Watching the multi-million dollar military parades across America on Veterans Day, I couldn’t help wonder why some of the money spent on the parades and celebrations honoring the fallen — along with some of the billions of dollars in military aid given to foreign countries — can’t be spent on the veterans living on the street who are jobless and homeless?
Many veterans are forgotten war heroes who have served their country selflessly and are now abandoned and forgotten.
We should honor soldiers who have made the ultimate sacrifice for America. But what about those who served their country and are barely surviving on the streets of America — jobless and homeless?
The scandals at the VA hospitals have been exposed and are being addressed. But what about the scandalous abandonment of the jobless and homeless veterans on the streets of America?
Surely the Departments of Defense and Veteran Affairs can allocate a few billion dollars to house and find jobs for these selfless-helpless warriors?
With Thanksgiving fast approaching, I couldn’t help remember my book talks to Rotary Clubs in Ventura County in 2012. A portion of the proceeds from my book sales went towards their fund raising activities to buy turkeys and Thanksgiving meals and toys for the wives and families of soldiers serving in Iraq and Afghanistan who were homeless and sleeping in cars, along with jobless and homeless veterans outside Port Hueneme. I was shocked!
It is inexcusable for a country as rich as America with a 2019 Department of Defense discretionary budget of $686.1 billion to leave veterans jobless and living in squalor on the streets.
There are numerous charities working with veterans to address physical and mental traumas of war, joblessness and homelessness.
Why aren’t all these charities put under one umbrella and given the funds necessary to employ and house veterans by the government’s Departments of Defense and Veterans Affairs?
The military cry “No soldier left behind” has to be expanded to today’s plight of veterans and add:
“No veteran left jobless or homeless.”