Letter to Congress re Benghazi

I hear the House will investigate the Benghazi, Libya, incident in which Ambassador Stevens and several others were killed.  If they do, I hope they will also investigate the Pat Tillman incident in Afghanistan.  I believe the Republicans engaged in more lies and cover-ups about the Pat Tillman scandal than the Obama administration did about Benghazi.

As a Vietnam veteran (Army artillery) and retired Foreign Service officer, I would prefer to let both men rest in peace.  I believe the Benghazi investigation is motivated by partisan politics rather than genuine concern about the death of Amb. Stevens.  If the Republicans are going to spit on the graves of brave Americans who died in the service of their country, they should look at all the deaths whose details were covered up.

I believe Amb. Stevens died in part because of the CIA.  (Of course the main blame lies with the crazy Libyans who killed him.)  The post in Benghazi was not a consulate; it was some kind of special mission set up to cover CIA activities.  The CIA safe house was several blocks away from the mission, and was eventually attacked itself.  I’m not sure, but I would guess that the CIA had some paramilitary types in their safe house who did not immediately come to the aid of the State Department mission, although at some point they did come.  I think at least some of the confusion at Susan Rice’s Sunday show briefings was due to a CIA cover-up, because they did not want to admit that they had such a large operation in Benghazi.

In addition, I believe there was genuine confusion about why the Benghazi mission was attacked, whether it was a terrorist attack or a protest of the anti-Islam video that got out of control.  There is good reason that people talk about “the fog of war.”  I don’t know what happened in the embassy in Tripoli, but it looks to me like neither the CIA station chief, the military attaché, nor the State Department security officer rose to the occasion in terms of helping the Ambassador in Benghazi.  Ambassador Pickering, with whom I worked in State, investigated this issue, and I am sure that he did a thorough, professional job, as he did everything while in the Foreign Service.

Congressional Letter - Net Neutrality

I am concerned that the FCC is destroying the Internet in America by ending net neutrality.  The Internet should be tightly regulated as a common carrier, as AT&T (“Ma Bell”) was 50 years ago.  The telephone system then only carried voice; the Internet is much more important since it carries data, music, and video as well as voice.  Nobody watches television broadcast over the airwaves anymore, but the broadcast spectrum is regulated as if it were much more important than the Internet.

Michael Powell decided that the Internet should not be regulated as a common carried when he was the chair of the FCC.  He later went on to reap his financial payoff by becoming president of the National Cable and Telecommunications Association, where he has continued to argue against regulating the internet as a public utility.

Currently the FCC is proposing an Internet “fast lane” for companies like Netflix, while arguing that this does not violate “net neutrality” because it does not create a “slow lane,” but if there is a fast lane, everybody else is in the slow lane.

Congress can remedy this situation and overrule the FCC by passing legislation strictly regulating the Internet as a public utility or common carrier.  I hope that you will do so.  The recent proposed mergers of Comcast and Time Warner cable and of AT&T and DirecTV show that this field is becoming a monopoly.  Government regulation becomes more important as competition decreases.

Already many countries outrank the US in Internet availability and speed.  I hope that you will take action to prevent American monopolies from destroying this important resource.

Congressional Letter - Keep Shinseki

I am writing to defend General Shinseki from charges that he should resign as Secretary of the Department of Veterans Affairs because of delays in treating veterans in Phoenix, Fort Collins, and other locations.

While I was at Firebase Barbara in Vietnam, in 1970, a few miles away, the US Special Forces base at Mai Loc was overrun by the North Vietnamese.  Then Army Captain Eric Shinseki went to relieve the base.  Although I don’t know him at all, I feel a bond with General Shinseki as an Army veteran who cares about the people who served with him.  The VA faces an overwhelming task; things have improved under Shinseki although they still have a long way to go.

I have heard no one on the news explain well why the veterans in Phoenix died while waiting for care.  Except for veterans wounded or otherwise injured during their service, the VA is a caregiver of last resort.  The fact that these people died in Phoenix means that they had no military Tricare, no private healthcare insurance, no Obama Care, no Medicare, no Medicaid, and their local emergency rooms apparently refused to treat them when their condition became urgent.  It is an indictment of the whole American healthcare system, as well as an indictment of VA care.

