Obtain the (free) services of a VSO rep; you will find links along the right column just for that purpose.     You may not be afforded (legal) representation from the initial filing, but you are not prepared to fight a bureaucratic machine such as the V.A. -- no one is!     The "deck is stacked against you."     President Clinton, before leaving office, signed into law a new veterans' assistance law that many of the V.A. regional offices do not follow.     That is the "benefit of the doubt" doctrine verus "rule of law" in evidentiary matters in filing a "substantially complete" claim.

    I submitted my claim with "hard evidence" as to combat zone presence, ie, intransit via Vietnam and the records do not show anything .. except my own (official) copy of an army pay voucher.     "In favor of the veteran," hardly.     "Formal Review," .. for what?     Administrative errors?     What a joke.     I asked my VSO rep, a "seasoned VSO veteran" of 15 years, and a military retiree of 20 years -- to boot -- what happened in the review?     No answers.

    The incompetence of the administrators in this agency and the network of VSOs is obvious to me; they better "watch their six" because I will (only) be going down fighting!

"The soldier is ill-equipped to fight the bureaucracy
that he served with honor & duty
believing in country & service
and mutiny and treason are synonymous
and trusting of the government that betrays him."

"The soldier goes into battle without legal representation
against an agency that acts above the law;
stays rulings that it disagrees with
and allows the veterans that sacrificed
their health to die first
without the dignity of just compensation to such ends."

-- Franco Picchione, SP/6 US Army
Advocate for Justice for all Denied Unfairly
and of course, those rated less than 30%

    What follows is several articles related to the adversary system of both DOD and VA, one for those wounded in action on active duty; pending discharge with disabilities ranging from minor to total and deception and adversarial system stacked against the veteran filing for disability in their senior years.

    It is meant to serve several purposes:   general public awareness of the general treatment our service men and women face both on active duty as well as veterans of all ages after leaving the military, to advocate change in government and wholesale changes in personnel administering today, and to disgrace those responsible.


    This cancer did not happen overnight, and it will not be cured with the removal of a few chiefs.     It will take (literally) a new generation of staffing with minds of understanding and appreciation for those that they are supposed to be serving.     To hear endless excuses why things are the way they are now, is futile.     To hire those that feel that these veterans deserve less for whatever reason from military retirees that "did their twenty" to mediocre civil servants that never served and have their own prejudices to those that did.

    Today, the DOD holds a veteran on active duty pending discharge with a disability package ranging from absolutely nothing to complete coverage for life for healthcare and compensation due to total disability.     It isn't those found to be totally disabled that we are concerned with because the government can not cover that up.     It is those that are intimidated, duressed and harrassed to sign "on the dotted line" for less than they deserve we are concerned about.     Laws regarding regulations and rating process where the Army actually goes "above the law" (see below; Severance Pay inequity to "rubber stamping" evaluations with pre-existing condition; coupled with zero rating; as well as coming to such medical decisions without medical evidence as required by law.) and circumvents every which way it can to legally bind a veteran with unfavorable terms, all without legal counsel.

An Army of One ..

    You might wonder how all this is possible, and rightfully so.     Assigning a "counselor" of a similar rank which may instill a "buddy" or trust relation.     Keep in mind that these men (and women) joined the military with patriotic motivations beyond the average citizen; realizing that they were placing themselves in a very hazardous environment, to say the least.

Army Pride ..

    They are not politically-minded, or self-serving, but truly "team players."     Therefore, when you approach someone like this with a discharge package that is legally binding, without legal counsel, you see the results we have today, piss poor.

    These soldiers need to be given civilian status after initial rehabilitation records and disability file ready for legal counsel representation and treated with respect.     Not harrassed into signing anything.     As a civilian, he would not be required to take orders from a chain of command, but respected for the service and sacrifice he has made.

Franco Picchione, Veterans Advocate Las Vegas, Nevada
Comments in Washington Post, March 5, 2007   re: Walter Reed Fiasco

"Buk" Frank, your Advocate

Articles and Stories Index

      Legal Precedence -- filing with "CZ" pay vouchers

      It's only money ..     VA Hall of Shame

      Healthcare Broken Promise

      All Vets are not equal..

      PR: Show Veterans Pride

      PR: VA Claim Backlog

      Walter Reed soldier wins small victory



      Disability Pay: DoD vs. VA

      Walter Reed patients told to keep quiet

      Wounded and waiting

      V.A. jerks the strings   .. a PTSD veteran of "Desert Storm"

      “Personality Disorder”: A Deliberate Misdiagnosis To Avoid
Veterans’ Health Care Costs!   - Congressional House Veterans' Affairs Committee
"The Hypocrisy of DOD/VA in misdiagnosising combat veterans with a pre-existing condition which was never noted on the veteran's medical records at entry to military service; yet, creating a legal environment in which the veteran is handicapped to show either aggravated or dispute."
VA's big lie ..

Allegations of Betrayal of Vets" - Army Times   29 Aug 2008

      Index on Walter Reed Controversy     Newspapers

    Congress Oversight Committee Hearing

    Politics, as usual .. Lawmakers vow.. dribble

    Politics, in appointments .. GOP Appointments

Former Surgeon General Says Politics Took Priority

Okinawa 1998 BVA Ruling AO Cover-Up - 1998!
 

	Which Cheney do you like? (a) Too busy Deferment Cheney (b) No bid Haliburton CEO (c) Two-face Cheney (d) Yes-man Cheney * (e) All of the above (a-d) (f) None of the above (Not nasty enuf.._) * Daughter lesbian (Sides with GW.._)
	For more fun, click here for Yahoo! Symphony of Lies .. Fumbling idiot .. Gotcha! They're all full of it.. Idiot clip ..     On legacy .. While our soldiers sweat'n die in Iraq, GW Bush takes a clip from President Clinton on his style of comedy in the oval office during the annual press (hoop-la-tuxedo) affair .. joking about "No IEDs under his desk.."    Click here.
<gee> too bad someone didn't plant a stink bomb under his desk when he did that... (The White House sells these video tapes of the annual event.) Will the real GW please stand up ..     See the funny, little clown ..   Right, sly as a fox! Colbert versus O'Rielly     More b.s. (piled higher and deeper) My idol .. John Kerry D-MA     VP John Edwards .. in the wings? Encore!   President Bush on .. accountability

BlueWaterNavy.org

Cover-Up Central Index *

VA Cancer Data Blockade May Imperil Surveillance

Taiwan - Okinawa - Phillipines from official Air Force Report

* U.S. Veteran Dispatch Staff Report - November 1990 Issue

    On August 2, 1990, two veteran's groups filed suit in U.S. District Court in Washington, D.C., charging that federal scientists canceled an Agent Orange study mandated by Congress in 1979 because of pressure from the White House.

    The four year, $43 million study was canceled, according to the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) in Atlanta, because it could not accurately determine which veterans were exposed to the herbicide used to destroy vegetation in Vietnam.

    The American Legion, Vietnam Veterans of America and other veteran's groups are charging a massive government cover-up on the issue of herbicide exposure because of the hundreds of millions of dollars in health care and disability claims that would have to be paid.

    The results of the scientific studies are rigged, claim many veterans, to exonerate the government which conducted the spraying and the chemical companies which produced the herbicides. Until there is a true study of the effects of Agent Orange, say the veterans - a study devoid of government interference and political considerations, the war of the rainbow herbicides will go on.

    Charges of a White House cover-up have been substantiated by a report from the House Government Operations Committee. That report, released August 9, 1990, charges that officials in the Reagan administration purposely "controlled and obstructed" a federal Agent Orange study in 1987 because it did not want to admit government liability in cases involving the toxic herbicides.

    Government and industry cover-ups on Agent Orange are nothing new, though. They have been going on since before the herbicide was introduced in the jungles of Vietnam in the early 1960s.
 
PLANTS GIVEN CANCER

    Agent Orange had its genesis as a defoliant in an obscure laboratory at the University of Chicago during World War II. Working on experimental plant growth at the time, Professor E.J. Kraus, chairman of the school's botany department, discovered that he could regulate the growth of plants through the infusion of various hormones. Among the discoveries he made was that certain broadleaf vegetation could be killed by causing the plants to experience sudden, uncontrolled growth. It was similar to giving the plants cancer by introducing specific chemicals. In some instances, deterioration of the vegetation was noticed within 24-48 hours of the introduction of the chemicals.

    Kraus found that heavy doses of the chemical 2,4-dichlorophenoxyacetic acid (2,4-D) could induce these growth spurts. Thinking this discovery might be of some use in the war effort, Kraus contacted the War Department. Army scientists tested the plant hormones but found no use for them before the end of the war.

    Civilian scientists, however, found Kraus' plant hormones to be of use in everyday life after the war. Chemical sprays that included 2,4-D were put on the market for use in controlling weeds in yards, along roads and railroad rights of way.
 
ARMY EXPERIMENTS WITH DEADLY DEFOLIANTS

    The Army continued to experiment with 2,4-D during the 1950s and late in the decade found a potent combination of chemicals which quickly found its way into the Army's chemical arsenal.

    Army scientists found that by mixing 2,4-D and 2,4,5-trichlorophenoxyacetic acid (2,4,5-T) and spraying it on plants, there would be an almost immediate negative effect on the foliage. What they didn't realize, or chose to ignore, was that 2,4,5-T contained dioxin, a useless by-product of herbicide production. It would be twenty more years until concern was raised about dioxin, a chemical the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) would later call "one of the most perplexing and potentially dangerous" known to man.

    According to the Encyclopedia Britannica, "The toxicity of dioxin renders it capable of killing some species of newborn mammals and fish at levels of five parts per trillion (or one ounce in six million tons). Less than two millionths of an ounce will kill a mouse. Its toxic properties are enhanced by the fact that it can pass into the body through all major routes of entry, including the skin (by direct contact), the lungs (by inhaling dust, fumes or vapors), or through the mouth. Entry through any of these routes contributes to the total body burden. Dioxin is so toxic, according to the encyclopedia, because of this: "Contained in cell membranes are protein molecules, called receptors, that normally function to move substances into the cell. Dioxin avidly binds to these receptors and, as a result, is rapidly transported into the cytoplasm and nucleus of the cell, where it causes changes in cellular procession."

    After minimal experimentation in 1961, a variety of chemical agents was shipped to Vietnam to aid in anti-guerilla efforts. The chemicals were to be used to destroy food sources and eliminate foliage that concealed enemy troop movements.
 
RAINBOW HERBICIDES

    The various chemicals were labeled by color-coded stripes on the barrels, an arsenal of herbicides known by the colors of the rainbow, including Agent Blue (which contained arsenic), Agent White, Agent Purple, and the lethal combination of 2,4-D and 2,4,5-T, Agent Orange.

    On January 13, 1962, three U.S. Air Force C-123s left Tan Son Nhut airfield to begin Operation Hades (later called Operation Ranch Hand), the defoliation of portions of South Vietnam's heavily forested countryside in which Viet Cong guerrillas could easily hide. By September, 1962, the spraying program had intensified, despite an early lack of success, as U.S. officials targeted the Ca Mau Peninsula, a scene of heavy communist activity. Ranch Hand aircraft sprayed more than 9,000 acres of mangrove forests there, defoliating approximately 95 percent of the targeted area. That mission was deemed a success and full approval was given for continuation of Operation Ranch Hand as the U.S. stepped up its involvement in Vietnam.
 
SIX TO TWENTY-FIVE TIMES STRONGER
    THAN RECOMMENDED

    Over the next nine years, an estimated 12 million gallons of Agent Orange were sprayed throughout Vietnam. The U.S. military command in Vietnam insisted publicly the defoliation program was militarily successful and had little adverse impact on the economy of the villagers who came into contact with it.

    Although the herbicides were widely used in the United States, they usually were heavily diluted with water or oil. In Vietnam, military applications were sprayed at the rate of three gallons per acre and contained approximately 12 pounds of 2,4-D and 13.8 pounds of 2,3,5-T.

    The military sprayed herbicides in Vietnam six to 25 times the rate suggested by the manufacturer.

    In 1962, 15,000 gallons of herbicide were sprayed throughout Vietnam. The following year that amount nearly quadrupled, as 59,000 gallons of chemicals were poured into the forests and streams. The amounts increased significantly after that: 175,000 gallons in 1964, 621,000 gallons in 1965 and 2.28 million gallons in 1966.

    The pilots who flew these missions became so proficient at their jobs that it would take only a few minutes after reaching their target areas to dump their 1,000-gallon loads before turning for home. Flying over portions of South Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia that had been sprayed, the pilots could see the effects of their work. Many of them adopted a grim fatalism about the job. Over the door of the ready room for Ranch Hand pilots at Tan Son Nhut Airport near Saigon hung this sign: "Only You Can Prevent Forests."
 
MAKERS KNEW OF DANGER TO HUMANS

    Unknown to the tens of thousands of American soldiers and Vietnamese civilians who were living, eating and bathing in a virtual omnipresent mist of the rainbow herbicides, the makers of these chemicals were well aware of their long-term toxic effects, but sought to suppress the information from the government and the public, fearing negative backlash.

    Of particular concern to the chemical companies was Agent Orange, which contained dioxin. Publicly, the chemical companies said dioxin occurred naturally in the environment and was not harmful to humans.

    Privately, they knew otherwise.

    A February 22, 1965 Dow Chemical Corporation internal memorandum provided a summary of a meeting in which 13 executives discussed the potential hazards of dioxin in 2,4,5-T. Following that meeting, Dow officials decided to meet with other makers of the chemical and formulate a stance on Agent Orange and dioxin.

    In March 1965, Dow official V.K. Rowe convened a meeting of executives of Monsanto, Hooker Chemical, which operated the Love Canal dump, Diamond Alkali, the forerunner of Diamond-Shamrock, and the Hercules Powder Co., which later became Hercules, Inc.

    According to documents uncovered only years later, the purpose of this meeting was "to discuss the toxicological problems caused by the presence of certain highly toxic impurities" in samples of 2,4,5-T. The primary "highly toxic impurity" was 2,3,7,8 TCDD, one of 75 dioxin compounds.
 
CONCERN OVER DIOXINS KEPT QUIET

    Three months later, Rowe sent a memo to Ross Mulholland, a manager with Dow in Canada, informing him that dioxin "is exceptionally toxic, it has a tremendous potential for producing chloracne (a skin disorder similar to acne) and systemic injury." Rowe ordered Mulholland in a postscript to the letter that "Under no circumstances may this letter be reproduced, shown or sent to anyone outside of Dow." Among those in attendance at one of the meetings of chemical company officials was John Frawley, a toxicologist for Hercules, Inc. In an internal memorandum for Hercules officials, Frawley wrote in 1965 that Dow was concerned the government might learn of a Dow study showing that dioxin caused severe liver damage in rabbits. Dow was concerned, according to Frawley, that "the whole industry will suffer." Frawley said he came away from the meeting with the feeling that "Dow was extremely frightened that this situation might explode" and lead to government restrictions.

    The concern over dioxins was kept quiet and largely out of the public view. The U.S. government and the chemical companies presented a united front on the issue of defoliation, claiming it was militarily necessary to deprive the Viet Cong of hiding places and food sources and that it caused no adverse economic or health effects to those who came into contact with the rainbow herbicides, particularly Agent Orange.
 
AIR FORCE KNEW OF HEALTH DANGER

    But, scientists involved in Operation Ranch Hand and documents uncovered recently in the National Archives present a somewhat different picture. There are strong indications that not only were military officials aware as early as 1967 of the limited effectiveness of chemical defoliation, they knew of potential long-term health risks of frequent spraying and sought to keep that information from the public by managing news reports.

    Dr. James Clary was an Air Force scientist in Vietnam who helped write the history of Operation Ranch Hand. Clary says the Air Force knew Agent Orange was far more hazardous to the health of humans than anyone would admit at the time.

    "When we (military scientists) initiated the herbicide program in the 1960s," Clary wrote in a 1988 letter to a member of Congress investigating Agent Orange, "we were aware of the potential for damage due to dioxin contamination in the herbicide. We were even aware that the `military' formulation had a higher dioxin concentration than the `civilian' version, due to the lower cost and speed of manufacture. However, because the material was to be used on the `enemy,' none of us were overly concerned. We never considered a scenario in which our own personnel would become contaminated with the herbicide. And, if we had, we would have expected our own government to give assistance to veterans so contaminated."
 
MILITARY DOWNPLAYS USE OF HERBICIDES

    Aware of the concern over the use of herbicides in Vietnam, particularly the use of Agent Orange, the U.S. Military Assistance Command, Vietnam (MACV), attempted to put the proper public relations spin on information concerning Operation Ranch Hand by announcing a "revision" in its policy on the use of herbicides.

    It was not so much a revision of the policy as it was an appearance of a revision of the policy as it was an appearance of revision, as is evident in a memorandum signed by Gen. R.W. Komer, deputy to Gen. William Westmoreland for civil operations and RD support (CORDS).

    "The purpose of this exercise would be to meet criticisms of excessive use of defoliants by clarifying that they will no longer be used in large areas, while in reality not restricting our use of defoliants (since they are not now normally used in this area anyway). In addition, there would be an escape clause . . . which would permit the use of defoliants even in the prohibited area provided that a strong case could be made to MACV/JGS.

    "Appearing to restrict the use of defoliants in this manner would (a) help meet US and Vietnamese criticism of these operations; (b) increase peasant confidence so that they would grow more rice; (c) be of psywar (psychological warfare) value by suggesting that large areas were sufficiently pacified by now that large scale defoliants use was no longer necessary."

    But the idea that the spraying of herbicides could be confined to a limited area as suggested in this memo was known to be futile as early as 1962
 
OPERATION MIST DRIFT

    One of the first defoliation efforts of Operation Ranch Hand was near a rubber plantation in January, 1962.

