VA FUNDING CRISIS: A Veterans Perspective

➡ The U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) is facing a financial crisis, lacking funds to fulfill its obligations such as building new clinics, hiring staff, and issuing payments for veterans’ disability benefits, education benefits, and caregivers. The VA has requested additional funds from the government, but this has raised questions about the department’s financial management. The situation has led to the approval of a $3 billion budget stopgap to prevent delays in delivering some veteran benefits checks. However, the VA is expected to explain the reasons behind its budget shortfall and is projected to fall $12 billion short for the fiscal year 2025.
➡ The VA leaders warned that without emergency funds approved by Congress by September 20, there could be delays in education support and monthly disability payouts for veterans. This situation arose due to a budget shortfall caused by record high benefit approvals and medical services usage, largely due to the PACT Act. The PACT Act, signed into law in 2022, expanded eligibility for services to veterans who suffered toxic exposure injuries. However, the accelerated implementation of the Act led to unexpected budget pressures, potentially affecting the most vulnerable veterans and survivors.
➡ The speaker discusses the struggles faced by veterans, particularly in relation to the VA (Veterans Affairs) not fulfilling its promises. They express frustration at the government’s lack of support for veterans, comparing it to a car dealership not accepting late payments. The speaker also mentions the Stu Crew, a subscription service offering premium content and giveaways. They then discuss a trip to Northern Europe, where they found that veterans were treated with respect and well cared for by their governments, contrasting this with the situation in the U.S.
➡ The article discusses concerns about the treatment of veterans in the United States, particularly regarding their benefits. The author criticizes the government’s handling of veterans’ affairs, including budgeting errors and a lack of accountability. They also mention proposals to address these issues, such as withholding bonuses from senior VA executives and reallocating funds from other departments. However, the author expresses skepticism about these solutions and emphasizes the need for more substantial changes to support veterans.
➡ Veterans, despite the hardships they face, are survivors who will always find a way to cope. However, it would be better if those in power, who often don’t understand the realities of military life, could provide more support. Additionally, the speaker criticizes the simplified and misleading version of history we’re often taught, suggesting that powerful families like the Rockefellers and Rothschilds are over-credited for human development, and that we might be living on the remnants of a hidden advanced civilization.

That the VA reported that it’s going to come up short, come up short on its financial obligations. Would you be surprised? Well, they did do that. Today. We’re going to have a little bit of a conversation. I’m going to try to dive into this thing the best I can and try to refrain, try to refrain from being jaded and cynical about the whole thing. But the fact of the matter is that if it’s not one thing, it’s the other. And I think that we know that. I think we’ve seen that over and over again from the Department of Veterans affairs.

So stick with us. Don’t go away. We start now. Hey, everybody. And welcome here to another installment of the Richard Leonard show. As always, I want to say thank you. Thank you for being here. Thank you for joining us. Me and everybody here in the studio, we all appreciate your participation. Just the watches and the clicks and the comments, they do a lot. They do a lot for telling us that we’re doing a good job or maybe we’re not at times. Anyway, before I get started, let me tell you about how the show is made possible.

And that’s Cortes wealth management. Get on over there. Get on over to americafirstretirementplan.com. sign up for our webinar. They happen on Tuesday and Thursdays at 07:00 p.m. eastern Standard Time. Carlos Cortez and his staff want to help you and anybody close to you plan and execute a tax free retirement plan. So check them out. Americafirstretirementplan.com. go through the webinar if you have any comments, questions or concerns. When it’s over, don’t worry. Carlos and his staff are there to help you reach out. Talk to them. They are there for you. They want to help you with this.

So again, America first retirement plan.com. get on over there and check it out. Okay. So the United States Department of Veterans affairs and some of you may know this, you may have seen this, or this may be something that is potentially going to affect you around 911. The VA came out and said, hey, big daddy government, we need money. We need money because we’re short. And not only are they short money to do things like build new clinics, remodel clinics, build parking structures, hire people, things of that nature. They’re short on money to issue direct deposit payments to veterans for their disability benefits.

