I was asked at a White House conference by the IRS, which gave me an MOU, to put an IRS program into the VA. He asked me and we received the support of the VA General Counsel. I spent two years developing and testing the program on my own dime. The project was handed to a top executive at the VA who did not respond until I sent some very aggressive emails to her, and she completely dismissed it – and it turned out she was given an ultimatum by the IG to resign or be charged with felonies for her accepting money from a client nonprofit while working as a senior VA executive.

My lesson learned is when government executives are corrupt, they cause a great deal of problems which multiply existentially. They are a disincentive to want to help when it takes a lot of our time and money for naught. Under Secretary Perlin broke a valid contract with NYS as partner with a DNA program. NYS spent $45 million when Perlin pulled it and later privatized it when he turned it into the Million Veteran Program. It was valued at a minimum of $5 billion at the time. A few years back he facilitated a $111 million contract over five years – the company to receive $20 million a year for five years to do 2,000 DNA tests a year. NYS would have done them for free without limiting the examinations to 2,000 per year. The unspoken for $11 million would appear to be a commission/consulting fee for Perlin, who also received a million dollars when he left the VA to run a private company.

We set up an agreement for the NYS DNA center to provide cost-free base line tests for the 69th Infantry when they were activated which could then be used to compare a post deployment DNA test to determine what exposures, if any, they had. It was nixed by some General for their own nefarious reasons. They never received the baseline tests – which would have expanded to cover everyone deploying. How mush did that failure cost the soldiers, families and the taxpayers when the VA costs to deal with after the fact explosion in ongoing needs?

These perpetrators do not even get a slap on the wrist. They are following in the footsteps of Col Forbes, one of the first Directors of the new Veterans Bureau, who between 1921 and 1924 embezzled $200 million while denying 85% of WW1 veteran claims.

We were left hanging, veterans were left being underserved, and valuable IRS programs fizzled. We never received any correspondence explaining anything. The VA has undergone a remarkable revolution starting with Secretary Shinseki and I am a firm believer in the medical and other programs for us. Big but, when these frauds are allowed to occur we pay over and over and veterans lose out, and taxpayers lose out. In these cases the VA lost value and money.

In short, veterans wanting to work with the VA need to vet the programs and the people in charge or face an ignoble end to their efforts.