Author: Dick

The two or three people who read my blog (perhaps one less these days — a long story that) on a regular or pert near regular basis may know of the troubles I’ve seen with the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs.

Well after a couple of calls screaming this afternoon at a couple of women at the VA’s billing call center in Topeka, Kansas, (some or all of the VA hospitals have outsourced their billing)I had an epiphany about my relationship with the VA.

That relationship boils down to this: The VA finds reasons why they cannot do something while I harbor any number of reasons why they can do something.

The VA’s attitude stems from it being institutionally averse to helping people, combined with any number of rules, regulations and layers of bureaucracy that could hide an entire Army division as well as its tanks, Humvees, skivvies, kits and kaboodles.

My reasoning is due to having witnessed the VA doing what others within that same organization says can’t be done. Thus, it is my belief that beyond what is natural, and perhaps even inside portions of the supernatural world, that things can get done. Oh, bureaucrats, administrators, hall monitors, DMV clerks and the like all SAY something can’t be done. But I believe that practically anything can be accomplished, perhaps with the exception of successfully having your socks emerge in pairs from a washer-dryer on a routine basis.

When a supervisor from the VA billing call center called me back this afternoon to tell me that the bureaucrat in Houston would send in the request for my second refund from having too much money stolen from my government pay, I screamed back at her: “You see, it CAN be done.” She said that if I didn’t stop yelling at me … Well, I didn’t wait around because at “yelling” I slammed down the phone thus cutting off communication with a person who would dare tell me that something can’t be done, mainly because she helped contribute to getting what I needed to be accomplished, done.

It might be a long, lonesome and frustrating road if you are a veteran and the VA tells you that they can’t do this or that, or if you are having trouble getting what you need for your health. But the worst thing that you can do is to take it from them. Too often, people just take the VA’s word for it and that’s it. I suppose I cost myself a lot of grief and high blood pressure, but sometimes it’s worth the struggle. Even though, a veteran shouldn’t have to struggle to get care for which they’ve signed up.

There is always another level a veteran can appeal to if nothing is getting done at the hospital level. Each VA facility is part of a so-called “VISN,” for Veterans Integrated Service Network. There are about 17 or 18 of these throughout the country. My VA clinic and hospital are in VISN 16, which includes VA facilities from Jackson, Miss. to Houston, Texas. This link will take you to a VA facilities locator. Enter your zip code and select “VISN office” on the drop-down menu next to the words “Facilities.” This will lead you to locations and numbers for the VISN office over your clinic or hospital. If you are having problems with a hospital or clinic and cannot get anywhere with the alleged “patient advocates,” locate your VISN office and ask for whomever is over the patient representatives or advocates in that VISN. They are the next step up in the food chain.

If you are a veteran and use the VA for health care, don’t take no for an answer because believe me, it’s not an answer.

Last night I watched some of the Republican presidential debates on CNN. By some, I mean maybe 10 minutes total. That was about 9 minutes and 45 seconds more viewing time than when I watched the Democratic debate a couple of nights ago.

Since I am hardly a big GOP supporter, it might seem odd that I would watch more of the Republican debate than the Democratic one. It wasn’t like I was watching “Dances With Wolves,” but I don’t know why I spent more time with the Grand Old Party, which in this case was very much an oxymoron. I suppose watching this sorry spectacle was like watching a car wreck, or staring at bovines having sex, it being mere curiosity.

The debate almost seemed meaningless because Fred Thompson wasn’t there. If indeed FDT throws his old hat in the ring for the GOP nomination, who knows how things will go. He has yet to officially announce and he is already doing better in the polls than Mighty Mitt Romney.

Although some of his ideas are kind of out there, I do like seeing U.S. Rep. Ron Paul of Texas in there mixing it up with the likes of McCain, and Rudy Doody and the other 600 some-odd GOP candidates. Just as no one in the current pack of Dems seeking the nomination have given me hope for the future, I like the pack of GOPs even less.

I suppose the world would shake and collapse if we ever had someone with a little integrity run for and get elected as president. We seemed doomed to forever electing one jackal or jackass after another. Maybe we should just elect a computer and be done with it.

During the two or so minutes I watched of the debate last night between the Democratic presidential candidates, I discerned these interesting statements:

CLINTON: Blah, BLAH, Blah, blah

OBAMA: BLAH, blah, Blah, Blah, Blah

BIDEN: BLAH, BLAH, BLAH, BLAH-BLAH!!!

WOLF BLITZER: blah

Crystal structure
of a protein from
a bacterium that
causes tuberculosis.

News stories with great regularity come along on both the world and national scene which cause a great stir. Take for instance the great December 2004 earthquake and tsunami in the Indian Ocean which killed more than 180,000 people. Hurricane Katrina and that whole freaking 2005 season in which they ran out of names for the storms might be considered such a huge story to a certain degree.

Then stories come along which touch a more national nerve because of their odd or bizarre qualities. A good example would be the Runaway Bride. Also, anytime someone — especially a cheated wife — cuts off someone’s penis — especially their husband’s — such as the John and Lorena Bobbitt story is a surefire media spectacle.

These day’s hot item du jour is the story is that of Andrew Speaker, the young Atlanta lawyer, who flew to Europe on his honeymoon and back while knowingly carrying a deadly form of tuberculosis.

Why is this such a hot news story that it eats up time on the cable news shows like Tommy Chong with the munchies? One reason is, unquestionably, that the guy may have exposed scores of people on his airline flights with the deadly disease. Can you just imagine how today’s media would have treated Typhoid Mary?

This is not to say the Speaker story is illegitimate when it comes to news. People’s lives may have been put in danger. Speaker was ordered quarantined by the government. And just the fact that it is tuberculosis being talked about, something that has barely raised eyebrows in the U.S. for years, should interest anyone who even thinks about health.

But is this story, like the Bobbitt story, like the New Orleans-Katrina aftermath obsession, overblown to the point of being underwhelming? Sure it is. But that is just how it is these days. People need not feed themselves a steady diet of this or any ongoing news story or issue so long that obsesses. This is from one who has sat in front of the tube watching CNN nonstop on stories such as the O.J. Simpson low-speed chase or the John-John Kennedy plane crash.

After awhile, though, stories just stay too long. That is how I already feel about the Speaker saga. It has come to that point in time in news-watching this all that I must turn off the TV and read a book. That is really the most redeeming point of this whole topic, not just talking about TB. It’s the fact that you can turn off the tube or quit reading your newspaper or news magazine for awhile when it overpowers or really begins to irritate.

It is so simple. Yet for some, it’s so elusive.

Attention somebody. I just spent about an hour on a post in which I put a lot of heart and emotion into. Then this stupid Internet Explorer error message happens and even though I have this little yellow bubble on my blog’s dashboard telling me that Blogger saves my drafts automatically, that does not appear to be the case.

I don’t know who is responsible for not fixing the computer system at the Beaumont Public Library, but I wish whomever it is would do something. Or maybe our city manager can stop thinking about tearing down the existing buildings along the river to build the Ritz-Carlton long enough to take action. The library needs a better computer system and new computers.

Although I am almost certain the new mayor, Becky Ames, or anyone in the Beaumont municipal government for that matter reads this lil ol’ blog. But if they do, I beseech them to do something. Your library computers suck. I am sorry for being ineloquent but that is about is as blunt as I can put it.