Veterans Groups Rip Into Sen. Richard Burr For Questioning Their Priorities
A highly bitter war of words has broken out between veterans organizations and the ranking member of the Senate Committee on Veterans Affairs amid the brewing controversy over health care for former servicemen and servicewomen.
Late Friday afternoon before the Memorial Day weekend, Sen. Richard Burr (R-N.C.) penned an “open letter to America’s Veterans” in which he took several veterans service groups to task for being insufficiently critical of Veterans Affairs Secretary Eric Shinseki.
Burr accused the groups (with the exception of the American Legion) of being more invested in maintaining access to the secretary than with fixing a troubled health care system. He questioned why they haven't called for a leadership change at the VA, and pointedly charged the groups’ leaders with not caring about the health and well-being of their members.
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In their own letter, Veterans of Foreign Wars responded to Burr by calling his letter a “monumental cheap-shot” and labeling it “one of the most dishonorable and grossly inappropriate acts that we’ve witnessed in more than forty years of involvement with the veteran community.” If the tone wasn’t clear, the group added that Burr’s conduct and allegations were “ugly and mean-spirited in every sense of the words and profoundly wrong, both logically and morally,” in addition to breaching “the standards of the United States Senate.”
Letter at link
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/05/25/richard-burr-veterans_n_5389296.html?1401037320
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