Conversation 551-004

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Well, good morning, Fred.

How are you today?

I was surrounded by people two days.

How are you today, Si?

I'm all right.

Good to see you.

But he was listening to you.

He said, I didn't do that.

Yeah, whatever.

They start boxing you.

You're just saving the team.

That's right.

And the message you're charging me, I said, and then he just throws it at them.

That's right.

Not that, uh, World War I, World War I, but it sounded good.

You know, not that you know that.

I don't know.

You can see how old this is on her, her, her, her, her, her, her, now.

She's never been to much 74 years.

Today, 74.

Now, there's still some.

You know what you did?

Go Tigers.

They're great guys, too.

They were granted a leech.

Remember, we went into it in 1946.

Now, do you know that?

They ran it.

They were a part of it.

.

three or four years is that right his son was dead his wife was dead she's very pretty

Yes, sir.

I was your driver.

Yes, sir.

That's right.

You remember, but that was the, you know, we, it was a hell of a fight.

And we thought we'd all get beat by it.

But we had to take it back.

I think there were 50-some-odd numbers.

That's right.

And there's not a phenomenon like these.

These are not over that.

As a matter of fact, that was the genesis of the Charter March.

And all of us, our tracks .

There's some support against the Kennedy coin, half dollar.

And the cargo supposedly retired this year, so if I get elected, I'll be the only survivable.

But that party, a great little group,

How old is HR?

Well, let me say it.

I'm glad to have a chance to talk to you and say something.

Okay.

and you look at the inquiries and so forth, and you start looking at racism, and you see that you're not as prepared as you'd necessarily be.

And I heard a lot of people say, really, what a labor of love you guys must have, and you've got to do that.

And it is something that is expected of the state of the nation, of course, in the future.

But I guess if you work your butts off, it's to be responsible and generous

Uh, I must say, this is really an appreciated cooperation.

Uh, Mr. President, uh, we, uh, uh, right now, Ted Johnson is, uh, he does work on the shelves.

I just, it's always the bedding.

The shelves get interrupted.

See, that's the bedding.

I know it's not a record.

I hope that's not a record.

It definitely has to do with the record.

Uh, well, I, I did, did, did.

We don't think we have been extravagant or we can't sit and let you lose the husband and

And we can't let our boys go to school getting such a small amount of money that it isn't effective.

Last year, we raised the education rate by 33%.

And there's still some...

We did all the scholarships, we did all the schools, the first to become the keyest, the best schools, the highest practice schools.

We tried to get a balance, but not pay all the way for a boy from the school to pay enough that he wants to go, he can go.

It was the work on the side.

Since we've increased our pension compensation, it's probably about 10% increase in cost of living.

We've got to look at that.

And when we did, we talked about Jesus in the back in the world of danger, talking about millions and millions and millions of dollars.

We had, the last few years, we had a lot of hostels.

We moved out of Australia, and Jack Hicks was down here.

We got out, and I remember we was driving to the budget.

That is a great thing.

We were going to have to all get together and work out a plan for a renovation and a new hostels.

Well, uh, you can do this, but then Kenny, then Kenny, then they go, and then John, and then they go, and now I have three new people.

They can't do anything.

But we do have to let our hospitals.

I was talking to Tom a minute ago.

These reporters have a press that they're going to work, or a building that we just, I had a room stuff, to train the front line.

Press it.

Press it, they're going to.

You've got the hospital up in New York.

It wasn't just a hospital.

How was it done?

About 90 years old?

About 90 years old.

Across, and it was built originally, and it's right in the jimmy, a plan for renovation in the hospice.

And I assumed they had some kind of a plan.

And then we backed it.

You're the budget all the time, Bob, too.

Great quality and tax ratio.

And it's a very high bill.

The figure we get is about 2.7 out of 3.

In the VA, about 1.5.

We didn't reach that sign in the last year.

It'll probably get close to 1.7 now, Tom.

It'll be about 1.7.

We'll be very close in 1973 to just because of what you had in the committee.

You had 1-1 in Psychiatric and 2-1 in General Mickelson.

You know, getting back to the same thing you just said.

This is something that we have- Excuse me, gentlemen.

