Replies to post #419955 on Tornado Alley (PROG)

[SoxFan]

They didn't change one word from the one that had close to 25 Republicans supporting it. So tell us oh wise one what did they change?

[hookrider]

livefree_ordie: "Plan all along one can read these Dem.’ s like a book."

LOL, funny, I read books about the Fucking republicans that are Fucking everyone everyday. The Fucking republicans care about one thing and one thing only. Fucking over the Dem's in everything they can. Remember this, Fuck All republicans!!!!!

[brooklyn13]

Except that what you wrote is not true. There was no pork in the bill, it was stand alone, and it was the Senate that blocked it. Your guys Hawley and Cruz are on camera fist bumping after they blocked its passage.

https://www.yahoo.com/news/callous-gop-fist-bump-holding-060155743.html

No offense, but you're an idiot.

[blackhawks]

Spare us the 'green eye shades' and the pearl clutching over 'slush funds' while overlooking.....

While the fiscal conservatives may be making a strong argument about oversight, they seemed to have picked the wrong time to stiffen their backbones on an issue of fiduciary responsibility.

This is, of course, a Congress that up until recently had no qualms about pouring billions into a slush fund (called Overseas Contingency Operations) when there were caps placed on the Pentagon budget.

They have found ways to fund pork projects using fuzzy math after so-called earmarks were banned, and they continue to raise the Pentagon budget into the stratosphere year after year.

Neither veterans nor veteran's families will buy the faux outrage of the GOP over slush funds when a good portion of the Defense bill each year is both a slush fund and a jobs program.

The GOP screwed the pooch no less on this issue than they have on the 1/6 revelations, abortion and the Chips bill that passed despite a 33 GOP Senate vote opposition.

https://www.reuters.com/business/majority-us-senate-backs-bill-boosting-chipmakers-compete-with-china-2022-07-27/

Seriously, a bill 'to boost companies as they compete with China and alleviate a persistent shortage that has affected everything from cars, weapons, washing machines and video games,' opposed by 33 assholes who think a chip comes in a bag ready to eat?

The GOP is for NOTHING that helps this country.

GOP hand powerful pro-veteran burn pit issue over to Democrats

Now is not the time to suddenly grow a backbone over big government spending and oversight.

JULY 29, 2022
Written by
Kelley Beaucar Vlahos

https://responsiblestatecraft.org/2022/07/29/gop-hand-powerful-pro-veteran-burn-pit-issue-over-to-democrats/

Republicans really stepped in it this time. Whether or not they find a way to work with Democrats to pass the super-popular PACT Act, which would provide unprecedented assistance to veterans suffering from toxic exposures, they have all but ceded pro-veteran issues to the Democrats.

This week, Republicans helped to kill a procedural bill that would have pushed ahead the PACT Act, which provides $250 billion to veterans and opens new opportunities for vets suffering from myriad illnesses they believe are connected to the burn pits in Iraq and Afghanistan. Veteran organizations have been fighting for recognition for their maladies — which include everything from irreversible respiratory conditions to cancer — for some 15 years. The PACT Act overwhelmingly passed the Senate in June but the House voted on a slightly modified version, sending it back to the Senate this week.

But Republicans like Sen. Pat Toomey who had voted for the initial bill, say the current legislation would create a slush fund of billions of dollars for the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) with little Congressional oversight.

They say the bill would mandate not only the $250 billion for PACT (which would avoid the regular appropriations process each year) but also an additional $400 billion of previous VA spending. (They also vociferously deny that the “nay” vote came after the the Democrats were able to finally push through the Build Back Better bill without their votes.)

While the fiscal conservatives may be making a strong argument about oversight, they seemed to have picked the wrong time to stiffen their backbones on an issue of fiduciary responsibility.

This is, of course, a Congress that up until recently had no qualms about pouring billions into a slush fund (called Overseas Contingency Operations) when there were caps placed on the Pentagon budget.

They have found ways to fund pork projects using fuzzy math after so-called earmarks were banned, and they continue to raise the Pentagon budget into the stratosphere year after year.

In the wake of Republicans killing the bill, Democrats and veterans advocates exploded in condemnation. As I write this, veterans were engaging in a sit-in outside of Republican offices. Jon Stewart’s visage was blasted across the media — conservative outlets, too — to rebuke the GOP for letting veterans down.

“So ain’t this a bitch?” Stewart said Thursday at a Capitol Hill news conference on Capitol Hill. “America’s heroes, who fought our wars, outside sweating their asses off, with oxygen battling all kinds of ailments, while these motherf**kers sit in the air conditioning walled off from any of it? They don’t have to hear it. They don’t have to see it. They don’t have to understand that these are human beings. Did you get it yet?”

