Mark Rankin / U.S. Army file

A bulldozer dumps a load of trash into a burn pit just 300 yards from the runway at Bagram Airfield. A law signed by President Barack Obama will create a registry of U.S. service members who may have been sickened or killed by burn pits used throughout Iraq and Afghanistan.

An American flag dangles from the Torres home, the sign of a long battle won: a new law — signed Thursday by President Barack Obama — creating a registry of U.S. service members perhaps sickened or killed by burn pits used throughout Iraq and Afghanistan to destroy waste ranging from batteries to body parts.

But amid occasional smiles over the first step to formally identify the toxic effects of what’s called “this generation’s Agent Orange,” there were tears, too, in that house near Corpus Christi, Texas. Resident Le RoyTorres, 40, a former Army captain, is one of the ill veterans who will land on that list.

“It was a big victory. It justifies the need for health care. And now we know we’re not alone,” said Rosie Lopez-Torres, Le Roy’s wife, who said she “knocked on a lot of doors” in Congressional hallways to push the bill, which passed Dec. 30. The law requires the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs to assemble the registry and report back to Congress. 

“But because of (our) finances, because my husband can’t work, today was also one of the toughest days for us,” Lopez-Torres said Wednesday. “Today, he was in tears. I’m not going to sugar coat that. How do I convince this once-strong, 6-foot-tall man who never missed a day of work: ‘You are the same man.’ But as the head of the household, he said: ‘You don’t understand what this has done to me.’ So it’s hard. But we still hang that flag on our porch. This has nothing to do with the military. This has to do with the contractors.”

After a lung biopsy, Le Roy Torres was diagnosed in 2010 with constrictive bronchiolitis, an irreversible disease that squeezes off airways. In 2007 and 2008, he was stationed in Balad, Iraq — home to what may have been largest military burn pit — the size of 10 football fields. Torres, for a time, performed his daily calisthenics near the dark plumes emitted by the smoldering crater.

Forced by breathing problems to later retire from his post-Army job as a highway patrolman, Torres is one of thousands of veterans who have filed more than 50 lawsuits against defense contractors hired to handle waste management in the war zones. The Motley Rice law firm is representing Torres and other veterans and their survivors in one of those class-action suits.

Attorneys allege the contractors — including KBR, Inc. and its former parent company, Halliburton — mismanaged the burns and exposed American troops to poison fumes. Last July, KBR’s lawyers argued that 55 such cases should be dismissed, in part because employees from the Houston-based company served “shoulder-to-shoulder” with service members, which should grant KBR the same immunity given to government entities and personnel, such as soldiers.

Service members, however, have complained for a decade that burn pits scattered across Iraq and Afghanistan were making them sick with cancers and other diseases, and were killing some young troops. In 2007, Army and Air Force health inspectors went to Balad and measured airborne, cancer-causing dioxins at 51 times the “acceptable levels.” They determined the cancer risk for people serving at the base for more than one year was eight times higher than normal. In 2008, the Military Times reported that single burn pit might have exposed tens of thousands of troops to dioxins and toxins such as arsenic.

What has been the health toll on U.S. troops? That’s what the new registry is designed to calculate, said Paul Rieckhoff, founder and chief executive officer of Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America, a group representing more than 200,000 former service members.

“This is something we’ve been fighting for, for years. It will be one database where doctors can go and look at the common symptoms. It also will help verify the problem quicker so vets can get the care they need,” said Rieckhoff, who served as a first lieutenant and infantry rifle platoon leader in Iraq during 2003 and 2004. He has experienced respiratory problems, although he cannot pinpoint the cause. “I don’t know too many people who weren’t exposed to a burn pit sometime during their deployment. They were constant.”

The smoking landfills typically contained damaged Humvees, unexploded ordnance, gas cans, mattresses, rocket pods, plastics, medical waste and amputated body parts, and they often were ignited by jet fuel.

The act does not mandate new VA benefits for veterans who chronically inhaled the vapors, Rieckhoff said. But the registry is expected to help private and government doctors document health conditions potentially related to burn pits, and perhaps hasten many diagnoses.

“It will help us get to the bottom of what’s causing so many vets to be sick,” he added. “We don’t know what toxic exposure is going to be (shown). It could be our generation’s Agent Orange (the defoliant used in Vietnam, later shown to be carcinogenic). But it’s important that you start with data. Data will be a critical part of identifying the problem and then creating good treatment. I’m glad we didn’t have to wait decades like the Vietnam veterans did around Agent Orange.”

Le Roy Torres, for example, has been given a 10 percent disability rating by the VA, said his wife, who calls that ruling “a joke” because “he served for 22 years, lost his childhood dreams, his career, just turned 40 and is unable to work because of his lung disease which also has affected his heart.” The Torres family is fighting the VA for a higher disability rating and, thus, higher compensation for his service-related symptoms. 

Before the lawsuits and the law, a handful of military families launched their own, online registries for service members, veterans and their survivors so they could report their symptoms and mark how closely they had served to one or several of the burn pits. 

As Le Roy Torres struggled harder to breathe, he and his wife launched BurnPits360.org. The site lists 11 service members who descended from full health to terminal cancer after serving near a burn pit. That roll includes Air Force Sgt. Jessica Sweet, who died of acute myeloid leukemia (AML) in 2009 at age 30. She served in Afghanistan. Also listed is Army Staff Sgt. Steven Ochs, who died from AML in 2008 at age 32. He served in both Afghanistan and Iraq.

One of the registry's primary goals is to determine if there are tangible links between the deaths of service members like Sweet and Ochs and their exposure to the burn pits.

“How many have been affected? Every week I get an email from someone who has passed,” Rosie Lopez-Torres said. “We started our registry because we weren’t going to wait on the Department of Defense and VA. Our list of people who have self reported their data — whether it’s the loved one of a fallen hero who lost the battle with toxic exposure, or someone who is fighting the battle — is well over 1,000 people. They are from all over the country.

“The hardest thing for us is trying to figure out the finances day to day, and hearing (from the government) ‘just wait’ on your retirement check,” she added. “He’s hearing, ‘wait, wait, wait’ but he’s having to provide for his family. And he’s looking at his life and saying: “What am I going to do now?’”

Gregory Bull / AP, file

Homeless veteran Jerome Belton poses for a portrait at a homeless shelter in San Diego on September 19, 2012. A former Marine, Belton now lives on the streets in San Diego.

The latest report card on the Obama Administration’s push to end veteran homelessness by 2015 arrived Monday: the number of ex-service members sleeping in parks, under bridges or in public spaces declined by 7 percent this year, the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) confirmed.

But other advocates — including a small cadre of soldiers who use their spare time and combat skills to track, clothe and house veterans forced to live outside on home soil — say they still are seeing an "alarming" rise in younger homeless veterans, many of whom fought in Iraq and Afghanistan.

HUD released Monday afternoon a full 2012 count of homeless Americans, including a fresh tally of homeless veterans: "On a single night in January 2012, 62,619 veterans were homeless," the agency said. Veteran homelessness has now been reduced by 17.2 percent since January 2009, the agency said. 

Before that report was made public, the head the National Alliance to End Homelessness (NAEH) said a fortified federal effort to house more disabled and low-income veterans is working.