This is something that we have been pushing very hard on the budget stand to be sure that we get quality care as high as we possibly can.

I think we must be sure that the control act of 1968, the freezer was put on.

to be able to do this before he came to this prison or not.

And it was hard to recover, to recover.

But both of us, and also the others around here, we have people and we have other partners who came in the morning to see us and that's good.

And it is a lot better where it should be.

Yeah.

Self-justification for a slight difference in that it's scientists and heart patients with the same illness who stay longer in that hospital where they go in a general hospital because he's farther away from home.

Three weeks, several hundred miles from home, they can't get him home.

As he could have been, we would have lost him.

Well, Congressman, we've got this down now.

That's not a major factor or something.

That's not a major factor.

But the only difference between a private and a VA hospital is that much of a time for the work that the doctor ordinarily does is no one else.

The lab testing and so on.

We're talking about 24, 48 hours.

Speaking of something, before we get away from the hospital, I'm like,

I noticed that we were being able to go to work on something on that, that forward facility that, you know, we had in Nashville.

And everybody in that office, they said,

I'm talking about last year, you people added another $50,000.

And we had about another $105,000.

And George's people then goes and tells Don that you can't use any of this money for recurring costs, which means that they did not have any staff.

So the $105,000 last year, none of that money was staffed.

Now we've done the same thing this year, and I hope George can keep none of the $50,000.

Go ahead.

We've got an 87th man in the Harry Putnam League of 5,000 people.

He said, he said, he said, he said, he said, he said, he said, he said, he said,

We've got that whole Southern California plan with you now, and I think George has it too.

And that's what they involved.

Here's another one.

I figure I have something under consideration.

I've got a hotel complex under consideration.

There's one that I got that name was built 70 years ago, too.

And it's been a good property, so you can build sometimes more in other places.

But now, as I understand it, you're saying the more sensitive problem is rather than building just that, who can do that?

I think we're approaching the staffing and the flexibility in which we've been able, and of course we've got in each of our seven, which we brought up to you, the new analogies of care that I frankly think the facility plan is the one that is of major concern because it's such a long-term proposition from when you get the word go to finally get somebody in the facility.

But we have at least...

18 to 12 areas are possible to make major renovation or replacement, like the Bronx is.

If I had my drivers, that would be the number one to be replaced in this country.

I'm just writing out of the Bronx.

George, we have phones on this year.

They need extra load from about 80, 400, 500.

Then I said 100,000.

We'd love to do the absolute best job we can for veterans in service.

Number two, we want to do absolutely the best job we can for Vietnam veterans.

And the thing that we're trying to be careful of is that services provided to veterans who have problems not service-connected, in a sense, may drive out our ability to give very high quality care to the first priority of the project.

And at least the load factors for the number of beds are expected.

The load has gone up, and they've pushed us on that very hard.

But I think it's concentrating on the service that they did on Vietnam is something that we felt deserved to have a great emphasis.

I'm creating a staff-patient ratio to try to achieve that.

something we worked out very hard.

I recognize your problem.

We'd give up some ground, but at the same time, we'd try to do everything.

Our fear is we may not want to have doing as well as we should, but it's a great priority.

The bad thing, Peter, is thinking what you're doing.

See, there's another track closed, 950, 950, which was 16.

And we had to have that one closed, so we had to close it.

And they're doing the same thing.

They're telling them to move that down 5,000 dash, which is 10,500 dashes.

And they've got a plan that's going down to 6,800 or 6,800.

And by 1972, three, something like that.

And I just wanted to say it kind of to the face of that plan, to the back of that office head.

You go way down on this, huh?

Well, I'll check.

And that's where these ones are going to be.

I've been there, man.

Somebody sent it to me, honestly.

Sure.

Who knows?

Who the normal men do, and what they say, and they talk about their protection for it.

George, I haven't been able to get a few more.

What are you, a jackass?

No, they seem like a jackass.

They seem like a jackass.

I mean, two pairs of jackass.

Well, could we look at a couple things here?

Do we really have a long-term rejection?

It seems to me, George, that what is needed here is gone.

I mean, the Bible said, gone is the age.

