Bless our Veterans, WTF is Wrong with America??

[greg775]

How dare we treat our veterans this way. One armed services veteran of the United States of America who needed treatment was SCREAMING on his deathbed in his own home, not in a hospital where he DESERVED to be.

We are not taking care of our own people.

Yet we care about so much bulls*** in this country that doesn't matter!!

Thanks to CNN for exposing this, hopefully it doesn't get buried by the rest of the nation's press but it probably will.

 

This is an ATROCITY against Americans who have served!! These men and women need healthcare NOW! If you have time, please watch this piece. It is HEART WRENCHING.

Wake up, Obama!!!! We must do better than this.

 

http://www.cnn.com/2014/06/23/us/phoenix-v....html?hpt=hp_c2

Edited June 24, 2014 by greg775

[southsider2k5]

Welcome to government run healthcare. It's been this way since the VA was created.

[Balta1701]

Welcome to government run healthcare. It's been this way since the VA was created.

The private sector does things better. 10% of veterans should just be SOL.

[southsider2k5]

The private sector does things better. 10% of veterans should just be SOL.

 

You mean like the VA who pretends that veterans don't have certain problems (Agent Orange is perfectly safe, you don't have any problems!) or just acts like people don't exist (waiting list? What waiting list?)?

[Balta1701]

You mean like the VA who pretends that veterans don't have certain problems (Agent Orange is perfectly safe, you don't have any problems!) or just acts like people don't exist (waiting list? What waiting list?)?

Yeah, thankfully the private sector happily covers everyone so there is no one they act like don't exist. And there are no waiting lists in the US private sector either. At least if you're rich enough, and as usual, they're the only ones who count.

 

At least in half the country those parts are getting a lot better.

[StrangeSox]

Increased funding for the va would be helpful.

[Balta1701]

Increased funding for the va would be helpful.

Not creating millions of new veterans based on lies would help as well.

[greg775]

At any rate, this is another deal where there are a lot of excuses. There need to be solutions as our country is barbaric on this issue. No more men and women should be spending their last moments screaming on their deathbeds because they can't get health care. The fact this isn't causing more outrage nationally is disturbing to me. Also should really help morale of the troops seeing how we're treating them when they get injured.

Edited June 24, 2014 by greg775

[Balta1701]

At any rate, this is another deal where there are a lot of excuses. There need to be solutions as our country is barbaric on this issue. No more men and women should be spending their last moments screaming on their deathbeds because they can't get health care. The fact this isn't causing more outrage nationally is disturbing to me. Also should really help morale of the troops seeing how we're treating them when they get injured.

The U.S. has a very long history of promising things to veterans and then forgetting about those promises once the fighting is over and Congress realizes it costs money that they'd rather spend on other stuff.

 

This goes for both parties.

[LittleHurt05]

The U.S. has a very long history of promising things to veterans and then forgetting about those promises once the fighting is over and Congress realizes it costs money that they'd rather spend on other stuff.

 

This goes for both parties.

 

Which probably means that veterans don't vote much?

[EvilMonkey]

Increased funding for the va would be helpful.

The VA budget has gone up more than almost any other governmental agency. Your answer alone is so emblematic of liberal group-think. MORE MONEY! Bulls***. More accountability. These assholes cooked the books on wait times so they can get bonuses and to cover their butts. more money is NOT the answer. Start by firing a whole bunch of people. And rescinding all the bonuses that were not earned. ALL of them. Then perhaps jail time for some if their actions truly resulted in deaths. This isn't a Democratic witch hunt, or at least is wouldn't be if Democrats weren't trying to cover something up. This should be as bi-partisan as we can get nowadays. The system is broke. It should be abolished, except for the prosthetics units which I am told to excellent work. Just give every vet insurance that they can go to their own doc. Oh wait, that would be privatizing something, and hurt all the VA employees who are unionized. Ah, there is where the politics comes in....

[Balta1701]

The VA budget has gone up more than almost any other governmental agency. Your answer alone is so emblematic of liberal group-think. MORE MONEY! Bulls***. More accountability. These assholes cooked the books on wait times so they can get bonuses and to cover their butts. more money is NOT the answer. Start by firing a whole bunch of people. And rescinding all the bonuses that were not earned. ALL of them. Then perhaps jail time for some if their actions truly resulted in deaths. This isn't a Democratic witch hunt, or at least is wouldn't be if Democrats weren't trying to cover something up. This should be as bi-partisan as we can get nowadays. The system is broke. It should be abolished, except for the prosthetics units which I am told to excellent work. Just give every vet insurance that they can go to their own doc. Oh wait, that would be privatizing something, and hurt all the VA employees who are unionized. Ah, there is where the politics comes in....

