The scandal at the Department of Veterans Affairs caught most of official Washington by surprise.

The main emphasis at the VA for the last several years has been the backlog of compensation claims. A great deal of effort and energy was expended by the VA to try and reduce the backlog and it appeared that progress was being made. And then the access to VA hospitals scandal hit the news. It remains to be seen if the VA can fix the scandal and continue to make prog-ress on the backlog at the same time. AFTEA will keep an eye on that and let

you know as we find things out.As this is written, both the House

and the Senate have passed bills to try and provide a temporary fix to the access to care issue, but they are dead-locked about how to pay for it. The Senate wants to declare that the cost is “emergency spending,” which would mean the money would be borrowed and added to the national debt. This is the way the entire 10+ years of war in Iraq and Afghanistan have been “paid for” and the position of the Democratic majority in the Senate is that taking care of veterans is a cost of war and therefore borrowing the money to pay for the Senate bill is nothing differ-ent from the way the wars have been financed to this point.

On the other side, the Republican

majority in the House of Representa-tives who are very concerned about reducing the national debt without raising any taxes have said that the veterans legislation must be paid for by cutting other budgets within the federal government and transferring that money.

Our position at AFTEA is that it is up to Congress as to how they want to pay for the legislative fix. We just want them to pass the bill -- without taking money from other parts of the VA budget -- as soon as possible in order to start dealing with this outra-geous situation.

However, it appears at this point that the House and Senate are very far apart in reaching a compromise

Secretary of Defense Chuck Hagel Orders Military Health System Review

Secretary of Defense Chuck Hagel has ordered a comprehensive review of

the department’s military health system. The 90-day review will be led by Deputy Secretary of Defense Bob Work, with the assistance of the acting undersec-retary of defense for personnel and readiness and the assistant secretary of defense for health affairs, and the direct partici-pation of the secretaries of the

military departments and the service chiefs. In addition, Secretary Hagel has asked Deputy Secretary Work to solicit the perspectives of outside experts in the areas of patient

safety and quality care.The review will focus on the following core areas:

access to health care, safety of care, and quality of care. Secretary Hagel has requested regular updates on the prog-ress of the review. Additionally, Secretary Hagel received an initial update in early June and the final report will be delivered to him no later than August 29.

“As the secretary has made clear, nothing is more important than the health and well-being of our people. To the degree we learn about issues affecting the health care of our military health beneficiaries, including active duty servicemembers, retirees, and their eligible family members, we will address them,” Pentagon Press Secretary Rear Admiral John Kirby said in a statement released to the press. M

(cont'd on page 3)

Chuck HagelSecretary of Defense

© D

oD P

hoto

July - August 2014Volume 10 • Number 4

With only 25 workdays left until the November elections it is questionable

if House and Senate leaders will reach a compromise on overhauling the VA healthcare and claims systems -- or if they will “punt” until after the elections. Two major features being debated are allowing veterans more options to get care outside of the VA healthcare system, particularly in rural areas, and giving the VA powers to more easily fire ineffective or incompetent leaders. The extra-VA care option is being sought due to the inordinately long wait times veterans have been experiencing for medical appointments and the documented cover-up of these unacceptable wait times by VA officials.

The reason so few legislative days remain before the elections is that Congress will be off in August and will work only a few days in September and October as they prepare for the November elections. Unfortunately, focusing on reelection at the expense of doing the American people’s business is an all-too-regular aspect of our system of government -- just another reason we at AFTEA need to exert pressure on the Hill.

I mention this to you because you should know what to expect out of your Congress in the coming days, but also to remind you that we try to keep our news reports to you as up-to-date as we can. But we have to finish writing our reports, send them to the printer, and then mail them to you -- all of which takes a fair amount of time. And some of what we tell you will have been overcome by events. We try our best to be as current as possible, but this time of year

Congress will, at times and on certain issues, move quickly and pass some legislation.

Lots of issues are still pending this year so I urge you to be sure and read our “Report from the Hill.” There are some changes coming that could affect every military person -- active duty, retired, Guard and Reserve and families.

Also, I want to remind you to renew your AFTEA membership when you receive notice of its expiration. It has never been more important for all of us as military people to stick together. The threats to our promised and earned military benefits have never been greater and there are many in Washington who want to try and balance the budget on the backs of military men and women.

