Bush’s Record on VA Funding

[Plasmaball]

Marco Rubio said it best the other night when he said that, "Obama is more concerned with what he's going to say than what he's going to do about it."

because he is playing politics

 

[hjmick]

Marco Rubio said it best the other night when he said that, "Obama is more concerned with what he's going to say than what he's going to do about it."

because he is playing politics

Both of them. One wants to get nominated and elected, the other wants to minimize blowback on his party during an election cycle...

 

[Harry Dresden]

It is common knowledge among most vets that Bush was AWOL on veterans.

AWOLBush.com - Home Page

its common knowledge with lots of Vets that EVERY fucking Administration has been AWOL on Veterans....

 

[Katzndogz]

The problems with the VA isn't a lack of funding. It's government inefficiency. Salaried cardiologists were seeing two patients a day while those in private practice were seeing eight.

Government employees are notoriously lazy and wasteful. Much more than in private industry. This doesn't change whether it's the post office or a government hospital.

you would be welcome to come down to the PO and ATTEMPT to get a route cased up and pulled down and then load the way too small truck and then deliver it in 8 hours...we will see who is lazy.....you would not last a week.....and you would be sore for a month....we have seen people like you before.....they come in saying...."how hard can this job be?"......3 days later they are gone....the ones who stick around have a whole new perspective on what its like to carry a mail route....especially when it fucking pouring rain and cold....im sure the ones who have to put up with Snow have it even rougher.....

they drive a little mail truck and push the carrier box around in a hand cart. All the while chatting or texting on their cell phones. Those are the ones who work. Many times they take the mail home and throw it away.

 

[Plasmaball]

Marco Rubio said it best the other night when he said that, "Obama is more concerned with what he's going to say than what he's going to do about it."

because he is playing politics

Both of them. One wants to get nominated and elected, the other wants to minimize blowback on his party during an election cycle...

true, but the bill the GOP put up was a trap bill.

 

[edthecynic]

My guess would be the last budget that was passed, TDM

Better question is when was the last time the GOP voted DOWN money for Vets?
Answer: this February while faking concern about Vets' waiting times!!! That's right, the GOP cut funding because more Vets getting health care would increase waiting time!!!

Senate rejects far-reaching Veterans Affairs bill - The Washington Post

“I don’t know how anyone who voted ‘no’ today can look a veteran in the eye and justify that vote,” said Daniel M. Dellinger, national commander of the American Legion. “Our veterans deserve more than what they got today.”

Aside from the costs, Republicans also were concerned that the bill would add more veterans to a system already struggling with extensive wait times at VA health clinics and a long-standing backlog of disability claims. The legislation would have extended the period of time veterans are eligible to enroll in the VA health-care system from five years to 10 years after deployment.

This dumb bill was brought up before.

If Bernie Sanders sponsored it, the damned thing was never meant to be passed.

The main sticking point was Sanders wanted to pay for it with fake money. Money that wasn't going to be spent on wars. Money we don't have allotted anymore. It also would have paid for reproductive procedures, abortions, not treating the wounded and injured. In other words, it was a stunt, never intended to be passed.

Bullshit!

http://www.gpo.gov/fdsys/pkg/BILLS-113s1982rts/pdf/BILLS-113s1982rts.pdf

 

[Meister]

The problems with the VA isn't a lack of funding. It's government inefficiency. Salaried cardiologists were seeing two patients a day while those in private practice were seeing eight.

Government employees are notoriously lazy and wasteful. Much more than in private industry. This doesn't change whether it's the post office or a government hospital.

you would be welcome to come down to the PO and ATTEMPT to get a route cased up and pulled down and then load the way too small truck and then deliver it in 8 hours...we will see who is lazy.....you would not last a week.....and you would be sore for a month....we have seen people like you before.....they come in saying...."how hard can this job be?"......3 days later they are gone....the ones who stick around have a whole new perspective on what its like to carry a mail route....especially when it fucking pouring rain and cold....im sure the ones who have to put up with Snow have it even rougher.....

they drive a little mail truck and push the carrier box around in a hand cart. All the while chatting or texting on their cell phones. Those are the ones who work. Many times they take the mail home and throw it away.

Working for the post office for 30 years.....you really don't have a clue and shouldn't embarrass yourself with your ignorance. Harry is right, you wouldn't last 3 days. I've seen so many that come in and 3 days later saying we're crazy for working for the PO.

 

[Meister]

Marco Rubio said it best the other night when he said that, "Obama is more concerned with what he's going to say than what he's going to do about it."

because he is playing politics

Playing politics AND telling the truth. One does't cancel the other.

I'm going to get to the bottom of this".

 

[mudwhistle]

Better question is when was the last time the GOP voted DOWN money for Vets?
Answer: this February while faking concern about Vets' waiting times!!! That's right, the GOP cut funding because more Vets getting health care would increase waiting time!!!

