one on the va. the president said that some of these problems did not surface to the level where shinseki was aware of it, that these things were troubles that they were hearing while traveling around the country and that we need to see how to get information about this since they are not working. the ig's report this week noted that there has been 18 reports since 2005 that have gone to the va, that have gone through committees of congress, including the one the president sat on when he was in the senate. how can we say that this was not risen to the level that it is not -- >> i think secretary shinseki both powerfully this morning about some of these issues. i think the nature of the problem here that has been identified by the ig, by some of the reporting on this, and by secretary shinseki's preliminary report is that there were efforts undertaken to misrepresent how long the waiting times were. so that the information that was being provided to headquarters, if you will, here in washington was no

the va. the cause that veterans have died because of the waiting list is still open. hopefully it will be answered in the final report though not in this interim report. even if the secretary didn't know about this in advance, and i don't believe he did, but they should not have happened on his watch. success in the military does want automatically translate into the success in all realms. we have a failure of leadership. funding isn't the issue. the issue is hands off leadership. even the secretary's response to the ig investigation was a failure. he promised to triage the 17,000 ret veterans. they should not be triaged they should be seen immediately. the average wait time is four months for a primary care visit and we know of similar stories emerging else where. why are thousands of veterans waiting for months when there is a system in place to treat these men and women in the private sector using fee bases? if the care isn't available at the va they can go to any hospital or clinic. why i

we are not here to analyze a poll that was taken about the va. but we are here rather to look at the investigations that have already taken place, and addressed certain deficiencies within the veterans system that no action was taken on, or at least not corrective action. in fiscal year 2013, the reported 93% of specialty primary-care appointments and 95% of mental health appointments were made within 14 days of the patients or providers desired date. at first glance, these numbers appear to demonstrate that veterans are receiving the care they want and when they want it. however, we know this is not the case. i think if va had asked hard questions regarding these statistics, we would not be here today discussing recent allegations surrounding many va facilities. more specifically, we are here to discuss when senior leadership in the department became aware that local va employees were manipulating wait times to show that veterans do not wait at all for care. it seems that every day there are new allegations regarding inappropriate scheduling prac

the problems in the va are very deep. not to begin with saying the appointment system has to be completely revamped. and then from the scheduling, it goes into the actual delivery of the care. it is somebody that has to have the understanding of the complete process and has dealt with these kinds of situations before. >> thank you for being here today. >> thank you very much. >>> up next, a congresswoman with a very personal connection to the va story. not only is she now representing vets who are struggling, she was also a vr nurse for more than a decade. if you have moderate to severe rheumatoid arthritis, like me, and you're talking to your rheumatologist about a biologic... this is humira. this is humira helping to relieve my pain. this is humira helping me lay the groundwork. this is humira helping to protect my joints from further damage. doctors have been prescribing humira for ten years. humira works by targeting and helping to block a specific source of inflammation that contributes to ra symptoms. humira is prove

if you look at the va objecti objectively a fairly, newt, what you find out, according to the veterans, themselves, from patient satisfaction surveys, they think va health care is pretty food. let me finish. dean was at the hear with me. we asked all the veterans organizations. we said, once you access, once you access va health care, is the care good? what they said is it was good to excellent. the problem that we're dealing with, which is a serious problem, is waiting lists, is access. >> well, two things. first of all, among younger veterans, iraq veterans and afghanistan veterans, i think 59% say it's bad to poor. only 38% say that it's excellent or good. so there's a big difference generationally. second, you've had cases now where you have people who couldn't get a colonoscopy, not a problem of getting registered, and they die. isn't anybody worried about that? >> worried about it? it's a tragedy. it's a tragedy. who could argue that? people have died because of bad care within the va, but newt, this is a scientific american article of a year ago. you know what it says? in hospit

