This page has been archived and commenting is disabled.
1000s Of Veterans Busted For Massive Benefits Fraud
When work is punished and grift is not, is it any surprise that, as The Washington Times reports, nearly 60,000 triple dipping Veterans picked up $3.5 billion in benefits (collecting their military retirement pay; and disability benefits from both the Veterans Administration and Social Security too). The arrangement is legal, but since everyone else is abusing the system, from crony banks to deadbeat dads to squatting slummers, it was only a matter of time before even veterans decided to dip, then dip again and dip some more. Sen. Tom Coburn, noted it was "hard to understand," but perhaps the hardest thing to understand is why it took veterans so long to realize we live in a world without consequences.
As The Washington Times reports, tens of thousands of veterans collect their military retirement pay and disability benefits from the Veterans Administration and disability checks from Social Security too, according to a new report from the Government Accountability Office. All told, nearly 60,000 triple dippers collected $3.5 billion in benefits.
The arrangement is legal, but it raises questions about the generosity of the American safety net system at a time when disability programs are already under severe financial stress.
"This report shows that, like other government programs, there is little coordination between these overlapping benefits, which increase cost[s] to taxpayers," said Sen. Tom Coburn, the Oklahoma Republican who requested the GAO report. "We should fulfill our promises to the men and women who serve, but we need to streamline these duplicative programs."
For decades, up until 2004, the government clamped down on veterans taking both military retirement pay and VA disability benefits. The Pentagon docked retirement pay dollar for dollar up to the amount of their VA benefits.
But veterans groups argued that vets should be entitled to both payments, saying the retirement money was earned for years of service, while disability is compensation for service-related wounds.
Under an intense lobbying campaign, Congress changed the law so that, beginning in 2004, vets were gradually allowed to collect both checks - though there are regular rumblings proposing to undue the 2004 change.
Social Security disability, however, is different.
Most Americans aren't able to collect Social Security disability payments if their income is at least $13,000 a year. But Social Security rules don't treat military retirement or VA disability payments as regular income, which means veterans can collect tens of thousands of dollars from the Pentagon and VA and still get money from Social Security.
Mr. Coburn said taxpayers should find that "hard to understand."
"With the Social Security Disability Insurance trust fund set to run out of money in two years, the report raises a number of questions about whether disability benefits are getting to those whose livelihoods depend on them," the senator said.
In an official reply to the GAO, the VA said it "generally agrees" with the report's conclusions. Social Security officials had no comment.
Social Security's disability trust fund is expected to run out of money in 2016, and some lawmakers believe that cracking down on double dippers could help extend the program's life somewhat.
About 3 percent of military retirees collect all three benefits right now, GAO investigators said. Most of them have a VA disability rating of 50 percent or higher, though just 17 percent of the disabilities are combat-related.
Of the $3.5 billion spent in 2013 on the triple dippers, $1.4 billion came from the VA, $1.2 billion came from the Pentagon, and $937.4 million came from Social Security.
As for the individual veterans, the GAO identified 101 who earn more than $150,000 a year in triple-dip benefits. Another 2,200 veterans earn between $100,000 and $150,000.
Investigators pulled seven cases at different benefit levels for further study, and in all but the lowest two, the veterans were making more as retired disabled than their salaries would have been if they'd still been in the service.
A 54-year-old who retired in 1997 after 20 years in the military, who had lung disease, vascular disease and lost use of his feet, collected $122,887 in benefits in 2013 — nearly three times the $43,808 someone of his pay grade would have made in the military.
Meanwhile, a 59-year-old who retired in 2004 after 26 years, who lost his feet, is blind in one eye and has renal problems, collected $152,719 in 2013 — more than twice the $72,824 salary of someone at his final military pay grade. Most of his benefits — $85,958 — came from VA disability, while $46,396 was military retirement, and $20,365 was from Social Security.
Since everyone else is abusing the system, from crony banks to deadbeat dads to squatting slummers, it was only a matter of time before even veterans decided to dip, then dip again and dip some more. Sen. Tom Coburn, noted it was "hard to understand," but perhaps the hardest thing to understand is why it took veterans so long to realize we live in a world without consequences.
- 31524 reads
- Printer-friendly version
- Send to friend
- advertisements -


how many dips does congress get?
the faux populists of ZH worship those at the top and despise the grunts who join the military and put their lives on the line...major league hypocrites, these ZHers
I spent 33 years in the Air Force and retired not long ago, there is so much fraud with military members it's just not funny. People thinking up anything they can and beating down the VA doors to prove their crazy and so forth. And this is the Air Force there's nothing to make you crazy in the Air Force!!!! So this causes extra hassle for the ones whom really need the benefits, lots of red tape!!! Soooooo many people feel you owe them.
For 33 years you worked for the biggest fraud on earth : the US military.
From then on black seems like white and vice versa. You have the rest of your life to turn that upside down.
Some challenge : full metal jacket to shed down to bare bones and rosebud!
If you peeled potatos for 3 years while serving in Germany in the 1970's, how does that entitle you to VA benefits for the rest of your life? I know a loser who was told by a judge to join the military or go to jail back in the 1970's after he stole a car. Never saw combat. Why is he entitled to jack shit?
Because it was job. So what if he didn't kill woman and children?
Work a job for 3 years and get hundreds of thousands of benefits for life? Great fucking deal. You should run for office.
@ FredFlintstone:
No!
I was not stabbed, I took a shot gun 38, the bullet passed through the stomach, large intestine and small intestine.
The doctor said that if the angle of entry of the bullet was 2 cm to the right or left or died or would be crippled.
Eleven days in the hospital, two liters of blood (four packs of 500ml).
Imagine accepting all this blood in the vein at the height of AIDS, the Santa Casa de Santos SP Brazil in 1995!
Man, I was six months without having sex with my wife, afraid of being infected with AIDS.
The son of a bitch who fired the shot was 17, was arrested three months, when he returned he died in a week, found the guy with a mouth full of crabs under a bridge.
I was six months into medical license, the police even questioned me about the death of the unfortunate but not me.
hehe.
Robbery or war?
Minus one for that 38 shotgun comment. Another poser. Fuck off.
