Monday, June 6, 2011

Collecting benefits is a losing battle for some veterans

Collecting benefits is a losing battle for some veterans

By Will Doolittle -- will@poststar.com

Editor’s Note: This is the second of a three-part series on blue water veterans, and part of a larger series on the struggles of veterans to collect benefits from the VA.

FORT EDWARD -- Charles Cooley, Vietnam veteran, shuffled out of his bedroom with an oxygen hose looped around his nose like a bridle and fell into a chair at the dining room table.

"Ungh," he gasped. "I fell out of bed again last night."

"Did you?" said his wife, Dolores. "Jesus Lord."

Day after day, the Cooleys sit around in their doublewide trailer in the Drifting Ridge subdivision, watching TV and listening to the cries of their four cockatiels.

They do not get out much. Charles can’t even sit outside, because the breeze would chill his arms and legs.
Collecting benefits is a losing battle

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