VA Officials, Exposed.

Tom's Journal. http://tomschuckmanjournal.blogspot.com/




tschuckman@aol.com


Hi  Friends,
     It's Feb. 20th, 2017 !   Today I just turned age 68, and I feel every day.... LOL !   Oh...  Just kidding, folks.   As I always say,  'God has blessed me in many ways and I am truly HAPPY today, after a good friend called me up to wish me "Happy Birthday," early this morning. '   It's so nice to be treated like a human being, again, by someone who truly seems to care if an old, combat Veteran lives or dies.    Not one of my 'real family members' have even bothered to contact me, and I cannot say if that is the Christian thing to do... or be, after all my years of support and care.   But....  this will NOT be a day of seeing that my glass is only 'half full.'   When / If  life only gives a person lemons --- learn to make lemonade !     I CHOOSE to be happy and thankful, today, and it just happens to be unseasonably warm for February, and we shall take it !  


Even though I always have good  things to eat at home,  I will go out for a great lunch and have a cold one, too.   But the Post Office should be closed for the holiday.   My ex-wife, of 22 years, Karen,  who gave me 3 beautiful children, had her birthday, Yesterday, on the 19th, so at least I left a cell phone message/ greeting for her.   I want to buy some celery too, for snacking, so I can chew on something healthy.   And I just made a new friend who knows a lot about 'weight loss.'  
      But patience has never been my strong point --- so I am seeking the help of the Lord, and H.S. to make my flesh firm and patient.   Prayers, requested.  


To turn to another subject, please....  Many people complain that they have trouble sleeping at night, and we should all know that lack or deprivation of proper sleep can make a person weak, crabby,  irritable, and sick ! !   I broke my neck [C1 nd C2] in 1997 because of lack of Sleep.... actually,  "Sleep Apnea !"    Now,  I have found that many Herbal preparations have helped me very much to had peaceful, sound, deep, "Rem- 4,"  sleep all of the night, or just getting up ONCE to use the bathroom.   There is a good, quality, inexpensive place where I order all my vitamins and healing Herbs:  VitaCost.com    ---So that herbs like, Valerian, Skullcap, Passion Flower, Hops, etc., and a special Prep. called:   "Silent Night," that really aids me in deep, restful, SLEEP !    And it's better to buy the "Extracts" of those Herbs, if you can, as they are more guaranteed to be potent, better !!    I also have a "Ritual" before going to sleep, and a smart VA Doc told me that a "Ritual" is important,  or in the back of your mind  --- things just won't seem right for you to fall asleep, naturally,  emotionally.    Like:  brush your teeth, wash your face,  say your prayers and thanks for another day of life, etc., or even reading a few Proverbs in the KJV Bible, etc.    But I also use Oxygen and a CPAP machine to help me breathe at night when I sleep,  or perhaps I would just wake up, DEAD !    Losing weight would be the BEST THING THAT I COULD DO, to sleep even better !   
        So,  that fateful day, before I broke my neck, that changed my life forever...... as I was working on 2nd shift at Chrysler Corp. in Kenosha, WI.,  ---   I went to Milwaukee to buy a warm insert for my Army Field Jacket, at a special Army Surplus store on Wisconsin Ave, down town,  but on the way home I got hit with a terrible wave of sleepiness.  So I opened the window, turned on the radio loud, sang, and did everything to stay awake,  but I closed my eyes for a SECOUND and ended up in a horrible crash, totaling out my new Dodge truck in an intersection in Kenosha, Wisconsin --- but NO one else was hurt except me.   PTL.   But the LORD allowed me to heal up, and I bought another brand new [better] Dodge Ram truck about a week or two latter.   However,  the goofy woman I was with at the time, also an RN, called my Dad and only told him that "I broke my neck,"  --- and nothing else, and he sat down and had a STROKE, and died 2 weeks latter !!!  Dang!   Wouldn't you think that a normal person could some how 'soften the blow' by also saying that I "would heal, and was NOT PARALZED ... DUH ??     Actually, my upper most vertebrae was still hanging by a thread and somewhat stable, so that the creep "doctor" sent me home the same day of the accident, with a large "Baloney" around my neck to stabilize my neck and head.... but not a "halo."   I was very sore and hurt, but took it easy, and was out of work at Chrysler for about a month and a half.   But I regret that my Father died, Mr. Gilbert L. Schuckman, a good, hard working man, also a U.S. Navy man in WW-2, also wounded in Saipan --in the Pacific war with the Japanese.   He taught me so much,  but my brother Albert told me that he didn't remember anything Dad taught him....  duh.   Perhaps the good Lord also blessed me with 'total recall.'   But that can be a 'two-edged sword',  because too many times a combat Veteran is forced to relive those time in battle and war, in nightmares, etc.     Anyway,  with lots of prayer, and studying I have found that it is possible to at least tame down the magnitude and frequency of nightmares and other bad symptoms of combat PTSD.    And when we finally get to heaven all those bad memories will completely vanish and never be brought to mind.  


