b.  Ask MOAA’s Benefits Counselors
Do you have a question about TRICARE For Life, the Survivor Benefit Plan, or other military benefits? Log in to MOAA's Web Base and ask one of MOAA's benefits assistance specialists.     (Click on  Ask MOAA’s Benefits Counselors here or above to access the link to ask your question(s). GF)

c. HBO's The Pacific Premiers Sunday
From the creative team behind HBO's Emmy Award winning miniseries Band of Brothers comes an epic 10-part miniseries that will track the intertwined odysseys of three U.S. Marines across the vast canvas of the Pacific front in World War II. Watch a trailer here.  (Click on   HBO's The Pacific Premiers Sunday  here or above to see the details.   GF)

                 ISSUES

Issue 1.  Senate Hearing Highlights People Concerns
New Chairman Jim Webb (D-VA) exchanged views with defense, MOAA, and other association leaders at a March 10 Armed Services Personnel Subcommittee hearing. (See Issue 1 below for the details. GF)  

Issue 2.  Armed Services Leaders Seek Budget Help
House and Senate Armed Services Committee leaders have asked their respective Budget Committees for budget headroom to make needed benefit improvements. (See Issue 2 below for the details. GF)

Issue 3.  Even Short Delay Is A Big Deal
This week, the Senate passed legislation to delay the 21% Medicare/TRICARE payment cut until October 1 (vs. April 1). Now the ball is in the House’s court. (See Issue 3 below for the details. GF) 

Issue 1.  Senate Hearing Highlights People Concerns

A March 10 Senate Armed Services Personnel Subcommittee hearing featured testimony by the Pentagon's top personnel leaders and several Military Coalition representatives, including MOAA Government Relations Director (and Coalition Co-chair) Col. Steve Strobridge (USAF-Ret).

New Subcommittee Chairman Jim Webb (D-VA) underscored his empathy with the military community and his intent to be an active chairman.

He said his father was an Air Force officer, he attended 9 different schools between the fifth and tenth grade, and "I'm the father of a Marine NCO who did some hard time in Iraq, and the father-in-law of a Marine infantry sergeant who, at age 24, is being deployed for the fourth time this coming July."

Webb intends to "exercise continuous and active oversight of all our military personnel matters." He called particular attention to the stress of lengthy deployments, noting, "We're in uncharted territory in terms of the long-term consequences."

He also acknowledged concerns about rising defense personnel costs, especially for health care.

The panel's ranking Republican, Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC), cited Webb as the "most clearly qualified [senator] to lead this subcommittee right now...When it comes to the troops, we’ll be as bipartisan as possible."

"Sustainability of health care is the issue," Graham said. "There's been no TRICARE premium increase since 1995, and eventually we'll have to deal with that."

Under Secretary of Defense for Personnel & Readiness Clifford Stanley, testifying for the first time in his new position, reported that recruiting and retention programs continue to be successful, and the services continue to maintain an all-volunteer force of top quality even after eight years of combat operations. But he acknowledged that rising personnel costs could affect readiness.

On a subsequent panel, Strobridge and the Coalition witnesses testified on an array of initiatives to support the military community:

Military pay raise: The Coalition urged adding at least one-half percentage point to the 1.4% military pay raise proposed in the defense budget - which would be the lowest raise since 1962, even while the Nation is imposing unprecedented sacrifices on troops and families.

TRICARE: Strobridge expressed the Coalition's gratitude that the new defense budget didn't propose any TRICARE fee increases, and urged the panel to include language in this year's defense bill to acknowledge that career military people pay huge, in-kind and up-front premiums through decades of service and sacrifice over and above fees paid in cash. He also urged the subcommittee to stop a scheduled Oct. 1 increase of more than $110-per-day above the current $535-per-day TRICARE Standard in-patient copay.

Concurrent receipt: Coalition witnesses expressed support for the President's initiative to end the disability offset for all medically retired members, with the ultimate goal of ending the disability offset to retired pay.

Survivor Benefits: When the Coalition urged ending the deduction of VA survivor benefits from military SBP annuities, Webb noted that his mother was an SBP annuitant and said how much it meant to her when Congress ended the Social Security offset to SBP several years ago.

Guard and Reserve: Priorities included authorizing reduced-retirement-age credit for all active service since 9/11/01, extending 9-11 GI Bill benefits to full-time Title-32 guard personnel, and authorizing Public Health Service and NOAA officers to transfer benefits to family members.

Wounded warriors: Strobridge cited the need to provide three years of active-duty level TRICARE coverage for disability retirees and to further improve protections for wounded warrior caregivers.  

Issue 2.  Armed Services Leaders Seek Budget Help

Late last week, both House and Senate Armed Services leadership sent bipartisan letters to their respective Budget Committees, seeking needed budget allocations to meet FY2011 military needs.

House Armed Services Chairman Ike Skelton (D-MO) and Ranking Member "Buck" McKeon (R-CA) highlighted several top MOAA priorities, including:

• An across-the-board pay raise increase of 1.9% (.5% above the Employment Cost Index) for military members
• Retroactive credit for early retirement qualification for deployed guardsmen and reservists
• Improved education programs for the Selected Reserve
• Concurrent receipt for all medically retired servicemembers
• Elimination of the offset for survivors entitled to both the Survivor Benefit Program and Dependency and Indemnity Compensation

Senate Armed Services Chairman Carl Levin (D-MI) and Ranking Member John McCain (R-AZ) asked the Senate Budget leadership to support the Administration's concurrent receipt proposal.

The Administration's FY2011 defense budget proposes a five-year phase-out of the disability offset for all medical (Chapter 61) retirees. Rep. Joe Wilson (R-SC) has introduced legislation (H.R. 4525) to implement that plan.

Last year, neither the White House nor Congress identified a funding source to offset the initiative's cost ($264M in FY 2011 and $5.3B over the next ten years). The Skelton/McKeon letter expressed frustration that the White House again did not identify specific offsets, and said the Armed Services Committee will need the Budget Committee's help to make it happen.

Under congressional rules, increases in so-called "mandatory spending" (which includes concurrent receipt, Reserve retired pay, and SBP fixes) must be offset by increased revenue or cuts in other mandatory spending programs. Since the Armed Services Committees can’t cut retired pay to fund SBP or vice versa, they need leadership help to identify other offsets.

Issue 3.  Even Short Delay Is A Big Deal

On Wednesday, the Senate passed H.R. 4213, the unemployment benefits extender bill that also would postpone the looming 21% cut in Medicare/TRICARE doctor payments until October 1.

Without this fix, that patently unacceptable cut would take effect as of April 1.

But we're not out of the woods yet. The House still has to pass it, and if the House changes anything in it (as they likely will), House and Senate leaders will then have to work out those differences.

Since the massive bill has a $140 billion price tag and some of the cost offsets the Senate proposed to pay for it are the same ones proposed to help offset the cost of national health reform legislation, clear sailing is far from assured.

Everyone is sick and tired of this extended drama, and wants to find a way to get the 21% payment cut stopped. But if it were simple, it would have been done long ago.

For now, legislators need to find a way to get the six-month delay through…so we can all move on to thinking about what happens Oct. 1.

Stay tuned.