Have you ever heard of workman's compensation? Do non-federal employees pay a premium to have that? What is the difference between workman's comp for a union factory worker or a Soldier – aside from the fact that there is no Soldier's union?

(from “Defense Potpouri #1″)

VETERANS

There had been reports that President Obama was considering billing veterans’ private insurance companies for the treatment at VA hospitals of combat-related injuries .

According to the Washington Post:

The proposal would have authorized the Department of Veterans Affairs to charge private companies for treating injuries and other medical conditions, such as post-traumatic stress disorder, that are related to military service. The measure was intended to save VA about $530 million a year.

There has been a huge public outcry against such proposals.

Yesterday, White House press secretary Robert Gibbs said that the president has “instructed that its consideration be dropped.”
“In considering the third-party billing issue, the administration was seeking to maximize the resources available for veterans,” Gibbs said. “However, the president listened to concerns raised by the [organization leaders] that this might, under certain circumstances, affect veterans and their families’ ability to access health care.”

Under the “bigger picture,” Obama has proposed, in his fiscal year 2010 budget, a 15 percent increase to VA’s budget, from $97.7 billion this fiscal year to $112.8 billion for the fiscal year beginning Oct. 1, 2009 on top of the $1.4 billion already set aside for VA projects in the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009.

Now, that’s good news for veterans.

House Veterans Affairs Committee Chairman Bob Filner said this about the budget recommendations:

“I applaud President Obama’s budget request for the Department of Veterans Affairs. After sixteen years on the Veterans’ Affairs Committee, I am very encouraged that this outline is consistent with recommendations made by the veterans’ groups who co-author the Independent Budget. This has never happened in the 23-year history of the IB!”

It was a failure of intelligence by both administrations.

Bullshit…

It wasn't a failure of intelligence, with the Clinton Administration it was pure cowardice, the “let's throw a bone to these right winger so they'll just shut the f**k up and leave us alone” and with the Bush Administration it was pure “manufacturing of intelligence”, they just wanted to go to war.

Congressional Record: January 28, 2004 (Senate)
Page S311-S312

I, along with nearly every Senator in this Chamber, in that secure
room of this Capitol complex, was not only told there were weapons of
mass destruction–specifically chemical and biological–but I was
looked at straight in the face and told that Saddam Hussein had the
means of delivering those biological and chemical weapons of mass
destruction by unmanned drones, called UAVs, unmanned aerial vehicles.
Further, I was looked at straight in the face and told that UAVs could
be launched from ships off the Atlantic coast to attack eastern
seaboard cities of the United States.

ROTFLMAO…

DQ, I now await your characterization of me as a right-wing neocon.

Even if you for some reason think this is what happened (that they were influenced by the conservative opinionators) then why wouldn't you hold them responsible for such idiocy? Don't you elect people from your party to think for themselves, and don't you want to hold them responsible if they're afraid to speak their own mind?

As far as I am concerned, any Democrat who voted for the Iraq war should be out of office. If they believed the bull that was coming of the Bush administration, they are to stupid to be elected officials, and if they didn't believe it then they are too cowardly to hold elected office.

She certainly isn't part of the Republoan apparatus,

Which is undoubtedly why her columns can be found on Townhall.com

And on top of that, why in the world would moderate DEMOCRATS listen to right wing pundits? You seem to be saying that everyone who supported the Iraq War did so because they were afraid of going against the right wing media, but how does that make any sense at all for the Democrats who voted to authorize use of force, and didn't speak out about any reservations until after it wasn't going well?

Even if you for some reason think this is what happened (that they were influenced by the conservative opinionators) then why wouldn't you hold them responsible for such idiocy? Don't you elect people from your party to think for themselves, and don't you want to hold them responsible if they're afraid to speak their own mind?

You know, you made a stupid, overly broad smear statement, and now are trying desperately to show you did not. I certainly have said things here at times that I realized were over the top, and have copped to it. You, I guess, are just too bat-shit crazy and stubborn to admit you made a dumb statement.

This is tedious, and no longer worth pursuing. Go on and think whatever psychotic conspiracy theories you need to you can feel better about your pathetic little existence.

You are the one that said, and I quote, “Malkin and company come up with the stupidest ideas imaginable, wrap them up in the ugliest language possible and throw them out to the mob, the moderates then come along, clean up the language, wrap the ideas up in some nice wholesome language and sell them to the public, which is how we ended up in Iraq, how we ended up in the greatest recession since the 1930's, how we ended up bailing out to the tune of a few hundred billions dollars, how we ended up in hock to the Chinese and how we are going to spend a few more billions in Afghanistan with nothing to show for it.”

So, unless you are now saying that I posted as you, you are flat out lying. Which does not surprise me in the least, frankly. You didn't say 'the right wing of the Republican party'; you said “Malkin and company”.

YOU are the one claiming that the 'media and pundits' drove national policy, that they set the agenda, and that the Bush Administration was simply following their orders.

That's not quite what I am claiming.

What I am claiming is that the right wing of the Republican party drove National policy, and that the so called moderates went along with the program with nary a peep, you can always rely on a moderate to parrot Republican views.

It is incumbent on the paranoid schizophrenic, i.e., you, to try and prove the validity their nonsensical ramblings (btw – the normal way for those in your state to try and accomplish that is to have a shopping cart full of random magazine and newspaper clippings. I do realize that is difficult to display on the internet, though).

It is also not the job of the sane to try and cure people with your malady – that is for professionals who can prescribe anti-psychotic drugs to treat your chemical imbalances.

So now Malkin, et. al., the pundits and commentators, are responsible for “how we ended up in Iraq, how we ended up in the greatest recession since the 1930's, how we ended up bailing out to the tune of a few hundred billions dollars, how we ended up in hock to the Chinese and how we are going to spend a few more billions in Afghanistan with nothing to show for it”????

Well, at least it is no longer SatanCheney and BushHalliburtonHitler who caused that!

For DQ's next revelation, Rush Limbaugh caused AIDS.

This is one of the things I hate (absolutely hate) about this site, for the so called “moderates” here everything has to be equivalent.

No, No, No …

That's not the way it works. To be a real moderate you have to kiss republican ass until you can figure out exactly what they had for lunch unless they do something really stupid like start a war of choice to find weapons of mass destruction that don't exist, in which case you can stop kissing ass and criticizing, by which point it's too late to do anything but attempt to mitigate the damage, but remember next time they propose something equally stupid you must give them the benefit of the doubt. On the other hand you must nitpick every thing a democrat does, and never ever give them the benefit of the doubt.

That 's a real moderate.