A former Defense Department spokesman is calling out the Obama administration for giving terrorists better medical treatment than its giving the nation's veterans.
In an opinion piece on FoxNews.com today, Defense Department alumni J.D. Gordon claims, 'Al Qaeda terrorists at Guantanamo treated better than our vets.'
'Yes, it’s true. I know because I served as a Pentagon spokesman from 2005-2009 and visited Guantanamo Bay Naval Base over 30 times during those years,' he writes.
Gordon is a retired Navy commander who served as a Defense Department spokesman under both presidents George W. Bush and Barack Obama.
After departing the Pentagon, he entered the realm of politics. In 2012 he served as an adviser to pizza magnate Herman Cain's bid for the Republican presidential nomination.
He is now a national security and foreign policy commentator and a Senior Fellow and Communications Adviser to several right-leaning organizations in Washington, D.C. He is also the Executive Director of a national security-based conservative political action committee called Protect America Today that he helped found in 2012.
In his op-ed on Fox's website, Gordon calls on the nation's Commander-in-Chief to 'refocus his priorities' on America's veterans and spend 'less time, effort and energy caring for Al Qaeda and Taliban detainees at Gitmo and much more attention put on caring for America's veterans.'
His op-ed points to a Joint Task Force Guantanamo fact sheet on Detainee Medical Care as evidence that the approximately 150 terrorists at Gitmo are taken care of by 100 health care providers.
'Doctors and medical personnel are at their beck and call,' Gordon writes.
'Got a cold, a fever, a toothache, a tumor, chest or back pain, mental health issues, PTSD? No problem, come right in. Military doctors are waiting to see you.'
The Joint Task Force Guantanamo fact sheet claims the 'medical care provided to detainees at Guantanamo is consistent with what U.S. service members receive.'
'JMG providers administer care to all detainees regardless of disciplinary status, level of cooperation or legal status,' it says. 'Detainees are treated at dedicated medical facilities with state-of-the-art equipment and an expert medical staff.'
The one-pager also notes that health services are available to suspected terrorists at Guantanamo Bay 'around the clock, seven days a week.
'If any government entity ever needed a complete overhaul, it’s the VA,' he says. 'If it were in the private sector, it would have been shuttered long ago.'
Gordon argues that both presidents Bush and Obama allowed the VA to spiral out of control, citing VA officials' big salaries, big bonuses and big budgets for decorating, but zeros in on the current office holder for sitting on his hands for the last five and half years.
'Instead of fixing the problem' with veterans' care, the Obama's administration's ' focus was closing Guantanamo and improving the comfort of detainees. Even though they already lived under some of the best prison conditions ever seen.'
Gordon, who is a veteran himself, says the government ought to be giving its countrymen and women who fought in uniform the same level of medical care than its giving to assumed terrorists.
'Our veterans have served the nation proudly. In many cases they were gravely wounded during their service and now will require a lifetime of medical support. Every one of them deserves better.'
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