President Obama on April 26 signed the legislation sponsored by Rep. Ike Skelton (D-Mo.) to ensure the Administration’s new health care reform law would not adversely affect Tricare. Both the House and Senate passed the Tricare Affirmation Act (HR 4887) unanimously. In an April 26 statement, Skelton said that the Tricare and non-appropriated fund (NAF) “health plans are such great plans that they already meet the minimum requirements for individual health insurance coverage in the recently enacted health care bill, and no Tricare or NAF health plan beneficiary will be required to purchase additional coverage beyond what they already have.”
Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen. Charles Q. Brown Jr. still “believes” in his mantra of “Accelerate Change or Lose”—and indicated the doctrinal changes it produced when he was Air Force Chief of Staff played a role in the service’s recent response to Iran’s aerial assault on Israel, he…