Yeah, I mean, it's not like we created 5 million+ new veterans for BS reasons.

[southsider2k5]

The VA budget has gone up more than almost any other governmental agency. Your answer alone is so emblematic of liberal group-think. MORE MONEY! Bulls***. More accountability. These assholes cooked the books on wait times so they can get bonuses and to cover their butts. more money is NOT the answer. Start by firing a whole bunch of people. And rescinding all the bonuses that were not earned. ALL of them. Then perhaps jail time for some if their actions truly resulted in deaths. This isn't a Democratic witch hunt, or at least is wouldn't be if Democrats weren't trying to cover something up. This should be as bi-partisan as we can get nowadays. The system is broke. It should be abolished, except for the prosthetics units which I am told to excellent work. Just give every vet insurance that they can go to their own doc. Oh wait, that would be privatizing something, and hurt all the VA employees who are unionized. Ah, there is where the politics comes in....

 

Do I hear clawbacks?

[StrangeSox]

The U.S. has a very long history of promising things to veterans and then forgetting about those promises once the fighting is over and Congress realizes it costs money that they'd rather spend on other stuff.

 

This goes for both parties.

 

e.g. the Bonus Army

[StrangeSox]

The VA budget has gone up more than almost any other governmental agency. Your answer alone is so emblematic of liberal group-think. MORE MONEY! Bulls***. More accountability. These assholes cooked the books on wait times so they can get bonuses and to cover their butts. more money is NOT the answer. Start by firing a whole bunch of people. And rescinding all the bonuses that were not earned. ALL of them. Then perhaps jail time for some if their actions truly resulted in deaths. This isn't a Democratic witch hunt, or at least is wouldn't be if Democrats weren't trying to cover something up. This should be as bi-partisan as we can get nowadays. The system is broke. It should be abolished, except for the prosthetics units which I am told to excellent work. Just give every vet insurance that they can go to their own doc. Oh wait, that would be privatizing something, and hurt all the VA employees who are unionized. Ah, there is where the politics comes in....

 

 

They were hiding wait times. How does firing administrators who were hiding wait times fix the actual problem, which is high wait times? If the problem is a lack of resources, shuffling management isn't actually going to fix it. A doctor can only see so many people a day, so if you don't have enough capacity, you need more doctors.

 

Turning the VA into the voucher system just means we can keep the same levels of under-resourcing as we currently do, but now it's not directly the responsibility of a single, democratically accountable government agency but is instead the responsibility of the larger healthcare system itself.

[EvilMonkey]

e.g. the Bonus Army

You have this bad habit of trying to make one bad thing OK by saying that the 'other side did it too'. THE VA SCREWED UP. Do you dispute that they are a really messed up place? Do you dispute that at least more than one someone lied about wait times? Do you dispute that people got bonuses based on this faulty data?

[StrangeSox]

You have this bad habit of trying to make one bad thing OK by saying that the 'other side did it too'. THE VA SCREWED UP. Do you dispute that they are a really messed up place? Do you dispute that at least more than one someone lied about wait times? Do you dispute that people got bonuses based on this faulty data?

 

You probably shouldn't take a reference to a thing that happened 80+ years ago as a comment on whatever modern political fighting is going on. It was just in reference to Balta's "we've always underpaid on our promises to veterans" comment.

 

edit: following the chain of the conversation, balta was responding to greg's "how can we allow this to happen?!" posts with "well, we always allow it to happen." Noting that historical fact isn't making a partisan point and it isn't trying to "make one bad thing OK." If you think that my comment or others in the past are trying to play that dumb tu quoque game, that's on you.

Edited June 24, 2014 by StrangeSox

[greg775]

Oh this is a really nice story ... not.

Pathetic treatment of our armed forces heroes.

 

from cnn

 

Veteran Finally Gets VA Doctor’s Appointment – 2 Years After He Died

 

Doug Chase, a Vietnam veteran who was diagnosed with a brain tumor in 2011. In 2012, his wife, Suzanne, tried to move his medical care to a nearby Veterans Affairs hospital. “It was so difficult for him to take the ambulance ride into Boston, we wanted to be closer.” They waited about four months and never heard anything -- Chase died later that year. But two weeks ago, he got a letter, from the VA in Bedford, saying he could now call to make an appointment to see a primary care doctor. “It was addressed to my husband and I opened it,” said Suzanne Chase. “I was in complete disbelief.

[EvilMonkey]

Oh this is a really nice story ... not.

Pathetic treatment of our armed forces heroes.

