[theoddz]

Let me speak as a disabled vet AND a "civil servant". You see, I work for the VA.....and am a health care provider (not a nurse). I think I can sum it up in another way for you so you can get the true picture....

"We the unwitting, led by the unknowing, can now do virtually anything with nothing."

I work for the VA because it is WHERE I WANT TO BE. I do it NOT because I cannot work somewhere else or because I make "so much money" from the VA. Did you all know that the average civil service worker makes approximately 30% less than our private sector counterparts?? What I do, for a large part, is a LABOR OF LOVE. I am here because I am a VETERAN..... and a SERVICE-CONNECTED DISABLED one, too. I am here to HELP my fellow vets because I understand what it was to have "stood the watch". Oh, and I'd be willing to bet that, if you withheld pay from a worker in any industry in the private sector, they would do exactly what a civil service worker or any other worker, for that matter, would do.....walk off. Why are you attempting to set a double standard for anyone who works for a living??

You all, who are so quick to complain, need to understand that the VA system serves many hundreds of thousands of veteran patients nationwide who are, typically, chronically ill, elderly males who are at the low end of the socio-economic scale. Most have no insurance and the VA gets no reimbursement for the care of these men and women who, many times, pay absolutely nothing for treatment of their complex, difficult to treat and expensive illnesses. In these days of increasing numbers of uninsured people, the VA is getting flooded with new patients, although funding has not increased to care for them. The VA is like a lifeboat in a sea of drowning people and *NEWSFLASH*: THE BOAT IS GETTING SWAMPED!!!

If you want to get angry and complain about something, get mad at the POLITICIANS. Get mad at the PRESIDENTIAL ADMINISTRATION who has, apparently, forgotten about those of us who served and whom this nation owes a debt to. He's been too busy funding a war and creating even more sick and disabled veterans to worry about the ones he already has.

If you want to get mad, bitch and complain, be sure you are addressing the correct respondent. I'm just as mad as you are, but I'm in the middle here. I have to battle attitudes such as yours that are aimed at me and also find also find ways to deliver quality care within the scope of very limited resources. Quite frankly, I think I have a right to get a little defensive.

Peace.