Rant. To write in a noisy, excited or declamatory manner. To scold vehemently. To utter in a bombastic declamatory fashion.
I joined the Navy as a wide eyed, insolvent adolescent. Fairly early in my career, I had to make the difficult decision of whether or not to contribute 25% of my paycheck to pay into the Montgomery GI Bill. As an E-1 serving my Country in the finest Navy in the world, my paychecks came to $250.00 every two weeks, so a 25% hit was not something to be decided without all due and very careful consideration. I believed then, as I do now, that the GI Bill is one of the best programs ever developed by Military minds. By contributing $100 a month of your pay for 12 months (and risking life and limb for God, Country and the Citizens of these United States) you are (upon honorable discharge and at least three years of service) eligible for a good amount of tuition reimbursement at the accredited school of your choice (within 10 years after your honorable discharge and depending on tuition costs)! (Boy, there sure are a lot of these parentheses, huh?)
Fast forward to 2009; having left the Navy in 2002, I need to use my benefit or I will lose the unused portion on February 10, 2012. After some gentle and loving persuasion from my beautiful and ever supportive wife, I enrolled in Greensboro College.
Now, to start receiving your benefit, you will need to complete and submit a 22-1990, your DD-214 and have the school verify your enrollment. Your 22-1990 and DD-214 must be received and processed by the correct regional office before verification occurs or the verification will be sent to the lost records department. I assume the lost records department is exactly what you imagine, a huge warehouse full of stakes and stakes of papers, piles of unopened letters and a small framed, mousey older gentleman sitting at an aluminum table in a hard aluminum chair slowly sorting through the ever mounting heaps.
Shortly after submitting my 22-1990, I decided to instead finish my degree at Excelsior College (my alma mater) since they would accept all of my prior credits allowing me to finish sooner. The school also offered an online degree program which gives me the flexibility I need. Having had the benefit of growing up in the military and serving for 10 years active duty, I had the foresight to research the forms required to make this change and I dutifully filled out and submitted a 22-1995, three months before starting school, again, because I know how unhurriedly the Government operates.
I have been in school now for two months and have not received a dime. Since I am taking accelerated courses I need to enroll for the next semester. After calling the VA representative at my school, she directs me to a 1-800 number and I speak to the first of what will be several happy, pleasant, competent and socially skilled Government workers. Since the Buffalo VA never processed my 20-1995 and the school submitted my claim, my claim was now in sub-basement 35F with Grandpa Stanley in the (scary music) lost records department (screams and horror music)! The school cannot re-submit my claim since the VA system does show the claim as "pending" but they estimate at least 6 weeks for Grandpa Stan to even find it.
Long story short, after much back and forth over the last 5 months, I was told yesterday that I would need to contact my SENATOR or GOVERNOR to get some movement on this!
Let me end by making this relevant to current events. Replace the GI-Bill money above with Cancer Treatment, Heart Surgery, Painful Hip Replacement or any other “elective” (not immediately life threatening is defined as elective in the Canadian and German national health plans) condition. This is what happens when the Government runs anything outside what they are constituently directed to do: bureaucracy, forms, incompetence and apathy.
The Founding Fathers understood that they faced the question of developing a government for humans, who are, as James Madison put it, "prone absolutely to selfishness, jealousy, laziness, weakness of character and, no matter how disguised, a war of all against all." As a result, they gave the Government only four roles:
1) Protect the individual's right to Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness.
2) Raise an army, when necessary.
3) Regulate interstate commerce.
4) Protect the people from the government.
As modern Americans, we collectively believe that somehow we are above the things that are ingrained in our nature and that we transcend these human weaknesses and fallacies. So, obviously, pride and arrogance are as real and as relevant as they were in 1787, perhaps even more so given our inability to recognize or acknowledge it.
I end this post to begin my letter to my Governor, perhaps she can get the VA to do their job?
The Honorable Beverly Perdue
Governor of North Carolina
State Capitol Building
Office of the Governor
20301 Mail Service Center
Dear Governor:
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