Senate rejects far-reaching Veterans Affairs bill - The Washington Post

“I don’t know how anyone who voted ‘no’ today can look a veteran in the eye and justify that vote,” said Daniel M. Dellinger, national commander of the American Legion. “Our veterans deserve more than what they got today.”

Aside from the costs, Republicans also were concerned that the bill would add more veterans to a system already struggling with extensive wait times at VA health clinics and a long-standing backlog of disability claims. The legislation would have extended the period of time veterans are eligible to enroll in the VA health-care system from five years to 10 years after deployment.

This dumb bill was brought up before.

If Bernie Sanders sponsored it, the damned thing was never meant to be passed.

The main sticking point was Sanders wanted to pay for it with fake money. Money that wasn't going to be spent on wars. Money we don't have allotted anymore. It also would have paid for reproductive procedures, abortions, not treating the wounded and injured. In other words, it was a stunt, never intended to be passed.

Bullshit!

http://www.gpo.gov/fdsys/pkg/BILLS-113s1982rts/pdf/BILLS-113s1982rts.pdf

No bullshit.

Bernie Sanders is a communist. He could care less about our military.

The whole thing was set up to make the Repugs look like they don't care about the troops.

If you read the article, just throwing money at the problems solves nothing. But that's what Sanders wants to do. Problem being, we don't have the money anyway.

 

[Lakhota]

Wingnut warmongers are sadly hypocritical.

The reason why the VA story won’t become a national scandal is that Republicans are also guilty of sweeping the issues under the rug, and letting them get worse. The real story features Republicans that are guilty of ignoring the VA, and this is something that Republicans in Congress would rather not talk about.

President Obama has done a lot of good things for our veterans. He has undertaken job creation initiatives for vets. The president has secured increased funding for the VA, and his administration has done remarkable work along with people like Senate Veterans Affairs Committee Chairman Bernie Sanders in cutting the VA backlog, but these kinds of scandals will continue to happen because very [few] people in Washington pay attention to the VA until it breaks.

This scandal isn’t President Obama’s fault. He is the guy who got stuck with this mess, because he is in office right now. If Republicans really cared about our veterans, they would stop trying to blame Obama, and start working with Democrats on legislation that would comprehensively reform the VA.

Veterans are waiting too long for care, but this has been an issues for years. The Republican attempts to blame Obama and call for the privatization of the VA are not answers.

The Republican compulsion to blame Obama for their own problems solves nothing, and will only allow a bad situation to continue to get worse for our nation’s veterans.

Republicans, as usual, have nothing, and President Obama is being left to clean up the decades worth of mess that they helped to cause.

Much More: Republicans Attack Obama For The VA Scandal That They Helped Cause

 

[edthecynic]

This dumb bill was brought up before.

If Bernie Sanders sponsored it, the damned thing was never meant to be passed.

The main sticking point was Sanders wanted to pay for it with fake money. Money that wasn't going to be spent on wars. Money we don't have allotted anymore. It also would have paid for reproductive procedures, abortions, not treating the wounded and injured. In other words, it was a stunt, never intended to be passed.

Bullshit!

http://www.gpo.gov/fdsys/pkg/BILLS-113s1982rts/pdf/BILLS-113s1982rts.pdf

No bullshit.

Bernie Sanders is a communist. He could care less about our military.

The whole thing was set up to make the Repugs look like they don't care about the troops.

If you read the article, just throwing money at the problems solves nothing. But that's what Sanders wants to do. Problem being, we don't have the money anyway.

Translation: There is nothing in the bill that has anything to do with abortion!

 

[Plasmaball]

Marco Rubio said it best the other night when he said that, "Obama is more concerned with what he's going to say than what he's going to do about it."

because he is playing politics

Playing politics AND telling the truth. One does't cancel the other.

I'm going to get to the bottom of this".

well no....it was a trap bill and nothing more. You bought it.

Same could be said for the GOP in feb. 2014 when they voted down a bill to fund the VA.

 

[Harry Dresden]

The problems with the VA isn't a lack of funding. It's government inefficiency. Salaried cardiologists were seeing two patients a day while those in private practice were seeing eight.

Government employees are notoriously lazy and wasteful. Much more than in private industry. This doesn't change whether it's the post office or a government hospital.

you would be welcome to come down to the PO and ATTEMPT to get a route cased up and pulled down and then load the way too small truck and then deliver it in 8 hours...we will see who is lazy.....you would not last a week.....and you would be sore for a month....we have seen people like you before.....they come in saying...."how hard can this job be?"......3 days later they are gone....the ones who stick around have a whole new perspective on what its like to carry a mail route....especially when it fucking pouring rain and cold....im sure the ones who have to put up with Snow have it even rougher.....

they drive a little mail truck and push the carrier box around in a hand cart. All the while chatting or texting on their cell phones. Those are the ones who work. Many times they take the mail home and throw it away.

come on down Katz.....dont let your big mouth hold you back....just let me know which office you are going to do it in....i wanna be there to watch it when they have to send 4 carriers out at 6 PM to bail your useless ass out and then watch you say you wont be coming back tomorrow....