    According to an unsigned U.S. Army memorandum dated January 24, 1966, titled "Use of Herbicides in Vietnam," studies showed that within a week of spraying, the trees in the plantation "showed considerable leaf fall."

    "The injury to the young rubber trees occurred even though the plantation was located some 500 yards away and upwind of the target at the time of the spray delivery."

    The memo went on to say that "vapors of the chemical were strong enough in concentration to cause this injury to the rubber." These vapors, "appear to come from `mist drift' or from vaporization either in the atmosphere or after the spray has settled on the vegetation."

    The issue of "mist drift" continued to plague the defoliation program. How far would it drift? How fast? Wind speed and direction were of major concerns in answering these questions. Yet, there were other questions, many of which could not be answered.

    What happened in humid weather?

    How quickly did the chemicals diffuse in the atmosphere or were they carried into the clouds and dropped dozens of miles away? How long would the rainbow herbicides linger in the air or on the ground once they were sprayed?

    A November 8, 1967 memorandum from Eugene M. Locke, deputy U.S. ambassador in Saigon, once again addressed the problem of "mist drift" and "significant damage" to rubber plantations from spraying earlier in the year.

    According to Locke, "the herbicide damage resulted from a navigational error; some trees in another plantation had been defoliated deliberately in order to enhance the security of a U.S. military camp. The bulk of the herbicide damage must be attributed, however, to the drift of herbicide through the atmosphere. This drift occurs (a) after the spray is released from the aircraft and before it reaches the ground, and/or (b) when herbicide that has already reached the ground vaporizes during the heat of the day, is carried aloft, then moved by surface winds and eventually deposited elsewhere.

    "There is a lack of agreement within the Mission regarding the distances over which the two kinds of drift can occur. When properly released (as required at 150 feet above the target, with winds of no more than 10 mph blowing away from nearby plantations) herbicide spray should fall with reasonable accuracy upon its intended target. The range of drift of vaporized herbicide, however, has not been scientifically established at the present time. In recognition of this phenomenon and to minimize it, current procedures require that missions may be flown only during inversion conditions, i.e., when the temperature on the land and in the atmosphere produces downward currents of air. Estimates within the Mission of vaporized herbicide drift range from only negligible drift to distances of up to 10 kilometers and more."

    Ten kilometers and more. More than six miles. In essence, troops operating more than six miles from defoliation operations could find themselves, their water and their food doused with chemical agents, including dioxin-laced Agent Orange. And they wouldn't even know it.

    More than four months later, on March 23, 1968, Gen. A.R. Brownfield, then Army Chief of Staff, sent a message to all senior U.S. advisors in the four Corps Tactical Zones (CTZ) of Vietnam.

    Brownfield ordered that "helicopter spray operations will not be conducted when ground temperatures are greater that 85 (degrees) Fahrenheit and wind speed in excess of 10 mph."

    But the concern was not for any troops operating in the areas of spraying, as was evident in the memo, but for the rubber plantations. The message ordered that "a buffer distance of at least two (2) kilometers from active rubber plantation must be maintained." No such considerations were given for the troops operating in the area.
 
PROJECT PINK ROSE

    One of the U.S. government's worst planned and executed efforts to use herbicides was a secret operation known as "Project Pink Rose."

    According to a recently declassified report on "Project Pink Rose," the operation had its genesis in September 1965 when the Joint Chiefs of Staff received a recommendation from the Commander in Chief Pacific "to develop a capability to destroy by fire large areas of forest and jungle growth in Southeast Asia."

    On March 11, 1966, a test operation known as "Hot Tip" was documented at Chu Pong mountain near Pleiku when 15 B-52s dropped incendiaries on a defoliated area. According to the declassified memo, "results were inconclusive but sufficient fire did develop to indicate that this technique might be operationally functional."

    What neither the government nor the chemical companies told anyone was that burning dioxins significantly increases the toxicity of the dioxins. So, not only was the government introducing cancer causing chemicals into the war, it was increasing their toxicity by burning them.

    Nevertheless, "Project Pink Rose" continued.

    In November, 1966, three free strike target areas were selected: one in War Zone D and two in War Zone C. Each target was a box seven kilometers square. The target areas were double and triple canopy jungle. The areas were heavily prepped with defoliants, the government dumping 255,000 gallons on the test sites.

    The three sites were bombed individually, one on January 18, 1967, another January 28, 1967 and the last on April 4, 1967. According to the memo, "the order and dates of strikes were changed to properly phase Pink Rose operations with concurrent ground operations."

    Which means that U.S. and Vietnamese troops were living and fighting in these test sites on which 255,000 gallons of cancer causing defoliants had been dumped.

    The results of "Project Pink Rose" were less than favorable.

    According to the memo, "The Pink Rose technique is ineffective as a means of removing the forest crown canopy."

    The conclusion: "Further testing of the Pink Rose technique in South Vietnam under the existing concept be terminated."
 
DEFOLIANTS DUMPED ON PEOPLE
    AND INTO WATER SUPPLIES

    In addition to the planned dumps of herbicides, accidental and intentional dumps of defoliants over populated areas and into the water supplies was not unusual, according to government documents.

    A memorandum for the record dated October 31, 1967, and signed by Col. W.T. Moseley, chief of MACV's Chemical Operations Division, reported an emergency dump of herbicide far from the intended target.

    At approximately 1120 hours, October 29, 1967, aircraft #576 made an emergency dump of herbicide in Long Khanh Province due to failure of one engine and loss of power in the other. Approximately 1,000 gallons of herbicide WHITE were dumped from an altitude of 2,500 feet.

    No mention was made of wind speed or direction, but chemicals dropped from that height had the potential to drift a long way.

    Another memorandum for the record, this one dated January 8, 1968 and signed by Col. John Moran, chief Chemical Operations Division of MACV, also reported an emergency dump of herbicide, this time into a major river near Saigon.

    "At approximately 1015 hours, January 6, 1968, aircraft #633 made an emergency dump over the Dong Nai River approximately 15 kilometers east of Saigon when the aircraft experienced severe engine vibration and loss of power. Approximately 1,000 gallons of herbicide ORANGE were dumped from an altitude of 3,500 feet."
 
1965 Internal Document Dow Chemical

From:             Stephen Tvedten <steve@getipm.com>
Organization:     Get Set Inc. (www.getipm.com) 
To:               Paul Helliker <phelliker@cdpr.ca.gov>
                  Director, State of California, Department of Pesticide Regulation  

cc:               Christine Whitman <whitman.christine@epa.gov> 

Dear Mr. Helliker,  I thought you might like to read the following:

For release and publication or web posting - Don Sarten New Zealand 

Legible transcript of Dow Confidential Document originating from Sarnia Canada.

Received

June 24, 1965 

Ross Milholland                         DOW  CONFIDENTIAL

Manager
Bioproducts
Dow Chemical of Canada                                     DOW 747096 
Sarnia Canada                                              MM069799

2,4,5-TRICHLORPHENOL, THE "T" ACIDS, AND ASSOCIATED ALKALOIDS

I have not been neglecting your request for information to use in discussing 
of the subject problem with Naugatuck and the Co-Op.

I have been stymied, however, because the analytical methods have been changed 
and are in the process of being cleared and reproduced. I expect them anyday, 
but rather than wait longer, I thought I should advise you of the situation. 
I will send you copies of these methods as soon as they become available.

In regard to the overall problems, we are attempting to do everything possible 
to avoid the possible occurrence of chloracne in any applications or handling 
involving the use of trichlorophenol, trichlorophenoxyacetic acid and its 
derivatives. As you well know, we had a serious situation in our operating 
plants because of contamination of 2,4,5,-trichlorophenol with impurities, 
the most active of which is 2,3,7,8,-tetrachlorodibenzodioxin. This material 
is exceptionally toxic; it has a tremendous potential for producing chloracne 
and systemic injury. If it is present in the trichlorophenol, it will be carried 
through into the T acid and into the esters and hence into formulations which are 
to be sold to the public. One of the things we want to avoid is the occurrence of 
any acne in consumers. I am particularly concerned here with persons using the 
material on a daily, repeated basis such as custom operators may use it. The 
whole 2,4,5-t industry would be hard hit and I would expect restrictive 
legislation, either barring the material or putting very rigid controls upon it. 
This is the main reason why we are so concerned that we clean up our own house 
from within, rather than having someone from without do it for us. In this way, 
we can approach the problem in an orderly manner. If the producers and handlers 
of this material will co-operate, there is no reason why we cannot get this 
problem under strict control and thereby hopefully avoid restrictive legislation; 
in other words, let us practice good citizenship. At the present time, we are of 
the opinion that material containing no tetra- chlorodibenzodioxin with a 
certainty of 1 ppm does not present an appreciable hazard to consumers; likewise, 
we do not believe that such material constitutes a significant hazard to persons 
working in plants handling such phenol, T acid, or T acid esters.

I might add that we are continuing our research on this particular problem from 
the standpoint of studying the other impurities which may have the capacity to 
produce this type of reaction. Also, we are attempting to quantitate the effects 
of the known acnagens when added to base materials. This work is progressing well, 
but it will be several months before we have a completed story.

I would urge again that if your big customers such as Co-Op and Naugatuck have 
particular questions about this problem that you invite them to come to Midland 
where we will be glad to discuss the matter in detail with them and show them 
what we have learned. We are not in any way trying to hide our problems under 
a heap of sand, but we certainly do not want any situations to arise which will 
cause the regulatory agencies to become restrictive. Our primary objective is to 
avoid this.

I trust you will be very judicious in your use of this information. It could be 
quite embarrassing if it were misinterpreted or misused.

V.K. Rowe

Biochemical Research Laboratory

1701 Building

DX 6-2376

VKR/jd

cc: L. Silverstien

C. Otis

Grady Holdeman

F. Asstuzz

G. Goergoa

M. Moyle

Y. Falsey

V. K. Rowe (2)

T17 . 4-12-20 

correspondence

P.S. Under no circumstances may this letter be reproduced, shown, 
or sent to anyone outside of Dow.

VKR 

From: "Ralph Ryder" <Ralph@tcpublications.freeserve.co.uk>
To: "Steve Tvedten" <steve@getipm.com>
Sent: Friday, March 08, 2002 11:20 AM
Subject: Dow Chemical letter.

Hi Steven

I found the Dow confidential letter you posted interesting as I am currently (trying) to write something on the extent of the dioxin contamination of New Zealand.

The following feature is for your 'background' files, although I would assume there is very little in it you do not already know, but there are a few references to the creep V.K.Rowe of Dow.

I wrote it in relation to the Belgium dioxin contamination a few years ago. A shortened version was published in the Ecologist Vol.29 No 6 October 1999, but this was a more in-depth article for the members of Communities Against Toxics. I hope you find it interesting.

Wishing you good health

Ralph
 
CHEMICAL COMPANY EMPLOYEES
    DEVELOP SKIN PROBLEMS

    The chemical companies continued to insist that the herbicides in general, and Agent Orange in particular, had no adverse effects on humans. This despite Dow's concerns about human exposure to Agent Orange expressed internally in 1965 but hidden from the government. And this despite evidence at the plants producing Agent Orange that workers exposed to it suffered unusual health problems.

    The Diamond Alkali Co. in Newark, New Jersey, was one of the major producers of Agent Orange for the government. Spurred by Pentagon officials to make their production schedules to "help the war effort," patriotic employees at Diamond Alkali eagerly sought to fill their quotas.

    But some of Diamond Alkali's employees began suffering what were described as "painful and disfiguring" skin diseases, according to the doctor who treated more than 50 of the employees in the early and mid 1960s.

    "They (the employees) were aware of what was going on," said Dr. Roger Brodkin, head of dermatology at the University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey.

    "No one worried much about the skin disease because everyone was determined to make production schedules."

    Brodkin said he alerted state health officials of the problem, but got little response.

    "They came out, all of them, said Brodkin. "They looked around and they said, `Ah hah,' and left. Nothing was done."

    Brodkin later discovered that many of Diamond Alkali's employees involved in the manufacture of Agent Orange were suffering a variety of ailments.

    "We discovered that not only were these people getting skin disease, but they were also showing some indication of liver damage," he said.

    It was not until 1983 that the state of New Jersey got around to testing the soil around the plant. It found hazardous levels of dioxin.

    New Jersey Gov. Thomas Kean urged residents living within 300 yards of the plant to move.

    It was not until 1968 that scientists began raising some concerns about the use of the rainbow herbicides in Vietnam.
 
STATE DEPARTMENT EXONERATES
    CHEMICAL COMPANIES

    Part of their concern came following a November 1967 study by Yale University botany Professor Arthur Galston. Galston did some experiments with Agent Orange and other herbicides to determine whether they were dangerous to humans and animals. Galston was unable to come to any definite conclusions on Agent Orange, but advised that continued use of it might "be harmful" and have unforeseen consequences.

    The American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) in the summer of 1968 sent a letter to the Secretaries of State and Defense urging a study to determine the ecological effects of herbicide spraying in Vietnam.

    That letter prompted a cable from Secretary of State Dean Rusk to the U.S. Embassy in Saigon. The cable, dated August 26, 1968, sought additional information but informed embassy officials of the tactic State was going to take in its reply to the AAAS.

    "The Department of State's proposed reply notes that the limited investigations of the ecological problem which have been conducted by agencies of the USG thus far have failed to reveal serious ecological disturbances, but acknowledges that the long-term effect of herbicides can be determined definitively only by long-term studies."

    Rusk suggested releasing "certain non-sensitive" portions of a study on the ecological effects of herbicide spraying in Vietnam done earlier that year by Dr. Fred H. Tschirley, then assistant chief of the Corps Protection Research Branch, Corps Research Division of the U.S. Department of Agriculture in Beltsville, Maryland. Tschirley went to Vietnam under the auspices of the State Department early in 1968 and returned with exactly the report the U.S. government and the chemical companies wanted.

    Tschirley foresaw no long-term ecological impact on Vietnam as a result of the herbicide spraying. In addition, in his report of April 1968, later reprinted in part in the February 21, 1969 issue of Science magazine, Tschirley exonerated the chemical companies.

    "The herbicides used in Vietnam are only moderately toxic to warm-blooded animals," Tschirley wrote. "None deserves a lengthy discussion except for Agent Blue (cacodylic acid), which contains arsenic."

    This despite evidence within the chemical companies that dioxin, the most toxic ingredient in Agent Orange, was responsible for health problems in laboratory animals and workers at the plants that produced the chemical.

    "There is no evidence," Tschirley wrote, "to suggest that the herbicides used in Vietnam will cause toxicity problems for man or animals."

    Rusk urged Tschirley's report be made public. In his cable to Saigon, he wrote: "Its publication would not only help avoid some awkwardness for Tschirley, but would provide us with valuable documentation to demonstrate that the USG is taking a responsible approach to the herbicide program and that independent investigation has substantiated the Midwest Institute's findings that there have been no serious adverse ecological consequences."

    What Rusk did not mention was that Tschirley's report had been heavily edited, in essence changing its findings.
 
USE OF CHEMICALS CONTINUES IN VIETNAM

    While the debate over the danger of Agent Orange and dioxin heated up in scientific circles, the U.S. Air Force continued flying defoliation sorties. And the troops on the ground continued to live in the chemical mist of the rainbow herbicides. They slept with it, drank it in their water, ate it in their food and breathed it when it dropped out of the air in a fine, white pungent mist.

    Some of the troops in Vietnam used the empty Agent Orange drums for barbecue pits. Others stored watermelons and potatoes in them. Still others rigged the residue laden drums for showers.

    Former Marine Danny Gene Jordan remembers sitting on Hill 549 near Khe Sanh in the spring of 1968, waiting for night and cooking his C-rations. Jordan had been in country just a few weeks and was still learning his way around, so he wasn't sure why the five C-123s approaching his unit would be flying so low and in formation.

    "They're defoliating," one of his buddies told him.

    Then came the mist, like clouds floating out of the back of the C-123s, soaking the men, their clothes and their food. For the next two weeks, the men of Jordan's unit suffered nausea and diarrhea. Jordan returned from Vietnam with an unusual amount of dioxin in his system. More than 15 years later, he still had 50 parts per trillion, considered abnormally high. He also had two sons born with deformed arms and hands.

    The spraying continued unabated in 1968, even though, according to military records, it apparently was having minimal effects on the enemy. A series of memorandums uncovered in the National Archives and now declassified indicate that defoliation killed a lot of plants, but had little real effect on military operations.
 
ADVANTAGES VERSES DISADVANTAGES DISCUSSED

    As early as 1967 it had become clear that herbicide spraying was having few of the desired effects. According to an undated and unsigned USMACV memorandum, Rand Corporation studies in October 1967, concluded "that the crops destruction effort may well be counterproductive."

    According to the memo, "The peasant, who is the target of our long range pacification objectives, bears the brunt of the crop destruction effort and does not like it."

    Col. John Moran, chief of the Chemical Operations Division of MACV, wrote a memorandum dated October 3, 1968, and titled "Advantages and Disadvantages of the Use of Herbicides in Vietnam" that provides some key insights into the defoliation program.

    "The effect of defoliation on the enemy, in itself, is of little military value," Moran wrote. "Its military potential is realized only when it is channeled into selected targets and combined with combat power to restrain the enemy from using an area or pay the cost in men and material from accurately delivered firepower."

    Disadvantages of defoliation were more numerous, according to the memorandum.

    "The herbicide program carries with it the potential for causing serious adverse impacts in the economic, social and psychological fields," Moran wrote.

    Ecologically, according to the memorandum, "Semideciduous forests, especially in War Zone C and D, have been severely affected. The regeneration of these forests could be seriously retarded by repeated applications of herbicide."

    An unsigned, undated memorandum written sometime late in 1968 provided even more details about the negative impact of defoliation.

