Tune into Mid-Day today on MPR for an interview with US Senator Norm Coleman. I’m not sure whether they’re going to be taking calls but hopefully you’ll get a chance to call in and ask Norm the tough questions he’s been avoiding over the last 5+ years. Here’s one to start: What have you done about no-bid contracts in Iraq and war-profiteering while you were the Chair of the Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations? Post the questions you’d ask the Senator in the comments.
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Related Posts: Senator Norm Coleman on MPR now (11-noon), Threats at the Capitol, Michele Bachmann Open House, This Time With Feeling: JNPizzle Announces, Keep an Eye on Rochester Today,
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Related Posts: Senator Norm Coleman on MPR now (11-noon), Threats at the Capitol, Michele Bachmann Open House, This Time With Feeling: JNPizzle Announces, Keep an Eye on Rochester Today,
21 Responses to “Coleman on Mid-Day Today @ Noon”
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“Minnesota’s Mayor in Washington” he calls himself.
And why did the ‘mayor’ vote to keep corporate tax loopholes on 14 March 2006, instead of increasing spending on Veterans’ Health Care by $1.5 Billion, and then go to Camp Shelby, Mississippi the next DAY (yes, THE VERY NEXT DAY, eat steak and salad with the Minnesota National Guard about to deploy to Iraq [in what would become the longest brigade-level deployment of the over 375-year history of our national militia], and tell them he was humbled to eat with them?
Cuz he was high
cuz he was high
cuz he was high
“instead of increasing spending on Veterans’ Health Care by $1.5 Billion”
Throwing more money at something always seems to be the solution with you guys. That is why you won’t keep the majority more than 2, maybe 3 congressional terms.
What we really should be doing is reducing the number of Vets that need health care. Is that your position Dan? We should be reducing the number of Vets that are homeless. We should be reducing the number of Vets that are permanantly disabled. We should be reducing the number of Vets that need prosthetic arms and legs. If that’s where your going Dan, I’m all for that but if you are just saying we should ignore the problem of Veteran’s care then, I would recommend you look a little deeper into the issue.
Well, since injured vets aren’t getting the care that they need (for both physical and psychological injuries) because they can’t afford that treatment, then yes, I absolutely supporting “throwing” money at the problem.
I didn’t support the war at any point, but I strongly believe that our country should take care of those who gave their lives, and their limbs, and their minds serving in Iraq and Afghanistan. If we need to raise taxes to do that, then raise taxes. Supporting the troops means more than putting a yellow ribbon sticker on the back of your car.
And if the Democrats are going to be puninshed electorally for spending the money to take care of veterans, then so be it.
Let’s spend existing money better. How about integrating Vets into the state-of-the-art academic medical facilities and community hospitals across the country that already exist and that our Federal Government is already funding (through Medical Education dollars).
Does it really make sense for the VA in Iowa City to spend $4 million on an MRI machine while the University hospital 6 BLOCKS AWAY has just purchased one, and neither one is fully utilized even though they cost $1.5 million a year to maintain, staff, and operate????
Spend the same money on paying for the VA’s visits to the University medical center MRI. Penalize the hospital financially if they don’t meet of list of service requirements ensuring Vets receive excellence in care.
We can care for Veterans healthcare without having a separate, redundant healthcare system in a country that is already challenged with medical spending.
Does it really make sense for the VA in Iowa City to spend $4 million on an MRI machine while the University hospital 6 BLOCKS AWAY has just purchased one, and neither one is fully utilized even though they cost $1.5 million a year to maintain, staff, and operate????
Wait a minute. One of the most frequently sited fallacies of the current Health Care Crisis debate is that in the US, with our wonderful system, patients don’t have to wait. Patients in Canada have to wait months to get MRI’s. That’s wrong by the way. But Dan seems to think there’s a surplus of MRI equipment and we need to pare down on all this equipment. I’m confused, which right wing talking point are we trotting out here?
Also, as far as the whole integration thing, (funny word to hear a Republican use), sounds good for the coming years, in fact, I would argue we are on the verge of seeing substantial improvements in our health care system, but that’s not going to happen in the next year. Veterans are suffering now. Let’s pay the piper and make sure these men and women who have served us and have been hurt as a result, are taken care of. Whatever the costs.
OK, let’s say you get another $1,500,000,000 to spend in the VA. How do you allocate the dollars?
Well, DantheGenderconcious, if you truly want to get the best value for your money, you would actually be encouraging all the other health systems to become the VA. Multiple studies and audits show that the Veterans Health Administration provides comphrensive, high-quality, and cost efficient care that the customers absolutely love.
See this DoD news release: http://www.defenselink.mil/news/newsarticle.aspx?id=14560
The VA of today is not the VA of the 70’s, which hurts your talking points. Further, while we don’t have to provide comphrensive health care to the men and women who volunteer to go whever they are ordered, when ever they are ordered, I (and many others) believe that we should.
After all, they are guaranteeing your right to complain about spending money to care for the very people who give you the right to complain.
So who’s side are you on, our troops and Veterans, or the people who want to hurt them?
Oh, and there is a difference between having the capacity to treat patients timely and being completely redundant in a small town like Iowa City. Today, our healthcare system is full of these redundancies. We could do alot of consolidating and still have plenty of capacity to treat patients.
And no, Single Payer doesn’t somehow magically make that happen.
