Op-Ed: Veteran Slams Alexander’s Record
From the The Tennessean: The tragedy that is Walter Reed Army Medical Center in Washington, D.C. — the abysmal failure to care for our wounded soldiers — is 650 miles from Nashville. Why should it bother Tennesseans who care less about what is going on so far away?
There are thousands of veterans in Tennessee. We care and, even more, instead of allowing our younger comrades returning from Iraq and Afghanistan to suffer in silence, we are rallying for their support.
My challenge to the staff of The Tennessean is to go to every veterans hospital in Tennessee and see how the patients are being treated within Tennessee. As a part of this, ask how many have been denied benefits or had their benefits decreased due to bureaucracy and budget squeezes.
After the data is collected, publish the voting record of our senior senator from Tennessee who, even though in Washington, seems as distant from the veterans’ issues as we are from Walter Reed.
His record has earned him a failing grade from every veterans’ organization that tracks the votes in Congress.
Furthermore, Empowering Veterans, a new national grass-roots veterans’ organization has marked Sen. Lamar Alexander as one of the top 10 enemies of veterans, and we hope others who proclaim “Support the Troops” will rally to defeat Mr. Alexander in 2008.
Richard Conover
Mt. Juliet 37122