    Regarding the effect of VC/NVA combat and infiltration capability, the memo reported that "Very few PWs who have infiltrated even mention the effects of US herbicide operations. Some state that they have seen areas where the vegetation has been killed, but do not mention any infiltration problems caused by the defoliation. There are indications that US herbicide operations have had a negligible effect on NVA infiltration and combat operations."

    The psychological effects of defoliation, according to the memorandum, were twofold; they either hardened the resolve of the VC/NVA or angered the Vietnamese farmers whose crops were destroyed.

    "Some enemy soldiers may become more dedicated to the elimination of those who `ravage the countryside.' In addition, Allied herbicide operations may provide good material for enemy propaganda efforts aimed at fermenting an anti-US/GVN (Government of Vietnam) attitude among the population."

    The reaction of the civilians affected by herbicide spraying is even more noticeable according to the memo.

    "The obvious reaction of the peasant whose labors have been destroyed is one of bitterness and hatred. He will frequently direct this hatred toward both the US/GVN, for accomplishing the destruction, and the VC/NVA, for bringing it about. If he has previously leaned toward the VC, he is likely to side with them completely after the crop destruction. He is aided in making this decision by the incessant propaganda of the VC cadre who decry the `barbarous crimes perpetrated by the Americans and their lackeys.'"

    So, while Operation Ranch Hand provided no long or short term military benefits, it also provided neither long nor short term psychological benefits. If anything, it embittered the civilian population of Vietnam and drove it closer to the Viet Cong and NVA. And no one yet was sure what eventually would be the effect on the health of those exposed to the chemicals. Operation Ranch Hand was shown by late 1968 to be a bankrupt strategy, one devoid of good sense, good planning or good intentions.
 
ORANGE AEROSOL DISCOVERED

    Meanwhile, the military continued to learn just how toxic Agent Orange could be. On October 23, 1969, an urgent message was sent from Fort Detrick, Maryland, to MACV concerning cleaning of drums containing herbicides. The message provided detailed instructions on how to clean the drums and warned that it was particularly important to clean Agent Orange drums.

    "Using the (Agent) Orange drums for storing petroleum products without thoroughly cleaning of them can result in creation of an orange aerosol when the contaminated petroleum products are consumed in internal combustion engines. The Orange aerosol thus generated can be most devastating to vegetation in the vicinity of engines. Some critics claim that some of the damage to vegetation along Saigon streets can be attributed to this source. White and Blue residues are less of a problem in this regard since they are not volatile."

    Not only was Agent Orange being sprayed from aircraft, but it was unwittingly being sprayed out of the exhausts of trucks, jeeps and gasoline generators.

    In March 1969, Lt. Col. Jim Corey, deputy chief of CORDS in I Corps reported to his boss, R.M. Urquhart, unusual defoliation in Da Nang.

    "A large number of beautiful shade trees along the streets in the city of Da Nang are dead or dying," Corey wrote. "This damage appears to be entirely a result of defoliation chemicals."

    There was no evidence of insect or fungus damage to the vegetation, according to the memo.

    "In every instance of tree and garden plot damage," Corey wrote, "empty defoliant barrels are either present in the area or have been transported along the route of the damage."

    The use of herbicides was not confined to the jungles. It was widely used to suppress vegetation around the perimeters of military bases and, in many instances, the interiors of those bases.
 
LAB TESTS ON ANIMALS CURTAIL
    SOME USE OF AGENT ORANGE

    Nevertheless, the use of Agent Orange throughout Vietnam was widespread through much of 1969. Then, late in the year a study done by Bionetics Research Laboratories showed that dioxin caused deaths and stillbirths in laboratory animals. The tests revealed that as little as two parts of dioxin per trillion in the bloodstream was sufficient to cause deaths and abnormal births. And some GIs were returning home from Vietnam with 50 parts per trillion, and more, in their bloodstream.

    When the report was released by the Food and Drug Administration, the White House, on October 29, 1969, ordered a partial curtailment of the use of Agent Orange in Vietnam.

    On November 4, 1969, a message went out from Joint Chiefs of Staff to Commander in Chief Pacific (CINCPAC) and MACV.

    "A report prepared for the National Institute of Health presents evidence that 2,4,5-T can cause malformation of offspring and stillbirths in mice, when given in relatively high doses. This material is present in the defoliant (Agent) Orange.

    "Pending decision by the appropriate department on whether this herbicide can remain on the domestic market, defoliation missions in South Vietnam using Orange should be targeted only for areas remote from population. Normal use of White or Blue herbicides can continue, but large scale substitution of Blue for Orange will not be permitted."
 
USE OF AGENT ORANGE FINALLY ENDED

    Despite the order, some troops continued to use Agent Orange when they ran out of the other rainbow herbicides. Finally, in early 1971, the U.S. Surgeon General prohibited the use of Agent Orange for home use because of possible harmful effects on humans and on June 30, 1971, all United States defoliation operations in Vietnam were brought to an end.
 
VETS BEGIN DEVELOPING HEALTH PROBLEMS

    As soldiers who had served in Vietnam attempted to settle back into civilian life following their tours, some of them began to develop unusual health problems. There were skin and liver diseases and what seemed to be an abnormal number of cancers to soft tissue organs such as the lungs and stomach. There also seemed to be an unusually high number of birth defects among children born to Vietnam veterans who had been exposed to Agent Orange. Some veterans experienced wild mood swings, while others developed a painful skin rash known as chloracne. Many of these veterans were found to have high levels of dioxin in their blood, but scientists and the U.S. government insisted there was no link between their illnesses and Agent Orange.

    In the mid 1970s, there was renewed interest in dioxin and its effects on human health following an industrial accident in Seveso, Italy, in which dioxin was released into the air, causing animal deaths and human sickness.
 
EPA BANS USE OF AGENT ORANGE IN U.S.

    Then, in 1979, the Environmental Protection Agency banned the use of Agent Orange in the United States when a large number of stillbirths were reported among mothers in Oregon, where the chemical had been heavily used.

    While veterans clamored for help from the Veterans Administration, the government responded either slowly, or not at all. In 1979, a National Veterans Task Force on Agent Orange was formed and legislation finally was passed by Congress at the urging of Rep. Tom Daschle (D-SD), a Vietnam veteran who became a U.S. Senator, to commission a large scale epidemiological study of veterans who had been exposed to the herbicide.

    That proved to be only the beginning of the battle over Agent Orange.

    Over the next four years, the VA examined an estimated 200,000 veterans for medical problems they claimed stemmed from Agent Orange and other herbicides used in Vietnam. But many of those examined were dissatisfied with their examinations. They claimed the exams were done poorly and often in haste by unqualified medical personnel. Many veterans also claimed that the VA seemed to have a mind set to ignore or debunk Agent Orange connected disability complaints.
 
CLASS ACTION SUIT FILED

    Fed up with what they perceived as government inaction on the Agent Orange issue, veterans filed a class action lawsuit in 1982 against the chemical companies that had made Agent Orange. Among the companies named were Dow Chemical Co. of Midland, Michigan; Monsanto Co. of St. Louis, Missouri; Diamond Shamrock Corp. of Dallas, Texas; Hercules Inc. of Wilmington, Delaware; Uniroyal Inc. of Middlebury, Connecticut; Thompson Chemical Corp. of Newark, New Jersey and the T.H. Agriculture and Nutrition Co. of Kansas City, Missouri.

    By the early 1980s, some of the chemical companies' dirty little secrets about dioxin were beginning to leak out.
 
TIMES BEACH

    Times Beach was an idyllic little community of about 2,200 residents in the rolling farmlands of eastern Missouri 20 miles southwest of St. Louis. It was an ideal place to live and raise children, with plenty of open spaces, two story wood frame houses, quiet streets and none of the pollution, poverty or crime of the inner city.

    Or so it seemed.

    Unknown to the residents of Times Beach, for several years in the mid 1970s, dioxin laced oil had been sprayed on the town's roads to keep down the dust. Times Beach was one of 28 eastern Missouri communities where the spraying had been done. But none of the others had the levels of dioxin contamination of Times Beach, parts of which had dioxin levels of 33,000 parts per billion, or 33,000 times more toxic than the EPA's level of acceptance.

    The contamination was so bad that the government decided the only way to save the town's residents from further damage from dioxin was to buy them out and move them out.

    In early 1983, the U.S. government spent $33 million buying the 801 homes and businesses in Times Beach and relocating its 2,200 residents. The entire town was fenced in and guards were brought in to keep out the curious. "Caution, Hazardous Waste Site, Dioxin Contamination," read the signs leading into Times Beach.

    What had been a comfortable little community became a ghost town. It remains a ghost town today because of dioxin contamination.

    So, while the government was paying off the residents of Times Beach because of dioxin contamination, it continued to deny that Vietnam veterans who had been exposed to Agent Orange and its dioxin were at risk.
 
AMA DOWNPLAYS DIOXIN DANGER

    While the government was busily buying up Times Beach and evacuating its residents, the American Medical Association was coming under attack from environmental health specialists for its stance on dioxin. In its June 1983 convention, the AMA adopted a resolution calling for a public information campaign on dioxin to "prevent irrational reaction and unjustified public fright."

    "The news media have made dioxin the focus of a witch hunt by disseminating rumors, hearsay and unconfirmed, unscientific reports," the resolution read, in part.

    That position was overwhelmingly supported by President Ronald Reagan in a speech at the AMA convention, calling the resolution "a positive step toward a more reasonable public debate" on the issue.

    But Dr. Samuel Epstein, professor of occupational and environmental medicine at the University of Illinois Medical Center in Chicago, called the AMA "incompetent and ignorant" for its stance on dioxin.

    "The AMA's contribution in this area is a profound disservice and consistent with their established record of extreme conservatism and lack of information and demonstrated lack of concern for preventive medicine," said Epstein.

    And Dr. Paul Wiesner, an assistant director of the CDC said that "Evidence is increasing that there is an association with a rare form of tumor called soft tissue sarcoma after occupational exposure (to dioxin)."
 
STUDIES CONTRADICTORY AND CONFUSING

    By 1983, the results of studies of Agent Orange and dioxin exposure began to trickle in. They were, for the most part, contradictory and confusing. A series of studies conducted between 1974 and 1983 by Dr. Lennart Hardell, the so called Swedish studies, showed a link between exposure to Agent Orange and soft tissue sarcomas and non-Hodgkin's lymphoma. And in July 1983, the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) released a report citing "an association" between dioxin exposure and incidence of soft tissue sarcoma.

    "The early warning sign has gone up," said Dr. Edward Brandt, Jr., assistant secretary of the HHS.

    This was also the year of the Times Beach buy out and growing nationwide concern over dioxin. Few people knew what it was and only Vietnam veterans and researchers knew what it could do to the human body.

    In December 1983, the EPA announced a nationwide plan to clean up more than 200 dioxin contaminated sites, including 50 plants where 2,4,5-T had been manufactured. The cost of the cleanup was put at $250 million and was expected to take four years.

    But barely two months later, in February, 1984, the U.S. Air Force released the first part of a three part study on Operation Ranch Hand pilots and crewmen. It concluded that the 1,269 pilots and crewmen involved in the herbicide spraying program in Vietnam suffered no higher death or serious illness rates than the general population.

    But to Vietnam veterans, studying aircrews who had handled drums of Agent Orange, and not the soldiers exposed to it, was like testing the crew of the Enola Gay for the effects of radiation, not the survivors of Hiroshima.

    Said Maj. Gen. Murphy Chesney, deputy Air Force Surgeon General: "Do I worry as a physician because we used it? The answer is no. I say war is hell, you've got to win it. Agent Orange was a war agent. It was used to protect our ground troops. It saved millions of lives possibly, thousands, anyway, in Vietnam."

    MACV memorandums written during the war did not support Chesney's claims that Agent Orange saved lives, but no one questioned him on his conclusions because those documents were still classified.

    The VA, meanwhile, continued to dismiss veterans health complaints if they dealt with exposure to Agent Orange.

    "A lot of veterans are scared because of early news reports of physical damage, while some among any large number of people are going to have health problems such as a matter of routine natural incidence," said Dr. Barclay Shepard, director of Agent Orange Studies for the VA. "Put that together with disillusionment over the Vietnam War and anger with the government and there is little wonder that many veterans truly believe that they have in some way been hurt. But the evidence has not supported a cause and effect relationship."
 
LAWSUIT SETTLED - VETS WIN, BUT LOSE

    Then on May 7, 1984, came the news that the Agent Orange lawsuit, filed two years earlier, had been settled. Prodded by U.S. District Judge Jack B. Weinstein, attorneys for the veterans and the chemical companies reached an agreement at 4 a.m. the morning the case was to go to trial. At that time, 15,000 veterans and their relatives were involved in the suit, but about 250,000 subsequently filed claims.

    Under the terms of the settlement, the Vietnam veterans who claimed exposure to Agent Orange would receive $180 million from the chemical companies. But those companies did not have to accept blame for any injuries that occurred as a result of Agent Orange. The U.S. government was not a party to the litigation.

    "Thus resolution is a compassionate, expedient and productive means of meeting the needs of the people involved," said David Buzzelli, vice president of government and public affairs for Dow Chemical.

    Veterans at first were ecstatic.

    "This is a defeat for the chemical companies. We brought them down to their knees and we got an open admission of guilt," said Rod Rinker of Atlanta, one of the veterans who claimed Agent Orange exposure.

    Not so, said the chemical companies.

    "When you look at the overwhelming scientific evidence, Agent Orange is not a reasonable or likely cause of the ill health effects experienced by the veterans," said R.W. Charlton, another Dow spokesman.

    Despite the release earlier of the results of the Operation Ranch Hand study, 1984 seemed to be a year in which the Vietnam veteran's complaints about Agent Orange and the health problems it caused were being taken seriously. The federal court decision boosted the morale of the Agent Orange claimants. Then Congress chimed in.

    In late 1984, Congress passed Public Law 98-542, designed to provide compensation for soft tissue sarcoma and required the VA to establish standards for general Agent Orange and atomic radiation compensation.

    It seemed as if the veterans were winning. But every time a veteran went to the VA seeking compensation for Agent Orange related problems, he was turned away.

    "Since 1984, Public Law 98-542 has been virtually ignored," said South Dakota Sen. Tom Daschle. "In spite of the intent of Congress, in spite of the efforts of everyone involved in the writing of that law, in spite of our promises to veterans at that time that at long last, after all these years, they would be given the benefit of the doubt, not one veteran in this country has been compensated for any disease other than chloracne."

    Agent Orange sufferers tried on several occasions to sue the government for its role in use of the herbicide, but their suits were routinely dismissed because of what has come to be known as the Feres Doctrine. In 1950, the Supreme Court ruled in a case involving the death of a military man that the government is not responsible for deaths, injuries or other losses related to military service.

    Meanwhile, the reality of the settlement reached in the lawsuit with the seven chemical companies began to settle in. The lawyers involved wanted $40 million off the top for their fees. They had decided in a secret agreement prior to the May 1984 settlement that they would receive a 300 percent return on any investment in time and effort they had made. Many veterans charged that this secret fee agreement by the plaintiff's management committee precluded any incentive for the committee to represent the veterans in the suit. Judge Weinstein decided to give the lawyers $9.2 million.

    It became readily apparent that $180 million just wasn't enough to take care of the Agent Orange claimants and their families, which had reached more than 200,000 by then. A master plan to divide the settlement noted that the settlement "is simply not large enough." The plan suggested taking $130 million for a settlement to provide cash payments to eligible veterans or the families of deceased members. Maximum cash payments of $12,800 to the most qualified claimants, or about 17,000 veterans and their survivors, was suggested. The master plan also suggested using $52 million to fund a "class assistance foundation" earmarked for benefit programs.
 
TEST RESULTS CONTINUE TO BE MIXED

    Results of Agent Orange tests continued to be mixed. The results varied greatly, depending on who was doing the testing.

    In December, 1985, the Air Force released the third of its Operation Ranch Hand studies. It confirmed the other two: that there was no evidence that Agent Orange had any adverse affects on those who handled it during the war.

    "At this time, there is no evidence of increased mortality as a result of herbicide exposure among individuals who performed the Ranch Hand spray operation in Southeast Asia," the Air Force concluded.

    But in April, 1986, the CDC released a report that showed that the residents of a mobile home park near St. Louis were suffering from liver and immune system damage as a result of their exposure to dioxin laced chemicals.

    According to the study, the 154 residents of Quail Run Mobile Home Park in Gray Summit, Missouri, near Times Beach southwest of St. Louis, showed depressed liver function and deficiencies in their immune systems. The dirt roads in the mobile home park had been sprayed in 1971 with dioxin laced oil to keep down the dust.

    While the CDC seemed concerned about Missouri residents exposed to dioxin laced chemicals, it did not demonstrate the same concern for Vietnam veterans exposed to dioxin contaminated herbicides. In fact, information began to surface in 1986 that the CDC not only was dragging its feet on Agent Orange studies, it was deliberately ignoring information to which it had access in order to come up with results that would be favorable to the government.

    In the summer of 1986, the House Veterans Affairs Subcommittee on Hospitals and Health Care held hearings to assess the progress of the CDC study of Agent Orange, mandated seven years earlier. Testimony from witnesses from the Office of Technology Assessment (OTA) shocked and angered members of the committee, according to Sen. Tom Daschle.

    "OTA reported that the Centers for Disease Control had changed the protocol for the study without authorization," said Daschle. "OTA also reported at that particular hearing that petty arguments at CDC were interfering with the study's progress and that progress had virtually come to a standstill."

    After seven years of study, the CDC had made no progress on one of the most important and highly publicized issues of the war in Vietnam.

    In charge of the CDC study was Dr. Vernon Houk, director of the agency's Center for Environmental Health and Injury Control. The White House's Agent Orange Working Group was supposed to supervise the CDC study while the Pentagon's Environmental Support Group was charged with providing the CDC with records of Agent Orange spraying and troop deployment.

