Good afternoon. And welcome to the National Press club. The place when news happens. Im andrea edney, immediate past president of the National Press club and and i serve on the bof both the club and of our journalism institute. We have a really, really Great Program ahead, invite you to listen, watch or follow along on twitter using the npclive. For our cspan audience and public radio audience, please be aware that in the audience today are members of the general public, so any applause a reaction you may here are not, is not necessarily from working press. Let me begin by introducing the head table and a like to ask you to please hold your applause and until all of the head table guests are introduced. Helpful to have the list. So from my left and from your right we have sean butcher, Communications Manager at disabled sports usa and editor of challenge magazine. We have retired navy captain jim noon, command of the American Legion post 20 here at the National Press club. Next to captain noon, we have retired u. S. Marine corps Lieutenant Colonel brooks tucker. He is the assistant secretaryhe for the v. A. Office of congressional and legislative affairs. We have laurie rousseau, the president of Stanton Communications and culture of the National Press club Headliners Team. We have max lyft or uber, the publisher of stars stripes. We have retired u. S. Marine corps colonel jim byrne, deputy secretary of internal affairs. Coming from my right and youre left, we have retired u. S. Army Lieutenant Colonel luke, director at the mccain institute. We have jerry, Washington Bureau chief of the buffalo news and former president of the National Press club. We have retired u. S. Air force colonel pamela powers. She is the chief of staff of the department of Veterans Affairs. We have john hughes, an editor at Bloomberg News and a former president of the National Press club. We have retired u. S. Navy captain kevin wincing, the National Press club headliner member who arranged todays event. Skipping over our guest just for one moment, we have donna, president at d. C. Media strategies and she is also a former National PressClub President , and the culture of the National Press club Headliners Team. I would like to also acknowledge a few additional members of the Headliners Team responsible for organizing todays luncheon. Laurie rousseau and donna, who we just mentioned, kevin, and press club staff liaison lindsey underwood, membership engagement manager laura coker, chef susan, who prepared your lunch today, National PressClub Executive director bill mccarron. Thank you all. [applause] i would also like to give a shout out to American Legion post 20, which celebrates its 100th anniversary this month. It has been meeting at the club since its inception in 1919. Is that right . No. Yes, yes, okay. We are so proud to have you here. [applause] and now let me tell you just a little bit about secretary robert wilkie. Robert wilkie is not a doctor, but he is responsible for the health care of about 20 million u. S. Veterans. And that is just the beginning. As secretary of the department of Veterans Affairs, secretary wilkie is also in charge of administering veterans benefits, including health insurance, the g. I. Bill, and even home loans. His agency employs about 375,000 people who care for millions. And healthcare is the most important benefit, as well as the biggest challenge. Five years ago it was reported that some veterans were waiting months for care, and that some may have died because of those delays. Served our country, more access to care outside of the va system. Before being sworn in as the va secretary in july of 2018, wilkie was the son of a commander and spent years at fort bragg. He has experience at national and International Level and remains an officer in the u. S. Air force reserve as rank of colonel. Before he joined the air force he served in the u. S. Navy reserve with the joint forces Intelligence Command and the office of naval intelligence. On the eve of veterans day weekend. Please join me in welcoming to the National Press club va secretary robert wilkie. Thank you, ladies and gentlemen, thank you for having me back for an encore. I said last year that i wanted to be one of you, that i was like some of you a High School Newspaper editor. Id learned how to cut out column inches on my easel in fayetteville, North Carolina at reed roth high school. I had a dogeared copy of dan rathers the camera never blinks and broadcast of edward rchlt m murmur edward r. Murrow. I was taught that he represented the others, freedom on the front line of history. And in my fathers time he saw many of your colleagues give the ultimate sacrifice in vietnam, during the invasion of cambodia, he was in the sector when two nbc news correspondents and cameramen did not come back from doing the job that they had sworn to do. So whenever i speak to journalists as a group of journalists, i thank you for defending the ideals that i hope all of us in National Security strive to uphold because without you, the rest of it wouldnt be worth very much, so, thank you all very much. [applaus [applause] the other item i want to use as a point of personal the va hospital broke ground, a new fisher house. My parents are new orleans, we were