Political Quotes

“I would also like to talk about some other positive things that this body has done here, as we approach the August break. This has to do with the VA. Since the wait list manipulation scandal was brought to the public's attention last year, Americans have become all too familiar with incompetence and misconduct at the Federal agency charged with helping our veterans. The House Veterans' Affairs Committee has held dozens of hearings; the head of the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs resigned under congressional pressure; and Congress has enacted major reform legislation. The Veterans' Access to Care through Choice, Accountability, and Transparency Act created a 3-year program to allow veterans to seek care from private providers if they live too far from a VA facility or cannot otherwise get an appointment within 14 days. It also gave the VA Secretary the authority to fire senior executives for poor performance and required a top-to-bottom study of the entire Department to be completed within 1 year of enactment. However, even with this oversight, the Obama administration has failed to correct the problems. We continue to hear about unacceptable patient wait times, unanswered benefit inquiries, patient safety concerns, medical malpractice, flagrant mismanagement, infighting, corruption, and years of construction delays that total millions of dollars.…”