Our VA Secretary is a moron. VA Secretary Disneyland-wait time comparison draws ire

[cali]

Thanks for handing trump and the rethugs ammunition.

terans Affairs Secretary Bob McDonald downplayed Monday the time it takes for veterans to receive medical treatment by comparing the "experience" of waiting for health care to Disneyland guests waiting for a ride.

"When you go to Disney, do they measure the number of hours you wait in line? Or what's important?" McDonald told reporters at a Christian Science Monitor breakfast in Washington. "What's important is what's your satisfaction with the experience?"

Prominent Republicans criticized the secretary in the hours following his remarks, including presumptive GOP presidential nominee Donald Trump, who painted McDonald as an example of Obama's administration.

"Obama's VA Secretary just said we shouldn't measure wait times. Hillary says VA problems are not 'widespread.' I will take care of our vets!" Trump tweeted, a reference to comments Democratic presidential front-runner Hillary Clinton made in 2015.


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http://www.cnn.com/2016/05/23/politics/veterans-affairs-secretary-disneyland-wait-times/

[Katashi_itto]

1. Yeah, it was only one and a half decades for my disablity. Not a big deal right?

[braddy]

2. Sunny Disneyland vacations, and military vet's medical treatment, what an idiot.

[Rex]

3. Sorry, but all the money has to go to defense contractors.

We veterans are at the bottom of the list.

[Lee-Lee]

4. Ahh yes i was just not understanding the joy

All the fighting and people losing my paperwork and appointments always scheduled 30 days out on the dot were all about recreating the Magic Kingdom experience.

They didn't lose my request to been seen at a different facility so I could have a female OB-GYN I was comfortable with- they just kept me around the place to experience more joy for a longer period before I was seen.

[meaculpa2011]

5. Just brought my Dad home from the Brooklyn VA...

Center where he spent the weekend with an irregular heartbeat problem that made him woozy.

He was there Friday to have his dentures adjusted and the dentist called the ER because he became incoherent.

They kept him there on a heart monitor, adjusted his medication and his heartbeat stabilized. The level of care he gets is excellent, although I have taken him to my private doc when I wanted another opinion. He had his cataracts done by my surgeon when his VA eye doctors couldn't come to a consensus and I brought him my neurologist when his VA doctors refused to give him Prednisone.

He is 94 and I have to keep track of his appointments and make decisions about his care. For someone his age, negotiating the bureaucracy is not a possibility. His room mate this weekend was a 96 year old who was also at The Battle of the Bulge so they spent three days recounted their shared experiences. The other fellow lives alone and his nearest relatives are two nieces who live more than 100 miles away. The staff members were trying to inform him about his condition and the care they were recommending, but he didn't understand any of it. If I wasn't with my Dad when he sees his primary, he wouldn't understand any of it.

Making light of the hardships that vets go through is insensitive at best. I see vets who are half my age who are dealing with physical and emotional challenges that make my head spin.