They’re short on money to make sure that the money promised to go out for veterans education benefits through the VA. So 911 Post 911 GI Bill stuff, education benefits we’re short on that. So those might not get paid in October or they’ll be greatly delayed. The VA is short on money to issue payments to caregivers. Caregivers are a very special group. To me, the caregivers are a group of people, whether they be wives, husbands, sons, daughters, friends of the family, whoever that have chosen to make their job the care of a veteran, whether it’s their spouse or their child or their parent, their friend, whatever it is.

So now we’re going to be short on paying those folks, too. If you’ve watched the show with any regularity, especially if you’ve been with us for some time, you will remember that I had Robin Stitt on the show for a good, what, seven or eight weeks? And we talked about how the VA was purging out caregivers. They were going to restructure what the qualifications were for these folks, and they were going to purge them out. And the VA’s answer to them was, well, maybe your veteran is going to have to go to an adult daycare while you go to work.

Just didn’t sit right with us. So Robin, God bless her, she did a whole ton of work. She did a great job on this show, talking about how this all was supposed to work, what it all was supposed to look like versus how it’s actually working and what it actually looks like, and what the people who claim that they’re there to assist, we’re here to take care of you. We’re here to help. What those people were actually doing, they were off skiing, they were off holding dinner parties. They were doing all kinds of stuff. All the while, these families who are struggling, struggling to put food on the table already, we’re trying to just figure out how to make it to the next day.

So now, now, because we have more veterans in this country than we’ve ever had after the longest war in our country’s history, we have a huge influx of veterans, and we’re gonna, we’re gonna go through an article I found here. It’ll explain a little bit more about why that is, and, but we’ll stop and we’ll pause to talk about different sections of this. But at the end of the day, it seems to me that the VA has prepared or has failed to prepare. They failed to prepare to prepare for the very thing that they created, for the very thing that they asked for.

Because many veterans up until the pact act came out, we’re just going to figure it out on their own. We’re going to figure out how to get the care we need, if it’s even possible, and then we’ll figure out how to pay for it somehow. And this great thing called the packtac came. Thousands and thousands and thousands of veterans applied, got approved, which is good, but now we can’t pay for it. Hmm. I wonder what they thought was gonna happen. Anyway, let’s go through this article here. Otherwise I’ll spend the whole show up on the soapbox and we’ll only have heard about what we’re here to discuss today.

So let’s get started. I’m sure we’ll pause on the way through. This was in the, the military times. I would believe it was on Thursday. I read this article. It starts here. Senate lawmakers approved a $3 billion budget stopgap for the Department of Veterans affairs on Thursday, preventing a threatened delay in the delivery of some veteran benefits checks next month. Some. The move came just two days after House lawmakers advanced, advanced the same appropriations measure, which also mandates a report from department officials on the reasons behind the department’s budgets shortfall within one month. The legislation is expected to be signed into law by President Joe Biden by the end of Friday.

So it should have been this last Friday. Now, this is going to be interesting because they say here that any department who is requesting funds where they came up short needs to submit an explanation of why, of why they’re short and just for conversation so that we’re aware of how much money we’re talking about here. The VA said back on 911 they were about two and a half billion dollars short for just this year. And, and guys, remember, the fiscal year starts October 1. So we got what, two weeks left in the fiscal year until we’re in fiscal year 25.

So we’re at the end of the fiscal year. The VA is already two and a half billion dollars short. They just learned that they have to provide an explanation to the president or to whoever the president says they do. But he’s going to sign this legislation into law, this stopgap now, so that, so that veterans can be paid. But that doesn’t get them off the hook. To explain why. Why do we need this? And just also for clarity, the VA has reported that for fiscal year 2025, they’re going to, they’re going to fall $12 billion short.

