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Speak Loudly and Carry a Twig
According to the Inspector General for the Department of Veterans Affairs, there are now 26 facilities around the country under investigation for delaying treatment and falsifying records related to veterans’ health care. Before you succumb to outrage, however, take this comfort: the President of the United States is responding to this scandal with his greatest weapon: a speech. From Fox News:
“We’ve got to do better,” Obama conceded, while indicating he wants to wait for the conclusion of internal probes before addressing whether any more top officials should resign.
“When I hear allegations of misconduct … I will not stand for it,” Obama said. “None of us should.”
He added: “If these allegations prove to be true, it is dishonorable, it is disgraceful and I will not tolerate it — period.”
Fair enough. The president has given us his word. What could go wrong?
Reacting to the IRS scandal (May 2013):
“This is pretty straightforward,” said Obama. “If, in fact, IRS personnel engaged in the kind of practices that have been reported on and were intentionally targeting conservative groups, then that is outrageous, and there is no place for it, and they have to be held fully accountable, because the IRS as an independent agency requires absolute integrity and people have to have confidence that they are applying the laws in a non-partisan way.
From a December interview with Chris Matthews, addressing shortcomings with the ObamaCare implementation:
“I’m holding every cabinet member accountable. And I want to have strong interactions with them directly.” Furthermore, he said, “I have an open door policy, where I want people to be bringin’ me bad news, on time, so that we can fix things.”
From the 2012 town hall presidential debate, on Benghazi:
President Barack Obama took ultimate responsibility on Tuesday for issues around last month’s terrorist attack on the U.S. consulate in Benghazi, Libya.
“I am ultimately responsible for what’s taking place there because these are my folks, and I’m the one who has to greet those coffins when they come home,” Obama said during a debate with Republican presidential challenger Mitt Romney in New York.
…
In addition to ordering an increase in security at all U.S. diplomatic missions in Libya and across the region, Obama said he ordered an investigation to find out exactly what happened “regardless of where the facts lead us to make sure folks are held accountable and it doesn’t happen again.”
The president said he also told his team the United States was “going to find out who did this and hunt them down.”
The President of the United States: that husband who’s figured out that, in the short term, it’s just as effective to say you’re going to take the trash out as it is to actually do it.
I’m not holding my breath for root-and-branch reform of the VA. I’m sure they’ll come up with a hell of a hashtag though.
Published in General
I have walked the halls of the Phoenix VA many, many times. Serves as a powerful argument against government-run healthcare.
Or you could re-read One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest (set in a VA hospital.)
Obama’s a joke, at this point. The question is: what do we do about the people who still believe in him at this late date?
Believing that the president’s outrage is meaningful is the same narcissism that lies behind holding up hashtag posterboards to bring our girls back.
Both are based on the narcissist premise that my “caring” is, in itself, noteworthy. The narcissist thinks it’s important for you to know that he (or she) cares. Why? Who cares that you care?
Unless you act upon the emotions you presume to display, no one cares. All you’ve done is made me wait while you pat yourself on the back for caring.
So, a new rule: “Care” me once (without action), shame on you. “Care” me twice, shame on me.
Troy, you could poke an eye out with a twig! So your last sentence captures it:
“Speak Loudly And Carry A Couple Of Well-Crafted Hashtags”
OK. Next time one of his kids gets sick and needs a doctor, tell Barry that they will have to wait 5 or 6 months to see a doctor.
Like Jon indicated above, this IS Obamacare.
The VA problems are a result of misapplied incentives. An incentive was given to reduce the time between an appointment being set and the patient actually seeing the MD. We can see what can go wrong with that.
I don’t mind the idea of a performance incentive. I think it ought to actually improve performance and be audited using truthful metrics.
How long until Harry Reid or Nancy Pelosi says this the fault of that darn Republican sequester?
You have this wrong, but I can understand due to your youth.
The correct statement actually hails from its origins in the Jimmy Carter era after he had canceled every major DoD system at the point of production decision, in favor of continuing R&D on the next one in line which would solve all problems perfectly (until it too was up for production decision, of course):
“Throw away the stick and strut around like a banty rooster crowing at the top of your lungs.”
I think Obama has grown in office. He didn’t blame Bush. That’s progress.
Now that the speech is given, all that follows is old news. Any reporter who brings up trouble in the VA is exploiting a phony scandal for political reasons.
You see, now He (APUH) has attended to the issue and a grateful nation is glad to have it finally behind us.
It’s easy to blame Obama (because he deserves it), but what share of the responsibility also belongs to the press who covers him and the voters who elect him? Obama does what he can get away with, and the voters and MSM let him get away with it.
Nothing we can do as far as I can see. Everyone’s mind is made up about whether they support him. The only thing I see we can do is keep telling the story of his incompetence. I think that’s his real weakness at this point. And boy is he incompetent – yeah, at the point of being a joke.
Years ago, there was a book called “Co-Dependant No More” For those familiar with it, it seems that Obama and his supporters are in that kind of relationship. The take out the trash analogy is incomplete. The wife may get mad, but she’ll get over it, and a few days later will provide excuses, like he works so hard, he was too tired. Because the press has an interest in controlling the way government works, they have enabled Obama to survive.
Obama tells people what they want to hear, and does what he wants to do.
I don’t think so. Obama and the Obamaramadingdongs posture and prevaricate because of who and what they are. They are incapable of seeing themselves as being wrong or responsible for any actual past or future actions. “Objective reality” is just a meaningless distinction–an unnecessary phrase, even–because they are cognizant of only what they think of themselves, or what they think other people should think of them. They would behave the same even if our institutions for holding public officials and figures to account were on the job, but the results would be more exciting and amusing.
BHO, Michelle, the whole bunch are really simple and unsophisticated. They grew up in the bien pensant Liberal Fascist bubble. They have had to deal with adverse reality so seldom that they rationalize each instance as an example of personal hostility or systemic racism/sexism/elitism/et cetera-ism.
Barry’s a poser. Always has been, always will be. Everyone knows one, they’ve met one, and they know they can’t rely on them to do anything substantive, ever.
Why? Because they’ve never had to, and they now confuse talking about doing things with those things actually being done. Note that at no time, ever, does the Poser have to actually do any of the real work himself, because, as everyone except the Poser knows – he’s posing.
Oh, they took care of that one. They put that filmmaker no one had ever heard of before or since in jail.
Well, he did work in the line about “this has been going on for decades.” It’s the old, “But, Mom, everybody’s doing it!” therefore there’s nothing uniquely bad about me. Even the left would see him as a shameful adolescent knucklehead of a president, if he wasn’t one of them.