There are changes coming this year that are likely to cost all of us more, but there is something called the Military Compensation and Retirement Modernization Commission (MCRMC) that is scheduled to issue a report that will cover all military compensation and benefits. It is due next February and Congress has put off dealing with many of the cuts to your benefits that DoD requested this year, pending the MCRMC report. If that report agrees with some or all of the cuts DoD wants, we will be in for the fight of our lives to simply keep the benefits we now have.

AFTEA needs your continued support and renewing your membership is one of the best ways you can give us that support.

“The quality of people willing to serve has been declining rapidly,” the U.S. Army Recruiting Command’s commanding general says.

Approximately 71% of the 34 million 17 to 24-year-olds in the U.S. would not qualify for military service because of reasons related to health, physical appearance and educational background, according to the Pentagon.

The ineligible typically includes those who are obese, those who lack a high school diploma or a GED, convicted felons, those taking prescription drugs for ADHD and those with certain tattoos and ear gauges, though some requirements can be waived.

Only 1% of young people are both “eligible and inclined to have conversation with” the military about possible service, according to the Defense Department.

“The quality of people willing to serve has been declining rapidly,” Major General Allen Batschelet, the U.S. Army Recruiting Command’s commanding general said.

Approximately 180,000 men and women volunteer for and enter active-duty forces each year, though U.S. military activity in recent years has led to some looser standards for recruitment. Only 79% of those enlisted had a high school diploma in 2007, while that figure was 90% in 2001. During the Iraq war, the military was also less strict about soldiers’ body fat.

“We have not adopted a zero-defect mentality,” said Defense Department spokesman Nathan Christensen, who noted that the military’s recruiting targets in recent years have been met. “We evaluate each applicant from a whole-person perspective.” M

Pentagon: 7 in 10 Youths Would Fail to Qualify for Military Service

PRESIDENT'S COLUMNBernd Dela Cruz

and although it is likely that they will eventually pass some kind of bill, it may take much longer than originally thought for them to do so.

In addition, there is much veter-ans legislation that AFTEA and other veterans groups have wanted to see passed, but it now looks like the emer-gency bill to fix the access to care issue may very well be the only veterans’ bill that is passed this year.

We should add that the causes for this scandal appear to be many and varied. There is not just one simple thing that can be changed in order to fix the problems. AFTEA fully supports the appointment of a special commission to investigate the VA from top to bottom in order to try and fix the problems permanently.

* * * *

The defense bills in Congress, which deal with your military bene-fits, have not, as this is written, been passed either. The House has passed its version, but the full Senate has yet to act. However, the Senate Armed Services Committee has passed the bill and it is likely that the full Senate will pass that version. Following is what things look like, as it stands now, based on what is in both the House defense bill and the Senate bill.

For active duty personnel, it appears that your pay raise for next year will be capped at 1 percent for the second year in a row. In addition, it is likely that BAH will be reduced by instituting smaller increases for three years until it covers, on average, 95 percent of average rental costs. Also, BAH rates will no longer cover renter’s insurance.

For retirees and all who use TRICARE for their prescription drugs, it is likely that there will be co-pay increases that would be phased in over 10 years. This will mean higher out-of-pocket costs for older retirees, spouses,

and survivors. We will give you the amount of those increases in the issue of the Alliance that appears after a bill is finally passed into law.

It also appears that if there is a cut in the Commissary subsidy, it will be an amount that is supposed to only encourage efficiencies and will not allow stores to set higher prices for their customers.

Again, none of this has passed at this point and it could all become law, part of it could become law, or none of it could become law. But it appears to us these are likely to become law when a defense bill is finally passed by Congress.

However, please note that we are far from being out of the woods on all of this, especially when it comes to further cuts in your healthcare benefits. It seems that Congress has refused to give DoD what it asked for regarding TRICARE cuts, but that is only because the Military Compen-sation and Retirement Modernization Commission is currently examining all parts of the compensation and benefits that are provided to career military men and women. The commission is expected to give its final report in February 2015, and whatever changes (in other words cuts) to military bene-fits it recommends will have a great deal of influence in Congress as it seeks to find places to cut the defense budget. That means that next year we could find ourselves fighting full force to try and save our promised benefits.

