Okay, I’ve been pretty well behaved for awhile, so I figure that’s about enough of that. So…

Why I am so opposed to President Bush, Part I.

There are a lot of reasons why I don’t like Bush, but the list starts at the way our troops have been treated by the current administration. I don’t want to get into the right or wrong of our actions in Iraq, that is the past and there is nothing that can be done about it now, what concerns me now is the cavalier manner with which the health, safety, and lives of our soldiers have been treated.

Let me give some examples:

We can look at pay rates for soldiers, including imminent-danger pay, the way Bush did not extend tax cuts to low-income military personnel, and the funding for programs for soldiers families.

“The White House griped that various pay-and-benefits incentives added to the 2004 defense budget by Congress are wasteful and unnecessary — including a modest proposal to double the $6,000 gratuity paid to families of troops who die on active duty. This comes at a time when Americans continue to die in Iraq at a rate of about one a day.
Similarly, the administration announced that on Oct. 1 it wants to roll back recent modest increases in monthly imminent-danger pay (from $225 to $150) and family-separation allowance (from $250 to $100) for troops getting shot at in combat zones.
The chintz even extends to basic pay. While Bush’s proposed 2004 defense budget would continue higher targeted raises for some ranks, he also proposed capping raises for E-1s, E-2s and O-1s at 2 percent, well below the average raise of 4.1 percent.”
from the Army Times (July 02, 2003)

“Bush’s signature on the latest tax cut…failed to extend a child tax credit to nearly 200,000 low-income military personnel; a $1.5 billion reduction in his 2004 budget, to $9.2 billion from $10.7 billion, for military housing and the like; and a cut of $14.6 billion over 10 years in benefits paid through the Veterans Administration.”
from the Wasthington Post (June 17, 2003)

“Commissaries and the Defense Department’s stateside schools are in the crosshairs of Pentagon budget cutters…The two initiatives are the latest in a string of actions by the Bush administration to cut or hold down growth in pay and benefits, including basic pay, combat pay, health-care benefits and the death gratuity paid to survivors of troops who die on active duty.”
from the Army Times (November 03, 2003)

Then there is the outfitting of troops who are in harm’s way in Iraq. Througout the war, the pictures that came back from Iraq showed soldiers dressed not in desert fatigues, but in the green jungle fatigues. And it wasn’t just one or two soldiers, but a high precentage. (This you can easily check for yourself by going to any on-line news source and looking at war pictures from March and April.). More seriously however, is the lack of armor, a problem that continue even now.

Lack of uniforms and armor I have mentioned before, but concern about lack of armor extends even to the House.

“Army Reserve and National Guard troops getting shot at in Iraq sometimes wait for new bulletproof body armor while active duty Army soldiers get it first, according to Reserve and Guard soldiers.”
from The Washington Times (Dec 3, 2003)

“The Pentagon confirms that at least 40,000 of the 130,000 U.S. troops in Iraq don’t have basic Kevlar Interceptor vests or the ceramic plates needed for full protection.”
from USA Today (2003)

Then there is the issue of troops, especially Reserve and National Guard troops, being kept away from home for so long. Yes, one can argue that regular troops and ever reservists should have known what they are signing up for, but I do not think that the same argument can be extended to National Guard troops. The National Guard is the group that helps states recover from flooding, and snowstorms, and wild fires, and that is precisely the association that civilians have of those troops–they help us during disasters. I would never have expected National Guard troops to be sent overseas for a year, but I suppose that could just be naivate on my part.

Senator Byrd has spoken on the issue of National Guard being kept overseas for extended periods of time and the treatement of those troops.

The point is that US troops are dying, they are sacrificing their lives for their country, there have been around 9000 soldiers wounded in Iraq, but our country does not seem to be giving our troops anything beyond flag waving, yellow ribbons, and “support our troops” signs. If we really supported our troops, we’d pay them better, bring home the National Guard Troops, stop cutting funding for base schools and comisaries, and increase Veteran’s benefits.