“There’s been a big increase in resources to make sure it does decrease,” said Nan Roman, NAEH's president. “There’s been a lot of investment in newer strategies around housing — programs that are really solution-oriented.”

One of those approaches, Roman said, is a $60 million initiative by the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs that offers prompt financial help to ex-military members on the brink of eviction — or those recently turned out of their apartments. In fact, the VA estimates that its Supportive Services for Veteran Families (SSVF) program will have helped the 42,000 veteran families by the end of 2012, according to an agency spokesman. 

“Sometimes people get laid off, can’t pay their rent, and lose their apartment. It’s a high cliff to get back into an apartment because you have to pay the first and last month’s rent plus deposits,” Roman said. “In most places, that’s $2,000 or $3,000, minimum. If you had $2,000 or $3,000, you probably wouldn’t have gotten evicted in the first place. So this program helps with that sort of thing.

"There’s been a lot of determination at VA to make the homeless veteran numbers go down," she added. "I’d be very disappointed if they don’t go down, frankly."

AP Photo / Gregory Bull

Veteran Arthur Lute holds his 5-month-old son Evan in his one-bedroom apartment in Chula Vista, Calif. on Oct. 9, 2012. Lute's arduous journey from his days as a U.S. Marine to his nights sleeping on the streets illustrates the challenge the Obama administration faces to make good on its promise to end homelessness among veterans by 2015.

VA spokesman Josh Taylor said the agency already had gauged critical gains as the rate of veteran homelessness dropped by 12 percent from 2010 to 2011. He cites, in part, SSVF – “our new homeless prevention and rapid re-housing program” which during the 2011 fiscal year helped house more than 35,000 people, including nearly 9,000 children, Taylor said.

A second federal program – one forged through a HUD-VA partnership – gives “eligible veterans” vouchers to pay for stays "in a residence of their own,” Taylor said, adding that nearly 40,000 veterans have accessed that program during the past two years.

According to a HUD report issued in December 2011, there were 67,495 homeless veterans in this country - down from 76,329 one year earlier. The same report projected the homeless veteran population would shrink to 45,797 during 2012. 

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In its 2013 budget request, the VA asked for $333 million in additional funding – an increase of 33 percent over 2012 – so that it could provide “specific programs to prevent and reduce homelessness," the VA said in making the pitch last February. The overall VA budget request for 2013 totaled $140.3 billion.

“We have made good progress, but there is more work to do,” Taylor said in an email to NBC News. “Our homeless initiatives are based on a strategy of rescue and prevention.

“The unprecedented effort under way, and the unprecedented resources being dedicated to it, have played a major part in the reduction of the veteran homeless population over the past couple of years. That work is ongoing and we expect it will continue to show progress,” Taylor added. 

Late last week, during the 2012 National Rural Housing Conference held in Washington, D.C, experts reported veteran homelessness is growing in many rural areas, in part because young men and women from small-town America are 21.5 percent more likely to join the military than their urban counterparts.

“Veterans’ homelessness isn’t going to end unless we work together,” said Kelly Caffarelli, president of The Home Depot Foundation, a conference sponsor. During the past two years, the Home Depot has donated more than $30 million to veteran housing issues and homelessness and recently announced it will be contributing another $50 million to those same issues over the next three years.

“We need the government, community-based groups, foundations, and the private sector to take up this challenge. Our veterans deserve nothing less than a safe place to call home,” Caffarelli said.

 'They are coming back messed up'

In Southern California, where Army veteran Joe Leal routinely leads a handful of active-duty and former service members on personal missions to find and help homeless veterans living “beneath bridges and in canyons,” Leal said he has encountered thousands of post-9/11 veterans without homes.

“It’s alarming,” said Leal, an Iraq War veteran who founded the Vet Hunters Project in 2010. His group, funded by private donations, has worked to place more than 2,600 veterans in temporary or permanent homes, he said.

“We house more Iraq and Afghanistan and younger veterans than older veterans. It used to be where a homeless vet was typically about 60 years old. Now, they’re 22 years old,” Leal said. “And a lot of them are female veterans who have witnessed combat. They are coming back messed up. They are coming back homeless.”

Monica Figueroa, 22, was an Army parachute rigger who served from 2009 to 2011, spending time in Germany, performing test jumps out of planes. She has a 17-month-old son and is married to Sgt. Jason Snyder, a 30-year-old Army reservist, who served four tours in Afghanistan and Iraq. While Snyder was still overseas, Figueroa couldn’t hold a job and couldn’t find a home for herself or her son. She slept in a car for several weeks near Los Angeles, she said.

“When we met her, she was living in a garage where they repair vehicles,” Leal said. “She was bathing in a sink where they wash car parts. Monica was just overwhelmed. She joined the military when she was young. She got out. She had a child. She was used to the fast pace of military life. And then, in getting out, the transition (preparation she received from the Army) was lacking.

Lucy Nicholson / Reuters, file

Army veteran Tara Eid, 50, writes an essay at New Directions women's house, a long-term transitional program for female veterans dealing with issues of homelessness, trauma and addiction, in Los Angeles, Calif., on November 18, 2011. Eid has seven children and was homeless many times over a period of 10 years.

“A lot of the active-duty people are getting out even though they don’t have a plan” for post-military life, he added. “They’re so fed-up after five to six deployments. They say, ‘I don’t care what I do when I get out, I’ll just figure it out when I get out, but I know I don’t want to do this any more.’ That’s what I’m running into.”

The Vet Hunters Project helped Figueroa, her son and husband recently move into a furnished temporary apartment in Loma Linda, Calif., and enter a program that provides them financial counseling to prepare for an independent life.

“Before this, my living situation was very unstable, moving from one house to another. Just jumping. Just living anywhere I could, with family members, friends, anybody who could help me for two weeks or so,” Figueroa said. “I had to leave my son with my mother — there was no room for anyone else where they were living. So I stayed in a car that my dad owned.

“The thing that made it very rough was I had no idea of the benefits I had. All I knew about was the GI Bill. Otherwise, no one ever explained anything else to me (about post-military benefits). I was not prepared for the transition.”

It’s not uncommon, in fact, for the Vet Hunters to come across Army reservists who are still serving the country but who have no home, Leal said.

“These guys show up for service looking sharp,” Leal said. “Then they leave at the end of the day and go sleep in a Chevy.” 

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Members of Congress angrily vowed Wednesday to crank its investigative floodlights far brighter on the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs, accusing agency leaders of dodging direct questions on travel and conference spending, failing to disclose a gathering in Las Vegas, and exhibiting “total incompetence” as veterans wait in record-long lines for medical help.

During a hearing before the House Committee on Veterans’ Affairs, chairman Jeff Miller, R-Fla., said that one day after he and VA Deputy Secretary Scott Gould had held a “civil conversation” on the same issues, Gould’s vague responses to the panel's precise and lengthy interrogation “raised the hackles on the back of my neck.”

“The truce is over. It lasted less than 24 hours. Expect much more oversight from this committee,” Miller said. “Expect more questions from this committee because they’re coming — in great volumes.”

