[congressionalshuffle]A promise is a promise, unless it becomes inconvenient.[/congressionalshuffle]

Bastard. I hope his constituents vote him out of office.

Quoted: Quoted: Quoted: Quoted: Quoted: Here's my take on it: snip for brevity I respect their sacrifice, but weren't they fighting for their own country as well ? Why doesn't their own government pay it's own citizens ?  To me this is like paying French resistance fighters a pension out of USA tax money. I guess it's a nice gesture but why are we paying for it now ? You need to learn American/Philippine history. I know they kicked us out and shut down our basing rights in the 90's, what else am I missing ? They must be made of money to do that. Why can't their own .gov compensate them ? You are being obtuse or else trolling. Let me make it easy for you. i13.tinypic.com/2dmcsxl.jpg We kicked the Spanish out of the Philippines in August of 1898, at that point until 1946 the Philippines was an American colony.

Yes there was fighting between the Americans and the Spaniards ... but actually the US back then bought my country for something like 20 million dollars along with some other SPanish colonies that was agreed upon by the two nations at the Treaty of Paris.

The reason for handing over the Philippines was more of monetary than of a assbeating

I'am bit hazy on the facts because it has been a long time since my history class...

/* brings out shovel to dig under the stairs for history book*/

Quoted: Quoted: Here's my take on it: snip for brevity I respect their sacrifice, but weren't they fighting for their own country as well ? Why doesn't their own government pay it's own citizens ?  To me this is like paying French resistance fighters a pension out of USA tax money. I guess it's a nice gesture but why are we paying for it now ?

History Lesson:
From 1899 to 1946, the US owned the Phillipines as a commonwealth, like Puerto Rico, or the Virgin Islands today.  Philipinos serving in the US armed forces were therefore actual US GIs.

So as with any stateside WWII vet, the Philipine Scouts 4 years of bloody guerrila war against the Japanese does earn them the recognition and reward for their sacrifice!

Quoted: Quoted: Quoted: Quoted: Why the hell don't they take a little money away from the fucking couch welfare queens instead. Why these politicians choose to ignore this is beyond me. I guess sacrificing WWII vets' pensions instead would hurt their political careers less. Nonetheless, this bill is nothing short of betraying our allies after the sacrifices they've made. The politicians should've taken money from a useless agency instead but I guess not... You can buy votes from welfare queens. Keep the checks coming and they'll vote for you every time. Generally speaking, the same cannot be said for veterans. We vote for whoever we think is best for the job and, quite often, it isn't Daddy Warbucks(D). One of the worst things about welfare is that the .gov rewards the welfare queens with more money for every child they have, perpetuating this horrible cycle that will drain more money out of our coffers. They should not be giving any financial incentives for having more children, but rather having less or none. But obviously this is too logical for any politician looking for a way to get more votes.

It people farming for votes been going on for a long time now

Considering the US basically owned the Philippines following the Treaty of Paris, for all practical purposes, Filipino soldiers were US soldiers, and should receive the same benefits. It's only fair.

The Spanish-American War was a low point in our history. The only time when we were truly imperialistic in the classic sense of the word.

Quoted: Considering the US basically owned the Philippines following the Treaty of Paris, for all practical purposes, Filipino soldiers were US soldiers, and should receive the same benefits. It's only fair. The Spanish-American War was a low point in our history. The only time when we were truly imperialistic in the classic sense of the word.

That's the past, people need to move on, US did alot of good things in the Philippines . most Pilipino are pro US specially the old Folks.


mmmm...white women

Reid pushes for vote on Filipino vets bill

By Rick Maze - Staff writer
Posted : Friday Apr 18, 2008 11:39:39 EDT
 
A 10-month stalemate over a major veterans’ benefits bill will come to a head Tuesday with a procedural vote in the Senate to take up a controversial measure: providing pensions to Filipino veterans who served with American troops in World War II by cutting benefits for other U.S. veterans.

The Veterans’ Benefits Enhancement Act of 2007 was approved by the Senate Veterans’ Affairs Committee on June 29 but has never been taken up by the full Senate because of objections to the proposed benefits for Filipino Scouts.

Tired of waiting, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., on Thursday night filed a cloture petition — a move to place a time limit on the consideration of a bill — that would end the standoff. A vote to invoke cloture, which will come at noon Tuesday, requires 60 votes to pass.

“I am disappointed that I need to file this,” Reid said as he made the motion, reminding senators that the fight was over a bill that included many improvements in veterans’ benefits, especially for those who served in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Reid said he tried to reach a deal with Republicans on bringing up the bill but did not get any response.

He said Friday that he is surprised that in the middle of a war, with more wounded troops returning home every day, the Senate couldn’t agree to even debate a veterans’ benefits bill.

“I would hope that we would be allowed to get 60 votes to proceed on this,” Reid said. “You would think there would be nine Republicans caring enough to allow us to go forward on this most important issue.”

The Senate has 49 Democrats, 49 Republicans and two independents.

If the Senate approves the cloture motion, a final vote on the bill would come after no more than 30 hours of debate, with each senator limited to talking no more than one hour during that time, and with a restriction on when and how amendments could be offered. Any of those limits could be altered by another vote.

Reid said anyone who doesn’t like parts of the bill could offer an amendment to change it.

The battle over the bill involves the proposed creation of pensions for Filipino veterans living outside the U.S. who served alongside U.S. troops in World War II. Under the bill, these veterans would receive up to $4,500 a year if married and $3,600 if single.

“We have been trying for many, many decades to extend benefits to them,” Reid said.

To pay for those pensions, the bill proposes to restrict special monthly pensions that have been provided to poor U.S. veterans with disabilities not directly related to military service — in effect, taking money from one group of veterans to give to another.

The fight over the bill is not limited to the Senate. The House of Representatives has similar problems with its version of a 2007 veterans’ benefits bill that has been tied up because of Republican opposition to the Filipino veterans’ pensions.

The House bill, HR 760, passed the House Veterans’ Affairs Committee on July 17 in a contentious session where Republicans complained they were denied the opportunity to offer amendments. The bill has been stalled ever since.

Sen. Richard Burr of North Carolina, ranking Republican on the Veterans’ Affairs Committee, proposed a compromise in February to provide smaller pensions for Filipinos. The money saved by reducing the pensions would have been spent on increases in benefits for Iraq and Afghanistan veterans.

Sen. Daniel Akaka, D-Hawaii, the veterans’ committee chairman, rejected the offer.

The benefits bill includes far more than the Filipino pensions. It also includes:

* A change in the Servicemembers’ Civil Relief Act to allow those called to active duty for 90 days or more to cancel or suspend cell phone contracts without penalty, and prohibit reactivation fees when they try to restore their phone service.

* A retroactive change in traumatic injury insurance coverage to cover injuries sustained between Oct. 7, 2001, and Dec. 1, 2005, that were not incurred as part of military operations in Iraq or Afghanistan. This would fix a disparity in coverage created when the temporary traumatic injury insurance program was made permanent in 2005.

* Insurance-related provisions making members of the Individual Ready Reserve eligible for Servicemembers’ Group Life Insurance; raising supplemental life insurance for totally disabled veterans to $30,000; and allowing traumatic injury insurance payments to be paid to a designated recipient when a service member is mentally incapacitated or is unconscious for an extended period.

* Improvements in burial benefits, such as a provision for a supplemental burial benefit of $900 for a death not related to military service and $2,100 for a service-connected death, as well as a supplemental burial plot allowance of $445.