“This unfortunately is the result of dollars. It’s money,” Duckworth said. “I think that we as a nation would want to take care of all of our veterans. But it means that we’re going to have be willing to get the folks in Washington to spend the dollars on all of our veterans. And as long as there aren’t enough dollars, then they are force to prioritize veterans.
“And combat-connected, disabled veterans are the highest priority. That is why when you and I go to the VA they will take care of me first because I am combat-connected,” noted Duckworth, who lost both of her legs when the helicopter she was co-piloting in Iraq in 2004 was hit by a rocket-propelled grenade.
“The difference is how did you get hurt. Unfortunately that’s just the way that … it’s a bureaucracy that was put into place in previous administrations in order to prioritize veterans because they didn’t spend enough to take care of everyone,” Duckworth told Wheeler.
As Preston goes on to explain, this is "Grade-A Bravo Sierra".
But the question I have is...if it was all "Bush's Fault", then why hadn't the new Obama leadership at the VA (Duckworth included) done anything about it??
Now you could reasonably expect to have some leeway when you place blame for something complex and intangible like "the economy", but when you are a bureaucratic administrator you cannot blame "a bureaucracy that was put into place in previous administrations" without also offering an explanation for why you haven't changed it after being in office for 18 months....
Of course the easy answer is that they haven't changed it because her statement wasn't true in the first place....
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