Top Veterans Official Resigns Amid Claims of Poor Care, ETC

[Zacha341]

This is a 'can' that is not going to close back shut easily. Good! It needed to come out.

V.A. Accusations Aggravate Woes of White House

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/05/21/us...w&rref=us&_r=0

Claims of Poor Care

http://www.nbcnews.com/storyline/va-...r-care-n107551

[rb336]

This is by no means a "new" story. The VA system has been underfunded and understaffed for decades. 10 years ago, the story was about how it took months or even years for returning vets to even get their paperwork to the VA

[Zacha341]

The joy of federal efficiency and accountability.

My elders, etc. who served in the military rued the day of ever having to go 'under' VA care.

Thankfully they had private health care to avoid it.

[JBMcB]

This wouldn't be nearly so embarrassing for the Obama administration if he hadn't made reducing VA hospital wait times part of his platform - six years ago:

https://www.documentcloud.org/docume...ment/p4/a85289

[Zacha341]

And, again, the white house 'buffers' say the president learned of the problem just as we did... What?

From dailymail.co.uk:

White House says Obama only learned of VA wait-list scandal on TV [[just like the IRS, Fast and Furious and reporter snooping scandals)

White House Press Secretary Jay Carney wound up with egg on his face Monday as he told reporters that President Barack Obama first learned from a TV news report that his Veterans Administration was denying medical care to vets with secret off-the-books-waiting lists....

\http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/arti...#ixzz32yTbGNoo

[jiminnm]

Finally.
http://www.nationaljournal.com/defen...obama-20140530

[Mikeg]

This is by no means a "new" story. The VA system has been underfunded and understaffed for decades. 10 years ago, the story was about how it took months or even years for returning vets to even get their paperwork to the VA

You sound like former Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi and her recent lame attempt to deflect any blame for this scandal away from President Obama and place it on the previous administration:

"Now he's commander in chief; now he sees the ramifications of some seeds that were sown a long time ago. Maybe, when we go into war, we should be thinking about its consequences and its ramifications. You would think that would be a given. But maybe it wasn't." [["The Hill", May 21, 2014)

Even President Obama disagrees with you. On May 21st, he correctly stated that

"We have made progress over the last five years. We’ve made historic investments in our veterans. We’ve boosted VA funding to record levels."
[[CSPAN Video, 5:46 mark).

Therefore, how can these performance problems at the VA be anything other than a failure of managerial leadership within the Obama administration? During the tenure of President Obama and VA Secretary Shinseki, the VA's

.... annual budget rose 78% in six budget cycles, with double-digit increases in four of the six years — while Defense spending was flat. No other Cabinet agency had a larger budget increase by percentage during Obama’s tenure..... The amount of increase in the VA’s budget in the Obama era, $65.9 billion, exceeds the entire VA budget in the FY2004 budget. [["Is the VA scandal a funding issue, or a leadership failure?")

In response to claims like Nancy Pelosi's that the VA is being overwhelmed with injured Iraq and Afghanistan vets on top of the aging WW II, Korean and Vietnam veteran population, the facts state otherwise:

"The VA's budget has been exploding, even as the number of veterans steadily declines. From 2000 to 2013, outlays nearly tripled, while the population of veterans declined by 4.3 million.

Medical care spending — which consumes about 40% of the VA's budget — has climbed 193% over those years, while the number of patients served by the VA each year went up just 68%, according to data from the VA.

From 2008 to 2012 alone, per-patient spending at the VA climbed 27%. To put that in perspective, per capita health spending nationwide rose just 13% during those years....

Some will argue that the increase in health spending was the direct result of all those wounded warriors coming back from Iraq and Afghanistan. But these vets aren't driving VA costs higher.

A Congressional Budget Office report found that they cost $4,800, on average, in 2010 compared with $8,800 for other veterans who used the system. It also found that while these Iraq and Afghan vets account for 7% of those treated, they were responsible for only 4% of its health costs." [["VA Spending Per Patient Exploded Amid Deadly Delays")

The lack of leadership in the Obama administration is clearly evident from these conflicting statements:

President Obama's Press Secretary Jay Carney, responding to a question on May 19th from a CNN reporter about when the president first became aware of the fraudulent wait time lists: “..... the specific allegations that were first reported by your network out of Phoenix, I believe, we learned about them through the reports.... That’s when, as I understand, we learned about them." [[Mediaite video, 0:30 mark)

President Obama, during his May 21st press conference: "That’s why, when I came into office, I said we would systematically work to fix these problems, and we have been working really hard to address them." [[CSPAN video, 3:50 mark)

[oladub]

http://comicallyincorrect.com/2014/05/22/obama-all-talk/