12 billion. $12 billion. Now $14.5 billion is a shitload of money. And my question to the government, whoever it is that would care to take my question, my question to them would be, where the hell do we get off sending hundreds of billions of dollars, hundreds of billions, to things like the Ukraine, to other foreign aid all over this world. What. Where are. I mean, if I’m. Let me know if I’m wrong, but it sounds to me like we as a country have our priorities all fucked up. We are now in a situation where the men and women who have fought for this country shed their blood, their sweat, and their tears, and much more.

And most of them did everything that they were asked to do. They did it with honor and integrity and selfless service and personal courage. And the whole time, the whole time that they were doing their job, whatever their job was, in the back of your mind, you always knew were one day away, one bad day away from complete and utter disaster. 1234 mortars in a good spot. A lot of people. Lives changed forever. Lives are changed forever anyway. But here we are, sending hundreds of billions of dollars to God knows where in this world for God knows what.

Who knows if it’s a good cause? Who knows if it’s morally sound? We’ll send it. Don’t worry. We’ll print more. We’ll print more money. And now we’re in a spot where we have to draft emergency legislation to ensure that the men, the men and women that did everything that their country asked them to do, get their. Get their benefits, the benefits that were promised to them through their sacrifice. I don’t know about you. It’s a little screwed up, if you ask me. Let’s continue. September 20. September 20 was a deadline given by VA leaders earlier this month for when they needed money approved by Congress to avoid benefit delays starting in October.

On Wednesday, Under Secretary of Benefits Joshua Jacobs told members of the Senate Veterans Affairs Committee that education support and monthly disability payouts could be delayed days or weeks without emergency funds. The majority of the funds that we provide are delivered through direct deposit, and we’re working closely with the treasury to find ways to compress that timeline. Well, work harder. I mean, I don’t know. Maybe that’s easy for me to say. I’m just sitting behind a desk being a talking head. The biggest risk to the 2% of veterans and survivors without that, 140,000 of the most vulnerable of our customers, many living in rural areas with more health conditions, who would have a delay up to two weeks if they had to get paper checks.

Okay, so here’s how. Here’s where we go with the pact act. Jacobs and other VA leaders said the budget shortfall came as a result of record high benefit approvals and medical services usage by veterans in the last fiscal year, much of it due to the pact act. That legislation, passed in August of 22nd, dramatically expanded eligibility for those services to veterans who suffered toxic exposure injuries while in their service. Under that legislation, administration officials had up to ten years. This is the important part. Had up to ten years to implement all the new benefits and support.

But the White House opted to accelerate that timeline earlier this year, which officials said led to the higher, unexpected, unexpected budget pressures. Man, I’m having trouble speaking today. I apologize. Okay, so August of 2022, President Biden signs into law the Pact act. The PACT act was supposed to help all of us who had been exposed to toxic burn pits while deployed to a forward area and all of the health conditions that go along with it. And there’s a list of them, and I believe that they are going to be adding to this list as time goes by.

They had ten years. They had ten years to put into place all of the benefits that were going to be laid out to these men and women who were approved for the PACT act. There’s two ways to go on this deal, I believe, and I believe that no matter what decision was made, there’s going to be a group of people bitching, and here’s why. The PACT act passes while people are waiting for decisions, they’re dying. Veterans are dying waiting for decisions on their claims so that they can get the medical care that is required to treat whatever issues they have, keep them alive, or at least keep them comfortable as long as they’re going to live.

And I bitched about it. Many people bitched about it. And part of the narrative that was put out there was, well, whatever we have to do, we need to take care of these guys because they’re dying waiting for their decisions. In fact, we even. We even had a story of one veteran from Minnesota here that had died waiting for his PAC DAC decision. By the way, his decision came back positive. I believe that he was going to get the benefits and the care and the stuff that he needed, which was great, because I believe that some of that helped with the things for his children.

He had small kids. But on the other hand, now we’re in a place where we’re, what, 16 or 14 and a half billion dollars short, and now people aren’t going to get their. Get their paychecks. And so, of course, we’re going to bitch about that. And so, I guess where I’m going with this is much like we thought, I’m much like we thought when the PAC DAC came out that it was going to be a huge strain on the system. The VA went nuts to hire people. The VA went nuts to approve claims. The VA did a lot of things to make this thing go as smoothly as possible.