    Houk's CDC team complained throughout the study that those records were too spotty to make a scientific study of the effects of Agent Orange on soldiers.

    Not so, said the Pentagon. Richard Christian, head of the Pentagon's Environmental Support Group, testified before Congress in mid 1986 that the records of troop movements and spraying were more than adequate for a scientific study.

    Christian's testimony was bolstered by two other sources. Retired Army Maj. Gen. John Murray had been asked by Defense Secretary Casper Weinberger in early 1986 to undertake a study to determine if Pentagon records were adequate for purposes of the study. After four months, Murray also determined that the records for a comprehensive study of Agent Orange were more than adequate.

    In addition, the Institute of Medicine, an arm of the National Academy of Sciences, had used outside consultants to study reports of troop deployment and Agent Orange spraying to determine if they were sufficient for CDC purposes. Its conclusion: the Pentagon had the necessary records. The Institute of Medicine also was highly critical of the CDC research methods, charging that it excluded from its study the veterans most likely to have been exposed to Agent Orange.
 
WHITE HOUSE COVER-UP

    Despite information from three sources that there were adequate records available for a comprehen sive CDC study on Agent Orange, the White House and CDC sought to cover it up.

    First, the Institute of Medicine's study was never turned over to the White House. Then, Murray decided that as a non-scientist, he was in no position to challenge the objections of CDC's Houk and deferred to his judgement on the matter of records. Then, according to Daschle, the Pentagon came down hard on Christian for criticizing the CDC.

    "DOD officials altered his follow-up testimony before it was sent to the Hill, deleting his information challenging CDC's claims," said Daschle.

    By mid 1986, the White House had set the wheels in motion to cancel the CDC's Agent Orange study.

    There were other indications that the Reagan administration had no real interest in studies of Agent Orange or dioxin. In late 1986, the House Energy and Commerce Committee learned that the White House's Office of Management and Budget (OMB) was trying to stop all dioxin research, claiming that enough research had been done.

    Despite efforts to shut down research and cover up results of studies not favorable to the government or chemical companies, evidence continued to flow in showing a definite statistical link between cancers and exposure to Agent Orange and dioxin:

    - A 1986 study by the National Cancer Institute of Kansas revealed that farmers exposed to 2,4-D, an ingredient of Agent Orange, had six times more non-Hodgkin's lymphomas than farmers not exposed.

    - A VA study released in 1987 showed that Marines who served in areas of Vietnam that had been heavily sprayed with Agent Orange had a 110 percent higher rate of non-Hodgkin's lymphomas. The study also showed these Marines had a 58 percent higher rate of lung cancers.

    - A 1987 study in the state of Washington showed veterans who had been exposed to Agent Orange had significant increases in soft tissue sarcomas and non-Hodgkin's lymphomas.

    - A 1987 VA study showed veterans who were most likely exposed to Agent Orange had eight times more soft tissue sarcoma than other veterans.

    Meanwhile, the CDC had been taking blood samples of 646 Vietnam veterans, selected on the basis of probable exposure to Agent Orange, to test the level of dioxin in their blood. Other scientists were highly critical of this method of testing, but the CDC moved on.

    Then, in September 1987, the CDC exonerated Agent Orange, claiming once again there were not sufficient records available to make the necessary tests.

    "We cannot find a sufficiently large number of people who have been exposed to do a scientifically valid study of exposure to Agent Orange," said Houk.

    "We looked at three different kinds of exposure: short-term, long-term and exposure from being in an area of Vietnam where the herbicide was used. In none of these groups was there any difference in the level of Agent Orange in the blood."

    Houk recommended that the Agent Orange study be canceled. The White House agreed, and shortly after that the CDC's $43 million Agent Orange study came to an end with a not guilty verdict for Agent Orange.
 
STUDY CALLED A FRAUD

    But again, there was more information available that was never presented. The Institute of Medicine in the weeks before the CDC released its results of blood tests wrote a stinging rebuke of the CDC's tests methods. It said that none of the CDC's conclusions was supported by scientific data. The CDC refused to turn this report over to the White House.

    "Either it was a politically rigged operation or it was a monumentally bungled operation," said Rep. Ted Weiss (D-NY), chairman of the Government Operations Human Resources and Intergovernmental Relations Subcommittee.

    Other information began turning up that there were concerted efforts by various agencies of the government to conceal records and information about the effects of Agent Orange.

    Daschle learned that there were major discrepancies between a January 1984 draft of the Air Force's Operation Ranch Hand study and the February 1984 report. According to Daschle, the draft showed there were twice as many birth defects among the children of Ranch Hand participants. "The draft also reported that the Ranch Handers were less well than the controls by a ratio of 5 to 1," said Daschle.

    But these results were deleted from the final Ranch Hand report, which said there had been no adverse effects from exposure to Agent Orange.

    "The Air Force deleted these findings from the final report at the suggestion of a Ranch Hand Advisory Committee set up by the White House Agent Orange Working Group," said Daschle.

    Air Force scientists involved in the study said they were pressured by non-scientists within the Air Force and the White House to change the results and delete critical information for the final report. Daschle says he has even obtained two versions of the minutes of the meeting in which that pressure was applied. One confirms what the scientists told him. Another set deletes that information.

    "What happened there was a fraud perpetrated by people whose names we still do not know," said Daschle.

    Part of the fraud appears to have been perpetrated by the Monsanto Corp., which produces a number of chemicals containing dioxin. Monsanto knowingly rigged test results of employees who had been exposed to dioxin to make the effects of it appear far less than it actually was, according to a February 23, 1990 Environmental Protection Agency memorandum.

    The memorandum was written by Dr. Cate Jenkins, a chemist in the Waste Characterization Branch, Characterization and Assessment Division of the EPA to Dr. Raymond C. Loehr, chairman of EPA's Science Advisory Board Executive Committee.

    Jenkins writes that a key epidemiological study leading to the conclusion that there was no definitive data on human health effects of dioxins was based on examination of medical records of Monsanto employees from a 1949 explosion. That study "found no statistically significant excess cancer deaths," according to Jenkins.

    "This study by Monsanto apparently has now been shown to be a fraud," Jenkins wrote.

    "This study on behalf of Monsanto is described, where it is alleged that the record demonstrated a deliberate course of conduct by Monsanto through `altered' research to prove to the world that the only health consequences of dioxins was the relatively harmless, reversible condition of chloracne."

    Since this study was altered, Jenkins surmises, "It could be that other studies on exposed populations are similarly flawed and subject to fraud." The study in question was done of employees at a Nitro, West Virginia Monsanto plant following an explosion in 1949 in which a number of them were exposed to dioxins. The study, performed by two Monsanto employees, concluded that the death rate of exposed workers was the same as the death rate of unexposed workers.

    However, later investigation revealed that the authors of the study omitted five deaths from the exposed group and took four workers who had been exposed and put them in the unexposed group. This decreased the death rate in the exposed group and increased the death rate in the unexposed group. The exposed group actually had 18 cancer deaths as a result of the exposure, not the nine deaths reported in the study. And there were a total of 28 cancers in the exposed group, compared to only two cancers in the unexposed group.

    This type fraud appears to have been perpetrated regularly in connection with Agent Orange research, yet Congress continues to rely on this flawed research when it considers legislation that would benefit the victims of Agent Orange and the other rainbow herbicides.
 
MONTGOMERY HOLDS UP AGENT ORANGE LEGISLATION

    Efforts to get comprehensive Agent Orange legislation through Congress to right the wrongs of the cover-ups have been unsuccessful largely through the efforts of one man: Rep. Sonny Montgomery of Mississippi, chairman of the House Veterans Affairs Committee, who claimed to be the friend and champion of veterans in Congress - in fact had virtually single-handedly bottled up Agent Orange legislation.

    The CDC, meanwhile, continues to perpetrate the scientifically flawed myth that Agent Orange and dioxin posed no health threats to Vietnam veterans.

    In a study released March 29, 1990, the CDC admitted that Vietnam veterans face a higher risk of non-Hodgkin's lymphoma, but denied that it was a result of exposure to Agent Orange. It said the studies showed that Vietnam veterans do not have higher rates of soft tissue sarcomas, Hodgkin's disease, nasal cancer, nasopharyngeal cancer and liver cancer.
 
BIZARRE FINDING

    One of the more bizarre aspects of this report from the CDC was the claim that those veterans who suffered most from non-Hodgkin's lymphoma had served on Navy ships off the coast of Vietnam. It said that those who had served in III Corps, which had some of the heaviest Agent Orange spraying of the war, seemed to be at lower risk.

    "There is no risk in this study associated with (dioxin) exposure," said Dr. Daniel Hoffman of the CDC. Veterans groups were appalled by the findings.

    "The conclusion seems to fly in the face of other scientific studies, which indicates there is a connection between Agent Orange and cancer, birth defects and other disorders. It makes it sound like Agent Orange is like orange juice, healthy for you instead of harmful," said John Hanson, a spokesman for the American Legion.
 
HOUSE COMMITTEE SAYS STUDY FLAWED

    The House Committee in its August 1990 report also found that the 1987 Agent Orange study canceled by CDC was done so at the behest of the White House. Its report was a stinging rebuke to the White House and the CDC. The report offered these conclusions:

    "A. The CDC Agent Orange exposure study should not have been canceled because it did not document that exposure of veterans to the herbicide could not be assessed, nor did CDC explore alternative methods of determining the exposure.

    "B. The original protocol for the CDC Agent Orange study was changed to the point that it was unlikely for the heaviest exposed soldiers to be identified.

    "C. The blood serum analysis, which was used as proof by CDC that an Agent Orange exposure study could not be conducted, was based on erroneous assumptions and a flawed analysis.

    "D. The White House compromised the independence of the CDC and undermined the study by controlling crucial decisions and guiding the course of research at the same time it had secretly taken a legal position to resist demands to compensate victims of Agent Orange exposure and industrial accidents.

    "E. The Federal Government has suppressed or minimized findings of ill health effects among Vietnam veterans that could be linked to Agent Orange exposure."

    An indepth reading of the report reveals even more sordid details of how the CDC and the White House stacked the deck on Agent Orange.

    According to the report, "The CDC study was changed from its original format so that it would have been unlikely for the soldiers who received the heaviest exposure to the herbicide to be identified. CDC accomplished this by unjustifiably discrediting the military records provided to it by the Department of Defense's Environmental Study Group (ESG)."
 
POLITICS AND MONEY MORE IMPORTANT
    THAN HUMAN LIVES

    The rebuke of the White House and its Agent Orange Working Group (AOWG) was even more revealing of the manner in which Agent Orange studies have been manipulated by political and economic concerns, not concerns about human lives.

    "The original mandate to focus the White House panel on the effects of all herbicides was abruptly altered by the Reagan White House," according to the report. "By focusing the work of AOWG on Agent Orange only, the administration laid the groundwork for manipulating the study to the point of uselessness.

    "A possible reason that the White House chose this path is revealed in confidential documents prepared by attorneys in OMB. The White House was deeply concerned that the Federal Government would be placed in the position of paying compensation to veterans suffering diseases related to Agent Orange and, moreover, feared that providing help to Vietnam veterans would set the precedent of having the U.S. compensate civilian victims of toxic contaminant exposure, too."
 
SOME DEFY CDC STUDY

    Despite the CDC's continuing recalcitrance on the issue of Agent Orange exposure, there have been other, more enlightened voices heard.

    Secretary of Veterans Affairs Edward Derwinski is one of them. After hearing of the CDC's latest study, he ordered the VA to pay compensation to all veterans suffering from non-Hodgkin's lymphoma, a ruling which could mean as much as $23 million to the 1,600 non-Hodgkin's lymphoma sufferers or their widows and children.

    Derwinski also decided not to challenge a California court's finding that the VA was applying too strict a standard to determine whether Agent Orange harmed Vietnam veterans. Derwinski ordered the VA to abide by legislation passed in 1984 to give veterans the benefit of the doubt on health claims.

    "Overall, we're doing things a lot different here now," said Derwinski. "We're making decisions without sweeping things under the rug. We're not procrastinating. We're also shaking up a few people and sweeping away a few cobwebs."

    Another of the more enlightened voices is that of retired Adm. Elmo Zumwalt Jr., who ordered certain areas of Vietnam to be sprayed with Agent Orange.

    Zumwalt's son, Elmo Zumwalt III, served in the Navy in Vietnam and was exposed to the herbicide. Elmo Zumwalt III died in 1988 at the age of 42 from Hodgkin's diseases and lymphoma. Father and son believed that exposure to Agent Orange caused the cancers.

    "I definitely believe my son would have had an additional 20 years of life had we not used it," said the elder Zumwalt.

    Adm. Zumwalt has become a crusader on the issue of Agent Orange, charging that the government "intentionally manipulated or withheld compelling information on the adverse health effects" associated with exposure to Agent Orange.

    "The flawed scientific studies and manipulated conclusions are not only unduly denying justice to Vietnam veterans suffering from exposure to Agent Orange," said Zumwalt, "they are now standing in the way of a full disclosure to the American people of the likely health effects of exposure to toxic dioxins."

    Daschle is another of the enlightened voices, calling not only for true, scientific studies of Agent Orange free from political interference, but investigations of the cover-ups by the White House and the CDC that enabled them to perpetrate the myth that Agent Orange is not harmful to human health.

    "Can you blame veterans for wondering what is going on?" asked Daschle. "Can you blame their families who continue to watch all of this unfold, and not share their sense of frustration, their sense of indignation at the conflicting comments, the duplicity, the obfuscation that occurs time and time again when government officials at the highest level are being called upon to inform the public, but they cover up information instead?"
 
A Brief History of Agent Orange

    In the early years of WWII, a grant was provided by the National Research Council to develop a chemical to destroy rice crops in Japan (the major food source of the Japanese). 2,4-D and 2,4,5-T (Agent Orange) was the result. A discussion between President Roosevelt and White House Chief of Staff, Admiral William D. Leahy determined that this heinous chemical should not be used. Agent Orange was not used during WWII. In 1961, President Kennedy signed two orders allowing Agent Orange to be used in Vietnam. One order to destroy crops, and another order to defoliate the jungle. [Note: These orders were signed prior to major U.S. intervention.]

    Agent Orange and other herbicides were used extensively through 1970 (and thereafter until the end of the Vietnam War). Vietnam Veterans and their families filed a class action suit against seven chemical companies (Dow Chemical, Monsanto, Uniroyal, Hercules, Diamond Shamrock, Thompson Chemical, and T.H. Agriculture). It was settled out of court in May 1984 for victims and families of those exposed to herbicides for $180,000,000 (the lawyers got a staggering 100 million dollars). The amount given to qualifying families was a pittance. Example: A woman whose husband suffered, and eventually died... leaving her and three children was given just over $3,000.00 (you should have been there the day she told me that). Another friend suffered with a brain tumor along with other herbicide related diseases for over three years. He was awarded $1,860.00. Victims and families of those exposed to herbicides in Vietnam had until January 17, 1995 to apply for compensation at: Agent Orange Veteran Payment Program, PO Box 110, Hartford, CT 06104
 
GOVERNMENT PLAYS WAITING GAME

    But as the government continues to drag its feet, more veterans and their children continue to suffer the effects of Agent Orange.

    Time is on the side of the government. The longer it waits, the longer it procrastinates, the more the problems of Agent Orange exposure is diminished by the deaths of those who suffered from exposure to it. Their names could be added to the black granite wall of the Vietnam memorial, casualties of the rainbow herbicides that followed them home from the war.

RAINBOW HERBICIDES AND THEIR COMPONENTS:

- Agent Orange: 2,4-D and 2,4,5-T; used between January 1965 and April 1970.
- Agent Orange II (Super Orange): 2,4-D and 2,4,5-T; used in 1968 and 1969.
- Agent Purple: 2,4-D and 2,4,5-T; used between January 1962 and 1964.
- Agent Pink: 2,4,5-T; used between 1962 and 1964.
- Agent Green: 2,4,5-T; used between 1962 and 1964.
- Agent White: Picloram and 2,4-D.
- Agent Blue: contained cacodylic acid (arsenic).
- Dinoxol: 2,4-D and 2,4,5-T; used between 1962 and 1964.
- Trinoxol: 2,4,5-T; used between 1962 and 1964.
- Diquat: Used between 1962 and 1964.
- Bromacil: Used between 1962 and 1964.
- Tandex: Used between 1962 and 1964.
- Monuron: Used between 1962 and 1964.
- Diuron: Used between 1962 and 1964.
- Dalapon: Used between 1962 and 1964.

Original at USVetDsp

Source:   U.S. VETERAN DISPATCH

 

The Wall of Shame     The Wall will have information as to specifics on the "disgrace of the VA" and how it treats disabled vets denied benefits.     It is important that both those that have served as well as those that did not know the truth.

Unit Patch
of
9th Infantry Division
"Old Reliables"

Always wondered why
they came up
such corny names/nicknames
for such (serious) shit!
Never thought it was funny
to get shot at, wounded, or crippled
and the DOD/VA must think it's funny!
p.s.   Getting sick, ie, cancer/diabetes from exposure to herbicides sucks too!
(Vietnam-era veterans denied benefits @ VA "adjudicators")
p.p.s.   Sr. Programmer, 9th Infantry Data Center, Ft Lewis, Washington (1972)
That's after redeployed from Vietnam .. after no "wanna'be" shit here - get a life!
.. kinda uGLY patch, huh?     Now, the "Screamin Eagle!" gets it on!
Pounce right on the VA!     Yank that Secretary right into reality!
 







      C-Span     Schedule
 
  Congress Hearing   - March 5, 2007
Per Rep. Stephen Lynch, D-MA
9th District - Boston, Brockton; Needham
Disabilities Granted by Service:
35% - Navy Personnel
24% - AF Personnel
4% - Army Personnel

    The higher the rank, the better the bull shit gets.     You have, of course, the "left-hand not knowing what the right-hand is doing."     Beyond that, you have more agencies from DOD to VA not communicating with each other for medical services to the veterans, ie, accountability lacking in both directions.