The fiery, two-hour hearing was primarily held to examine how the VA plans to prevent future, exorbitant spending lapses like the estimated $9 million the agency doled out for two Orlando gatherings in 2011. During those conferences for VA human resources personnel, the VA invested, for example, $84,000 for VA-branded promotional items, including pens, highlighters and hand sanitizers, according to Office of the Inspector General. But at the close of the hearing, Gould complained the committee’s line of questioning had devolved into “a slap at the employees who work at VA every day.”

Miller interrupted Gould.

“No, no, no, no,” Miller said, his voice rising. “Don’t you ever accuse a Democrat or a Republican on this committee of slapping any of the hardworking 300,000 VA employees. Rest assured, it’s the leadership that we’re concerned with.”

Earlier, Gould opened by describing the VA’s beefed-up oversight to block other Orlando-type escapades, which he called: “abdications of responsibility, failures of judgment, and serious lapses of stewardship.”

Those tightened measures include requirements that all VA conference planning now include “a detailed business case analysis.” And, from this point, any VA gatherings estimated to cost $20,000 to $100,000 must receive prior approval by a VA under secretary or assistant secretary, conferences estimated to cost $100,000 to $500,000 must be approved by the deputy secretary, and conferences costing more than $500,000 “are generally not permitted,” he said. 

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But the hearing quickly turned into larger prosecution of VA leadership by the committee. The members complained about what they called the VA’s chronic lack of responses — or its fuzzy answers — to dozens of congressional requests for information on items ranging from VA spending to its internal discipline of employees caught making ethical errors. 

For example, on Aug. 16, Congress asked the VA to disclose how much it spent during 2011 on conferences. According to Miller, the VA first reported the price of those events was $20 million but later amended that figure to more than $100 million. At Wednesday’s hearing, VA Chief Financial Officer Todd Grams testified that the events cost, in total, $86.5 million.

Miller asked Gould if he “or anyone at the table” had been ordered to withhold information from Congress. Gould responded: “No.” Miller then blasted VA leaders for failing to answer 75 specific congressional questions.

“Unfortunately, lengthy delays or not responding to requests at all has become normal for VA,” Miller said. “We clearly have a problem here.”

The Orlando conferences had served as the initial spark for ramped up congressional scrutiny of the agency. But several members said the VA’s lack of answers had left them increasingly irked — and several members sounded so Wednesday, their voices sometimes breaking or shaking, including Rep. Tim Huelskamp, R-Kan.

“It’s been 106 days since I asked some of these questions. I have asked for: a list of the attendees at the July 2011 conference in Orlando; a list of attendees at the August 2011 conference in Orlando; a list of individuals involved in planning these conferences; the names and titles of employees who are being held accountable. Why have you refused to answer all of these?” Huelskamp asked Gould. “Those were all ignored. When will you find it out — in another 106 days? These are simple questions.

“This is an issue of competence, the failure to either know the answers or refuse to answer them,” Huelskamp added. “It’s about a gentleman in Syracuse, Kan., who had to drive 522 miles to the nearest VA hospital. In that time, you could fly folks to Orlando for a great conference. And you won’t even tell the American people who attended? Either you’re trying to hide something or it’s total incompetence.”

In response, Gould testified that VA leaders “understand we have an obligation to respond to Congress.” He further testified that, following the many information requests from Congress, the VA has supplied 35,000 documents and answered 6,000 policy questions and attended 100 hearings and 1,100 staff briefings.

“Sir,” Gould added, “you can sit here and shake your head, but the reality is there’s a tremendous amount of information that flows to this committee and others on a daily basis by a very competent team.”

But Congress has grown so impatient with the VA’s silence on the issues, Miller said, he and other congressional members and their staffs have begun perusing VA’s Facebook and Twitter accounts to try to independently piece together a more complete list of the VA conferences and training seminars.

Miller discovered, for example, posts on the VA Facebook page about a VA senior management conference at Las Vegas' Venetian Hotel in August 2010. That event included teachings on “yoga, massage therapy (and) acupuncture,” according to the VA Facebook post, which showed pictures of people — ostensibly VA employees — getting massages. Beneath those images, someone commented: “Sounds like my kind of conference!” That observation was followed by a comment posted by the administrator of the Facebook page for VA’s Veterans Canteen Services: “It’s amazing how immediate the results are!”

Miller asked Gould why the VA had not mentioned the Vegas conference when Congress had requested a full accounting of all VA conferences since 2005.

Gould testified that he had no explanation other than the VA has hosted thousands of conferences since 2005.

That post on the VA Facebook page was removed shortly after the hearing. 

“The perception out there, if you’re a taxpayer just barely getting by ... is you’ve got one set of rules for people in government, and (another set for) the rest of us out there in the real world, said Rep. Phil Roe, R-Tenn. “And perception is reality.

"It’s embarrassing for me to go home and try to explain to people why their money is being wasted,” added Roe, a physician. “I have veterans who come up and say, ‘I can’t get into a hospital down here, Doc. I’m in a line 40 miles long.’ And then they show me this plush event that occurred in Orlando. It’s very hard to explain that to people. It’s embarrassing for the 300,000 hardworking VA people who are then tagged with this.” 

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Why do some people reject the existence of PTSD?

The topic is touchy. Even asking the question is slammed as irresponsible.

“Why on Earth would you try to put out something that states combat PTSD isn't a true affliction? Or even try to debunk it? Or to put questions into the minds of society? In the first 155 days of 2012, we lost 154 men,” Amy Cotta, an author and the mother of a Marine wrote in an email to NBC News. Her message arrived minutes after she learned NBC News was seeking to interview a PTSD denier.

Despite exhaustive scientific studies that have explored the symptoms, causes, diagnoses, and prevalence of post-traumatic stress disorder, hardcore skeptics remain.

They exist within the military, where some leaders openly call PTSD a mental weakness, according to mental health advocates. David Weidman, who did two tours in Afghanistan and was diagnosed with PTSD, said all of his senior non-commissioned officers advised him not to seek treatment, instead suggesting he “just put your head down and keep going” in order to maintain any chance at a promotion.

They exist within the veteran community. Kevin R.C. “Hognose” O’Brien, who operates a blog called “WeaponsMan” and identifies himself as “a former Special Forces weapons man,” wrote in July that PTSD was a “quack” diagnosis, “invented” to clump “any odd and many normal behaviors.” He added: “If a vet is wound up tight? PTSD! If he or she is calm? Hypercontrolling due to PTSD! Lose weight, gain weight, maintain weight, those are all PTSD markers. Get in fights? PTSD, natch. And avoid fights? Well, clearly it's .... are you starting to get the idea?” O’Brien declined to be interviewed for this story.

And they exist within medicine. In late September, Washington, D.C. psychiatrist Dr. Joseph Tarantolo authored an op-ed piece titled: “PTSD, The Grand Scapegoat.” In it, Tarantolo described PTSD as a “pseudo-diagnosis” and held that “the PTSDer gets an enormous amount of pseudo-sympathy.” On Friday, Tarantolo’s voicemail message said he was out of the country on vacation.

To Afghanistan veteran Weidman, most people who so stridently dismiss PTSD have simply failed to read the available scientific literature on the subject and are, he said, “uneducated.”

