Veterans Administration Management

Open email to House Speaker John Boehner:

Dear Speaker Boehner,
I was somewhat surprised to see in your newsletter your focus on the Veterans Administration (VA). My surprise was not related to the general subject, but rather to the details.
You said, "I’m backing the VA Management Accountability Act (H.R. 4031), a bill introduced by House Republicans that gives the Secretary of the VA the ability to fire or demote senior executives who are not fulfilling their responsibilities to our service men and women." I had thought that top management in every branch of the federal government had the ability to fire or demote executives under their control, for what the boss judges as improper performance of duties. This is routine in industry, and I was not aware that it would take a separate law to do this with the VA.
I wonder also whether that law will really do any good because of its cultural conflict. By that I mean, I was under the impression that the culture of government employment did not allow firing or demotion, even though top management had that prerogative.
To be even more specific, the top dog of the VA is Eric K. Shinseki. We know that the VA has been sorely deficient in aiding veterans to obtain benefits, to which they are entitled. You also pointed out that a number of top executives have received significant bonuses up to $63,000. It seems to me that there's no way those top executives could have received bonuses without the approval of VA Secretary Eric Shinseki. This then leads us to the conclusion that Sec. Shinseki is obviously not running an efficient organization, whether he has had previous ability to hire and fire or not.
What do you plan to do about Sec. Shinseki, since he seems to be the key element in the inefficient operation of the VA?