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Tag: 2014 elections in pennsylvania
VA Investigation Turns Up Widespread Problems With Wait Times

VA Investigation Turns Up Widespread Problems With Wait Times

By Richard Simon, Los Angeles Times

WASHINGTON — An investigation of wait times for medical care at Veterans Affairs facilities has found “inappropriate scheduling practices are systemic” through the VA and “instances of manipulation of VA data that distort the legitimacy of reported waiting times,” prompting new calls for VA Secretary Eric Shinseki to resign.

The VA inspector general’s interim report, released Wednesday, shows the investigation has expanded to 42 facilities, more than a dozen beyond the previously reported 26.

At the Phoenix VA, the main subject of the interim report, investigators “substantiated that significant delays in access to care negatively impacted the quality of care,” finding about 1,700 veterans who were waiting for an appointment but were not on a waiting list.

“These veterans were and continue to be at risk of being forgotten or lost,” the report says, adding they may never obtain an appointment. “A direct consequence of not appropriately placing veterans on EWLs (electronic waiting lists) is that the Phoenix HCS leadership significantly understated the time new patients waited for their primary care appointment in their FY 2013 performance appraisal accomplishments, which is one of the factors considered for awards and salary increases.”

The report prompted U.S. Representative Jeff Miller (R-FL), the chairman of the House Veterans Affairs Committee, to immediately call for Shinseki’s resignation.

Miller said the report confirmed “beyond a shadow of a doubt what was becoming more obvious by the day: Wait time schemes and data manipulation are systemic throughout VA and are putting veterans at risk in Phoenix and across the country.”

“VA needs a leader who will take swift and decisive action to discipline employees responsible for mismanagement, negligence and corruption that harms veterans while taking bold steps to replace the department’s culture of complacency with a climate of accountability,” Miller said in a statement. “Shinseki has proved time and again he is not that leader. That’s why it’s time for him to go.”

Photo: U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs via Flickr
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How A Lot Of Money Helped Vault A Pennsylvania Primary Candidate To The Top

How A Lot Of Money Helped Vault A Pennsylvania Primary Candidate To The Top

By Alana Semuels, Los Angeles Times

There are a host of primaries on Tuesday in states across the country, but for one that shows just how effective money can be in politics, look no further than Pennsylvania.

Four Democrats are competing to run against Republican Governor Tom Corbett, widely thought to be one of the most vulnerable incumbents in the country this election year. Voters are unhappy with Corbett because of cuts to education funding, and because of the state’s moribund economy.

If voters don’t like how Corbett has handled the state, Democrats have an answer for how they would change things. Trouble is, most of the positions of the four Democratic candidates on the issues are the same. They all want more education spending, they all want a severance tax on the natural gas industry, they all want more environmental regulations on the industry.

How to differentiate between them, then? The answer, of course, is money.

Candidate Tom Wolf, a virtual unknown in the race, has given himself $10 million to spend on the race, in addition to raising $4.5 million more. He did an initial TV buy in late January and early February, airing 1,800 TV commercials in four markets. He was initially the only candidate on the air.

“They were maybe the best introductory commercials of a candidate in modern Pennsylvania history,” said G. Terry Madonna, a pollster at Franklin and Marshall College in Pennsylvania. “They were very, very well done, and they shocked the political world because they were so effective.”

Wolf’s ads highlighted his personal biography: He has a Ph.D. from MIT, served in the Peace Corps and ran his family’s large business.

Wolf’s polling numbers skyrocketed after the initial ads. Two surveys by Republican firm Harper Polling firm show the jump — a November 2013 poll had Wolf at 5 percent, putting him in fourth place among Democrats. After Wolf’s ads began to hit the airwaves, that equation changed completely. In February, Wolf was at 40 percent, running far above three other candidates.

Little has changed since then, though the Democratic challengers have tried to differentiate themselves and bring down Wolf at the same time. Wolf has spent an estimated $1 million a week on television ads.

“He built this huge lead and he’s maintained it despite repeated efforts to bring him down,” Madonna said.

Wolf is up against state treasurer Rob McCord, who spent nearly $8 million on his campaign; U.S. Rep. Allyson Schwartz, who has spent $7.5 million of the $8.8 million she’s raised; and former state environmental protection secretary Katie McGinty, who has spent about $500,000.

Of course, money doesn’t always work. Linda McMahon, a Connecticut Republican, spent about $100 million of her own money in 2010 and 2012 trying to win a race for U.S. Senate. She was not elected either time, giving her a kinship with California’s Meg Whitman, who spent $144 million of her own money — and $33 million raised from others — in her unsuccessful bid for governor in 2010.

Photo via Wikimedia Commons