One problem with firing Shinseki is replacing him.  Healthcare costs in America have skyrocketed.  To replace Shinseki, you would ideally get a senior administrator of a large, private hospital system, but almost every person in one of these positions makes millions of dollars per year.  They would have to make a significant financial sacrifice to take the VA job.  One example is former Senator Frist; the Frist family in Tennessee is fantastically wealthy because of its hospital chain which was taken over by HCA, in which the Frists remain involved.  If you look at other well-known hospital systems, the Cleveland Clinic or the Mayo Clinic for example, the senior personnel are extremely well paid.

Although all aspects of the VA could be improved, I think the current scandal mainly involves old veterans like myself.  For veterans who come home wounded in combat, my understanding is that the VA is doing a better job, and once a person is in the VA system, the VA health data (as opposed to service data) is probably automated better than any private hospital’s.  I have looked into somehow getting on the VA’s roles, and frankly have been put off, but I did not make an issue of it because I have private insurance and Medicare.  The VA replied to my letters by saying that because I had these other coverages, I did not qualify for VA care.  I belong to the American Legion mainly because I hope that if something catastrophic happened to me not covered by insurance, the American Legion would help my wife get some kind of VA care for me.  I understand that the VA cannot be the primary healthcare provider to everyone who ever served in the American military.  It is more important that the VA take care of wounded veterans rather than old guys with chronic diseases, although admittedly I might change my tune on this someday.

Meanwhile, I think Shinseki is doing a better job than almost anyone who would replace him.

Veterans Affairs

I am sure the Department of Veterans Affairs needs improving, but I am not sure the latest scandal sheds much light on what needs to be done.  The fact that the scandal occurred in Phoenix, although similar cases have been found in other cities, indicates to me that his is a problem affecting older veterans.  Nice people don’t serve in the military very often these days.  Most volunteers come from rural or inner city areas where jobs are scarce.  American elites talk about being patriotic, but they don’t often do anything about it.  Therefore, I don’t think the people in Phoenix who died waiting for a call from the VA were veterans of Iraq or Afghanistan.  There are a lot of old people in Phoenix; these veterans were most likely from an earlier war or peacetime service.  

This raises the question of what services the VA is supposed to provide.  In many cases, it is the caregiver of last resort for veterans.  It has been criticized for falling down on this job, for example, failing to care for homeless veterans.   Retired career military have a program called Tricare.  If these Phoenix veterans died waiting for VA medical care, it means they had no Tricare, no private health insurance, no Obama Care, no Medicare, no Medicaid, and no local hospital would admit them to the hospital’s emergency room.  That is a sad state of affairs for the veterans, and for the US health care system.  

The VA has an enormous number of programs, covering young vets who have been badly wounded in combat, old wounded vets, young vets who are failing to adapt to civilian life after leaving the military, and old vets who are down on their luck, broke and sick.  I am guessing the Phoenix scandal involves the last category, but the talking heads on TV don’t shed any light on the issue.  They talk as if the VA is your mother, and once you leave the military, the VA will take care of you for the rest of your life, no matter what.  I’m not sure that what the law says.  

Lots of people want Secretary Shinseki to go, but nobody talks about who should replace him.  He is a combat veteran (who served in I Corps in Vietnam while I was there), who cares about the men and women.  As a cabinet secretary, Shinseki makes about $200,000 per year.  Both the head of the Cleveland Clinic and the head of the Mayo clinic make over $2 million per year.  Most heads of hospital systems earn over $1 million, and those systems are all smaller than the VA system.  Most doctors running university medical schools earn well over $500,000.  For almost anyone in the private sector, taking a senior government job means a substantial cut in salary.  So the VA can probably rule out getting a first rate medical administrator.  I would not expect much improvement if Shinseki gets replaced by some political hack, although the people shouting, “Off with his head,” would be appeased for a while.