MINNEAPOLIS, MN (NBC) — When they came home from Iraq, 2,600 members of the Minnesota National Guard had been deployed longer than any other ground combat unit. The tour lasted 22 months and had been extended as part of President Bush’s surge.
1st Lt. Jon Anderson said he never expected to come home to this: A government refusing to pay education benefits he says he should have earned under the GI bill.
“It’s pretty much a slap in the face,” Anderson said. “I think it was a scheme to save money, personally. I think it was a leadership failure by the senior Washington leadership… once again failing the soldiers.”
Anderson’s orders, and the orders of 1,161 other Minnesota guard members, were written for 729 days.
Had they been written for 730 days, just one day more, the soldiers would receive those benefits to pay for school.
“Which would be allowing the soldiers an extra $500 to $800 a month,” Anderson said.
This is outrageous!!!
I expect corporate America to act like this. We all know people get ‘retired’ just short of being able to get their full retirement benefits in the corporate world. But these Soldiers, regardless of how long they have been deployed and ESPECIALLY because of how long they were deployed, do not deserve to be treated like this.
Veterans have been mistreated by this country for as long as I can remember. Even the World War II vets I knew when I was a kid didn’t get a fair shake from the country. These people SERVE the country. They do more than their share. We owe them benefits.
I go through the check out line at grocery stores and see illegal immigrants using food stamps and WIC and working the system to get the most benefit they can from it. Its not just illegals, there are all sorts of people who work the system and our tax dollars pay their way through life while they expend all their energy on how to get more from the ’system’.
It is all backwards. THESE SOLDIERS HAVE EARNED THE RIGHT to get a few things from the system.
We owe them at least that.
GET MAD about it!
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c/p at Southern Sass on Crime
October 7th, 2007 at 6:01 pm
Oh I am mad. Therefore, unless you object, I am swiping this and cross posting it. I couldn’t say it better or add another word. B-)
October 7th, 2007 at 6:14 pm
And if it doesn’t trackback this time, I will personally beat myself half to death with a pound of wet noodles. X-
Don’t do that Jo!!! I’ll do the trackback!! One of these days I’ll have to teach you how to do them