3 years? you obviously don't know much about the military. you are eligible for retirement after 20 years of active duty, not 3. Even then it is only a relatively low % of your active duty pay (50%) .. you have to put in 40 years to get to 80%. 3 years .. what an idiot. some of the amounts sound high, but the thing the article is very shady about not mentioning is that the people who recieve the high disability payments are typically missing multiple limbs. although they did point out the guy getting $85K in disability at the end lost both his feet .. so a bit of integrity i suppose.
Talking about VA benefits in general and not any of the specific examples in the article.
With a 30 year bull market around the corner, as heralded by the Oligarchs, all based on USD strength and WS exuberance, coupled with cheap fracking oil permanent horizon, what can America fear for its future.
Its all there for the taking. Rejoice perma doomers...so goes the current Koch a doodle libertarian mantra!
'All we need is to replace this progressive shill, Black Potus, elected during a passing crisis of no consequence and we will be fine.'
So goes the bullish mantra which will not stop 'cos Branson lost his little toy in the Mojave.
We have "exceptionialism" written in our DNA. Go, go, go USA, on the way to Gravity defied, like Altas shrugged !
Capitalism of free markets, resurrected after political reset, will save America's future, aligning it with its glorious past.
I've been told that here on the Hedge! Whoopie!
Off-topic:
There is an interesting deal on ZeroHedge.
There is a section called Time Zone, there is another called'm running not to lose the prayer five times a day, there is another interesting thing called football games, races that also eat the time of many people.
hehe!
Aside from the people who are giving the missus a deal that is very justifiable, there are paid trolls boring Kkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkk!
There are lots of good people here, I like here!
Banzai, Durden, a lot of guys on the other side of the world everyone talking, this is interesting exchange of ideas.
:-)
I also know a loser who got stabbed stumbling out of a Georgetown bar in the 1980's. He got discharged from the Marines and has been collecting disability for the last 20 years. Damn, I know a lot of losers.
@ FredFlintstone:
I have a spine injury on account of track military pentathlon, am half deaf in his left ear for so shoot FAL rifle - is used in Brazil's Armed Forces in 1981.
Never! I never asked for compensation for my country so!
I am confused if I call incompetent or bum a guy coming out of the military, each case is unique.
For my part, I believe that the potato peelers have always been cannon fodder.
No offense.
: - \
Were you a pentathlete?
from the article:
"Most Americans aren't able to collect Social Security disability payments if their income is at least $13,000 a year."
Untrue. If you have earned at least $4800 per year over 5 of the last 10 years, your SS disability payments are not dependent on your income
/former SSA worker
$3.5bn over how many years? 10? The federal government has spent $31trillion over that period of time.
but it is veterans who put their lives on the line, and not white collar workers, like who post here. So, it is obviously suspect.
I'm a veteran and a white collar worker. I do more in a week working my corporate job that I did in 4 years in the navy. Fact.
Think you can get me on with your company?
I don't shave every day, I drink alcohol, sometimes I look tired, and since I am single I might go to bars, look at women, and get drunk in public.
That is too much for many US jobs. We have lots of people that have time to talk, spread rumors, and stab you in the back. Might be like working in the Navy or Air Force.
I was a data puller. Data analyzer.
Actually. I don't know if I have pull. But they get a boner for hiring vets.
In fact of the things I can "self-identify" for at work: veteran, disabled or sexual perference. Which if you put down you're a marine vet , I guess we can determine easily one of the other two.
I'm not surprized. It was the navy after all.
Do you know why the Navy has Marines?
Easier than sneaking sheep on board.
oh, boo hoo, the people who put their lives on the line for all americans might not be forced to live in poverty. It's a tragedy of epic proportions.
Anyone who paid attention in the 90's to the junk culture being pumped out need not wonder why there are so many today lacking the honor and integrity that so many had in the past. Progressives have engineered America to fail through the various proxies they control.
I'd rather pay Veterans triple dips , whose lives at least were in jeopardy (for the wrong causes, but that is irrelevant) rather than the .001% ,whom never sacrife anything, but who steal so much moolah the Vet's $3.6 which is a rounding error against the .001's pillage.......
Yes, Corps = never Patriots.
It's turned to shit but shit makes good humus. The healthy element in Amerika, and there is one, is going underground for a certain span. There is just no way to function on the surface. You will get burned for everything you have in this environment.
Up shall be down and down shall be up. Our leaders from dog catcher to Asspuppet are exactly and absolutely the wrong element, the worst possible mettle with which to lead the sheep. They are natural enemies, each and all.
Historians have a term for this type of social arrangement - a DARK AGE.
"Shovel me over and let me work. I am the grass, I cover all."
Anywhere in the world is a veteran respected - not only in France if the French Foreign Legion, they are as Jehovah's Witnesses, do not like celebrations.
hehe.
I honestly believe that much money was diverted, you would not see so many veterans mendicando - asking for money - in the streets if that were distributed.
Many people walk apathetic today.
When a Sergeant or Lieutenant start calling in the streets like this:
"-Soldado! Name, serial number and function!"
Come with me !!
And those guys follow them, may believe that gulhotina be the lesser of two evils to banksters and politicians.
When that happens - and the day is near, very close - there will be no "Cops" (police) on the streets, will only be militarily trained citizens ready to kill.
Whether that's good or bad is a matter of perspective.
It's bad because it takes away freedom is good because the dealers and banksters are killed one by one.
Corrupt judges, police and politicians, and many people in prison will also pro bag, can believe.
All that said above happened in 1917 in Russia, in France happened, happened in Rome.
Look at Google.
The Barbarians are coming ....
hehe.
No cops on the streets?? That's GOOOOD! Especially if they're replaced by wel-armed vets guarding their neighbourhoods.
- Blackwater?
- XE?
- Academi
Did they go from all American name to a "French" name?
"The arrangement is legal" Enough said.
Since when do morals and doing the right thing get into the mix in this day and age. No wonder more and more people scam, because they know there aren't any consequences and it's legal anyway.
Make it illegal, and see how much of this bullshit is curtailed. Maybe not prison time, but get caught, and no more payments for you.
Same goes with the pieces of shit who draw a government pension from one pension system, and continue to work in a governement job in another pension system. Most are law enforcement so I wonder why the shit aint made illegal. These guys get rewarded with civilan governernment jobs, sucking up salaries while kids out of school can't get these jobs and have to work waiting tables.