 

[Harry Dresden]

you would be welcome to come down to the PO and ATTEMPT to get a route cased up and pulled down and then load the way too small truck and then deliver it in 8 hours...we will see who is lazy.....you would not last a week.....and you would be sore for a month....we have seen people like you before.....they come in saying...."how hard can this job be?"......3 days later they are gone....the ones who stick around have a whole new perspective on what its like to carry a mail route....especially when it fucking pouring rain and cold....im sure the ones who have to put up with Snow have it even rougher.....

they drive a little mail truck and push the carrier box around in a hand cart. All the while chatting or texting on their cell phones. Those are the ones who work. Many times they take the mail home and throw it away.

Working for the post office for 30 years.....you really don't have a clue and shouldn't embarrass yourself with your ignorance. Harry is right, you wouldn't last 3 days. I've seen so many that come in and 3 days later saying we're crazy for working for the PO.

she is just as clueless in the pot threads she sticks her nose in....

 

[mudwhistle]

Wingnut warmongers are sadly hypocritical.

Republicans Attack Obama For The VA Scandal That They Helped Cause

Bush did it....yeah, you've used that excuse too many times.

Try another one.


The president knew the VA was swamped with inefficiencies and red-tap before he became president. He never lifted a finger to do anything in almost 6 years. Now the problem is 60 times worse than it was when he swore in as POTUS.

Seems the only thing Obama is any good at is hosting sports teams at the White House, and lying.

 

[PixieStix]

How many VA hospitals were there that had been hiding data with cooked books under Bush?

Isn't this the real discussion? Or, is it just another "Booooooosh did it too" thread

I am glad you said that Meister, I was beginning to wonder if the real issue got lost in the blame game

 

[jasonnfree]

the treatment of veterans returning from deployments in Iraq and Afghanistan has been a national disgrace, highlighted most dramatically by the neglect and substandard care given wounded troops at Walter Reed and other military hospitals.

The budget increases that have occurred mostly were enacted over Bush’s opposition or related to the fact that injuries from the Iraq War far exceeded the administration’s rosy projections in early 2003. The Bush team especially underestimated how many cases of post-traumatic stress disorder to anticipate as well as the number of brain injuries, which have been endemic to the Iraq War where insurgents made effective use of “improvised explosive devices,” or IEDs.

Before Bush ordered the invasion of Iraq in March 2003, documents released by the Department of Veterans Affairs said it expected a maximum of 8,000 cases of post-traumatic stress disorder.

However, according to a study released last year by the RAND Institute, there are more than 320,000 veterans of the Iraq and Afghan wars suffering from major depression, PTSD and/or traumatic brain injury. The report found that the VA has been and continues to be ill-equipped to deal with these cases when soldiers return from combat, especially after multiple tours.

An Army task force last year also found major flaws in the way the VA treated and cared for veterans suffering from traumatic brain injuries.

Bush’s Record on VA Funding

For his part, Bush stacked the VA with political cronies, such as former Republican National Committee chairman Jim Nicholson, who as VA Secretary defended a budget measure that sought major cuts in staffing for healthcare and at the Board of Veterans Appeals; slashed funding for nursing home care; and blocked four legislative measures aimed at streamlining the backlog of veterans benefits claims.

Of the 84,000 Iraq and Afghanistan war veterans diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder by VA, only half, about 42,000, had their disability claim approved by VA. Instead of expediting PTSD claims, Bush's political appointees at VA actively fought against mental health claims.

Bush's appointees also obstructed scientific research into the causes of Gulf War illnesses dating back 18 years to Operation Desert Storm and opposed medical research on treatment for 210,000 of those veterans.

As for funding, Bush proposed a 0.5 percent budget increase for the VA for fiscal year 2006, which amounted to a “cruel mockery” of Bush’s promises to do everything to support veterans and soldiers, Rep. Lane Evans, D-Illinois, said at the time.

Evans called Bush’s proposed budget increase for the VA “grossly inadequate,” saying it would force the VA to “ration” healthcare to veterans.
VA officials had testified in 2005 that the agency needed at least a 13 percent increase to meet the needs of hundreds of thousands of war veterans wounded in Iraq and Afghanistan and others who needed long-term mental health care.

In early 2007, the Washington Post put a spotlight on the human consequences resulting from the combination of Bush’s wars and the budget squeeze.

The Post published a series of articles documenting the substandard conditions at the Walter Reed Army Medical Center, which is located only 4.7 miles from the White House. Wounded vets were housed in rooms with moldy walls, leaky plumage and an infestation of vermin, underscoring how out of touch Bush had become regarding the nation’s veterans.

