The Party That Supports the Troops Strikes Again

Since the 1950s, veterans groups have had the opportunity to make legislative suggestions at joint Senate-House hearings, usually held about a month after the President submitted his budget requests to Congress. House Republicans are now trying to replace this with a system in which the vets will still have an opportunity to be heard, but not in joint hearings and at roughly at the same time as the President's submission, denying the vets groups a chance to review the White House submission before providing their own input.

The Republihack explanation for the change is that the hearings just weren't very well attended and that meeting with Congress earlier in the process would actually be helpful for the vets.

Oddly, the vets fail to see that as being beneficial. Lobbyists for the vets say the change is prompted by a desire by the White House to avoid having the President's budget for veterans affairs criticized by the vets. Hard to imagine that could be the case with this administration. They've always been so transparent in the way they do business and tolerant of criticism.