But Weidman acknowledged that different people possess varying degrees of mental “resiliency,” underscoring the slippery nature of diagnosing anxiety disorders. That means, he added, that if an entire platoon collectively endures the same moment of extreme combat violence, not every platoon member will ultimately feel the symptoms of post-traumatic stress. According to the Mayo Clinic, those signs can include “flashbacks, nightmares and severe anxiety, as well as uncontrollable thoughts about the event.”

“There are people who can experience something who have no side effects. It could be that person (who ends up being a denier),” said Weidman, a student at Penn State-Lehigh Valley. “Or it could be the person who is extremely uneducated and chauvinistic, who says a guy who gets diagnosed with PTSD ‘is not being a man.’ You’re going to have a perfect storm within the individual who’s going to be that outlier, who says: ‘It doesn’t exist.’

“Or, it could be the person who actually has post-traumatic stress, who is not seeking help, who is more living up to society’s ideal male image of being strong and being resilient,” he added. “Those people going to make even more noise.”

Mental health experts say the occasional repudiation of PTSD is merely an extension of the larger societal taint associated with anxiety or mood disorders.

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“It comes back down to the stigma of mental illness,” said Jean Teichroew, spokeswoman for the Anxiety and Depression Association of America. “Military members also are afraid to speak out because it’s seen as a weakness. The VA has programs to try to combat that, too. But when you have a sergeant who doesn’t think you should be afraid of a bomb going off near you or seeing a dead body, that’s another issue.”

Still, the rate of diagnosed PTSD cases among Iraq and Afghanistan veterans is higher than the rate of cases associated with men and women who served in past conflicts. That abrupt spike has sparked an ongoing debate within American and British academia as to how common PTSD truly is among military personnel and veterans.

“The suffering of people with PTSD is very real whether we label it an ‘anxiety disorder’ or not. As for the skeptics, some of them may believe that a proportion of veterans without the disorder may report symptoms to secure service-connected disability compensation payments for PTSD,” said Harvard University psychology professor Richard J. McNally. He has penned more then 320 publications on anxiety disorders, including PTSD.

“According to (Department of Veterans Affairs) data reported late last spring, 45 percent of all veterans from Iraq and Afghanistan have applied for service-connected disability compensation, and 31 percent have secured it already. This figure includes all forms of medical problems, however, not just PTSD," McNally said. "The percentage of veterans of World War II and Vietnam who obtained disability compensation is 11 percent and 16 percent, respectively.”

In 2011, the VA listed the three most common service-connected disabilities among veterans receiving federal compensation that year: tinnitus (ringing in the ears) at 10.9 percent, hearing loss at 7.5 percent, and PTSD at 5.3 percent.

Is PTSD being over-diagnosed in post-9/11 veterans?

“Yes. I think it is,” said Simon Wessely, vice dean of academic psychiatry at King’s College in London. “I think that despite the formal criteria, there is a confusion sometimes (about) the normal emotional responses to war — my father still has nightmares about his World War II service in Royal Navy and he is 87, but he doesn't have PTSD.

“I also think that, for example, depression often gets under diagnosed, and substance misuse also,” Wessely said. “Our evidence also shows, for example, that quite often the triggers for what becomes labeled as PTSD is not combat exposure but actually a reflection of problems back home. It is important that we remember that not every mental health problem in theater is PTSD."

Despite the loose diagnoses or cases of outright PTSD fraud, to those in medicine and the military (post and present) who deny PTSD altogether, Wessely offers three final words: “They are wrong.”

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After a decade of war, America is well schooled on post-traumatic stress, lost limbs and traumatic brain injury, but the most common injury sustained by U.S. troops is literally a silent wound: hearing loss.

Mark Brogan, a retired Army captain, can speak quite personally about almost all of those examples of combat carnage – he suffered a brain injury, a spinal injury and a nearly severed right arm when a suicide bomber on foot detonated his weapon near Brogan six year ago in Iraq.

Courtesy of Mark Brogan

Mark Brogan sustained a spinal injury, a brain injury, a nearly severed arm - and severe hearing loss - when a suicide bomber blew himself up not far from Brogan in Iraq six years ago.

What does Brogan, 32, consider the worst of the physical trauma? “Hearing loss and the brain injury,” he said from his home in Knoxville, Tenn. He has “profound unusable hearing” in his right ear and severe hearing loss in his left, he said, along with constant ringing, or tinnitus, in his ears.

After the insurgent's bomb killed a soldier just behind Brogan – along with the person who was wearing the device – other U.S. troops quickly rushed Brogan's side and saw blood streaming from both ears, he said.

“You’ve been to a concert – you know how your ears are ringing afterward? It’s just like that my entire life,” Brogan said. “A lot of guys get home and they probably don’t even think about getting their hearing checked.

According the Department of Veterans Affairs, the most prevalent service-connected disabilities for veterans receiving federal compensation in 2011 were tinnitus and hearing loss, respectively, followed by PTSD.

"I suspect today’s generation of veterans – those who have been in a combat environment – probably have a higher severity of hearing loss (than past generations), especially with the explosions and the IEDs and the ruptured ear drums they’ve sustained,” said Brett Buchanan, a VA-accredited claims agent with Allsup, a national provider of services with disabilities.

Allsup recently organized a one-day Web expo where younger veterans had a chance to log in and seek advice on how and where to get treatment — including a primer on how to successfully access and steer through the monolithic VA system.

While chatting online with dozens of veterans, Buchanan repeatedly was told about their hearing loss, he said.

To Buchanan, a former Army artillery officer who was among the first wave of U.S. troops to invade Iraq in 2003, the massive scope of the disability is simple to grasp.

“The military, in general, is just a high noise-producing environment,” Buchanan said. In the Navy, where most sailors work only below deck, there is " the constant drumming of the engines and metal-on-metal noise.”

And in the Army and Marines, many personnel, he added, spend hours inside “military vehicles that are not quiet,” including tanks and personnel carriers.

In addition, service members typically devote time to practicing at firing ranges.

“In those cases, hearing protection negates the loud noise to a large degree. But when you’re in these environments for years upon years, that negation you do with hearing protection may not be enough to prevent injury long term,” Buchanan said.

“Then you get into the combat environment where weapons are going off, explosions are going off. In combat, you can’t call time out and say, ‘Hey, I need to put in my earplugs.’ ”

Service-related injuries in veterans are assessed and rated by VA doctors to determine how much monthly compensation those veterans will be paid for their physical sacrifices. Those ratings span scores of 0 to 100 depending on the severity of the wounds. (Brogan, who due to the partial spinal injury has weakness on his right side and a lack of sensation on his left side – but no paralysis – is classified as 100 percent disabled by the VA, he said).

Through earphone-tone exams and other diagnostic means, the VA also rates hearing loss and tinnitus in veterans who come in for checkups.

“For hearing loss, the ratings I usually deal with for my clients are 0 percent, meaning they’ve had some hearing loss but it doesn’t quite meet the criteria to get the minimum VA disability rating, which is 10 percent,” Buchanan said. “Tinnitus is a simple 10 percent rating. There’s nothing above that. My tinnitus might be worse than yours but there’s no test for that.

