Why I have been Angry all Day----V.A. Bonuses

[Monkeyman]

Run time: 02:33 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7Jgn0274wU4   Posted on YouTube: May 04, 2007 By YouTube Member: Views on YouTube: 0   Posted on DU: May 04, 2007 By DU Member: Monkeyman Views on DU: 822

 
To Dam Angry to Comment

[MadMaddie]

1. Monkeyman...I read the article and was stunned...

Charges should be brought against the people that approved these bonuses....our men and women are suffering and the money that could help them is literally being stolen....

[fed-up]

2. remember a few months ago Nicholson said they didn't have $1M for a database for injured vets??

http://vawatchdog.org/07/nf07/nfMAR07/nf030807-10.htm
VA NEWS FLASH from Larry Scott at VA Watchdog dot Org -- 03-08-2007 #10

UPDATE & VIDEO: NICHOLSON DIGGING A DEEPER HOLE

AT THE VA -- He shelved a Seamless Transition program

aimed at helping returning veterans when he

took over as VA Secretary in 2005.

Under VA Chief, Effort to Aid Wounded Vets Stalled, Ex-Employee Charges

Brian Ross and Justin Rood Report:


A proposal to keep seriously wounded vets from falling through the cracks of the bureaucracy was shelved in 2005 when Jim Nicholson took over as the secretary of the Veterans Affairs Department, according to the former VA employee who was responsible for tracking war casualties.

As a result, seriously wounded veterans continued to face long delays for health care and benefit payments after being discharged from the military, says former VA program manager Paul Sullivan.

The program, called the Contingency Tracking System, had been approved by Nicholson's predecessor but died once Nicholson took over the VA, Sullivan told ABC News.

Sullivan said he was told the cost of the system -- less than $1 million to build and requiring a handful of staff to maintain -- was prohibitive.


...snip

[lumpy]

3. Bump

x

[orleans]

9. of course they didn't have the $1 million for the database!

they needed it to go toward their $3.8 million in bonuses!

[fed-up]

4. "people who nearly shortchanged our veterans shouldn't get a bonus check at the end of the year"

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/n/a/2007/05/03/national/w005358D01.DTL&type=politics
AP: Senior VA Officials Get Big Bonuses
By HOPE YEN, Associated Press Writer
Thursday, May 3, 2007

Several watchdog groups questioned the practice. They cited short-staffing and underfunding at VA clinics that have become particularly evident after recent disclosures of shoddy outpatient treatment of injured troops at Walter Reed Army Medical Center in Washington.
"Hundreds of thousands of our veterans remain homeless every day and hundreds of thousands more veterans wait six months or more for VA disability claim decisions," said Paul Sullivan, executive director of Veterans for Common Sense. "The lavish amounts of VA bonus cash would be better spent on a robust plan to cut VA red tape."

...snip

Steve Ellis, vice president of Taxpayers for Common Sense, said the VA bonuses appeared to reflect a trend in government where performance bonuses were increasingly used to reward loyal associates and longtime employees.
Put in place shortly after the 1978 Civil Service Reform Act, executive bonuses were designed to increase accountability in government by tying raises more closely to performance. But while bonuses can help retain key employees, damage can be done when payments turn into an automatic handout regardless of performance, Ellis said.
"Simply put, people who nearly shortchanged our veterans shouldn't get a bonus check at the end of the year," he said.

[Monkeyman]

5. Now I will Comment

You all know I fight for Vets. 151,000 returning troops on waiting list for health care. Kids not being taken care of. Ok Enough about Vets only think about the programs this money could of helped. We have a shit head President who claims I support the troops and veterans (BULLSHIT) We had a Republican Debate if you want to call it that. Did anyone say a word about this matter. Democrats today called for Nicholson to resign now. How DARE THESE PRICKS SAY THEY SUPPORT THE TROOPS AND VETERANS. OK comment over

[fed-up]

6. well said, but I also remember what Gulf War I vets had to go through to get care :(

[emilyg]

7. Disgusting thiefs

R

[lazer47]

11. I Cannot comment, you already know how I feel,,If I said what I feel

the mods would just delete it anyway,,,

[Monkeyman]

12. That's Why I had to come back Brother

[FloridaJudy]

8. I'm sure all these fine executives

Have yellow ribbons prominently stuck to the backs of their SUV's.
Hey, they're supporting the troops, don't you know? :sarcasm:

These creeps make me :puke:

:grr:

[emald]

10. this is sick shit

I'm a disabled vet who can't even get his teeth fixed. My medical care is third world, squeezed into nothingness by inept administrators and budgets that ignore the reality of needed care for vets. These inept admins get bonuses? This is horrible and wrong. Messed up country rewards the criminals, the thieves, and burns those who have no voice. Time for change.

