{"id":30967,"date":"2017-06-07T11:46:42","date_gmt":"2017-06-07T15:46:42","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.rightwinggranny.com\/?p=30967"},"modified":"2017-06-07T11:46:42","modified_gmt":"2017-06-07T15:46:42","slug":"revising-the-rules-of-government","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rightwinggranny.com\/?p=30967","title":{"rendered":"Revising The Rules Of Government"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.foxnews.com\/politics\/2017\/06\/06\/senate-oks-bill-to-make-firing-employees-easier-for-va.html\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Fox News<\/a> reported yesterday that the <a class=\"zem_slink\" title=\"United States Senate\" href=\"http:\/\/maps.google.com\/maps?ll=38.8905555556,-77.0088888889&amp;spn=0.01,0.01&amp;q=38.8905555556,-77.0088888889 (United%20States%20Senate)&amp;t=h\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"geolocation noopener noreferrer\">Senate<\/a> has passed a bill to make it easier to fire <a class=\"zem_slink\" title=\"Employment\" href=\"http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Employment\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"wikipedia noopener noreferrer\">employees<\/a> of the <a class=\"zem_slink\" title=\"United States Department of Veterans Affairs\" href=\"http:\/\/maps.google.com\/maps?ll=38.9009027778,-77.0348222222&amp;spn=0.01,0.01&amp;q=38.9009027778,-77.0348222222 (United%20States%20Department%20of%20Veterans%20Affairs)&amp;t=h\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"geolocation noopener noreferrer\">Veterans Administration<\/a> (VA). The bill is the result of complaints of long waiting times and the fact that the VA is simply not doing a good job of caring for many of our veterans. Part of that is due to the aging of the <a class=\"zem_slink\" title=\"Vietnam veteran\" href=\"http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Vietnam_veteran\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"wikipedia noopener noreferrer\">Vietnam veterans<\/a> and their health problems, part of it is due to the large numbers of wounded veterans returning from war in the <a class=\"zem_slink\" title=\"Middle East\" href=\"http:\/\/maps.google.com\/maps?ll=29.0,41.0&amp;spn=1.0,1.0&amp;q=29.0,41.0 (Middle%20East)&amp;t=h\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"geolocation noopener noreferrer\">Middle East<\/a>, and part of the problem is morale and efficiency among VA employees.<\/p>\n<p>The article reports:<\/p>\n<p style=\"padding-left: 30px;\"><strong>The bipartisan measure passed by <a class=\"zem_slink\" title=\"Voice vote\" href=\"http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Voice_vote\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"wikipedia noopener noreferrer\">voice vote<\/a>. It comes more than three years after a 2014 scandal at the Phoenix <a class=\"zem_slink\" title=\"Veterans Health Administration\" href=\"http:\/\/web.archive.org\/web\/20060221031414\/http:\/\/www1.va.gov:80\/health\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"homepage noopener noreferrer\">VA medical center<\/a>, where some veterans died while waiting months for appointments. VA employees created secret lists to cover up delays.<\/strong><\/p>\n<p style=\"padding-left: 30px;\"><strong>The bill would lower the burden of proof needed to fire employees \u2014 from a &#8220;preponderance&#8221; to &#8220;substantial evidence,&#8221; allowing a dismissal even if most evidence is in a worker&#8217;s favor.<\/strong><\/p>\n<p style=\"padding-left: 30px;\"><strong>The <a class=\"zem_slink\" title=\"American Federation of Government Employees\" href=\"http:\/\/www.afge.org\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"homepage noopener noreferrer\">American Federation of Government Employees<\/a>, the largest federal employee union, opposed the bill. But the measure was viewed as more in balance with workers&#8217; rights than a version passed by the House in March, mostly along party lines. The <a class=\"zem_slink\" title=\"Bill (law)\" href=\"http:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Bill_%28law%29\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"wikipedia noopener noreferrer\">Senate bill<\/a> calls for a longer appeal process than the House&#8217;s version \u2014 180 days vs. 45 days \u2014 though workers would not be paid during that appeal. VA executives also would be held to a tougher standard than rank-and-file employees.<\/strong><\/p>\n<p style=\"padding-left: 30px;\"><strong>The bill now goes back to the House, where the revisions are expected to be approved.<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>The changes in the rules for firing employees need to take place in all areas of government. The bureaucracy of government has become bloated and inefficient. If we are ever going to get federal spending under control, we need to look at the size and efficiency of government. Changing the rules for firing employees who are not performing is a good place to start.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Fox News reported yesterday that the Senate has passed a bill to make it easier to fire employees of the Veterans Administration (VA). The bill is the result of complaints of long waiting times and the fact that the VA &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/www.rightwinggranny.com\/?p=30967\">Continue reading <span class=\"meta-nav\">&rarr;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[10880,711,9550],"class_list":["post-30967","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-american-federation-of-government-employees","tag-senate","tag-veterans-administration"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rightwinggranny.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30967","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rightwinggranny.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rightwinggranny.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rightwinggranny.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rightwinggranny.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=30967"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.rightwinggranny.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30967\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":30968,"href":"https:\/\/www.rightwinggranny.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30967\/revisions\/30968"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rightwinggranny.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=30967"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rightwinggranny.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=30967"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rightwinggranny.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=30967"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}