September 02, 2011 
Tom Philpott | August 25, 2011
Rising to Shield Commissaries from the Budget Knife
Jerry Ensminger, a retired Marine Corps master sergeant who has fought for years to win government-funded health care for families exposed to contaminated water at Camp Lejeune, doesn't want the measure passed if, to pay for it, Congress would gut the military's prized commissary benefit.
Critics contend that's what the Caring for Camp Lejeune Veterans Act (S. 277) would do, funding health care for these families by ending annual appropriations for commissaries and merging these base grocery store operations with exchanges, the name for base department stores.
"Do I agree with this proposal to punish veterans and their families and active duty people who depend on, and worked for, the right to use the commissary? Hell no. We have lost too many of our benefits over the years to have this taken from us," Ensminger said in a phone interview.
Read more at
Military.com.