Mayor Daley will address a Veterans Awareness Day rally at Daley Plaza Friday, August 29, at noon.  Veterans are marching from three locations to the rally, calling for full mandatory funding of VA healthcare, full eligibility for all veterans, and full funding for veterans’ mental health.

Meanwhile, national veterans groups are unanimous in opposing the plan of one presidential candidate, himself a veteran, to privatize the VA health system.  “Ideologues… hate the fact that there’s a functional example out there of the government providing better care at a lower cost than the private sector,” Inter Press Service quotes John Sullivan, a Gulf War veteran who heads Veterans for Common Sense.