he was blind sided by problems at the va. >> the reporting problems inside the va did not surface to the level where rick was aware of i.t. or we were able to -- it our we were able to see it. >> despite that claim, wait -- times have been documented over the last 15 years. problems like those faced by air force veteran benjamin jones. >> including the are veterans health in danger because the longer they wait you never know when the lord could take them home. >> reporter: it was veterans like jones that motivated shinseki to step down. addressing a group earlier today he said he was deceived by a lack of integrity within his own department. before meeting the president shinseki spoke on an issue where he has had success, fighting homelessness by veterans. addressing what he calls the el fant in thelephant in the room,t defend it. >> i will not defend it because it is indefensible. >> confirmed him for a lower level position back in february, here is an individual like shinseki, a graduate of west point but a lot of:00 in the army as an per -- time in the army but heading up the uso b

because i don't think the va needs to have thousands of new people. how can we work with the community that is already doing it. it's not just that they are homeless, but they need comprehensive care. so how can we work closely to provide the veterans with what they need. it's not just a list by making sure that they get the services that they need. >> congresswoman, the va has been holding summits for the past two years out of the best of my knowledge, where we involve community providers in understanding what her mental health needs are and engaging them in participating in the mental health care. >> you want to speak to that? >> additionally i would just echo much of what you saw the last week where we have the veterans service organizations make statements and the simple truth is that the va is about health care provider for veterans and in fact they specialize the services incomparable resources in one of the most senior health care systems, the commander of the american legion made it the private care to help get money more quickly, saying that w

>> that's what i want somebody at the va focused on. not how are they getting second guessed, and speculation about their futures and so forth and so on. and that's what rick agreed to as well. [ audio difficulties ] with icepackion in the hospital with a really bad headache. >> it was more than a month before she felt normal again. >> whether we don't know is for some individuals there is a more lasting effect of these injuries. >> the president announced more than $80 million in budget witness much to support that critical research, including $30 million for the most comprehensive clinical city by the ncaa and defense department into concussion and head impact exposure. another $16 million project by the national institutes of health studying the chronic impacts of repetitive concussion and supporting youth sport safety projects. the nfl agreed to pay more than $760 million to settle concussion claims brought against it by former players. that settlement still awaits a judge's approval. is it enough to change the pattern and behavior o

and bigger investment in the va than just about any other va secretary. cut veteran homelessness by 24%. brought in folks exposed to agent orange waiting for decades to get the services and benefits they earned. making sure post-traumatic dress disorder and traumatic brain injury was dealt with and facilities for our women vets who weren't receiving the kind of specialized services that they needed. he's been a championship of our veterans and where there's problems he's been ready and willing to get in and fix them. with the disability backlog that as a consequence of the agent orange veterans as well as making it easier to apply for post-traumatic stress disorder disability claims, when it spiked, he went after it in a systematic way and we cut it by 50% over the course of the last year or so. he's not adverse to admitting where there's a problem and going after it. we occupy not just an environment that calls for management fixes. we've also got to deal with congress and you guys and judgment that he could not carry out the next stages of reform without

the va reports to him. he ought to have the same kind of interest in this that he did in the obamacare website and that obamacare law in general. make it a top priority, shape these people up. it doesn't make any difference that he just heard about phoenix in april, we've known for years that the va backlog was enormous. i had the secretary of veterans administration in my office a year and a half ago on the same subject and other members have, as well. this has not to been a secret t va was not doing right by our veterans. >> and yet, it takes it to another level when there is specific warning or knowledge the numbers are being falsified. not only veterans waiting too long but data coming in from the va facilities is false, misrepresented and cannot be relied upon. no one can know without doing an audit how bad the situation is. you mentioned the republicans. according to the same reports now, nine recommendations arising from inspector general audits from 2005 to 2007 were not implemented by 2008. so both

it hit the va with a perfect storm. we not only got the vietnam vets ageing and needing care badly, we've got vets from the recent conflicts who we were able with the miracles of modern military medicine to keep them alive. they would have died in previous wars, but they require greater levels of care and what do we have? we're trying to treat them with a civil service that -- where we protect the bad actors, government union rules that protect bad actors, procurement rules that keep technology, administrative technology in the dark ages. i mean, one thing after another. i see general shinseki as in five years struggling to undo 50 years of under funding and neglect and he's the wrong guy to blame. >> when you talk about burprobl, they stopped it. the democrats and house voted for it, more control in terms of hiring and firing and democrats in the senate said no. your thoughts and response to what ralph peters said about this isn't general shinseki's fault. this has been endemic. what would you put at the helm of this tr