 So, the good news for today is,  that finally some of the corrupt, lazy, crooked, VA people got taken down, and I have a feeling that our new, good POTUS, Pres. Trump will clean out that cess pool, too.   I can testify first hand as to the many abuses of the VA system and many VAMC's  in America.   Obama never cared one way or another, and his administration was a total shame, geared to enriching himself.  


Well,  if you know any Veterans, please share this with them,  to brighten up their day.


Warm Regards,
Tom  Schuckman
My email:   tschuckman@aol.com 
       --There is my Mom and I, on her 50 th Wedding Anniversary.  

VA Officials Get Exposed In Hearing, Evidence Now Shows 0 Work Hours Spent On Vets

Posted by Matthew Bernstein | Feb 17, 2017 | Liberal Corruption

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Exposed!

It’s no surprise to anyone that has paid attention to the news that the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) has been one of the worst attended to departments under the Obama Administration. It’s a disgusting that this happened, considering that they are putting our military veterans in danger.
Military veterans deserve some of the best care in the world and yet they are left with unbearable waiting times, leaving some of them to die without being seen. It’s something that started under former President Obama, and continued throughout his tenure.
Finally, Republicans have had enough and they thoroughly blasted VA officials on Thursday. They started with the fact that the department has allowed hundreds of employees to spend 100 percent of their work time on union activities instead of actually caring for veterans. That led to some in the GOP debating whether they should eliminate taxpayer-funded union time completely.

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They were not alone, as some Democrats on the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform (HOGR) Subcommittee on Government Operations joined the GOP members in demanding something from the VA officials. They demanded a full accounting of the taxpayer-funded hours that VA employees have devoted to conducting union work.
These comments came after a Government Accountability Office (GAO) report showed that the VA doesn’t track official time accurately. That led some VA managers to worry that such activities are distracting the workers from patient care. It’s disturbing that some people would rather spend more time working on a union than helping out military veterans.
Ohio Republican Representative Jim Jordan was visibly irritated at the meeting. “Something’s gotta change. I appreciate y’all having the hearing, but look, this is unbelievable, unbelievable what we have here. So let’s hope we can change it and get rid of all these folks on official time.”
Again, it’s downright infuriating that these people would rather focus on union time rather than helping the veterans that deserve the best care. They don’t deserve to have this crisis affect them.

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They Didn’t Spend Time Working On Them!

“I love the way government works – a fancy name, official time. It sounds like they’re actually working for the taxpayers, working for the veterans, when in fact it’s just the opposite,” Jordan continued.
Records from the VA have shown that roughly 290,000 employees spent about 1.1 million hours in fiscal year 2015 on union activities. Almost 350 of those employees devoted 100 percent of their efforts to official time. The GAO doesn’t have a lot of confidence in those figures thought. That’s because VA facilities use diverse methods for tracking official time, making the numbers unreliable as a result.
Union officials claim that the official time does improve service quality. However, North Carolina Republican Representative Mark Meadows questioned the impact that some VA workers have if they’re devoting all their time to union work while the veterans are put on long wait-lists or suffer lack of care.

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Meadows gave VA officials 60 days to provide evidence that prove a direct correlation between the hours spent on official time for unions and the quality of service given to veterans. He doesn’t believe that a correlation like that exists.
Democrats, while also demanding more accurate figures, defended the use of official time as a good, even necessary tool. Texas Democratic Representative Beto O’Rourke, even feared that Republicans were pushing official time as “shameful.”
“If we agree official time has value, then we can move on to the other questions. If we don’t believe in the value of official time, if we think it’s a scam and a fraud, well that’s a decision we can make as well.”
Meanwhile William Lawrence Kovacs, a labor policy analyst for the Competitive Enterprise Institute and witness, put up the argument that Congress should eliminate official time.
“Union official time is an unwise use of limited tax dollars and serves the private interest of unions. The public does not directly benefit from the use of official time. Congress should eliminate the use of official time,” Kovacs testified.

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It’s simple. If the union time isn’t providing accurate service to veterans, then it needs to be eliminated. People don’t need to be spending all of their time on union activities when the VA is in such bad shape. Look at all the scandals that they have had, and then determine if the time is being spent wisely.

If It Doesn’t Help The Veterans, Then Why Should It Continue?

The VA has had plenty of scandals under Obama. One of the more disgusting and disturbing scandals to come out was the fact that a veteran didn’t receive proper care and was found dead with maggots crawling all over him. To make things worse, these maggots were NOT the cause of his death, but they were on him when he was still alive.
Even worse, there was another case days later that had another veteran that was found dead in a shower. Even worse, the veteran was left in that shower, dead, for NINE hours! The people that were responsible for that attempted to cover up the crime.
Share this article to show that Republicans officially blasted the VA due to them putting unions ahead of veterans care. Despite the fact that the veterans have sacrificed so much and should be rewarded, the VA thinks that their time would be spent working