It's the day after Veteran's Day
Nov. 12th, 2009 09:21 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
kyburgAnd I'm still thinking about them. (Told you I did.)
I love this little chalk talk about the portion of the entire US budget the DOD, specifically The Pentagon, gets.
And then I see something like this really Useful Site and get angry.
I'm the one who likes to look at percentages, not actual dollars - but even this pisses me off.
When it comes down to the actual Life in our armed services - the people that make it all work - suddenly, we're back in school and hosting fund raisers to buy them a warm coat in the winter.
The people suddenly MUST BECOME charity cases and become objects of pity. Sickening.
And look - we're spending HOW MUCH on their portion of the GNP again?
People are the expensive part of any budget, to be honest. Where the bleep is the money going if not TO THEM?
Then the local NPR affiliate broadcasts this delightful piece of non-news last night on the drive home.
"Salas says California’s Department of Veterans Affairs isn’t doing a good enough job of that. Only 12 percent of the state’s veterans actually collect the benefits they’re due."
Wonder what it's like elsewhere.
I've had direct experience with the VA in San Bernardino county - the VA there is across the street from the best care anywhere in that county, Loma Linda University Medical Center.
Seriously. The place would not pass a JAHCO inspection to save its life - but it doesn't have to! It's a VA! But they're one of the lucky ones - they can refer across the street, and do. (Loma Linda is a not-for-profit foundation hospital.) Don't forget - it's a benefit, not insurance. If you don't use their facilities - eh. Too bad, so sad, we don't reimburse.
I can hazard a reasonable guess why they're not distributing 'benefits' - seriously, the penal system does a better job of providing services, more of them and so on. (Biggest provider of mental health services in California - the penal system. Yes it is.)
Who would waste their time banging a head against the wall for nothing. I never recommend the VA for services. I'd rather fall back to Medi-Cal/Medicaid and hold car washes. That useless.
And Jim did his clinical in a VA hospital. Ask him if you want more direct reports. What HE has to say is barely repeatable in polite company.
No, veterans deserve more than one day - and an exceptional day at that - and then be treated like ugly foster children on every day including that one thereafter.
That said, things are what they are and I'll be over at Soldier's Angels and the USO as much as I can. It is what it is.
And IT SUCKS.
I love this little chalk talk about the portion of the entire US budget the DOD, specifically The Pentagon, gets.
And then I see something like this really Useful Site and get angry.
I'm the one who likes to look at percentages, not actual dollars - but even this pisses me off.
When it comes down to the actual Life in our armed services - the people that make it all work - suddenly, we're back in school and hosting fund raisers to buy them a warm coat in the winter.
The people suddenly MUST BECOME charity cases and become objects of pity. Sickening.
And look - we're spending HOW MUCH on their portion of the GNP again?
People are the expensive part of any budget, to be honest. Where the bleep is the money going if not TO THEM?
Then the local NPR affiliate broadcasts this delightful piece of non-news last night on the drive home.
"Salas says California’s Department of Veterans Affairs isn’t doing a good enough job of that. Only 12 percent of the state’s veterans actually collect the benefits they’re due."
Wonder what it's like elsewhere.
I've had direct experience with the VA in San Bernardino county - the VA there is across the street from the best care anywhere in that county, Loma Linda University Medical Center.
Seriously. The place would not pass a JAHCO inspection to save its life - but it doesn't have to! It's a VA! But they're one of the lucky ones - they can refer across the street, and do. (Loma Linda is a not-for-profit foundation hospital.) Don't forget - it's a benefit, not insurance. If you don't use their facilities - eh. Too bad, so sad, we don't reimburse.
I can hazard a reasonable guess why they're not distributing 'benefits' - seriously, the penal system does a better job of providing services, more of them and so on. (Biggest provider of mental health services in California - the penal system. Yes it is.)
Who would waste their time banging a head against the wall for nothing. I never recommend the VA for services. I'd rather fall back to Medi-Cal/Medicaid and hold car washes. That useless.
And Jim did his clinical in a VA hospital. Ask him if you want more direct reports. What HE has to say is barely repeatable in polite company.
No, veterans deserve more than one day - and an exceptional day at that - and then be treated like ugly foster children on every day including that one thereafter.
That said, things are what they are and I'll be over at Soldier's Angels and the USO as much as I can. It is what it is.
And IT SUCKS.
