This may sound radical, but Shinseki could in fact be innocent. That statement has no bearing on his competence. If he is the central authority to whom a lot of regional incompetents/frauds report, he may well have been under the impression that things were going swimmingly out there in the boonies.
I also agree with the idea that firing him as a piece of theater accomplishes less than nothing.
“he may well have been under the impression that things were going swimmingly” No Commanding Officer could ever use that as an excuse. I can just imagine giving my CO that rap.
With such well known issues, did he ever make unannounced inspections at hospitals? Were there any skip-level meetings with the worker-bees?
Howzabout this?
Tell Shinseki, “No, we’re not going to force you to quit! We’re going to force you to stay right there and go after your underlings who caused such pain to our nation’s vets!
“And we’re going to bring your sorry @zz before the House committee every f*****g week and demand an accounting of everything you’ve done to kick @zz and take names!
“And we’ll keep up the pressure until you announce your own f*****g resignation!