[Congressional Record Volume 153, Number 175 (Tuesday, November 13, 2007)]
[Senate]
[Page S14240]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                            VETERANS FUNDING

  Mrs. HUTCHISON. Mr. President, I rise to discuss an issue that is 
important for our country. That is the appropriations bill for Veterans 
and Military Construction.
  The Senate and House Appropriations Committees worked together in a 
bipartisan way to craft a bill that fully funds the Veterans' 
Administration and Military Construction for the quality of life of our 
troops. However, we became bogged down last week because the Senate and 
House leadership decided they would put forward a combination of bills 
that have no relationship to each other. The Labor-Health and Human 
Services bill and the Veterans' Administration-Military Construction 
bill. Under normal circumstances, that might be fine. We have had 
omnibus appropriations bills before. But there was one problem. That 
is, the President had already said he would sign the Veterans bill, but 
he would veto the Labor-Health and Human Services bill. So the 
combination of these bills was destined to assure a veto.
  The Veterans and the Military Construction legislation should go 
forward on an expedited basis. I call on this Congress to do that. 
There is no reason--there is no substantive reason, no commonsense 
reason--we should delay a bill that has been agreed to by Republicans 
and Democrats and could easily pass the House and Senate and be sent to 
the President before the end of this week.
  Yesterday we had celebrations all over the country for veterans, 
saying how much we appreciate their sacrifices and what they have given 
to our country. Today we come back to work, and we still don't have a 
Veterans' Administration funding appropriations passed for this year. 
It is not that the veterans' needs are not going to be funded, because 
we are in a continuing resolution that assures the basic things will be 
done. But what isn't going to be done is the new priorities we put in 
this legislation on a bipartisan basis. We have added more funding for 
research into protheses, artificial arms and legs, because those are 
the kinds of injuries our troops are coming home with. They are 
becoming veterans because, of course, they can no longer serve in 
Active Duty.
  I will digress for one moment and say that when I visit Walter Reed 
or the Center for the Intrepid in San Antonio where young men and women 
who have come home injured from Iraq and Afghanistan are being 
rehabilitated, they complain because they are being put out of Active-
Duty military. That is the kind of spirit these young men and women 
have. They will be maimed. They will have lost arms or legs; they will 
be burned. Yet they will say: Senator, I want to go back. I want to be 
with my comrades.
  Of course, we are going to take care of those young men and women who 
have sacrificed so much through our Veterans' Administration. We have 
new priorities in these bills that will put more into research and 
rehabilitation for these brave men and women. We also have a new burn 
unit initiative to do more research on our burn victims. Many of our 
troops come back with mental health problems. We are establishing more 
research and centers of excellence for post-traumatic stress syndrome 
in the bill that has been agreed to.
  All I am asking this morning is, why not pass this bill right now? We 
have a formality of calling a new conference committee on the separate 
bill. That could be done today. We have agreement. There is no reason 
not to fund these new priorities. I call on the Senate and House 
leadership to make it happen. There is no excuse. We have new 
priorities. We have bipartisan agreement.
  My message to the leadership is: Let's trust our committee members. 
Let's trust the leadership on the committees. Democrats and Republicans 
came together. We increased the President's budget. We increased his 
request. He said: OK, because he knew how important it was that we 
fully fund the health care needs of our veterans.
  Let me tell you another priority in this bill. We have heard story 
after story of people leaving the Active Duty, usually because of 
injuries, going into the veterans system. But what happens? There is a 
long delay, sometimes months, before the veterans' benefits kick in. 
These are injured warriors. In our bill, we have funding so those 
applications can be processed more quickly. We are trying to streamline 
leaving the Active-Duty military and going into the veterans system. 
That is in the bill that is languishing this week in Congress.
  I call on our leadership to do the right thing. Let's put politics 
aside. We can take up the Labor-Health and Human Services bill in due 
course. But today we have a bill with bipartisan agreement that 
requires a mere formality of calling the conference committee, having 
the House pass it, the Senate pass it, and sending it to the President. 
We can celebrate a joint bipartisan victory with Congress and the 
President coming together. That is what the American people expect. 
That is what they are looking for in Washington. When we see the 
approval ratings of Congress and the President so low, why don't we try 
a new approach? Why don't we do something everyone can celebrate? That 
is, fund our veterans and military quality-of-life issues this week. It 
can be done. I call on the congressional leadership to do it. The 
President has said he will sign it.
  I yield the floor.
  The ACTING PRESIDENT pro tempore. The Senator from Colorado.
  Mr. ALLARD. Mr. President, first of all, I associate myself with the 
comments made by the Senator from Texas. She is right. I serve on the 
Appropriations Committee with her and have worked on veterans issues 
with her. I very much am joining her in this effort to try to get this 
veterans bill passed because it is extremely important.

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