I joined several of my colleagues in introducing the Veterans Employment Transition Act of 2011, which would provide tax incentives to employers to hire veterans.

The model of the way forward is not to replicate what we have been doing.

It seems like we always come together and talk about the cookie-cutter programs that we come up with.

Who should be held responsible for the pitiful placement of our country's veterans, which agency?

It is time to take real and comprehensive steps to put our veterans back to work.

all but three of those programs overlapped with at least one other program and five programs that specifically targeted veterans provided seven similar types of services.

But I hope that for the programs that do not measure outcomes, that you are as disgusted as I am that we would continue to fund those efforts.

Our problem today is putting veterans in a job. It is enabling them to get a paycheck and to feel the worth of the service that they committed to.

These are elementary to employment opportunities regardless of whether you are a servicemember or a graduate out of high school.

Now if they are career, they are getting a lot of education while they are in the military, but the education that the young ones are getting, they do not realize it.

I applaud you for the effort. I applaud the administration for focusing government attention on this.

So how can we all admit how well trained they are, and the only thing that separates them from where they are today and a job is a certificate saying that they have 15 years as an electrician? Something is crazy wrong with this.