WELCOME HOME, GENTLEMEN

Posted on October 23, 2012 by asknod

I spotted this article on Military.com this morning and am happy to announce two more of our BNRs are now home on American Soil. Only 1,655 souls to go.

 

 

Posted in Milestones | Tagged , , , , , | 1 Comment

NEGATIVE OBJECTIVE

Posted on October 22, 2012 by asknod

NEGATIVE OBJECTIVE

These were always the most frightening of words to hear when we were flying upcountry. Sometimes relayed by Cricket, our 7th Airborne Command Post and sometimes directly on 118.9 frequency, it was radio speak for a pilot down and no hope (or need) of rescue due to death. Negative objective was the equivalent of Extreme Unction from the priest because it was Last Sacrament time. Negative objective was an announcement that no more assets would be allocated towards the rescue. It meant Det. 1, 37th Aerospace Rescue and Recovery Squadron (ARRS) was being summarily ordered to cease and desist and their HH-53 BUFFs (Big Ugly Friendly Fellows) were to return to Long Tieng or Udorn. Negative objective was a statement of finality that also implied BNR (Body Not Recovered).  We had no Geneva Conventions Agreement with them nor they with us. Simply put, we weren’t there militarily so there were no military protocols for the occasion. This was your fate upcountry and what you volunteered for.

When David passed on October 13th, negative objective came to mind. The joy of his returning to health only to be struck down by medical mishap was almost more than we could bear.  With the passage of several weeks, the pain has subsided but not the dissatisfaction. Anger is pointless and retribution is hollow. Why anyone might think they can derive satisfaction from inflicting suffering on another has always escaped me in my sunset years. With nothing left to save, David was allowed to pass peacefully as he had become a negative objective.

Bombing the Pathet Lao back into the Stone Age at age nineteen seemed a worthy endeavour, one that gave me great personal satisfaction for a job well done. Anger didn’t arise until my friends were harmed. After that, the Pleistocene Era seemed too benign a fate for them. I look back in retrospect now and see a man I don’t recognize. I can’t explain  to a sane person today that which I felt 40 years ago. I have a hard enough time convincing myself of my own sincerity.  With age comes compassion for both sides of the equation. I do not feel comfortable with that but reason says I must to remain sane.

Unfortunately, the best seats in the house at a funeral are reserved for the family. When that honor finally befalls you, the feeling is pure dread. There is no joy in Mudville today. Mighty David has struck out. Euphemisms like letting the dead bury the dead are no panacea for easing the pain. All the kind words and hugs do little to assuage the void and the hollow, empty feeling where someone should be.

A friend from this site mentioned it must feel like the leg he lost during the war. He remarked that he can still feel it and it occasionally itches. I suspect I will feel David’s itch for years to come. He will always be in our memory’s chords like a familiar song you can’t get out of your head.

We wish to thank all of you who came to the service and showed your respect for him in spite of his relatively short tenure here on the Peninsula. I would especially thank Pierce County Sheriff Paul Pastor for coming. He quipped ” How could I not come?” I will treasure those words forever in light of his own loss. There are others too numerous to mention here that are deserving of thanks for their help.  I close in praying that none will ever have to experience this loss.  History has taught us nothing if it doesn’t instruct that children should always outlive their parents. Wars have almost always been the reason scenarios like this came to pass. Here, the government’s short-sighted, myopic desire to shape society in their desired mold has backfired.  Hopefully David’s death will be the ultimate instructional video on how to care for the mentally challenged in the future. Should that happen, we feel his passing would not be for naught.

I may forgive but

I will never forget

Posted in Milestones | Tagged , , , , | 5 Comments

vAMC– $10 MILLION FOR SMOOTHIE SHAKES?

Posted on October 22, 2012 by asknod

And we wonder why vA is up poop creek without a rowing device.  Read this one and try to keep a straight face. I advocate for a simple study to determine whether HCV can be transmitted via a jetgun and vA complains it would be

a) pointless

b) too expensive

c) no benefit would accrue to the Vet, and

d) they have far more important things to squander studies that require funding

This is most definitely at the top of my list. Mind you, I feel any research is valuable in this area but $10 million for a study of three hundred Vets? Really?  Let’s play calculator fun and add that up. $33,333.00 per vet?  One must realize that is slightly less than what you get a year based on 100% plus Cupcake ($$34,588.00). Again, really?

