Celebrate, honor those who’ve served
When crowds gather this time of year, it often follows that veterans are asked to stand and be recognized. But those who’ve protected and defended the nation deserve more than polite applause. They need the benefits they were promised.
This Veterans Day provides reminders of the challenges that veterans continue to face on the home front, more than a year after the appalling wait times and other failings of the Department of Veterans Affairs were revealed and reforms were announced.
As long as the nation is in a state of war, with only the specific battlefronts and enemies changing year to year, it will keep needing servicemen and women and increasing the veterans’ ranks.
Whether it occurred in conflict zones or support roles, their service to country is part of a pact. The Kansas delegation in Congress should keep the pressure on the VA to do its duty to veterans, including by allowing rural veterans access to health care as close to home as possible.
The rest of us can celebrate and honor those who’ve served and sacrificed in other ways:
▪ Attend an area event marking the federal holiday, such as the observance at 11 a.m. Wednesday at Veterans Memorial Park featuring the new Sedgwick County manager, Brig. Gen. Michael Scholes, or the Veterans Remembrance Services at 11 a.m. and 1 p.m. Saturday at the Robert J. Dole VA Medical Center.
▪ Answer Dole’s call to contribute toward building the National Eisenhower Memorial alongside the National Mall in Washington, D.C., by going to eisenhowermemorial.gov. “Ike was our hero,” the former Kansas senator recently wrote, recalling his own service under the supreme Allied commander in Europe. “And I believe he was a hero to most of the 16.5 million Americans who served in World War II, as well as to countless others across the nation and around the world.”
• Further the mission of Kansas Honor Flight to enable area veterans to visit the war memorials in Washington, by making donations through kansashonorflight.org.
▪ As Wichita Mayor Jeff Longwell suggested at Tuesday’s City Council meeting, take care to collect and preserve the stories of the veterans in our own families.
Those who serve in the U.S. military do so for a measured period of time, but are veterans for the rest of their days. May they never have cause to doubt their nation’s gratitude.
This story was originally published November 10, 2015 at 6:07 PM with the headline "Celebrate, honor those who’ve served."