It appears that it wasn’t very well thought out. And furthermore, we’re talking about arguably some pretty smart people, right, that work in these, these high positions of government. They’re smart, right? They’re supposed to be smart, intelligent, thoughtful people. And if we’re expected to believe that nobody in the VA system, at least in the leadership suite, looked at this issue going on, and number one, didn’t see it coming. The Pact acts been out since 2022. It’s been two, just a little over two years now. I mean, the government was reporting fantastic numbers for fact, for PAC DAC participation, but we didn’t see the shortfall of money coming anywhere.

Did we think that the government was going to just print money like they do for the bullshit that they, they send money to overseas for the VA? Of course not. Of course not. Why would. Let me ask you this. Why would our government, who has promised the men and women who wore a uniform in service of this country, why would they give a shit about coming up a little bit short on veterans benefits, but yet we’re going to just print money and send it all over the world? And I’m not completely naive to the situation. I mean, I know that you got to spend some money to make money, and I’m sure that there are initiatives around this world that are worth the United States investing in, sending some aid and putting money somewhere else to help, some initiative here, some initiative there.

But when we’re sending hundreds of billions of dollars to places like the Ukraine, it’s kind of hard to, to drum up any kind of sympathy for the folks that were, were put in charge of managing this thing called the pact act and managing a VA budget, because now, at the end of the day, everybody across the board potentially is going to be screwed. And then what are we going to be labeled? Well, we’re going to be labeled as well. There we go. The veterans are whining again. We’re going to be labeled as whiners and crybabies and this and that, and that’s fine.

That’s all right. Do we think that the VA might have seen a little bit of a shortfall in money coming about this time last year when we’re one year into the program? Let’s say we’re one year into the pact act, and there’s a massive influx of patients that are applying and being approved and given access to healthcare, given access to some kind of financial benefits, given access to education benefits, they can now go and finish their education if they want to, or learn a new skill, to be able to work and have a meaningful, happy life and not have to depend on the government.

That’s kind of what we do all this for. Right? But I’m going to tell you the main reason why. I think that it was an overlooked oversight. I believe that they did see trouble ahead. I believe that they did see that we were running out of money. And how could they not see the influx of veterans applying for VA healthcare and subsequently applying for PAC DAC benefits? How could we not have a conversation? I mean, in the government, they have meetings to have meetings to talk about what they’re going to talk about at the meeting tomorrow.

But nobody ever thought to check out the PAC act budget. Nobody in the. Nobody in the high. In the high iv offices of the VA ever thought, wow, this is, this is alarming. We were all riding high because we had over the top participation, which I agree is a good thing. But you know what? Whether we take care of the veterans or not, the veterans, they don’t, they don’t necessarily give anything back. The veterans aren’t going to owe you a favor. The veterans aren’t going to pass you some money or a check under the table. The veterans just want what was promised to them.

What we were all told would be available to us should we need it after our time serving this country is over. We weren’t aware that it was a quid pro quo type of thing where you do this for me, and don’t worry, I got you covered. We did all that. The men and women of this country who chose to put that uniform on their shoulders, and even the ones that didn’t, that were drafted into Vietnam but did it honorably because their country asked them to, are now the same ones that are going to have to possibly swallow the pill, the pill that says, hey, man, we’re really sorry.

We didn’t, we didn’t, we didn’t plan on this many people. We didn’t plan on having to pay out this kind of money. All these discussions that were had about the pact act before passed and after about how the hell are we gonna pay for all of this? We had it on this show. We had it right here on this show at least once, and now look at where we’re at. We can’t pay for this shit. It’s like going to the. It’s like going to the car dealership and signing out a $72,000 brand new vehicle. And then a little while later, saying, man, I had some health issues I had to pay for.