In the interest of playing numerology, the recent figures vAOIG came up with vis a vis the Human Resources playcation in Orlando: at $34,588.00 per head, 221 Veterans at 100% could have been accommodated for a year.

What would $10 million buy? Obviously a sh*t ton of Omega 3 milkshakes. What does Omega 3 consist of? Colloidal gold dust? More importantly, are they hiring $250,000 a year researchers to accomplish this? Whatever happened to”Hire the Vet. Your best bet.” Surely we could train some lab techs formerly employed by the military to do the lion’s share of this. Perhaps this needs a little more time on the drawing board.

The miracle is that any monies actually matriculate down to actual,  physically disabled Vets. I hate to make comparisons, but in an ideal world, this would pencil out much like donating to a church fund that helped disadvantaged children in Guatemala. You would hope to see the majority of the funding spent on the children. Without digging too deeply into this, I smell 60% going to overhead and 30% to Vets. The unmentioned 10% is, of course, allocated for human resources conferences in warm locales during inclement DC weather. But I digress…

Posted in PTSD, vA news | Tagged , , , , , , , , | 3 Comments

CONGRESS WANTS vA CHIEF OF STAFF OUT NOW

Posted on October 22, 2012 by asknod

I guess it wasn’t a secret but Shawn sent me this. Heap big trouble for Chief. Congress on warpath. Circle the Teepees. Hide the squaws.

vA’s troubles are not going to abate. Much like the cowboy who shoots himself in the foot, vA has taken this to an exalted level with numerous holes in its boots and no cobbler in sight.

VA Chief of Staff John Gingrich’s new Human resources footache

 

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GULF WAR ILLNESSES-AGENT ORANGE IN A DIFFERENT THEATRE

Posted on October 22, 2012 by asknod

First, kudos to Shawn for sending me this. Second, a profound look at what we have not learned from history

America, in her haste to become the most dominant military force on Earth, often goes off the reservation in search of chemicals which appear to be innocuous on their face. We were conned into this in 1961 with dioxin even though Monsanto was more than aware of the side effects of Agent Orange and its rainbow cousins. Porphyria Cutanea Tarda and Chloracne were well-known and described in contemporaneous literature four years before one ounce was sprayed in Southeast Asia. That didn’t deter the Deptartment of Defense then and it seems the same krewe is hard at it again.

It should not come as a surprise to anyone, be they a military strategist or scientist in their employ, that chemicals suitable for one job have the ability to become obnoxious when they turn up in unintended places. Add in chemicals from another country’s army which were not contemplated in the mix and you have the makings of a witch’s brew. This, then, seems to be what we are facing in Southwest Asia.

There are two insidious events with two different sets of chemicals or inert ingredients capable of causing long-term harm and the military is taking the same tortured path to recognition of the inevitable conclusion.  I characterize this ploy as uninformed denial or more simply put “Nobody told us.” Why is it that every possible study is ignored, denigrated, disparaged and thrown on the ash pile of scientific logic before some tenacious soul finally teases the truth out of it?

A case in point is Hepatitis C. After more than thirty eight years of yeoman service inoculating troops, the jetguns were quietly retired in 1998 with little fanfare. No mention was made of their inherent ability to cross-contaminate individuals. The military is nothing if not anal in trying to save money on any weapons system and the logic spilled over into medicine with what I consider horrible consequences. Now, with the evidence mounting and pointing to one common etiology, the military, and by extension, their lackeys at the vA, fall back on the lack of medical evidence to exonerate the jetgun’s culpability in all of this.

The military is fond of hiring Remington Rand or Morton Thiokol to do studies for them proving the efficacy of any given munition or missile.  White Sands and the Atomic Boys have been drafted to sell all manner of Poseidons to the American public. Their mantra is couched in  trademark phrases like “Studies show there is no inherent hazard associated with the use of this herbicide.” or my favorite “If it were detrimental, we wouldn’t employ it.”