It was clear from when I started covering this issue in 2009 that this was a grassroots effort, built by sick veterans and their families, their doctors, veterans organizations like Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America (IAVA), American Legion and Disabled American Veterans (DAV), and, finally, members of Congress who have been advocating over the long haul.

But at its core, the movement could not have progressed without its own fierce determination because the Pentagon and VA have been loath to take responsibility for toxic exposures, fearing the liability would break the bank. It was a fight all the way.

Well, Washington chose to send millions of men and women to their wars in Iraq and Afghanistan — just like they did in the Persian Gulf a generation before and Vietnam a generation before that. (Those veterans, by the way, are also helped in the PACT Act because their illnesses — due to Agent Orange and exposures in the Gulf — have not all been recognized either).

Republicans are getting politically slapped around today, and it is hard to defend them under the present circumstances. The movement hasn’t come this far to let politics get in the way now.

[Zorax]

Do you just make bullshit up all the time.
Because that's beyond conspiracy shit right there.

[BOREALIS]

Combat vet 'fuming' over lawmakers' failure to pass two bipartisan measures that could have helped millions

Senate Republicans suddenly tanked the PACT Act on Wednesday, two weeks after a House committee declined to advance the Major Richard Star Act.

July 29, 2022, 4:17 PM CDT
By Melissa Chan

A U.S. military veteran who would have benefited from two bipartisan measures recently sacked in the House and Senate said lawmakers “spit” in veterans’ faces by rejecting both proposals.

Michael Braman, 45, is one of many veterans left angry and confused after Senate Republicans suddenly tanked a widely supported measure that would have expanded medical coverage for millions of former military members exposed to toxic burn pits during their service.

Supporters of the Sergeant First Class Heath Robinson Honoring Our Promise to Address Comprehensive Toxics Act — or PACT Act — overwhelmingly expected the House-passed bill to sail through to the president’s desk for a signature.

But in a procedural vote Wednesday night, 41 Senate Republicans blocked the bill’s passage, including 25 who had supported it a month ago.

“They’re playing games with our veterans and their families, and that’s cruelty,” Braman said. “Our leaders of our country spit in our face by going back on this bill.”

The move comes two weeks after a House committee declined to advance the Maj. Richard Star amendment, which would make medically retired and severely disabled combat veterans with under 20 years of active service eligible for both disability and retirement benefits.

“I’m fuming over this,” said Braman, who is relying on the passage of both measures.

Braman said he was a star athlete in high school who never had breathing problems. But when he returned home from a deployment to Afghanistan, where he said he was constantly around open-air burn pits, he was diagnosed with asthma.

Burn pits were common at U.S. military bases during the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. Dangerous materials, from electronics and vehicles to human waste, were regularly doused in jet fuel and set ablaze, spewing toxic fumes and carcinogens into the air.

"Depending on the wind, no matter where you were, you’d get the smoke," Braman said.

After serving in the Army and the Army National Guard for 19 years and five months, Braman said the military forced him to medically retire in 2014 due to disability caused mostly by post-traumatic stress disorder.

Under the Maj. Richard Star amendment, Braman and about 50,000 other combat-disabled veterans like him would qualify for hundreds, if not thousands, of dollars more a month in benefits.

When the House Rules Committee did not move that amendment forward two weeks ago, Braman said he felt forgotten by the nation he served.

At the time, however, he felt hopeful that at least the PACT Act would succeed, expanding Veterans Affairs health care eligibility to more than 3.5 million post-9/11 combat veterans who were exposed to toxins while serving in the military.

[...]

https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/combat-vet-fuming-lawmakers-failure-pass-two-bipartisan-measures-helpe-rcna40688

[fuagf]

livefree_ordie, Highly likely a supporter of treasonous fuckwad Donald 'criminal through working life' who was born with a silver spoon in his snout and paid you people back by stealing from you, cheating you and lying to you ever since. This story of Landis Sims might help you to see what courage, a sense of humanity and integrity can lead to:

Landis Sims shows how opportunities are endless as a quadruple amputee

1,167 views Feb 10, 2021

On the other hand on bit on your guy who one 9/11 first responder says
takes blood money, your party (assuming) ) that lets Vets down again.

9/11 First Responder Calls Trump A ‘Piece Of Sh**’ Over Recent Comments | The Katie Phang Show

1,034,579 views Jul 30, 2022

MSNBC
Donald Trump defended hosting a Saudi-funded tournament at his golf course by casting doubt on any connection
between Saudi Arabia and the 9/11 terrorist attacks. 9/11 first responder John Feal joins Katie Phang to discuss.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_tbqlciaUGE

"Brooklyn the Rep.’s blocked the Vet bill due to your typical Libersl tax slush fund..."

No vote because of "pork?" "Pieces of shit" the first responder says of your mob.