I didn’t plan on that. Can you just give me. Give me a little bit. My payments gonna be a little late. Maybe I’ll. Don’t worry. I’m good for it. I’ll make it up when I can. What bank is gonna. Is gonna swallow that pill now? I don’t know of any car dealership you can go to and tell them that business, but yet we’re here left to just accept that. If you ask me, it’s a real fucked up scenario. It doesn’t make. It doesn’t make anybody who chose this life or that life proud of it. It doesn’t help us to deal with the issues that we have as a community, let alone the medical or mental health issues.

But the issues we have as a community, it doesn’t help us to deal with those any better. It just furthers the narrative. The government forgot about us once again. But if we look back in history, if we look back in history, we can see every time the government needed warm bodies, when the government needed warm bodies to fill uniform boots, hold rifles, and march on that hill, fly this pit, fly this plane, drive this tank, shoot this artillery gun, patch up that wound, fix that truck, please. Whatever the job was, they had no problem asking. And now that all we’re doing as a community of veterans is asking that the VA can, can ensure that what we were promised remains in our.

In our. In our hands, that we get it like we were promised we would. Now we potentially have to just go without, just because there’s. It’s not. It’s not there. And I agree. Yeah, you, you can’t. You can’t pay money you don’t have. You can’t get blood out of a rock. Right. My last question for the segment is this something to chew on, uh, for a minute or two while we go to a break? You can’t get blood out of a rock. But what would the government do if none of these, none of these people, none of these men and women chose a sacrifice? Where would we be? Not the government, per se.

Where would we be? Some would say, someone say, well, we would be just fine. We’ve been the bullies anyway. We’re not the world police. And maybe some of that is true. But the point is this. When the United States of America came calling for warm bodies to jump on a plane or a ship or in a truck and go in and handle the country’s business and train the men and women to be experts in taking lives in destruction. What’s the other one? They told us hearts and minds at winning over hearts and minds and doing so mindfully when all of that shit was needed.

We answered the call. Americans answered the call. Doesn’t seem our government knows where the phone is because America, not just veterans, but America, is calling. But there’s nobody there to answer. We’ll be right back. Hey, folks, we just have a very short break here because we’re running short on time, but I wanted to talk to you quickly about joining the Stu crew. If you have watched the network in the last few weeks, you will have probably seen this already. But if not, this will be new to you. And a reminder for some, the network is growing.

We are growing large. For the last four years, everything that we have put together, all the work we have done, has all been free to you, the watcher, the viewer. We are now at a stage where we need some. We need some help, we need some support. All of these things take resources. And so if you would consider joining the Stu crew, I want to show you here down on the left side of the bottom left of the screen here, you’re going to see this red button that’s labeled Stu Crew. You can click on there, and for $9 a month or $90 a year, you’ll get two months for free.

You can join the stew crew to get premium access to extra content. There are also other benefits, such as giveaways. Stu is putting together packages of giveaways for premium subscribers so you do receive something extra as a thank you for joining us and for your support. This is, folks, a sign of growth. But we have to, we have to, we have to keep growing. We are in the constant search for truth and we are in the constant search of making sure that you, our viewers, are properly informed to make your own decisions about whatever the topic at hand is.

So again, here at the bottom left, the stew crew. $90 a year, $9 a month. There’s also the ability to make a one time donation if that is what you so choose to do. You can do anything from as small as $1 all the way up to a million dollars, I think is the cap. So feel free to go nuts on there, whatever you can do. It’s important to mention, though, that we, of course, do not want anybody to go backwards. We don’t want anybody to feel the hurt by supporting the network. We don’t believe that you should have to, have to do, do with less to support us.

So if you can’t do it, we understand it’s no big deal. We still appreciate you watching and participating in the content that is put out to you. But if you can, and you won’t miss $9 a month, please consider joining again. We are running short on time, so I’ll see you back in the show. Hey, folks, welcome here to the next segment of the show. Let’s continue. Let’s just continue on with the article and let’s see where we end up. I have a feeling that we’ll get on some goat trail at some point. The last we read was about how the pact act was supposed to take ten years to roll out.

