Sadly, the House Veterans Affairs Committee is not one of the prestigious committees of the U.S. House of Representatives. It has not, historically, attracted the best and brightest. Never do we hear a newly elected “rising star” of either party tell us of his or her ambition to serve on that committee.

Rather, it has been a make-work dumping ground for undistinguished backbenchers like our own Rep. Mike Michaud. Yet this committee is charged with keeping our commitment to the veterans who laid their lives on the line for all of us.

Maybe it’s time to consider abolishing the Veterans Affairs Committee and assigning its oversight duties to other standing committees with more influence and clout. We must serve the needs of our veterans with the same level of excellence with which they served our nation.

Rep. Michaud, a nonveteran, has never been modest about what he claims to have done for our veterans. I borrow a phrase from Winston Churchill when I say that Rep. Michaud “has much to be modest about.”

Porter D. Leighton

Falmouth


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