National Defense Authorization Act For Fiscal Year 2008

Floor Speech

NATIONAL DEFENSE AUTHORIZATION ACT FOR FISCAL YEAR 2008 -- (Senate - July 12, 2007)

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Mrs. MURRAY. Madam President, it is an honor to me to be here today to speak about the amendment that is currently before the Senate, the Dignified Treatment of Wounded Warriors Act. This is a critically important amendment for the Senate and a critically important action for Congress and for the United States of America in finally making sure that we take care of those who have served this country so honorably, the men and women who are serving us overseas.

Madam President, 4 1/2 years ago, the President asked Congress to go to war in Iraq. I stood on this floor as one of a handful of Senators, 23 of us who, at that time, said no. I said no because I didn't believe we had a clear mission. I didn't believe we should take our eye off the ball of the war on terror and the al-Qaida threat that was confronting our Nation, and I believed we did not have in place a long-term plan for military action in Iraq. I have never regretted that vote.

But when I spoke on the floor opposing the action of the President, I said once our troops were sent to war, no matter how we voted on it, it was our responsibility to make sure we took care of them when they came home. This country has failed to do that.

I had to sit out here on the Senate floor and fight, literally, vote after vote to get this Senate to pay attention to the fact that we had men and women coming home, waiting in long lines to get their VA benefits, who were not able to get an appointment to see a doctor, who were unemployed, who were being sent back to the front time and time again, whose families were falling through the cracks because of the long deployments, and that we had military facilities that were incapable of dealing with the thousands of men and women who were coming home and who were injured.

Today, finally, we are coming to a point where, through the hard work of our VA Committee, Armed Services, and others, we have brought to the Senate a bipartisan amendment that I hope passes overwhelmingly this afternoon, that begins to address the critical needs which our soldiers are facing.

Since this war began 4 1/2 years ago, I have taken the time to stop and talk to our men and women when they have come home. I have seen the tears in their eyes as they wait on medical hold not for days, not for months, but for more than a year, fighting the very service they swore to serve, to get their benefits. They were given ratings that were far too low in order to keep them in the military rather than allowing them to get out and get on with their lives. I have talked to men and women on medical hold, who were trying to get through a complex system of ratings for help, whose advocates themselves, advocates to help them get through the system, were soldiers who had post-traumatic stress syndrome and had difficulty themselves dealing with their own lives, let alone advocating for a servicemember who is trying to get through a complex system.

I have talked personally to men and women who, after not once, not twice, but maybe dozens, if not more than 100 times, being close to explosives, came home and couldn't understand why they couldn't remember their children's names or where they put their car keys or even where they lived because they had traumatic brain injury, but no one had diagnosed it correctly.

I have talked to too many parents and spouses and family members who have told me horrific stories of their very proud servicemember who has come home, left the service, and been left at home medically dealing themselves drugs because they have post-traumatic stress syndrome and no one had taken the time to find them or their family to educate them about the services they need.

When we agree to this legislation, this amendment today, we will finally have taken a very direct step in helping the men and women who have served this country so honorably.

Madam President, 4 1/2 years ago, when the President asked us to go to war in Iraq, he talked about weapons of mass destruction, he talked about al-Qaida, he talked about the mission to fight the war on terror--but what he has never talked about, in my opinion, is taking care of those men and women who have served us honorably. Today, the Senate is going to talk about those men and women who have served us and what we need to do for them.

Several months ago, Bob Woodruff presented an amazing television series to us about traumatic brain injury and its impact on men and women as they make their way through medical hold and finally go out and get into communities and are lost in the system. Traumatic brain injury is not something that can be treated today and you are fine tomorrow. It is a lifelong, debilitating injury. We do not have out in the country today the capability of making sure those men and women are not lost.

We have seen too many times, when men and women who have post-traumatic stress syndrome can't keep a job, and they find themselves at home and, tragically, cases of suicide because of that.

We have to address the costs and the issues that face our men and women, and proudly stand here and make sure we are doing everything we can. This year, with the Democratically controlled majority, we have finally moved forward for the first time to put in place a strong budget to take care of our veterans. We have finally, for the first time when we passed the supplemental war spending, actually added dollars to care for our veterans.

Today the step we are taking has more to do with the policies these men and women fight when they come home. They are in a system in the service that rates them one way, and when they finally get discharged, they go through a veterans system that rates them in an entirely different way. The two systems do not talk to each other. They do not electronically talk to each other. Soldiers lose their medical forms. They are fighting systems. They can't get the benefits they deserve because they are fighting paperwork.

No one should fight for our country overseas and come home and have to fight paperwork. That is what this amendment will do, is make sure, finally, that the VA and the DOD speak in the same language and treat these men and women as a single person and not just a pile of paperwork.

This amendment has teeth. It will require the Department of Defense and the Department of Veterans Affairs for the very first time to come back to us by January 1 of next year with a series of comprehensive policies that will make sure our rating systems are the same; that their electronic systems that track our men and women speak to each other; that no one gets lost because their advocate is dealing with his or her own health care issues. It will make sure we can go back with pride to the men and women who have served us and say we have made a tremendous effort for them.

We have seen partisan battles through many years on the floor of the Senate. Today we are going to see a time when we come together as Republicans and Democrats to say there is one group of Americans who deserve us to speak with one voice, and that is the men and women who have served us. Regardless of how we feel about this war, regardless of how we want to end it--I want to end it more than anyone--I want to make sure the men and women who served us are taken care of. This amendment makes a dramatic step forward.

I think it is important to know, even if we were able to get enough votes to end this war today, the men and women who have served us will need our help and our support and our dollars for years to come--whether they have lost a limb, whether they have traumatic brain injury, whether they have post-traumatic stress syndrome. They have borne the burden of this war. It is incumbent upon this country to bear the burden of their care. This amendment takes a major step forward, and I hope today we have 100 percent of the Senators on the floor saying yes to the men and women who served us so honorably.

I yield the floor.

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