Vets who have to wait and wait in line at VA hospitals for even the most simple, let alone the most serious of illnesses, and those who have to travel far to get to a VA hospital for multiple treatments because the one near them doesn’t have all the proprietary necessities to treat them… I don’t know that such vets will take Senator Mike Gravel to their hearts.
Senator Gravel, 77 years old, and running for the Democratic Presidential nomination, was US Senator from Alaska from 1969-81. He’s not held a major decisional office for nearly thirty years, and tonight, during the televised debate of all candidates, he pretty much shot himself in the foot.
When asked how he, as a vet himself (Army 1951-54, Intelligence) who receives his medicines from the Veteran’s Hospital/ Administration, finds the service to vets there… he sort of shrugged and indicated in a small voice, that it was fine.
Fine? It’s not fine. His response indicated he is out of touch with the common veteran who has watched helplessly over the years as his or her benefits, including medical care, have dwindled and diminished, year after year after year.
What was promised to the vets by recruiters, by congress people, by presidents, has never been realized, and especially in health care, during and after war service; during and after service of any kind.
George Bush declined to give the 2B needed to fund timely and proper quality health care for vets returning from Afghanistan and Iraq. But that’s only the latest blow in a long scourging of warriors after they, in full strength, put themselves on the line for their country.
Senator Gravel should have risen out of his chair, and said, ‘I speak for every veteran who has not been treated fairly…There is unequal care depending on if you are an officer or if you are enlisted…there is wrong care, sub-standard care, and if ALL vets were treated as well as I am, because as a former Senator, I have privilege… then we would have a great system, Sadly we do not. And we must change that, and here is how….
But that’s not what Senator Gravel said.
Standing in line at the Prescription Counter at the VA (usually there are chairs, because the wait can be long) BEHIND active duty soldiers who properly have priority, probably doesn’t happen for the former Senator. I doubt he even goes to pick up his own scripts, or fills out the form for mail delivery.
His response is understandable in one way: he’s not currently in Congress and probably doesn’t have a close up view of the most important matters. But those who are in Congress have the close up view… and year after year, decade after decade, they’ve chosen to give less and less to help the vets who’ve given everything they’ve got. Who will speak for the veterans, and not stop? Apparently, not Gravel.