Bob Filner: “I thank Mr. Carter. I thank all the Members who spoke on this legislation. It is an important bill. But I must say, we…”

“I thank Mr. Carter. I thank all the Members who spoke on this legislation. It is an important bill. But I must say, we ought to go further than this resolution. Mr. Poe said voting for this resolution means we're standing up for our troops. Well, I just spoke recently to the Annual Convention of the Vietnam Veterans of America. I'll tell you what they define as standing up for our troops--and there will be legislation embodying all of this soon. It would mean that we would look at the 200,000 Vietnam vets who are on the street homeless tonight and solve that moral blot on our record. Most of us go to Stand-Downs every year, where the whole community comes around for 3 days and provides security and comfort, medical attention, dental health, legal assistance, clothes for the homeless vets in that community. The community comes together and has a holistic approach of drug and alcohol abuse and job counseling. So we know what to do for those 3 days. But the last five or eight Stand-Downs that I've addressed I said, I'm tired of coming to Stand-Downs. We should have Stand-Downs 365 days a year. That's what the Veterans Administration ought to do. With a $100 billion budget, you would think we could take care of the Vietnam vets who are homeless. That would be standing up for the troops. In addition, many of them have been fighting for decades to get compensation for an agent orange disability.”