"We were not getting adequate feedback from the families and/or veterans."

LG - "Herebefore these injuries of these great young Americans .."   - 65% same per GAO Dir ..     If they are the same, then why hasn't the administrators got some sort of automatic "rubber stamping" of the paperwork down?

    May be what we need is some franchise owners of In/Out Burger?

* Fired; predecessor retired without subpoena/hearing.     IOW, the Commander responsible, ignored; LG promoted and 2007 Commander that took over the mess is fired!     The three (3) Commanders, current, and last two .. thru 2004 is promoted, the one in the "thick of the mess," allowed to retire without accountability/naming and the poor bastard that took over the mess last August, 2006 is hung by the balls.   .. sounds like the Army.

    "We need a sustained focus here, and much more needs to be done," said Rep. John Tierney (D-Mass.), chairman of the subcommittee that held the hearings Monday, adding that he is afraid "these problems go well beyond the walls of Walter Reed" and that "as we send more and more troops into Iraq and Afghanistan, these problems are only going to get worse, not better."

    "We've contracted out so much in this war," Waxman said. "We have mercenaries instead of U.S. military. ... We are, in Iraq, overpaying for the work of the contractors and here we're underserving our military."

    "You've been fighting a war," said Rep. Chris Van Hollen (D-Md.), addressing veterans.     "You shouldn't have to come back here and fight a system."

    "I don't know how things work in Washington, D.C., but in combat, we don't get to resign when bullets are flying and people are dying," Shannon said.     His advice to Army officials:   "Pull themselves up by their bootstraps like any sergeant would do, admit to their mistakes and work to fix them until they're fixed."

-- Chicago Tribune   Mar 6, 2007   `The tip of the iceberg'

  DOD Secretary Gates
    fires Army Secretary Harvey

By Kelly Kennedy, William McMichael and Gina Cavallaro - Staff writers   Army Times
Posted : Saturday Mar 3, 2007 8:46:31 EST  

    Gates was unhappy with the Army’s response to revelations, reported by Army Times and The Washington Post, that wounded soldiers at Walter Reed Army Medical Center in Washington were consigned to squalid quarters and mired in administrative red tape while awaiting care and evaluation for benefits.

    “I am disappointed that some in the Army have not adequately appreciated the seriousness of the situation pertaining to outpatient care at Walter Reed,” Gates said in the Pentagon briefing room.

    “Some have shown too much defensiveness and have not shown enough focus on digging into and addressing the problems,” Gates said.

    “Also, I am concerned that some do not properly understand the need to communicate to the wounded and their families that we have no higher priority than their care, and that addressing their concerns about the quality of their outpatient experience is critically important.

    “Our wounded soldiers and their families have sacrificed much and they deserve the best we can offer.”

Good, but good enough?

    In Congress, Harvey’s sudden resignation didn’t end concerns that the military leadership had forgotten the basic mission of taking care of the troops.

    House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., called Harvey’s resignation “further evidence of the administration’s inability to competently discharge its responsibilities to those most deserving of the nation’s attention.”

    Sen. Claire McCaskill, D-Mo., who, with fellow Democratic Sen. Barack Obama, is sponsoring legislation to overhaul how the military treats wounded troops and their family members, thinks the wrong person resigned.

    “I think the change that Secretary Gates announced today is positive, but the fact remains that the general in charge of the medical command knew of the problems and then diminished them when they became public,” she said, referring to Lt. Gen. Kevin Kiley, who had been the Walter Reed commander until August.

    “I agree with Secretary Gates that the doctors and nurses at Walter Reed are top-notch, but today’s announcement does not go far enough,” McCaskill said. Kiley, she said, “was responsible for the command culture that caused these problems and should be relieved of his command.”

Committee questions

    Some supporters have said Weightman was a fall guy for those higher up the chain.     After he was fired, the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform sought to have him testify, but Army officials refused to allow the general to appear before the legislators, who then subpoenaed him to a scheduled March 5 hearing.

    Committee Chairman Rep. Henry Waxman, D-Calif., and national security and foreign affairs subcommittee Chairman Rep. John Tierney, D-Mass., said they want Weightman to testify about a memo written in September by Garrison Commander Peter Garibaldi to Weightman.

    In a letter from the committee to Weightman, the members said the Garibaldi memo “describes how the Army’s decision to privatize support services at Walter Reed Army Medical Center was causing an exodus of ‘highly skilled and experienced personnel.’   ... According to multiple sources, the decision to privatize support services at Walter Reed led to a precipitous drop in support personnel at Walter Reed.”

    “The conditions that have been described at Walter Reed are disgraceful,” the committee statement said.

    “Part of our mission on the oversight committee is to investigate what led to the breakdown in services.   &nbps; It would be reprehensible if the deplorable conditions were caused or aggravated by an ideological commitment to privatize government services regardless of the costs to taxpayers and the consequences for wounded soldiers.”

    “The memorandum also indicates that officials at the highest levels of Walter Reed and the U.S. Army Medical Command were informed about the dangers of privatization, but appeared to do little to prevent them.”
 
‘No way they didn’t know’

    Weightman arrived at Walter Reed as commander in August.     By then, a Government Accountability Office report had already laid out the problems with the Army’s medical evaluation system that occurred between 2001 and 2005, and an inspector general investigation was underway that ultimately found 87 problems with the medical evaluation system.

    Those well-documented problems occurred during the tenures of Maj. Gen. Kenneth Farmer, now retired, who was at Walter Reed from 2004 to 2006, and Kiley, now the Army surgeon general, who served as Walter Reed chief from 2002 to 2004.

    “It’s clear that General Kiley, the surgeon general at the Army, knew about the conditions at Building 18,” McCaskill said, referring to the facility just off the Walter Reed campus where some outpatient troops are housed.

    Critics, including soldiers, lawyers and lawmakers, say the the problems at Walter Reed have been known for years — through soldier complaints, congressional testimony, and investigations by the GAO and the Rand Corp.

    “The chain of command knew about this,” Paul Rieckhoff, director of Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America, told Army Times.     “There is no way they didn’t know.     In 2004, we knew soldiers were carrying the paperwork through the snow.     Congress needs to find out who knew and clean house.”
 
    Congress added a couple of provisions to the 2007 Defense Authorization Act in hopes of helping soldiers through the process — including better training for counselors in the physical evaluation board system, and a requirement that board members document the medical evidence behind service members’ disability ratings, rather than denying them by simply writing “pre-existing condition.”

    Army Times also reported problems with the physical evaluation board system in June, while several other papers reported problems as they wrote stories about individual soldiers.

So why all the attention now?

    “People are seeing it as a conglomerate now — an accrued set of grievances,” Sen. John Kerry, D-Mass., told Army Times in a March 1 interview.

    He said he and his staff had heard anecdotes of problems but that no one seemed to know how widespread they were.

    “It’s very frustrating,” he said.   &nbps; “It makes me very angry to see another generation coming through with the same fight we thought we had won.”

    Kerry referred to the work veterans did after Vietnam to make sure soldiers were cared for physically and mentally.

    Retired Army Lt. Col. Mike Parker also finds it frustrating.     For at least two years, he has gathered thousands of pages of documents — which he shared with Army Times — and banged on doors trying to get the problems he saw fixed.   &nbps; He spends much of his free time trying to help soldiers through the process.

    Parker also spent time alerting lawmakers and speaking before the Veterans’ Disability Benefits Commission — which has heard testimony from doctors in the disability rating system who say much needs to be done to help soldiers.

    In March 2006, Parker filed a complaint with the inspector general at Walter Reed, asking for an investigation of whether the medical evaluation boards were following the law, and another complaint with the Army’s Human Resources Command.
 
    He said the Army is supposed to rate injuries according to the Department of Veterans Affairs’ Schedule for Rating Disabilities but charged that Army officials wrote their own regulation in the mid-1990s that allows them to rate disabilities differently — and at lower percentages.    No other service has such a regulation.

    When Parker filed a complaint asking about the legality of that regulation, the Human Resources Command Inspector General’s Office sent him a reply stating that the issue was “not within our purview.”

    “It took them 10 months ... to tell me there’s a regulation that says [the Army] can do it,” Parker said, shaking his head and laughing.   “No shit, Sherlock.”

    Meanwhile, he said, he was told last spring that the Army inspector general was reviewing the whole system — which Army officials verified this week.     The IG asked him to provide documentation from the cases he had looked at.

    “I did,” he said. “But then they told me to stop, saying, ‘We’ve already talked to people — it’s not a problem.’”

    He has letters documenting the responses.

    Another complaint resulted in a “final response” that he hadn’t provided enough information for an investigation — even though Parker never appears anywhere without PowerPoint slides packed with information.

    “I’ve hit them time after time,” he said.   “I can show you back to March 1, 2006.”

    So then he started hitting Congress, where the response was often disbelief.

    “That’s typical,” Parker said. “It is hard to believe.”

    The Army response to media coverage of the problems seems to have loosened things up — though the blame, he said, is rolling downhill.

    Soldiers in Building 18 reported that their first sergeant and platoon sergeants would be replaced within a month.

    But several soldiers told Army Times in December that those were exactly the people who were trying to fix things, and that they were brought in specifically to solve some of the problems in January 2005.

A new beginning

    Pvt. Martin Jackson, of the 1st Armored Division, spent almost two years in the Medical Hold Unit recovering and waiting on paperwork.     Though he complained extensively about the physical evaluation board system, he praised his noncommissioned officers.

    “Now we have formations once a day, and we don’t have to hunt down our platoon sergeant,” as they had to before 2005, Martin said.     The current first sergeant is “the first one here and the last to leave.     The platoon sergeants you have now?     They actually care.     With the new [company] commander and first sergeant, there’s been a big turnaround.”

    Spc. Karl Unbehagan, of the 3rd Infantry Division, also spent several months at Walter Reed and remembers what it was like before the new first sergeant.

    “The platoon sergeant was in medical hold with mental issues,” Unbehagan said.     “He’d answer your questions between slugs of Cold Duck.     If it weren’t for our [current] direct chain of command, I wouldn’t have gotten anything done.”

    [Army Times] Staff writers Matthew Cox, Kris Osborn and Rick Maze contributed to this report.
 

Groups decry DoD ‘betrayal’ of vets

By Kelly Kennedy, - Staff writer  
Posted :   Friday   Aug 29, 2008   16:09:27 EDT

    In a letter going out to members of Congress next week, the directors of two major veterans’ groups say the Pentagon’s personnel chief has intentionally withheld benefits from wounded service members.

    “We need your immediate assistance to help end the Defense Department’s deliberate, systemic betrayal of every brave American who [dons] the uniform and stands in harm’s way,” states the letter, signed by David Gorman, executive director of Disabled American Veterans, and Paul Rieckhoff, executive director of Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America.

    “Sadly, the 2007 Walter Reed scandal, which resulted mostly from poor oversight and inadequate leadership, pales in comparison to what we view as the deliberate manipulation of the law” by David S.C. Chu, undersecretary of defense for personnel and readiness, and his deputies, the letter states.

    Kerry Baker, legislative director for Disabled American Veterans, said Chu sent out a memorandum in March redefining which injuries qualify as “combat-related.”

    The definition is important because Section 1646 of the 2008 Defense Authorization Act said service members with combat-related disabilities no longer must pay back any disability retirement severance they receive from the Defense Department before they become eligible for disability compensation from the Department of Veterans Affairs, as has been the case under longstanding policy.

    The policy affects service members who receive a disability rating of 20 percent or less from the Defense Department, and thus receive a severance payment rather than lifetime disability retirement pay.

    Baker said he has seen cases in which, for example, a veteran receives a $30,000 severance payment from the Pentagon, uses it for medical care or education, and then, even if subsequently awarded a full 100 percent disability rating by VA, >b?must pay the $30,000 back first before he can draw any VA compensation.

    Baker said this leaves many veterans who may not be able to work in a quagmire o f debt.     DAV and IAVA think no veteran should have to pay back money he or she earned before becoming eligible for VA benefits, but they still see the new law extending such waivers to veterans with combat-related disabilities as a step forward.

    Under a separate program called Combat Related Special Compensation, which eliminates the offset in retired pay required of some retirees who also receive VA disability compensation, “combat related” is defined as any injury or illness incurred in a combat zone or performing tasks related to combat, such as training for deployment or hazardous assignments like jumping out of airplanes.

    But according to Chu’s memo, the definition of “combat related” for the purposes of the new severance pay waiver is limited only to those injured in a combat zone in the line of duty or as a direct result of armed conflict.

    In June, Defense Department spokeswoman Eileen Lainez told Military Times that Chu did not remake the definition to save money, as Baker has charged.

    “Saving money was not the driver in the implementation,” she said in an e-mail. “The statutory intent of [the law] clearly and appropriately focuses the ‘enhanced disability severance’ to those service members where the unfitting condition is a result of direct participation and participation of duty in the war effort.”

    She also noted that the law on repaying severance money left it to the secretary of defense to define “combat related.”

    But three lawmakers have told Military Times that their interpretation puts Baker in the right and Chu in the wrong — that they expected the Defense Department to adopt the existing definition used for the CRSC program.

    “The Department of Defense appears to be interpreting this law in the most narrow and tightfisted way possible,” said Rep. Timothy Walz, D-Minn., a House Veterans Affairs Committee member.   “I am disappointed that [the department] is implementing this policy in a way that makes as few veterans as possible eligible for the benefit.”

    After Walz weighed in, DAV sent a letter to Chu asking for an explanation.     William Carr, one of Chu’s senior deputies, responded in a letter dated Aug. 14 by saying the intent “was to direct the enhanced benefit to those hurt in combat.”

    “Such an approach is consistent with our strong belief that there must be a special distinction for those who incur disabilities while participating in the risk of combat, in contrast with those injured otherwise,” Carr wrote.

    But Baker, and the authors of the new letter, continue to insist that congressional intent was not to make a special distinction that leaves out service members hurt in activities defined as “combat related” under other programs.

    “The law defines such disabilities as those caused by armed conflict, instrumentalities of war, hazardous service and conditions simulating war,” Gorman and Rieckhoff wrote.     “The [Defense Authorization Act] did not change these definitions; in fact, it reinforced them, and it added disabilities incurred ‘in the line of duty in a combat zone.’ ”

    The letter states that Chu “lacks the authority to change the will of Congress.”

    In an interview with Military Times, Baker laid out cases of veterans already affected by the new memo.     A female soldier in her 30s, who asked that her name not be used, dove for cover into a pile of rocks in Iraq during a mortar attack wearing full battle rattle — Kevlar and body armor that can weigh 20 pounds.

    Afterwards, she suffered a fused spine and had to have her hips replaced, all of which her doctors said was directly attributable to her dive to safety.

    “The rating was good, but they said it was not combat-related,” Baker said.   “You can see Chu’s memo confusing the issue. This is a disease process that began in Iraq in the line of duty.”

    In a second case, Marine Cpl. James Dixon incurred a traumatic brain injury from a roadside bomb on his third tour in Iraq.     He has headaches, insomnia, short-term memory loss, hearing loss and post-traumatic stress disorder.

    According to the Pentagon, “the disability did not result from a combat-related injury,” Baker said.

    Dixon’s ruling was changed on appeal, but Baker said there should have been no question to begin with about whether his injuries were combat-related.

    Army Sgt. Richard Manoukian served two combat tours, but when he was diagnosed with PTSD and bipolar disorder after he tried to commit suicide — as well as suffering a spine disability after a hard helicopter landing in Kuwait — the Defense Department called his injuries “not combat related,” Baker said.

    “The list of cases like this is reprehensible and growing every day,” Gorman and Rieckhoff wrote in their letter.     “Moreover, if cases like these are ruled not combat-related, then one can only imagine how many other less obvious cases are suffering the same fate.”

    They asked Congress to look into how many cases have been ruled not combat-related under Chu’s memo and have them reviewed by a group independent of the Pentagon.

    “Congress should then take immediate action to ensure DoD upholds the plain and unambiguous language of the law,” they wrote.     “Most of these service members have no representation in the military disability evaluation system and are therefore unaware of the benefits stolen from them — they are depending on you.”

"Unlawful/Abuse of Authority" - see Franco's Editorial
 

Politics, as usual .. Lawmakers vow..
  dribble.

Lawmakers vow action on Walter Reed woes *

* I'm getting all emotional, already..

By Anne Flaherty - The Associated Press    
Posted :   Wednesday   Mar 7, 2007   18:07:19 EST

    Democrats are stepping up their anti-war rhetoric and casting Walter Reed as the latest Bush administration failure in planning for the war and other contingencies.

    “This is the Katrina of 2007,” said Sen. Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., comparing the hospital scandal to the 2005 hurricane that left Gulf Coast residents stranded for days without federal assistance.

    For its part, the Bush administration has moved quickly to try to contain the political damage.     Defense Secretary Robert Gates forced Army Secretary Francis Harvey to resign last Friday, and Maj. Gen. George W. Weightman, who was in charge of Walter Reed since August 2006, was ousted from his post a day earlier.

    The rapid removal of the two officials was followed by a promise by Vice President Dick Cheney and the president himself that the problems would be fixed, and the creation of high-profile panels to unearth gaps in the system.

    In a speech at the American Legion on Tuesday, Bush announced he had asked former Senate Majority Leader Bob Dole, R-Kan., and former Health and Human Services Secretary Donna Shalala, a Democrat, to lead a bipartisan probe into the mistreatment of wounded troops.
 
