Author Archives: Team VCS

VCS Testimony: FY2009 Veterans Affairs Budget Proposal

Fiscal Year 2009 Veterans Affairs Budget Proposal Secretary James Peake testified about the proposed fiscal year 2009 budget for the Department of Veterans Affairs. Witnesses representing veterans’ organizations including Veterans for Common Sense also testified about the budget request and … Continue reading

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Electronic Searces at Border Prompt Protests

February 7, 2008 – Nabila Mango, a therapist and a U.S. citizen who has lived in the country since 1965, had just flown in from Jordan last December when, she said, she was detained at customs and her cellphone was … Continue reading

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Editorial – Military’s Fuzzy Math

February 6, 2008 – The Pentagon’s budget request for the next fiscal year is about as squishy as a pair of combat boots full of Jell-O. Make that one boot, not a pair, because so much is missing from the … Continue reading

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Wishing Away the Effects of Prolonged Combat on Troops

February 7, 2008 – Kathy Dobie has a very troubling–but very important– article about PTSD in the February 18 issue of The Nation.  It centers on the high rate of post-traumatic stress within the Marine Corps, along with anecdotal evidence … Continue reading

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Told to Wait, an Iraq War Veteran Marine Dies

VA care in spotlight after Iraq war veteran’s suicide.  Jonathan Schulze commits suicide after being turned away three times by VA hospitals when pleading for assistance due to his Iraq War PTSD.  Across the country, there are stories of veterans … Continue reading

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Anti-War Candidates Are Top Recipients of ’08 Donations From US Troops

February 5, 2008 – Conservatives opposed to redeployment in Iraq have consistently claimed that U.S. troops are on their side: President Bush: The [military] families gathered here understand that our troops want to finish the job. [Link] Sen. John McCain … Continue reading

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Bush Administration Argues That Veterans Not Entitled to Specific Types of Health Care

February 5, 2008 – The Bush administration on Wednesday filed arguments in a lawsuit in the U.S. District Court of San Francisco stating that veterans have no legal right to specific types of medical care, the San Francisco Chronicle reports. … Continue reading

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Editorial Column: Powell’s UN Fiasco – Fresh and Festering

February 6, 2008 – Yesterday was a difficult day for Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity. It was hard to celebrate the fifth anniversary of our first corporate memorandum, a same-day critique of Colin Powell’s Feb. 5, 2002 UN address, when … Continue reading

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Why Are These Ex-Soldiers Still Fighting Their Own Wars?

February 3, 2008 – It was, he admits, quite a shock. The sniper’s bullet ripped through his left cheek, gouging through both eye sockets before exiting below his right ear. Corporal Simon Brown remembers lying in a Basra backstreet trying … Continue reading

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VA to Boost Spending on Combat Veterans By 21 Percent

February 5, 2008 – After a year of news reports about a stubborn backlog of 400,000 disability benefits claims and combat veterans turned away from immediate mental health care, the Department of Veterans Affairs unveiled a proposed fiscal 2009 budget … Continue reading

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