Me Thinks The World Just became a little safer

[gailannr 1]

Who the hell said anything about low income? That thought never crossed my mind and I think you missed the point! Slightly! He is a totally disabled veteran. Not service connected, if you needed to know that information. And, I don't need your links but thank you anyway.

[GeezerSue 7]

Who the hell said anything about low income? That thought never crossed my mind and I think you missed the point! Slightly! He is a totally disabled veteran. Not service connected, if you needed to know that information.

Okay..so apparently you really believe the line of crap you've been fed, but here's the reality. The government promised ALL of us medical care. It does not now provide that care to everyone.

Here is the webpage, but it's hard to read. http://www.va.gov/healtheligibility/Library/pubs/VAIncomeThresholds/

(Click on the PDF copy.) It only provides that care to those who have SERVICE-CONNECTED-DISABILITIES. Now, putting your ass on the line isn't enough. Now, you have to be poor enough, too.

There are PLENTY of totally disabled veterans who are, because their disabilities are not service-connected--NOT eligible for VA services.

I guess I thought you knew how this worked.

Everyon should get the kind of service your brother is receiving...but not everyone is. They must now prove that they are poor enough.

[lisah25 3]

Thanks for the links Jack - I didn't know that about the ACLU.

[GeezerSue 7]

Here's an easier-to-read chart:

http://www.va.gov/healtheligibility/eligibility/PriorityGroupsAll.asp

(I am fortunate both that I do have medical insurance AND I'm in Category

Three. I have friends who have NO insurance and who--like the rest of us--were promidsed medical care but are screwed until they are old enough for MediCare.)

[Carlene 12]

There are PLENTY of totally disabled veterans who are, because their disabilities are not service-connected--NOT eligible for VA services.

I guess I thought you knew how this worked.

Everyon should get the kind of service your brother is receiving...but not everyone is. They must now prove that they are poor enough.

Sue....you are at least half right. Vets who were already enrolled in the VA program prior to the implementation of the income test (approximately 4 years ago) are still eligible for VA services, even if they have no service connected injuries.

My DH receives meds etc thru the VA, although he would not qualify if he applied today. Also, Vets who were in Vietnam, even for one day, receive more services. Almost anything is considered "service connected" if you were in Vietnam. My DH was not. He spent his entire enlistment in AZ, except for basic and jet training.

Edited to add...

* Enrollment Restriction:

Effective January 17, 2003, VA suspended NEW enrollment of veterans assigned to Priority Group 8 (VA's lowest priority group consisting of higher income veterans). If you are a veteran enrolling for the first time on or after January 17, 2003, your income exceeds the current year income threshold, and you have no other special eligibilities such as a compensable service connected condition or recent combat service, you are not eligible for enrollment at this time. Veterans enrolled in Priority Group 8 on or before January 16, 2003, will remain enrolled and continue to be eligible for the full-range of VA health care benefits.

New enrollees assigned to subpriority groups e and g, are not eligible for enrollment at this time.

[GeezerSue 7]

Aha...thanks, Carlene. (Just in time to cut the boomers off at the pass, huh?) I'm

VietNam ERA, but not VietNam service. I got my rating 30+ years ago. My husband just got his (weird-ass) rating a couple of years ago.

He went in with normal hearing. He came out (infantry) with damaged hearing. The medic at the discharge physical gave him a copy of his hearing test and told him, "Hang onto this...you're going to need it." He was not eligible to be in the guard or reserves. Thirty years later, he flunked a required hearing test at work. Employer said, "Our fault...we'll pay for the hearing aids." And they did. But he finally filed for his VA disability. They told him that his hearing was so bad he could have gone out on a medical discharge thirty years earlier. He has the hearing loss AND the tinnitus.

Funny thing. The VA won't rate the hearing loss because they (also) gave him hearing aids and they say that hearing aids are as good as hearing. (But amputees are rated whether they get a prosthesis or not.) But they gave him the tinnitus rating.

I ALMOST had to spend time at DIDDY-BOP school at Fort Huachuca. Instead, poor me, they sent me to language school in that hell hole known as Monterey, CA...right next to Pebble Beach and Carmel. Poor, poor pitiful me.

[Carlene 12]

Gail...

I'm sure I speak for everyone here when I say that we do truly appreciate your brother's willingness to serve his country. Many of us have brothers who did the same, myself included. Mine did 3 tours of Vietnam. Thank God he survived, because today it's a vaction hot spot with KFC and souvenir stands on every corner. All that blood shed for nothing. What a waste.

Anyway, our brothers are to be commended for their service. My DH also served, but did not see any combat, as luck would have it. My dad enlisted in the Navy after the start of WWII and my father-in-law was a Marine stationed at Pearl Harbor. We are a very patriotic bunch. There's a big old flagpole in my front yard and we fly Old Glory every day. But we don't agree with Bush or the war in Iraq. We are appalled at what we believe is the immorality of this war. We support bringing our troops home NOW. Because you can be a patriot and a veteran and still not agree with George Bush. You can be anti-war or anti-Bush or anti-anything....it doesn't matter. They still deserve every bit of homage and respect that any other Vet is entitled to. And that includes Geezer Sue. Who, by the way, is NOT always on the same side as Carlene. But that's okay. She's still a Vet and we still owe her.

[GeezerSue 7]

... And that includes Geezer Sue. Who, by the way, is NOT always on the same side as Carlene. But that's okay. She's still a Vet and we still owe her.

You don't owe me anything. For me, the whole concept was to DEFEND our right to disagree with each other and those in office. And besides, the VA did my sleep Study and some other stuff. But now I feel guilty about taking appointment times from people who have no other options.

[Carlene 12]

You don't owe me anything.

We choose to stay home and bitch about foreign policy, the election, sex in the oval office, taxes, Rush Limbaugh's duplicity, etc. You volunteered to defend our right to do that - against people with guns, if necessary.

Will you just be quiet and let us appreciate you? Please?

[GeezerSue 7]

:yo:

[TruBlueSue 0]

Geezer Sue - I spent 4 years at Fort Wegotcha...diddy bop school it still is...lol...

[Carlene 12]

Geezer Sue - I spent 4 years at Fort Wegotcha...diddy bop school it still is...lol...

And thanks to you, too TruBlue.

[BJean 16]

I thought it was Fort Hoocheekoochee. At least that's what everyone called it when we lived in Sierra Vista and DH worked on post. We spent 5.5 years in that burg and it was my first foray into the world of selling real estate. A prime spot for that, I must say, because back then many Army folks were still moving every 2 years or so.

Fond memories of the high desert. And some not so fond ones. It was beautiful and weather was ideal, but it was considered remote and it WAS. I spent just over an hour in the backseat of our car in hard labor with my DD on our way to the hospital in Tucson. Not one of the fondest memories.

A small point of interest that just popped into my head... When we were at Armed Forces Staff College, living on the Naval Base at Norfolk, we met lots of officers and their wives from all over the world and all different branches of the military and government. We were talking one night at a party to a group of doctors and pilots, etc., and I recounted the time in Ft. Huachuca when all the men we knew and our sons became ill with an intestinal flu of some sort. They had to shut down the base. They were sick as dogs with extremely high temperatures. Women were unaffected.

One of the Naval doctors spoke up and said that he was very familiar with the event. He had read up on it in some military medical journals. The Army (I guess) had done a test on a biological (potential) weapon. Yeah, so you don't have to be a military person all signed up and official to be a guinea pig.