President Barack Obama thinks the solution to the troubled Department of Veterans Affairs is a "money issue," but the department really needs a major overhaul, former Defense Department spokesman J.D. Gordon tells
Newsmax TV.
"If President Obama spent one percent of the time on helping our veterans than he does trying to give more rights to terrorists at Guantanamo, we'd have a lot better country," Gordon said Monday on "Newsmax Prime."
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"There's $168 billion in the budget for next year," Gordon said. " That's more than there was in the past, but just throwing money at a problem doesn't get results."
The Denver VA hospital's costs are up to $1.7 billion, triple the estimate from last year, he said.
"That's outrageous, but that's what you get when you have big government," he said.
Gordon also blamed the VA's problems on the inability to fire anyone for incompetence.
"Some of the unions have had kind of a negative role in this because they've been interested in protecting the workers too much," he said. "The bottom line is you have to be able to fire anybody that's not performing and unfortunately, in the government, it is super difficult to fire anyone."
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