GOP Senators block passage of act to provide benefits to toxic-exposed veterans

[T master]

On 7/28/2022 at 1:58 PM, ChiGoose said:

From Military Times:

 

"The Promise to Address Comprehensive Toxics Act — better known as the PACT Act — had been up for a procedural vote in the chamber with an expectation of final passage before the end of the week.

 

The measure is the culmination of years of work by advocates to improve health care and benefits for veterans suffering injuries from burn pit smoke, Agent Orange spraying and other military contaminant exposure. It has been widely celebrated as a potential landmark legislative victory in veterans policy.

 

The measure passed the Senate by a comfortable 84-14 vote in early June, and by a 342-88 vote in the House two weeks ago with significant Republican support.

But on Wednesday, after technical corrections sent the measure back to the Senate for another procedural vote, 41 Senate Republicans blocked the measure, leaving its future uncertain."

 

The bill was good enough for the GOP last month, but suddenly providing benefits to our veteran's is no longer acceptable.

 

This is not surprising from any party in the US gov't i watched a documentary a year ago that was very disturbing in many ways that was filled with information of just how corrupt this subject is if you want to know why this will continually be voted down by either democrats or Republicans watch this documentary .

 

After the veterans agree'd to get the settlement all documents & further laws suits could not be taken up for this cause which is so wrong for all that were effected by this & still are today because it is still being used right here in the US as we speak & Carol Van Strum has the papers to prove it she has been following it since Viet nam .

 

 

[ChiGoose]

Has anyone been able to find the actual changes in the text between the two versions of the bill?

 

I pulled the text from HR 3967 from June and S. 3373 with amendments and I only found one material change, which was removing the following language:

 

"(e) Not A Taxable Benefit.—A contract buy out for a covered health care professional under subsection (a) shall not be considered a taxable benefit or event for the covered health care professional."

 

I can't believe that is the only change, and with different versions of the the same bill out there, I may have pulled the wrong versions. Does anyone have the specific text that was changed / challenged?

[L Ron Burgundy]

On 8/2/2022 at 6:30 PM, Demongyz said:

What was the sentence before and after it changed?

Turned out it was just 1 sentence removed,  nothing was changed.

 

It was 100% political theater from the right.  They lied and people blindly believed them.  

 

Stewart said, and this sounds very plausible,  that Toomey pushed for the rest of his pals to block this under false pretenses and now they're pissed at him because of the blowback.

[Demongyz]

6 minutes ago, L Ron Burgundy said:

Turned out it was just 1 sentence removed,  nothing was changed.

 

It was 100% political theater from the right.  They lied and people blindly believed them.  

 

Stewart said, and this sounds very plausible,  that Toomey pushed for the rest of his pals to block this under false pretenses and now they're pissed at him because of the blowback.

As I understand it, the funds were not earmarked for only helping vets, it's $400,000,000,000.  That's a ton of money for sick vets or for whatever they want to spend it on.  If they could just write a bill that does only what they claim, and the Republicans fight it, I'm on their side.  If they are looking to dump a bunch of money on stuff that is completely unrelated under the guise of helping vets, I'm siding with the Republicans. 

I'm just of the opinion they are doing the latter, because that's all Washington ever does.

[ChiGoose]

54 minutes ago, Demongyz said:

As I understand it, the funds were not earmarked for only helping vets, it's $400,000,000,000.  That's a ton of money for sick vets or for whatever they want to spend it on.  If they could just write a bill that does only what they claim, and the Republicans fight it, I'm on their side.  If they are looking to dump a bunch of money on stuff that is completely unrelated under the guise of helping vets, I'm siding with the Republicans. 

I'm just of the opinion they are doing the latter, because that's all Washington ever does.

 

Is there any evidence for this? The text of the bills are public. Did anyone point to where in the text this was?

[Gene Frenkle]

10 minutes ago, ChiGoose said:

 

Is there any evidence for this? The text of the bills are public. Did anyone point to where in the text this was?

 

If there were, the right would be all over it using it as an excuse. The silence is deafening.

[Over 29 years of fanhood]

33 minutes ago, ChiGoose said:

 

Is there any evidence for this? The text of the bills are public. Did anyone point to where in the text this was?

It’s right there in the CBO estimate I posted up thread and referenced several times. 

[ChiGoose]

54 minutes ago, Over 29 years of fanhood said:

It’s right there in the CBO estimate I posted up thread and referenced several times. 

 

I looked through that and I definitely could be reading it wrong, but wasn't that dollar amount in the version passed by the senate in June?

[Over 29 years of fanhood]

1 hour ago, ChiGoose said:

 

I looked through that and I definitely could be reading it wrong, but wasn't that dollar amount in the version passed by the senate in June?

I don’t think so it was 698 billion I think. The280 and then the other 400B people are talking about.

 

Maybe I misread it. 

Edited August 4, 2022 by Over 29 years of fanhood

[ChiGoose]

7 minutes ago, Over 29 years of fanhood said:

I don’t think so it was 698 billion I think. The280 and then the other 400B people are talking about.

 

Maybe I misread it. 

 

Yeah, that's what I'm trying to figure out. I would not be surprised if there was pork in the bill, but was the pork in there when it passed the senate with 80+ votes or was it added after?

 

I pulled the text from (what I believe to be) both versions of the bill and ran a compare on them and found the only difference to be a removal of a single line about taxation of benefits. Which doesn't seem to be a giant slush fund thingy.

 

However, I am willing to admit I'm wrong. I could have pulled the wrong versions of the text. Or maybe I don't understand the implications of that sentence because I am most certainly not a tax expert. I just wish that the people complaining about how it changed would point to the specific language that changed.

 

I appreciate you providing insight and evidence into this conversation.

[Over 29 years of fanhood]

9 minutes ago, ChiGoose said:

 

Yeah, that's what I'm trying to figure out. I would not be surprised if there was pork in the bill, but was the pork in there when it passed the senate with 80+ votes or was it added after?

 

I pulled the text from (what I believe to be) both versions of the bill and ran a compare on them and found the only difference to be a removal of a single line about taxation of benefits. Which doesn't seem to be a giant slush fund thingy.

 

However, I am willing to admit I'm wrong. I could have pulled the wrong versions of the text. Or maybe I don't understand the implications of that sentence because I am most certainly not a tax expert. I just wish that the people complaining about how it changed would point to the specific language that changed.

 

I appreciate you providing insight and evidence into this conversation.

There’s alway pork and both sides are guilty. I can’t imagine anyone not expecting blowback from pushing back… but I understand the lead objector isn’t running again. Maybe this was his last Nobel stand for some thing he eventually caved to etc. 

 

hard to see the facts through all the spin agendas and half truths. Maybe I’m wrong here but it looked like the senate bill didn’t get into money but the house bill did. 

[BillStime]

Another GQP doozy 

 

 

[BillStime]

Happy Veterans Day!