Suicide Saves Us Money (or I read Salon so you don't have to)

In a breathtakingly brilliant move, the VA is sending letters to mentally traumatized veterans telling them that their benefits are going to be under review, again. Ron Nesler, for instance, received

a letter from the V.A. saying that his file was one of those in its review. He said the letter left him shocked, angry and afraid. The letter warns that "confirmation" of his mental wounds "had not been established" and that his file at the V.A. "does not establish that the event described by you occurred nor does the evidence in the file establish that you were present when a stressful event occurred." (The V.A. recently determined, again, that Nesler's claims are legitimate.)

Nesler then correctly predicted "It is my educated opinion that [the V.A.] will kill some people with this. They will either kill themselves or die from stroke." And look here:

On Oct. 8, Greg Morris, 57, was found by his wife, Ginger, in their home in Chama, N.M., an old mining town of 1,250 in the Rocky Mountains. Lying at Morris' side were a gun and his Purple Heart medal. For years, Morris had been receiving monthly V.A. benefits in compensation for post-traumatic stress disorder. Next to his gun and Purple Heart was a folder of information on how the V.A. planned to review veterans who received PTSD checks to make sure those veterans really deserved the money.

Really, it's just like that liberal hell-hole, Salon.com, to not see this for the genius it is. Reviewing people's claims of PTSD costs money. A lot of money. And if it turns out that Barack Obama is right and the problem is not that there are too many fakers, but too few legitimately disturbed people receiving the benefits they were promised, that's going to cost us more money, money we can ill-afford when there are places like Syria to invade. But, if the VA sends out 72,000 letters at a good bulk mail rate, that are worded sternly enough to really scare the bejeezus out of the most mentally disturbed of the group, chances are that some of them, the very veterans most likely to need full benefits, will kill themselves, thus saving the taxpayers and all of society from a great burden. Who can argue with that?