This irrational rush to the ramparts in defense of weapons systems was no different when advances in medical knowledge accrued. This is what seemingly occurred at the dawn of the sixties. Munji Systems and Pedojet Industries were hell-bent to get their machines on the market and the military was a willing accomplice. With little or no testing to determine sterile potential, they were rushed into service at all the major intake centers for recruits. Little or no training of the medical personnel assigned to them was forthcoming. They were pretty much self-explanatory-Wipe occasionally. Pull trigger. Next? Jez. Homer Simpson could have taught Mojo how to do this in ten minutes or less.

In retrospect, with the chickens coming home to roost, the military and their civilian sidekicks at the vA feel no compelling desire now to revisit this and determine who was naughty and who was nice. A simplistic phrase was carefully constructed to cover this looming controversy in 2004. I refer, of course, to the infamous FAST letter wherein the vA begrudgingly admitted that it was merely “plausible” that HCV could be transmitted via a “pneumatic inoculation device” but that no definitive evidence was on record proving it. The study most often mentioned was of a weight loss clinic that used the Pedojet gun and inadvertently cross-contaminated patients with the Hepatitis B virus. Hence the logical assumption that, while it’s theoretically possible to transmit HCV via the gun, it has never actually been proven to have occurred. This is one of those rare instances where vA contradicts itself by saying in so many words “Absence of evidence is positive evidence that supports our argument”. Try using that logic in your HCV claim.

Next we turn to the relative “viability” of HBV and HCV. The vA maintains HBV is a much “heartier” virus than HCV. To what study they ascribe this is a mystery. vA nevertheless  takes it as an article of faith. Most recently, studies have shown that HCV is viable after drying on a surface for three months. Keeping in mind that HCV, like Ebola, is a single-stranded RNA virus, even the most naive observer would know its potential for infection in a  “hygiene-challenged”  environment. Diluting the conversation into a discussion of whether one virus is more viable than another is a hallmark of vA non-science.

Absent any medical proof of transmission, vA can legitimately say there is no proven correlation between jetguns and HCV. If that were then the end of this scientific investigation, there would be no controversy. However, when you see the same investigative technique, or should I say the glaring lack of any medical  inquiry into the why and how of Gulf War Illness (GWI) and its host of cousins waiting in the wings, you see the perfidy and collusion of which vA is capable. This is part and parcel of the M-21 methodology.

The Chicken Little Syndrome, whereby the military and vA steadfastly deny any possibility that the sky is falling, is endemic to the system. This has been so for decades. The “You can’t prove it and we are not about to find out why” is now the de facto default  setting. Ignorance is Bliss would be an apt motto.

I fear the next wave of Veterans will fight for aeons to get recognition for their “strange, unexplained illnesses” over the next 40 to 60 years. When sufficient numbers have succumbed and died, there will be an epiphany accompanied by browbeating,  mea culpas and the usual “If only we’d known.” Based on the article above, I submit that science is sufficiently adept at ferreting out the causes of these ailments and that the vA is unwilling to part with more funds to remunerate our Veterans or to commit to any serious investigation.

Think how easy it would be to put the HCV via jetgun argument to rest. As one reader with no scientific bent opined: “Obtain a Pedojet device. Inoculate me ten times without wiping the ‘nostril’. Allow me to jerk and slice my skin on the fifth shot. Turn to a pig and inoculate it ten times. Wait six weeks and do a PCR. Multiply this test scenario on ten HCV-positive subjects and collate the results. If HCV isn’t as hearty as its touted to be, this should put paid to it.” There isn’t enough money in vA’s coffers for this eventuality. There wasn’t enough for PTSD when we came home from Vietnam.  There isn’t enough now for Gulf War Illness and I have an unwelcome newsflash. There won’t be any on the horizon as longs as the current mindset and party mentality at VA continues. Bonuses for denying claims at near- outlandish levels is far more preferable to a nuanced study on the disease transmission capabilities of a discredited twentieth century medical device.

I give up. What’s wrong with this picture?

WHEN SCIENTIFIC

EVIDENCE IS INSUFFICIENT

IGNORANCE IS BLISS

Posted in Gulf War Issues, Medical News | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

STORY WITH NO WORDS

Posted on October 20, 2012 by asknod

Member Tom sends us this moving series of pictures.