he's going to run the va on an interim basis. all of this, as the president begins the search for another va secretary. a huge move for sure. joining me now to digest all of what this means is the man in the middle of this. he broke the va scandal. cnn's senior investigative correspondent drew griffin, he's also joined by senior white house correspondent jim acosta, pentagon correspondent barbara starr, and jake tapper also joining us. drew griffin, it's why i come to work either day, because i work with people like you. this started with your work. this is a huge move today. the end of a secretary's rein. is it enough, is it going to fix the problem, and is there a future, according to all of those people you worked with who wanted to see a solution here? >> well, i don't think this solves the problem in any way. it solves the political crisis for the president. but i hope it doesn't remove the spotlight on the va. quite frankly, probably should have been 300 people whose heads rolled over at the va. these people, any of whom hav

number won the va is extraordinarily important. they are not getting the care that they deserve. i would hope in a we would never send our men and women into combat without proper equipment and proper planning. that's what we are doing to the almost 2 and a half million vets coming home to iraq and afghanistan. we don't have the systems in place, don't have the care in place and the funding in place. we have known about this for a decade. it is bipartisan failure on both sides. >> you voted for president obama. how do you think he is handling it? >> i don't know. it is hard from the seed of power. he has done a lot to help veterans. it has improved since he has been in office. i think the accountability needs to be placed on the right people. >> how about the issue of accountability? we had valve peters saying he defends shinseki. what do you think? >> i have to say when president obama had his press conference a few days ago i thought i was going to finally see some presidential leadership and he was going to say he had accepted s

tarantino. >> the va is underfunded. throwing money at the problem doesn't help a must have clear lines of accountability and reform for the things that are not working. >> i would agree with mr. tarantino. mr. weidman point out a lot of people are hired. ireland written testimony points out serious staffing shortages and the entire service. clearly people are not being hired there or there is a demonstrated need. you can be reallocation of resources that we believe by extension its even more need for additional resources. >> i agree with my two colleagues to marry if they just come in the va is underfunded. however, i would say first there should be infrastructure and systemic reviews and issues addressed and after that, after we are intelligent on where the funds will be allocated, then they should be funded via thank you. >> i would agree with her independent budget partners that we support the numbers they believe the va in its current form is underfunded. >> you guys are part of the independent budget, are you not qu

way of real reform happening at the va. they keep saying well it's because we need more money. well, we need more staff. that's not the case at all. it's them. they are the problem. they are the one who is are standing in the way of real reform and they are the ones who are not allowing things to happen. that's it. plain and simple. >> and wayne, you know, when you think about the va scandal, our veterans are dying on a wait list and whatnot and when you think about a union, unions typically aren't in a big rush to get the job done, are they? >> no and not only that eric. this was known about for a number of years. that's the part that's really startling. the president talked about it. he knew about it. he knew about it when he was running for president. he knew this kind of thing was going on and he did nothing about it. >> what about this union angle. we're shocked to find that 78% of all va workers are unionized. i mean, do we really -- do they really need to be unionized and is that part of the problem? is that why it's

the va system is a platonic ideal for those that support obamacare. but this is a perfect example of what happens when everyone has coverage but no one has care. the reality is we want the kind of system good for men for women for veterans, for civilians and that's a market based system that allows individual to have choice and markets respond to demand. >> john, right now, congresswoman pelosi is suggesting that the fix for the va is obamacare but, in fact, isn't obamacare an example of where we're going just like the va did? >> i think absolutely. for all the military's virtues it is a bureaucracy. it's not run by free marketsor price signals. it's no surprised that it's marked by rationing and bad health care outcomes. in the case of obamacare, the government is going to have a bigger role in how health care is apportioned. that's going to rob it of market signals and we're going to see the va large on the u.s. health care system and the lucky ones will get out of it. >> we're already starting to see it already in terms of rationing. you see with ma