[DollyM]

13. I still say . . .

the answer is to do away with the VA system as we know it, shut the hospitals and clinics and give Veterans medical cards to use at Dr's and hospitals of their choice, close to home. Our closest VA is 70 miles one way. We drug my poor little 77 year old father back and forth to VA for two years, even having him transferred from a local emergency room to VA by ambulance for a grueling 70 mile trip. I know there were times when he put off telling us he was sick because he didn't want to make that trip.
Think of the millions of dollars that are spent on employee salaries, benefits, pensions, building costs such as heating and cooling and upkeep. That money could all go directly into a program to allow veterans to use their own Dr and or specialist of their choosing. Sometimes I think the Doctors they get for VA are the bottom of the barrel that can't make it on their own. I have spent more time arguing with VA Doctors because they won't order a particular test or subscribe a particular medicine (they have to cut costs by using the cheapest medicines and not ordering expensive tests) or having a prescription changed to a cheaper and less effective one.
I was so thrilled when our income dropped low enough that we were able to qualify for state medical cards. For the first time in years, we were able to get good medical care, close to home. My husband's health improved immediately as he was able to get medications that VA had been denying him for years.
Scrap the dang VA system! Heck, scrap the whole insurance system and give us universal health care that is equal for everyone!

[Monkeyman]

14. 70 miles in Texas vets have to go 250 miles for their treatment

Universal Health Care is the right idea but will never happen. I wish it would. So until then the VA is the olny place we who have served can go

[haele]

16. If you can get a system to replace it, fine -

Problem is, if given the choice (to do away with the VA, privatize or to fix the VA), this bunch will just do away with the VA and toss vets that don't have alternatives to the street. Privatization (for which "choosing your own doctor" is a code word for when it comes to military health care) sucks; I've seen what it's done to Tricare where supposedly military member have choices - the hoops people who have "expensive" problems have to go through to get a primary care doctor that's in the system and worth anything is more of a crap shoot as trying to get anything done through a for-profit HMO; privatization requires even more "cost cutting" measures as the administration costs start skyrocketing.
My father, a National Guard/Reserves retiree of 30 years who has a heart condition, used to go to a mixed VA/TriCare facility in Washington state a couple years back and received excellent care; the VA outpatient portion of that clinic is now closed, as well as a couple nearby VA clinics in the state he now lives due to cost cutting and "privatization" - luckily he's got some options through TriCare and another supplemental program for seniors through Medicare, but if he wasn't eligible for Medicare yet and didn't have those options, he'd be up shit creek like several other under 65 "retirees" he knows who are currently without health care - even those who are still somewhat employed. These people depend on either Worker's comp or the VA for their health care.

The VA has been so underfunded for the past 6 years, I'm not surprised you're seeing what might be otherwise good doctors who can't do anything because they've been hampered by politics and cost cutting measures that can be harmful to patients as well as burn out at an alarming rate - that's currently an issue with active and reserve military doctors, also.

Single payer health care should take care of the problems with outrageous costs and declining service, but until we get to that point, for the sake of the million or so vets who depend on the VA as their only health care provider, we've got to get the VA fully funded and clinics back open.

Haele

[maddezmom]

15. Monkeyman, have you seen this? Rep John Hall wants to kill the bonuses

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=102x2834328

[Monkeyman]

19. I hope he can do it. Just got back from our VA

Had two kids who where denied and they are back from Iraq

[maddezmom]

20. I'm with you

:hug: Thanks for all you do for all the Vets.

[puerco-bellies]

17. Holy Shit..

I am lucky, because I live 20 minutes from the West Los Angeles VA Medical Center. My dad who just retired has been denied VA benefits twice on bullshit technicalities in Southern Colorado. Where is the outrage from the freepers, Glen Beck, Limpballs, and all the other fake troop supporters??? Imagine if these administrators were Clinton appointees.

[maddezmom]

18. just posted another one, that could use some love

Hall D-NY seeks to stop bonus payment to VA officials until backlog cleared

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=389x823313