LET THERE BE NO MORE MILES TO GO….
(before they live up to the promises they swore to keep)

Like many others who have served I’m one of the lucky ones who have never had to wade through the morass of the VA’s disability claims process.

 On second thought, morass, is perhaps too kind a label for it since it more closely resembles slogging one’s way through a swamp, loaded with an infinity of hostile obstructive alligators, and venomous bureaucratic snakes of one kind or another, all intent on making the process as agonizing, frustrating, and soul-destroying, as possible.

And no matter how many times new well-meaning Secretaries are appointed to direct and improve it, no matter how many times there are outraged calls for yet more Congressional “hearings” about it, or how many up-for-re-election politicos attempting to show their own “concerns” about it, with carefully scripted local “meetings” with constituents to air grievances about it,  nothing ever changes, as the VA’s tenured bureaucracy merrily goes about its business of  crocheting procedures, and more procedures, just to avoid delivering what should be delivered to those who, having served this country, have been injured, maimed, or otherwise damaged in line of duty while in that service.

It almost looks like the entire disability claims process was designed by some Mad Hatter, with carefully calculated malice, to ensure that any such claiming veterans will have long passed into eternal sleep…. before one penny’s worth of “disability” need be paid out. Sadly, that’s exactly what happens much too often, as many of them do just that…. either by blowing their brains out, or just wandering off into some unknown hole to quietly booze themselves from despair into oblivion.

And now, we have yet another of these reported FUBAR claims processing conditions, this time from Oakland, CA, where that VA office whines about its case loads of claims being too much for its overwhelmed staff to handle, taking not less than a full year on average, and, in many instances, even more than a decade to be concluded. A decade?

Worse yet there are some of the lawyerly class who consider any complaints about such a time lag to be just that of congenital “whiners”, the ones who were sacrificing themselves while these were benefitting from draft exemptions, no doubt, to pursue their legal studies. Yes indeed, all of them whiners, like that snot-nosed, starving orphaned brat, Oliver….who dared to ask for….more.

Lord Have Mercy!

Ironically, one would think that such ministers of the law would acknowledge that, since all those who are sworn into service are subjected to a rigorous array of physical and mental examinations before being accepted for it, that there is an ipso facto basis for determining that they are fit and whole upon entering that service. Thus, if they return from that service damaged in one way or other, is it unreasonable to conclude that such damage was caused by or from that service ( haven’t they ever convicted criminally accused on much flimsier circumstantial evidence)? But no, that would be too neat and simple. Disability claims must be finely ground, processed, adjudicated, and shuffled through endless reviews, even if it takes decades.

Such is the gratitude of a “grateful” nation for those who had the gall to come limping, if not properly marching home….instead of being carried home….in a flag-draped box.

Well, on this Memorial Day, for those who were not lucky enough to come in a box, but who deserve at least the same respect for having to bear their physical and emotional disabilities, and with apologies to Robert Frost, let there be no more miles to go, before they live up to the promises they swore to keep…for them.

If not, we have indeed become a nation without….honor.

CENTURION