Up or Down Vote
An appeaser is one who feeds a crocodile—hoping it will eat him last. Sir Winston Churchill, 1954 Filibuster rights of minority and dissenting Senators to express objections to judicial nominations have been compromised into limbo. It worked so well on judges; the threat can easily be reused on legislative issues or the total elimination of a minority “right.” “Veterans rights” is a good example of rights which are not just elective or an entitlement but a predetermined obligation owed by this Nation to its veterans. “Up-or-Down” vote now appears to be the slogan for the usurpers. Without a concerted effort, “veterans rights” may diminish into rhetorical “illusory rights” for use in political campaigns. The Minority Leader called the compromise a “victory for the country.” The Majority Leader reflected on the accommodation as “a basic principle: whether to restore the precedent of a fair up-or-down vote…or to enshrine a new tyranny of the minority into the Senate rules forever…It had some good news, it has some disappointing news, and will require some careful monitoring…bad faith and bad behavior” would require a return to stage one. In other words, it was truly a political bad faith challenge devoid of any attempt at integrity or at good faith—makes you realize that Machiavelli is not dead. When PM Chamberlain of Britain sacrificed pieces of Europe to Germany, it was called “Appeasement.” His slogan of “Peace in our times” effectively led to an abandonment of honor and the entry into World War II. The filibuster compromise is the epitome of appeasement and a surrender of political integrity into the ultimate naked arrogance of a pure and effective majority political control with the combined power of the three branches of government—Executive, Congressional and Judicial. Now that an immutable policy is being recognized, allowing for a “fair up-and-down” review and vote on issues, the majority controllers would now have the unilateral ability to call for an unconstrained change in veterans’ benefits. Now here comes an official of the Department of Defense (DOD) who, in discussing the VA budget, claimed as matter of “fact” that veterans benefits are responsible for the Pentagon’s inability to provide weapons and equipment for our troops. By ignoring that every VA benefit, especially VA medical care and rehabilitation, is the on-going cost of war, it becomes apparent that the DOD’s bottom line was that the VA budget should not be increased, but should be revised and compromised since those benefit monies are vital to the DOD budget and thus would adversely impact on our capability to fight the terror war. It would further allow DOD to create more veterans who can then return from war to no health care or benefits. Not even the most talented of Jewish mothers could lay guilt with such panache. Both the majority and the minority play by one immutable rule—that majority political control requires winning. Some of you may recall, in the most recent Presidential election, veterans were glorified for their many contributions to America’s defense and stability and were used by all candidates as the frosting on the cookies at rallies and political events. We were seduced into believing that we were important. After the election, the winning candidates proceeded to screw the veterans. By having the creative bean counters retreating on health care for you—what are they going to do for the returning veterans? Will they tell us that the 24,000,000 surviving veterans have intentionally been living too long? So, if the Control Freaks can only figure out how they can substantially increase the 400,000 annual veteran death rate, will they even consider entertaining VA health care without enrollment fees, deductibles, co-pays, etc? Brings to mind a suggested formula for Social Security survival by increasing the age for entitlement to 75 years of age, while providing each recipient with two cartons of cigarettes and matches with each monthly payment. While fairness and up-and-down votes are now the vogue, veterans should take advantage of this vogue by calling for the immediate vote on Mandatory Funding of VA health care (HR 515 and S331) by 1. Demand that each one of your Representatives and Senators sign on as an active co-sponsor on the Mandatory Funding bill by letters, phone calls, e-mail, faxes or visits to their local offices. 2. Send letters to the editor of your local newspaper expressing thanks to co-sponsors, and make sure all of your local members also send such letters. 3. Make sure that all of your members vocally refuse invitations to appear at any rally or event for a non-consenting candidate and by placing an ad explaining the reason for rejection. That would include campaign or any other such event. 4. When we have sufficient sponsors and the “up-or-down votes” to pass the legislation, we must call all sponsors to have it placed on the calendar for vote. Insist that all of the sponsors and leaders in the House and the Senate not allow themselves to become shallow political hacks. “Up-or-down” are the key words. 5. Once the legislation is passed, keep pressure on the VA to immediately implement the legislation by calling and visiting their offices and facilities for applications and complaints about any delays in service. 6. In the last election, only 18% of us voted—so the Control Freaks may feel safe that you will continue to be as equally ineffective—they are confident that you are all words with no follow through—so they can make their usual inadequate offers to move us off our challenge. 7. So, if you don’t fight for the above approach to mandatory funding or to any other action program to preserve health and other veterans rights—then the Control Freaks are absolutely correct to call us paper tigers who are deficient in resolve with all talk and no action, or to sum it all “up-or-down” that veterans are plain stupid in seeking to secure their rights. 8. They win—you lose. Thus, fact, fiction, and fantasy are all the same.
|