In response to complaints that some veterans under VA care were being neglected, Nicholson said in March 2007 that such cases were “anecdotal exceptions.”

“When you are treating so many people there is always going to be a linen towel left somewhere,” he said.

In May 2007, the AP revealed that while Nicholson was pinching pennies on treatment costs and coping with a $1.3 billion budget shortfall, he awarded “$3.8 million in bonuses to top executives in fiscal 2006″ — many as much as $33,000.

Simultaneously, Bush was resisting congressional efforts to beef up the VA’s budget. In May 2007, Bush threatened to veto legislation that sought a 10 percent—$3.2 billion—increase, calling it too expensive. Bush proposed a 2 percent increase, far below what lawmakers and VA officials said was needed to treat a dramatic increase in traumatic brain injury and PTSD cases.

After Congress passed the legislation with the higher VA spending, Bush backed down on his veto threat but that was largely due to the fact that every Republican in the Senate with the exception of Jim DeMint of South Carolina, supported the measure.

Amid the growing scandals about substandard VA treatment and inept management, Nicholson resigned in July 2007.

Suicide Epidemic

Even after Nicholson’s resignation, the Department of Veterans Affairs continued to be buffeted by scandals, including a cover-up in an epidemic of veterans’ suicides and attempted suicides.

Last year, internal VA e-mails surfaced that showed how top agency officials tried to conceal the information from the public about the sudden increase in suicides and attempted suicides among veterans that were treated or sought help at VA hospitals around the country.

And last November, internal watchdogs discovered 500 benefits claims in shredding bins at the 41 of the 57 regional VA offices around the country.

Paul Sullivan, the executive director of Veterans for Common Sense, a veterans’ advocacy group that sued the VA in federal court, said attempts by the White House to portray Bush as an advocate for veterans is beyond shameful.

“Bush is the worst failure for our veterans since Hoover,” Sullivan said, expressing shock that the President “would shamefully continue his legacy of lies to the American people as he and his political cronies are forced to leave office on Jan. 20.”

Sullivan disputed some of Bush’s claims as misleading, such as the assertion that he doubled funding for the VA. “However, President Bush failed to disclose that the number of veterans seeking VA healthcare doubled, from 2.7 million to 5.5 million, and that rising healthcare inflation actually resulted in a net decrease in spending per veteran by VA during the past eight years,” he said.

“If not for the intervention of Congress to substantially increase VA funding beyond Bush's inadequate budget requests, especially in the past two years, the situation would have deteriorated from a serious crisis to a catastrophe at VA.”

Read much more:
Consortiumnews.com

Now here this! Now here this! Stay Tuned for a Breaking News Bulletin!!!


George W. Bush is no longer president!!!


That's right folks, you heard it here first...there have been not one, but TWO presidential elections since George Bush was last president of the United States.

It's true folks...Barrack H. Obama has been...I repeat HAS BEEN the President of the United States for the previous FIVE YEARS!!!

That's right folks, as shocking as it seems, George Bush has NOT been president for half a decade!!!

This ends our Special Bulletin, we now return you to your regularly scheduled thread...please stay tuned for more breaking news at the top of the hour.

Check out this bulletin. We'll be paying for bush screwing things up for decades. Everything didn't get set back to zero when he left office.

 

[Lakhota]

Who Really Broke Veterans Affairs? It stains the legacies of presidents as far back as John F. Kennedy

Who Really Broke Veterans Affairs? - NationalJournal.com

Just being narrow-minded and partisan won't fix the problem. The problem requires a bi-partisan solution. Bumper stickers won't solve it.

 

[jasonnfree]

The problems with the VA isn't a lack of funding. It's government inefficiency. Salaried cardiologists were seeing two patients a day while those in private practice were seeing eight.

Government employees are notoriously lazy and wasteful. Much more than in private industry. This doesn't change whether it's the post office or a government hospital.

you would be welcome to come down to the PO and ATTEMPT to get a route cased up and pulled down and then load the way too small truck and then deliver it in 8 hours...we will see who is lazy.....you would not last a week.....and you would be sore for a month....we have seen people like you before.....they come in saying...."how hard can this job be?"......3 days later they are gone....the ones who stick around have a whole new perspective on what its like to carry a mail route....especially when it fucking pouring rain and cold....im sure the ones who have to put up with Snow have it even rougher.....

they drive a little mail truck and push the carrier box around in a hand cart. All the while chatting or texting on their cell phones. Those are the ones who work. Many times they take the mail home and throw it away.

You see them do it? You still bashing girls in the head for saying hello to you?

 

[PixieStix]

Check out this bulletin. We'll be paying for bush screwing things up for decades. Everything didn't get set back to zero when he left office.

You just won the "IT'S BUSH' FAULT" award

congrats