Free Shit Army indeed.
There is all kinds in the FSA.
If ordered to do so, many of these guys would have killed you and your family without remorse. For their complete blind faith to the State, do they do not deserve unfettered access to the taxpayer's hard earned currency? And if not adequate, indebting the children and unborn as well?
"If ordered to do so, many of these guys would have killed you and your family without remorse."
You have no idea of what you are talking about. I'm thinking you play a lot of video games.
You move up in the military for one, and only one, reason. You follow orders, no questions asked. You are naive or misinformed if that is not your understanding.
Is this based on experience or movies? Not saying you are wrong, if you disobey LEGAL orders you will move, that is correct, move. Move out that is, out to Ft. Leavenworth and civilian life after.
You sound like someone who has no personal experience with taking or giving orders in the military sense.
I know my history and I know that being in the military is about being a follower, not a leader. They couldn't stand me for 5 seconds.
Thanks for verifying that you have zero experience in the matter and know nothing about leadership. Look up "lawful order," it will give you a clue. Your video games are not real life.
This legal amount is a pittance for so many vets that compared to real theft and corruption that goes on in DC everyday, we should increase the amount for vets. Or get ethics and morals back into our system from top to bottom - time for a total reset.
I knew someone a few years back whos mother was collecting death benefits from the VA for her first husband who died in WWII even though she had remarried 50 years ago and had 3 children.
As a VA doctor I can attest to this. There is rampant abuse of depression, ptsd, joint pains. Even though some of it is legitimate.
I personally don't blame them. They take advantage of the system while the system functions, which is what we all should be doing. The suckers are those who volunteer and "work hard" and play by the rules.
>>>The suckers are those who volunteer and "work hard" and play by the rules.
You are, unfortunately, absolutely correct.
I may still work hard, volunteer and play by the rules, but 1) I feel free to look upon the rules something to be gamed, and 2) I sure as hell don't work and pay taxes in the USA. I might retire there, though - Amurica is pretty cheap livin', if you can handle the whole "third world" and "no future" thing.
Why Doc, its evident tat you did take advantage of the system. Working in the highly corrupt and grossly overpaid medical field, as well as being a .gov employee. And besides you're a genuine asshole. I happen to have always worked hard, played by the rules, and tried to save for retirement rater than steal it like you do. Fuck you.
You know what they call a doctor that graduated at the bottom of his or her class?
My VA doctor.
That attitude is the problem. Being a good person and standing up for what you believe is a sucker? And this coming from a person in what should be a noble profession? I pity you.
Even veterans, really? What did you expect from people volunteering to blindly and obediently kill on the commands and whims of corrupt politicians and their oligarch backers?
These morons weren't drafted, you know.
"RBS is among several banks being investigated by regulators over allegations that currency markets were rigged."
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-29839343
Oh look, rigged markets, and what will the banksters get? A tiny wrist slap as a cost of doing business, then back to the same old, same old
Well, according to the government damage control solution, they can handshake with terrorists again to release more POWs.
my grandparents each have two different government retirements, full VA benefits, and they sit back and watch Fox news all day and complain about all the people freeloading off the government - unbelievable!
While you live in their basement and post on ZeroHedge.
This is the biggest non-story I've ever seen. Our government and politicians ENCOURAGE disabled veterans to apply for SS disability. This is part of a letter I sent the author of this story yesterday:
1. Veterans can't be “caught” doing something that they're encouraged to do. Upon completion of a disability claim the veteran is sent a package from the VA. This package includes VA Form 21-8760 Sep 2006 which contains the following paragraph:
SOCIAL SECURITY BENEFITS
The Social Security Administration (SSA) administers several benefit programs, including Social Security retirement and disability benefits and Medicare. Veterans may be entitled to Social Security work credits for active service performed after September 15, 1940. For more information about Social Security benefits and credits, call SSA toll-free at 1-800-772-1213 (Hearing Impaired TTY line 1-800-325-0778). You may also contact SSA by Internet at http://www.ssa.govl.
2. In recent years, perhaps 4-5 years ago, there was an effort by politicians to get veterans who were eligible for SS disability on it. I'm sure you can find info on this. To further assist, just this year, the SS admin started a new program for veterans. Google this:
Social Security officials announce expedited claims for vets with 100% disability rating
Some are parasites and some really are disabled and need the benefits. There's so much abuse and fraud in the system it meeses it up for the really disabled. While in college I worked for a disability judge (they call them administrative judges where I live), to make some extra money to avoid taking a very nasty student loan. Some of the claimants were such obvious fakers you had to swallow your laugh. Some others were so desperately disabled you had to swallow your tears. The judges' dockets are so friggin overloaded it's extremely hard for them to sift through all the fakers vs disabled people. They need to double the budget of these judges (hire at least double the number) and the savings by eliminating the frauds would easily pay for the benefits of valid claims imo. It would be a start.
One thing for sure; the system is badly broken and needs alot of work ... which I don't see coming from either party.
I spent 12 years in the military. I have bad shoulders, hips and knees from the obstacle courses. I never turned in my my medical records into the VA and I never tried for disability. Fuck you fucking faggot cocksuckers. Sitting on the sidelines like fairey Queens. Wanna get something done? Kill a politician.
So you are an even bigger tool than these "faggot cocksuckers". Wonder how that feels!
Doom and Dust, besides the physcopaths McNamara being buried in Arlington and Westmorland being buried at West Point I'm good. I'd like to teach a few history lessons on some subquent douchnozzles but hey, we live in a new world now.
I'm in the same boat. 30% hearling loss in left ear and 40% in right. Years of work on the flight deck and flightline will do that to you. All I get is my retirement check, nothing more. I won't even visit the VA hospital like all of my retired friends. Maybe I should jump on the train that crashes the scheme...
I don't go to the VA or the Army hospital. I value my health too much.
If you want to die, seek VA medical care.
If you can rape, pillage and murder based on the ultimate lie that sacrifices "your own countrymen" and keep doing it with impunity collecting a paycheck while in service to a lawless murdering State!...
Why the fuck not?...
Give those men and women in unifrom a Lynndie English thumbs up and a "yellow ribbon" for following through all the way for the Big Team!!!
An argument for a govenment so limited that it doesn't "offer benefits."
