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I am seriously considering donating a 1999 30 ft travel trailer to a San Diego area 501C3 program for disabled veterans. Any advice out there on pitfalls or things to look out for? The two strongest candidate agencies claim they will pick it up and do all the paperwork. I would really like to give the proceeds to Fisher House but can't seem to find an specific pathway for that.

President Barack Obama has declined to attend a dedication ceremony in October for a new memorial honoring American veterans who have been disabled fighting for their country in wars, according to sources close to the event. The American Veterans Disabled for Life Memorial (AVDLM), the first such memorial of its kind, is set to be dedicated during a ceremony on Oct. 5 near the National Mall in downtown Washington, D.C. However, Obama, who was first invited to attend the event in January, will not be among those in attendance, according to a veteran’s advocate familiar with the situation. This would...

Sens. Mark Warner and Tim Kaine, D-Va. Military veterans are pressuring Congress to move quickly when it reconvenes this week to cancel cuts in pensions for working-age vets - a change set in motion as part of last month's budget deal. However, reversing the decision to reduce cost-of-living pension increases could be difficult and, at best, would take some time to negotiate, say some legislators and lobbyists. Federal lawmakers from Hampton Roads, which has one of the nation's largest concentrations of retirees and active-duty service members, strongly support undoing the cuts. Most have already proposed or are co-sponsoring legislation...

In its rush to pass a budget deal, Congress voted to slice the benefits of veterans, even those who retire after suffering injuries while serving their country. This unconscionable sneak attack on former members of the armed services was evidently inserted into the legislation by GOP House Budget Chairman Paul Ryan during talks with lead Democratic negotiator, Sen. Patty Murray. He ought to be ashamed. The provision would cut veterans’ cost of living adjustments beginning in 2015 by $600 million a year — less than one-tenth of 1% of the $630 billion Pentagon budget. But the pain would be real....

Convicted petty thief, Mildred Fedd had pressing bills to pay: parking tickets, a faulty sewage system, house payments and the impound lot holding her truck hostage. So she turned to the U.S. Department of Veteran Affairs and promised — for a small fee — to watch over an 82-year-old disabled veteran. With his $5,000, she agreed to buy him a burial plot. Instead, the Houston caregiver paid her own bills — and got caught only after she had spent all his money and went back for more...

The Democrat habit of appointing “good Democrats” to positions without regard for the required administrative skills it calls for is hurting almost 900,000 disabled veterans. The incompetence of Barack Obama’s Veterans Affairs Department has created a bureaucratic nightmare in which more than 65% of its disability claims sit on someone’s desk for more than 125 days. More than this 16% of the cases that are brought to resolution are done so in error according to veterans’ advocate groups’ testimony to the House Veterans Affairs Committee last week. The V.A is totally underprepared for the predictable increase in disability claims stepped...

VA official launches passive-aggressive "Blame Bush" attack. Speaking off the cuff is something everyone in the Teleprompter Administration really ought to avoid. Earlier, we had Secretary of State Hillary Clinton suggesting (correctly, actually) that the national debt that’s gone out of control under Obama is a threat to our national security. She was right, but that’s surely not the party line. What Veterans Affairs assistant secretary for public and intergovernmental affairs Tammy Duckworth said while campaigning for Democratic Senate candidate Alexi Giannoulias in Illinois today may have been closer to the party line, but it was farther from the truth....

One president gave his pre mature "Mission Accomplished" speech about Iraq on the deck of an aircraft carrier. Now another has given his own version as part of a Chicago-ward-politics sales pitch to disabled veterans. The difference is that the first guy was sincere. President Obama's pork-barrel speech to the Disabled Veterans of America yesterday (if you want to help our vets, shut up and do it) would have drawn a blush from those Soviet propagandists who cropped purged Politburo members from Stalin-era photographs. Ignoring his own opposition to the liberation of Iraq, supporting our troops and the surge, Obama...

My gas-powered 100mhz boat anchor PC finally bit the dust, so you won't see me here for awhile and to add insult to injury, I won't be able to work at my new-found job as a loan originator and so can't buy another CPU. I'm on my stepson's laptop right now, as he's home for a few days. I'd appreciate your thoughts and prayers as I'm trying to do somnetghing in case my wife has another stroke and just to help out. Can't do physical labor or conventional work anymore and while my VA disablity comes in handy, it only...

The cost of war — on veterans’ health and taxpayer wallets — will loom a little larger in the new year. The Department of Veterans Affairs will issue a final rule to claim adjudicators to presume three more diseases of Vietnam veterans, including heart disease, were caused by exposure to Agent Orange. The rule, expected to be published soon, will make almost any veteran who set foot in Vietnam, and is diagnosed with Parkinson’s disease, B cell leukemia or ischemic heart disease (known also as coronary artery disease) eligible for disability compensation and VA medical care. The exception would be...