But the White House chose to expedite that process, which is what brought us to the budget concerns that we face today. Moving on. Through the first ten months of fiscal year 2024, VA staff granted disability compensation benefits to more than 1.1 million veterans and survivors, a new record. It was. Nearly 413,000 veterans were newly enrolled in the VA healthcare system over the previous twelve months. It’s a 27% increase from the same time as last year. Now, despite approving the $3 billion lifeline, numerous republican lawmakers criticized the department for not recognizing the budget issue sooner than, just like we talked about, leading to a near emergency situation.

Near emergency situation. I would say. I would say this was a lot closer than near, though. I mean, we were a ball hair away from an emergency situation. And so while we got, while we’re talking about this, let’s just, let’s, let’s dig into this real quick. Why do you suppose, why do you suppose that the VA would consider veterans not being paid their benefits for disability education or housing or any other program that’s affected the caregivers? Why would they consider that an emergency? Is it because it’s bad optics? It’s bad optics to show the world that we, as a country, we can’t organize ourselves in our government well enough to ensure that our veterans get paid and our veterans get taken care of? I’ll tell you this.

I recently was, my wife and I, we went on a trip. We went on a cruise of northern Europe. So we went to Denmark, Sweden and Norway on a cruise ship, and just about everywhere we got off the boat and got into a taxi cab. You know, we did a bunch of those scheduled excursions where you leave the ship, get on a bus and do your tour, do a little bit of shopping, might have some food from the local area, and then you get back on the ship, and you head for the next place. But there was a few places where we were able to adventure on our own.

The ship would stay there overnight. So you get off, and you got till the next day at, like, one in the afternoon when the ship leaves to be back on the boat. And the thing that I appreciated about northern Europe, among a lot of other things, Washington. How serious everybody I spoke to, and mind you, nobody was a police officer, nobody was a government official. These were all, like, taxi drivers or a waiter at a restaurant. We ate at this, this restaurant, this outdoor restaurant in Oslo, Norway. And our waiter was a really cool kid. I think he was, like, 22 years old and just working to try to survive.

And you want to go to school and all the other jazz, but I would ask them, how are your country’s veterans treated here by the government? Does the government take good care of the men and women that, that serve in your military? And without thought, 100% of the people I talked to, without thinking at all. Yeah, absolutely. They’re held among the highest regard by everybody, not just the government. Everybody. Everybody appreciates people who have answered the call to service. And a couple. A couple of them had asked me, well, how did. How is America? I mean, America just fought a really long way at war for forever.

I mean, some of these people, some of these young people usually wait staff or something like that you’re talking to. This is the first time, the first couple, last couple of years is the first time in their lives that America hasn’t been fighting a war. And I’ll tell you what, it didn’t make me proud. It didn’t make me proud to be able to say, well, we could do better. We could do a lot better with taking care of the men and women that served our country. So anyway, why would the government consider an emergency that veterans aren’t getting benefits? And my suspicions tell me that has nothing to do, nothing to do with the fact that we’re just not getting what we’re due, what we’re owed, based on what was told us when we joined the service.

It has everything to do with optics on an international level as far as our leadership is concerned. I think because the VA has been really quick to do things, to dismiss veterans or sweep things under the rug. I will. I will say, I will admit that there’s some things that they handle quite well, but it seems like when we have these times of the government has to almost declare an emergency situation for, for veteran issues, I don’t think it’s. It’s never it’s never anything that’s like a surprise, right? Like this wasn’t a surprise to anybody. Yeah.

We’ll prove this $3 billion lifeline. But who the hell was managing this and how did it get this far? Why, why are we here? I don’t know. Well, I think that I know, but I don’t claim to be the expert. So I’ll leave, I’ll leave some of my opinions to myself. House lawmakers included the oversight report language to hold the administration accountable for its budgeting errors, according to Speaker Mike Johnson. And so did Representative Garcia from California. Said the measure, said the measure demands accountability with real oversight to make sure every dollar is spent in the right way.