 

from cnn

 

Veteran Finally Gets VA Doctor’s Appointment – 2 Years After He Died

 

Doug Chase, a Vietnam veteran who was diagnosed with a brain tumor in 2011. In 2012, his wife, Suzanne, tried to move his medical care to a nearby Veterans Affairs hospital. “It was so difficult for him to take the ambulance ride into Boston, we wanted to be closer.” They waited about four months and never heard anything -- Chase died later that year. But two weeks ago, he got a letter, from the VA in Bedford, saying he could now call to make an appointment to see a primary care doctor. “It was addressed to my husband and I opened it,” said Suzanne Chase. “I was in complete disbelief.

You forgot to include where she was just floored because they had to have known he had died, as she tried applying for death benefits and was turned down.

[DrunkBomber]

Im actually in California right now because my dad, who is a Vietnam vet, had been going to the VA out here for months complaining of stomach pains amongst other things and was continually either rescheduled or just had basic tests run on him where they told him he was ok and was probably dehydrated and on Thursday the pain got so bad he called 911 and was taken to a different hospital where they relatively quickly found a golf ball sized tumor in his colon. The surgery to remove it seems to have gone well and were still awaiting the results of the biopsy but it was pretty infuriating to know that the VA essentially hung him out to dry and had he not called 911 he probably would have died waiting for the VA to diagnose and treat him. It gets to the point where they might be better served recommending people go to a regular doctor/hospital to get diagnosed and then returning to the VA or something for the treatment. I dont know if thats even feasible but they need to do something. I probably would never even have given this issue a second thought before this experience but its been a real eye opener.

[greg775]

Im actually in California right now because my dad, who is a Vietnam vet, had been going to the VA out here for months complaining of stomach pains amongst other things and was continually either rescheduled or just had basic tests run on him where they told him he was ok and was probably dehydrated and on Thursday the pain got so bad he called 911 and was taken to a different hospital where they relatively quickly found a golf ball sized tumor in his colon. The surgery to remove it seems to have gone well and were still awaiting the results of the biopsy but it was pretty infuriating to know that the VA essentially hung him out to dry and had he not called 911 he probably would have died waiting for the VA to diagnose and treat him. It gets to the point where they might be better served recommending people go to a regular doctor/hospital to get diagnosed and then returning to the VA or something for the treatment. I dont know if thats even feasible but they need to do something. I probably would never even have given this issue a second thought before this experience but its been a real eye opener.

 

Thanks for sharing this story. Best wishes.

 

[Y2HH]

They were hiding wait times. How does firing administrators who were hiding wait times fix the actual problem, which is high wait times? If the problem is a lack of resources, shuffling management isn't actually going to fix it. A doctor can only see so many people a day, so if you don't have enough capacity, you need more doctors.

 

Turning the VA into the voucher system just means we can keep the same levels of under-resourcing as we currently do, but now it's not directly the responsibility of a single, democratically accountable government agency but is instead the responsibility of the larger healthcare system itself.

 

For one, they should be fired for being unethical, not to mention without morals, as knowing that hiding those wait times was actually harming people that needed care, rather than bringing attention to it...so there's that.

Edited July 7, 2014 by Y2HH

[Chisoxfn]

They were hiding wait times. How does firing administrators who were hiding wait times fix the actual problem, which is high wait times? If the problem is a lack of resources, shuffling management isn't actually going to fix it. A doctor can only see so many people a day, so if you don't have enough capacity, you need more doctors.

 

Turning the VA into the voucher system just means we can keep the same levels of under-resourcing as we currently do, but now it's not directly the responsibility of a single, democratically accountable government agency but is instead the responsibility of the larger healthcare system itself.

Yeah, probably shouldn't have fired/jailed the responsible execs at enron for cooking the books? That wouldn't fix the actual problem, which was the fact that it was a sham business.

[StrangeSox]

You guys are misreading that as a defense of the administrators or an argument that they shouldn't be fired. My argument was that firing them won't fix the problem because it's not as simple as administrative corruption.

[EvilMonkey]

You guys are misreading that as a defense of the administrators or an argument that they shouldn't be fired. My argument was that firing them won't fix the problem because it's not as simple as administrative corruption.

But you have to know there is a problem before you can fix the problem. And if those in charge keep insisting that there isn't a problem, and keep hiding the problem, then how can it ever be fixed? Fire those that are covering it up, jail where appropriate, identify the problem, then you can figure out ways to fix it. The VA gets tons of cash, has a large staff and many facilities. Despite the influx of patients, there is no reason they should be so backlogged, unless they are too top=heavy to survive. Considering that may of those top=heavy positions are 6 figure spots and just as likely to be political patronage as not, yeah, they are pretty boned.