For Brogan, post-military life has included mastering subtle tricks and new technology to adapt to his muffled hearing. For example, his phone transcribes conversations as they take place. “And in a loud restaurant with background noise, I pretty much can’t understand anybody’s voice,” Brogan said. “I have to tell somebody, ‘Hey, can you repeat that? Can you speak slower so that I can understand you?’ There are techniques, over time, that you learn.”

But his world is not devoid of pretty sounds. At age 5, he learned the piano. Six years after a bomb bloodied the insides of his ears, someone donated a new piano to the veteran. Brogan tickles those black-and-white keys as physical therapy for his brain and for the weakness in his right hand. He's mastering covers of popular tunes. And he's even composed his own melody, captured on video.

Finally, he's making music again. 

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The word “veteran” was uttered seven times during Monday night’s debate – each time by President Barack Obama.

Republican nominee Mitt Romney did not use the word although he did say: “We're blessed with terrific soldiers.”

Three times, including his closing remarks, Obama veered momentarily into economic and health concerns facing the tens of thousands of men and women returning from war and those ex-service members trying to crack into the civilian work force. He mentioned recently having lunch with a veteran in Minnesota who, due to medical-certification procedures, can’t simply transfer the skills he learned as a combat medic to become a licensed civilian nurse. And he cited work done by First Lady Michelle Obama on the “Joining Forces” initiative, through which 2,000 companies have hired or trained 125,000 veterans or military spouses.

“After a decade of war, it's time to do some nation-building here at home. And what we can now do is free up some resources to, for example, put Americans back to work, especially our veterans ...” Obama said. “Making sure that, you know, our veterans are getting the care that they need when it comes to post-traumatic stress disorder and traumatic brain injury, making sure that the certifications that they need for good jobs of the future are in place.”

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Those shout outs marked the first substantive attention either candidate has paid to former service members during their three debates – and they came 19 days after a leading veterans group urged the contenders to start discussing some of the home-front costs of two American wars, including a higher unemployment rate among ex-troops and battle-related anxiety symptoms linked to an alarming military suicide rate.

On the day after the final direct, verbal showdown between Romney and Obama, four veterans offered their reactions.

Paul Rieckhoff, chief executive officer and founder of Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America, a nonpartisan nonprofit with more than 200,000 members:

Q: What is the most critical issue facing military members?

A: Unemployment, but we've yet to hear either candidate address the scope of the problem – let alone smart solutions. In September, the unemployment rate for post-9/11 veterans was two percentage points above the general public at 9.7 percent, and even worse for female veterans at 19.9 percent. We must do better.

Q: Did you hear what you needed to hear about that issue?

A: In last night's debate, veteran unemployment briefly became a subject of discussion – finally.

Q: What is your takeaway from last night's debate?

A: The new veteran community needs real leadership and commitment from our next president to reverse negative trends in unemployment, suicide and (Department of Veterans Affairs) services. We haven't seen either candidate step up to the plate, so we'll keep asking the tough questions until November 6th.

Jason Thigpen, founder and president of the Student Veterans Advocacy Group and a student at the University of North Carolina Wilmington. As a U.S. Army sergeant, he earned a Purple Heart medal for combat wounds he sustained in Iraq in 2009:

Q: What is the most critical issue facing military members?

A: The budgetary cutbacks on defense spending leading to nearly a million service members losing their jobs, which will send them to the unemployment line. Additional cutbacks in veteran-appropriated budgets by way of education and medical benefits will invariably leave many with unfulfilled promises made to them for their service to our nation, while our government creates more lenient guidelines for illegal immigrants.

Q: Did you hear what you needed to hear about that issue?

A: No, but I do feel as though our efforts to raise awareness of the detrimental impacts facing our veterans, and how that affects our national economy, both now and in the future, are being heard.

Q: What is your takeaway from last night's debate?

A: While I'm not enthusiastic about the lack of bipartisan efforts from our federal legislators, (and) neither party looks appealing to me, I personally think the president has wiped the floor with Governor Romney in every debate. Although I've always considered myself a Republican, I don't feel it's in the best interest to elect Governor Romney as president. Electing Governor Romney will give Republicans control of the House, Senate, and presidency, which doesn't seem like much of a democracy to me, especially with a group of federal legislators whom can't seem to agree on much of anything except the end of a work-day or session.

Genevieve Chase, founder of American Women Veterans, a foundation that works to improve the lives of women veterans and their families. She served in Afghanistan in 2006 and remains in the U.S. Army Reserves. She earned a Purple Heart for injuries sustained in a bomb blast in Helmand Province:

Q: What is the most critical issue facing military members?

A: What's going to happen (when) we draw down our presence in Afghanistan? How will the military, responsibly and with the best interests of its members and families in mind, decide which troops will be kicked out in order to bring down its numbers? The witch hunts have already started and I'm learning of incidents that are disconcerting.

Q: Did you hear what you needed to hear about that issue?

A: The money our country thinks we'll save in the defense budget will need to be put toward our veterans – there’s no getting around the fact that America will be paying for these wars in one way or another, long after they're over. I'd like to know how either candidate proposes they'll do that.

Q: What is your takeaway from last night's debate?

A: That war has become so lucrative for some and the defense industry employs thousands of veterans who have families and no degrees – they will need jobs in the post-war economy. Before we espouse ideologies, what are the practical measures being considered for the short-term issues – or are we still being so reactive that we're not looking five years ahead? Additionally, in terms of veterans, if the VA backlog isn't being handled now, why is that and what's being done or promised to address it?

John E. Pickens III, executive director of VeteransPlus, a nonprofit that has offered financial counseling to more than 150,000 current and former service members.  He served as a combat medic with the U.S. Army Special Forces and the 82nd Airborne Division in the early 1970s. 

Q: What is the most critical issue facing military members?

A: The unexpected obstacles they face while transitioning into civilian life: jobs and employment. In this economy, it’s a difficult transition. For those who are lucky enough to be engaged by the VA understand their benefits, but they may not realize there are delays getting those benefits. They’re going to wait. That’s improving. But from our experience, those who are transitioning are so excited about the prospect of civilian life, they sometimes fail to see some of the obstacles.

Q: Did you hear what you needed to hear about that issue?

A: No, I honestly didn’t. I was glad that, especially the president, talked about how the nation owes veterans a debt of gratitude and good care. But it’s a much deeper subject than that. The military is an honorable profession. And even though they’re drawing down, we’re wondering: Are people going to continue to look at the military as a good profession, as something I want to go into after high school? It’s that old adage that people will join the military if they truly believe it’s a respected career and that (society) will treat you well when you finish your career.

Q: What is your takeaway from last night's debate?

A: It’s always good to hear people mentioning how we need to appreciate our veterans in a public forum. But somebody I admire a lot, Col. David Sutherland, who co-wrote that outstanding white paper, “Sea of Goodwill”, had a statement that has always stuck with me: ‘Well done is better than well said.’ ”

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Franz De Leon

Veteran Julie Weckerlein and her family are shown last weekend in the Washington, D.C. area. She served in Iraq and Afghanistan in 2007 with the Air Force. While in Iraq, she was a few yards away from another female service member who was killed by incoming mortar round.

Julie Weckerlein vividly recalls the horrid sounds that filled her base - and her head - after the incoming shell exploded: the radio call summoning the chaplain, the whirling blades of the chopper evacuating the burned remains of the Army sergeant killed in Iraq

Five years later, she still remembers the name of that dead soldier: Trista Morietti. 