"Where were all
the Service Organizations?"
.. a reference to all VSOs
and their presence
at the Walter Reed facilities.
.. were they "across the street," like the general/army surgeon general that took no blame?
See No way they didn’t know

    In regards to the army general staffers, their accountability is questionable.     After all, by the time an officer is promoted to "full bird" colonel, they have lost touch with their troops in their command and reality.     Nothing personal, just the facts.     Those that aspire not to be retired a "LTC," well, have their noses so far up their boss's ass, they haven't smelled air since they were a Major...
 
    When Sen. Bob Dole made the politically-correct, network news, Sunday morning circuit, his "colors" really showed when he was quoted as saying:   Where were the Service Organizations?"     It's like brain-in-gear reaction.
   
    In an attempt to make a (poliically-correct) reversal of the damage, he muttered "DAV" and "AMvets" which should not be conclusive as to only those two VSOs were not doing their job, in assisting wounded soldiers from the war.

    The army generals, with their personal concern for their own careers, and then you have the VSOs, given their own office space at Walter Reed and responsibility for assisting the veterans with their disability claims, well, Senator Dole "hit the nail right smack on the head."

    What's up?!     My nose for "smelling a rat" hasn't lost its touch with age.     Are these (so-called) Service Organizations self-serving, ie, conflict of interest in job security too versus really providing an impartial advocacy counsel -- not legal counsel (remember how the V.A. works and veterans are not allowed legal counsel due in part to the complaints of these same organizations) so that the DOD doesn't look like the "bad guy" and the VSOs, the "good guy," look like they are helping them get the best rating possible, or in actuality, worse possible rating???

Vow story continued ..

    Bush also directed Veterans Affairs Secretary Jim Nicholson to set up a task force of officials from various agencies to identify problems in treating wounded troops.     To underscore the message that he cares about the troops, Bush referred to the group as a task force on “returning global war on terror heroes.”

Editorial:   is that anything like "the blind leading the blind", or "Fox guarding the hen house?"

    Meanwhile, in a second day of hearings, senators vowed Tuesday to consider all options to fix a broken system of caring for wounded troops.

    Army officials on Tuesday repeated assertions that they accept responsibility but denied knowing about most of the problems.

    “We have failed to meet our own standards at Walter Reed. For that, I’m both personally and professionally sorry,” said Lt. Gen. Kevin C. Kiley, in charge of Walter Reed from 2002 until 2004, when he became Army surgeon general.

    Kiley has said he had been aware of some issues, but told the Senate panel he was not aware of specific problems, including a backlog of maintenance orders and a lack of staff to conduct room inspections.



Editorial:   okay, I'll bite.     Will somebody explain to me what that is supposed to mean?     "..aware of some issues" [,but] "not aware of specific problems" .. anybody?

    I know!     "I knew (this shit) was going on, but hell, I wasn't about to complain .. OER (Officer Efficiency Report.)"

".. these guys were getting out, what's a few (percentage) points in rating?     Okay, okay -- I know:   it is the difference between a lifetime compensation package and absolutely nothing."



Bullshit -- I mean, story continued ..

    Bush administration officials also headed to Capitol Hill on Tuesday and apologized profusely, one by one saying they were at fault for not delving deeper into reports of staffing problems and a maintenance backlog at Walter Reed.

    The rhetoric failed to placate Democrats, who said the Walter Reed problems were shining a spotlight on the administration’s failed war policies.

    Sen. Edward Kennedy, D-Mass., said the Bush administration failed to plan adequately for the long and bloody war.

    “And now they’re failing those who have sacrificed so much,” said Kennedy.

    During a hearing Monday, two soldiers wounded in combat and a spouse of a wounded soldier recounted nightmarish stories of frustration as they tried to get medical attention and disability compensation.

    “I’m afraid this is just the tip of the iceberg, that, when we [get] out into the field, we may find more of this,” said Rep. Tom Davis, R-Va., a member of the House Oversight and Government Reform subcommittee that held the Monday session.

-- Amen bro     Stop -- all the (political) rhetoric bullshit, and clean it up!

Advocate for (Major) Reform
in
Advocacy Program
.. that's spelled
"providing legal
counsel"
and
elimination of the VSO System  


Our wounded ..

[those] wounded in battle
and
those sick because of service-connection ..

Soldier's Creed -   "No one is left behind"
And, we expect DOD/VA to do likewise ..

    Monday, June 11, 2007   More so, the recent Attorney General/Department of Justice Office scandal related to the firing of US Attorneys is the political appointees in powerful judicial positions is hi-lighted in a recent Washington Post article, click here.

    The Bush administration increasingly emphasized partisan political ties over expertise in recent years in selecting the judges who decide the fate of hundreds of thousands of immigrants, despite laws that preclude such considerations, according to an analysis by The Washington Post.

    Here is a little bit of the bullshit excerpted for your information -

    At least one-third of the immigration judges appointed by the Justice Department since 2004 have had Republican connections or have been administration insiders, and half lacked experience in immigration law, Justice Department, immigration court and other records show.

    Two newly appointed immigration judges were failed candidates for the U.S. Tax Court nominated by President Bush; one fudged his taxes and the other was deemed unqualified to be a tax judge by the nation's largest association of lawyers. Both were Republican loyalists.

    These appointments, all made by the attorney general, have begun to reshape a system of courts in which judges, ruling alone, exercise broad powers -- deporting each year nearly a quarter-million immigrants, who have limited rights to appeal and no right to an attorney. The judges do not serve fixed terms.

    Department officials say they changed their hiring practices in April but defend their selections. Still, the injection of political considerations into the selection of immigration judges has attracted congressional attention in the wake of controversy over the Bush administration's dismissal last year of nine U.S. attorneys.

 

  Former Surgeon General
Says Politics Took Priority

Translation:   truth takes a back seat
to political expediency.

Washington Post Article, Thursday, July 12, 2007

    Richard H. Carmona told a House hearing Tuesday that he believed his task as surgeon general from 2002 to 2006 was to improve "health literacy" using the best medical and scientific data he could collect.     But top Bush administration officials, Carmona testified, had other ideas.

    The following are excerpts from testimony by Carmona -- a former Army Special Forces medic, hospital chief executive and university professor -- before the House Committee on Government Oversight and Reform:                         Dr. Carmona's Biography

    "The vetting was done by political appointees who were specifically there to be able to spin, if you will, my words in such a way that would be preferable to a political or an ideologically preconceived notion that had nothing to do with science. . . .

    "[To write an] emergency preparedness report . . . I brought my colleagues in, as I always do to achieve consensus. . . . I then, as they say, ran it up the flagpole, went to domestic policy at the White House, spoke to HHS [Department of Health and Human Services] officials and I was given lots of different reasons.     Well, this might incite, you know, scare the people. . . . I could get no traction whatsoever to move this agenda forward . . .

    "I recall during my tenure that from time to time we would receive invitations, sometimes they were called 'mandatory meetings' of quote, unquote political appointees. . . . I went to a couple of those initially, but I recall early on that I recognized that these were really more political pep rallies. . . .

    "The issue of global warming came up . . . with senior officials, where they were heralding global warming to be nothing more than -- you know, a liberal cause and had no merit. . . . I remember thinking . . . 'Well, I understand why they want me here now. They want me to discuss the science because obviously they don't understand the science.'     And I had this scientific discussion for about a half an hour, and I was never invited back."

    "In my first year, clearly I was told a number of times that the president's name wasn't mentioned in the speech and I was told it should be mentioned -- at one point, at least three times on every page. And I said, 'I'm not going to do that.' . . .

    "I put in my paperwork to go to this meeting [of the Best Buddies program, a program for people with intellectual disabilities that was founded by Anthony Kennedy Shriver and has long been championed by other members of the Kennedy family]. . . . I was admonished for doing that. . . . I was told that I would be helping a politically prominent family who is -- this is one of their endeavors, and why would I want to help those people? . . . I said, 'This is about sick kids.     It has nothing to do with who's moving the project.' . . . I took a weekend vacation, I paid for it myself, and I went up there. . . ."
 
Biography of Vice Admiral Richard H. Carmona, M.D., M.P.H., F.A.C.S.
United States Surgeon General
Commander, USPHS Commissioned Corps
U.S. Department of Health and Human Services     Bio Details

    Vice Admiral Richard H. Carmona was sworn in as the 17th Surgeon General of the United States Public Health Service on August 5, 2002.

    Born and raised in New York City, Dr. Carmona dropped out of high school and enlisted in the U.S. Army in 1967. While enlisted he received his Army General Equivalency Diploma, joined the Army's Special Forces, ultimately becoming a combat-decorated Vietnam veteran, and began his career in medicine.

    After leaving active duty, Dr. Carmona attended Bronx Community College, of the City University of New York, where he earned his associate of arts degree. He later attended and graduated from the University of California, San Francisco, with a bachelor of science degree (1977) and medical degree (1979). At the University of California Medical School, Dr. Carmona was awarded the prestigious gold headed cane as the top graduate. He has also earned a masters of public health from the University of Arizona (1998).

    Dr. Carmona has worked in various positions in the medical field including paramedic, registered nurse and physician. Dr. Carmona completed a surgical residency at the University of California, San Francisco, and a National Institutes of Health-sponsored fellowship in trauma, burns and critical care. Dr. Carmona is a Fellow of the American College of Surgeons, and is also certified in correctional health care and in quality assurance.

    Prior to being named Surgeon General, Dr. Carmona was the chairman of the State of Arizona Southern Regional Emergency Medical System, a professor of surgery, public health and family and community medicine at the University of Arizona, and the Pima County Sheriff's Department surgeon and deputy sheriff.

    Dr. Carmona has also held progressive positions of responsibility as chief medical officer, hospital chief executive officer, public health officer, and finally chief executive officer of the Pima county health care system. He has also served as a medical director of police and fire departments and is a fully-qualified peace officer with expertise in special operations and emergency preparedness, including weapons of mass destruction.

    Dr. Carmona has published extensively and received numerous awards, decorations, and local and national recognition for his achievements. A strong supporter of community service, he has served on community and national boards and provided leadership to many diverse organizations.

 

  Legal Precedence

    Publishing date, March 1, 2007, 30 years after the war in Vietnam.     Another landmark ruling is about to be given by the VBA in Washington, D.C.     1SG Wayne Boyd has been summoned to an unnecessary appeal hearing on his disability claim; having submitted five (5) army pay vouchers that indicate his service in Thailand included "stepping foot in Vietnam" because he was awarded:   (a)   Combat Pay,   (b)   Tax Exempt status for "CZ" (combat zone) and (c)   one (1) Overseas Bar, awarded for service in a combat zone.

    1SG Boyd retired from the Army and works at Carlisle Barracks in Pennsylvania, the site of the Army War College where the elite officers of the army attend advanced military strategy disciplines, etc.

    Wayne contacted me months ago regarding his disability claim and I was confused too.     Why do ROs (Regional Offices in the various states) push off on the VBA (Veterans Board of Appeal Court) claims that they should resolve themselves?     That is the key question.     Secondary, from this research and other veterans contacting me:   why isn't the "Benefit of the Doubt" Doctrine, signed into law by President Clinton before leaving office in November, 2000, being adopted?

    Recent landmark rulings, eg, Haas vs. Nicholson and Ribaudo vs. Nicholson point to the agency holding itself above the law in practicing unlawful stays and disobeying orders made by judges in the VBA system.

    Prior conduct by this agency, its adjudicators (and administrators,) would deny veterans exposed to herbicides, stating that their medical condition was not "Type II," but "Type I" which is defined as "insulin dependent."     Wrong.     "Type I" diabetics are born with a deficiency in their pancreas which provides natural body insulin for the proper chemical reaction to glucose in the blood.

    If this wasn't so serious, ie, denial of disability benefits and compensation, it would be ridiculous.     My research only shows this cover-up.     It does not indicate whether each and every claim that was affected was reversed; reversed by the agency or required those that did appeal the denial at the filing level, were compensated, eventually, by a judge's order at the VBA.

    It does show the (blatant) ignorance of the staffers given responsibility for adjudicating disability claims.     It shows an even deeper problem that exist today with the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan and a claimant that contacted me recently from Houston, Texas as a veteran of "Desert Storm," a PTSD patient.

    I certainly hope that I kept print-outs of my sources because our government tends to lose such documents at an alarming rate.     In fact, whether you consider these allegations (or accusations) valid, I can understand; many (especially of the GOP persuasion) tend to ignore the "misgivings" of our government and/or live in a fantasy world.

Here comes the judge ..

.. after waiting in the hall, then the court,
the judge arrives; he must have been all of 30-35;
obviously didn't read my c-file,
and, asked questions like about my diabetes???

Err, judge -- we're hear because the RO can't read!
You're supposed to read, know the law, and understand
"presumptive application for exposure to herbicides"
Not once, or twice, but three (3) times ..
explaining the evidence, ie, LESs with "CZ"
for "step foot in Vietnam..."

Bookmark this page ..
.. return often   .. as it will grow
.. with more government cover-ups.

    Right now, what got my goat, was the recent scandal regarding the U.S. Army Medical Center at Walter Reed in Maryland and the housing of wounded soldiers returning from the current wars and the attempt to silence the patients from speaking out to the democratic media.     In the past generations, this "war machine," ie, government/army could easily get away with it, but not any longer in the age of UTube, MySpace and blogs!     Congress has felt the rath of public opinion in the mid-term elections of November, 2006.

    The new Secretary of Defense Gates, coming from the private sector, has had the wisdom to face the issues head on, instead of attempt to cover it up.
 

Hey -- it's only money ..

    With a VA Healthcare budget estimated at $1 billion short for the year, and a backlog of disability claims not addressed/paid, VA agency authorizes hefty bonuses to its executives.

    ABC News has a related headline story:   "VIDEO:   INSULT TO INJURY
- VA EXECUTIVES GET BONUSES WHILE AGENCY REMAINS UNDERFUNDED"

    This Associated Press story is worth a read.

"Lawmakers wants VA to explain bonuses"
By HOPE YEN, Associated Press Writer 5/3/07

Congressional leaders on Thursday demanded that the Veterans Affairs secretary explain hefty bonuses for senior department officials involved in crafting a budget that came up $1 billion short and jeopardized veterans' health care.

    Rep. Harry Mitchell (news, bio, voting record), chairman of the House Veterans' Affairs subcommittee on oversight, said he would hold hearings to investigate after The Associated Press reported that budget officials at the Veterans Affairs Department received bonuses ranging up to $33,000.

    Sen. Daniel Akaka (news, bio, voting record), who heads the Senate Veterans' Affairs Committee, said the payments pointed to an improper "entitlement for the most centrally placed or well-connected staff."     He has sent a letter to VA chief Jim Nicholson asking what the department plans to do to eliminate any bonuses based on favoritism.

    "These reports point to an apparent gross injustice at the VA that we have a responsibility to investigate," said Mitchell, D-Ariz. "No government official should ever be rewarded for misleading taxpayers, and the VA should not be handing out the most lucrative bonuses in government as veterans are waiting months and months to see a doctor."

    One member of the House committee, Rep. Phil Hare (news, bio, voting record), D-Ill., called for Nicholson to resign.

    A list obtained by the AP of bonuses to senior career officials in 2006 documents a generous package of more than $3.8 million in payments by a financially strapped agency straining to help care for thousands of injured veterans returning home from Iraq and Afghanistan.

    Among those receiving payments were a deputy assistant secretary and several regional directors who crafted the VA's flawed budget for 2005 based on misleading accounting.     They received performance payments up to $33,000 each, a figure equal to about 20 percent of their annual salaries.

    Also receiving a top bonus was the deputy undersecretary for benefits, who helps manage a disability claims system that has a backlog of cases and delays averaging 177 days in getting benefits to injured veterans.

    The bonuses were awarded even after government investigators had determined the VA repeatedly miscalculated — if not deliberately misled taxpayers — with questionable methods used to justify Bush administration cuts to health care amid the burgeoning Iraq war.

    Annual bonuses to senior VA officials now average more than $16,000 — the most lucrative in government.     All bonuses are proposed by division chiefs, then approved by Nicholson.

    A VA spokesman said the payments are necessary to retain hardworking career officials.     "Rewarding knowledgeable and professional career public servants is entirely appropriate," spokesman Matt Burns said.

    Several watchdog groups questioned the practice.     They cited short-staffing and underfunding at VA clinics that have become particularly evident after recent disclosures of shoddy outpatient treatment of injured troops at Walter Reed Army Medical Center in Washington.

    "Hundreds of thousands of our veterans remain homeless every day and hundreds of thousands more veterans wait six months or more for VA disability claim decisions," said Paul Sullivan, executive director of Veterans for Common Sense. "The lavish amounts of VA bonus cash would be better spent on a robust plan to cut VA red tape."

    In a letter to Nicholson, Akaka also asked the department to outline steps to address disparities in which Washington-based senior officials got higher payments than their counterparts elsewhere.

    "Awards should be determined according to performance," said Akaka, D-Hawaii. "I am concerned by this generous pat on the back for those who failed to ensure that their budget requests accurately reflected VA's needs."

    Burns, who said the department is reviewing Akaka's request, said many of the senior officials have the kind of experience that would be hard to replace.

    "The importance of retaining committed career leaders in any government organization cannot be overstated," Burns said.

    VA officials characterized the agency's Washington-based jobs as more difficult, often involving management of several layers of divisions that would justify the higher payments.

    In 2006, the VA officials receiving top bonuses included Rita Reed, the deputy assistant secretary for budget, and William Feeley, a former VA network director who is now deputy undersecretary for health for operations and management.

    Also receiving $33,000 was Ronald Aument, the deputy undersecretary for benefits, who helps oversee the strained and backlogged claims system that Nicholson now says is unacceptable.

    In July 2005, the VA stunned Congress by suddenly announcing it faced a $1 billion shortfall after failing to take into account the additional cost of caring for veterans injured in Iraq and Afghanistan.

    The admission, which came months after the department insisted it was operating within its means and did not need additional money, drew harsh criticism from both parties and some calls for Nicholson's resignation.

