ANDREA HOPKINS: Support The Troops With Words, Deeds And Necessary Funding

Freshman Sen. Jim Webb’s signature piece of legislation – a bill to provide more robust college education benefits for today’s veterans – cleared the House last week.
But veterans and their families shouldn’t break out the bubbly just yet. This laudable piece of lawmaking is snared in a dysfunctional Congressional family squabble over the broader issues of Iraq war funding, war policy and taxes.
The bill had plenty of bipartisan support at the outset. Webb, D-Va., worked with Sen. John Warner, R-Va., on the bill, which had 54 other Senate cosponsors. In the House, 289 representatives signed on.
THIS ROBUST support should have portended smooth sailing for the measure when it reached the House floor Thursday. But some supporters had second thoughts. The measure passed 256 to 166, with a measly 32 Republicans voting in favor of it.
Rep. David Davis, R-Tenn., was one of those cosponsors who executed a flip that would make an Olympic gymnast proud.
Davis oozes enthusiastic support for the troops. He has no quibble with the new GI bill, as Webb’s legislation is often termed. He just doesn’t want to pay for it.
In a Friday telephone interview, Davis first said his about-face on the GI bill needed no explanation. When pressed, he offered one anyway.
“THERE WAS $5 billion in foreign aid in the bill that has nothing to do with the military,” Davis said. “And, it raised taxes on small business owners. ... It wasn’t brought to the floor in a way you could separate it out.”
Put simply, Davis hates taxes more than he cares about securing the futures of America’s combat veterans. He’d rather fight the Democrats than compromise on behalf of his constituents.
The war funding measure – of which the new GI bill is a part – was a complicated compromise crafted in an effort to bring disparate congressional factions together. The House leadership also hoped to achieve broad enough support to survive a threatened presidential veto.
However, fiscally conservative Democrats, called Blue Dogs, had refused to support the GI bill unless it was coupled with a revenue source. The better benefits under the bill are projected to cost $5 billion a year for the next decade.
THE BLUE DOGS’ objection almost scuttled the entire war-funding bill. Furious negotiations resulted in a plan to levy a half of a percentage point surtax on income of more than $500,000 for individuals and $1 million for couples.
This was one of the deal breakers for Davis, who referred to it as a tax on “small businesses.” He also objected to an unspecified “$5 billion in foreign aid” and proposed to take away that aid to fund the veterans’ benefits. No word on whether this is recurring aid or a one-time expenditure. Obviously, paying to send veterans to college is a long-term obligation that requires a reliable, recurring source of revenue.
Published reports about the GI bill and the broader war-funding package make no mention of $5 billion in foreign aid. The funding bill contains $770 million in foreign aid to provide food to countries that face shortages, an amendment inserted at the request of President Bush. The bill also contains $5 billion to rebuild levies in New Orleans, part of a domestic spending package that includes additional unemployment benefits. Bush opposes the domestic spending measures. Perhaps Davis is just confused.
THE NEXT step for the GI bill is uncertain. Although it passed the House, the broader war-funding bill was killed by a coalition of anti-war Democrats and angry Republicans. Davis said another vote before Memorial Day is unlikely.
The war-funding bill and the GI bill also must pass the Senate. Already, there is talk that the Senate will reject the surtax proposal; no word on what will replace it. Looming large over the entire debate is Bush’s vow to veto any war-spending bill that includes the GI bill or any other domestic spending amendments.
As the political wrangling continues, our leaders must not lose sight of the goal – bolstering the educational benefits offered to this nation’s young men and women who volunteer to leave their loved ones behind and serve in a time of war. They deserve more than a public show of patriotic zeal. They deserve the best equipment to protect them in the desert. They deserve high-caliber health care, for their physical and mental wounds, when they return. And, they deserve an opportunity to improve their lives by attending college without having to go into debt to do so.
It’s time for all in Congress – Republicans and Democrats – to support our troops with more than words. Support them with deeds and with treasure – even if it requires some small sacrifice from the rest of us.

Andrea Hopkins is opinion editor of the Bristol Herald Courier. She may be reached at ahopkins@bristolnews.com or (276) 645-2534.