Bullshit. Military pay was nowhere near the poverty line because it's a flat out lie to only use base rate in the equation. The only reason many servicemembers qualified for assistance was because many agencies didn't take BAH into account and mane servicemembers are fucking idiots that get married to their high school sweetheart during boot leave, pop out a dependent or two thinking it'll get them out of the bricks and some extra spending money then blow their entire bonus on a fucking car. There's a reason one of the first things they force guys to learn these days is basic
financial management.
The military pay gap has been grossly overblown for years. Not that those pay raises weren't good but to say that anyone in the military was impoverished due to anything but their own mismanagement of their finances and bad decisions is ridiculous. Even today kids are bitching that they're getting paid shit despite the fact that in no other field can an 18 year old be making the equivalent of nearly 30 grand a year with nothing but a high school education plus receive free medical, tuition assistance and most importantly a completely free ride to college after only four years on the job.
More importantly, if you're going to argue against his point then try to use a legit argument because government employ is a cheat in this case. He was clearly referring to private sector jobs. During those Bush years the average middle class income fell while the economy grew. For the first time in the history of the country. So to say that you prospered due to GOP policies - like what, invasions? because you know damn well that many of those increases in benefits and pay raises would have happened if he didn't have to maintain his conservative base from the people he was sending into combat for no good reason - may be technically true but it's a total bogus move and you know it.
note: this rant stems from the fact that i've had to knock sense into more than one of my marines for being a fucking idiot with his money; complaining that he's broke when he has virtually no expenses but pretty much throws his money away on bullshit. there's no reason that anyone enlisting today or during the past decade without dependents or prior debt can't put at least half a grand into a savings account every month. fucking dumbass kids