The more limited a government is, the more it offers of the greatest benefit of all. Personal freedom.
Only 60,000 vets cheat? Out of how many millions that have served? That's got to be some kind of (low %) record. And they received less than the USDA pushed through to pay black farmers for (fake) reparations.
The real money is going to the double and triple dippers working for state, local, and Federal governments who get Cadillac health care and benefits.....example, the Bell, CA police captain that gave himself a $500,000 year retirement? Government workers make 100% more in benefits, with a generous retirement, than the average person in the private sector. That's what's causing our huge deficits.
How about a little perspective on reality when pointing fingers on the Vets? The VA is one of the largest of all Federal programs and $3.5B is a rounding error.
How many Billions did we give to the rich Wall Street families of 9-11, just because we felt sorry for them? What did they do? Why wasn't their own life insurance good enough for them?
Probably a lot more of the millions of vets do cheat, but of those with disability claims 60,00 cheat. Do you have problems comprehending the article?
The greatest benefit any government can offer its citizrns is the benefit of freedom. How soon we forget.
Honestly, I don't care if these guys are robbing FT Knox, much less collecting extra SS disability pay for losing their legs or whatever. None of them fought in a war that meant shit. They were lied to and abused. They should each get the same pay as a Congressman and it should come directly out of a tax on the Federal Reserve that they were actually fighting for.
Hey fucker, I was lied to and abused too. Wheres my congressmans pay? Send it right over asap.
So it is legal, but the author is calling it fraud? What am I missing?
Hero is the guy who defends his country from invasion.
Hero is the guy who has a wife and kids, a house, and seeks a weapon when a son of a bitch try to get close.
The real hero does not come out of its territory to invade another territory in search of oil or political intersections.
Hero is the guy who got shot in his backyard, he was defending.
hehe.
Thank you for your disservice!
(I wonder if that MIC stooge McCain is one of them.)
McCain is a fourpel dipper.
Never missed a regular federal paycheck since age 18.
Freedom Fighter.
Hero.
Reporting on small fish, when we have killer whales running around.
Who the fuck cares if Veterans double, tripple or quadrouple dip?
LET THEM
Do something about the trillions of counterfeit dollars given to foreign banks, then you have earned the right to point fingers at veterans (maybe).
The airwaves are putrid with dis-information this weekend.
The herp a derp few veterans taking on the machine for da tidbits of some cabal is funny. Zero slapping balls all over palm desert, while the disabled vets get thrown on waiting lists or left to rot for 5-6 years is ok though.
The cabal be digging those cornerstones of honesty today. End of der rant.
+++
Exactly Yen. I have noticed lately the headlines on ZH are distortions or lies.
If it is legal, how in the fuck is it fraud?
+1 for that.
GOOD FOR THEM..........
Cops, Soldiers, Firemen.... some of the biggest welfare queens there is.
Every wounded Vet should get $7,000 / month for life, plus the same medical treatment the POTUS gets.
Every non-wounded Vet should get same exact thing.
Anything else is cheating the vets'.
Cost of war does not end when war is over, it lasts for the remainder of the lives of those that faught it.
Spoken like a true triple dipper.
I would be inclined to agree with you if a vet was wounded defending New Orleans from an amphibious attack but when they work overseas for the benefit of private corporations, they should only be entitled to disability the same as a lineman for Con Edison or a welder for Devon Energy.
A carpenter may spend an entire career going no higher than a 6 foot stepladder but he also knows that any time he may be 200 feet up on an outdoor staging in winter sliding on icy walks.
Both have the possibility of being high risk careers. Just because one has a political element to it doesn't alter anything.
It's a job.
I find myself agreeing with you Shovelhead.
Used to be Triple dipping was about getting a retirement from military service or maybe railroad or maybe fireman... then you move to a state job, the post office, and get another retirement.
Triple Dipping here is a misnomer, or propaganda.
Anyway I have worked in an office where an old vet from Vietnam had 100% Disability, Went to the Gym everyday, Looked and walked and talked like anyone else, and spent valuable work time teaching veterans how to claim 100% disability from this military service retirement.
Makes me think.
If a guy is an American Mercenary, a Military Contractor, a Military Subcontractor (they don't have to pay FICA), or... even a guy that wants College Educational Benefits while pulling in Military Pay... It is a Job.
Joining the Military can be a Family Tradition or a Patriotic Act... But generally the military is a Job and it would not serve political purposes at all if it was a Draft.
Are you kidding? I live in a military town -- colorado springs -- and am sadly familiar with that "type."
1. The overwhelming majority of military sorts have desk jobs that require absolutely NO danger. Those jobs should be outsourced to civilians. The military people doing these jobs shouldn't be given rank, privileges, housing allowances, life-long medical/dental, retirement/pension, etc. They should be treated like any other private sector employee.
2. Those who are retiring from the military now were inducted in the early 1980s, a time when standards were incredibly low (a sizeable percentage of them were in the bottom fifth -- barely literate. Even the officers were of a quality below the typical college grad. The quality of the inductees has increased in the last few years, particularly at the bottom. Still, those who are retiring now with big titles surely don't merit them. "Grade inflation" is rampant in the military. "Kernels" are a dime a dozen. They promote them right before they "retire."
3. Speaking of promotions, I obliquely have had contact with a man who was a sexual harassment guy in Afganistan. He was given THREE metals for his work, there. Now, he's the sexual harassment guy at the military academy. Boy, it must have been really difficult to track down those Taliban ... no, white male harassers.
4. Why do we have a military academy anyway? The AF academy, here, is substandard. Kids get in on the basis of who they know, not ability, test scores, etc. Once in, the military academy weighs EQUALLY academics, physical stuff and military science: 1/3 for each. This allows dumb jocks, or suck-ups, to graduate knowing very little. But they rank high in the warped world of military "academe." Just have ROTC programs in all universities that are willing to offer them. We'll see, then, how the military grads compare to graduates from the better universities and colleges. And we'll be able to choose the brightest, not the ones with the brownest nose.
5. Mental illness is endemic among vets. One wonders how they were chosen in the first place.
6. The military self-selects for certain traits. I'm not sure those traits are the best traits to have. Perhaps we should bring back the draft? Make every kid do two years of service before college, Israel-like? Otherwise, we'll have a military that values deference over individual initiative, group-think over individuality, heirarchy over equality, etc.