“Females died over there, too,” said Weckerlein, who served in Afghanistan as well. She works today as a full-time federal employee in Washington, D.C. “But there is a cultural disconnect in our society. People don’t know: What is a female veteran? What does she look like? What does she bring to the table? What did we do over there?”  

Women compose 15 percent of homecoming U.S. troops and 15 percent of the U.S. armed forces, yet many Americans are unsure how to accept or view them, female veterans say. That applies to the job market, fueling a 19.9 percent unemployment rate among post-9/11 female veterans, while some VA hospitals seem unprepared to handle the heavy influx of women returning from war, contends a leading veterans group.

"I’m the first female veteran that a lot of people know personally, and I’m becoming more aware of this lack of understanding of who we are," said Weckerlein, who spent nine years in the Air Force. Now, 31, she is married with three children and, as an Air Force reservist, she also works part-time at the Pentagon. "There is no real example in society of a female veteran. In Hollywood, there's just the 'GI Jane' version – you know, like Demi Moore shaving her head. But that’s about it.

Jim Varhegyi

Julie Weckerlein waits for the all-clear in a shelter during a 2007 mortar attack at a U.S. post south of Baghdad. A moment after this photo was snapped, Weckerlein and others heard the radio call go out for a chaplain. A female sergeant was killed in the explosion.

"We are a normal family. My husband is addicted to (the TV series) 'Pawn Stars.' My 9-year-old and I, we struggle with homework. I struggle with DC life and the commute. This is a female veteran." 

Last week, Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America, a nonpartisan and nonprofit group with more than 200,000 members, called on President Barack Obama and Republican nominee Mitt Romney to cast at least some of their attention on the mounting and - as IAVA sees it - unaddressed needs afflicting female veterans. That heightened focus, IAVA said, should begin with how the Department of Veterans Affairs provides health care to female ex-service members. 

"There aren’t enough female health professionals in the VA system. There aren’t enough folks specialized in female health, especially around reproductive health. We’ve got to push the system to work harder for them," said Paul Rieckhoff, chief executive officer and founder of IAVA

"The bottom line is you need someone who recognizes that female veterans are a critical part of this population and that they have unique needs," added Rieckhoff, who served as a first lieutenant and infantry rifle platoon leader in Iraq during 2003 and 2004. "We’ve got women on our staff who say that a lot of times, when they walk into the VA, they get treated like a candy striper instead of like a returning warrior. As a country, we've got to go through a huge cultural shift." 

VA officials maintain, however, that their agency has launched multiple initiatives to cater to the rising number of female veterans using its hospitals. Last Friday, NBC News asked a VA spokesman to lay out some of those programs. On Wednesday, that spokesman emailed NBC News a series of Internet links describing the strategies, adding: "Nearly all of these programs are new in the past few years (2-4 years), and some have simply been enhanced. Of course, women vets are eligible for VA programs just as males would be too."

For example, the VA's Women Health Services "addresses the health care needs of women Veterans and works to ensure that timely, equitable, high-quality, comprehensive health care services are provided in a sensitive and safe environment at VA health facilities nationwide," says the VA website. "We strive to be a national leader in the provision of health care for women, thereby raising the standard of care for all women."

In 2007, the VA broadened the scope of Women Health Services to include the use of mammography machines, ultrasound and biopsy equipment, the VA reports.

'Didn't know what to do with me'
But Air Force veteran Terri Kaas, 29, said that after being seen at two VA hospitals near her home in Pasco, Wash., for knee problems she said were sustained during overseas service, she felt the staff at those VA facilities "didn't know what do with me." Kaas, who received a 20 percent disability rating after leaving the Air Force, said the VA also recently admitted to her that it had lost her medical records, leaving her pension and disability package pending, and allowing her to use VA facilities to receive only "some care that's service related."

courtesy of Terri Kaas

Terri Kass, an Air Force Veteran who lives in Washington State, has been job hunting for a year since leaving the military. She has more than 100 rejection letters to show for her effort.

When she did go in for treatment, Kaas described the VA visits this way: "Here you have a young woman – who is not old – who mostly likely will have another child or two. But I think they’re always amazed to see me. They’re like, 'Oh, is your husband here?' I’m like, 'No, it’s me. You're seeing me.' I’m used to being the only female in the lobby."

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Kaas, who served for 10 years, spending time in Bahrain and Germany, also has been snared by the second critical pitfall facing one in five post-9/11-female veterans: unemployment. She said she has more than 100 rejection letters to show for her job hunt during the past year. More troubling, she said, numerous hiring managers have asked if she is "service disabled." 

"Every job I've applied for that required both my resume and their corporate application asked that question. Are we discriminating against our wounded warriors? Starbucks, Walmart, Macy's, Amazon, Target, and Lockheed Martin are just a few who asked," Kaas posted on Facebook. Amid looking for work, she is attending college with hopes of becoming a math or science teacher. 

"That question astounds me - and it's always the follow-up question to: Are you a veteran?" Kaas said in a phone interview. "If Walmart won’t hire me at Christmas, when they're advertising, I kind of wonder what the reason is. I’m not trying to dime out Walmart. I’ve applied for work at many major department stores. But when I can’t get work at Walmart, I wonder: Why not? There’s other people getting hired there during the holidays."

The disability question, Kaas suspects, is asked because some hiring managers "assume that most veterans have PTSD."

"I don't know if it's legal to ask that but it certainly doesn't seem appropriate," said John E. Pickens III, executive director of VeteransPlus, a nonprofit that has offered financial counseling to more than 150,000 current and former service members. He agrees that such a query by hiring managers "is being driven by mental health concerns."

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Said Walmart spokeswoman Tara Raddohl: "That question is not standard practice or a part of our company interview process. We’re looking into this specifically" (at the Walmart store where Kaas applied for a job).

A number of Pickens' female-veteran clients have told him that although they served in war zones, they don't seem to earn the same level of prestige - or employability - as do U.S. male combat veterans, "and they don't carry home that same mantel as a warrior."

'Hey, I'm a female veteran'
Yet many carry home combat tales equally as harrowing as those being told by male veterans of Iraq and Afghanistan.

Just ask Julie Weckerlein. 

Courtesy of Julie Weckerlein

Veteran Julie Weckerlein and her husband, Martin. After nine years of active duty in the Air Force, she now works at the Pentagon.

After the insurgent shell detonated at the coalition base in Nasir Lafitah, Iraq, Weckerlein didn't know the name of the casualty - Trista Morietti, 27 - until she returned to her own post in Baghdad and read the incident report. Several U.S. service members were wounded as well when that mortar round landed on a sleeping quarters just a few yards from Weckerlein's position. 

"I also spent a lot of time reading up all the hometown articles and blogs her friends wrote about her. Hers was the first death I experienced on my deployment, and that she was also a 20-something female NCO really affected me," Weckerlein said. "I felt so sick for the family members back in the states who had no idea what was going on at that moment. Later, actually seeing those family members and their pain ... it tore out my heart.