 

This is the essence of America’s warriors. Its what makes us a Great Nation under God.  8% of America are all that stand between peace and anarchy in the world. I think its about time the government honor the promises we were given when we signed up. I pray fervently that Mr. Taylor Morris will not be given a back seat on the bus of life. Short of giving his life, he has earned far more than we can ever remunerate him. He has no idea what is in store for him from the vA.

Posted in Inspirational Veterans | Tagged , , , , , , , , | 1 Comment

VARO–LATEST PLOY TO DELAY/DENY

Posted on October 20, 2012 by asknod

We have been treated to shredding, misconstrual, interminable delays, ignoring our filings, phantom disappearances from the mailroom of unregistered mail, and innumerable other mysteries on our claims. I have told you the bag of tricks is endless and a constantly evolving phenomenon.

LawBob sends me this latest involving his filings. In order to enjoy it in it’s original state, I include a perfect copy and paste reproduction of his transmission.

The latest ploy in the ongoing effort of VA to be more creative in monkey wrenching benefits claims comes out of the Detroit VARO.

 Detroit was center stage in Shredder Gate.   They are watching the shredders and elevator shafts.  A new plan is needed.

 Why not send the evidence back to the veteran or attorney?   Yeah, that’s the ticket.   Send it back!  Send it back!  Send it back!

 We had two submissions sent back over the past few months.

 Today we got a call from DAVE (from Detroit VARO).   Dave told Shawn that “I have 300 pages of medical records but you did not specify what claim they go with.”

 Shawn: “Huh? Say all after what claim they go with?”

 Dave: “Claim. You did not tell us which claim they are for.”

 After having a circular discussion for 5 min. with Dave, Shawn put him on hold and told me what was going on.

 Shawn: “If you don’t want to cooperate with the NCOIC, I can let you talk to the CO.  You won’t like the result, but I can let you do that.”

 Soooooo. . . . . I got on the line with DAVE.    He spelled out his position.   I told him that evidence was evidence and NOT to send any back to me.

 He said he was going to send it back. It was making the file too large, and that I needed to say what issue it should be associated with.

 But. . . he would or could not tell me what veteran it was for so I could look at the file.

 I told him if it came back here there would be an investigation.   He said I was being unprofessional and I raised my voice and he was going to hang up on me and it was not a very nice way for an attorney to behave.

 LawBob: “Oh, you are knifing my client and destroying evidence from his claims file and I am supposed to be happy?   Since it was 300 pages of recent medical we may infer that it is new and material to the case?”

 I told him once again that there would be an investigation and hung up on him.

 I will sent this evidence to Thomas.  He can take it over to Big Red and drop it on her desk.   Maybe she can find a way to get it in to the claims file.

 Of course we will NOT get a refund for our postage and certified mail costs.   And I won’t call on the VA OIG pukes.  I will ask the FBI to look into it.

 So beware pilgrims. Make sure you go to Office Depot and get one of those self-inking rubber stamps with your name, rank, airspeed and tail number along with your last known heading. Ask them to put a happy face at one end of it so the Intake boys and girls will know you aren’t upset.

WE DON’T CARE

WE DON’T HAVE TO

WE’RE THE ONLY

GAME IN TOWN

Posted in SHREDDERGATE, Veterans Law | Tagged , , , , , , | 3 Comments

BVA-STRETCHING THE TRUTH

Posted on October 20, 2012 by asknod

I spotted this decision and was struck by the reference to Dr. Cecil. I have many who arrive here without a medical nexus asking for help. I generally ask them to send me their medical records from service in order to ascertain whether there is some seminal event to point to that might be the smoking gun. When this happens, I invariably forward them (and the Veteran) to Dr. Cecil for appropriate action.

Some Veterans either “disremember” the past or have a rosy recollection of it at odds with reality. The government is nothing, if not anal, in recording every utterance about anything medical or having to do with drugs and alcohol. This is their signature trademark.

I have often told those I help to obtain those medical records to “wake up” their memories and to spot any problem areas that might rear their ugly heads when filing. One, obviously, is any drug or alcohol abuse during service. This can often be ameliorated by addressing it far in advance. A single infraction with a small UCMJ hand-slap in 1968 is far easier to deal with now than when it appears suddenly in the denial. Similarly, if you sought alcohol counseling or rehabilitation, it can be phrased in a much better light than to have vA come down on you like a new suit.