so politically the tide of criticism against the va and the man running the va is politically scatterght now. practically the task of getting a handle on the scope of the va's problems, figuring out which of them is just failure and which of them is scandal and figuring out how to fix them regardless of whether it's just a problem or a scandal. that practical question, that's the one that's still quite open. joining us now is ed o'keefe, "washington post" congressional reporter who has followed events at the va for many years. mr. o'keefe, thanks for being with us. >> great to be with you, rachel. >> in terms of oversight of the va, this massive agency, second only in size to the defense department in terms of numbers of employees with these huge and deep responsibilities in the lives of our veterans, is congress very good at overseeing this agency? they seem to think they're better at overseeing veterans issues than they are on most. >> they are two aggressive agencies. they keep close tabs on these things. they've been moving legislation. and i think the fact that you've seen the le

and been compares the va -- >> is that insane. you cannot throw money at fraud. this place is broken from the top to the bottom. >> they have not touched on the most important point here, the demographics. we have a lot of soldiers that are getting old and we are flooding the system that is unable to deal with it. >> well, there is -- >> i am not doubting the fraud. >> but then that gives us back to something that others have been talking about, if you don't junk the va as we know it, do you look at privatized alternatives, something to cut the wait list down, because that's the problem people are dying and getting sicker because they have to wait for treatment. >> charlie, there is tremendous fraud in almost every medical endeavor. there is tremendous fraud in procurement during world war ii. there is a lot of fraud in everything. there is a lot of fraud in everything. >> no -- >> with all due respect, many years i have toured the va hospital, and -- >> that means you know everything about the va. >> do you work there? >> we all know people that work somewhere. >

it's taken months to get the va to do anything. he needed a procedure where they inject surgical cement into the back. >> do you agree with this doctor that says there's a secret list and do you think your husband was on it? >> yes, i do think my husband was on the secret list. >> you think your husband might have been the last person on that list because he died a month ago? >> he died a month ago. yep. he was probably the last person. >> that was fox's ainsley earhardt reporting. can our president fix our problem and can we trust that he will? memorial day, veterans who have faithly served, died on behalf of this country and those that are left waiting to die? >> president obama in the past said it was going to be a important for thing for him. will he? it's going to take a lot of money, time, commitment. i'm not sure he is willing to throw all that at it. it's interesting how all these things happen to him, these scandals happen to him and he has never really seen them coming. oh, yeah, look what happened to us, irs, fast and fur

the head of the va is out. put this guy in? don't laugh. many of you said montel williams i would about perfect for the job. he says no but he is here and brought a friend with him and you'll want to stick around. we have a couple of heroes on basic cable. ♪ here's a good one seattle... what did geico say to the mariner? we could save you a boatload! ♪ foghorn sounds loudly ♪ what's seattle's favorite noise? the puget sound! ♪ foghorn sounds loudly ♪ all right, never mind doesn't matter. this is a classic. what does an alien seamstress sew with? a space needle! ♪ foghorn sounds loudly continuously ♪ oh come off it captain! geico. fifteen minutes could save you fifteen percent or more on car insurance. at od, whatever business you're in, that's the business we're in. with premium service like one of the best on-time delivery records and a low claims ratio, we do whatever it takes to make your business our business. od. helping the world keep promises. [ girl ] my mom, she makes underwater fans that are powered by

so the va needs more resources. need more physicians more than anything else and that is what has to be addressed. the difference between the affordable care act and the va is the affordable care act provides services through private insurance companies and the physicians affiliated with them. the va is a public sector medical system for veterans. big difference there. you can't compare the two. eric: what about the situation, we have a lot of people being pushed into medicaid and medicare and government-run system? >> the president promise, there was a big disaster at walter reed in 2007. big exposure of terrible care and this is right before president came into office. he promised he would fix the system, the va system, particularly and make it very effective, another broken promise. bottom line we don't know what obamacare is going to go except we didn't do anything to reduce the cost. i think at end of the day here you will overload systems already strained and i think at the end of the day, lots of problems. eri

supposedly that was resolved and the default was the va. we didn't know that was true, we have been told that was true. it would be wonderful to hear from the current national guard in that status to see if they will be seen at the va. >> we know that things are not changed at the phoenix facility. they they still use a post cart system, you don't get any confirmation of an appointment. we met with the administration of the va on a number of occasions. they assured us they were work on a call the center, we don't w if that happened. they said we will send you a post card. in daniel's case, he had been living in many a place for four years, and they had an incorrect address. >> not always incorrect, sometimes incorrect. >> this was not just for the health care aspect but the benefits aspect. he was getting a lot of trouble getting his disability benefits and this continued until the time of his death. >> howard summers and jean summers. also with us, sheila macvicar and we appreciate you sharing your pain. >> thank you. >> after the break: tr