"I think of all the awesome women who served alongside me, who are struggling to find work, and it just baffles me because they are so qualified," she added. "It just motivates me to want to go out there and say, 'Hey, I’m a female veteran.' "

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Congressional members charged with overseeing the interests of former American service members have asked the Department of Veterans Affairs for a briefing to explain why its "work study" program is often months late paying many of its employees: college students who served in the military. 

Kami Fluetsch

Iraq and Afghanistan veteran Ashley Metcalf, now a student at the University of Colorado Denver, says he and other students employed by the VA to help fellow vets transition into college frequently wait months for VA wages to arrive.

The House Committee on Veterans Affairs issued that request of VA officials on Wednesday, one day after NBC News reported student veterans hired by the VA to help fellow ex-service members transition into college have routinely waited one to two months — and, in one case, four months — for unpaid wages. Delayed compensation from the VA has caused eviction worries and mounting debt among some of those student veterans. 

A call by NBC News to VA media relations officials Wednesday seeking comment on the Congressional briefing was not returned by Thursday morning. 

Rep. Jeff Miller, R. Fla., chairman of the committee on veterans affairs, said the VA's sluggish payment-pipeline seems to be "just another example" of a federal agency purposely sticking to outmoded practices versus modernizing its approach in order to help veterans. He also called for a wholesale streamlining in the way student veterans who work for the VA on campuses across the nation are reimbursed for their hours logged on the job.

"It is my understanding that VA's policy is to have student veterans accumulate 50 to 100 hours of work before submitting their claim for payment to VA. That payment schedule is counterintuitive to how people pay their living expenses," Miller said. 

"Therefore, GI Bill work study participants should be able to verify their working hours on a calendar basis, similar to the way Montgomery GI Bill students verify their enrollment on a monthly basis, as they have for decades," Miller added. "VA has the technology to set up the system in this way already. So, this problem appears to be just another example of government bureaucracy being satisfied with business as usual instead of evolving to serve veterans more efficiently."

Ashley Metcalf, a student veteran — and a "work study" employee who uncovered the scope of the payment snags via a survey of 18 colleges — said Miller's plan to fix the issue would solve the VA's payment snags. 

"He's absolutely correct," said Metcalf, an Air Force veteran who served in Iraq and Afghanistan. "I started school under the Montgomery GI bill in 2007 and used that online system to verify my school attendance. This option seems like a solution that simply requires reallocating resources and tweaking the system a bit to fit work study requirements."

Metcalf, a student at the University of Colorado Denver, told NBC News he's been living on credit cards since June and was forced to obtain an emergency loan because the VA has failed to compensate him for about 100 hours he's logged in the VA work study program. 

According to the VA website, the “work-study allowance” is available through the post-9/11 GI Bill. Student veterans employed by the program earn the minimum wage from the VA for devoting hours to specified, on-campus jobs such as “providing assistance to veteran students with general inquiries about veteran benefits,” the site says, adding: "VA will pay you each time you complete 50 hours of service."

But Metcalf's survey earlier this year found VA work-study employees at five campuses who reported waiting one month to two months for payments — and a student in North Dakota who was not compensated for four months. (Among the 18 schools represented in the survey were Texas A&M, Florida State and the University of Kentucky). Survey participants also revealed that a number of student veterans have quit their work-study jobs due to the chronic payment delays, hamstringing veteran-services departments at some campuses. 

On Wednesday, a VA spokesperson offered an e-mailed reaction to Metcalf's survey results, in part putting the onus back on colleges where work-study employees have been hired to help fellow vets: "VA will review any issues with the work-study to ensure payments are delivered in a timely manner. To allow more timely payments to work-study students, our regional processing offices recommend that employers submit time records to the work-study coordinator once 50 work hours have been accrued. In some cases, time records are submitted after a student has accrued 100 or more hours."

The same e-mail from VA added: "VA regional processing offices for work-study typically process time cards quickly, on average less than a week."

"The word 'typically' would suggest that we are an anomaly. And that’s not by any means the case," Metcalf responded. 

Beyond finding delayed VA payments to student veterans at more than a dozen campuses covered by his survey, Metcalf said student veterans in two additional states — Michigan and Washington — contacted him after NBC News reported the glitches and added  their late-payment complaints to the growing list. 

"If we were an anomaly, it would only be happening to us," Metcalf said. "Before we even sent out the survey, we called different schools and different organizations. We went online to find out if other schools are having the same issue. That’s the reason we started the survey — we were talking to student veterans who were all having the same problems in different states."

He also responded to the VA's claim of "typically" processing time cards in less than a week with one word: "preposterous."

According to Metcalf and many of the students he surveyed at the 18 other colleges, the VA has frequently failed to respond to calls and e-mails from student veterans seeking to learn when their owed wages would be arriving and asking for explanations for the compensation holdups. 

"We’ve been trying to tell them," Metcalf said, "and no one there is listening."

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A leading veterans group, seeking to muscle any mention of military issues into the first presidential debate, published an online voter guide Tuesday listing five criteria on which service members past and present can judge the two candidates and ultimately cast their votes. 

Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America, a nonpartisan and nonprofit group with more than 200,000 members, released "Vote Smart For Vets" on its website with hopes that its five stated benchmarks — along with some mathematical prodding — will prompt Republican candidate Mitt Romney and President Barack Obama to tangle on topics that include the military suicide epidemic or the high veteran unemployment rate. 

"Our goal is to obviously make progress on these issues but also just to get the candidates talking about them," said Paul Rieckhoff, chief executive officer and founder of IAVA. "We get a lot of pandering. We get a lot of pleasantries. We get a lot of ceremony. But let’s get down to specifics.

"We’re trying to force just a conversation of any kind (about veterans) when economic issues are front and center," added Rieckhoff, who served as a first lieutenant and infantry rifle platoon leader in Iraq during 2003 and 2004. 

The five-point checklist drafted by the IAVA for veterans and vet-friendly voters "to evaluate your candidates' platforms" is placed in this order:  

• Ensuring Iraq and Afghanistan veterans have the tools they need to succeed in the civilian work force;
• Ensuring every veteran has the right to the education benefits they have earned;
• Improving mental health programs in the military and VA to prevent further suicides among troops and veterans;
• Modernizing the claims process at the VA so that veterans have access to the benefits and resources they have earned;
• Improving VA healthcare facilities and claims processes for female veterans. 

How have Romney and Obama fared — in the eyes of veterans — in their attention to or work on those five points? 

"The reality is that neither one has been judged on them yet because these issues really haven’t been a focal point in the campaign," Rieckhoff said. "You’re not hearing about plans to lower veteran unemployment."

Related: NBC/WSJ poll: Obama holds lead over Romney in key battleground Ohio

Partly due to the lagging U.S. economy, joblessness has dogged thousands of men and women who have returned after serving in Iraq and Afghanistan. During 2011, the veteran unemployment rate was more than 12 percent — far above the national median. In August of this year, that number was 10.9 percent — still higher than the rest of the American work force. 

"We view this as not just a social issue but an opportunity for investment. If you invest in these men and women coming home it’s going to produce a tremendous return," Rieckhoff said. "This is might be the one thing  Romney and Obama could agree about on the stage. But we’ve got to force the questions.

"Just one question about veterans during the debate makes everybody remember that we’re out there," he added. 