38 CFR §3.301 (c) (2)  states:

If, in the drinking of a beverage to enjoy its intoxicating effects, intoxication results proximately and immediately in disability or death, the disability or death will be considered the result of the person’s willful misconduct. Organic diseases and disabilities which are a secondary result of the chronic use of alcohol as a beverage, whether out of compulsion or otherwise, will not be considered of willful misconduct origin.

Similarly §3.301(c)(3) says

The isolated and infrequent use of drugs by itself will not be considered willful misconduct;

With that said, if vA gets there first and plants the flag, it can be fatal. You will spend the rest of your life and your claim trying to overcome misperceptions of impropriety. Here, LA Johnny is at a tactical disadvantage because he has made statements in the past that he probably thought would help his claim. Someone uninformed might mistakenly believe listing a transfusion automatically entitles them to service connection. If it occurred after service and before 1992, it will be used as proof against you unless it occurred in a vA hospital.

It is clear on its face that, the more Johhny studied this, the more he realized he needed to revamp his pronouncements and fine-tune his theories. I do not know how many Vets have faced the Risk Factors Questionnaire and answered something incorrectly or with much less candor than required. When unmasked later, they scramble to alter their history to comport with what’s needed to win. It  doesn’t work.

Johnboy has made medical pronouncements that the hepatitis is due to a transfusion. He discounts his post-service tattoos as a risk but is tripped up by trying to move the tattoo timeline forward to protect his diagnosis. Piehole diarrhea ensues because its evident visually that he had them prior to his 2001 diagnosis. Rearranging your timeline after a partial construction is always fatal to any credibility assessment. vA is a past master at demolishing them as I mentioned earlier.

What is of more consequence is making the medical assessment that you did not have a transfusion after service- after you read up and realize that will work against your claim. It is a waste of time to opine on your conditions medically if you have no medical training. Here, it’s not only futile but fatal. vA will use this from now on through any future appeals to the CAVC as evidence that Johnny LA is a liar and a welfare queen on the hunt for free money.

Vets do not realize that the vA views us as scam artists looking for a free ride. Plain and simple, we are suspect from the outset. They like to point to the 85% denial rate as proof that this is true. Reality shows that with over 60% overturned on appeal for egregious violations of judicial regulations, the real number of legitimately injured Vets is astronomical.

The bottom line is underscored when someone uses legitimate resources like Dr. Cecil to further their agenda. This puts him in a bad light and compromises his usefulness to all of us. vA considers him to be a fly in the ointment. Since he works for vA part time, they cannot very well discount his credentials and nexus letters. However, when a Vet purposefully sets out to deceive the good doctor, it impugns his credibility because he was duped into providing a favorable medical opinion. Under the best of circumstances, this is a difficult endeavour. Attempting it with the vA increases the difficulty exponentially.

Read this decision to understand what deception looks like and the ultimate effect it will have on your outcome. Read it also in the context of what you may do to Vets who follow in your footsteps. I have often spoken of the mirror test and its significance in your claim. I have spoken of timelines and continuity. What I have never spoken of is using my theories in a manner to achieve a result illegitimately.  Quite honestly, I never considered anyone would. Apparently I was wrong.

Posted in BvA HCV decisions, Frivolous Filings | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , | 4 Comments

DR. SALLY SATEL–VETS’ NEMESIS

Posted on October 19, 2012 by asknod

I received this missive from LawBob. It appears to be a 2006 headline but I find it intriguing for its message. Nothing has changed in the Army’s or the vA’s modus operandi.

Dr. Sally’s New Kidney

By Hugh Cox

from The New Hampshire Gazette Vol 250, No 15,

April 21, 2006

[The author of the following piece, Hugh D. Cox, is a Greenville, NC attorney “Proudly Representing the Disabled for Veteran’s Benefits, Social Security and Workmen’s Compensation.” He served in Vietnam in 1968. Mr. Cox forwarded the item to us under the suggested heading, “Second Thoughts about Dr. Sally Satel’s Personal Kidney Transplant.”-The Ed.]

