thedrifter
05-24-07, 07:31 AM
Congressional feud ties up bill to honor vet
By Rick Maze - Staff writer
Posted : Wednesday May 23, 2007 18:11:06 EDT
In a day that was supposed to display bipartisan support for veterans, the two leaders of the House Veterans’ Affairs Committee feuded over a bipartisan bill to name a veterans’ hospital in New Mexico after a popular Medal of Honor recipient who died in April.
Rep. Steve Buyer of Indiana, the former chairman and now senior Republican on the veterans’ committee, wondered why the House Democratic leadership and the current committee chairman, Rep. Bob Filner, D-Calif., refused to take up a bill, HR 474, that would name the VA medical center in Albuquerque, N.M., and speculated it was because the bill’s chief sponsor is a Republican — Rep. Heather Wilson of New Mexico.
The Senate passed a similar bill, S 229, on April 12, just days after Marine 2nd Lt. Raymond Murphy died at the age of 77 in a Department of Veterans Affairs nursing home.
“There is nobody more deserving of having a VA hospital named for them,” Wilson said Wednesday. “I am just sorry this bill has been tied up in a squabble between these two guys. I don’t care whose bill passes, I just believe it should be passed.”
Buyer said he tried to get Wilson’s bill added to Wednesday’s floor schedule, but Filner blocked it from the calendar. He did not respond to two letters from Buyer asking about the bill, and did not take Buyer’s phone calls.
Six other veterans’ bills, including one putting a new cemetery in Colorado, were being considered.
The cemetery, Buyer noted, does not even meet the VA’s criteria based on need, while the Murphy hospital bill met all of the criteria — it is sponsored by the entire New Mexico delegation, endorsed by veterans’ organizations, and the hospital is being named posthumously or for someone who was at least 70 years old.
“This should have been a simple request, but it was not honored,” Buyer said.
When asked about the controversy, Filner’s response was brief: He said Buyer was trying to force consideration of a bill. “He is obsessed,” Filner said, giving no explanation for why he would not approve putting the bill onto the House floor schedule.
Murphy received the Medal of Honor, the nation’s highest award for valor, for action during the Korean War when he was a Marine infantry platoon leader.
According to Wilson, Murphy made several trips under heavy gunfire to rescue casualties from two other platoons who were pinned down. “At one point, Jerry Murphy was helping lift a stretcher when he was hit in the back by fragments of an enemy grenade,” she said, noting that he refused medical treatment and continued to command his men in the rescue. At another point in the battle, Murphy helped hold off Chinese troops until all of his Marines evacuated, and eventually was wounded a second time — and again refused treatment — until everyone was down the hill.
Murphy went on to work for VA for 23 years, and continued to volunteer at the hospital after he retired. “He would push people around the hospital in wheelchairs,” Wilson said. “Most of them had no idea who he was.”
Murphy was buried in the smock he wore as a VA volunteer, she said.
Wilson said she is surprised this has become a partisan issue since one of the biggest supporters of the bill is New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson, a Democrat who formally announced earlier this week he is running for the Democratic presidential nomination.
Despite the bickering, the House passed six veterans bills and a resolution encouraging people to visit veterans’ memorials and cemeteries on Memorial Day.
One of the six bills would provide grants for state and local governments to pay for outreach programs that tell veterans about benefits they have earned. Supporters said this could help older veterans, especially widows, learn about, and get help filing for, pensions aimed at low-income veterans and their survivors.
Also on the list of veterans bills that were scheduled for a vote to give lawmakers something to trumpet back home during the Memorial Day congressional recess: bills expanding chiropractic care; providing more support for veterans with traumatic brain injuries, including plans for long-term care; extending veterans’ vocational assistance to some severely wounded service members still on active duty; and extending to five years the length of time combat veterans can get post-service VA health care without having to prove that their medical problems are service-connected. The current time limit for such care is two years.
None of the six bills will become law until passed by the Senate, where the Senate Veterans’ Affairs Committee is still wading through a pile of proposals.