the va hospital system is the model for socialized medicine and obamacare. w it wouldn't run well. we knew it would run like va hospitals. how about letting us all go to whatever doctor we want to and letting us go to whatever hospital we want instead of destroying health insurance in america, which is what obamacare does? instead we have a welfare system that we pay for through our insurance premiums, which makes obamacare the most regressive tax in world history. i pay the same health premium as michael bloomberg does and he has a lot more money than i do. there's a general welfare program. people are taxed according to their income. there's one central program. no here, i'm going to pay for everyone else's health care and their smoking cessation programs and their marital counseling, but it prevents me from going to the doctor i want to and the hospital i want to. those waivers are working. people are going to go to the voting booth this september without realizing that their health insurance is about to be made illegal. it is only the individual self-empl

he's content to sit back and let the va investigate the va. well, at least one democrat is smart enough to realize that's a bad idea. here's senator richard blumenthal at today's hearing. >> isn't there evidence here of criminal wrongdoing, that it's falsifying records, false statements to the federal government? that's a crime under the -- >> should be, yes. >> and wouldn't it be appropriate to ask for assistance from the federal bureau of investigation or some other similar agency? >> you'd think so. yeah. in the "crossfire" tonight, larry korb, jessie jane duff. they have not been shy in their investigations. they investigated media leaks, investigated sheriff joe arpaio, investigated e-book price fixing. they have no plans to investigate the deaths of 40 veterans. why does it seem like instead of holding people accountable, the administration wants to protect the people currently in place? >> well, first of all, as i mentioned before, the inspector general who, by the way, is independent of the secretary, he or she is confirmed by the cong

but congress created the va, funds the va and presumably provides oversite. all this time? that wraps things up for "the reid report." join us back here tomorrow at 2:00 p.m. eastern. "the cycle" is up next. >> hey, joy. >> we're going to start off with the latest on the va scandal. will secretary shinseki step down. as we know, the problem is much bigger than that. what happens next? we're going to spin about edward snowden in the big interview last night. does putting a human face on the human story we've been following so closely, does that change the way we think about him? leah thompson is talking about her new movie "ping-pong summer." i'll talk about time management. how we should spend time doing things important to us, like maybe watching t"the reid repo " report." >> of course. i can't wait to see that, indeed. "the cycle" comes up next. dad!! i missed you. i missed you, too. hi buddy. mom! awesome! dad!! i missed you. ♪ oh... daddy. chevrolet and its dealers proudly support military appreciation month. with the industry's best military purchase pro

and bigger investment in the va than just about any other va secretary. he cut veterans homelessness by 24%. brought in folks who had been exposed to agent orange who had been waiting for decades to get the services an benefits that they had earned. making sure that posttraumatic stress disorder and traumatic brain injury was dealt with in a serious way. making sure we had facilities for our womens vets who all too often were not receiving the kind of specialized services that they needed. so he has been a champion of our veterans and where there's props he has been ready and willing to bet in there and fix them. so, with the disability backlog, that had shot up, as a consequence of the admission of the agent orange veterans as well as making it easier to apply for posttraumatic stress disorder disability claims, when it spiked he went at it in a systemic way and we've now cut it by 50% over the course of the last year or so. he's not adverse to admitting where there's problem and going after it. but, it would occupy a, not just a an environment that calls

they can stay in the va and do that. but that will lighten the load, allow us to cut the bureaucracy and give veterans the help they need immediately. the old factory health care system doesn't work at the va and i think, as you noted, and i think it's a great column, it doesn't work on a lot of our complex problems today. >> it doesn't mean you need to throw away government. what you need to do is make it smarter and more efficient, which, by the way, reinventing government goes all the way back to bill clinton days. >> by the way, it does mean that government can't do some things. the more complex the problem is, the more personal it is, the more intimate the job is, the less washington can do it. you and i are not going to enforce justice alone. we're not going to fight wars alone by ourselves. some things washington has to do. got it. but look what it's done. republicans, democrats, even veterans themselves. we're not going to get somebody better than shinseki. everybody in this town knows that. they know he's a good

