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War, War, War See other War, War, War Articles Title: Judge dismisses suit over veteran health care A U.S. judged dismissed on Wednesday a lawsuit against the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs that claimed the government was failing to meet the mental health needs of former troops, who have a rate of suicide far higher than the general population. Two groups had sought a court order to require the department to improve the way it cares for veterans and processes benefits. U.S. District Court Judge Samuel Conti said Veterans for Common Sense and Veterans United for Truth were demanding an overhaul of the VA system, "something clearly outside this court's jurisdiction." "Congress has specifically precluded district courts from reviewing veterans' benefits decisions and has entrusted decisions regarding veterans' medical care to the discretion of the VA Secretary," Conti wrote in his 82-page decision. "The court can find no systemic violations system-wide that would compel district court intervention," he said. Lawyers pressing the suit said in April that veterans commit suicide between three and 7.5 times more often than the national average. That kind of evidence was used to bolster the argument that the VA has systemic problems treating mental health problems. But Conti disagreed. "He adopted a definition of 'systemic' that is very, very limited," Gordon Erspamer, a lawyer with the firm Morrison & Foerster, said during a telephone conference call. "We think the bar was set too high." The VA, which has come under fire for its care of veterans returning from Iraq and Afghanistan, said in a statement that it was "pleased with the decision." 'SHH!' Conti cited a study by the RAND Corp that found 18.5 percent of U.S. service members who have returned from Iraq and Afghanistan now have post-traumatic stress disorder, about half of those who need treatment for the condition seek it, and of those who get treatment, only slightly more than half get minimally adequate care. The decision also referred to a December 2007 e-mail by a VA official saying that there were about 18 suicides per day among America's 25 million veterans, and that VA data showed four to five suicides per day among those who receive care through the system. In a February e-mail, the VA official wrote, "Shh! Our suicide prevention coordinators are identifying about 1,000 suicide attempts per month among the veterans we see in our medical facilities. Is this something we should (carefully) address ourselves in some sort of release before someone stumbles on it?" The head of one of the veteran groups said an appeal to the U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco was planned. "This ruling will only cause us to redouble our efforts and our pursuit of justice for our nation's veterans. We will not rest until our job is finished," Paul Sullivan, director of Veterans for Common Sense, said in a statement. Arturo Gonzalez, another Morrison & Foerster attorney, told Reuters that lawyers for the veterans groups will ask the circuit court to back the kind of broad judicial powers Conti said he lacked. "We believe a federal judge is obligated to act when confronted with facts as egregious as the ones in our case," Gonzalez said.
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I would like to see all the "non-lifers" tell the military to shove it and say they quit. I'ts getting close to revolution time in the U.S.
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