I mean, you've got to get it all in perspective.

You've got the world, we're one of God's.

You've got some.

Now, in terms of that, we really, we ought to take a pretty hard, we really want to take a long-term look

the whole hospital program and say, now, what really ought me to do, it may be, as Tiger said, we probably ought to close some of these old installations.

And there you've got to have a little business and a little project of it and say, well, now, that's fine.

It's been in a veteran's hospital, but I've been in an old rat trap, rat infested, flies and everything like that.

No air conditioning, you know, except for the hands or the air conditioners, but that's all ridiculous.

However, you can't do it all at once.

But on the other hand, you can have a program which really goes to the field.

You can say, look, over five years, 10 years, 10 years from now, we have not been able to

And they say over the next 10 years, we're going to do this, this, this, this, this.

So people would say that instead of our just want to hit and miss, that's what really, I mean, you're hitting one here.

And Johnson said, okay, he has a budget problem.

And we've got a budget problem.

So John said, all right, we'll cut here.

So he said, we'll cut here.

I'd rather have it looked at.

So he said, I'm wondering where the hell the better it's going to be 10 years from now.

And what are we going to have to deal with?

And then we deal with it.

That's facilities.

The other thing, of course, has to do with

Personnel.

Personnel, I guess, is something else that we, I think that these two fellows, George, and I think Dr. McRae, they probably know more about this than most of us.

They forgot the part that most of us will ever know.

You probably think your department is a little more efficient.

They did.

five years and uh i'd like to take a heart of the person you actually will help us you know we've got to help from what i can do more and we appreciate that you have resisted both of you but i have said i i do not want particularly with regard to the budget in this period of time

That was only the, that only latched the boy up.

This idea of downgrading those that served in the Air Force into the Army, particularly as they can handle aircraft, that the American servicemen are savage, dope baddies, and so forth and so on, and, uh, uh, so that's a, uh, that, uh,

They're a little greedy to look at dropouts rather than the intellectuals that stay here and grow beards and demonstrate and try to tear down the question.

I don't know why they think they're better than their molestable student.

But nevertheless, if you let go of propositions, you have a major attack being made over the last five years and escalated over the last two years due to the fact that the frustration over Vietnam.

It goes even beyond that.

Unless Vietnam is over, even a lot of the garbage you want to

They want to get out of the war zone.

They want to turn in.

They want the United States to be a great power.

They don't want us to have a presence in Europe.

They don't want us to have a presence in Asia.

You and I know this can't happen.

What's all this got to do with this?

But the next group of this is that there is basically, we all hear about the pro-veteran swapping.

But there's a hell of an anti-veteran swapping now in this country.

It's an anti-veteran talk.

And sure, you talk about the votes we get.

You always get votes for hospitals and the rest.

What I'm getting at is that I think that, and this expresses my own views and convictions, I do believe that veterans, and particularly, may I say, Vietnam veterans, are entitled to an edge.

They're entitled to an edge because they come back not as heroes, but as mighty bonds in the public mind.

They come back, they go out and serve

It's like World War II, when Harry was there, unless he, you know, had some wrong help, and these poor guys got out there, and then the privileged kids went on to college, you know, and took 18 more degrees or something, and then they had their credit services demonstrated against the government.

So much for that.

So I think the veterans should have an answer to that problem.

Second, one way to give them an edge is through our veterans programs, the jobs programs, and that's doing pretty good.

I think that's one job statistic that is better.

Yes, sir.

It's very good.

We don't, we want to, now, in terms of the, in terms of the, in terms of this, I want to, I want to approach it in a way that we can, we can solve for the country as a long-term program.

where they're looking at the facilities, they're looking at the treatment, and in a way, which is, there's a point of view that goes the other way, and I realize this too, and frankly, it was quite prevalent in the mid-80s.

The point of view was that since everybody originally had been a veteran, that's the difference.

Everybody had been a veteran for World War II, and the irony was, why didn't you get better and get better?

You know, we better, and that's a pretty good argument to make.

This is very different now, but as far as the Vietnam veterans, everybody has been a veteran.

And the Vietnam veterans, they've been a hand grab.

And you agree?