    In urging Nicholson to step down, Hare cited problems with accounting and data security that contributed to the loss of 26.5 million veterans' personal data last year.

    "Time and time again, Secretary Nicholson, a former chair of the Republican National Committee, opted to offer political spin instead of preparing for the inevitable influx of new veterans entering the system," Hare said.     "Veterans deserve a secretary that will fight for them."

    The investigative arm of Congress, the Government Accountability Office, determined the VA had used misleading accounting methods and claimed false savings of more than $1.3 billion, apparently because President Bush was not willing, at the time, to ask Congress for more money.

    According to the White House Office of Personnel Management, roughly three of every four senior officials at the VA have received some kind of bonus each year.     In recent years, the payment amount has steadily increased from being one of the lowest in government — $8,120 in 2002 — to the most generous — $16,713 in 2005.

    In contrast, just over half the senior officials at the Energy Department in 2005 received an average bonus of $9,064.     Across all government agencies, about two-thirds of employees received bonuses, which averaged $13,814 i n 2005, the most recent data available.

Follow-up Article

    "The Defense and Veterans Affairs departments were the largest users of all three types of incentives in 2006. Defense paid 8,785 bonuses totaling $54.7 million, and VA paid 6,393 bonuses totaling $27.2 million."

Source:   Washington Post   September 12, 2007

Agency is accustom to rewarding mediocre performance ...

    As of last week, there were 400,786 veterans waiting for the Veterans Benefits Administration to process their claims for monetary compensation, VA spokesman Terry Jemison said.     Those claims, represent the agency's "most complicated types of financial cases," he said, ranging from veterans seeking decisions on service-connected disability or pension payments to survivors seeking death benefits.

Source:   The Oregonian, Mark Larabee: 503-294-7664; marklarabee@news.oregonian.com
 

Hall of Shame - VA First Place

.. from
   

    The more you look.     The more corrupt this agency becomes!     Under the leadership of Secretary Anthony Principi the Department of Veterans Affairs has become nothing more then a sham.

    And then when you realize that the Office of General Counsel is operated by his close friend, and another extremely corrupt Republican, Tim McCain, you realize that the Department of Veterans Affairs is just about as corrupt, dishonest, and fowl as an agency can get.

    All management level personnel in the Department of Veterans Affairs are encouraged to use any technicality, or means, to deny claims, or to string out claims as long as possible in the hope that the Veteran will give up.     Management level personnel are paid very substantial bonuses for such conduct.

    As a result, it is "Normal" for VA Management Level Personnel to destroy evidence in Veterans Claim Files, and there is an Official Policy of ignoring any evidence favorable to the Veterans Claim.


Follow-up bullshit ..

"At VA, Bonuses Meet Head-On
    with Backlogs and Budgets"

By Stephen Barr - Washington Post   May 16, 2007

In the government, a bonus is never far from controversy.

For the past two weeks, the Veterans Affairs Department has been faulted for awarding $3.8 million in bonuses in fiscal 2006, while congressional critics portray the VA as strapped for resources as thousands of injured veterans return from Iraq and Afghanistan.

House Veterans Affairs Committee Chairman Bob Filner (D-Calif.) criticized inadequate budget planning by the VA in 2005 and said he was concerned that VA officials who "miscalculated the needs of our veterans were awarded with significant bonuses."

Rep. John Hall (D-N.Y.) pointed to the VA's backlog of more than 600,000 disability cases and average delays of 177 days, saying it was "shocking and scandalous" that bonuses were given to VA employees when veterans are waiting longer and longer for benefits.

Hall is trying to write a bill that would freeze bonuses for the VA's senior management this year until the department has reduced its backlog of work to fewer than 100,000 cases. The VA says that political appointees do not receive bonuses, but the committee is apparently interested in trying to sort out who holds VA jobs because of political considerations and those who are in policymaking roles that determine how well the VA performs.

With Democrats in an uproar over the bonuses, Filner announced that Rep. Harry E. Mitchell (D-Ariz.), who chairs an investigations subcommittee, will hold a hearing on the issue.

"We're not after the career people," Filner said yesterday. "We are trying to get accountability from the secretary, assistant secretaries and undersecretaries."

The flap over the VA bonuses reflects the tensions that come with running a federal agency these days. Agencies are expected to be stewards of the public trust but also to operate like a business and to recruit and keep experienced and talented professionals to improve the performance of multibillion-dollar programs.

VA Secretary Jim Nicholson recently told the House Veterans Affairs Committee that many of his top employees could get higher salaries in private business.

The VA thinks bonuses help keep experienced officials and make their compensation more competitive with the private sector. Over the long run, keeping the most talented employees helps improve efficiency and maintains quality services, the VA says.

Congress, of course, has authorized the use of bonuses at agencies, and in 2004 changed the law so that federal executives could receive pay and bonuses worth up to $215,700 this year.

Congressional attention was focused on the VA bonuses after the Associated Press published a report describing annual bonuses to senior VA officials as averaging more than $16,000, "the most lucrative in government."

Democrats were irked that one of the VA officials who received a top bonus of $33,000 was the deputy undersecretary for benefits, who helps manage the backlogged claims system.

The AP reported yesterday that 21 VA officials who received bonuses also sat on the performance-review boards that recommended such payments. The VA, in a response, said board members are not allowed to make recommendations on one another's bonuses.

Filner said Hall's proposed bill may address the issue of how boards make decisions on bonuses. He said the committee will probably have to learn how other agencies select recipients for bonuses before reaching any conclusions.

The Senate also seems likely to have questions about the VA bonus practices.

Sen. Daniel K. Akaka (D-Hawaii), chairman of the Senate Veterans Affairs Committee, wrote Nicholson that the bonuses were not distributed evenly across the department "and that some employees received large bonuses in spite of questionable performance outcomes."

Akaka said his staff's review had found that executives based in Washington received, on average, higher bonuses than their counterparts in other parts of the country.

He said that he was not concerned that VA bonuses to executives are among the highest of any agency but that the bonuses "should not give the appearance of an entitlement for the most centrally placed or well-connected staff."

Nicholson replied that bonuses are based "upon the contributions made by each executive and the relative complexity of his or her assignment." The higher bonuses to VA's central office and health officials "reflect this fact," he said.

See "VegasAdvocate" posts, click here.

Comments:   Why does Congress speak of only 600,000 case backlog when the Secretary chooses to put on hold up to 832,000 Vietnam Era claims based on the court ruling in Haas v. Nicholson (16 Aug 06) indefinetly?

See also Ribaudo v. Nicholson (13 Apr 07)       See Official Documents.

Other Washington Post Comments.

As a former VBA employee, I am appalled at some of the bonuses that Sr. Management received. All we heard was numbers, numbers, numbers, more, more, more. There is a tremendous amount of turnover in VBA and all we heard was numbers. There are some tremendous and dedicated employees who believe in putting the "Veterans First.", but there comes a point when employees are burnt out and morale is very low. To see Sr. Management receive and give themselves bonuses of up to $33,000 while the employees on the front line get only a $300 bonus is sickening and appalling. Shoddy and rushed work on veteran's claims is why the system is buckling and these managers are awarded for incompetence. Cronyism and favoritism rule the day at VA.
- David Donahue

sirmio99 wrote:
I am totally disillusioned and angered to see what's happening in this Country, everyone has it's own agenda and the heck with those who truly deserve their Nation's Thank you. The Veteran Administration was supposedly set up to assist in every way those Hero's who served and gave so much. It is very obvious that only a few employees care and belive in what they are doing, of course those are not being rewarded with bonuses! Politics is indeed dirty and makes strange bedfellows, my Vietnam Vet husband died on April 1, 2007. He was sick and had many problems that went un cared for. At age 58 he died of Terminal Lung Cancer discovered only after making 2 visits to the Emergency Room. We believed it related to Agent Orange (Sorry about the cuss word in the political arena), a claim was filed and immediately closed upon his death. As his widow, I have already filed the same form 21-534 three times. VA Regional denies ever receiving those forms nor that I was being represented. Disabled 100% and with little funds, the 3rd set of deliver personally with another power of attorney to my Rep, 340 miles R/T. On April 30th, I received a letter advising me that nothing was received by them again! The large envelope, however did contain another set of forms as before to be filled out and it included papers that I had signed on April 11th, 2007, the complete power of attorney given to my representative (stamped by them on April 26th, 2007) and instruction on how to appeal! So am I being denied before I can even apply? Finally after contacting several State Politicians and again my Representative, On May 14th I received another letter informing me that they now had received my application. "It is "their" sincere desire to decide my case promptly, However, as we have a great number of claims, action on yours may be delayed. We are now in the process of deciding whether additional evidence or information is needed. If we need anything else from you, we will contact you, so there is no need to contact us in the meantime." (Quote from the letter). I've gotten pretty much the same indication from Politicians that I can expect a denial...When? Only God knows that! I've been also awaiting an autopsy report regarding my husband's death, which to is taking a long time. Perhaps, Politics dictates that BONUSES are were deserved by those who saves the Government money with Denials. So many Vets have died already and many are dying, families are shattered! Supporting our military and showing appreciation is not done by words, but facts! Put the money where it should be to care for those who really deserve it, the yesterday and today's HEROES.

Okay
  - how many claims
have you denied today?!     25, sir!

Slow day?!   .. huh, yes sir.

And, how many granted?   2, sir!

2?!!!   You are over the weekly quota!

Next week, zero - you got it?!

Ummh .. your bonus is in jeopardy dude.

Editorial:     Did you know how the government counts?     One for u.s., two -- people will never know.     In the case of the V.A. agency, make that five (5) that people will never hear about, and that is active claims, or initial claims.     Claim rating changes, well, you can wait 3 years .. go before the Board (of Appeal,) and wait another 90-120 days.     .. 177 days -- get real.
 

Healthcare Broken Promise ..

    Most of you reading this will be too young to understand the premise behind what is termed "the Broken Promise" for lifetime healthcare for military retirees and their dependents, surviving or otherwise.

    To give you an idea, here is a reference to Hollywood and the movie "We were Soldiers," based on a real 3-day battle in Vietnam back in November, 1965.     On the anniversary of that victory, I joined the army and recall being told that if I stayed in the army for "20" that I could expect a lifetime of free healthcare.

    Of course, the sad part is that it has become a broken promise where even the Federal District (en banc/full) court found in favor of the government and the U.S. Supreme Court refused to hear the appeal.     Now, what do you do?   .. Congress.     The only (real) hope that these veterans affected in the class action lawsuit have is for our Congress (use the term "our" loosely) to consider new legislation.     Details to follow.

    Now, I'm no different than a lot of other guys, ie, "sucker for a uniform."     If I wasn't, heck -- why would I sign up for 3 years in the army during the Vietnam War?     Here is a photo of Colonel Day, a World War II and Korean War veteran.

    From his (medal) awards, bottom row; second from the right, the Vietnam Campaign medal; reflecting that Colonel Day is a Vietnam Veteran too.

Article Links

Lawsuit Summary

Ruling   February 8, 2001

Appeal Ruling   June 13, 2001

Next Ruling   November, 18, 2002

Supreme Court   June 3, 2003

Senator McCain Statement

Military Retiree Advocate

.. more on the swindle

Keeping Apace Military Blog

Brown Bag Project     Bud's bag ..

                    Medal of Honor Recipient - Colonel Bud Day, USAF (Retired)

    Now, before proceeding with the RAO Bulletin article update, it wouldn't be very nice of me unless I make (honorable) mention of another military advocate (for retirees,) Floyd Sears, USAF (Retired.)     I always had trouble interpretting airmen's ranks, but he is "right up there" like an army E-9, Sergeant Major.     I was never sure whether to extend a salute or duck.

re:   Military Humor

    For those that serve, it is okay if we laugh at ourselves, but if you didn't serve -- watch out!     From Floyd's homepage, here are some (vintage) cartoons that just about sum up the predicament of veterans everywhere, ie, being abused by a government that couldn't care less.



 

 




And, drum roll please ..

"Our" United States Supreme Court

HEALTHCARE BROKEN PROMISE UPDATE:   From WWII until the early 1990's personnel in positions of authority acting as agents of the United States Government promised the active duty military that if they served for 20 years in the military and retired they would receive free medical care for themselves and their eligible dependents at military treatment facilities for as long as they lived.

That promise has been broken.

On 16 Jul 96 Colonel George E. Day filed a lawsuit in the Federal Court in Pensacola, FL, to regain the medical care that had been promised, i.e., story.     In the process of arguing the promised medical care case, Colonel Day proved the military retirees allegations that the Armed Forces did make the medical care promise and we had a contract.

On 8 Feb 01, a three judge panel of the United States Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit made this unanimous decision.     "The retirees entered active duty in the armed forces and completed at least twenty years service on the good faith belief that the government would fulfill its promises.     The terms of the contract were set when the retirees entered the service and fulfilled their obligation.     The government cannot unilaterally amend the contract terms now.

In contracts involving the government, as with all contractual relationships, rights vest and contract terms become binding when, after arms length negotiation, all parties to the contract agree to exchange real obligations for real benefits."

However, the government would not let this decision stand and they appealed.

In a 18 Nov 02 conclusion the full court of the United States Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit, in a nine for and four against decision, said, "We cannot readily imagine more sympathetic plaintiffs than the retired officers of the World War II and Korean War era involved in this case.     They served their country for at least 20 years with the understanding that when they retired they and their dependents would receive full free health care for life.

The promise of such health care was made in good faith and relied upon. Again, however, because no authority existed to make such promises in the first place, and because Congress has never ratified or acquiesced to this promise, we have no alternative but to uphold the judgment against the retirees' breach-of-contract claim," i.e. details.     The court went on to say, "Perhaps Congress will consider using its legal power to address the moral claims raised by Schism and Reinlie on their own behalf, and indirectly for other affected retirees."

Military Retirees are waiting for the Congress to act on the court's recommendation.     The words of the court say that they proved their case, but in the end they lost because on 2 Jun 03 the Supreme Court refused to hear the case.


    On 28 Feb 07 Representatives Chris Van Hollen (D-MD), Chet Edwards (D-TX), Jeff Miller (R-FL) and Walter Jones (R-NC) introduced two bills in Congress:   a revised version of the Keep Our Promise to America's Military Retirees Act - HR1222, and a new bill, the Keeping Faith with the Greatest Generation Military Retirees Act - HR 1223.     Retirees are asked to contact their representatives and request they review and cosponsor these bills to enable their passage.     For additional info on the Broken Promise issue refer to story.

[Source:   Veteran Advocate Floyd Sears msg.   25 Apr 07 ++]

  Background
 

All Vets are not equal ..

    Enrollment in the VA Healthcare System that provides many excellent services to our veterans is not open to all veterans.     If your medical condition is not service-connected, ie, "cart before the horse," and your income level is over $27,790 (single vet,) forget it.

re:   "Cart before the horse"

    In order to be deemed "service-connected" medical condition, you must first file a claim.     How you do that before enrolling, well, is beyond me and furthermore, we all know that you can die before your claim is either granted or denied.

re:   Budget Cut move by the Bush Administration   (17 Jan 03)

    Bush has always attempted to either cut programs or require additional fees from veterans in the VA Healthcare System.     In 2003, the GOP-controlled Congress passed legislations that limited enrollment to those at a poverty level.   Translation:   the Middle Class pays for everything irregardless if you served your country in uniform.     In addition, the VA co-payment during the Clinton Administration was $2 per prescription per month supply.     It is now $7 for the same prescription supply per month, an increase of 350%.

VA CATEGORY 8 CARE UPDATE 01:   A key senator has joined forces with a New Jersey congressman in trying to re-open enrollment for veterans' medical care to veterans with moderate incomes and no service-connected disabilities.     The bill, introduced in the House and Senate, would restore eligibility to veterans' health care to about 242,000 people.     Sen. Patty Murray (D-WA) a member of the Senate veterans' affairs and appropriations committees, has joined Rep. Steve Rothman (D-NJ) in sponsoring the Honor Our Commitment to Veterans Act, which would reverse a Bush administration decision four years ago to bar new enrollments in the VA health plan for those in Priority 8, the lowest category on VA's health care priority list.     Priority 8 includes veterans who either have no service-connected disability or a zero percent disability rating, with incomes above a threshold based on family size.     The thresholds range from $27,790 for a veteran with no dependents to $38,948 for a veteran with four dependents, with an additional $1,866 in income to allow for each additional dependent.

The enrollment ban took effect on 17 JAN 03, and was done to cut costs.     VA officials said that most of the veterans who are in Priority 8 either have or could get other medical coverage.     "When it comes to veterans' healthcare, caveats and exceptions are not acceptable," Murray said.     Her bill, S 1147, is similar to a measure introduced in January by Rothman, a member of the House Appropriations Committee who has been trying to get enrollment reopened for Priority 8 veterans since 2004.     "My legislation demands that the federal government fully fund VA health care services so that no veteran in need is turned away," Rothman said.     Rothman's bill, HR 463, has 37 cosponsors.     Murray didn't have any original cosponsors for her bill.

Both bills take the same approach by requiring the VA to allow enrollment for any veteran who applies, which would terminate the enrollment freeze.

The cost of restoring the eligibility of Priority 8 veterans for VA health care is a matter of some dispute.     Murray's office estimates it would cost $519 million to provide coverage today and $2.3 billion to provide coverage through 2012.     Murray said the Bush administration cut off enrollment for new Priority 8 veterans in the face of budgetary problems and growing backlogs for patients when there were other options.     "Instead of confronting the VA's shortfall head on by asking for the resources necessary to address them, this administration cut off care to veterans of modest means," she said.     Rothman said the enrollment ban is particularly hard on people in high-cost areas, like the New Jersey counties he represents.     That is because they generally earn more money, making them more likely to exceed the income thresholds - but their cost of living is higher as well.