7. I'm was a professor until quite recently when I quit to start a business. I had many recent vets in my classes. They were given educaztional vouchers. The vouchers are such that "sit classes" are twice as valuable as "online classes." So, they'd come to my "sit classes" -- their phrase -- so they could pocket twice the money. Just sickening. They were supposed to be training to get a job after the military. Seems to me that that's not the military's responsibility. By the way, I teach intellectual history and philosophy. Not exactly pragmatic subjects.
8. The vets who are wounded deserve ALL we can give them. And more. Much more. THey're the real soldiers.
In the Industry they know that outsourcing military jobs is 3 times as expensive.
Plus in government contracts you know they go up 3% every year minimum... where government jobs don't have to get inflated each year.
Not sure if you are a total Privatization advocate.
Military bases were congressionally mandated to go through BRAC Programs to privatize. Military bases have water, electric and other systems critical to war. Do you think corporate costs are less than government salaries???
No, Pubic Utilities were recognized in the Great Depression as vital to the public and that there cost must be kept down. So decide what commodities do you want to leave to Executives making more than $2 million a year in compensation?????
Base Realignment and Closure Commission for U.S. military bases
1988 Base Realignment and Closure Commission
1991 Base Realignment and Closure Commission
1993 Base Realignment and Closure Commission
1995 Base Realignment and Closure Commission
2005 Base Realignment and Closure Commission
----
Good response above. Sounds like good info.
I want to add that while government systems can protect workers and soldier... sort of like sovereign immunity for supervisors in government positions where they don't really get in trouble unless there is a capital crime.
I would add that we have Auditing Systems, Accounting Systems, and Inspection Systems in the government that match the banking system. They are well developed and very useful and very enforceable. So what is the problem with the USA and all of this false war? The leadership has determined not to enforce accounting, auditing, regulations, standards that were pre-2002, and not to have good inspections.
We can do it. We can fix the US Government & Military. We just need to use the old rules, the old standards, the old auditing, the old accounting.
Bunch of made up bullshit and lies.
You were a professor?
Quote
"7. I'm was a professor until quite recently when I quit to start a business."
You can't even write a sentence and you were a professor? You are a moron.
Look out for the intel guys. If you think congressional insider trading is bad...
Watch and learn.
Send the veterns is to do the bankers evil deeds, and string them up for gaming the game. Piss them off good, LoL, I'm all for it.
“it was only a matter of time before even veterans decided to dip”.
Or, maybe it was a case of ‘what’s good for the goose is good for the gander’.
The SS Admin has been cheating retired workers since around 1970; of course, this also includes those who EXPECT to receive retirement checks when they retire.
In fact, it is probably the grievance that impacts the largest number of Americans. There are some 50 million people now receiving retirement checks from the SSA. Each gets an adjustment on their amount each year based on the Consumer Price Index (CPI).
And here is the fraud: the CPI is currently reported as 2%; but according to its formula as of 1970, the CPI stands at 10%. This represents quite a lot of cheating on the part of the SSA.
If we were to correct for this fraud, how should it be done? Current options are, raise taxes, cut government expenses, or reduce retirement checks. Notably absent from this list is an investigation and recovery of $9-$11 Trillions that went missing from DoD, HUD and SSA.
This solution will favorably impact some 130 million Americans: 50 million private retirees, 60 million who work in the private sector (lower taxes, and, eventually, greater retirement checks) and probably another 20 million who are looking for work.
What I aim at here, is a tad bit more complicated and comprehensive than what I did before: the establishment and operation of a gold-based banking service. Here, I aim at nothing less than a re-establishment of ideals confirmed by the American Revolution, and immediately lost by lethargy and ignorance. The nation of America, as known today, is irretrievably lost (governmental debt is the means and measure of that loss). It is corrupt beyond recovery; after all, what less can be said about a nation that voluntarily, and ignorantly, allowed its following generations to be so badly used, as I have described many times in other places.
The vast majority of affected following generations are not even born yet; they had no voice in the transactions that doomed them to a birth without promise; no voice, that is, but ours.
So, perform your due diligence, and act accordingly. (Complete article)
Clesthenes; There is no other way to manage SS than to keep an inflation index very low. Social Security is a very big program, very expensive... if we had a true inflation index Social Security would get killed by Politicians.
The only way I could manage Social Security and the future of Social Security is pretty much to keep cost of living increases at the level that you see today. The program would collapse. Hawks would soar in to kill it and grab the scraps.
As it is we could trade a cold war or a hot war for $1 Trillion to save Social Security for our Elderly, Our Parents, for a Civil Society.
Redefining the CPI every few years and excluding or minimally including anything -- any asset, any commodity -- that increases in price is one way of silent screw-job theft of the peeples.
Thanks for your reply. However, there are several factors missing from your formula: the $9-$11 Trillion missing from DoD, HUD, and SSA (should we do nothing, and let criminal and useful-idiot classes perpetrate genocides and general plunders with impunity?); also missing, a concern for following generations of Americans (that is, our children and grandchildren; there is enough governmental debt on the books to cannibalize them to the end of time)
But, there is one thing that is certainly included in your formula: a kind regard for criminal and useful-idiot classes. I mean, when you let them perpetrate their crimes, what less can be said of your stance?
Uhm .... It is legal ... so NOT fraud!
Uhm .... I am sure if given a choice between having the use of your feet eyes and bodily functions or not having them and getting more money ... most folks would choose having a working body.
Uhm ... $ 3.5 billion is what the Pentagon spends EVERY FUCKNG DAY! (Yes the US military budget is more than a trillion a year when all the hidden items are added in ... or about $3.5 billion a day)
Uhm ... if you fight stupid costly wars you have to pay the price later to take care of the vets, not just the price now to enrich the defense contractors.
Stupid issue. ZH you can do better. Bring on some Russell Brand instead.
He retired THEN lost use of his feet. Most likely due to diabetes. One guy had renal failure, again most likely due to diabetes. A lot pf people don't take care of themselves. Most who served our country went on to work elsewhere and have the means to take care of themselves with health insurance or medicare after retiring from the private sector. A big part of the VA is serving the indigent population by keeping them on drugs and so forth. A lot of addicts and acoholics sitting in the lobby waiting for their drugs.