privileged to get to know one of new orleans prominent families, a fellow who ended up one of the greatest in the house of representatives and his wife who not only took his seat in the United States house, but went on to be our ambassador to the vatican, im talking about hale and lindy. Im talking about Cokie Roberts. And she was in new orleans and a regular customer. I became reacquainted with her as i became an adult and through her work in new orleans helping Loyola University get back on its feet after katrina. She had one piece of advice from me and it came from her father and it was about doing business in washington, particularly in the congress when she said that the fellow that you are arguing with in the morning will probably be the fellow that you walk out of the chamber with your arm around in the evening. I think we would all be much better as a people and a country if we stuck by Cokie Roberts dictum. So, thank you. [applaus [applause]. I will say im glad to be back at the press club celebrating the anniversary of American League post number 20 he here, a post inaugurated by the only man who is below washington on our protocol chart, of the first man below George Washington on the protocol chart, general pershing, the general of the armies, general of the armies. General pershing, a member of this club and also the person who found the post here, now celebrating its 100th and remembersry. [applause]. Since the first shots were fired at lexington in april of 1775, more than 41 million americans have put on the nations uniform to defend freedom. Today Americas Army is comprised only of citizen volunteers who have determined to defend this country. And our history is filled with heroes who found a way to fight even after being told they either werent healthy enough or young enough or were not the right color or gender to walk on to the battlefield and defend those colors. So who were these americans who were told that they could not serve . One of them was a 33yearold book worm farmer from jackson county, missouri. He lied and cheated to get into the Field Artillery prior to world war i because he could not bear the thought of his friends and neighbors going to war and he not being there to support them. What he was saddled with was a battery called battery d of the 29th Field Artillery of the Missouri National guard. In france, they were known as the dizzy ds. The dizzy ds was the hardest Drinking Group of irishmen to ever stagger around the streets of kansas city and they were saddled with a bespeckled baptist 33yearold who never commanded anything in his life except a plow, and before his first battle he sent a note to his future wife and he said, i have my doubts about bravery, when the explosive shells begin to explode and the gas attacks start. But when battery d came under fire for the first time in 1918, one private said of captain harry s truman, i dont think hed ever been under fire before and i dont think it bothered him a damn. About the same time, thousands of young africanamerican soldiers marched to the colors before they could vote in most parts of the country. And before they were recognized for the foundational role that they played in the creation of our great republic. The legendary 369th infantry regiment of Harlem New York signed up before anybody else in america, but they were not permitted to join the farewell parade down fifth avenue. But these dedicated americans were attached to the french army because there were parts of our army that would not accept them. They spent more time on the front lines. They suffered over 1500 casu casualti casualties. They have received 100 french gere, they received more commendations than any other unit in world war i when they returned home in 1919, the city of new york insisted that they lead the parade down fifth avenue. Just a few years ago president obama awarded the congressional medal of honor to needham roberts, william johnson, the two most decorated soldiers of the most decorated unit of the United States army, almost 100 years after they saw richly deserved it. There are some other characters. At the out set of world war ii there was a very small accountant from chicago by the name of George Rumsfeld who wanted to join the navy. He was told who was too light. He spent months drinking milk shakes and eating banana splits just so he could pass the weight requirement. He couldnt do anything about his age, but he could do something about his strength and he spent months in the gym trying to build up his endurance and the navy finally allowed him to enter service. But the navy actually moved young ensign rumsfeld to a blimp base in elizabeth city, North Carolina. Much to the consternation of his young son, who told his daddy that he needed to start writing letters to president roosevelt to convince him that he needed to go to the pacific. Well, they wrote those letters and George Rumsfeld persevered and the navy finally agreed to let him go serve in combat in the pacific. My father didnt want to spend the war in North Carolina, Donald Rumsfeld said, and he did what every american was proud to do, go where the country sent them. So one of our strongest bonds as americans are those stories that we share about military service and how we come