Brickbat: Do No Harm

The family of 80-year-old Shedrick Morris is angry that the Michael E. DeBakey Veterans Affairs Medical Center released him sometime between 2 a.m. and 3 a.m. without telling them. Morris, who relatives say has memory loss, was taken to the hospital by ambulance just a few hours earlier after complaining of chest pain. Relatives say police later found him wandering off of hospital property. A hospital spokesman says they thought he had a ride waiting on him.

Comments

[UnCivilServant]

"You've had your appointment, now scram" - VA Nurse.

[Ted S.]

Only one comment so far? Are the server squirrels acting up again?

[Ted S.]

Single-payer health care for the win.

[Doctor Whom]

My progressive acquaintances haven't yet explained how this is the fault of market failure, but I have faith that they are working on it.

[datcv]

Did you know they subject the VA to a budget and cost controls! That's why the free market fails. If we spend INFINITE MONEY then none of this would have happened!

[Brett L]

Who needs death panels when we can just turn the mentally degraded out into the night?

[pan fried wylie]

There was a doctor on the floor to discharge him in the middle of the night? Now THAT'S Service!

[pan fried wylie]

A hospital spokesman says they thought he had a ride waiting on him.

Annecdata: My hospital stays, my ride home was required to check in at the nurses station, to prove there was actually someone there to get me. Something about liability I think. Like, not being liable for me wandering off in a daze.

Of course, why would an All Glorious Government Medical Facility need to worry about liability? Fuck You, That's Why.

[Drake]

Exactly, nothing says "complete indifference" like a unionized mid-level government job.

[Knarf the Yenrabian]

A class-action suit against the VA for about half its annual budget might cause this behavior to change.

If my calculations are correct, this essential court case should occur shortly after the class-action suit for preventable deaths caused by shoddy federal highways and just before pigs fly.

[UnCivilServant]

just before pigs fly.

But there are already police helicopters. They've been around for decades.

[Knarf the Yenrabian]

Well done.

[Brian D]

Look, the VA is only getting $163.9 billion next year, and their budget as merely doubled over the past decade. What do you people expect, competence??

[invisible furry hand]

Just to balance this out, here's a happy story about a vet on the run

[UnCivilServant]

I couldn't figure out why they'd said 'no' in the first place. I mean, he was clearly capable of making it there and back again on his own.

[invisible furry hand]

Another story said they tried and failed to get him on an official tour, so he said "fuck it" and went rogue. The staff on the ferry and some fellow travellers decided to look after him. True to form, when he got to Normandy he busted through the official lines despite not having a security pass.

And that, kiddies, is how they won the Second World War.

[Brett L]

I love this bloke. All his pictures are of him with a woman a quarter of his age on each arm. I hope to have his style and verve when I reach his age.

[Drake]

This guy is awesome.

[Rufus J. Firefly]

You have to admit, the vets from the Great Wars were a special breed.

[Ivan Pike]

You have to admit, the vets from the Great Wars were a special breed.

That they were. But what the hell happened to their kids?

[Swiss Servator, CH yeah!]

AHEM!

[Ivan Pike]

SS, I don't mean to lump everyone of that generation (I was born in 1960) together, but I think as a generation, they left the nation worse off than when they got it.

SLD applies if that works for you.

[Gene]

Television.

[Drake]

Government education / indoctrination, prosperity, resentment at hearing how awesome their parents were.

[mkreitler]

What the hell happened to their kids?

Public schooling -- which is working exactly as intended.

[Rich]

"He's a *grown man*! What the hell do you want from us?!"

[Cdr Lytton]

Was this his ride?

http://theangrysquirrelblog.fi.....755059.jpg