On November 22, 2005, Dr. Sally Satel, M.D., issued a deeply personal account of her need of a kidney transplant because of the “no-fault” failure of her own kidneys. She wanted a normal life rather than dialysis due to convenience and she was not critical of any potential donor. Her writing was very moving. All can empathize with her and wish her a speedy recovery now that she has a new kidney.

But this Dr. Satel is the same anti-veteran physician on the payroll of the neoconservative American Enterprise Institute (AEI) who openly criticized military veterans making claims for disabling PTSD after they were assigned to duties in Iraq, Afghanistan and past wars. Satel accused veterans of using “an underground network [that] advises veterans where to go for the best chance of being declared disabled.”

Dr. Satel believes that PTSD is not a medical diagnosis of any social consequence. Those who seek VA benefits for PTSD were recently labeled by Dr. Satel in a New York Times op-ed of March 1, 2006 as, “[b]ut it’s also very likely that some of the veteran baby boomers who have filed claims in recent years did so not out of medical need but out of a desire for financial security in their retirement years.”

In the same op-ed, Dr. Satel stated, “it is often hard to know which applicants can be helped with short-term psychiatric care, which are seeking a free ride and which are truly deserving of the diagnosis of post-traumatic stress disorder and thus long-term care and payments of up to $2,300 a month for life.”

Dr. Satel appears to view many disabled veterans as “welfare queens” seeking a “free ride” and unjustified “financial security”.

There is more disturbing information about Dr. Satel to consider.

Dr. Satel works for the AEI, and appears to be the Bush administration’s “go-to” physician for denial and reduction of rightful health care and veteran benefits.

Satel is also a “go-to” physician for the tobacco industry. She has stated that second hand smoke is not as harmful as most medical experts think.

Likewise, Satel is also the “go-to” physician for the silicone gel-filled breast implants industry. She assures women that breast implants are quite safe.

Interestingly, breast implants are linked to kidney failure.

Her credibility as an expert was once demolished in a reported court case. In the case of Farmer v. Ramsay, 159 F.Supp.2d 873, D.Md. [2001] (the case is a reverse racial discrimination case seeking to allow white applicants into medical school over minority student applicants with lesser MCAT scores. Satel was expert for the white applicant), the court found:

“The Defendants have filed a motion to strike Dr. Satel’s report on the grounds that it lacks the necessary indicia of reliability required under FRE 702. The Court agrees and will, by separate order, grant the motion. Satel offers little more than her personal opinion of Farmer’s application and the weight that … should have [been] placed on his MCAT scores. Satel has no familiarity with [the school]; she lacks an extensive background in medical school admissions; she reviewed a total of only five applications; her work has not been subjected to any peer review; and her opinions are not based on a methodology that can be tested. Accordingly, her views lack the indicia of reliability required … ”

The Court found that Dr. Satel’s credibility and so-called expertise was so unreliable that her findings had to be stricken by law without waiting for opposing evidence or cross-examination. Dr. Satel appears to be a “mouthpiece” for sale to any neoconservative cause.

Based on Dr. Satel’s current lobbying and speculation, the VA now places great emphasis on “combat” exposure supported by almost non-existent documents because VA officials know that it is a convenient method to deny or lower PTSD benefits. If there is no confirmed documentary combat stressor-the veteran is denied the claim for PTSD. As a civilian, Dr. Satel apparently believes that military clerks are taking detailed notes on wi-fi computers right there on the battlefield during a firefight or IED explosion.

Dr. Satel advanced that “civilian” theory in her 2006 New York Times op-ed: “As the department tries to distinguish among these groups, verification of exposure to trauma is vital. The inspector general’s office found that for one-quarter of Vietnam veterans claiming post-traumatic stress, the department could not confirm any incidents of traumatic stress. A study in a leading psychiatric journal last year could not verify such history in 59 percent. True, military personnel records are not perfect-a cook who endured a terrifying rocket attack on an airbase at which he was stationed may be unable to produce documentation of it. However, such records could indeed disprove the fabrications of a cook who claimed he was traumatized by a firefight on infantry patrol.”