AFTEA opposes cuts in military personnel compensation and benefits and we continue to urge Congress to force DoD to get its books in order so that it can be audited and actually find out where it spends its money. It is the only department of the federal govern-ment which cannot be audited because its books are in such terrible shape. We believe that one of the reasons DoD comes after personnel benefits when-ever it is forced to reduce its budget is that personnel is one of its budgets

that it knows how much and where the money is being spent. Before any personnel benefits are looked at for cutbacks, DoD should audit its books so it can see where all of its money is spent. There is a huge amount of waste within DoD and we insist that the waste be cut as a first priority.

* * * *

Two other things of note are impor-tant to be aware of. First, more than 27,000 Army and Navy TRICARE Prime users who see civilian primary care providers are being involuntarily moved to doctors within a military treatment facility. Those who are affected will be notified by their branch of service.

Second, AAFES, known to many of us as the Army & Air Force Exchange Service, has proposed to the Defense Department to allow the nation’s 22 million honorably discharged veter-ans to shop online at the military exchanges. No action has been taken yet, and there are several issues that need to be dealt with, but the idea is to broaden the customer base of the exchanges to enable them to survive if Congress decides to close or raise prices at the commissaries. The exchange leadership believes that reducing the commissary benefit or closing the commissaries would have a devastating effect on the exchanges and cause their survival to also be in ques-tion. AFTEA will continue to monitor this issue and keep you updated. M

Report from the Hill(cont'd from page 1)

President Obama has announced Robert “Bob” McDonald as his choice to head the troubled Department of Veterans Affairs. A one-time Army

Ranger and former CEO of a Fortune 500 consumer products company, McDonald may face his toughest challenge yet in fixing the huge, scandal-plagued Veterans Affairs Department.

McDonald served in the Army for five years, achieving the rank of captain in the 82nd Airborne Division. He retired from Procter & Gamble in June 2013 and lives in Cincinnati, Ohio.

In nominating Bob McDonald as the next Secretary of Veterans Affairs, President Obama is recruiting a West Point graduate with experience in running a big corporation -- Procter & Gamble -- to turn around a department whose failure to provide timely care to veterans has caused a political furor.

If confirmed by the Senate, McDonald would succeed Eric K. Shinseki, a retired four-star Army general who stepped down last month amid a scandal in which VA employees falsified records to cover up long waits for medical appointments.

McDonald would face a daunting task in trying to fix the numerous problems within one of the largest federal departments, which a White House report described as having a “corrosive culture.” The VA also is struggling to respond to increasing demand for services from veterans of wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Rep. Jeff Miller (R-Fla.), Chairman of the House Veterans Affairs Committee, said McDonald faced the challenge of turning around a VA “under a specter of corruption that may very well surpass anything in the history of American government.” Investigators are examining whether VA managers pressed subordinates to manipulate waiting lists for appointments so that the managers could qualify for bonuses. The investigation could lead to criminal charges.

Miller said the next secretary would need to “root out the culture of dishonesty and fraud that has taken hold within the department and is contributing to all of its most pressing challenges. Quite simply, those who created the VA scandal will need to be purged from the system.”

Miller, who has complained about the VA’s failure to respond to his committee’s requests for information, said the next secretary also would need to focus on “solving problems instead of downplaying or hiding them, holding employees accountable for mismanagement and negligence that harms veterans, and understanding that taxpayer-funded organizations such as VA have a responsibility to provide information to Congress and the public rather than stonewalling them.”

House Speaker John A. Boehner (R-Ohio) said in a statement that although McDonald was “capable of implementing the kind of dramatic systemic change that is badly needed and long overdue at the VA,” he would succeed only if the president “commits to doing whatever it takes to give our veterans the world-class healthcare system they deserve by articulating a vision for sweeping reform.”

“The VA needs a permanent secretary as soon as possible to oversee the restructuring necessary to guarantee that our veterans receive the care they have earned in a timely manner,” he said.

The VA, which operates 1,700 hospitals and clinics and handled 85 million outpatient visits last year, has been rocked by a spate of critical reports.

Last month the VA Inspector General found systemic problems throughout the VA healthcare system in scheduling veterans for medical appointments in a timely manner, including instances of manipulation to mask long waits. At the Phoenix VA, investigators found an average wait of 115 days for a sample of veterans, when the VA’s goal was 14 days.