Ahead of Thursday’s Senate vote, lawmakers block proposals from Senator Sullivan from Alaska to withhold bonuses from senior VA executives in cases of budgeting issues and Senator Rand Paul to rescind $2.9 billion from the Department of Energy to pay for VA, for the VA funding patch. Now, now bonuses. This one, this one really, really got to me. In fact, the hair on the back of my neck is standing up because I already know what I’m going to tell you. Last year, in fiscal year 2023, the VA, the VA says that this was a mistake. It wasn’t supposed to, they weren’t supposed to pay out these bonuses, okay? But they were paid.

And to the best of my knowledge, they weren’t taken back. The VA paid $11 million in bonuses to senior leadership. Now $11 million is not going to move the needle on 14.5 billion. That’s, that’s pocket change, right. When you’re dealing with 14 and a half billion bucks, $11 million is something you hope to find in the couch cushions, I would imagine. I mean, for, for me and you, that’s a lot of money for these people. It doesn’t mean it’s not even worth the, it’s not even worth the conversation because it’s not going to move the needle.

But this is yet another example, another example of how we now, the common, the common person, the regular guy veteran, is, is going to have to potentially swallow this pill. And now, mind you, that the, the two and a half billion that they are, the 3 billion, I guess, that they signed for this year to get us from fiscal year 24 to 25, that’s only $3 billion. We’re still, we’re still twelve. We’re still twelve away for next year. So this isn’t over. Like, they’re, they need to, they need to make some decisions and they need to do some, some real reorganizing.

And the idea that Rand Paul said, well, why don’t we take 2.9 billion from the Department of Energy? In my opinion, it’s pretty awesome, because I believe that. That we, as on a global stage, are just throwing money down the drain with this electric vehicle stuff. I’d read somewhere recently that in the eight or nine years that people of different nations and super rich people and all this other stuff have been pouring billions and billions and billions of dollars in this electric vehicle movement, in six to eight years, we’re still like 89% dependent on combustion engines and oil.

So how many, how many trillions of dollars are going to be spent on this electric energy, this, this electric vehicle bullshit, before they just scrap it and start spending that money somewhere else? I agree with Rand Paul there. You know, there’s some things about things that he says I don’t really agree with much, but I agree with this one. Why don’t we start re appropriating money? Why don’t departments. Excuse me. Why don’t departments in the federal government have to justify their existence every year? When are we going to stop this? Hey, man, we got to spend all the money we have this fiscal year or we won’t get as much next year and we need more next year.

When are we going to stop all that just spending money to spend money so that we get the same amount or more in the next fiscal year that we asked for in some budget proposal? This is. This is. These are the types of things that go on in committee hearings and closed door meetings and all kinds of stuff. Capitol Hill. These are the things that happen that we never know anything about unless we dig a little bit deeper. And I’m willing to bet, in fact, I know that there’s still a whole lot of this shit that we have no idea about.

This is only the stuff they really let loose, that they let get out, in my opinion. Let’s continue. Democrats in the House and Senate have downplayed the budgeting problem, saying that while the specifics were not known until recently, the extra expense from increased participation of veterans. Here we go. Increased participation of veterans and Department of Veteran. Veteran. Veterans affairs. Man. Sorry, was not a surprise. Duh. This is not the time for partisan politics, said John Tester. John Tester. Boy, he’s a. He’s a real peach. It’s time to act to ensure that 7 million veterans and their families who are wondering whether they’ll receive their benefit checks in the next 13 days will get them.

VA officials have also asked for an additional $15 billion in fiscal year 2025 to cover the increased benefit and medical care costs. Lawmakers are expected to debate the lawmakers are going to debate about whether or not an extra $15 billion for next year will come. And so we kind of went all wishy washy all over the place today. But I think what’s important to remember and identify is that veterans in the United States of America seem to be an afterthought. It’s almost like, it’s almost like if the government would just shut us up, right? Just give them enough to keep them quiet.