If either campaign needs more convincing that winning the military and veterans vote could tip the election, IAVA is armed with the sorts of stats that make pollsters drool. 

More than 2.4 million veterans have served in Iraq and Afghanistan. Three battleground states are packed with veterans: 60,000-plus in Ohio, and more than 150,000 in both Virginia and Florida. The organization also reports that 90 percent of new veterans are registered to vote, and many remain undecided.

In fact, according to a membership survey IAVA conducted last year, more than 40 the group's participants don't identify themselves as Republicans or Democrats.

"If you look at the broader military and veterans population, that’s an incredibly influential voting bloc. And not only are they strong in numbers and not only are they registered to vote in a high percentage, they’re also very influential," Rieckhoff said. "They have an opportunity to be force multipliers — not only influencing their families but influencing their communities.

"They're also incredibly nonpartisan," he added. "They’re patriotic and pragmatic and they just want to see people who can get things done. They are much more dedicated to their country than they are their party. They are a political jump ball."

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Courtesy of Ashley Metcalf

Ashley Metcalf, who served in Iraq then enrolled in college, is leading a push to compel the VA to pay back wages owed to dozens of student veterans like himself.

Student veterans hired by the Department of Veterans Affairs to help fellow ex-service members transition into college have routinely waited four to six weeks — and, in one case, four months — for unpaid wages, prompting eviction worries and mounting debt, according to a survey of program members obtained by NBC News.

Ashley Metcalf, who served in Iraq and Afghanistan — and the student veteran who organized the survey of other VA "work-study" employees at 18 campuses — said he’s been living on credit cards since June and was forced to obtain an emergency loan because the VA has failed to compensate him for about 100 hours he's logged in the VA program. 

“How can this happen? If I was working for McDonald’s and they said they’re not going to pay me for 10 weeks, I’d have a lawsuit,” said Metcalf, an Air Force veteran now enrolled at the University of Colorado Denver.

“We’re not asking for a raise or for extra benefits. We’re just asking the VA to do what it said it would do: pay us on time,” Metcalf said. “Coming back home, trying to figure out mentally how to transition into college life and then not getting paid? It’s way too much of a stress for people who are possibly already on edge.”

According to the VA website, the “work-study allowance” is available through the post-9/11 GI Bill. Student veterans employed by the program earn the minimum wage from the VA for devoting hours to specified, on-campus jobs such as “providing assistance to veteran students with general inquiries about veteran benefits,” the site says, adding: "VA will pay you each time you complete 50 hours of service."

A voicemail left Monday by NBC News with the VA media relations office prompted an emailed response Wednesday from a VA spokesperson: "VA will review any issues with the work-study to ensure payments are delivered in a timely manner. To allow more timely payments to work-study students, our regional processing offices recommend that employers submit time records to the work-study coordinator once 50 work hours have been accrued. In some cases, time records are submitted after a student has accrued 100 or more hours."

But Metcalf’s survey found VA work-study employees at five campuses who reported waiting one month to two months for payments — and a student in North Dakota who was not compensated for four months. (Among the 18 schools represented in the survey were Texas A&M, Florida State and the University of Kentucky). Survey participants also revealed that a number of student veterans have quit their work-study jobs due to the chronic payment delays, hamstringing veteran-services departments at some campuses. 

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“I usually have 100 hours logged before I get paid for 50. For any other job I would find this to be a reason to quit,” one student veteran replied to the survey. “It is mind boggling to think that I work 50 hours, submit my form and have to wait almost a month to get paid for it. I'm married with a kid on the way. Please just pay me already!!!” wrote another.

A second dominant survey theme: rising anger over the VA's lack communications — and its failure to provide basic answers as to why faxed time sheets take weeks or months to process and pay. Many survey respondents described numerous unreturned voice mails and unanswered e-mails from VA officials.  "God answers my prayers faster than the VA answers my phone calls," complained one student veteran. 

Tomorrow, Neal Boyd would have marked his one-year anniversary with the VA work-study program. Instead, he resigned the post one month ago. An Iraq War veteran, Boyd was named to the Danville Area Community College Board of Trustees in April as the panel's student representative. (The school, in Danville, Ill, has about 120 students enrolled via military benefits). On Aug. 1, Boyd applied with the VA to renew his work-study contract for the fall semester. He then invested about 70 hours in his assigned job — helping veterans find employment. 

Two months later, Boyd has not received a reply from the VA about his contract renewal — or any money. In September, his college learned of the problem and hired Boyd, adding him to the school's payroll and allowing him to retain his job while letting him simultaneously step away from the VA's work-study program. 

"I’d be in the same boat (as the other unpaid student veterans) if I didn’t have such a great school," Boyd said. "When I would call the VA (for an answer), I wouldn’t get anybody, just a recording saying they were busy processing time sheets. At this point, I'm no longer interested in the VA work-study contract."

While the GI Bill covers veterans' tuition fees, many other living expenses remain. That's where the work-study money is supposed to help students like Ashley Metcalf stay financially safe while attending a full load of college classes and devoting 20 hours a week to guiding other enrolled veterans from the battlefield to the classroom. 

"People are relying on this money. This is ridiculous," Metcalf said of the results gathered by his survey. "I knew that somebody had to step up and do something."

For a personal view of the financial strain caused by the payment delays, Metcalf opened his personal books. In addition to his full tuition coverage, he receives $1,464 in monthly GI benefits. From that check, he pays $600 for rent. The remaining $864 must cover a month's worth of groceries, household items, clothing, school supplies, bills, gas for his car, and parking fees in downtown Denver where his college is located. While the GI Bill also allots $500 for college books, that doesn't cover the true cost each semester — just one of Metcalf's fall classes required $300 in book purchases. 

Courtesy of Ashley Metcalf

Ashley Metcalf served in the Air Force for 12 years, spending time in Iraq. He's being forced to return to service in January because the VA has been months late in compensating him for college work the agency hired Metcalf to perform.

"I’m running short every month (due to unpaid wages; he's supposed to receive $600 every 30 days). I know the VA has numerous veterans issues that are being handled now — mental health and people being homeless. But I have to pay rent. We had another guy (in the work-study program) who almost got evicted," Metcalf said. 

At the University of Colorado Denver, about 900 student veterans are enrolled — 13 of those are employed by VA's work-study program, aiding fellow veterans in tracking their GI benefits and merging into college life, Metcalf said. Amid the VA compensation snags, the bursar's office at UCD created emergency loans — $1,500 per semester — for student veterans, he added. 

"I had to take one of those loans because I don't know when I'm going to get paid," said Metcalf, who also serves as president of the UCD student veteran organization. "I just can't wait any longer for the money." 

And with the draw down in Afghanistan causing more service members to leave the military and enroll directly in college — in part due to the weak job market — Metcalf expects the work-study payment holdups to worsen. That means, he predicts, additional students will quit their work-study posts in college veteran-services departments, which will, in turn, reduce on-campus help for former troops who are trying to carve out success in college.

Metcalf, who spent six years on active duty in the Air Force and another six as reservist, also has reached a career crossroads. 

"I'm going back into the (Air Force) Reserves in January," he said. "I can’t afford to not work. And even though it’s a requirement that I be a full-time student to stay on the GI Bill, I can’t afford to live like this." 

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