Now Dr. Satel believes that if there is no confirmed documentary combat stressor-the veteran should be denied benefits. The infantry battalion cook who holds a dying fellow soldier killed by a suicide bomber in a Baghdad mess hall and then must put the body in a body bag receives no “sympathy” from Dr. Satel.

Dr. Satel’s most recent malice against disabled veterans, on March 1, occurred since she received her kidney.

Perhaps it is time for Dr. Satel to walk in a veteran’s boots. Had Dr. Satel been subjected to the kind of hostile inquiry she believes ought to be used in the VA claims process, she might never have received a kidney transplant. Her own positions could subject her to the following insulting and outrageous questions from the VA suggested by her own anti-veteran positions:

“Dr. Satel, why do you say your kidneys ‘retired early’ and ‘mysteriously’? Have you ever used controlled substances or abused alcohol or had breast implants? Do you have a tattoo? Why should we give you a ‘free’ kidney if you abuse your body? We need documentary proof that you did not engage in reckless behavior causing your kidney failure.”

“Dr. Satel, do you want us to give you a free kidney for your convenience? Thousands of people in the U.S. are waiting for kidney transplants. Why should you break in line in front of them? Your kidney ‘problem’ did not seem to halt your prolific writing and speaking engagements, did it? Where is the financial ‘inconvenience’?”

“Dr. Satel, did anyone on your behalf use any form of ‘influence’ to obtain your kidney match so soon? Did you use an underground network to advise you on the best chance of finding a kidney?”

“Dr. Satel, Haven’t you made use of a system that has coalesced around the idea that deprivation of convenience is the root of all devastation and victimization. You deserve dialysis treatment if it can help, but rarely should long-term or expensive payments or gratuities be justified. Don’t you agree?”

Fortunately, this kind of interrogation will never take place for Dr. Satel and all can wish her a speedy recovery.

One of the most insidious attacks on our military troops and our combat veterans is from Dr. Satel, who apparently believes that combat trauma must be proven with almost non-existent documentary evidence at the expense of battlefield common sense and traditional medicine. The concept that combat PTSD is of little consequence or is quickly and easily cured by quick medical intervention, by return to combat, or by a good hard day’s work at Wal-Mart borders on treason. That is evident every day at military recruiting offices when potential recruits reject military service when they sense that neoconservatives might exploit and abandon them. Our brave troops in Iraq and Afghanistan deserve the protections of a solemn and sacred contract that our nation will care for “him who shall have borne the battle and his widow, and his orphan.”

Hugh D. Cox, Greenville, N.C.

———————————————————————

Wowser, huh? I thought Neanderthal thinking went out of style on mental health. Even more so with the field increasingly feminized. You notice the Army seemed to be astounded that there could be an assembly line diagnosis mill similar to the way we went through shot lines in Basic.

My inside fly on the wall down at Madigan tells me they want eleven souls a day diagnosed up or down per day. Nurse Beth says more like 3 if you’re lucky and have good service military records, not medical. This allows them to separate the wheat from the welfare queens.

Posted in C&P exams, Gulf War Issues, PTSD | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , | 4 Comments

MISS BEATRICE–WOMENS ARMY CORPS

Posted on October 18, 2012 by asknod

 Miss Beatrice, a Womens Army Corps Veteran from the second World War, was the church organist. She was in her late eighties and had never been married. She was admired for her sweetness and kindness to all.

One afternoon the pastor came to call on her and she showed him into her quaint sitting room. She invited him to have a seat while she prepared tea. As he sat facing her old Hammond organ,  the young minister noticed a cute glass bowl sitting on top of it. The bowl was filled with water, and in the water floated, of all things, a condom!

When she returned with tea and scones, they began to chat. The pastor tried to stifle his curiosity about the bowl of water and its strange floater,  but soon it got the better of him and he could no longer resist. ‘Miss Beatrice’, he said, ‘I wonder if you would tell me about this?’  pointing to the bowl.

‘Oh, yes,’ she replied,  ‘Isn’t it wonderful?  I was walking through the park a few months ago and I found this little package on the ground. The directions said to  place it on the organ, keep it wet and that it would prevent the spread of disease. Do you know I haven’t had the flu All winter.’

Posted in Humor | Tagged , , , , , | 1 Comment