The Office of Special Counsel, which investigates whistle-blower complaints, criticized the VA for failing to acknowledge the “severity of systemic problems” that have put patients at risk. White House Deputy Chief of Staff Rob Nabors, who has been visiting VA facilities, issued his own report, finding a “corrosive culture” inside the department that has been exacerbated by poor management and a history of retaliation toward employees who report problems.

The department’s inspector general is investigating 77 facilities and is scheduled to issue a final report in August.

In the meantime, House-Senate negotiators are working to reconcile differences on legislation that would allow more veterans facing long waits at VA facilities to see private doctors and expand the VA secretary’s authority to fire senior managers for poor performance. A potentially contentious proposal would increase VA funding so that it could hire more doctors and nurses. M

Obama Selects Former Procter & Gamble Chief to Lead Veterans Affairs

Mo r e than

1,000 veter-ans may have died in the last decade because of malprac-tice or lack of care from D e p a r t m e n t of Veterans Affairs medical

centers, a new report issued by the office of Sen. Tom Coburn finds.

The report aggregates government investigations and media reports to trace a history of fraudulent sched-uling practices, budget mismanage-ment, insufficient oversight and lack of accountability that have led to the current controversy plaguing the VA.

The VA has admitted that 23 patients have died because of delayed care in recent years, but the report, titled “Friendly Fire: Death, Delay, and Dismay at the VA,” shows many more patient deaths have been linked to systemic issues affecting VA hospitals and clinics throughout the U.S.

Coburn, an Oklahoma Republican and physician, says that if the VA’s budget had been properly handled and the right management had been in place, many of these deaths could have been avoided.

“Over the past decade, more than 1,000 veterans may have died as a result of VA malfeasance,” said Coburn, a three-time cancer survivor who says the government should offer veterans access to private hospitals.

“Poor management is costing the department billions of dollars more and compromising veterans’ access to medical care,” he said. Coburn’s office says the VA has allocated about $20 billion since the beginning of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan to numer-ous non-health-related projects, such

as office makeovers, unused software licenses, undocumented purchases on government debit cards and the funding of call centers that received an average of 2.4 calls per day, among others.

In 2013, four VA construction projects in Las Vegas, Orlando, Denver and New Orleans cost an extra $1.5 billion because of scheduling delays and excessive expenditures, the report shows. Additional funds have been funneled into legal settlements. Since 2001, the VA has paid about $845 million in malpractice costs, of which $36.4 million was used to settle claims involving delayed health care.

Criticism of the VA’s budget has increased in light of a controversial performance bonus system that alleg-edly created financial incentives for managers to hide the fact that patients were waiting months for care.

At a congressional hearing, Gina Farrisee, the VA Assistant Secretary for Human Resources and Administration, confirmed that 78% of VA senior managers qualified for extra pay or other compensation in fiscal year 2013, despite ongoing delay and malpractice controversies. Former VA Regional Director Michael Moreland received a $63,000 bonus in 2013 for infection prevention policies, for example, but the VA’s Office of Inspector General concluded that his policies failed. Moreland presided over the Pittsburgh VA, where an outbreak of Legionnaires’ disease killed six veterans in 2011 and 2012.

The report identifies crimes committed by VA staff, including drug dealing, theft and sexual abuse of patients dating back many years. Earlier this year, one former staffer at the Tampa, Florida, VA was sentenced to six years in federal prison for trading veterans’ personal information for crack cocaine.

A CNN investigation recently uncovered an additional scheme at the

Phoenix VA hospital, where records of dead veterans were changed to hide how many died while waiting for care.

The VA’s inspector general is investigating 69 medical centers for allegations that administrators altered appointment data to make patient wait times appear to be shorter. Yet the VA’s medical review agency refuses to admit that delays in care have affected veter-ans’ health.

Acting VA Secretary Sloan Gibson said in a news conference in Washington that he plans to remove more VA officials from their positions once he receives more information from the inspector general.

The FBI has opened a criminal investigation of the Veterans Affairs Department. FBI Director James Comey told a House hearing the bureau’s Phoenix office has joined an ongoing review by the VA inspector general. The move at least partly satis-fies requests from key members of Congress from both parties who have pressed for a full probe by the Justice Department as the scandal accelerated in recent weeks and led to the resigna-tion of VA Secretary Eric Shinseki in May.

