Should Tuskegee Airmen Spend Twilight In Poverty?

William Booker

UPDATE:
Since this post was originally published, Mr. Booker has been enrolled in the VA system with the help of volunteers from Veterans And Friends of Puget Sound. The staff at the hospital were very welcoming and it looks like he and his family will be getting the help he earned. There will be a fuller post on this soon. But for the record, here's the original post:
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William Booker served in combat as one of the Tuskegee Airmen. You might have seen the movie, and you probably enjoyed seeing other Airmen at the 2012 Inauguration but won't thing you won't see is the VA helping him stay alive. The rules don't allow it.
In his late 80s and suffering from multiple illnesses, Booker's problem is that his pension, combined with his wife's, exceeds the $40,000 maximum allowed for those seeking VA assistance.
Mr. Booker's medically necessary direct care costs are around $4,000 a month, due to his illnesses. On topic of that are several hundred dollars  in medication, every month. His caretakers have decided, after careful consideration, that he will require a better bed and a reclining wheelchair due to his condition; this will be many thousands of dollars more.
Over Christmas, he was sent to the hospital; his wife hasn't gotten the bill for that yet, but three days and two nights there are not going to come cheap.
You don't need an advanced degree in math to figure out that this adds up to a lot more than $40,000 a year. In other words, if his wife Dolores spent all of their pensions and social security, that would not cover their medical expenses, and it would leave nothing for her to live on.
Some of these expenses are covered by Medicare, but even when they pay 80% for medicines, that still leave a lot for her to come up with.
Dolores says she went to the VA four times to apply for help. "They say he can't get any VA benefits at all" because of the income limit. "I just want some help paying for medication".
There's not necessarily any bad guys in this story; rules are rules and if the rules say that VA can't help you, it won't.
But are we really supposed to pat ourselves on the back for celebrating The Greatest Generation, and then demand that they impoverish themselves at the end of their lives?