I agree.

And the thing is, both of you know that.

They're trying to look at me.

The Armed Services, I must say, I even talked to Dave, who came back from another series in the Navy and so forth, and said, you know, it's very hard for these kids that are in the Navy and the Army and the Air Force, and the guys that happen to have the numbers that get called, and they think of the other kids in the Army, and I say, I'm not against the kids in the Army, you know, that's the law, so that's, but I do feel that we have, that we're gonna keep some spirit, some in this country of,

It led us to maintain the minimum forces, the maximum minimum forces for the United States to play a peacekeeping role in the world.

We've got to change the attitude toward first going into the armed services in the first instance and saying, if you're injured and if you do happen to be not involved in service and so forth, that you are properly treated at that time.

It's a little edge.

That's what Brady VA is all about, right?

It's an edge.

And I come out of that, and that's my philosophy.

Now, having stated that philosophy, of course, I remember the problem with the Tiger Eagle, Chuck, and others, and this damn budget thing.

It's a terrible problem.

And frankly, I must say, there are a lot of other places that we're constantly concerned in.

Rather than here, I think we can't.

I have a long-term program looking at this problem.

I guess it's been studied and studied and studied, looking at it in the light of the new situation, looking at it.

We know what's left from World War I.

We know what's left from World War II.

We now got Vietnam veterans.

Now let's see how the hell we can end it.

Mr. President, we, immediately after I came on board, we did make such a decision.

All we had to do was update it with some new input.

Okay.

that with the thought in mind of going to the year 2000, with the change in the amount of use of health delivery, of the nursing care, the extended care, as most of us on World War II get older, and all of these things are directly in the study.

And I think we are rapidly approaching, well, it's a few times we're talking on a set, and then on the facility set,

And then all we need to do is back to the emergency desk and our suppliers and our suggestions of ours on to the studies.

And I think that what we need to do really is to incorporate into this study what role the VA's play, the VA medicine's play, in the overall national health strategy that is going to be developed in this decade.

I think we can make a difference here, but I think this fall would have been

I'm not supposed to be sure that there's a, that there is a tendency, I must say, for the professional medical guy to say, well, I'm going to help you pursue your search for the health of the nurse, right?

Well, they are, that's a part of this instance for a fairly good reason.

I think there are other good reasons.

As you yourself have said, in the case of the VA hospital system, it's a national asset and a national resource.

Right.

Our affiliation was to take you on to medical schools in the country.

Yeah, that's right.

All of it is attributed to medical.

It's one of the indirect ways that you support members.

You started to say something, correct?

We have an attack that moved over Bethlehem.

We're going to stop it.

Take a $600 million job and come on.

This program made a profit of over $200 million.

This year, I cleared this guy in his hands.

To me, the biggest reason we don't understand him is just wrong.

Tell me if I had to pack an answer to this one, and I'll also give you an answer on what's going to happen.

Well, I may have disagreed with the president, but the approach was good.

I do agree with you, Jesse, and that was that we have a limitation on our direct loan paper that we could not be stolen less than $98,000.

It's the only direct paper in the government that was so effective.

There is now, and we're just pursuing the deal that removes that limitation.

The moment that since it is an administration sponsor, and I'm assuming that you're going to recommend it to us later, that the moment that you do sign this letter,

We will be presented to you with a direct law program.

Okay, yes, sir.

And, uh... Good.

And I don't know why you're talking like that.

Well, you know, it's good.

It's not me.

I'm just getting the process here.

I'm just trying to discipline your drug use message.

You think that he's going to need to qualify his organization to do something about that use of drugs.

You took a child from him and gave him arm surgery because of a child from him and gave him his hand.

We kind of leaped on, but we kind of managed to get it.

Not much.

Well, you might be able to move on, too, if you want to.

I think, I don't know if you disagree.

I did, before I disagreed with some of the mechanical operations.

As far as I'm concerned, the president has told me that you can get the contract, but it's a short step.

Whatever money would be needed would...

What are the views?

I do want to say that the department has developed this.

We assisted the QB in part of that.

You were in the meeting, right?

Yes, they're all gone.

That's all part of the drill here.