The VA if anything should be a benefits program and not a PLACE such as a hospital. Many vets travel past many hospitals on their way to a VA site.
Maybe... But think of all the money going some place in the Federal Budget. Many Agencies have all more than Doubled for no reason since 2002, GWB. Well except for VA Medical which only just doubled as of 2013. Very cheap when it comes to $1 Billion to fix data migration from US Services to VA Computers. Very cheap when it comes to medical care for Veterans. Let's look and ponder where the Federal Government, US Taxpayer Money, is going.
----
Total—Department of Veterans Affairs Outlays 2013 = $143.6 Billion
Total—Department of Veterans Affairs Outlays 2000 = $50.1 Billion
Total—Department of Veterans Affairs Outlays 1998 = $45.6 Billion
----
2013 VA Medical Care = $44.7 Billion
1999 VA Medical Care = $17.8 Billion
Obviously Government Budget serve some Elite Contractor or Directors that live large and spend without discipline. Why does the VA Grow 3 Times larger and yet... a story comes out that Veterans don't understand the benefits they are due and the Benefits they don't deserve??
Catch 22 is a book that exposed this in 1961. Catch-22 is a satirical novel by the American author Joseph Heller. He began writing it in 1953; the novel was first published in 1961.
We knew all we needed to know from the history of World War II. In fact harry Truman was involved in early investigation into War Department Contracts prior to World War II. He worked for FDR if memory serves.
The obvious solution is to raise the minimum wage and.............ROADS!
/sarc
ZH, please make sure you qualify "World Without Consequences." That is true only for the elite crime syndicate---you can be sure there will be consequences for these Veterans---they may get moved up on the extermination lists; the FEMA lists, whatever, but they will have consequences.
IT IS ONLY THE ELITE CRIME SYNDICATE that is above the law----us mere mortals never get away with anything---you can be sure of that! We are the crime syndicates SLAVES to be used and abused for their pleasure----DON'T EVER FORGET THAT. I know, people have accepted it as everyone has just thrown down their resistance and given up, but most people still "pretend" that they have freedom and resist the tyranny----it is all a mind game as most realize we are entering the endgame for humanity and freedom!
But I do see lots of homeless veterans on streets. They fought to make money for you, our coporate masters. While you take shameless corporate welfare in trillions without even paying any income tax, you have guts to turn around to blame those poor guys whose best hope was to get back in one piece? What a fucking joke this is!
Cliches 101:
2 wrongs do not make a right.
Personally, as an Agorist, I say milk the system for as much as you can. Do your part to crash the Ponzi.
Morality is nothing more than propaganda/social construct for keeping wage slaves docile and obedient so that the ruled can control themselves. There is no such a thing as good-vs-evil or right-vs-wrong. You are either a slave-owner or a slave. You either have or don't have. Is that simple?
hogs at the trough, piglets on the sow, as long as she's feedin, they be eatin......
Cant blame em, after all, they take their cue from the bankers
nm
Military do pay social security taxes. That started with Prez. Carter.
I am fine with this - I have gold and silver and food - and it just means the collapse will come that much sooner.
The problem has always been how to help those in need without allowing abuse. Government is not the answer.
I like SS, Medicare, Medicaid, and VA benefits.
Normally I think VA Disability displaces Military Retirement by a percentage... percent disability = percent retirement offset.
What I don't understand is how you compensate a person wounded in military service that did not retire. I think the have to decide on a kind of disability retirement. If you are a E-3 airman wounded with pay of $1000 a month, they have to look both at future medical costs, what he.she needs, and current pay... so maybe $700 a month military retirement on partial disability makes sense... but the current military pay seems less important as a factor.
Pre-2001 the Federal Auditing, Military System, Accounting System, Inspection System.... seemed to work.
- It is VERY Noteworthy that Baby boomers and those in Charge of the Federal Government were Ready to Retire.
- And wow Obama Retired many Senior Officers Recently
- You like Coincidences, Retirement is Strategic, Rome would be Proud of US Federal Government
What a PLAN!!
If you are a veteran who has a disability you get paid on the percentage of your disability. Rank is not a factor. A general gets paid the same as a private.
There is a thing called Medically Retired. You were retired for medical reasons. A guy down the street got it, he did 13 years. I am not sure of the regulations for that, but I am sure you could do a search and find out.
I knew a guy when I was in the 7th ID who was medically retired because he had cancer. The cancer went into remission and he was activated again and had to go back to the Infantry. He was a very unhealthy looking dude, like he was going to fall over at any moment. I don't know what happened to him because I was sent to Panama and never saw him again.
In an earlier post I pointed out how concurrent reciept works. I am not sure how it works for someone who retires and gets a disability rating now. However, I am sure you can search that too.
Off Topic:
Commenting on blogs is an addiction, an interesting but sometimes stressful thing if you take it seriously.
Send some commentators the bitch that bore him is normal-and commendably healthy, is good for the ego and leaves the soul washed Kkkkkkkkkkkkkkkk!
If you talk today to a German "slecken meinen Arsch" probably the guy does not understand shit but this curse was recurrent in Austria after WW I - my grandfather taught me that.
I could cite a lot of old expressions in Russian and French, with a few learned Partizan who killed a lot of Germans, he lived in Iguape-SP Brazil, the guy was married to a Bolivian and their son, Michel is still a great my friend has my age.
Could tell you about one of the Wermacht lieutenant, a priest of the Society of the Divine Word, a Roman Catholic Apostolic, a guy who told stories about insane IIWW he passed, his name was Bertholdo, Father Bertholdo, died two years ago on the Island Long-SP Brazil.
You guys have seen a Dutch priest? No?
Well, I met one guy had over two feet tall, was a guy who spoke when the walls were shaking, here is a video of it:
http://www.museudapessoa.net/pt/conteudo/pessoa/jan-van-der-heijden-padr...
With these people I grew up and lived.
There is another guy who would like to present to you an insane researcher, a guy who before had no empirical evidence that Monsanto's poisons were killing the world:
http://www.museudapessoa.net/pt/conteudo/historia/historia-de-vida-46558
Does anyone else here have a story to tell?
Toc Toc Toc ....
Nothing between the ears.
hehe.
