ravings of a semi-sane madwoman: it is our DUTY

Monday, February 19, 2007

it is our DUTY

to make sure we care for each and every man and women returning from deployment (or even any duty assignment). THEY volunteered. THEY deserve only the VERY BEST care. CONTINUING CARE

instead of the KAZILLIONS of dollars king george keeps wanting to direct to iraq, HOW ABOUT INVESTING IN THE CARE AND UPKEEP OF OUR VETERANS AND MILITARY HOSPITALS???

why don't i hear king george talking about this? why don't i hear mccain talking about this? why doesn't cheney talk of this? what about rice? and my personal favorite, DA LIEBS. i can't recall the last time i heard him speak of the care of our returning troops.

Soldiers Face Neglect, Frustration At Army's Top Medical Facility

By Dana Priest and Anne Hull Washington Post Staff Writers Sunday, February 18, 2007; Page A01
Behind the door of Army Spec. Jeremy Duncan's room, part of the wall is torn and hangs in the air, weighted down with black mold. When the wounded combat engineer stands in his shower and looks up, he can see the bathtub on the floor above through a rotted hole. The entire building, constructed between the world wars, often smells like greasy carry-out. Signs of neglect are everywhere: mouse droppings, belly-up cockroaches, stained carpets, cheap mattresses.
This is the world of Building 18, not the kind of place where Duncan expected to recover when he was evacuated to Walter Reed Army Medical Center from Iraq last February with a broken neck and a shredded left ear, nearly dead from blood loss. But the old lodge, just outside the gates of the hospital and five miles up the road from the White House, has housed hundreds of maimed soldiers recuperating from injuries suffered in the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.........

and more on this also from the washington post via americablog (part ii)

(sit down because if you're standing, it will KNOCK YOU RIGHT OVER)

By Anne Hull and Dana Priest Washington Post Staff Writers Monday, February 19, 2007; Page A01

................Perks and stardom do not come to every amputee. Sgt. David Thomas, a gunner with the Tennessee National Guard, spent his first three months at Walter Reed with no decent clothes; medics in Samarra had cut off his uniform. Heavily drugged, missing one leg and suffering from traumatic brain injury, David, 42, was finally told by a physical therapist to go to the Red Cross office, where he was given a T-shirt and sweat pants. He was awarded a Purple Heart but had no underwear.
David tangled with Walter Reed's image machine when he wanted to attend a ceremony for a fellow amputee, a Mexican national who was being granted U.S. citizenship by President Bush. A case worker quizzed him about what he would wear. It was summer, so David said shorts. The case manager said the media would be there and shorts were not advisable because the amputees would be seated in the front row.
" 'Are you telling me that I can't go to the ceremony 'cause I'm an amputee?' " David recalled asking. "She said, 'No, I'm saying you need to wear pants.' "
David told the case worker, "I'm not ashamed of what I did, and y'all shouldn't be neither." When the guest list came out for the ceremony, his name was not on it.......................