Veterans Observing Veterans Day

On behalf of the Veterans Caucus of the California Democratic Party, I applaud President Barack Obama's pledge to bring home all our troops from Iraq by year's end. We encourage him now to bring the war in Afghanistan—the longest in America's history—to a rapid close as well. It's time once again to turn our swords into ploughshares and attend to the growing inequities here at home.

It's easy enough to say how firmly we stand behind our service men and women as they march off to war, their step quick and their faces shining brightly. Harder is the task of standing by them in the long decades that follow as they and their loved ones work through the physical and psychic injuries prolonged combat causes even the strongest among them. We have work to do. As Vietnam veteran and Los Angeles City Councilman Bill Rosendahl (pictured here) recently told a gathering of veterans, "We have eight thousand homeless veterans in Los Angeles eating out of garbage cans—and there should be none."

Please join the Veterans Caucus in making sure that today's veterans have all the benefits—educational, vocational, housing, medical—they so rightly earned. The GI Bill and VA loan benefits granted "Greatest Generation" World War II veterans are often credited with fueling America's miraculous economic growth in the last century. Together we can work the same miracle in the 21st Century by lavishing similar benefits on our new veterans. Let's get it done.

Ricardo Reyes
Chair, Veterans Caucus