But there's a... Go ahead.

We asked how many...

But you just said you didn't have enough facility.

You needed more, remember?

Is there a VA?

In fact, Jack pointed this out.

He said the G and VA just didn't have them.

And I don't think, Tiger, that if the direct abuse message was wrong, or at least in the plan, there's certainly no intention of not using VA, as a matter of fact, I'd say.

it's an enormous facility that can't be used so they have to develop it's hard to do it you know they don't have people that do this uh uh

And, uh, well, on this, George, and I'm sorry, you know, let's, let's get down to the heart of the matter.

George, I, I want to be sure that it's understood that he, uh, here's the very fact that we, we talked about this thing.

He set up the Jackie office, and it's not for the purpose, basically, of just adding another man later, bureaucracy.

But the purpose was to take all the arms and shoulders of this government and do them more effectively.

Now, the VA that I really feel, I like to chat with you, the examiners, he does take a case.

He does take a case.

I told him I didn't.

And he said to me, he said, he's going to tell you a lot of things.

He's going to tell you a lot of things.

I said, I'm sure there's a problem at all.

I know there's a lot of people trying to do that, but excuse me.

Let's just see.

Jack is a very go-go kind of a guy, but so are you.

You folks, I want you to sit down.

I want you to sit down with the two T's.

And let's see if you can stand straight now, because we're all the same way.

We're all behind the charges for Jack is under me.

And if there's any, you have any problems on this, Tom, you see what I mean?

Yes, sir.

speak up on it.

I particularly don't want to see, yes, I particularly don't want to see a whole brand new facilities built when you've got old facilities that could be used and personnel and upgrade and get a double shot.

That's my point.

No, I don't see this as an L.A. for B.A., but I am.

So you've got 19 B.A.

centers.

I know the ocean tendency as well to go out and build a brand new building and it'll call drug addicts and non-drug addicts

That isn't any good, my friend.

Let's use our hospital.

Let's use the VA. Let's use all the rest.

There's a problem with this government.

Every time we have a new problem, we say, oh, we've got to build a whole damn new building.

And there are wonderful guys, good, dedicated people.

You've got psychiatrists, haven't you?

Yes, sir.

Of course, we've got to have them because their psychiatry problems are a lot worse than drug problems.

You know, people have been in the war.

Excuse me.

I'm very honest with you, sir.

We're going into the neighborhood to listen to what we're calling a tour operation for the outpatient clinic for these guys.

Great.

And it's a hard-to-earn basis and absolutely a matter of money.

You have a good doctor?

Yes, sir.

Your shop?

Yes, sir.

How close is it?

So there's got to be a hospital.

They don't have to be close at all.

What we have to do is the hospital says to us that just after we get to...

Stabilized, detoxified, stabilized.

If you have one left undone, you have to dispense that to the parts that they had to.

And it's a vert-tube, some counseling rose, the places that we were here to sample.

And that's it.

Now look, this is a urethane first.

This is a pro-tubes, because pro-tubes are long.

I wanted to explain the things they learned.

First of all, the drug problem is, if you listen to CBS, 10% of all people in Vietnam are on heroin.

So the estimate, or even the 10% are on heroin.

He went out there and found that at the very outside of 84,

So the problem is not as great and significant, but not all that great.

But the second point is, though, that they have developed, and this is the best thing about it, already as a result of this, and this is what comes out of war, I mean, they develop and you go to handle a boat that's got a foot problem or something else.

But one of the good things about this is that Kathy says they have already developed as a result of just

So that's a new method, one for planning on it, and second for treatment.

So what could come out of this whole huddle about veterans on drugs could be a great way to clean.

Because I don't need to tell you two thoughts.

The drug problem is not Vietnam's problem no more.

It is a service problem of a year ago.

But it's a new problem all over this country, and it is with black kids.

They're out there in the hills in Santa Barbara,

I think there's some, maybe some

And I said, and I said, Doc, I'm going to Fort Worth tomorrow and I've got to say something to him.

And he said, well, you can say that Fort Worth, Dallas area will have a bit of a drug headache.

I don't think it is settled.

One word on it.

