Why Not The President?

[Fosk]

Just for that extra boost to get it out of ratings I wrote to the White House, I tried a congressional inquire but its still taking forever even with a hardship. Hey I have nothing to lose and all to gain.

[broncovet]

Since there are 1,000,000 Veterans waiting on benefits, along with millions more of homeless Veterans many of whom have already given up on the VA, they have already gotten thousands of your letters before, and shredded them. One of those shredded was my application for an "Advance on the Docket" due to hardship and my impending home foreclosure. The VA didn't care and didnt even consider my application and my home was foreclosed upon in 2005. They deny that they ever got my application, and, since that way back when I still trusted the VA, I didnt keep copies, or send them certified mail return receipt requested.

The President selected Shinseki to head the VA and to reduce the backlog. When Shinseki increased the claims backlog by 16% instead of reducing it, the President has apparently decided to keep Shinseki, at least until election time, then he can hire a new Secretary who will also promise to reduce the backlog, and probably enough people will buy it to get him reelected.

Oh, yes, I wrote to my senator, and, since that caused further delay, next time I think I will try writing to the Easter Bunny or the Tooth Fairy. Sample Easter Bunny Letter:

Dear Easter Bunny

I have written to congress, the President and Santa, and since all of them were too busy to listen, I would like my VA benefits this Easter put in an egg, and I will find it no matter how well you hide it, because I have already waited so long I lost my home, and you can just hide the egg under the bridge where I now live.

Signed...Still Another Homeless Veteran waiting on Benefits.

[broncovet]

Timetowinarace:

I would be in favor of a "march" on Washington, and as I recall, Veterans have done so, and the National Guard was called to quiet them down. Someone else may be aware of the details or a link.

"Marches on Washington" have not been all that successful. For example, Pro Life Groups have marched hundreds of times, and, even tho public opinion favors Pro Life, but in more than 20 years, Roe Vs Wade has never been overturned, in spite of literally thousands of protests all over the country.

Ditto for same sex marriage. There have been thousands of "gay parades", but one more state voted down same sex marriage, just in the past few weeks.

I do think you are on to something, tho, and that is to "hit the VA where it hurts" which is right in the media. You see, the VA HATES bad publicity because they know they need the public and congress backing for them to get still more money next year.

However, the VA is an expert at keeping the media away. Did the national media say anything about shreddergate? No...merely VA watchdog, and they dont have enough readers to bother the VA that much. Dr. Phil went on TV about the horrible treatment Vets get, in one of his episodes, but the VA knows that show is seen mostly by housewives and not by congress so they let it slide, but did you notice that CBS or NBC or MSNBC did not pick it up?

The VA has their own media department and always releases flag waving propoganda about how the department of Veterans affairs is helping Vetrans. Once recent spin was the Secretary making "emergency money" available to student Veterans waiting on their Gi Bill payments. They made it sound like the VA, out of the goodness of their heart, is helping Veterans, when the reality is that there are hundreds of thousands, or even millions of Veterans waiting on education, or disability compensation while the VA is compensating its executives bonuses in the millions for a "job well done". Vets are homeless and VA execs get bonuses for it. VA watchdog even reported that VA employees got bonuses for delaying Veterans claims. Rememeber: It the VA can get away with screwing up once, they know they can repeat it on a national scale. And, the facts are that the VA gets away with screwing over millions of Veterans each year, delaying their claims, shredding their evidence, and making more Veterans homeless, all while promising to do the opposite.

[carlie]

Since there are 1,000,000 Veterans waiting on benefits, along with millions more of homeless Veterans many of whom have already given up on the VA,

Why do you refer to millions of homeless veterans.

Your stats are truly wayyyyyyy over inflated.

carlie

[timetowinarace]

Timetowinarace:

I would be in favor of a "march" on Washington, and as I recall, Veterans have done so, and the National Guard was called to quiet them down. Someone else may be aware of the details or a link.

"Marches on Washington" have not been all that successful. For example, Pro Life Groups have marched hundreds of times, and, even tho public opinion favors Pro Life, but in more than 20 years, Roe Vs Wade has never been overturned, in spite of literally thousands of protests all over the country.

Ditto for same sex marriage. There have been thousands of "gay parades", but one more state voted down same sex marriage, just in the past few weeks.

I do think you are on to something, tho, and that is to "hit the VA where it hurts" which is right in the media. You see, the VA HATES bad publicity because they know they need the public and congress backing for them to get still more money next year.

However, the VA is an expert at keeping the media away. Did the national media say anything about shreddergate? No...merely VA watchdog, and they dont have enough readers to bother the VA that much. Dr. Phil went on TV about the horrible treatment Vets get, in one of his episodes, but the VA knows that show is seen mostly by housewives and not by congress so they let it slide, but did you notice that CBS or NBC or MSNBC did not pick it up?

The VA has their own media department and always releases flag waving prop Once recent spin was the Secretary making "emergency money" available to student Veterans waiting on their Gi Bill payments. They made it sound like the VA, out of the goodness of their heart, is helping Veterans, when the reality is that there are hundreds of thousands, or even millions of Veterans waiting on education, or disability compensation while the VA is compensating its executives bonuses in the millions for a "job well done". Vets are homeless and VA execs get bonuses for it. VA watchdog even reported that VA employees got bonuses for delaying Veterans claims. Rememeber: It the VA can get away with screwing up once, they know they can repeat it on a national scale. And, the facts are that the VA gets away with screwing over millions of Veterans each year, delaying their claims, shredding their evidence, and making more Veterans homeless, all while promising to do the opposite.

edit: your way more excited than I am. maybe i'll send ya a pm.

Edited November 6, 2009 by timetowinarace

[blanco63]

can someone give me an update on this march? i sure hope that it isn't going to happen until winter is over because i am definitely not marching in the cold. also at where does this march end and how close does the bus get to this location? sorry, i shoudn't have written this because i don't know or remember why we are marching. thanks for listening.

[broncovet]

Carlie...

Probably no one knows how many homeless there are. HOw many depends on who you beleive. According to the VA one third of homeless people are Veterans.

Here is one estimate of the number of homeless:

http://www.washprofile.org/en/node/2295

If you take this number, and divide it by 3, then you get more than a million Veterans homeless. Add Veterans families, plus the numbers are way worse with the present economy and all the statistics are old and do not reflect the current economy, so I think "millions of homeless Vets and their families" is more accurate than "thousands".

Of course, the VA minimizes the problem, claiming there are only 131,000 homeless Vets. Given the VA's history of lying to us, their numbers are highly suspect.

Shinseki has recognized there are more homeless Vets than "merely" 131,000, he just did not say so directly.

Even the Urban Institute that recognizes that 3.5 million homeless people (divide that by three and you get 1.16 million homeless Vets) many understate the problem, and the actual numbers may be higher.

Still another issue is how you define homeless. Some people refer to homeless as anyone who has been without a home during the past year. Others define homeless as to how many show up at a shelter on a given night. Especially on warm nights, those who show up at homeless shelters is only a small fraction of the people who are actually homeless.

Edited November 6, 2009 by broncovet