the va secretary has been called to the white house. many want to see what kind of change, if any, this will bring. we'll have that coming up. ♪ ♪ no matter what kind of business you own, at&t business experts can help keep it running... seamlessly. so you can get back to what you love. when everyone and everything works together, business just sings. we cannot let the fans down. don't worry! the united states postal service will get it there on time with priority mail flat rate shipping. our priority has always been saving the day. because our priority... amazing! ...is you! the amazing spider-man 2 delivered by the united states postal service. i'm d-a-v-e and i have copd. i'm k-a-t-e and i have copd, but i don't want my breathing problems to get in the way my volunteering. that's why i asked my doctor about b-r-e-o. once-daily breo ellipta helps increase airflow from the lungs for a full 24 hours. and breo helps reduce symptom flare-ups that last several days and require oral steroids, antibiotics, or hospital stay. breo is not for a

because there's price controls in the va. i don't think president obama is really mad about it because this is the precurser so obamacare it happens to be our greatest generation this time having to deal with the government and this is what i predict, i predict president obama, if he's really savvy, he's going to come out and he's going to say, okay, pass the supplemental budget to the va. he's goss to say i want it on my desk in 48 hours and the republicans are going to go gulp, and even republicans who vote for more money for the va is going to have democrats use it against them in the election. they are going to turn it around and make it an issue. >> it's not a money problem, bob. it's an incentive issue. obama will ask for more money and it won't do anything. >> we're all raising valid points. you can't throw money after a problem without having some infrastructure and an oversight and an investigation. >> money is not the answer. they get a bigger budget ever year. it's about incompetence. they warned about health care.g

the va center wouldn't do it. they only spent a couple 00 dre dre dread thousand to keep it all in house. because they have an incentive to it because the more money they do it. >> and colonoscopies actually go down. the solution here is to priva privatize these hospitals. the vas -- it will improve the private hospitals. as the evidence seems to suggest, veteran also have access to better civilian private care. >> you can can still subsidize veterans to give them the quality care, but you give them the access to -- particularly those who can't afford other private coverage are now denied. >> right, exactly. i think we should point out, there are dedicated people in the veteran's administration who do good work, but they themselves are the victim of a bureaucracy that they can't solve, unless we do something like this, those people are going to be forced. >> it's the incentive in a government run system. >> when we come back, what this week's primary results tell us about the mood of the republican electorate and t

so we went to his primary care physician in the va clinic. the doctor told him three times, and i heard it, that blood in your urine is nothing to be concerned about. we have always heard that once you see blood, you should go to the doctor immediately. >> right. >> so we finally got an appointment in october, october 17, 2011, to the northern va in prescott. >> how long was it from the time -- how much blood, first of all, was -- i guess he was urinating this blood. how much are we talking about? >> it was quite a bit. each time he would urinate, there would be like maybe a couple of blood clots, a quarter cup of blood. >> a quart, a half a gallon? >> maybe a half a cup of blood. >> so what happened in the end? >> well, he was diagnosed with bladder cancer at prescott va october 17th. the va behind us was not able to do the bladder removal surgery and bladder prostate and appendix be removed. they couldn't do that, so they started him on his chemotherapy and they approved the outsourcing to the mayo clinic to get the chemotherapy. they wanted

va hospitals. what do you know about that? >> i'm the primary investigator for the miami va health care system. it's three large counties in south florida. we have an accountability process with the medical center. any time that some of our equipment or some of the equipment within the medical center goes missing, it has to be reported to the police. i can say that i've done millions of dollars of investigations in a year's period. i mean, i've gone to a patient's home and recovered a piece of property that was around 45 to $50,000. it was left there after the patient moved. it was determined this property still belonged to the miami va. >> tell us exactly why you're coming forward now. >> because i've tried to many times to reach out to individuals and all i've done is basically talked to the wall. i haven't gotten anywhere with it. after this -- >> go ahead. >> after mr. cutter had expired on the fifth floor of the miami va, i brought up the fact that this is not being investigated properly. the police weren't notified immediately. there are so many different things that have occurred that are