Let’s give them their pills. Let’s give them their doctor’s appointment. Let’s give them their benefit checks, their disability benefit checks. Let’s make sure that they can get a home, a home loan, which in recent years hasn’t really proved to be a huge benefit to vetted to veterans, in my opinion, not here in Minnesota, anyway, that we’ll just be silent and we’ll go along to get along. And maybe for some, maybe for some, that logic is true. Yeah. I’m sure that there’s, there’s, there’s folks out there that just, you know, they don’t want to rock the boat.

They just want to live out their days in peace and silence. They don’t want to have to worry about whether or not they’re going to get a check on the first of the month. But if I got to wait a couple weeks for a paper check, don’t worry, the government will figure it out. Well, I’m here to tell you something. As time goes by and these issues keep coming up with just a tad bit more severity each time, it isn’t going to be long before the, the news, the news report is going to be America’s veterans.

We apologize, but we don’t have the money. And then all of these folks are going to have to figure something out. And we already have, we already have many issues in this country revolving around veteran suicide, veteran homelessness, veteran mental health disorders, chemical dependency, employment. There’s a lot of, there’s a lot of things that go along with all of this. It’s not just, it’s not just a guys, it’s not just a disability check. Now, I’d be lying if I said that getting a, getting a disability check every month isn’t a huge help because it is a help.

But I think that if we were to poll veterans, I think that many of them would, would tell you that they’d give all the money back. They’d take out a conventional loan instead of a VA loan. They’d take student loans or work their balls off to pay for school. And they do a whole lot of other things. To not have to get a disability check, to not have to deal with the issues that they deal with, whether they be physical or mental. Now, this becomes a conundrum because for people in my era of the military, we all chose this life.

We all chose to put on a uniform, we all chose to stand a post, and for majority of us, we knew. We knew what the potential consequences were going to be. And at some point, you just have to make your peace and you have to figure out where your new normal is, whatever that looks like for you, and put 1ft in front of the other and navigate your life. You see, it’s really easy. It’s really easy for somebody to say, oh, you know, the veterans are crying again. They’re claiming that they got forgot about again. And I don’t know that I’d call it crying, but for Pete’s sake, if someone told you that they were going to take care of you, don’t worry, we got you.

Nowadays, you don’t trust the government as easily, clearly, but for a lot of us, that’s too late. The time for second guessing has come and gone long ago. I hope. I hope that there is someone, somewhere, some way, somehow they can figure this out so that this never becomes a problem ever again. But I’ll tell you one thing. If it does become a problem ever again, whether it be temporary or permanent, we will find a way. The veterans of this country will find a way to survive. We’re survivors. Don’t worry. We’ll get it done. But it would be really nice.

It’d be really nice if the people who sat up on the, on their big ivory pedestals on high, who had the balls to bark out orders and all these things, but never, never take an opportunity to lace up a pair of fucking boots. They didn’t do it. But they tell us what to do, and then they’re the ones that tell us, we’re sorry. It’s okay. If nothing else, we got each other. We have. We have our own community and we have a lot of people that know how to do a lot of things. So if we got to take care of ourselves, I guess we’ll just have to figure out how to take care of ourselves.

It’s all the time we have for today, folks. Of course, again, I want to thank you for being here. Have a great rest your evening. Take care of yourselves. We’ll see you next week. Good night. There’s a whole bunch of stories that have to be dug into, rethought, reconsidered, and in some cases, completely discarded. As modern Americans, we’ve been spoon fed this dumbed down, cartoonish, simplified version of history. It’s all fake. It’s all bull. Everything that we have been taught is part of a self serving narrative written by the people who will say and do anything to keep us on a leash.

Now, this version of history, some big name, corrupt families like the Rockefellers and the Rothschilds and their many associates, are credited over and over and over again with propelling human development. Throughout the late eighties, in the 19 and early 19 hundreds, almost every major american city was burnt to the ground. What if we really are quite literally living atop the ashes of an advanced civilization that’s been hidden from us for our entire lives? It.
[tr:tra].

See more of Stew Peters Network on their Public Channel and the MPN Stew Peters Network channel.