BernieHund: The Political Watchdog

Of course, I’m not saying that there is some sort of serial killer on the loose, running around “taking out” our veterans, one by one. 

What I am saying is that the lack of funding for and the lack of quality administration of the VA hospitals are the serial killers, systematically killing our veterans through negligence and incompetence.  And, each of us bears that burden and that guilt.  Our hands are dirty and covered with the blood and suffering of our veterans.  We can’t take a murderer to court and seek the death penalty on this one.  The killer is our (yes, “we, the people”) neglect and abuse of the American soldier.

According to a recent NPR story:

Investigators say the surgical unit at a southern Illinois veterans’ hospital was in such disarray that doctors were allowed to perform operations they weren’t qualified to perform and that hospital administrators were too slow to respond once problems surfaced, leading directly to the deaths of at least nine surgical patients and as many as 19.

Two internal Department of Veterans Affairs investigations also found that the medical mistakes seriously harmed more than a dozen additional veterans who were patients at the Marion, Ill., VA Medical Center.

Is anyone out there paying attention?  For God’s sake, we have ask these men and women to put their dreams on hold to fight a war that is the delusion of aggrandizement of Dick and the Decider.  We have asked these men and women to leave their families to go to a foreign land and offer their lives so we can pretend that we are changing a fundamentalist theocracy into a democracy. 

These men and women, our veterans be they from Viet Nam, the First Gulf War, or this War of the Insane and the Inept, have spoken loud and clear, whether they were drafted into Nam or volunteered into Iraq.  They have said to America that they love their country and what we (used to) stand for enough to sacrifice their lives. 

Let’s not punish our veterans, present and future, for the mistakes of old men who lied us into war years ago or more recently.  We owe it to these veterans to have the balls to tell the President, his Puppeteer, and Congress, both Republican and Democratic sides of the isles, that our American veterans deserve and will receive the care they need and that they will fund it during this session of the Congress.

We are spending over $10 B a month… A MONTH… to kill and disable these warriors, our precious treasure, and those within the beltway can’t fund proper care for our brave when they return home. 

It’s time to demand that Congress halt all further funding of this War and begin funding the VA hospitals, immediately.  The premise of the war was a lie.  The neglect of those who served is a disgrace.  The blood of those who were falsely sent into war is on the hands of our leaders.  The blood and suffering of those who return is on the hands of the nation. 

We are not a nation who turns its back on our own.  We are not a nation who watches a man sleep on the street without offering help.  We are not a nation who allows the sick and injured to be abused or killed through neglect and incompetence when they can’t speak up for themselves.  Or, are we?