The Obama administration is ushering in the largest expansion of government control of our personal lives in the history of this country. Our national debt is approaching $11 Trillion, an out of control, record breaking debt that is reaching the stratosphere. While this administration is ignoring the cost to the taxpayer of taking control of private businesses and forcing through universal health care that will increase our debt even more, they are simultaneously working on a bill that will require veterans to pay for treatment of combat-related injuries. So, it appears that we will tax us into poverty to pay...

WASHINGTON (CNN) -- Veterans Affairs Secretary Eric Shinseki confirmed Tuesday that the Obama administration is considering a controversial plan to make veterans pay for treatment of service-related injuries with private insurance.

VALDOSTA, Ga., Jan. 30 /PRNewswire/ -- Little Caesar Enterprises, Inc. today celebrates the grand opening of the fifth store to open under the Little Caesars Veterans Program as U.S. military veteran and Little Caesars franchisee Patricia Evans opens her doors for business at 1650 F Baytree Road in Valdosta, Georgia. "The Little Caesars Veterans Program has provided me the opportunity to transition to a new career as my family and I begin the next chapter in our lives," said Evans. "I am proud to be the first woman to open a store under this program, and I'm excited to be...

Would anyone like a free dinner at Golden Corral? Well, there is an easy way if you are an American military veteran. Golden Corral just announced this year’s Military Appreciation Monday will be November 12, 2007, from 5 to 9 pm. For the past 6 years, Golden Corral has been honoring the US Military with a free “thank you” dinner and beverage at any Golden Corral restaurant on Military Appreciation Monday (first Monday after Veteran’s Day), to honor any person who has ever served in the United States Military. In the past the only requirement to receive the free meal...

Last Monday was a maddening day. The swimming pool heater was not working right and when I wanted to get my nightly swimming exercise before bed, the water was a bit cool. Plus, the water heater was broken and my shower was barely tepid. I lay in bed sulking and then turned on the TV. Ken Burns's magnificent epic about American participation in World War II came on. There were American children being starved in Japanese prison camps in the Philippines. American Marines getting blown to pieces by Japanese shells on Iwo Jima. American soldiers fighting and freezing at the...

"There is no mountain too high for me NOT to at least try to overcome to help my fellow Veterans in such similar situations as to have their pride restored in having their own homes. There has to be a way, Sir. There has to be a program worth creating . . ."

SNOWMASS VILLAGE, Colo., April 5, 2006 – More than 350 severely wounded troops and disabled veterans are conquering emotional as well as physical mountains at the 20th National Disabled Veterans Winter Sports Clinic here. Participants in the 20th National Disabled Veterans Winter Sports Clinic prepare their gear at the base of Snowmass Mountain. Photo by Donna Miles  (Click photo for screen-resolution image);high-resolution image available. The participants, who range in age from 19 to 83 and served in every conflict since World War II, are joining together and showing the world they're not going to let an amputation or a spinal...

CAMP PENDLETON – All morning yesterday, Dawn Halfaker dashed after a running back and nabbed a blue flag off the opponent's waist in a game of flag football. But she rarely held the ball. A little more than a year ago, Halfaker, a retired Army lieutenant, lost her right arm after a rocket-propelled grenade tore it apart in an ambush in Baquba, Iraq. Twenty-six teams of men and women played eight games of flag football simultaneously on a vast field at Camp Pendleton. Yesterday, Halfaker and her mother, Connie Halfaker, were among more than 400 participants at the All-Star Buddy...

Excerpt from Jul 03 petition for Congressional Medal of Honor consideration: On 2 April 1968...[Joe Vitale and Mike Wacasey], armed only with an M-14, M-60 machinegun, fragmentation/white phosphorous grenades and 1000 rounds of ammunition, were inserted by PBR (river patrol boat) near [a] village on the Ham Luong [river]... [the two sailors] were shortly confronted by [a North Vietnamese Army] company (approximately 100 troops) with no PBR or helicopter gunfire support. The men decided their only chance for survival was to take the fight to the enemy, so Joe threw grenades into half a dozen hooches as Mike continued...

Soldiers shouldn't be guinea pigs Posted: April 12, 2005 1:00 a.m. Eastern Editor's note: Eilhys England contributed to this column. © 2005 WorldNetDaily.com The presidential commission looking into the cluelessness of U.S. intelligence regarding weapons of mass destruction in Iraq recently issued its report to banner headlines that should cause every member of the American military to take a long second look at the need for – not to mention the safety of – the big-bucks "emergency" anthrax vaccination program still being pushed by the Department Of Defense. Because the acknowledgment of this disastrous intelligence failure rips the guts right...