Ellie
By Rick Maze - Staff writer
Posted : Wednesday May 23, 2007 18:11:06 EDT
In a day that was supposed to display bipartisan support for veterans, the two leaders of the House Veterans’ Affairs Committee feuded over a bipartisan bill to name a veterans’ hospital in New Mexico after a popular Medal of Honor recipient who died in April.
Rep. Steve Buyer of Indiana, the former chairman and now senior Republican on the veterans’ committee, wondered why the House Democratic leadership and the current committee chairman, Rep. Bob Filner, D-Calif., refused to take up a bill, HR 474, that would name the VA medical center in Albuquerque, N.M., and speculated it was because the bill’s chief sponsor is a Republican — Rep. Heather Wilson of New Mexico.
The Senate passed a similar bill, S 229, on April 12, just days after Marine 2nd Lt. Raymond Murphy died at the age of 77 in a Department of Veterans Affairs nursing home.
“There is nobody more deserving of having a VA hospital named for them,” Wilson said Wednesday. “I am just sorry this bill has been tied up in a squabble between these two guys. I don’t care whose bill passes, I just believe it should be passed.”
Buyer said he tried to get Wilson’s bill added to Wednesday’s floor schedule, but Filner blocked it from the calendar. He did not respond to two letters from Buyer asking about the bill, and did not take Buyer’s phone calls.
Six other veterans’ bills, including one putting a new cemetery in Colorado, were being considered.
The cemetery, Buyer noted, does not even meet the VA’s criteria based on need, while the Murphy hospital bill met all of the criteria — it is sponsored by the entire New Mexico delegation, endorsed by veterans’ organizations, and the hospital is being named posthumously or for someone who was at least 70 years old.
“This should have been a simple request, but it was not honored,” Buyer said.
When asked about the controversy, Filner’s response was brief: He said Buyer was trying to force consideration of a bill. “He is obsessed,” Filner said, giving no explanation for why he would not approve putting the bill onto the House floor schedule.
Murphy received the Medal of Honor, the nation’s highest award for valor, for action during the Korean War when he was a Marine infantry platoon leader.
According to Wilson, Murphy made several trips under heavy gunfire to rescue casualties from two other platoons who were pinned down. “At one point, Jerry Murphy was helping lift a stretcher when he was hit in the back by fragments of an enemy grenade,” she said, noting that he refused medical treatment and continued to command his men in the rescue. At another point in the battle, Murphy helped hold off Chinese troops until all of his Marines evacuated, and eventually was wounded a second time — and again refused treatment — until everyone was down the hill.
Murphy went on to work for VA for 23 years, and continued to volunteer at the hospital after he retired. “He would push people around the hospital in wheelchairs,” Wilson said. “Most of them had no idea who he was.”
Murphy was buried in the smock he wore as a VA volunteer, she said.
Wilson said she is surprised this has become a partisan issue since one of the biggest supporters of the bill is New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson, a Democrat who formally announced earlier this week he is running for the Democratic presidential nomination.
Despite the bickering, the House passed six veterans bills and a resolution encouraging people to visit veterans’ memorials and cemeteries on Memorial Day.
One of the six bills would provide grants for state and local governments to pay for outreach programs that tell veterans about benefits they have earned. Supporters said this could help older veterans, especially widows, learn about, and get help filing for, pensions aimed at low-income veterans and their survivors.
Also on the list of veterans bills that were scheduled for a vote to give lawmakers something to trumpet back home during the Memorial Day congressional recess: bills expanding chiropractic care; providing more support for veterans with traumatic brain injuries, including plans for long-term care; extending veterans’ vocational assistance to some severely wounded service members still on active duty; and extending to five years the length of time combat veterans can get post-service VA health care without having to prove that their medical problems are service-connected. The current time limit for such care is two years.
None of the six bills will become law until passed by the Senate, where the Senate Veterans’ Affairs Committee is still wading through a pile of proposals.
Ellie