citizens that are experiencing homelessness we've talked to community leaders and others including the va we'll be hearing from them shortly. our homeless people over the age of 50 in terms of homeless they fall between the cracks of the safety nets because they're not old enough to quality for medicare and they have a hard time vnltsd heirs in san francisco. for any the ssi is not enough to cover the cost of housing we've had a 9 percent drop of non-veterans receiving ssi. 35 percent even if homeless people didn't think they were eligible for assistance and that doubled in 2011. image e i believe there's a city for elderly we have to make sure their importing gold in ssi and there are a number of agencies that have taken steps to increase the enrollment and the life septembercy is between 42 and 52 without homes and we need to do more. in terms of veterans certainly hits home to me my father additional many veterans are placed at an increased risk for homelessness and drugs and alcohol are the main cause. the veterans are more likely to live on our streets compared to non-veterans vetera

but as he told me this morning, the va needs new leadership to address them. he does not want to be a distraction because his priority is to fix the problem and make sure our vets are getting the care they need. that was rick's judgment on behalf of his fellow veterans and i agree. >> joining me now is derrick bennett, msnbc analyst jack jacobs joining me by phone. first to you, is this the first step or right move? >> we certainly applaud the president for making an aggressive step in replacing general shinseki and applaud shinseki's five deck atds of service to this country. this is not about a single individual or one leader. it's a systemic problem across the veterans affairs that we call on the president to ensure he correct. this is not a scapegoating issue going to be wiped away once this is over. >> what do we know about his replacement, the acting secretary and whether or not he's going to be able to manage this enormous problem? he's only been there for a couple of months. >> deputy secretary gibson is a dedicated national servient and served in the u

and new demands for accountability at the va. kers are reacting to the boem's administration plan to allow veterans so seek health care at private facilities. they are abused of trying to cook the books, hiding a backlog of patients. steve, what are lawmakers saying on this sunday? >> there's a fairly widespread agreement on both sides of the aisle to allow veterans to take advantage of private hospital care though some wonder why it took so long. it would expand a program already in place. the government spent $5.8 billion last year on veterans health care outside the va system. there's calls for eric shin seki to retire. the president stands behind the secretary. >> i have said secretary shinseki doesn't need to go. the va already knows that there are 23 veterans who have died because they were on waiting lists. >> miller and other republicans say the va shouldn't have waited so long to let additional patients to get outside care. >> we know that the inspector general is also investigating. some people are saying more needs to b

inspector general at the va has launched investigations into the phoenix va and other facilities, and some individuals have already been put on administrative leave. i know that people are angry and want swift reckoning. i sympathize with that. but we have to let the investigators do their job and get to the bottom of what happened. our veterans deserve to know the facts. their families deserve to know the facts. once we know the facts, i assure you if there is misconduct it will be punished. second, i want to know the full scope of this problem, and that's why i ordered secretary shinseki to investigate. today he updated me on his review, which is looking not just at the phoenix facility but also va facilities across the nation. and i expect preliminary results from that review next week. third, i've directed rob nabors to conduct a broader review of the veterans health administration, the part of the va that delivers health care to our veterans, and rob's going to phoenix today. keep in mind, though, even if we had not heard reports out of this phoenix facility or other faciliti

also, a deeply personal take from the va scandal from a vet who received no help when he was at a breaking point. >>> plus what's it like to hold the life of the world's powerful man, it's in your hands? plus, the life of maya angelou. i'm antonio mora, and this is "consider this." more on what's ahead. >> president obama revealed a major change in foreign policy. >> to more effectively partner with countries where terrorist networks seek a foothold. >> many feel assad's roll in power would be better. >> i'll work to ramp up those for the syrian opposition. for terrorists and dictators. >> secretary of defense chuck hagel has ordered a review of the health care system. >> secretary shinseki, i call on the congress to fire him. >> maya angelou has died. >> she is the say i guess all the odds. >> i had something to do in this world. >> after months of accusations of feeble leadership and his handling of international crises and conflicts, president obama sought to counter his critics wednesday on a commencement address at the u.s. naval academy at west point. demand he it working through mul