Officials have said the inspector general is sharing findings with federal prosecutors, and the Justice Department could launch a full-blown criminal probe if any of the information meets the standard for doing so. M

Senator’s Report: Bad VA Care May Have Killed More Than 1,000 Veterans

Tom CoburnUnited States Senator

Making a permanent-change-of-station move can be stressful, but changing health care providers during that time is easy, according to the director

of the TRICARE health plan. In a DOD News interview, Mary Kaye Justis said she wants servicemembers and their families to know there are several easy options to find new health care providers at their new duty station ahead of time or after they arrive, following the April 1 closure of the TRICARE service centers.

“We have a lot of folks to make sure the health care is there with good support for beneficiaries,” Justis said. “When you’re moving, there are a lot of changes going on and we want to make it as easy as possible through the multiple safety nets that exist in both our military treatment facilities and in our network.”

A first step servicemembers and families should take is to update their information with their new address and duty station in the Defense Enrollment Eligibility Reporting System, also known as DEERS. Every beneficiary and servicemember is responsible for keeping their DEERS database information up-to-date, Justis pointed out.

“Once that’s done, if they’re in the middle of moving and haven’t thought about changing doctors or networks, the new management care support contractor will contact them,” she said.

Several options exist to help in changing health care providers, Justis said. A program called Moving Made Easy will walk beneficiaries through the process on TRICARE TV or as a webinar on the Military OneSource website, and TRICARE Web Resources on YouTube also offers valuable information, she added.

The Moving Made Easy initiative helps families in

the continental United States moving from one region to another, Justis said, adding that TRICARE is divided into three regions – north, south and west.

Another choice is to call. “If you’re moving, you can call either region and either contractor will assist you,” she said. “So, there really are a lot of opportunities.”

One thing people often don’t know is that they don’t have to disenroll from TRICARE or TRICARE Prime, Justis said. “They just need to call their regional office or management support care contractor and let them know they’re moving,” she added. “It’s a simple process. They’ll set beneficiaries up with a new primary care provider and take care of any special needs they may have in their new area.”

Transferring information for medication also is an easy process, she said. There is one national contractor in the retail network, and other options are mail order prescriptions and using pharmacies at military treatment facilities.

“All the military treatment facilities in our direct-care system work very actively to take care of their folks,” Justis said. “We work together from purchase care from the networks, and from the military treatment facilities to make sure there’s a good safety net for beneficiaries.”

TRICARE is reaching across the Military Health System to ensure ease of changing health care during a move, she added. “We make it easy for folks to get to their providers, we make sure we have great quality in place in terms of the providers, programs and services and we take good care of those with special needs, whether it’s a child with autism or a physical challenge,” Justis said.

“If there are areas where beneficiaries need additional help,” she added, “they can reach out to their provider and let them know so they can help create that support system.” M

Official Explains Options for Changing Health Care Providers

The Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) announced that it is making renewed funding available to 25 organizations in 11 states that provide transitional housing and supportive services to homeless Veterans with special needs. The Grant and Per Diem Program (GPD) Special Need Grants -- totaling $5 million to grantees – will allow the organizations to continue providing housing and necessary services to homeless Veterans from any or all of the following groups with special needs: women, frail elderly, terminally ill, chronically mentally ill and individuals who care for minor dependents.“We will continue our work until no Veteran has to sleep on the streets,” said Acting VA Secretary Sloan Gibson. “We have made significant progress toward our goal to end Veterans’ homelessness. That progress would not have occurred without the important work of GPD Special Need

grantees and other local partners.” VA’s Homeless Providers Grant and Per Diem Program provides funds to community agencies that provide services to homeless Veterans. The program promotes the development and provision of supportive housing and services with the goal of helping homeless Veterans achieve residential stability, increase their skill levels and income, and gain greater self-determination.A national count in 2013 of homeless persons in the United States revealed there were 57,849 homeless Veterans. While still large, this number represents a 24-percent decline since January 2010. In support of the VA’s goal of ending Veteran homelessness in 2015, VA committed more than $1 billion in fiscal year 2014 to strengthen programs that prevent and treat the issues that can lead to Veteran homelessness. M

