Republicans strike back with own GI Bill plan

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Republicans strike back with own GI Bill plan
By Rick Maze - Staff writer
Posted : Tuesday Apr 22, 2008 14:38:41 EDT

A Republican GI Bill plan with many features attractive to active-duty service members and their families was unveiled Tuesday, in an effort to show that it’s not just Democrats who want to improve veterans’ education benefits.

The plan includes increases in basic benefits, a new book allowance, broad rights to transfer unused benefits to family members, and the ability to use veterans’ benefits to pay off existing student loans.

It also would extend GI Bill benefits to service academy and Reserve Officers’ Training Corps scholarship graduates, who are currently ineligible for payments, and would allow about 5,000 people who entered active duty between 1977 and 1985 to sign up for the benefits plan from which they were excluded.

The package is intended as an alternative to a GI Bill plan introduced last year by Sen. Jim Webb, D-Va., that has the support of most House and Senate members.

It also helps Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., Republican presidential candidate and ranking minority party member of the Senate Armed Services Committee, who has faced increasing pressure from veterans’ groups for not supporting Webb’s bill, S 22.


Rest of article at: http://www.armytimes.com/news/2008/04/military_gibill_improvements_050508w/