The US military has become nothing but a bunch of green suited welfare queens. Half my unit redeploying from OIF were cheesing for disability. When my battle duddy told me how he is now retired and gets disability to the tune of $8K / mo I nearly puked like I had ebola. The firemen, policemen and soldiers are just like the blacks, illegals and welfare queens - FREE RIDERS.
Made up bullshit. Show me the pay chart that you can get 8K a month from the VA.
Will the person who red arrowed me show me the pay chart from the VA that allows $8K a month?
That shit is an outright lie. Fuck you red arrow. Facts are facts.
A 100% veteran with a dependent spouse and a child gets $3,134.32.
I just looked it up, the highest figure is for a veteran with a dependent spouse, two dependent parents and a child, it is $3,390.10; here is even more:
All other entries on this chart reflecting a rate for children show the rate payable for children under 18 or helpless. To find the amount payable to a 70% disabled Veteran with a spouse and four children, one of whom is over 18 and attending school, take the 70% rate for a veteran with a spouse and 3 children, $1,616.50, and add the rate for one school child, $179.05. The total amount payable is $1,795.55.
WHERE IN THE FUCK DO YOU SEE $8,000 A MONTH?????
How many of you guys live on $1,795.55 a month with a wife and three children? Most of you mutherfuckers have mortgage payments higher than that.
Most of us motherfuckers actually work so your point is moot. Minor detail, I know. You want a free ride, you take what you get and learn to live on it. Dumb, stupid animals shouldn't have gone into the military to begin with. Perfectly fine human beings becomming "disabled" by bankers' wars. Total insanity.
Moe, you are correct. However, there are ways to double down. There are programs like Homebound that pay a severely disabled vet more money. It starts at $341 per month but could be several thousand more per month. The program was designed to help offset spouses who would quit their jobs to stay home and take care of the severely disabled vets. Also, it reduced the need for the VA to send nursing care to a home. The VA says it saves them money. So, he could get anywhere from $2K (enlisted) to $5-6K (officer) for retirement, $3K disability, $3K homebound (very, very few get this), civil service retirement (?K), plus SS disability (1-2K). I can see how the rare few could get between $100-125K but can't see how anyone could get $210K. They would have to be severely handicapped and formerly very high ranking. Also one thing to point out, this MUST be SERVICE CONNECTED. A vet gets nothing for non-service connected injuries. Also, the VA has HIGH burdens of proof. Ask any vet, it's easy to get 20-30% disability but it's not easy to get 100% disability. The VA subdivides each additional disability by 50%. So, two 50% disabilities equal 75%, not 100%. The real issue here is getting double paid for disability (VA and social security). IMHO, even though vets paid into SS, they shouldn't get it because they're already being paid for their disability by the VA. Another issue is why should the government pay for someone to retire at age 40 from the military and then allow them to work 20 years in civil service and retire again? IMO, one can only retire from government service ONCE. I think this is the ONLY way someone can get up to those really high numbers in the article.
BTW, retirement is calculated at 2.5% of BASE pay per year. At 20 years, that'd equal 50%. This usually comes out to only 66% of ones pay (because other pay isn't included, like housing), then divided by 2. A retirees last 3 years of pay are averaged to further reduce their pay by 10-15%. As an example, if one makes $7K per month (all pay considered) when they retire their pay may be only $2500 per month. As a comparison, a New York Police Department cop gets all the overtime they can handle their last year of service then they get paid the rest of their life at that rate. I read about an NYPD cop who retired at 42 with $104K per year for life. Many municipalities have sweat heart deals like this across the US. Military retirement is a good deal for the tax payer.
This is yet more great news! Let the world burn and see what is left. These leeches will not be around. I welcome the reset!
Meanwhile, back at Camp Lejeune......
http://www.jdnews.com/news/military/mccs-to-experience-layoffs-reduction...
Lets parse this article, shall we?
Title: "MCCS to experience layoffs, reductions in services"
So, what kind of layoffs and services are reduced?
1. "Budget cuts include the elimination of free child care for parents attending training events or other family readiness events." (Who gets free child care anyway?)
2. Child care will see an "hourly price hike from $4 to $6 per hour." (Still not at free market rates.)
3. The "health and wellness program" will experience a reduction to the "fitness centers, recreation centers, theaters and community centers." (I suppose the marines will have to pay for their movies and gym membership like the rest of us).
4. "The varsity sports program will cease to exist and business operations such as hobby shops. marinas, clubs and golf courses..." will close. (Horrors!)
5. THe "auto body shop" will close and the "auto hobby shop" will increase its fee.
6. Nut quotes: Les Boone, a retired Marine Corps master gunnery sergeant, said he is not in favor of the changes that are underway but added that it does not surprise him.
“The military has been losing its benefits for years,” Boone said. “Slowly but surely it is being cut back, within the active-duty service members and also those things for retirees and their families.”
Boone, who frequents the French Creek Fitness Center on Camp Lejeune to play racquetball, said he wouldn’t be surprised if he eventually had to pay to use the racquetball courts at the center.
“It’s sad that generally speaking that the military men and women has to go out there … come back and has to pay for and get diminished recreation,” he said.
Parsing is always a good thing.
Maybe that's how the Marines work, but in the states in the Army all the bullshit either pays for itself via fees or is funded with the money made at the fucking PX. That's a fact. Most of the golf courses make a profit, if they don't they shut them down. The auto craft shop is self sustaining for example, it pays for itself through user fees and the staff does auto repairs and sells tires and parts.
Curious as to what demographic these vets fall into.
Are they like what you would see on Leave It to Beaver or they like what you would see on Cops?
You can be sure that if they are under 85 years old they are not Joos.
Dissability pay for service related injuries is a form of settlement and is tax free similar to someone being rewarded in a law suit for being injured (made whole). The idea is actualy good considering it is the efforts of our military who alow us to have freedoms (quasi-freedoms that is, although not entirely great as used to be but still not as bad as a third workd country). However, there are a lot of service men and woman who are getting dissability who never realy were injured while on duty and did'nt realy see any action who act like they did. They are the ones who are a fraud. I knew someone who claimed he was a vet but he never even left the country. He did'nt do shit! People like that are a discrace! That is not fair to the tax payer. Small fish compared to our goverment's waistful actions with the tax payers money though...
