mr. McHUGH. Mr. Speaker, will the gentleman yield?
Mr. STRICKLAND. I will not yield. It is the vote that gives the
benefits to the veteran, not the talk, and what we have is talk. As I
have said before, rhetoric is empty unless it is followed up with the
willingness to cast the vote to make the resources available to the
veterans.
We are talking about disabled veterans, veterans who have suffered
bodily injury as a result of their service to this country. For too
long, these disabled veterans have been denied justice. We are simply
asking for justice.
Mr. MICHAUD. Mr. Speaker, reclaiming my time, I would like to read an
e-mail.
Mr. McHUGH. Mr. Speaker, will the gentleman yield?
Mr. MICHAUD. No.
I would like to read an e-mail I received from a constituent: ``It is
the veteran, not the preacher, who has given us freedom of religion.
``It is the veteran, not the reporter, who has given us freedom of
the press.
``It is the veteran, not the poet, who has given us the freedom of
speech.
``It is the veteran, not the campus organizer, who has given us the
freedom of assembly.
``It is the veteran, not the lawyer, who has given us the right to a
fair trial.
``It is the veteran, not the politician, who has given us the right
to vote.''
Mr. Speaker, I think that pretty much sums it up. It is the veterans
that made this country what it is today. We should be taking care of
our veterans, living up to the commitment, making sure that they get
the proper health care that they deserve, and we ought to take care of
some of the problems of concurrent receipts and mandatory funding.

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