Retirement News : Seniors : Give vets long-term care with a sales tax

Give vets long-term care with a sales tax

Date Added: 18-05-2005

Fresno Mayor Alan Autry's budget includes $100,000 for a program that would employ the homeless — particularly veterans — as downtown guides and maintenance workers.

Autry's goal is to give displaced people a chance to work and get off the streets. It's a noble idea reflective of Autry's good intentions and one worth trying.

But it's also a local bandage on a national problem that figures to become more serious as our military returns from the war in Iraq. About one in three homeless people served in the military, according to the Veterans Administration, and about half of homeless veterans are mentally ill.

Only 10% of the wounded military in the Iraq war die — the lowest casualty fatality rate ever — because of modern medicine and rapid surgical response on the front lines. But the war is producing veterans who will need long-term physical rehabilitation and counseling to overcome crippling injuries.

The question: How do we help veterans who, along with their families, exclusively are making the sacrifices to bring democracy to Iraq? The answer: a national sales tax that would sunset with the end of the Iraq war.

I don't expect this to be a popular idea. President Bush and Congress have convinced many Americans that it's possible to wage war without widespread sacrifice.

The cost of the war is being pushed on future generations, and a record deficit of $427 billion is forecast this year because of Iraq and tax cuts.

The all-volunteer Army, while bringing efficiency and purpose to the fight, also has made it easier for Americans to sleep at night. With the draft done and gone, few of us have to worry about losing sons, daughters or other relatives on the battlefield.

The result: We put patriotic magnets on our cars, give change to volunteers sending care packages to the troops, and look away when we see a homeless veteran pushing a shopping cart on the street.

I don't know what the appropriate national sales tax would be to pay for the war and to care for veterans. I'll leave that to experts.

But I know we can do much better than we're doing. And I know the government does things on the cheap when it comes to the military — unless it's handing out millions of dollars in bonuses to contractors with friends in high places.

A properly funded military wouldn't have hit the desert in Humvees minus proper armor. A country that values its Marines wouldn't be recalling more than 5,200 combat vests because the vests failed a bullet-stopping test, as happened this month.

Bush and members of Congress from both parties say the fight in Iraq is about securing peace in the Middle East, protecting America from terrorists and spreading democracy.

By toppling Saddam Hussein and helping bring free elections to Iraq, our military reminded many of us of an important truth forgotten during the Vietnam War — that democracy and freedom always are worth fighting for.

They're worth paying for, too.

Not tomorrow. Not decades from now.

Right now, when veterans new and old need help.

For More Information:

http://www.fresnobee.com/columnists/mcewen/story/10506186p-11300833c.html