If President Bush didn't know about the Walter Reed scandal, shouldn't he have?

Question

The people who have spoken out the loudest about this administation's callous policy regarding veterans are John Murtha and Chuck Hagel. Both are distinquished veterans. I too am a veteran of the Marine Corps and I find what I hear from this administration offends me. Bush and his friends pretend to have the interests of our veterans at heart, but the facts speak otherwise. I would like to see some of these chickenhawks be forced to change bedpans for awhile and serve those who have served us.

Answer 1

My elderly veteran father has been handing out flyers full-time all over Washinton D.C. at government agencies, meetings and Congressional members' offices for six years now about what's going on at Walter Reed and the military retirement medical facilities there. Yes. Bush and Rumsfeld absolutely knew.

Answer 2

I'd like to see a history of VA hospitals dating back to the '70s, when they were nothing to write home about. I'd be very surprised if they haven't had their ups and downs along the way. And even more surprised if they haven't turned out to have been caught napping by the large numbers of seriously wounded vets coming home from the Middle East. And, being the military (read: a VERY large government bureaucracy), even if they had seen clearly the problems facing them, the time it takes them to get on top of something like that can be glacial unless something like the current political blowup comes along.

And it's not just Bush and the Defense Department. What were the Senate and House Armed Services Committees doing all this time? Unfortunately, most of the noise coming out of Washington on this subject is just that - noise. I do believe, however, that some good things are going to happen as a result of having the light of day shone on these sorry practices.

Answer 3

Yes, indeed, President Bush should have or maybe he did know about the Walter Reed Hospital scandal. This is inexcusable for anyone connected in any way with this part of the government.

Answer 4

I thought the poor conditions in VA hospitals in general was something that had been public knowledge for decades. I'm surprised there are so many people this scandal has apparently surprised.

At the very least, wasn't funding of VA care a campaign issue in '04?

Answer 5

There's only so much one person can keep track of. That's why there is a Cabinet, for example, a Secretary of Defense who is responsible for overseeing all miltiary matters. Or a House/Senate Armed Services Committee, who is responsible for making sure that funds allocated to the military are being spent properly.

Or a commanding officer of the facility. Note that the guy who resigned was only there for 6 months, and the guy currently in charge was the one who was there before that.

It's obvious a lot of people dropped the ball. And it happened on Bush's watch, so it's debateable whether that makes him personally responsible.

Answer 6

That just scratches the surface. As someone in the behavioral health field I can vouch for how pisspoor of a job the government does of helping to turn trained killers back into whole, functional members of society and help them assimilate accordingly.

Answer 7

I find everything about George Bush offensive. Veterans have been treated like trash for many years, and I find it outrageous. It stuns me that people are even willing to join the service.

Answer 8

that's referred to as DELEGATION....that's while he delegates a committee to accomplish a particular accountability, such as check out Walter Reed and that they then latest him with the info and what may be carried out to strengthen and forestall reoccurances.

Answer 9

Its not that he should have known so much as that he should have appointed people who understand that taking care of our service men should be a priority and is certainly wasn't a priority of Rumsfeld...

Answer 10

Why would he know? He doesn't seem to know anything else that is going on.