SHINSECKI or whatever his name is is NOT the problem. Rachel just hosted a vet scapegoating

[UTUSN]

The VA has had a bad reputation for all of my own 50 yrs of when I became a vet. The problems can't be fixed with "high tech" crap. It's the nature of the beast. The VA has had a problem and probably will always have a problem.

O.K., *fire* the top dude. Let's see where that'll getcha.

[Calista241]

1. Target

Target fired their CEO for the data breach they had recently.

He'd been on he job for less than 2 years, and the decision to purchase the equipment and utilize the service hacked was made years before his tenure started.

[UTUSN]

2. you get me n/t

[Cleita]

3. A few years back a friend and neighbor of mine got VIP treatment at the

Wadsworth VA Hospital in W. Los Angeles. He was a WWII vet. They kept him for a month, in a very nice ward where he had a private room at no cost to him. Every test available was given to him to get a diagnosis. He was well fed and looked after. He not only had heart problems but cancer it seems. It didn't cost him a penny.

The real problem I found was when he became an out patient. That's where all the delays and lines were. Fortunately, he also qualified for Medi-Cal which enabled him to get care and drugs outside of the system if the VA was too bottled necked. They needed more staff. They had the space. They just needed the personnel, no doubt the results of some Republican budget cuts. This was the middle eighties.

The problems are there, but I see easy fixes, and they aren't going to be coming out of this Congress I believe.

[UTUSN]

4. There can never be an honest discussion of the VA because of the emotion and fakery

1) Vets having their (unrealistic?!1) expectations.

2) Rethugs doing their fake vet-baiting.

3) Dems cowering, afeard to be accused of being unpatriotic.

4) The big one, the elephant in the room, vet-on-vet authoritarianism.

[GP6971]

9. Well, I'm going to register

With the VA next week. Vietnam Nam and first Gulf War vet, no disabilities. Like they'll see me in a couple of weeks......r...i...g...h....t. more like a couple of years. Probably more than that and that's OK. Not doing this because I need their care......I have private medical insurance.....I'm just curious as to the wait time and what they tell me. But there will be a time when I'll need their care, so I'm going to get on their waiting list.

I always doubted the choice of Shinseki to head the VA. 4 star, Chief of Staff of the Army from the late 90s to early 2003. When did all the problems and deplorable conditions surface with Walter Reed hospital.......not during his watch, but they were festering. He had to be aware of the problems, but he let it go on.....as he is doing with the VA. Can him!!!! We can only change the VA when we change the culture. Good luck with that......too many entrenched bureaucratic assholes protecting their pensions.

I'm not knocking the VA at the working level.....everything I hear is that the staff is great and very caring and dedicated. But the most I hear is that they are over worked.

[Cleita]

11. Keeping a light shinning on the goings on and making the bureaucrats

accountable should help as this has already.

[SoCalDem]

14. Congress creates the messes by starting wars all over the place

without ALSO placing a 15% surtax on every citizen when we do go to war..
10% for the was and 5% to go to beef up the VA.

They also should turn the VA into what it should have been all along... a place for the rehabbing of war-wounded soldiers.

They should be specialized facilities, and then every vet should get a "free healthcare card" that entitles them to care anywhere..

One of my friends had been going to Pettis weekly for physical therapy, and then they changed his appointments to San Diego (totally out of reach for him).. ..They did not deny him the care..they just made it impossible for him to get to where they were offered...

[CatWoman]

5. I'm with you

[UTUSN]

6. Have I told you lately that I love you?!1 n/t

[okaawhatever]

7. Agreed. I hate to say it, but as bad as the problems are now, they're nothing compared to

post-Vietnam. I'm not saying the problems now aren't bad and need to be fixed, but the faux outrage by some politicos is disgusting when you know they were voting cuts for Veterans programs for the last 30 years.

When you mentioned your reasons for the VA problems not getting fixed you forgot one, IMHO.
1. the Republicans only care about active duty service members because when they become Veterans a lot of
their budget falls under entitlement programs. Since the GOP has convinced everyone that entitlement means something other than "you are entitled to it because you did something to earn it" they've screwed themselves. If the Vet programs have increased funding, it will increase the entitlement budget. Notice how you don't have the same problem with, say retirement (different part of the budget). The medical care portion isn't under the entitlement budget but many of the work programs and programs for homeless vets are. Bottom line, when you become a vet you stop being a Republican priority and start being a Democrats priority.

[treestar]

8. I hate the way when there is a problem

rather than solve it, people look for somebody to blame.

Is this even a real scandal? Or a made up Faux one?

[Cha]

12. I hear that, treestar. Sometimes it is their fault but this knee jerk.. OFF

WITH THEIR HEAD!.. does nothing but an instant gratification for those calling for it.

[Cha]

10. Eric Shinseki, UTUSN.. if I can learn to spell it you can. :) Firing the top dude will get us

nowhere, I agree. Glad the President has his back.. this seems to be a local. And, it will be routed out.