Ok, let’s say you don’t get another $1,500,000,000 to spend in the VA. How do you tell a legless blind vet he can’t have the care he needs because the money isn’t there. Those of us, who were against the war from the beginning, understood there would be costs like this that would be have to be paid. Veterans care on the cheap sounds exactly like what the war-mongers in the Bush administration had planned. As far as allocating those funds, I’m sure there’s plenty that needs to be done and plenty of veterans advocates who could find worthwhile ways to distibute that money. Add another zero to that figure so that maybe next time we won’t be so damn anxious to go to war.
Although accurate numbers are impossible to come by — no one keeps national records on homeless veterans — the VA estimates that nearly 200,000 veterans are homeless on any given night. And nearly 400,000 experience homelessness over the course of a year. Conservatively, one out of every three homeless men who is sleeping in a doorway, alley or box in our cities and rural communities has put on a uniform and served this country. According to the National Survey of Homeless Assistance Providers and Clients (U.S. Interagency Council on Homelessness and the Urban Institute, 1999), veterans account for 23% of all homeless people in America. http://www.nchv.org/background.cfm
Veterans’ advocates can proceed with a lawsuit claiming that the federal government’s health care system for troops returning from Iraq and Afghanistan illegally denies care and benefits, a federal judge in San Francisco ruled Thursday.
U.S. District Judge Samuel Conti, a conservative jurist and a World War II veteran, rejected Bush administration arguments that civil courts have no authority over the Department of Veterans Affairs’ medical decisions or how it handles grievances and claims.
If the plaintiffs can prove their allegations, Conti said, they would show that “thousands of veterans, if not more, are suffering grievous injuries as the result of their inability to procure desperately needed and obviously deserved health care.”
He said federal courts are competent to decide whether those injuries were caused by flaws in the health care system and the VA’s grievance procedures. http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2008/01/11/BAKDUDEB5.DTL
So I ask:
Is more money the only way to improve the system?
You all seem to say yes.
Moderates say “maybe, but lets first examine the system”
Just slap another magnetic yellow ribbon on your car, Dano. Problem solved.
You are proving my point, Richard. I don’t want to put words in your mouth, but what I’m reading from you is an indication that it is all about how much you spend on an issue. If you want to support Veterans, you simply increase the VA budget.
That only works if the core system is highly efficient. If you spend another $1.5 billion and the system is so broken that the benefits don’t improve the Veterans’ lives, then who is better off? Nobody. Not the Veteran, not the Taxpayers who enable Government to exist, nobody.
200,000 homeless vets.
thousands of veterans, if not more, are suffering grievous injuries as the result of their inability to procure desperately needed and obviously deserved health care
The monies in that bill would have been used to pay for additional staff, additional facilities to make sure Veterans could have access to the care they need. Let’s plug the holes in the system first, then we can look at it for inefficiencies. At the present time, it’s a question of the volume of care needed. Another little detail the Bush administration didn’t factor into it’s pre-war calculations. Another cost they don’t want to pay. Another cost left to our grandchildren.
Sen. Coleman has had the opportunity, 10 times, to improve healthcare for veterans by closing corporate tax loopholes and cutting, limiting or deferring various tax breaks for the rich. But Coleman voted against every one of those measures to improve veterans’ healthcare. Ten times, Coleman put tax breaks for corporate interests and the wealthy ahead of funding veterans’ hospitals, military retirees’ healthcare and veterans’ mental-healthcare, among other common-sense solutions for honoring the men and women who have served our country.
In 2005, the Bush Administration admitted that it was underfunding veterans’ health care by $1 billion. Even after that startling admission, Sen. Coleman voted seven more times against granting the Department of Veterans Affairs the resources that it needs to help our returning soldiers and sailors.
And when faced with a proposal that would ensure access to health care and prescription drugs for all veterans, Coleman actually voted to keep it from coming to a vote. Even though the American Legion, the Disabled American Veterans and the Veterans of Foreign Wars all supported the bill, which would let another 3 million veterans get health care from the VA.
http://www.dscc.org/news_item?news_item_KEY=3959
Meanwhile on Norm’s site.
One of my proudest moments in the Senate was the signing of my first piece of legislation — a bill requiring the Pentagon to pay our troops’ travel expenses when they head home from abroad for R&R.
That’ll be a big help. And,,
I was extremely proud to pass into law the Veterans Benefits Outreach Act, the first ever action plan requiring the VA to reach out to all veterans to ensure they are aware of the benefits for which they are eligible so they can receive them efficiently and fairly.
Norm talks a good game but when it comes time to go to the mat for the veterans, he fails.
“as the result of their inability to procure desperately needed and obviously deserved health care”
No Veteran who ‘desperately needs’ care is ever denied it. I’ve taken relatives to VA hospitals — never has a medical need gone unaddressed. Maybe the infrastructure is in place but Vets just aren’t using or don’t know how to use the system. Maybe they need help navigating the huge VA bureacracy.
If that is the case, maybe Outreach ain’t such a bad idea.
In 2005, the Bush Administration admitted that it was underfunding veterans’ health care by $1 billion.
So maybe funding the VA adquately would be a good idea.
If my memory serves me correctly, the bureau miscalculated the cost to serve those coming back from Iraq. Big blunder, yes. Hides were tanned, jobs were lost, they went back to Congress, and got their money.
It was a big mistake but was identified, fixed, and didn’t prevent any Vets from getting the care they needed.