XPost: soc.veterans, alt.military.retired, us.military.army   
   XPost: alt.politics.elections, alt.fan.rush-limbaugh, talk.politics.guns   
   From: bobuser@mindspring.com   
      
   In a blow to combat-disabled veterans, the House Rules Committee declined   
   to move the measure forward, but it approved hundreds of others, including   
   one that addresses UFOs.   
      
   A measure that would have provided desperately needed monthly compensation   
   to about 50,000 severely disabled war veterans was left out of the House's   
   defense spending in a blow to retired service members struggling to   
   survive amid rising inflation.   
      
   The House Rules Committee declined last week to advance the Maj. Richard   
   Star amendment, which would make medically retired and severely disabled   
   combat veterans with under 20 years of active service eligible for both   
   disability and retirement benefits.   
      
   Under current law, only disabled veterans who have served 20 years receive   
   both benefits.   
      
   Those with fewer years of service receive disability payments, but not   
   retirement — an injustice that robs retired service members of hundreds,   
   if not thousands, of dollars a month that are not only sorely needed but   
   earned, veteran groups say.   
      
   For Michael Braman, who served the Army and the Army National Guard for 19   
   years and five months, the current law means he is unable to collect an   
   extra $2,200 a month, despite being seven months shy of 20 years of   
   service.   
      
   Braman, 45, said the military forced him to medically retire in 2014 due   
   to disability caused mostly by post-traumatic stress disorder. He said he   
   struggled mentally after spending a year in combat in Afghanistan in 2004   
   and pulling security at mass grave sites in Bosnia.   
      
   His mental health spiraled back home in Iowa, years later when he found   
   his first wife dead in a car crash.   
      
   "The floodgates opened," he said. "I had nightmares over that. I have   
   nightmares of some of the things I witnessed while overseas. I've   
   struggled ever since."   
      
   Braman now supports himself, his wife and four children, including a 2-   
   year-old son who has autism and needs speech therapy, on about $4,900 in   
   monthly disability and combat-related special compensation.   
      
   “It’s not that I’m in poverty,” Braman said, adding that surging costs   
   nationwide, including the fuel he needs for the weekly two-hour round   
   trips to Des Moines for his son's appointments, have made life more   
   difficult.   
      
   "There are people worse off than me. But I served the country," he said,   
   "and I should be more financially stable than what I am."   
      
   The bipartisan measure was named after an Iraq and Afghanistan war veteran   
   who died last year from cancer caused by toxic exposure from combat,   
   according to the nonprofit Military Officers Association of America.   
      
   The amendment was among 1,200 proposals that House legislators sought to   
   have included in the National Defense Authorization Act, or NDAA, this   
   year.   
      
   Last week, the House Rules Committee allowed 650 of those amendments to   
   move forward for a House vote. The Maj. Richard Star Act was not one of   
   them.   
      
   Those that advanced out of the committee include an amendment that would   
   create a secure government system for reporting UFOs and another that   
   requires the Defense Department to only purchase U.S. flags that are made   
   in America.   
      
   Some parts of the NDAA that the House passed address inflation and boost   
   pay for active service members. That includes a 4.6% pay raise for   
   military members and a minimum 2.4% “inflation bonus” for military and   
   civilian personnel who earn less than $45,000 a year.   
      
   Those who had been on the front lines and were forced to retire on   
   disability feel forgotten by their government.   
      
   “I feel personally that my service wasn’t meaningful,” Braman said. “Why   
   did I serve?”   
      
   In Tallahassee, Florida, Bill Geiger and his wife are burning through   
   their savings as they raise two teenagers.   
      
   Before Geiger medically retired in 2014, he had deployed twice with the   
   U.S. Army and worked detainee operations in Guantanamo Bay in Cuba and   
   Iraq's Camp Bucca.   
      
   "I was a good soldier. I was tough," said Geiger, 48, who was deemed   
   unemployable due to PTSD when he left the military. Because of that, he   
   relies on his benefits and cannot secure a second income.   
      
   Through the Maj. Richard Star amendment, Geiger would qualify to receive   
   about $3,700 more a month, which he said would substantially help his   
   family.   
      
   Geiger said it was a "travesty" that it did not advance in the House and   
   "demoralizing" to retired service members who are struggling financially,   
   emotionally, physically and mentally.   
      
   "It’s a slap in the face. It’s almost unbelievable," he said. "I’m a real   
   person, who lives in the real world, with real bills and a real family.   
   And we’re talking about real money."   
      
   Retirement pay vs. disability compensation   
      
   Retirement pay from the Defense Department and disability compensation   
   from the Department of Veterans Affairs are “fundamentally different” and   
   “earned for different reasons,” the Veterans of Foreign Wars, a nonprofit   
   veterans group, said.   
      
   Yet no combat-disabled retiree could receive both at the same time until   
   2004, when Congress said those with at least 20 years of active service   
   and a disability rating of at least 50% could.   
      
   That left out tens of thousands of people, including Purple Heart   
   recipients, whose military careers were cut short due to combat-related   
   injuries, veteran advocates said.   
      
   “Combat doesn’t care whether you serve one year, two years, 10 days, 20   
   years. It’s going to treat you equally,” said Jose Ramos, vice president   
   for government and community relations with the Wounded Warrior Project.   
   “It doesn’t discriminate based on time and service.”   
      
   The 42-year-old Navy veteran knows firsthand. Ramos lost his left arm in a   
   rocket explosion in Iraq while serving with a Marine sniper team as a   
   medic in 2004.   
      
   The blast also left him with lung contusions, nerve damage to his left   
   leg, bulged lumbar discs and numerous shrapnel wounds.   
      
   But because he served under 20 years, Ramos had to figure out how to   
   stretch his $2,800 a month budget as a civilian.   
      
   At 24, he stressed over bills for basic necessities, including food and   
   rent. He wondered how he could afford to stay in the Washington, D.C.,   
   area, where he was getting prosthetic care treatment.   
      
   At the end of 2005, Ramos met his now-wife, and their combined incomes   
   helped ease his burdens.   
      
   “If I had not met my wife, I don’t know how the heck I would have   
   survived,” he said. “I was beyond fortunate. But veterans shouldn’t have   
   to depend on luck.”   
      
   The Senate could revive the measure   
   Veteran groups are now relying on the Senate to get the measure included   
   in its version of the NDAA this year. It is more likely to pass as part of   
   a larger package than as a standalone bill, Ramos said.   
      
   If it survives in the Senate, there is a chance that the Maj. Richard Star   
      
   [continued in next message]   
      
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