AP can’t tell the truth
I’ve been boycotting Associated Press along with the rest of blogs since they got uppity (uh-oh, is using the word “uppity” showing my bigotry?) a few weeks back, but I’m breaking the boycott for this piece of crap reporting from Deb Reichman;
President Bush helped break ground Thursday for a new military medical center to replace Walter Reed hospital, whose reputation was soiled by allegations of shoddy care for war veterans.
Bush didn’t talk about the institution’s problems, instead lauding the work of the military medical staff.
How much is wrong with that few lines? Walter Reed was scheduled to be closed more than a year before Washington Post’s equally shoddy story about conditions there. That’s one of the reasons it was being closed – Walter Reed is located in one of the worst neighborhoods in DC and the entire area is filthy. There is no room for Walter Reed to grow and improve to meet current needs and the population is not suitable to employment in a hospital environment.
Walter Reed was busted in the Washington Post for their transient barracks – their out-patient facilities, not because of “shoddy care for war veterans” as Ms. Reichman writes. The care for soldiers at Walter Reed has never been criticized successfully.
When the Bush Administration tried to speed building the new facilities at Bethesda after Walter Reed’s problems, it was Congressional Democrats, my Congressman Chris Van Hollen specifically, who blocked those efforts. Read the post I wrote at the time. Van Hollen opposed speeding the process because he wanted federal money dedicated to improving roads along which he and the other snotty elitists in country club Bethesda drove their Mercedes SUVs .
Why would President Bush talk about the problems that have been rectified over a year ago and will be cured when the new facility is built? Reidman is a tool and a hack – but then so is the ASSociated Press.
I know some of you have more to add about the Walter Reed thing. Have at it.
Category: Politics, Walter Reed
I actually disagree a moderate amount with you on this one. All in favor of ramping up other areas and such, not however in favor of closing Walter Reed at this time. First off, there should be no discussion of closing it until such time as the other one is set to go. Because it will be hard for WRAMC to retain and hire good people if they know that they are going to be moved to a different area. Also, Having seen what happens when you are on the demolition list, I fear what could happen there at WRAMC in so far as the dash 10 type maintenance goes. So, more procedural differences that actual ones, but either way, this article is some poorly contrived nonsense.
And don’t even get me started on Van Hollen. He’s my second least favorite congressman, and the most disengenuous one there. Ask me about it sometime Jonn.
Jonn wrote: WRAMC was on the BRAC list and that’s why it’s being closed. Since the whole world was looking over my shoulder when we finally published the list, it’s kind of hard to curtail discussion. Most of the contractors are contractors at Bethesda, too, so the non-military staff will transfer. It’s only about eight miles cross-lots on the Military Road. But Walter Reed suffers where it is now. They can’t make the maintenance people do their jobs and that goes back to before BRAC. Better to move the whole operation ASAP.
Much of the problems at Walter Reid can be laid at the feet of federal employee unions, which fought desperately to avoid having to compete for the maintenance work at the facility with the private sector. The decision to compete for the maintenance work at Walter Reid was made in June of 2000 during the Clinton Administration, and following the required bureaucratic procedures, the formal competition documents were issued 2003. Formal bureaucratic protests by both the private sector bidder and the union representing the government employees delayed award of a contract to the private sector, at a savings of $7,000,000 until November of 2006.
The democrats in Congress attempted to defund the awarded contract; Non-Voting Delegate Norton and others sponsored a bill that passed the House, and Senator Mikulski a bill that failed in the Senate. Congressional and other delays precluded the private sector Contractor from starting maintenance work until February 4, 2007, two weeks before the stories of the deplorable conditions were first reported in the press.
There’s plenty of blame to go around – bureaucratic contracting process; frivolous protests by government employee unions, Congressional interference, politics, etc., etc., etc. But the terrible conditions at the facilities are first the responsibility of the government employees paid to keep them in excellent condition for our soldiers – civilian maintenance workers, their union, their civilian bosses, and the post commander. Several high ranking military officers have paid for this with their careers – I haven’t heard that any civilian employees lost their federal jobs for malfeasance.
I called AP’s White House desk and gave the AP an ear full. I also called an editor I know and told him what I’ll tell you. I’ve been in BLGD 18 many times before the Washington Post hit piece on Walter Reed. The AP story describes “squalid conditions” which is just so much bullsheet. I can’t remember the total number of rooms there but it’s about 70. The day after the WaPo hit piece, SecArmy and Vice Chief of Staff inspected BLDG 18 and moved people out of TWO rooms. A few others failed inspection put not bad enough to warrant moving folks out and the vast amjority passed. The two rooms were occupied by two bad actors, one who I knew personally. The other guy took a substandard room because he didn’t want a roommate. There was ONE hole in the ceiling from an tub overflow on the upper floor. Funny watching Dana Priest on TV one night admit there was one hole, but she called it “a metaphor for everything else”. Else what? The other kid would drop takeout cartons anywhere in his room, and leave them, punched holes in the walls for which he was billed and in general seemed to be out of control while in BLDG 18. I knew him while he was in Mologne and almost got him to attend the first Milblog conference. Not that he had a blog right then, but he was doing some writing and thought he might find a mentor there. One time I overheard him at the front desk on a Friday night asking how to get to the airport on $12 the next morning. The desk arranged for duty driver to get him there for free, and as $12 wasn’t going to buy much for lunch or dinner on a long trip home with multiple flights, I slipped him $30 towards airport food. BLDG 18 housed folks from Medical Hold Company and Soldiers on TDY to WRAMC for training. Being just outside the gate, it didn’t get quite the attention as the wards, Mologne House or… Read more »
Little Miss Pants on Fire:
dReichman@ap.org
They built a couple of nice BBQ pits with built-in gas grill in the Mologne courtyard.
Sweet deal for the State Dept weenies who are supposed to take over that real estate.
Raoul wrote: “And there didn’t seem to be a incest or rodent problem the way the WaPo would have you believe.”
My God, I do hope incest is NOT a problem there!