Rep. Waxman: Bush admin push for privatization may have helped create Walter Reed 'disaster'

[Doondoo]

The Bush Administration's drive for privatization may be responsible for the "deplorable" outpatient care for soldiers at Walter Reed Army Medical Center, according to a top Democratic Congressman investigating the scandal, which has already led to the resignation of the Secretary of the US Army. A five-year, $120 million contract awarded to a firm run by a former executive from Halliburton – a multi-national corporation where Vice President Dick Cheney once served as CEO – will be probed at a Subcommittee on National Security and Foreign Affairs hearing scheduled for Monday.

A letter sent by Rep. Henry Waxman (D-CA), chairman of the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, to Major General George W. Weightman, the former commander at Walter Reed, asks him to "address the implications of a memorandum from Garrison Commander Peter Garibaldi sent through you to Colonel Daryl Spencer, the Assistant Chief of Staff for Resource Management with the U.S. Army Medical Command" in order to better prepare himself for his testimony at the hearing.

"This memorandum, which we understand was written in September 2006, describes how the Army's decision to privatize support services at Walter Reed Army Medical Center was causing an exodus of 'highly skilled and experienced personnel,'" Waxman's letter continues. "As a result, according to the memorandum, 'WRAMC Base Operations and patient care services are at risk of mission failure.'"

Waxman's letter states that "several sources have corroborated key portions of the memorandum."

.......

Waxman adds that "the conditions that have been described are disgraceful," and that the Oversight Committee will "investigate what led to the breakdown in services."

"It would be reprehensible if the deplorable conditions were caused or aggravated by an ideological committment to privatized government services regardless of the costs to taxpayers and the consequences for wounded soldier," Waxman writes, alluding to the Bush Administration's push for privatization.


http://www.rawstory.com/news/2007/Bush_Administration_push_for_privatization_may_0303.html

[yardwork]

1. k&r

[Dover]

2. I would like the Dems to outline where they Do and Don't support privatization.

Clinton and legislators have a long record of being very pro-privatization.

[peacetalksforall]

5. CSA = take a look - possible good checklist to use for research

and communication with our COngressional leaders - State and Federal. This is all going too far - because it appears they are not going to stop until they own our souls.

[peacetalksforall]

3. Notice the phrase 'MISSION FAILURE' - like in the opposite of

Bush's famous MISSION ACCOMPLISHED. Did he just give us two words to rally around?

(by the way - did he get the two words from someone at DU?)

[wryter2000]

9. Mission failure

I'd imagine that's a standard military term. Maybe one of our military vets can clarify. It sure has a ring, huh?

[Bitwit1234]

4. Hannity says = what's the big deal.

They were going to close anyway.

So in other words, our soldiers, whom bush sent to be maimed and killed should shut up about the filth and falling apart of the place they were sent to recuperate and receive help from injuries. They should keep quiet about the fact that 2/3's of the care givers were fired, and that they should make do with a lot less.

This is the republican way. If the dems were in charge of Walter Reed they would want them arrested. But if it is republicans they should be given a pass.

And as far a privatization, it seems that every time a private company is given the running of a department that the federal government had done, the services dramatically decrease and the level of care suddenly proves almost not exsistance, while the level of costs triples, over and over. Name one of the things this administration has put in private hands that has proved less costly or efficient.

[peacetalksforall]

6. This is is the cold, cruel in-your-face, non-American attitude of

those who think they did everyting on their own - by their bootstraps.

[MadMaddie]

7. It's the the private company that the administration keeps picking

that's a huge part of this issue. And Haliburton keeps coming up...there has to be "criminal charges" filed for failure to meet contractual obligations, this is pure war profiteering and "War Profiteering" should have very serious consequences.

[wryter2000]

10. Truly, I doubt which company it is doesn't matter

Halliburton and its subsidiaries are clearly the worst, but any outfit that wants to make a profit off taking care of wounded soldiers wouldn't do as good a job as the Army.

When will people wake up to the fact that if you hand something over to a for-profit entity, that entity will skim a profit off the top, making less money available to do the actual work?

IMHO, that's the biggest problem with HMO's...the profit motive.

[indepat]

8. 'pukes don't give a flying-fu*k no matter the cost to taxpayers nor the horrendous

consequences of their ideological commitment to privatized government services as they offload much of the treasury into the pockets of loyal cronies via lucrative, often no-bid contracts: they're continuously giving us two middle fingers up at a time and tens of millions of Amurikkkans love it and eat it up, praising God that we have a 'puke administration. :shrug:

[wryter2000]

11. Will this be ignored by the media?

Oh, look...Britney's shaved her head.