Tag Archives: politics

The VA Strikes Again, Again

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The Department of Veterans Affairs has mistakenly declared [more than 4,000] veterans to be deceased and canceled their benefits over the past five years, a new snafu to emerge at the embattled department.

Of course, one thing that’s carefully elided is the “evidence” the VA uses to tell a veteran he’s dead.

The department doesn’t keep records of the causes behind such errors.

Can’t have things like this be known to be commonplace:

A clerical error led to the first instance of [Navy veteran Michael] Rieker’s canceled benefits after a VA employee identified him as Michael G. Rieker—though his middle initial is “C”—and declared him dead in the system, according to a department letter sent in December.

Under the system that led to Mr Rieker’s benefits cancellation, the VA’s system automatically cross-checked the name and Social Security number with the Social Security Administration’s so-called Death Master File….

That’s an utterly dishonest response to a simple typo.  For how long had “Michael G Rieker” been dead, and why was a flag not raised over the continued payments to this dead veteran, especially in light of the VA’s having been caught out routinely paying benefits to dead veterans?  Did a “Michael G Rieker” even exist in this Death file?

Not even incompetence sinks to this level of laziness, not in an agency with this one’s long, venerable track record of failure.

Veteranos Administratio delende est.

Wait Times, Schmait Times

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A disabled veteran needing to see a VA doctor—or a non-disabled vet who’s “merely” sick, come to that—should blow off his wait times—too often weeks or months—just as he does his half-hour or hour wait times at Disney parks.  That is, if the disabled vet can partake of a Disney park at all.  Or so said Veterans Affairs Secretary Robert McDonald:

When you got to Disney, do they measure the number of hours you wait in line?  Or what’s important?  What’s important is, what’s your satisfaction with the experience?  And what I would like to move to, eventually, is that kind of measure.

Indeed, as McDonald would have it, this unimportant wait time shouldn’t even be measured from when the veteran expresses his need by calling for an appointment.  No, not at all.  The proper measure is a “preferred date,” a measure of the VA’s convenience, rather than the veteran’s need.

Never mind, either, that not only is wait time a part of McDonald’s satisfaction with the experience.  For veterans needing to see their doctors, wait time too often is a Critical Item.

This is beyond disgusting or despicable.  The VA’s corporate culture of indifference isn’t going to change.  McDonald should be terminated, promptly and for cause.  And then the VA disbanded.

Veteranos Administratio delende est.

Hillary Clinton Said, “No”

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Hillary Clinton is ducking her final debate with Senator Bernard Sanders, brushing off a commitment she made earlier this year to participate in a forum in California ahead of the state’s June 7 primary….

This raises two questions in my pea brain.  One is, of what is she so afraid?  She’s shown herself an effective debater, and this would have been a golden opportunity to put her opponent away and enhance the strength of her supporters at the Democratic Convention regarding such things as the Party Platform, which Sanders wants to drag even farther to the left.

The other question is a larger one: if Clinton won’t keep this commitment, how can we trust her to keep any commitment were she to be elected?  What is the value of her word, exactly?

Maybe It’s Time

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…to start locking banks out of SWIFT (no, I don’t mean as a matter of National Policy).

A little-noticed lawsuit details a hacking attack similar to one that stole $81 million from Bangladesh’s central bank, saying cybercriminals stole about $9 million last year from a bank in Ecuador.  The case suggests global bankers haven’t been sharing critical information to prevent such heists.

And

A third attack, from December 2015 at a commercial bank in Vietnam, was detailed last week….

The banks aren’t telling SWIFT about these attacks, either.

A spokeswoman for Swift said Thursday that the network was never told of the earlier hack.  “We need to be informed by customers of such frauds if they relate to our products and services, so that we can inform and support the wider community,” said spokeswoman Natasha de Teran.

Bad security and victim banks didn’t tell SWIFT, despite SWIFT warnings:

We specifically remind all users to respect their obligations to immediately inform Swift of any suspected fraudulent use of their institution’s Swift connectivity or related to Swift products and services….  The security of our global financial community can only be ensured through a collaborative approach.  To this end, it is essential that you share critical security information related to Swift with us.

The Obama/Lynch Justice Department

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A federal judge in Texas has ordered hundreds of US Department of Justice lawyers to undergo ethics training, accusing the agency of a “calculated plan of unethical conduct.”

The extraordinary order by US District Judge Andrew S Hanen says Justice Department lawyers intentionally misled him in the course of a lawsuit filed by Texas and 25 other mostly conservative states challenging the Obama administration’s immigration policy.

Hanen wrote in his order

What remains before this Court is the question of whether the Government’s lawyers must play by the rules.
…
The United States Department of Justice (“DOJ” or “Justice Department”) has now admitted making statements that clearly did not match the facts.  It has admitted that the lawyers who made these statements had knowledge of the truth when they made these misstatements.

And this:

The decision of the lawyers who apparently determined that these three-year renewals…were not covered by the Plaintiff States’ pleadings was clearly unreasonable.  The conduct of the lawyers who then covered up this decision was even worse.

Such conduct is certainly not worthy of any department whose name includes the word “Justice.”

In fact, it is hard to imagine a more serious, more calculated plan of unethical conduct.  There were over 100,000 instances of conduct contrary to counsel’s representations.

Nor has this been simply a “first offense.”

This Court in at least one prior order has detailed the multiple times attorneys for the Government misrepresented the actions being taken (or, according to their representations, not being taken) by their clients.

Hanen’s reference to 100,000 was to 100,000 deferrals under the Obama edict that had already been granted, contrary to the DoJ lawyers’ representations at trial.

Unfortunately, Hanen has no authority to disbar these despicable liars.  It’s interesting to note, however, that while Hansen assures us that he’s satisfied these misbehaviors did not occur after Attorney General Loretta Lynch ascended to her AG-ship, Lynch herself has chosen to remain silent on the matter—and by clear implication, to do absolutely nothing concerning these…lawyers…who now work for her.  In particular, these persons are still on the Government’s payroll.

Is there any way at all this DoJ can be trusted with any case before it or potentially before it?

Elections have consequences.