Posted on 09/25/2015 6:02:59 AM PDT by Kaslin
There is only one guaranteed way to get fired from the Department of Veterans Affairs. Falsifying records won't do it. Prescribing obsolete drugs won't do it. Cutting all manner of corners on health and safety is, at worst, going to get you a reprimand. No, the only sure-fire way to get canned at the VA is to report any of these matters to authorities who might do something about it.
That, at least, is what the U.S. Office of Special Counsel recently reported to the president of the United States. The Special Counsel's office is the agency to which government whistleblowers go to report wrongdoing.
"Our concern is really about the pattern that we're seeing, where whistleblowers who disclose wrongdoing are facing trumped-up punishment, but the employees who put veterans' health at risk are going unpunished," Special Counsel Carolyn Lerner recently told National Public Radio.
Now, obviously, this shouldn't happen. Everyone, except perhaps the managers at the VA, probably agrees with that. So by all means, let's have some reforms and further protections for whistleblowers.
But that's not a real solution. The real fix is to get rid of the VA entirely.
The United States has an absolute obligation to do right by veterans. It does not have an absolute obligation to run a lousy, wasteful, unaccountable, corrupt and inefficient bureaucracy out of Washington. Of all those adjectives, the one that gets to the core of the problem is "unaccountable."
Elected officials are supposed to be held responsible for the actions of the government, right? Well, which politician should we fire for the endless stream of outrageous VA scandals of the last few years? The president? Leave aside the fact that he won't be on the ballot in 2016; not a lot of voters put reforming the VA bureaucracy at the top of their list of priorities.
Is there a congressman or senator who might lose an election because of the VA scandals? If there is, I can't figure out who it might be. Every representative and senator has raced to the cameras to express their outrage, and not one is accepting a scintilla of responsibility for the problem. But they are all responsible because they have simply ceded authority to the bureaucrats themselves.
There is a reason the Founding Fathers put most governmental functions at the state and local level. It's because a large nation cannot be run from the center.
Imagine that the federal government simply gave all of the VA hospitals to the states they're in. Instead of the VA budget, Congress just cut checks to states to spend on their veterans. You'd still have problems, of course. But what you would also have are local elected officials -- city councilmen, state legislators, mayors, governors, etc. -- whom voters could hold directly accountable. Moreover, these officials would be more likely to understand the nature of the problems faced by their constituents.
As a result, you would see states handling similar problems in different ways. Some techniques would be better, some would be worse, and some would just be different. Arizona is simply different than Vermont, so it may handle things differently. Still, this process would allow everyone to learn from both mistakes and successes in a way that a centralized bureaucracy cannot or will not.
Personally, I'd rather see the money spent on veterans go straight to the veterans themselves, in the form of cash payments or vouchers to be used for health care in the private sector. But my point really isn't to figure out the best way to provide for veterans; it's to highlight the best way to organize a free society.
One of the chief reasons so many people are angry at Washington right now is that government has become detached from democratic accountability. Obamacare really isn't a piece of health-care legislation, it's a huge permission slip for bureaucrats to design a system as they see fit. The same goes for large swaths of the federal government. Congress doesn't make many decisions about environmental regulations; the EPA does. Moreover, the EPA makes decisions that no Congress would ever approve if the decisions were left to the elected officials. Congress likes it that way, because the politicians would rather complain about bad decisions than take responsibility for tough ones.
That's not how America is supposed to work. We elect politicians to make decisions. If they make bad ones, we get to fire them come Election Day. The growth of the federal bureaucracy is really a protection racket. It insulates both the bureaucrats and elected officials from the voters they're supposed to work for.
The way out of the VA.fiasco is to elect someone to the presidency who cares about the vets. That’s all otherwise a new pres gets in there bs continues disappointing us on this
Isn’t Jonah working to get rid of trump?
What is it with these people?
You nailed the problem...regardless of political bent, the insiders are for the insiders first...funny thing is they don’t even consider that let alone acknowledge it!
This has nothing to do with this article but Martha McCullum just reported on Fox News that Speaker Boehner will resign at the end of October.