VA Announces $5 Million in Grants to Aid Homeless Veterans With Special Needs

Officers & Directors

Bernd Dela Cruz, CSM USA (Ret)National President

Roger J. Ehrke, CSM USA (Ret)Vice President

Marion O. Walley, CSM USA (Ret)Vice President

Charles Richardson, CMSgt USAF (Ret)Secretary

Oscar R. Hinson, SGM USA (Ret)Treasurer

John C.T. Meyer, MCPO USN (Ret)Director

Thaddues Peters, CMSgt USAF (Ret)Director

Vincent W. Patton III, MCPOCG, USCG (Ret)Advisor for Sea Services

is published bi-monthly by the Armed Forces Top Enlisted

Association 1 (800) 808-4517

Publisher Bernd Dela CruzCSM USA (Ret)

Executive Editor Catherine Tavarozzo

Managing Editor/Designer Sue Boyles

Armed Forces Top Enlisted Association Membership Application

Name:_____________________________________________________

Rank:___________________ Branch of Service:___________________

Address:___________________________________________________

City:____________________________State:______ Zip:____________

Make your check payable to: AFTEA

q Check Enclosed q Visa q Mastercard

Card No. __________________________________________________

Exp. Date _____/_____

Name on Card: ______________________________________________

Signature: __________________________________________________

q 1 Year ($30) q 2 Year ($53) q 3 Year ($75)

q Lifetime Membership Lifetime Membership dues based on age (May be paid quarterly)

Under 51 q $255 (one payment) q $63.75 (qrtrly)51 - 60 q $230 (one payment) q $57.50 (qrtrly)61 - 70 q $180 (one payment) q $45.00 (qrtrly)Over 70 q $155 (one payment) q $38.75 (qrtrly)

Membership:Armed Forces Top Enlisted AssociationP.O. Box 90030Washington, DC 20090-0030

The AFTEA Alliance

A message from Liberty Mutual InsuranceFrom Dennis Goebel, Vice President, Liberty Mutual Insurance Company

By Coletta Teske

You never know when disaster might strike. Within minutes, cherished or valuable goods could be ruined.

Keeping an archive of your belongings will accelerate the process of replacing damaged property. It will also help you make better decisions about the insurance coverage you need before a disaster strikes.Follow these three simple steps to archive your home:

yy Make a list of your possessions. Some people prefer a low-tech approach to list-making—index cards or a notebook, for example—while others are comfortable with spreadsheets on a CD or USB drive. The method doesn’t matter, as long as the list is thorough, well-organized, and kept in a safe place. You should also remember to adjust your files periodically, deleting items you’ve gotten rid of and adding any new purchases.

yy Photograph your living space and possessions. Use a digital camera or a smartphone to capture rare,

important, and expensive items, both in close-up shots and in wider pictures that show their position in the room. You should also photograph each wall, as well as closets and drawers. And be sure to label your photographs clearly, so you can correctly identify which numbers or details belong to which item.

yy Store digital photos and inventory in a safe place. Once you’re finished, find a safe place to store your records. Make a copy of everything and store it away from your home. For hard copies or a USB drive or CD, it’s often best to use a bank’s safe deposit box. For digital archives, Internet-based providers offer digital storage, online backups, or cloud technology to easily access or change your records.

To learn more about the Liberty Mutual Auto and Home Insurance program for AFTEA members or get a free, no-obligation quote, call 1-800-524-9400 or visit libertymutual.com/aftea. Please mention client #117534 when you call. Coverage underwritten and provided by Liberty Mutual Insurance Company and its affiliates, 175 Berkeley Street, Boston, MA 02116. Reprinted with permission from Liberty Mutual. ©2014 Liberty Mutual Insurance

How to Digitally Archive Your Home

Armed Forces Top Enlisted AssociationP.O. Box 90030Washington, D.C. 20090-0030

Address Service Requested

NONPROFITUS POSTAGE

PAIDLYNCHBURG, VA

PERMIT 324

Secretary of Defense Chuck Hagel Orders Military Health System Review . . . . . . . . . page 1

Report from the Hill . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . page 1

President's Column . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . page 2

Pentagon: 7 in 10 Youths Would Fail to Qualify for Military Service . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . page 2

Obama Selects Former Procter & Gamble Chief to Lead Veterans Affairs . . . . . . . . . . page 4

Senator’s Report: Bad VA Care May Have Killed More Than 1,000 Veterans . . . . . . . . page 5

Official Explains Options for Changing Health Care Providers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . page 6

VA Announces $5 Million in Grants to Aid Homeless Veterans With Special Needs . . . page 6

How to Digitally Archive Your Home . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . page 6