I was working on it earlier, and I had to say to our guys,

Very close friends, I think.

Also, I think it would be very good, while we're talking about this, to have Duval, a U2, that's 100 feet to get done, couldn't get done, but Jack ended up doing my office launch with this, and Duval gets him too, my money should be there too, and this Duval, the current, they don't even know I have, I don't even know if they have a good deal in the medical school, but they're going to have to, I've got to tell them my name is.

The state of Arizona is not better than this field at any state of the nation in Redfield.

There's a lot of other things.

There's two battles to help a guy.

And also, I'd like to keep that out to get the field.

You see, he's the advisor to our minister.

They can get the field of the veterans.

You know, got no doctor can really get the field unless he sits in.

But you know, man, you found it.

You guys found it.

so that he knows what that percentage is.

Because he don't care if his own profession is A.M.A.

or something, and they'll give us something else.

But I'd like to get Mr. Bell, he's the realest, good guy.

You said when they're raising them, for a week, we get upstairs.

Today, when they come home, when they go there, then they're usually upstairs.

Now, we have put...

He was out in Vietnam, beginning to compose for the military, and found that help.

For a veteran of the Arab town of Sandy, he learned how to use a cable rope and said,

Now, the military, they're asking that the St. Act 97, what's your name?

It's not about that church.

I know that we raised this, this was raised, in fact, as a result of what you're committing, and it's your issue.

They were afraid that we were houching their members and all the rest.

And I said, by God, let's do this.

It's just terrible to take these kids, and none particularly on a labor market.

A labor market that is not as, well, after World War II, you didn't have an escalation.

Well, you didn't really have one at all because Korea came so soon.

you did have escalation as far as unemployment, it was around 4% you could call it.

So it stocked them up.

But now they're still throwing these kids back into the labor market, where you've got a climate rate of 5.6, so it's comfort.

.

All it is to get me, well, I don't get me in, but at that time, man, it was Oakland, Germany, Pennsylvania, and South Vietnam.

South Vietnam, Berkeley.

I got a couple weeks, and instead of this, I guess, going down to Green Bay, it goes down to Berkeley.

And I understand also where you've been swamped with kids.

Do they learn something today?

Do you want to go to school?

Oh, yes, indeed.

I think we get a quicker jungle in the school.

We were starting to realize we could challenge the orientation.

And we can carry them through to their local area and then see what's happening.

Oh, I see.

That's correct.

And then you say we've got a plan here, but could you give us a place?

Because we had a bomb.

We could follow up on this.

We didn't have to speak to you.

The two that killed me and the two that injured me.

Before we do, Rick, I'll say it's getting down on us what the cash is this week.

Yes, this happens sometimes on our street.

I've heard it a few times.

You mentioned it a long time ago, and I'm going to ask if you concur with the two.

I'm going to respect that today because this is a building program in Southern California to take care of some of the problems that Brentwood, Bosworth, other areas, the pressures would be

Okay.

I don't know.

They get rid of that for it.

You put it to the test.

What do you think the mothers and the fathers and the widows of 45,000 Americans say?

You fought an immoral war, which they have.

That's a great thing to talk about.

You know, you get to give me a sense of the status.

Not yet.

I was in the department on a Saturday night.

I was on the steps of the military.

You were an officer?

Yeah, I was an officer.

What do you mean?

Well, very much.

I heard you were listening to the...

Well, I know, let me say, we want to work with you.

I know you're responsible.

They said you took the lead.

He's not your dad.

He's in Europe.

And they had a whole time attacking him.

So he went wild, Jackson, and the rest of us, you know.

Mr. Jackson, I think, would have been in the war.

He wasn't in the war.

I think he was in the war.

All right.

I want to get you a couple of trams to take along here.

You got a couple right now.

Thank you.

Wait a minute.

I think you have to go right to your wife.

This is for Secretary.

Okay.

All right.

I don't think you're good at this.

Don't worry about it.

You're a criminal.

Oh, I'll defend you.

Hold on.

They have a record for me.

I'm going to get you a piece of paper with a voice attack.

Harvard College.

No, this is interest.

This is a crime.

Yeah, fine.

Thanks for your good job.

Hey!