This is 15 minutes. Ladies and gentlemen, the president and Vice President of the United States accompanied by bob mcdonald. Good afternoon, everybody. Please be seated. Let me start by thanking acting secretary gibson for welcoming us here today. Im pleased to be joined by our Vice President , joe biden, from leaders across this department and our many partners particularly representatives from our incredible veterans and military Family Service organizations. I want to begin by making a basic point. Those of you who serve here at the v. A. , do absolutely vital work every single day for our veterans and their families. I know how deeply you care about our veterans. Many of you are veterans yourselves. Veterans serving veterans. You help them transition to civilian life, college, a first home, and start a new business and you have some of the best doctors and provide some of the best Specialized Health care. In our national cemeteries, you lay our veterans to rest with dignity and com
Agriculture sector. They say that 40 of his food and drugs come from europe and he is really hurting the russian people. Yeah, thats right. I mean, its tragic in my view. Not least because we worked several years when i was in the government to try to increase trade and investment including food imports to russia. And at the end of the day, who is going to be hurt is the Russian Consumers both because these goods will no longer be on the russian market and because their absence will increase inflation. Thats just simple market logic. The consumers in russia are the ones that are going to be hurt, not the americans. And there are a number of ceos who have been here in washington for this africa summit. Theyre bidding on african contracts trying to counteract china which has been investing so heavily in the continent. Theyve all been largely affected because these are big global players. They say that it isnt good for their companies but they think the u. S. Is doing the right thing. I t
veterans first. bob is the manager we need help get this done. so, i urge the senate to confirm him as soon as possible. i also urge the senate to finally confirm any nominee for cfo, helen tire tierney. and linda swartz, i m our no, ma am knee to lead the board of veterans appeals, constance tobias. they have all been waiting and waiting and waiting for a vote. in constance s case for more than a year. we need them bñhk on the job no. and congress needs to act and help us do right by our veterans. we have to do right by veterans like corporal carpenter, some of you may have seen the story of kyle. i recently had the privilege of presenting kyle with the medal or honor for his actioners in afghanistan. where he used his body to shelled his best friend from a grenade blast. kyle spent two and a half years in the hospital.
according to what the american people want their veterans to have. two, if you look at a critical office, the office of the inspector general, that is an acting position for way too long. he needs to get an inspector general appointed to investigate fa sills and give him a blunt assessment on them, and third, when all that is done, he needs to come up with a monetary assessment, how much is reforming the va going to cost, and are the american people willing to live with that cost? nobody wants substandard care or substandard performance for any benefits our veterans have earned but let s be upfront what it s going to cost with an all-volunteer force to do that. we know when the president makes this announcement he said he found a perfect man for the job, guy who gave money to mitt romney, and has given money to republicans, almost every go-round. is there something to be said about the president s seriousness or is he just putting up appearances. i don t think he is putti