Military Officer - December 2008 - (Page 38) washingtonscene under 65 would see their copayments and deductibles waived for things like mammograms, immunizations, and colonoscopies. Congressional budget rules kept Congress from including beneficiaries over 65 directly, but the law does authorize TRICARE the discretion to reimburse that group for copayments associated with preventive care. MOAA will be pushing DoD to implement that authority to the maximum extent allowed by law. Why does the transferability option under the GI Bill only apply to currently serving servicemembers? Unlike other GI Bill initiatives, which are traditional VA benefits (that is, you qualify if you have completed the prescribed service), the transferability feature was written into the law as a retention incentive for the current force. Philosophically, it’s actually a form of retention bonus. Retention bonuses aren’t paid to people who already have left service or are about to leave but only to currently serving people who agree to remain in service for an additional period of time. Given the poor economy and recent proposals to change the military retirement system, is my retirement pay or SBP at risk of being reduced? There’s no proposal on the table that would reduce military retirement benefits or survivor benefits for anyone already serving or in retired/survivor status. The 10th Quadrennial Review of Military Compensation has proposed some changes that, if enacted, would affect future service entrants. MOAA is doubtful that those will get much serious consideration, but we can never say never. During past budget crunches, there have been proposals to delay or limit annual COLAs for current retirees, and we could see those again at some point. If so, MOAA will strongly oppose them, as we have in the past. DECEMBER 2008 2008 Bills Die Your help is needed to rebuild cosponsor support. W Happy Trails to Two Key Leaders I Sen. John Warner (R- Va.) and Rep. Duncan Hunter (R-Calif.), ranking Republicans on the Senate and House Armed Services committees — both previous chairs of those committees — retire from Congress this year. Both have been stalwart supporters of the military community and major players in the compensation wins of the past decade. MOAA salutes them and will miss them. hen Congress adjourns at the end of each two-year session, all of the bills not passed expire. All of MOAA’s bills on concurrent receipt, SBP, TRICARE fee protections, Guard/Reserve retirement age, etcetera, that didn’t get wrapped into the FY 2009 Defense Authorization Act officially die. And the long lists of legislator cosponsors that you helped build for them expire, too. That means our work will start over when the new 111th Congress convenes in January. MOAA lobbyists will get with our House and Senate champions after the New Year to reintroduce new bills. And then you’ll need to contact your legislators to rebuild longer cosponsor lists to improve the bills’ chances of getting passed next year. The reminder to all of us is that these legislative initiatives don’t happen by accident. They get passed only through strenuous, repeated collective efforts to push legislators to do the right thing by those who served and sacrificed for the rest of the country. The lesson is not to get discouraged when our bills don’t pass. It took year after year of sustained effort to win TRICARE For Life and elimination of the age-62 SBP annuity reduction and achieve major inroads on concurrent receipt. Military people can win on our other big issues, too, if we hang together and keep consistent heat on our legislators. MO — Contributors are Col. Steve Strobridge, USAFRet., director; Col. Mike Hayden, USAF-Ret.; Col. Bob Norton, USA-Ret.; Cmdr. René Campos, USNRet.; Cmdr. John Class, USN-Ret.; Col. Phil Odom, USAF-Ret.; Joy Dunlap; Cass Vreeland; and Bret Shea, MOAA’s Government Relations Department. 38 MILITARY OFFICER
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