UPDATED

At first, reports that the Obama administration was exploring charging injured veterans’ private insurance to cover care for service-related injuries enraged me. Then it occurred to me that it may just be a proposal floated about in some bean-counting bureaucrat’s office.

But then, it appears the president was unable to assuage veterans groups’ concerns. The head of the American Legion left a Monday meeting with Obama visually upset.

“It became apparent during our discussion today that the President intends to move forward with this unreasonable plan,” said Commander David K. Rehbein of The American Legion. “He says he is looking to generate $540-million by this method, but refused to hear arguments about the moral and government-avowed obligations that would be compromised by it.”

The Commander, clearly angered as he emerged from the session said, “This reimbursement plan would be inconsistent with the mandate ‘ to care for him who shall have borne the battle’ given that the United States government sent members of the armed forces into harm’s way, and not private insurance companies. I say again that The American Legion does not and will not support any plan that seeks to bill a veteran for treatment of a service connected disability at the very agency that was created to treat the unique need of America’s veterans!”

From any perspective, this is an atrocious idea. Instead of keeping all of his options open and thereby piling on to the stress incurred by our nation’s injured veterans, the president needs to tell his staff to drop it — and drop it now.

Members of Congress already have said any such proposal would be “dead on arrival.” This is a fight the president would lose while forcing veterans who were injured while serving our country to fear increased insurance costs or losing their insurance altogether.

To be fair, this boneheaded plan to save $540 million each year didn’t come from the administration’s political operatives. It came out of the Office of Management and Budget, which likely spewed out a spreadsheet of how much it costs to cover veterans’ injuries and then threw it into a report of cost-cutting measures.  That it’s being “considered” isn’t a big deal by itself — that could mean that Veterans Affairs Secretary Eric Shinseki hasn’t really read it and it’s sitting in his in-box of reports.

But after the president’s events marking the 20th anniversary of the creation of the department (announcing his plan to build “A 21st Century Department of Veterans Affairs”), Obama apparently did not tell Rehbein and other veteran leaders that the idea wasn’t being seriously examined.

That the president is even thinking about punting the nation’s responsibility to its vets is causing that rage to resurface. Unconscionable. Atrocious. Ludicrous.

First, apparently there’s plenty of money to go around for stinky pig studies, maglev trains from LA to Las Vegas and bailout after bailout. Not to mention the $634 billion “down payment” on a national health care system. But we can’t afford to take care of our veterans? The men and women who fought to defend our country and everything for which it stands? Talk about messed up priorities.

Second, if it’s one of those floated ideas to get everyone into a tizzy so you can score points later by scrapping it, the administration really is full of smug elitists who clearly don’t care about the nation’s veterans. Threatening their health care in an attempt to score political points later is just disgusting.

Third, if this is just bureaucrats throwing ideas around, Obama should put an end to the speculation. There is such as a thing as a bad idea, and as the leader, the president has to differentiate. As I already said, there’s no need to cause our injured veterans to worry.

I’m hoping the later is the case. I can’t imagine any administration turning its back on our veterans in such a way — but I’ve been surprised before. As McClatchy reported:

“It’s a betrayal,” said Joe Violante, legislative director of Disabled American Veterans, which signed the letter to Obama. “My insurance company didn’t send me to Vietnam, my government did. The same holds true for men and women now fighting in Iraq and Afghanistan. It’s the government’s responsibility.”

It certainly is. And it would be a betrayal of monumental proportions. Let’s hope it’s not a serious idea.

No matter what the case, the president needs to deposit any plan to save money by forcing veterans to find their own coverage for their service-related injuries in the trash where it belongs.

UPDATE

Expiration date

Ed Morrissey over at Hot Air has video of Obama during the campaign attacking President Bush and John McCain on Veterans’ issues.

Obama sang a much different tune during the campaign.  In June 2008, Obama appeared at a Sioux Falls pancake breakfast to lambaste the Bush administration and John McCain for opposing Jim Webb’s GI Bill.  During that speech, given from a rostrum with the slogan “A Sacred Trust — Support Our Veterans”, Obama had this to say about caring for our wounded once back at home:

More over at Hot Air.

Still making the same mistakes

Even Obama’s own party is distancing itself from this fiasco — and it shows the administration isn’t getting any better at correcting its mistakes. As Moe Lane notes at RedState:

It’s become increasingly obvious that the administration’s tin ear when it comes to dealing with groups not inclined to be forgiving about it remains in full force.   They haven’t gotten any faster at correcting their mistakes, either: Obama’s profoundly unsuccessful meeting with American Legion President David Rehbein should have been resolved yesterday, not tomorrow. Assuming that it will be: it’s possible that Obama will try an I-won and a flash of the charisma that he does not, in point of fact, actually have.

No, really.  Bill Clinton would have had Rehbein walking out of there all smiles in the first place.  For that matter, so would have George W Bush; but then, Bush had the advantage of being a Republican.