Eric the Red-Faced

With proof of long waits for service at Department of Veterans Affairs hospitals and fudged numbers to make the care at said hospitals look better than it actually was,  Veterans Affairs Secretary Eric Shinseki resigned after delivering a report to President Obama that spelled out just how bad the problems at the VA are - apparently, they were far, far worse than Shinseki himself realized.  He probably did the right thing by quitting, having already been at the helm of the VA for five years and not been more in the loop.  This, however, this is not the end of the affair, and it isn't even the beginning.

Here's the problem.  Republicans are vowing to hold Obama's feet to the fire - they'd prefer to hold his feet in the fire - for as long as it takes to untangle the VA mess.  It's not going to be that simple.  Problems at the VA go back years, even decades, and a top-to-bottom restructuring of the agency under a new Veterans Affairs secretary isn't going to happen in a few months.  I heard on the news that General Omar Bradley testified before Congress back in 1956 about how the agency, then called the Veterans Administration and then a mere 26 years old, was a mess and needed to be completely reformed.  Now, in 2014 - 26 years after the VA was upgraded to Cabinet-level status - it's still a mess.  Don't expect a big cleanup anytime soon. :-(