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John McCain is all talk when it comes to supporting veterans
By Amy Silverman
published: October 23, 2008
Jamie Peachey Photography
Vietnam veteran Bobby Collins wonders why McCain forgot about
him.
If you want to know what it's like to be a veteran in
John McCain's home state, stop by the Justa Center in downtown Phoenix.
On a Thursday morning not long ago, a volunteer named Twyla stands in front
of a group of clients at Justa, a day program for homeless seniors, explaining
what she's brought from the food bank.
"I hope that those of you who don't have many teeth, that you'll be OK with
the salad," she says, adding that she's also brought blueberry pomegranate
juice. "And cake for dessert!"
Scott Ritchey rolls his eyes good-naturedly as he passes through the room,
where the fluorescent light doesn't do any favors to the dirty linoleum and the
worn-out, mismatched couches. For the past three years, this decrepit little
building near the Arizona capitol has been a godsend for about 100 homeless
seniors at a time who have nothing to do with their days after waking up at a
nearby shelter.
On any given day, about half the participants are veterans.
When Ritchey, a Methodist minister, started the program — which operates on
about $260,000 in private donations a year — one of the first things he did was
call the local office of the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs to get some
help for the vets. It took a year for anyone to show up. And in three years,
Ritchey says, the VA has yet to place a single vet from the Justa Center in
housing.
Bobby Collins, 59, is a homeless Vietnam vet who shows up at Justa from time
to time. He's been waiting for a benefits check from the VA for eight months.
Collins was shot in the throat in Vietnam; his leg's full of shrapnel. He's got
two purple hearts, but he didn't claim his medical benefits for years. He didn't
need to — he had steady jobs as a welder and a carpenter. Then last
Thanksgiving, he came to Phoenix and couldn't find work and quickly found
himself homeless. Now he needs his money.
The people at the VA are very nice, Collins says, but the bureaucracy is
impossible. They've told him he'll get his money; he doesn't understand why it's
taking so long. Collins says he's working hard not to be bitter, but when he
arrived in Phoenix and saw what few services there were for him as a veteran, he
was mad at John McCain.
"I have a lot of respect for Sen. McCain as a war hero," he says, but "I
would never vote for a veteran who lets veterans in his state be treated this
way."
McCain has had 25 years in Congress to help veterans. Instead, he has
regularly voted against plans to increase funding for veterans services,
including proposals that would have improved conditions at veterans hospitals
and increased rehab services for vets. Meanwhile, McCain has served as one of
Washington's most vocal war hawks.
In the last few minutes of the first presidential debate, on September 26,
McCain made a statement that probably blew past most economy-obsessed Americans,
but it stopped a lot of military veterans short.
Barack Obama had just remarked that he's approached all the time by Iraq War
veterans who say they can't get help for post-traumatic stress disorder. When it
was his turn to reply, McCain seemed incensed.
"I know the veterans, and I know them well," he said. His voice shook with
emotion. "And I know that they know that I'll take care of them. And I've been
proud of their support and of their recognition of my service to the veterans.
And I love them, and I'll take care of them. And they know that I'll take care
of them."
Veterans groups are finally speaking out about their frustration with McCain,
who rides on his reputation as a war veteran at the same time he's compiled a
long record of opposing legislation benefiting vets.
McCain's campaign did not return a call Monday for comment regarding his
voting record and his constituent services operations.
At the second presidential debate, on October 7, McCain told the American
people that he supports a spending freeze that excludes veterans. Here are a few
examples of pro-veteran legislation that didn't get McCain's support:
• January 2008 — McCain didn't vote on the National Defense Authorization
Act, which included an increase of 3.5 percent in basic monthly pay for active
military and permitted vets who are 100 percent disabled to get both retirement
and disability pay.
• October 2007 — He didn't vote on another version of the Defense
Authorization Act, which included billions of dollars in veterans health
services funding.
• February 2006 — He voted against an amendment proposed by Christopher Dodd,
a Democrat from Connecticut, that would have appropriated $1 billion for
hospital improvements at places like Walter Reed Army Medical Center and also
included $14 billion for the Veterans Benefits Administration for Compensation
and Pensions for 2006-10 and $6.9 billion for the VA for medical care for
2006-10.
• November 2005 — He voted against an amendment that would have provided $500
million each year from 2006 to 2010 for "readjustment counseling, related mental
health services, and treatment and rehabilitative services for veterans with
mental illness, post-traumatic stress disorder, or substance use disorder."
• October 2005 — McCain voted against an amendment that would have required
that funding for VA health administration be increased each year to adjust for
inflation and the number of veterans served.
• March 2004 — He voted against closing tax loopholes to create a reserve
fund to allow for an increase in medical care for veterans of $1.8 billion.
Brandon Friedman is a former Army officer who served in Iraq and Afghanistan;
he's now vice chairman of a national veterans support group called Vote Vets, an
organization devoted to electing veterans — with one notable exception — to
public office.
Friedman calls McCain's statements in support of vets "a slap in the face."
He says, "Coming from a guy who's kept us stuck in Iraq at the expense of the
fight against al Qaeda in Afghanistan — and who opposed the new G.I. Bill —
[such comments don't] carry much weight. Those are empty words. John McCain is
all talk when it comes to supporting veterans, and his voting record shows
it."
Until the 2008 presidential race, the only veterans really harping about
McCain were from a group called Vietnam Veterans Against McCain, and you need
only visit their website, vietnamveteransagainstmccain.com,
to see how fringe the group's members and their complaints can be. They've
called McCain "the Manchurian Candidate" and disparaged the senator for ignoring
their efforts to find missing POWs in Vietnam. McCain has never been
particularly patient with them either — he famously made the mother of one
missing POW cry at a congressional hearing in the early 1990s and engaged in
heated arguments with others. They will never forgive him for voting to
normalize relations with Vietnam.
The new complaints, though, focus on bread-and-butter issues. It's not only
about a difference of opinion over how the war in Iraq is being handled, though
that's part of it. It's a story about how the soldiers are treated once they
come home.
Another vets organization, Veterans for Common Sense, posted this comment on
its website earlier this year: "John McCain is yet another Republican former
military veteran who likes to talk a big game when it comes to having the
support of the military. Yet, time and time again, he has gone out of his way to
vote against the needs of those who are serving in our military. If he can't
even see his way to actually do what the troops want, or what the veterans need,
and he doesn't have the support of veterans, then how can he be a credible
commander in chief?"
