I was shocked to hear of this situation for the first time while listening to C Span yesterday, so I decided to see what was available on Google. Here's what I found:


Nearly 300,000 veterans are homeless on any given night, and almost half served during the Vietnam era, according to the Homeless Veterans coalition, a consortium of community-based homeless-veteran service providers. While some experts have questioned the degree to which mental trauma from combat causes homelessness, a large number of veterans live with the long-term effects of post-traumatic stress disorder and substance abuse, according to the coalition.
Some homeless-veteran advocates fear that similar combat experiences in Vietnam and Iraq mean that these first few homeless veterans from Iraq are the crest of a wave.
"This is what happened with the Vietnam vets. I went to Vietnam," said John Keaveney, chief operating officer of New Directions, a shelter and drug-and-alcohol treatment program for veterans in Los Angeles. That city has an estimated 27,000 homeless veterans, the largest such population in the nation. "It is like watching history being repeated," Keaveney said.
Data from the Department of Veterans Affairs shows that as of last July, nearly 28,000 veterans from Iraq sought health care from the VA. One out of every five was diagnosed with a mental disorder, according to the VA. An Army study in the New England Journal of Medicine in July showed that 17 percent of service members returning from Iraq met screening criteria for major depression, generalized anxiety disorder or PTSD.
United Press International, Dec 7, 2004.

How can we possibly justify this, especially in view of the tax breaks for the wealthy, unnecessary war, corporate welfare, etc??

We can't. But you must remember that many of these vets are what Reagan called "homeless by choice." (I think he meant that they chose not to live in shelters, but I was never sure what he meant. I am still looking for those pollution-causing trees.)
The situation is disgraceful, but not without its irony. Someone will say that we can't afford to pay for the vets' care because we are paying for a war, which, of course, increases the number of vets needing care. Then there will be those who cop the Patton plea, that PTSD, Combat Fatigue, and the like, don't really exist, that these guys are just slackers. I guess support for the troops doesn't involve good medical care coverage, just words and $2 magnetic ribbons (which were probably made in Asia).

I'd heard about the homeless Vietnam Vets, but I don't believe that it's by choice, tho. I'm almost sure that the right-wingers will say otherwise. With all the money that America is putting in a wild hog's back, no vet should be homeless.

quote:

Originally posted by DorianGreyed:
We can't. But you must remember that many of these vets are what Reagan called "homeless by choice." (I think he meant that they chose not to live in shelters, but I was never sure what he meant. I am still looking for those pollution-causing trees.)

"Homeless by choice" meant that Reagan, as Governor of California, chose not to fund the halr-way houses where the mentally ill could live when he closed the state's mental hospitals.

quote:

The situation is disgraceful, but not without its irony. Someone will say that we can't afford to pay for the vets' care because we are paying for a war, which, of course, increases the number of vets needing care. Then there will be those who cop the Patton plea, that PTSD, Combat Fatigue, and the like, don't really exist, that these guys are just slackers. I guess support for the troops doesn't involve good medical care coverage, just words and $2 magnetic ribbons (which were probably made in Asia).

Didn't we fight a long expensive war in Asia so that we could get those magnetic ribbons made there cheaply?

The VA has already got a certain track-record of denial on illnesses associated with the first Gulf war, as well as their position on the long-term effects of exposure to agent orange, and various little-known tropical diseases. Why should this war be different?

Alan Moore

I remember when Reagan did that, and also a few other things, like the tuition change.

I'd be interested in hearing what Scotty's dinner companions have to say about this:
http://washingtontimes.com/upi-breaking/20041207-121848-6449r.htm