What's New
| VA Secretary Pressed by Senator on High Percentage of Wrongly Denied Benefit Claims |
March 16, 2010, Washington, DC (CQ Politics) - A leading Republican senator on Tuesday asked Veterans Affairs Secretary Eric Shinseki to explain why so many veterans’ benefit claims are wrongly denied, resulting in a high rate of reversal on appeal. |
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| Profile of New Veterans' Courts in New York Times |
Defendants Fresh From War Find Service Counts in Court - VCS Supports Veterans' Courts March 15, 2010, Charleston, West Virginia (New York Times) — When Judge Robert C. Chambers handed down Timothy Oldani’s federal sentence for selling stolen military equipment on eBay, he gave the former Marine a break. |
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| Presdent Obama Donated $250,000 of Nobel Prize Money to Fisher House |
March 11, 2010, Washington, DC (New York Times) - President Obama made good on his promise to give his $1.4 million Nobel Prize money to charity, releasing the names on Thursday of the organizations that will benefit. |
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| Philanthropist Bobby Willis to Build New $3.3 Billion Hospital for VA in Farmington, NM for Rural and Native American Veterans |
Proposed state-of-the-art Kirtland veterans clinic could provide as many as 8,000 jobs March 14, 2010, Farmington, New Mexico (Farmington Daily Times) — A proposed veterans complex in Kirtland centered around a new hospital, backed by a wealthy entrepreneur and costing an estimated $3.3 billion promises to bring state-of-the-art medicine and other benefits to veterans, as well as 8,000 jobs to the local economy. |
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| Dr. Haley at UTSW Presents Compelling Brain Images Showing Gulf War Illness |
VCS Asks VA: Since UTSW Research Remains Vital to Understanding Gulf War Illness, Then Why Did a Handful of VA Staff in Washington Impede UTSW Contract and Then End Funding for UTSW? March 9, 2010, Salt Lake City, Utah (Science News) - Nearly two decades after vets began returning from the Middle East complaining of Gulf War Syndrome, the federal government has yet to formally accept that their vague jumble of symptoms constitutes a legitimate illness. Here, at the Society of Toxicology annual meeting, yesterday, researchers rolled out a host of brain images – various types of magnetic-resonance scans and brain-wave measurements – that they say graphically and unambiguously depict Gulf War Syndrome. |
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VCS in the News: Court Hears Veterans Appeal in Mental Health Care Case
Written by CBS in San Francisco
Thursday, 13 August 2009 08:58
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August 12, 2009 - A federal appeals court judge in San Francisco today urged both sides to try to reach a settlement in a massive lawsuit challenging mental health care for veterans returning from Iraq and Afghanistan.
Chief 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals Judge Alex Kozinski told lawyers for the government and two veterans' groups, "What I'm struck by in this case is that everybody here is concerned with helping veterans." Kozinski spoke after he and two other judges heard nearly an hour of arguments on a lawsuit filed by Veterans for Common Sense and Veterans United for Truth against the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs, known as the VA. Kozinski said the panel will delay taking the case under consideration for one week in order to give the attorneys a chance to seek mediation or a settlement. The two veterans' groups claim that lengthy delays by the VA in providing care for vets suffering combat stress, including those who are suicidal, violate the Constitution and a federal law. They are appealing a ruling in which U.S. District Judge Samuel Conti of San Francisco said last year that the delays are troubling, but said the solutions "are beyond the power of this court" and lie in the hands of Congress and the VA. Gordon Erspamer, a lawyer for the veterans, argued that the delays are "unconscionable." He told the panel that appeals within the VA system take an average of 4.4 years and that more than 85,000 vets are on waiting lists for mental health care. Kozinski said he questioned the power of courts to tell federal agencies how to do their jobs. "I'm just skeptical of where we get the authority to do that," the judge said. "How do we go about telling an agency 'you've got to work faster?'" But another judge on the panel, Stephen Reinhardt, said courts sometimes have to step in when government agencies fail in their duties. Reinhardt, who recently served on a different panel that ordered a reduction in the California prison population, said that in the veterans' case, "Congress and the administration should resolve the problem, but if they don't, you're left unfortunately with the court to do it." He said, "You shouldn't have to do it, but it's a last resort." The same three-judge panel also heard an appeal today in which Philip Morris USA Inc., the nation's largest tobacco company, is challenging the city of San Francisco's ban on tobacco sales in pharmacies. The company claims the ban violates its constitutional free speech right by curtailing its drugstore advertising and displays. It is appealing a ruling in which U.S. District Judge Claudia Wilken of Oakland upheld the city law. Philip Morris attorney Daniel Collins argued that while the city law doesn't directly prohibit cigarette ads in drugstores, "it has the effect of eliminating a method of advertising." Wilken ruled last year that the law regulates conduct - the sale of tobacco - and not advertising.
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