Editor’s note: Abbreviated News Roundup due to travel this week. We’ll hit it deep and hard next week.—BK
The VA Really Doesn’t Want to Hire You, Gross Veterans:
Despite a long-running government-wide push to hire veterans, only 13 percent of the top officials managing Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) healthcare system medical facilities are veterans and only two of those facilities are run by doctors who served in the military, according to an analysis by The Daily Caller News Foundation.
TheDCNF analysis examined the biographies of the 300 top employees who run VA’s 75 medical centers and regional offices, including directors, chiefs of staff and associate and assistant directors. (See interactive database below and here.) The original Veterans Preference Act in federal employment became law in 1944.
The Daily Caller News Foundation did a fantastic investigation about the makeup of the people who run the VA. Go over there to see all of the relevant documentation. I’ve taken the liberty of excerpting some of the better bits here.
Viewing the 13 percent figure, it’s almost as if the VA wants to ensure that, if veterans do work for the agency, they don’t have the power to make changes.
Retired Navy Seal officer Gilberto Serrano, for example, told TheDCNF he applied for “at least 20” jobs at the VA. He has two master’s degrees, a background in finance at major corporations, and spent three years volunteering doing financial analyses for the Puerto Rico VA.
But VA turned him down for an assistant director job and every other full-time job down to the clerk level.
“When I would apply for something as simple as clerk, they would say I didn’t qualify, without saying why,” Serrano told TheDCNF.
Yes, they fear that you are a guy who might actually do his job, Serrano. What kind of asshole takes a look at that resume, and says, “Nah, we’re good.” Unbelievable.
When they do occasionally come under pressure to boost their veterans hiring numbers, VA’s highly-paid administrators sometimes only hired returning heroes for menial jobs like cleaning toilets.
They don’t want you savages running anything, but clean the shitters? Right this way.
Meanwhile, VA has hired thousands more administrators, including some whose jobs are allegedly to find out what veterans want by conducting surveys and planning “listening meetings.” Such meetings and surveys wouldn’t be needed if VA hired more veterans in more decision-making roles.
It gets better. Not only are they not giving the jobs to the veterans, they’re hiring people whose health-care qualifications are, uh, DUBIOUS:
But TheDCNF analysis made clear that few of VA’s current bosses are irreplaceable. Only six directors and three associate directors are medical doctors. Associate and assistant directors commonly have master’s degrees in public health, public administration or business, but their degrees were often obtained after the employee had been with VA for many years.
The associate director of the West Texas VA Health Care System, Manuel M. Davila, for example, never attended classes in a brick and mortar college, instead receiving his degrees from an online institution.
Heh. So Davila got his degree at some online diploma mill. Sounds legit. And when they get called on their bullshit, “WE HIRE VETERANS” propaganda, they hurriedly put together some sham job fair where they mass-hire janitors.
The Puerto Rico VA, after routinely turning away vets for individual jobs as they opened up, made a show of upping its stats by hiring 50 vets in one day — all of them at the GS-4 level, near the bottom of the federal employment scale that ranges up to GS-15.
Some highly qualified veterans were reduced to taking menial jobs just to survive:
“Even Ph.D.s” were among those veterans given bottom-of-the-barrel jobs, which they accepted due to Puerto Rico’s imploding economy, said Serrano, who is now a doctoral candidate. Once they accepted the low-level jobs, the newly hired veterans were prevented by federal personnel rules from applying for higher positions for a time. The Puerto Rico VA did not respond to TheDCNF’s request for comment.
Remember, the Church of Diversity is like a religious cult with government/academia. So, I’M SURE they paid careful attention to who they were hiring, right?
The Office of Personnel Management (OPM) systematically tracks ethnicity in the civil service, breaking it down by every level and job type within each agency and publishing stats every quarter. But the only data OPM has published recently on veterans is a 2014 document with little detail. OPM did not respond when asked for more extensive data on veterans in the civil service workforce.
All kinds of great tables and graphs at the link. The VA continues to be terrible.
Investigation Continues Into SOF Deaths:
A Republican congressman who previously served as a Navy SEAL commander said Thursday that bureaucratic red tape might have delayed a rescue force and prevented close air support from adequately helping an Army Special Forces team during a firefight in southern Afghanistan this week in which one American was killed.
Rep. Ryan Zinke (R-Mont.), questioned if the rules of engagement in Afghanistan played a role in limiting the support troops on the ground received. They remain “so restrictive that when a unit is pinned down available assets are not given the latitude to respond in a timely manner and it appears in this case that it cost lives,” Zinke said in an interview.
