policies are only as good as the institutions and people whose job it is to carry them out.

Admiral Timberlake, you have until September 2009 to develop and implement a fully interoperable health care capability for DOD and VA. Are you going to make it?

Congress intended that wounded servicemembers have the broadest possible options for brain injury care and rehabilitation.

Now, in terms of support for the spouse who's life has changed as much as yours has, there is a compensation stream, is that right, Colonel Gadson?

I encourage the Services to devise road maps to enable our wounded warriors with additional skill sets.

how many more mental health providers have DOD and VA hired since 2001?

One thing I'd like to just bring to the committee's attention, and to the public and our panel members, is that Colonel Gadson's a good example of how this war is different.

Are the resources available to meet the demand for care sufficient?

We need to look at all the ideas, collect the best ones, and develop the best legislative solution possible.

The country needs to come to grips with the fact that the moment the person is catastrophically, devastatively injured, the family changes.

We will need new authority to begin a program, and look to the committee for assistance with that.

Make sure I get this right. You get wounded, you get back home, your Active Duty pay continues until you're medically discharged. Is that right?

What do you say to skeptics who believe that you are just playing with semantics when you assert that the goal will be achieved?

how will we know if laws and policies have made a positive difference for wounded servicemembers and their families, or not?

Do you think it would be wise to look at doing something new?

I believe that enforcement is very important to addressing this problem. But I also believe that prevention works, and I also believe that treatment works.

Can you see any reasonable possibility down the road based on science where that might be required?

Can you get this from eating pork? [Laughter.]