[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 150 (2004), Part 10]
[House]
[Page 13922]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                VETERANS PROGRAMS ARE BEING UNDERFUNDED

  (Ms. WOOLSEY asked and was given permission to address the House for 
1 minute and to revise and extend her remarks.)
  Ms. WOOLSEY. Mr. Speaker, over 200 years ago, our Founding Fathers 
pledged their lives, their fortunes, and their sacred honor to the 
untested ideas of liberty, equality, and democracy. But today as a new 
generation of veterans is being created in Iraq and Afghanistan, 
Republicans are underfunding the programs that are vitally important to 
our veterans by passing a budget that underfunds veterans health care 
by $1 billion and rejecting Democratic efforts to fully fund VA health 
care.
  What is even worse is that this will not stop this year because the 
Bush administration's plan for the 2006 budget includes a $900 million 
cut in funding for veterans health care. And this will conveniently not 
come into effect until after the election.
  No Republican has come forward and rejected the Bush administration's 
latest proposals to cut veterans programs. Not one. This is outrageous.
  Democrats are fighting to honor veterans by honoring their 
sacrifices. Why are the Republicans making our sons and daughters fight 
bravely on the battlefield and come home and fight the government for 
their benefits?

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