Solution?
Fire some of the VA Executives. Hold them responsible. Once they understand that they will be responsible for their organization’s behavior, then they will hold their subordinates responsible.
The problem with the VA is that the executives think of Veterans as problems to them. Their jobs would be so much easier if the Veterans just went away.
Put a CONSERVATIVE VETERAN in charge. No more civilians to over see the VA and Veterans healthcare, but a real honest to GOD CONSERVATIVE VETERAN WHO GIVE A CARE about our Veterans.
The best solution I’ve seen proposed is a private veterans health co-op, roughly based on the USAA model.
USAA is the veterans insurance company (though they are perhaps ill-advisedly trying to open it up to the public.) And USAA is very profitable, based on the formula that veterans are different from the public at large. That is, if you look at the actuarial tables for veterans for home and automobile insurance, they are a LOT better than for the public at large.
The same applies to veterans and their family about a health co-operative.
It would use the “concierge” form of medical care, for say, the top 100 medical treatments and procedures used by veterans and their families. It would be paid for with one check at the beginning of the year, and from that point, all medical treatment is free. Importantly, no insurance, Medicaid or Medicare is accepted.
Doctors who have cash only practices have discovered that they can offer services for half the price, it costs them much less to run their practice, yet they make more income.
And concierge practices have a limit on the number of patients, so doctors can take their time with each one, as often as they need.
As an added bonus, those veterans who can afford the small expense of private health care can kiss the VA goodbye, which takes a lot of pressure off the VA, having fewer patients, so that (ha ha) they can take better care of the ones remaining.
Hmmmm...in Tucson and Pima County, any check sent to cover veterans would end up lining the pockets of corrupt businessmen, or be used to pay off the interest on bonds to cover spending on pork.
In an era of tribal politics, local and accountable don’t go together automatically.
If you think I am kidding, just get recruited by the VA for some job and just listen to what the employees say. It's a completely self-serving, work-ducking, passive aggressive, stone lazy culture.
I say give the veterans a voucher for care ANYWHERE.
Repurpose the VA physical plants (hospitals) for all the homeless schizophrenics and out of this world crazy people abandoned during the 80s when they closed the chronic psych hospitals.
Whose going to do that?
Mattis would be great except for his attitude toward being broken.
Another reason to give states or veterans direct funding is that the corrupt department of injustice defends the VA against those who have been wounded or killed at their centers. How many veteran’s have the money to defend themselves against the biggest union in the nation?
Problem is that the state run healthcare is not much better than the Feds run health care. I’ve not gotten into the new Medicare booklet yet but I know we are losing a lot of treatments and testing., some testing that should be done yearly as it is in the Patients best interest are being put off of 2 years. Some of the issues is the experimental stuff that shows promise of improving Seniors heath and letting them live much longer and more productive lives. If only they had better access to such treatments.
Some simple things that would help those on fixed incomes are Better quality eye glasses, hearing aids, and electric scooters or wheel chairs with better battery life, longer range of use that a single person can function who is no longer strong enough to lift them on their own.
As the spouse of a Ret SCPO every thing for me comes out of our pockets so I end up with the lower end products. The higher end durable medical items unless you are on Military Disability comes our of your pocket not Tricare life. A Co-pay system would help. I’m not saying it should be free, but use a co-pay system to give a little help with the financial burden of durable medical items.
Quick and accurate filling of Disability claims is a must. Wait times for VA care have to be much swifter, if your local VA facilities can’t do this then use private doctors. They are already “farming” out parts of a Veterans health care now, why not do the entire case?
That's what the left really wants. To destroy the health care system we veterans have been using and throw us into the clusterf*#k that is ObamaCare.
Well, NO THANK YOU!
I get excellent care at my VA and I do not want to get stuck in the private sector where a spinal cord injury like mine costs triple or more what it costs the VA to provide.
Plus, the VA handles medical problems that affect veterans much more so than civilians, so the doctors are skilled and well trained to deal with us.
Adding the 8+ million veterans to ObamaCare? Catastrophe in the making, IMO.
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