together as a nation to protect individual freedoms we love and enjoy. This year, i was reminded of my own childhood at fort sill and fort bragg when i was visited by a classmate and a friend. In the 1960s and 1970s when a child was called to the Principals Office either in kindergarten or Elementary School where i grew up, there was always a chance that that child wasnt going to a doctors appointment, that there was bad news from southeast asia. My own father was so badly wounded in the invasion of cambodia, it took him three years to recover. It was a year after he was wounded before we saw him and he came back weighing half of what he did when he left, but that wasnt the end of the story for those times. When he recovered, he joined the most decorated combat division in all of the military of the United States, the allamericans. The 82nd Airborne Division and in that time, and in that place, he was not allowed to wear his uniform off post for fear of the reaction from his fellow citizens. Ladies and gentlemen, that was not berkeley, california or cambridge, massachusetts, the southeast North Carolina the heart of Richard Nixon country. People still stepped forward. One of those who did in the 1970s was Master Sergeant cicero johnson of harding county, North Carolina. He was an air force medic. In april of 1975, Donald Rumsfeld and gerald ford decided to evacuate all the orphanages in saigon ahead of the north vietnamese army, they called it operation baby lift. Sergeant johnson volunteered for that mission and on april 5th, 1975, as the guns of the north vietnamese could be heard, he boarded a c5 with 178 vietnamese orphans. The c5 did not make it to the end of the runway at the air base. 138 children lost their lives and 11 airmen. One of them was Master Sergeant denning johnson. This year 44 years later, i accompanied my classmate denise, to panel 1w of the vietnam wall where she was able to touch the name of her father, one of the last from that conflict, and if you look just under his name, on that same panel is the name of one of the eight Women Officers of the United States air force, nurses and doctors, who lost their lives in vietnam. Captain mary therese clinker, who was on that plane when Sergeant Johnson went down is the name right below his. So next week, we start our second century of remembering americas heroes on what used to be called Armistice Day, the 11th day, the 11th month, the 11th hour, that marked the end of the forlornly named war to end all wars. In the mid 1950s after more wars demanded more from the American People, america began celebrating not the stopping of the guns, but the men and women who made them stop and under general eisenhower, Armistice Day became veterans day. We rightfully call our veterans heroes, but i can think of an even higher compliment than that. These men and women rise to the defense of this nation because i think they see more clearly than most of us that our way of life is not guaranteed, it might be fought for as members of this profession have done throughout its history. Alvin york started life in the army as a conscience objector and soon became a hero of the great war and by the time world war ii came around, he had been sounding the alarm as to what he saw happening in the place that he had fought in in 1917 and 1918 and he went around the country, reminding america that america is the last best hope on the planet. He said of those who wanted to avoid fighting nazi germany, the thing that we forget is that liberty and freedom and democracy are so very precious that you do not fight to win them once and then stop. Liberty and freedom and democracy are prizes awarded only to those people who fight to win them and to keep fighting them eternally to hold onto them. I am privileged to be part of an organization that stands with men and women who talk like that, and that is why i appreciated Richard Nixons grand gesture to veterans when america withdrew from vietnam. In those days, the Counter Culture was rampant. Something i said, i saw as a young boy when my father as i had mentioned could not wear his uniform off of fort bragg, but nixon saw clearly we had to value our soldiers no matter what the outcome. He signed legislation boosting education and Work Training as a way of affirming our respect and gratitude to all of those who had born the battle. He praised them when they came back from the job in vietnam which he said was honorably undertaken and honorably ended and he said that our american soldiers are the strongest hope for americas future. I am very fortunate to be in this position. To be in a position where we care for our veterans, we care for their families, and we remind people every day that they are sleeping soundly at night because of the sacrifices of their fellow citizens who have experienced the incommunicable experience of war. A few years ago va was not in a very good place, with scandal after scandal, as many in this department and this place have noted. I believe we have turned the corner. This year i was able on behalf of the president to present the largest budget in the history of Veterans Affairs. 220 billion dollars calling for 400,000 employees over 172 hospitals. Our Patient Satisfaction rates are at the greatest in our histo