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Truth-out
Republican Texas Senator Jon Cornyn has led the charge in trying to get Shinseki to resign, saying that he thinks it's time "for new leadership at the VA."
Senate Minority leader Mitch McConnell, meanwhile, while not explicitly calling for Shinseki to quit, has said that "a change in leadership [at the VA] might be a good step in the right direction."
Public outrage about what allegedly went on at the Phoenix VA hospital is understandable and justified, but what we're seeing from Republicans like Cornyn and McConnell is just cynical manipulation of public opinion.
Republicans don't really care about veterans or the VA, they just care about using this controversy to discredit the President and his Democratic Party - there is an election coming up, after all - and as a twofer, discredit the idea of government-run healthcare programs like the VA. John McCain has even called for the VA to be privatized.
The hypocrisy here is astounding.
Remember, it was just a little under three months ago that Senate Republicans under the leadership of Mitch McConnell filibustered a bill that would have boosted VA funding by $21 billion, expanded benefits, and repealed a provision of the Murray-Ryan budget deal that slashed military pensions.
And it wasn't like this anti-veteran Republican filibuster was some radical break from the past either. Time and time again during the Obama presidency Republicans have either blocked or opposed bills that would have helped out the veterans they're now claiming to care so much about.
Back in 2012, for example, GOP senators blocked a $1 billion jobs bill would havehelped millions of unemployed veterans find work.
And in that same year, Republican opposition also blocked a bill - the so-called Veterans' Compensation Cost of Living Adjustment Act - that would have kept veterans' benefits on par with rising expenses.
The list goes on. Before that, GOP lawmakers killed the Wounded Veteran Job Security Act, the Veterans Retraining Act of 2009, the Homeless Veterans Reintegration Program Reauthorization Act of 2009, the Disabled Veterans Home Improvement and Structural Alteration Grant Increase Act of 2009, the Veterans Business Center Act of 2009, and the Job Creation Through Entrepreneurship Act of 2009.
Every single one of these these bills would have helped veterans and every single one was killed exclusively by Republican opposition.
http://www.truth-out.org/news/item/2...ell-va-scandal
Truth-out
boutons and his beloved echo chamber.
lol truthout.
This forum is ed and un able, gfy racist red state bubba LOL tb magic negro
Standard Repug strategy: we things up by starting and botching two bogus wars, defund the huge increase in veterans' care, and blame it all on the Dems.
all y'all GFY
btw, Iraq, Repugs' War for BigOil profits and 5000 US military deaths, is thinking about legalizing marriage of 9 year old girls.
Heckuva job, dubya
Last edited by boutons_deux; 05-15-2014 at 10:24 AM.
285,000 Veterans Are Going Without Unemployment Compensation
By the end of June, an estimated 285,000 veterans will be going without long-term unemployment benefits because Congress allowed the program to expire, according to an analysis by the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities (CBPP).
CBPP estimated that about one in 10 recipients of the Emergency Unemployment Compensation program, which gave benefits to workers who had been out of work 26 weeks or longer and had been cut off from state programs, were veterans. When the program was first allowed to lapse in December, about 130,000 who had served their country were cut off from that lifeline. In all, more than 3 million unemployed people who would have been getting the benefits are going without that source of income.
Senators reached a deal to extend those benefits and pay them retroactively to everyone who had been kicked out of the program earlier this year, but Republicans blocked its passage over objections to procedural rules.
http://thinkprogress.org/economy/201...rans-benefits/
Yawn.
WC and other right wing assholes here fit the mold, yawn:
Overwhelming Majority Of Conservatives Believe Poor ‘Have It Easy’
http://www.nationalmemo.com/poll-ove...eve-poor-easy/
That graph makes it clear the poor don't think they can achieve, therefore they don't.WC and other right wing assholes here fit the mold, yawn:
Overwhelming Majority Of Conservatives Believe Poor ‘Have It Easy’
http://www.nationalmemo.com/poll-ove...eve-poor-easy/
Which of the respondents are poor?
- DP -
LOL... Well, unless they didn't poll any, how else would they vote? Have a hard time connecting dots? People who believe they can achieve more often do than people who don't believe.
Have you taken the test?
http://www.people-press.org/quiz/political-typology/
Did you read the report?
http://www.people-press.org/files/20...y-release.pdf?
Instead of going to the source material, I suppose you prefer to be told what to think by Henry Decker and the National Memo.
LOL...
I was going through the data, and considering there were 41% more democrats polled than republicans, this is interesting... The general public numbers:
You forgot your classic "waste of oxygen".
So if they had polled an equal number of Repug assholes, the PERCENTAGES would have changed to show that Repug assholes are really touchy-feely, empathetic, understanding, bleeding heart supporters of helping poor people?LOL...
I was going through the data, and considering there were 41% more democrats polled than republicans, this is interesting... The general public numbers:
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