A funny thing happened over at the Aurora VA construction site this week, a top Obama administration made the most honest statements we’ve ever heard from a government official.
That $1.1 billion cost overrun? Yeah, we’re NEVER going to know where that money went, confessed Sloan Gibson, the deputy secretary of the VA.
Congress has demanded an accounting of the wasted funds, and so have the veterans who are the victims of this fraud.
Not going to happen, Gibson said.
He defended his department’s accountability, noting that two senior executives retired amid questions from an agency-appointed investigative board and other top officials involved in the Aurora project had retired before the investigation.
“None were removed,” however, he said.
Gibson was asked if he felt the VA’s response to the Aurora debacle would satisfy congressional critics.
“The honest answer is no,” he said. “They want to see people fired.”
See? We told you. Honest answer. In truth, we expected to win the lottery and use it for a vacation on the moon before anyone at the agency was held accountable.
Speaking of which … the inspector general from the VA has suddenly retired.
Correction, make that acting Inspector General Richard Griffin – he was never even confirmed to the post by the U.S. Senate during his 18 months at the helm.
Seems Griffin was the target of internal VA whistleblowers, that rightly complained he had done “little to uncover fraud and abuse in the agency,” said the Military Times.
Good riddance, say we.
U.S. Rep. Mike Coffman has led the Colorado delegation in pressuring the administration to finish the project (which Gibson assured during his visit this week would happen), and had this to say about the IG’s retirement:
“I lost all trust in Richard Griffin’s ability to oversee the VA. For an agency mired in bureaucratic incompetence and corruption, the leadership at the VA needs a strong and independent Inspector General to hold them accountable.”
We’re disgusted that the VA refuses to hold anyone accountable for the Aurora mess, as well as the wait list scandal.
It’s obvious that we’ll have to wait on an entirely new administration, and a Republican one at that, to clean house at that agency.