13th Hour Ruse by American Legion
After Years of Sleeping With the Enemy
By Robert Rosebrock and Gordon Duff
Today, the American Legion, in its publication seemed to side with homeless veterans in a lawsuit against the Department of Veterans Affairs. The suit, initiated by the 3 plus year struggle of the Veterans Revolution and Old Guard Veterans, filed by the ACLU and top law firms, cites Secretary Shenseki and regional director Donna Beiter with, not only failure to serve homeless veterans but full participation in a culture of corruption.
The problem with the Legion is that they have sided with the defendants and have openly refused to support the veterans groups and ACLU in their efforts. In fact, that the American Legion isn’t listed as a defendant themselves may in fact be an oversight on the part of the legal teams, which include many of the nations top attorneys, that have stepped in on behalf of veterans rights.
“Despite opposition to these efforts by Legion officials, Legion rank and file have been strong supporters all along,” says Rosebrock. “They have been with us all the way. The Legion organization, we just can’t imagine what they must be thinking.”
The veterans who have, for 171 consecutive Sundays, demonstrated for the rights of homeless veterans in West Los Angeles, the group responsible for this lawsuit, had gone to the American Legion for help but were turned away. Legion spokesman, Lawrence Van Kuran gives their rationale:
“The Legion has intentionally chosen not to participate as an organized VSO in protest rallies held on Sunday afternoons outside the gates of the W. Los Angeles VA facility, rallies organized and managed by a specific group of Veterans, one of whom resigned his Legion membership because the Legion declined to participate in his rallies (i.e., you’re either with me or against me). This decision was made because those rallies have typically been characterized as highly argumentative and emotional; some of those attending the rallies have been arrested.”
The problem with Kuran’s statement, however, is that the arrests he cites are, in fact, the reason for this ACLU lawsuit and an additional one awaiting trial. The arrests of the demonstrators had long since been deemed illegal and unconstitutional and charges had been dropped.
Kuran knew this. However, in the article below, he changes his position entirely.
Worse still, in 2007, the Legion issued a letter of support on behalf of the very activities they are now trying to say they oppose, activities specifically challenged in the lawsuit they would like to take credit for. That letter, one they wish didn’t exist, is reproduced below:
The real issue is with the Legion itself. It had a choice, it could side with homeless veterans and the ACLU or with the wealthy and powerful homeowner association and developer group that sits in the middle of one of the nation’s most powerful political machines.
Instead, the Legion issued communiques supporting the defendants against homeless veterans and, in fact, came out directly in support of each issue listed in the lawsuit, putting its full power and massive membership in direct opposition to the rights and welfare of American veterans.
Now that the Legion Convention is going on in California and the lawsuit pushed forward by the Veterans Old Guard, VT, the Annenberg Foundation, the ACLU and Carolina Winston Barrie, the truth, the real history of who is who and what is what is being shoved under the table.
From the Legion’s publication:
Homeless vets sue over medical center
Four homeless veterans suffering from post-traumatic stress and other war-related injuries are suing the Department of Veterans Affairs, alleging it has misused land in West Los Angeles originally donated to the government specifically to provide housing for disabled veterans.
Acreage that once provided homes, food and convenient access to medical care for tens of thousands of veterans now is leased for rental car storage, a dog run and a private school’s swimming pool among other purposes, according to the class-action suit filed June 8 in federal court in California by the American Civil Liberties Union, Vietnam Veterans of America and other groups.
The suit charges that private leases violate the terms of deed that transferred the property to the federal government in 1888.
“If our nation’s laws are enforced, soldiers who risked their lives on the battlefield won’t be condemned to live in dumpsters or under freeways while land donated to house them is used instead to house a rental car company and a laundry facility for luxury hotels,” said Laurence Tribe, a Harvard law professor and former Obama administration adviser who is one of the attorneys representing the homeless veterans.
The former adjutant general of the California National Guard calls the situation tragic, especially considering that between 8,000 and 20,000 homeless veterans live in the Los Angeles area. “If anybody should have housing, it’s the veterans,” retired Maj. Gen. Paul Monroe said. “These people sacrifice for us, and we dump on them.”
The plaintiffs include three combat veterans who served in Iraq and Afghanistan and a woman who claims to have been raped while serving in the Army in the 1970s. All need permanent, stable housing in order to receive effective treatment, the lawsuit says. It argues that VA should be ordered to resume using the West Los Angeles facilities to provide permanent housing for homeless veterans.
VA referred inquiries about the lawsuit to the U.S. Department of Justice, which declined to comment. However, exactly a week after the lawsuit was filed, VA unveiled a new master plan that proposes renovating up to three historic buildings to house homeless veterans. VA says the timing of the announcement is not related to the lawsuit.
The land in question is part of the West Los Angeles Medical Center & Community Living Center, one of three major medical complexes managed by the VA Los Angeles Health Care System. It is adjacent to Brentwood, one of the most upscale housing communities in the metropolitan area.
The 387-acre parcel is part of the land given to the federal government in 1888 by Sen. John P. Jones and Arcadia de Baker to establish a “Veteran’s National Home” to care for injured soldiers, according to Carolina Winston Barrie, great niece of de Baker. By the 1920s, the site housed veterans from the Civil War, Spanish-American War and World War I.
West Los Angeles VA’s predecessor agency stopped accepting new residents during the Vietnam War, and buildings that housed veterans were converted to other uses or abandoned. VA now leases 110 acres of the property to private companies, the UCLA baseball program, a private school and other entities.
It has never shared the details of the leases, how much revenue is generated or how VA spends the proceeds, said Larry Van Kuran, a vice commander for The American Legion’s Los Angeles County Council.
The lawsuit is accompanied by calls for Congress to investigate the Los Angeles VA’s lease deals and all property management decisions. The American Legion supports that probe.
“This is one symptom of the Greater Los Angeles VA’s questionable use of land and facilities,” Van Kuran said. “First and foremost, we want a full and fair accounting of the leases and other property management decisions and the revenue related to those decisions. VA has managed West Lost Angeles in a secretive manner, similar to Sepulveda.”
Sepulveda VA Medical Center is one of the VA’s trio of hospital complexes in the Los Angeles area. Four years ago, VA quietly leased seven acres and two outpatient buildings at Sepulveda to a private company that plans to develop a low-income apartment complex. The secret deal didn’t come to light until the developer applied for a zoning variance, even though federal law stipulates VA consult veterans groups and surrounding neighbors before signing such contracts. As troubling: VA can simply give the private company the property anytime during the 75-year lease.
Meanwhile, VA is slowly closing health-care facilities and curtailing medical services at Sepulveda and forcing hundreds of thousands of veterans to commute to West Los Angeles for care.
“There are a lot of things that raise question after question,” Van Kuran said. “We would like to see the onion peeled and full disclosure.”
U.S. Army, 1965-67, Schofield Barracks, Hqs., U.S Army, Hawaii. Director, The Veterans Revolution, Captain, the Old Veterans Guard, and Director, We the Veterans.
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