The GI Bill that is. Are you listening Dr. Chu?
I’ve been watching this for 30 years. On the one hand, we say, ‘This is the new greatest generation,’ and on the other we don’t even give them the type of educational benefit that will allow them to go to a good school. It’s just not right.-Sen James Webb D-VA.
PBS ran a pretty good story today outlining how, as is so often the case with this crowd of losersof folks at DOD-what they say and what they do are too different things. As long as Dr. David S.C. Chu is in a position of prominence at DOD, this hypocrisy will continue. One thing, one message that John Mc Cain-and for that matter Barak Obama-can send loud and clear, is a message that this lip service of saying we support our troops, while proposing legislation that screws them over will come to an end.
Sooner or later, John McCain will have to go through that annual right of passage on military issues-addressing the VFW. I have a suggestion for his speech writers:
You have heard me say here-that I was a loud and frequent critic of the Rumsfeld strategy on Iraq. Well now in Iraq, we have new leadership and a new strategy. And it is showing results-results that will bode well for our troops and for the success of the American effort as a whole.
(Sorry-had to pause for a second while I cleared the bile from my throat. …..But I digress).
However it was not just in Iraq, where Donald Rumsfeld and his lackeys in DOD led the United States and its military in the wrong direction. In so many areas, from force structure to personnel policy, his vision-as expressed by those who held principal positions inside the Department of Defense-was fatally flawed. It can be summed up in one sentence. Do more with less-and cheat the serving Soldier, Sailor, Airman and Marine out of benefits and support that they had earned at every opportunity.
I tell you today, that in a McCain administration those days are over. We will expand our armed forces to a size that can adequately support this long term effort we have undertaken. So that the same people do not have to deploy over and over again without a break. And we will honor those who have undertaken this effort by providing for them, taking care of their families, and properly funding and protecting those benefits they were promised and given by law. To those rotten men, such as Dr David Chu, who under the encouragement of Donald Rumsfeld actually displayed disdain for those who, in the past, served their country with honor, I have a message. For such men as Dr. Chu, come January 20, 2009, they will find a NOT WELCOME sign on all the entrances of the Pentagon. We will no longer allow you to behave with what one proudly serving officer called “misguided parsimony”. There is no place for you and your mean spirited thinking here.
For Senator McCain’s speech writers-feel free to use this verbiage. I will expect consideration for a job in the White House next January though-or a cushy overseas posting. Take your pick.
Either way-just make the Pentagon shut up and pay the bill.