Veterans Groups Concerned with Bush's Priorities

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Leaders of the American Legion, the Paralyzed Veterans and the Disabled American Veterans all noted a striking partisan division in Congress on veterans issues, with Democrats giving them much more support than Republicans.

Traditionally, Violante said, "Republicans have been supportive of defense," but he said Bush administration policies and votes in the House and Senate suggest that the GOP does not view the care of veterans as "a continuing cost of war."

In the 2004 election, exit polls showed that voters who had served in the military were decisively more Republican than those who had not. President Bush carried the one out of five voters who had served by 16 percentage points, 57 to 41, while Sen. John F. Kerry (D-Mass.) barely won those who had not served, 50 to 49.

The Bush administration's priorities are "a little bit different now and veterans aren't a priority," Violante said. He described this as "terrible -- I think it's unconscionable."

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/conte...5062301888.html