Failure Masquerading as Success

Book excerpt: President Lincoln in 1865 said: To care for him who shall have borne the battle and for his widow and his orphan. This quote was later adapted as the VAs motto. General Omar N Bradleys VA Mission Statement We are dealing with veterans, not procedures- with their problems, not ours has been quoted repeatedly during the seventy five years since. In 1982 President Reagan approved $55.6 million in financial aid toMeharryMedicalCollege. An acute care facility was established atMurfreesboroVAfor training Meharry students. Bob Stump [Rep, Arizona], the chairman of the House Committee on Veterans Affairs, recently heard that, in some VAs, incompetent managers are not fired on the spot, but instead, reassigned or transferred. The fix was the immediate removal of Konik as the failed director at theSalisburyVAand recycling him as our new director in the summer of 1996. . On Tuesday April 14th, 1998, an E-Mail was disseminated with following quotation: Weak leadership at the York VA Medical Center has prompted changes in the hospitals administration staff, with hospital Director Gene Konik reportedly asking for reassignment, VA officials said. Mr. Dandridge began to initiate his long-term plan for integratingMurfreesboroandNashvilleVA.One of his famous quotations was: Practice, practice makes perfect. Another of his public quotations was: Having theNashvilleVAsurgical residents perform the surgery would provide world-class surgery to the area veterans. . In the last five years, York has seen four different directors. Gordons office has been bombarded with complaints from ailing veterans and their families about lack luster care. Those whove died as a result of the administrative and service changes cant complain anymore. Current York VA Director David Pennington has never spoken to the press about anything, but did send a memo to the medical staff warning them to get online or get out! Our last crop of veterans is dying because of VA medical mismanagement, and our next batch is being loaded onto airplanes to fly back to an uncertain future. Mr. Sullivan, a gulf War I vet and VA project manager stated: This administration is so absolutely corrupt, incompetent and malevolent; it pales anything that came before it. Why is our economy tanking? The war, the war, the war.