Military Officer - September 2006 - (Page 28) washingtonscene Your Help Is Needed Now! ■ MOAA and The Military Coalition send Congress priorities, but what really motivates legislators is a large volume of individual constituent input. Please use one or both of the following ways to contact your legislators: ■ Visit http://capwiz.com /moaa/home/ to send MOAA-suggested e-mails on key issues. ■ Call them via MOAA’s toll-free Capitol Hill hot line, (866) 272-6622. won’t have final decisions on the issues for many months. MOAA hopes that congressional leaders will be looking at TMC positions with particular interest in this election year. To review the TMC letter and matrix, visit MOAA’s Web site at www.moaa.org /legisletters. GAO Begins TRICARE Study Agency seeks input from The Military Coalition on issues, options. ting principles that establish the level of benefit that beneficiaries have earned; ■ appropriate limits on periodic increases; ■ differences between military and civilian service conditions; ■ the unique role of military health benefits as an offset to the extraordinary demands and sacrifices inherent in a military career; and ■ the need to consider financial sacrifices already made by retired members (e.g., lifetime retired pay losses due to decades of pay caps and past health cost absorption by Medicare-eligibles who had to pay 100 percent of their own health costs before enactment of TRICARE For Life). MOAA will continue communication with the GAO as the study progresses. M OAA’s Col. Steve Strobridge, USAF-Ret., and Cmdr. John Class, USN-Ret., along with other The Military Coalition members, met with Government Accountability Office (GAO) representatives July 13 to discuss beneficiary concerns about DoD’s proposed increases in TRICARE fees. The GAO is looking at all issues surrounding the proposed increases. The scope will be refined once the FY 2007 Defense Authorization Act is passed — the House and Senate versions of the bill both require the GAO to study the TRICARE system, its costs, possible inefficiencies, and ways to reduce spending. MOAA stressed the importance of ensuring DoD pursues all possible internal efficiencies before proposing significant cost increases for beneficiaries and provided the GAO a list of alternative cost-saving initiatives not affecting beneficiary access or cost. Other issues that were addressed with the GAO included: ■ a lack of beneficiary input in preparation of Pentagon health care proposals; ■ concerns over the validity of assumptions used in cost projections; ■ generating initiatives based solely on cost savings for DoD rather than formula- The Flag Amendment Flames Out Senate amendment fails by one vote. O n June 27, the Senate came up just short of passing a constitutional amendment to let Congress outlaw desecration of the U.S. flag. The vote was 66-34, one shy of the two-thirds majority needed for passage. The amendment would not, in itself, ban flag desecration but would authorize Congress to pass laws criminalizing such behavior. The House passed the measure in June 2005. The Senate has never passed it, but this year’s vote was the closest ever. If it had cleared the Senate, the proposed amendment still would have to be approved by at least three-quarters of the states (38) within a seven-year period to be ratified formally. For many years, MOAA members have approved resolutions supporting congres- 28 MILITARY OFFICER SEPTEMBER 2006 http://www.moaa.org/legisletters http://www.moaa.org/legisletters http://capwiz.com/moaa/home http://capwiz.com/moaa/home
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