Army Staff Sgt. Matthew Q. McClintock, 30, of Des Moines, Wash., was killed Tuesday when his team, along with a detachment of Afghan commandos came under small arms fire. In the ensuing battle, an Army HH-60 helicopter was damaged, forcing it to the ground, while another was waved off because of heavy enemy fire. Two other U.S. soldiers were wounded as were an unknown number of Afghan troops.
SOFREP was all over this before anyone else. Go read Jack’s story about it and get caught up. We also have more detail about Zinke’s inquiry right here. What a waste.
Idiot Army CID Special Agent Pulls Out Gun, Penis:
FORT BELVOIR, Va. — A man arrested just before Christmas for allegedly pulling out his gun at a restaurant because he didn’t like the bill is a special agent for the U.S. Army’s Criminal Investigation Division.
Curtiss Davis is also accused of exposing himself to a female employee and demanding a sex act.
Davis is now the subject of a criminal investigation, not the investigator. Fairfax County Police have charged the federal agent with three felonies and a misdemeanor after an alleged incident inside this Lorton restaurant.
According to police, on Dec. 22nd, Davis allegedly exposed himself to a 21-year-old employee and asked her to perform a sex act.
I always wish they would say specifically what the “sex act” was. Touching? Stroking? Butt stuff? I want to know, dammit.
Police say he later became upset about his bill, pulled out a gun and confronted the woman and a 31-year-old coworker. Davis allegedly demanded that the two women lower his bill. The victims complied. Davis paid the new amount and left. Fairfax County Police charged him with abduction, extortion, exposure, and attempted forcible sodomy.
CO of Pacific Fleet Relieved for Looking at Porn at Work:
The San Diego-based commanding officer of Pacific Fleet’s carrier strike group training command has been relieved following allegations that he used his government computer to access pornography.
Rear Adm. Rick Williams was fired by 3rd Fleet boss Vice Adm. Nora Tyson on Friday “based on the initial findings of an ongoing investigation into the alleged misuse of government computer equipment,” the Navy said in a release.
During a routine inspection, Williams was found to have looked at pornographic images on his government computer, violating Navy rules, said a Navy source familiar with the incident. The misuse of the computer did not involve any classified material and the investigation is ongoing, the source added.
“They have enough information to say it wasn’t just a mistake,” the source said. “It was extensive enough that they knew it was not just an error.”
In other words, it was a lot. A whole lot of porn.
BURNS, Ore. — The personal bodyguard of armed activist Ammon Bundy and his father Cliven Bundy has lied about service in the U.S. Marine Corps, according to a report in the Daily Mail.
The British newspaper reported that it confirmed from the Marine Corps that Brian Cavalier, 44, never served in any capacity.
Cavalier has openly talked about being in the Marines and serving in Iraq and Afghanistan. He wears a shemagh scarf often worn by veterans who served in the Middle East.
Confronted at the Malheur Wildlife Refuge about the discrepancy, Cavalier was described by the newspaper as “nervous and the bravado of previous days vanished.”He asked the Daily Mail for its source. When told it was the Marine Corps, he said “That’s unfortunate they would say that. It is what it is.”
I freaking love that.
“TELL ME YOUR SOURCE!!!”
“Uh… the Marines.”
“That’s unfortunate.”
LOLOLOL. Get the hell out of here and take your Wal-Mart shemagh and huge beer gut with you.
Asked to respond to how activists might react with disappointment about the revelation, he said “Hey, you’ve got a job to do and I’ve got a job to do.”
What does that even mean?
Navy Wife Gave a Shitload of HJs:
HONOLULU — A woman who came from a poor family in Thailand became a prostitute in Hawaii through working in the massage industry, her defense attorney said at her sentencing Thursday.
Khemwika Ernst “worked very hard,” her attorney, Catherine Gutierrez, said. “Unfortunately the trade that she chose was not legal.”
U.S. District Judge Susan Oki Mollway said she took those circumstances — along with her husband’s suicide — into account when sentencing her to six months in federal prison.
In a deal with prosecutors, Ernst pleaded guilty to a conspiracy charge and filing false tax returns.
More than $525,000 (!!!) can be traced to her working as a prostitute from 2008 to 2014, prosecutors said.
Five hundred large, folks. That’s a shitload of hot oil massages with the bonus ending. Damn, if you’re telling me I could make five hundie thou, I’m pretty much ready to start oiling up dudes myself. Holy crap.