Dissability pay for service related injuries is a form of settlement and is tax free similar to someone being rewarded in a law suit for being injured (made whole). The idea is actualy good considering it is the efforts of our military who alow us to have freedoms (quasi-freedoms that is, although not entirely great as used to be but still not as bad as a third workd country). However, there are a lot of service men and woman who are getting dissability who never realy were injured while on duty and did'nt realy see any action who act like they did. They are the ones who are a fraud. I knew someone who claimed he was a vet but he never even left the country. He did'nt do shit! People like that are a discrace! That is not fair to the tax payer. Small fish compared to our goverment's waistful actions with the tax payers money though...
It's fine the chinese will pay for it.
Stop. Look. Listen. You call it fraud but admit its legal? You think vets would imagine that they could run this scam against computers? The system works this way. To use it as designed and then call it abuse is almost as obscene as the congress voting themselves pay raises and salary for life in 1991.
What would you do? $8 dollar clerk says, "system says I may I may not". How fucking stupid are you?
Make sure you grasp this. With the right tools its a no brainer to wipe out a swarm of ants. Its hard to select the ants you want to keep. What are you going to do, allow the ones who climbs the walls or risk the counter jump to live? You're all about to be taken care of by the Tall Orkin Man.
I'll take my crippled & terminal vets over your social engineer selected college draft, grotesque media personas and corporate management puppets any day. My vets have degrees too. Their experience granted you this opportunity just to speak.
Defy centralization of power. Freedom is key to survival.
Name an intentional abuse of the system for criminal gain, such as the 5 billion plus a year the IRS throws to the enemies of our republic every year. Get the facts from Gary Webb. Ask Danny Casolaro. Ask Colonel Jim Sabow. Ask Maxine Waters.
You can't put this off again.
Say it again, brother.
double post, my bad.
Get it straight - Nobody ever fought for my freedom or granted me the opportunity to speak because of their experience. THE BIGGEST LIE GOING. Wars are not fought to preserve freedom or protect any rights and if you think this you're very misguided. Maybe it helps you sleep at night but it ain't the truth.
Just bring back the draft. ZERO DEFERRALS. Rich, poor, Jew or Gentile......your ass goes to war the next time.
See what happens then.
During Viet Nam I knew Joo business men that could not only get you out of the draft, but could actually get you out of the Army if you had the cash. No bullshit, fact.
It was an awsome time to be a government employee or beneficiary for the last forty years. Going forward, not so much. These things always end the same way with anywhere from 30% to 50% reduction in benefits. And no, printing to infinity isnt going to happen. That is for reserve currencies which the US is no longer. China is the new reserve currency. It is amazing some of you after repeatedly being told are still debating "if or if not" it is yesterdays news.
Print to infinity now and you get a revolution, a real one where the military mashes the shit out of the politicians. They may be sociopaths but who said such are stupid? Most are brilliant, just self-serving and deep down petrified of the world so controllling others is the best method of protecting themselves and projecting their illness on others as the pain is hard to bear.
The banksters here are coming clean now. They got away with the heist, invested eastward and expanded real assets many fold. Even if governments ends the Fed which they just might to deflect blame, banksters know in ten or twenty years a new one will emerge. WW3 going off may change this as the entire remaining survivors will want to know who to blame but 1/3 of the population dying isn't worth people slowly waking up to the model in my opinion.
You vets signed up knowing the risks. Ya you got bamboozled but so did I in the private sector with the pseudo patriotic crap. I just was forced sooner to wake up not having the same kind of social safety net. So I don't condemn but I am not sorry this fascist bullshit is starting to come apart. NWO my ass! Nothing new about corruption and ends justifying the means. You are your brothers keeper whether you want to or not. In the end, some of you will also get a very rude but necessary awakening to this reality.
Narcolypsy was/is the big scam. My ex wing-CC used it to get 50% Tax Free retirement...
$3.5 bn equals to 1 day of QE.
so what is the point, the FED with the help of US Gov robbs every day the same amount, nobody cares and here they see a scandal?
People learn fast and here simply the veterans picked the practices of Wall Street, is there anything, what is immoroal, or illegal?
Not entirelly true. Congress left it up to the services to make the decision. The US Army maintained the one for one offset and keeps the difference in its operational funds.
Bullshit. The Army enacted Concurrent reciept, and the offset was removed at a rate of 10% per year.
In addition, there also was a program called CRDP, Combat Related Disability Program I think it stood for, if you are combat related they stopped the offset entirely for the whatever extent the disability rating was combat related.
So many lies, rumors, myths etc on this fucking subject. I know a guy, my nieghbor, my grandparents, but all the stuff is distorted like the post I am responding to. There is enough bad shit out there, let's discuss the FACTS rather than bullshit.
well well, all wee wee'd up over vets getting the .gov cheese..while every banker- pol- sec and doj corrupt pig feeds off the cream at that top. lets see savings and loan scandal hundreds went to jail, 2008 we got "no controlling legal authority " thank you al gore, (look it up)..
my view on this is tainted by my service in a war zone..humans make me ill but they can amaze as well..those that understood the military and I guess the government we live under did some great crimes (by law not morality)..found scams that most here would appreciate,, PX sargents making six figures, awol guy living large in saigon stealing us army vehicles and selling on black market, money traders selling green backs on black market, gold dealing, drugs ..but the really smart ones ran the px's...I am contacting a screen writer in hollyweird about this ..it is as american as apple pie..
take everything you can," they" will just bleed you of it anyway. dumb was I who did not understand the game in nam until very late.
Just find the 2.3 TRILLION that Rumsfeld's Pentagon "lost" on sept 10, 2001 and we won't worry about these peanuts spent on our warriors! Oh wait! those accounting records just happened to be in the part of the pentagon that the missile struck...
Goldman, JPM and the rest of banksters recieved 100's of billions in taxpayer bailouts compared to this small amout.
Everyone is doing fraud now. They see the big boys stealing 100's of billions and getting away with it. Our department of just-us looks the other way if your a billionaire bankster.
well.... not condoning these fraudsters...... but it takes two to tango....
meaning....
what kind of BLIND & STUPID bureaucrazy pays out these "benefits" without checking you are not screwing up ?
as guilty as the fraudsters.... are the lazy SOB's sitting in their arses just paying out bills as if they were delivering candy to children....
fucking morons (and fucking thieves too)