According to her plea agreement, she deposited cash into a bank account she shared with her husband. When the bank questioned the large deposits, she started mailing cash to her husband or father-in-law in New Jersey. The couple used some of the money to buy a house in Newton, New Jersey. No mortgage or financing was used to purchase the home for $390,000, her plea agreement said.
Michael Ernst shot and killed himself in New Jersey a month after he and his wife were indicted, according to court records.
It could spell the end of time-honored Navy titles like fireman and seaman.
The Navy secretary has ordered the service to review all job titles and consider removing any reference to “man” in them, a move that could force name-changes to nearly two dozen specialties, from airman to yeoman. Navy Secretary Ray Mabus ordered the scrub as the force prepares to open the last remaining billets to women sailors in Marine ground combat elements and the Navy SEALs.
“Lastly, as we achieve full integration of the force … this is an opportunity to update the position titles and descriptions themselves to demonstrate through this language that women are included in these positions,” Mabus wrote, according to sources who quoted directly from the letter. “Ensure they are gender-integrated as well, removing “man” from their titles, and provide a report to me as soon as is practicable and no later than April 1, 2016.”
Religious Cult Leader/Navy Secretary Ray Mabus Continues Fanatical Quest:
The United States Marine Corps, it seems, won’t go down without a fight on fully integrating women.
As the only branch to air its opposition to the Pentagon’s plan to allow women into even combat jobs such as infantry, the Marines have seemingly found themselves in a new chapter of the gender integration struggle: boot camp.
The Marine Corps, like the Army, Navy and Air Force, was required to submit to the Pentagon a detailed plan outlining how they would fully integrate the genders, with the goal of executing those plans no later than April 1. But the Marines, the only service that segregates men and women in basic training, turned in a plan that left out any changes relating to boot camp, likely because there was no explicit directive for them to do so. Additionally, a set of guidelines released with Pentagon’s directives indicated that the branches would use existing training procedures when implementing the changes.
So the Marines are being nudged to do more.
Earlier this month, Secretary of the Navy Ray Mabus sent a memo to Gen. Robert B. Neller, the commandant of the Marine Corps, notifying him that the Marines had 15 days to submit a detailed plan that would address gender integration in basic training.
“Officer and enlisted basic training is the first opportunity to develop the cohesion needed for full integration of women in the Armed Forces,” said a senior defense official with knowledge of the situation. “Secretary Mabus has directed the Marine Corps to submit a plan to integrate training during this critical milestone in the development of new Marines.”
Lt. Col. Eric Dent, Neller’s spokesman, said the Marines submitted their gender integration plan on Dec. 17 and received additional memos regarding boot camp integration dated Jan 1 shortly after.
Not everyone was happy with the fanatic. A Marine officer, captain, and counterintelligence officer, Eric Kirsch, absolutely nuked Mabus on a social media post that went viral:
“The Navy secretary served for 24 months (1971-1972) in a non-combat role within the United States Navy prior to attending Harvard Law School.
He issued his memo request on 1 JAN and expects a detailed plan to be delivered no later than 15 JAN, erasing 241 years in 14 days, the United States Marine Corps, compliant to lawful order, obedient and faithful, always, is scrambling to dismantle title, as if it were an gangrenous arbitrary item and they have 5 further business days in which to do it.”
Zing. Boy, they sure can get shit done in a hurry when they want to, can’t they? You know, I’m starting to change my mind on this. I say hurry up and send a bunch of chicks through infantry school. Push them through regardless of ability. I mean, it’s all about the vagina, right? Promptly send them in the Helmand Province and start patrolling. Let’s see how they do. Maybe when the inevitable carnage takes place, the fanatics will re-examine things. Probably not, but maybe.
Naked Florida Chick Fights Off Police by Peeing on Them:
DAYTONA BEACH — A mother is facing charges after discarding her child and fighting and urinating on the officers who arrested her, police said.
Jennifer Cael, 34, left her child with strangers Thursday evening in the lobby of the Windsor Apartments and said she didn’t want her child anymore and didn’t care if the police were contacted, according to a Daytona Beach police charging affidavit.
When police arrived shortly after 6:30 p.m. and were unable to find Cael at her apartment, other residents suggested Cael was intoxicated and may be at the apartment of another resident, who was described as the woman’s “sugar daddy,” according to the report.
After police made entry into the apartment of the “sugar daddy,” a nude and intoxicated Cael aggressively approached one of the officers and punched one in the chest, according to the report. Cael continued being aggressive as the officers were attempting to take her into custody and urinated on them when they tried to place her in handcuffs.
We’ll get back to it next week. @BKactual on Twitter.
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