[Source:   NavyTimes Rick Maze article 19 Apr 07 ++]
 

VA Secretary calls for
"Veterans Pride"
    by wearing
the medals you earned ..

    The only problem with this (hypocritical and political) statement is the under-lying cover-up of denying a generation of veterans that the VA Secretary even acknowledges as some 836,000 veterans of the Vietnam War Era both health care and disability compensation based upon service-connected medical conditions.


What the VA Secretary says out of one side of his mouth -

America's veterans are the face of America. They come from all walks of life, all ages, all ethnicities. They served our Nation honorably and well and we honor that service, but how do we honor the veteran – the individual who put on the uniform and gave his or her all for our country?

That is why I am calling on America's veterans to wear their military medals on Veterans Day, Memorial Day and the Fourth of July. Wearing their medals demonstrates the deep pride our veterans have in their military service and reminds all American citizens of the sacrifices our veterans have made.

Veterans, wear your pride on your left side on patriotic holidays! Let America know who you are and what you did for freedom.

For more on this (self-serving) bull, click here.
 

VA CLAIM BACKLOG UPDATE
.. an exercise in public relations

    It never ceases to amaze me how (and why) the government wants the public to feel that they are doing right by those that have been injurred in service to their country.     Below is a recent RAO Bulletin article (4/30/07) that depicts, or implys a goal of six months in processing disability claims -- let alone for those coming off of active duty!     There is no excuse for such representations and again, is a form of covering up the truth.

VA CLAIM BACKLOG UPDATE 06: The worst city in which to file a veterans' benefits claim is Washington, where 63% of claims take longer than six months to resolve, according to a major veterans' service organization. AMVETS, a 60-year-old group that helps veterans with about 24,000 claims a year, says a survey has shown veterans in Fargo, N.D.; Boise, Idaho; and Providence, R.I., have the fastest service, with only 6 to 7% of claims taking longer than six months to resolve. Washington may be the worst, but other major cities also are slow. AMVETS national service officer and Navy veteran Luz Rebollar said in Chicago, Detroit, Pittsburgh, New Orleans and Montgomery AL about 40% of the claims take longer than six months to process. One reason for the differences is that the number of people assigned to process claims in some VA regions does not match the claims caseloads in those areas. For example, VA workers in Hartford CT handle 92 cases a year, while workers in Augusta ME handle 57 cases a year.

The Bush administration has proposed hiring 450 additional claims processors to try to reduce the backlog, but AMVETS officials have warned that more people will not solve the problem and, unless the caseloads are more evenly spread, will not eliminate delays for some people. AMVETS is pushing the idea of allowing electronic claims filing and other efforts to use technology to help process claims. "The backlog issue is not going to go away until the federal government rolls up its sleeves and takes a serious look at expediting the resolution of claims," Rebollar said. "Until that happens, young veterans just returning from service in Iraq and Afghanistan are going to continue to be frustrated with our government and with a system they believe is failing to fulfill the promises that were made to them when they entered the service."

[Source: NavyTimes Rick Maze article 20 Apr 07 ++]


Things better you didn't know about ..

VA CLAIM BACKLOG UPDATE 05:   On 17 APR the Department of Veterans Affairs responded negatively to the four bills pending before Congress to reduce the 600,000-case backlog of veterans' benefits claims.

- H.R.0067, sponsored by Rep. Mike McIntyre (D-NC), that would allocate $25 million a year - about $1 for each living veteran - to improve veterans' outreach programs, and would give grants to states to pay for education and training programs for state and local veterans' agencies.

- H.R.1435, sponsored by Rep. Joe Baca (D-CA) that orders a three-year, five-state test in which benefits claims that are not complete would be referred to a county or municipal office for help developing the claim.

- H.R.1444, would provide a $500 monthly stipend to any veteran who appeals a benefits decision and it takes more than 180 days for a final decision.   Sponsored by Rep. John Hall (D-NY), the proposal would allow a veteran whose claim is denied to keep the accumulated payments.     A veteran whose claim is approved for a benefit of more than $500 a month would receive the difference, said Hall, chairman of the House Veterans' Affairs disability assistance and memorial affairs subcommittee where the four bills are pending.

- H.R.1490, sponsored by Reps. Joe Donnelly (D-IN) and Fred Upton (R-MI) which would automatically grant disability benefits claims filed by combat veterans as long as they met minimal requirements, with payments set at the median level for the disability.

Rep. Upton said, "The current system is more than broken, it is shameful.     On average, it takes the VA 177 days to process an original claim and 657 days to process an appeal.     This delay deprives many veterans of Iraq and Afghanistan of much-needed income at a time in their lives when they are not only learning to cope with a disability but also transitioning into civilian life."   Ronald Augment, the VA's deputy undersecretary for benefits, said, "The VA opposes the four bills, even though the agency shares many of the bills' goals. Augment said:

- Hall's bill H.R.1444 to provide a $500 stipend for delayed benefits would create an incentive to submit claims of dubious merit.     And, for veterans whose claims are questionable, it creates a reason for the veterans to delay supplying information and evidence so they can get more money.     A claimant's cooperation with VA can reduce the time it takes to resolve a remand claim.     Inversely, a claimant's lack of cooperation can delay the resolution of a claim."

- The Donnelly-Upton bill H.R.1490 presents a similar problem.     VA is concerned that a presumption of service connection creates an incentive to file invalid claims, especially when benefits would be paid without appropriate claim development.     Even if the VA audited 25% of all file claims, an unscrupulous claimant would still have excellent odds of obtaining and retaining benefits.

- The VA opposes the bill H.R.0067 giving grants for veterans' outreach programs because it doesn't give enough flexibility to reach veterans in small, rural communities, and because the VA is expanding its existing outreach program.

- Paying county and local veterans agencies to help process claims, the idea in H.R.1435, would take money that ought to be spend by the federal government and apply it to local programs while raising questions about who, ultimately, is responsible for the claim.

The VA was not alone in opposing the bills.     Some of the same issues raised by Augment were also noted by Veterans of Foreign Wars and Paralyzed Veterans of America in their testimony before the disability assistance subcommittee.

[Source: Military Times Rick Maze article 17 Apr 07 ++]


Have you ever heard so much bull shit out of one agency?

    As far as I know, this is the same agency that says you will "forfeit all healthcare and compensation benefits for life" .. if you engage in fraud.

    And, it continues to sound disengenuous when VSO organizations oppose bills for veterans benefits -- like they did in opposing legal counsel representation for filing disability claims in the first place!
 

Walter Reed soldier wins small victory
   
By Kelly Kennedy - Staff writer Army Times
Posted :   Tuesday Feb 27, 2007 14:49:34 EST

    After being told his depression existed before he joined the Army — even though physical evaluation board members couldn’t verify that because his medical records had been lost — Spc. Ruben Villalpando received a 10 percent disability rating Monday morning from a second board.

    “They said my depression was aggravated by service,” the Iraq veteran said.     “I was happy.     It was more than I expected.”

    Villalpando was featured in the Military Times newspapers as an example of soldiers struggling through the medical retirement process at Walter Reed Army Medical Center in Washington.     He spoke in an interview Monday morning, before Army officials ordered troops in Walter Reed’s Medical Hold Unit to stop talking to the media.

    Villalpando found himself in paperwork purgatory when his medical records were lost in Germany.     This was key to his case because he said he became depressed in May 2005 when his cousin, Marcos Omar Nolasco, was electrocuted in a faulty shower in Iraq.     Villalpando was also serving in Iraq when his cousin died.

    His lost records showed he had never gone to a doctor before his cousin was killed, Villalpando said.     Doctors in Iraq prescribed him antidepressants, he said, but when he returned to his unit in Germany after finishing his tour, he became so depressed that he took a handful of pills in a suicide attempt.

    But at his first informal physical evaluation board, board members found his depression to be a preexisting condition not aggravated by his service in Iraq, and gave him no disability rating.
 
Editorial:    Now, do you see why soldiers need legal counsel?

    According to Defense Department regulations, board members are supposed to give soldiers the benefit of the doubt in situations where proof doesn’t otherwise exist, and board members are also supposed to give medical evidence for their decisions.    In Villalpando’s case, they could not because his records were lost.

    And Villalpando could not present his own case because service members do not attend their initial formal board.     He did present evidence, including a newspaper article about his cousin’s death, during his formal evaluation board hearing Monday.

    “It’s all over with — thank God,” he said.     “I had to show them how stressful and how hard it was to get through my cousin’s death.     I’m just concerned about getting help when I get out of here.”

Editorial:    He should be concerned, entering an adversary bureacracy; without legal counsel or representation.
 
    His 10 percent rating does not earn him disability retirement — only severance pay.     However, he will automatically qualify for Department of Veterans Affairs treatment for his depression because the Army said his illness is service-related.

Editorial:    How many cases are de-valued in rating?     The system is stacked against the soldier with bureacracy and intimidation.     If you think otherwise, how about the First Sergeant that contacted me, baffled by the bureacracy and what to do?     They pat themselves on the back, sweep it under the carpet, and stamp it "service-connection" for the minimum, ie, healthcare options.

    A Military Times investigation found that experts throughout the system believe soldiers are not getting the ratings justified by the extent of their injuries.     In 2006, about 54 percent of 13,145 soldiers who were medically evaluated were discharged without disability retirement benefits, while just 9 percent received retirement benefits in the form of a monthly percentage of their military paycheck, along with commissary privileges and health care for themselves and their families.

    Villalpando agreed the system is faulty.     “It’s unfair that they were doing a medical board and came up with results without my medical records,” he said.     “I’m ready to go home.”


Editorial:    Damn straight -- the system is not awarding disability compensation, and only to those that are obviously crippled by the war, ie, loss of limbs, can they cover it up.     This GOP administration and Congress refers to such matters as "entitlements," "limiting entitlements" and forget that this class of people, soldiers/veterans, answered the call with personal sacrifice that 95% of all Americans today, will never experience.     It is a political "hot potato" to even speak of reinstating the Draft, but our soldiers and marines fight, ill-equipped and under-staffed with "yes man" leaders that are more interested in their personal career than the men in their command.
 

Disability Pay:   DoD vs. VA

    Trapped in Limbo By Linda Bilmes, Boston Globe Columnist   March 21, 2007

   
Posted :   Friday Feb 23, 2007 23:12:18 EST   Army Times

    The Defense Department and the Department of Veterans Affairs have separate systems for awarding disability pay.

    The Defense Department policy has two facets:

    • Disability severance is paid to members who have less than 20 years of service and disabilities rated less than 30 percent.     Disability severance pay equals two months of a member’s basic pay for each year of service, up to 12 years (a maximum of 24 months of basic pay).     These members also may be eligible for monthly disability compensation from the Department of Veterans Affairs if the VA rules that the disability is “service-connected.”

Editorial:    Those coming right off of active duty should be eligible without reservation for "service-connected" disability and therefore, disability compensation by the V.A.     Again, note the DOD policy regarding the disability rating, ie, less than 30 per cent.

    • Permanent/temporary disability retirement is paid to members who have 20 or more years of service or disabilities rated 30 percent or more.     For reserve component members, at least 7,200 retirement points are required to qualify for 20 years of creditable service.

    The payment rate is the higher of two computations:   multiplying the retired pay base either by the percentage of the disability rating or by 2.5 percent of the number of years of service, up to a 75 percent ceiling.     The retired pay base is final basic pay for those who entered service before Sept. 8, 1980, and average basic pay over the three highest earning years for those who entered service on or after that date.

Editorial:    The inequality in severance pay, or other method of compensation based upon formula of basic rank pay, and other discrepancies in the involunteer mandate of national guard soldiers (and reserves) may never be resolved.

    The Defense Department and VA disability retirement systems have important differences, chief among them the fact that the services assign ratings only to medical deemed “physically unfitting,” with the intent of compensating for the loss of a military career.     The VA may rate any service-connected condition to compensate for the loss of civilian employability.

    Also, military disability retirement ratings are final upon disposition, while VA ratings can vary over time, depending on how the condition progresses.

    Finally, military disability compensation varies only by the percentage disability rating, but also by a member’s years of service and basic pay, while VA payments are based on the percentage rating of the disability and the veteran’s family status.
 

Walter Reed patients told to keep quiet
   
By Kelly Kennedy - Staff writer   Army Times
Posted :   Wednesday Feb 28, 2007 20:26:13 EST

    Soldiers at Walter Reed Army Medical Center’s Medical Hold Unit say they have been told they will wake up at 6 a.m. every morning and have their rooms ready for inspection at 7 a.m., and that they must not speak to the media.

    “Some soldiers believe this is a form of punishment for the trouble soldiers caused by talking to the media,” one Medical Hold Unit soldier said, speaking on the condition of anonymity.

    It is unusual for soldiers to have daily inspections after Basic Training.

    Soldiers say their sergeant major gathered troops at 6 p.m. Monday to tell them they must follow their chain of command when asking for help with their medical evaluation paperwork, or when they spot mold, mice or other problems in their quarters.

    They were also told they would be moving out of Building 18 to Building 14 within the next couple of weeks.     Building 14 is a barracks that houses the administrative offices for the Medical Hold Unit and was renovated in 2006.     It’s also located on the Walter Reed Campus, where reporters must be escorted by public affairs personnel.     Building 18 is located just off campus and is easy to access.

    The soldiers said they were also told their first sergeant has been relieved of duty, and that all of their platoon sergeants have been moved to other positions at Walter Reed.     And 120 permanent-duty soldiers are expected to arrive by mid-March to take control of the Medical Hold Unit, the soldiers said.

    As of Tuesday afternoon, Army public affairs did not respond to a request sent Sunday evening to verify the personnel changes.

    The Pentagon also clamped down on media coverage of any and all Defense Department medical facilities, to include suspending planned projects by CNN and the Discovery Channel, saying in an e-mail to spokespeople:   “It will be in most cases not appropriate to engage the media while this review takes place,”   referring to an investigation of the problems at Walter Reed.

Editorial:    Sure sounds like Communism to me.     Did a soldier give up his rights of "free speech" when he joined the army?     Sure sounds like a cover up when the media is not granted access to facilities that are not classified and in the United States.
 

Wounded and waiting      
    "A slow medical evaluation process
      leaves many injured troops in limbo"

By Kelly Kennedy - Staff writer   Army Times
Posted :   Tuesday Feb 20, 2007 14:41:57 EST

    Leaning over the sink in an almost-clean barracks bathroom across the street from Walter Reed Army Medical Center, Pvt. Robert Van Antwerp, 20, quickly sheared the hair of his new roommate into a fresh crew cut.

    “This is what my dad does when he really wants to get to know someone,” Van Antwerp said, referring to Lt. Gen. Robert Van Antwerp, head of the Army’s Accessions Command.     “He cuts hair.   Now it’s a family tradition.”

    His dad told him people reveal their deepest secrets while sitting in a barber’s chair, he said.     It builds that sense of camaraderie — of taking care of each other.

    “I cut hair the whole time I was in Iraq,” he said.

    But as he cut, Van Antwerp revealed much more about himself than did his customer — who fell asleep in Van Antwerp’s gentle hands.

    A pale scar creates a deep furrow connecting Van Antwerp’s eyebrows.     Doctors replaced bone with titanium after he fractured his skull.     Bare-chested as he trimmed, Van Antwerp has a deep, laddered line from beneath his sternum to at least the top of his sweatpants.     A blast ruptured his spleen and ripped out his colon.     Pushing up his left pant leg as he told his battle story, Van Antwerp showed where three ligaments tore away from his knee, and then pointed out the scar from his broken tibia.

    Above his heart, the ranks and last names of two dead friends are etched in ink.     But he calls a friend to ask their first names.     Short-term memory loss arrived for Van Antwerp in the same attack that killed his buddies.

    In Bayji, Iraq, a suicide bomber drove a vehicle beside the truck Van Antwerp drove for the 101st Airborne Division and set off an improvised explosive device, killing Pfc. Alex Gaunky and Spc. Vernon Widner on Nov. 17, 2005.     Van Antwerp said he believes in one of the Army’s oft-repeated mottoes:   “No soldier left behind.”

    He will always carry his friends with him.

    Yet when it was time for the Army to take care of him, one of its wounded warriors, Van Antwerp gave up before he even began.     Rather than fight for a higher disability rating, he quietly signed for 20 percent — and no medical benefits — saying he knew he couldn’t do better.     He inherited his father’s stubbornness, he said, and refused to ask anyone to pull strings based on his dad’s rank. Then his first medical board counselor, the person who would help him make his way through the medical evaluation board system, left. The second, he said, “wasn’t on the ball.”

    “The Army is trying to give you the lowest amount of money possible,” he said.     “A lot of people are appealing, but I’ll be going to [the Department of Veterans Affairs]. I want to go home.”

    Van Antwerp is one of thousands of wounded troops rushed from the war zone for health care and then stranded in administrative limbo.     They are at the mercy of a medical evaluation system that’s agonizingly slow, grossly understaffed and saddled with a growing backlog of cases.     The wounded soldiers, sailors, airmen and Marines are stuck in holding companies awaiting hearings and decisions on whether they will continue their military service or be discharged, and if so, at what level of benefits — if any.

    In 2001, 10 percent of soldiers going through the medical retirement process received permanent disability benefits.     In 2005, with two wars raging, that percentage dropped to 3 percent, according to the Government Accountability Office.     Reservists dropped from 16 percent to 5 percent.

    Soldiers go to VA to try for more benefits, but the department had a staggering 400,000-case backup on new claims in fiscal 2006, according to VA.

    For that reason, Van Antwerp faces another wait at VA.     Cases there have an average of a one-year wait.     And this is important because it may take a while before Van Antwerp, who must carry a notebook to remember his daily chores, can make his way back to the work world.

    Perhaps more important, many of the soldiers leaving Walter Reed face post-traumatic stress disorder.     Studies have shown that if soldiers receive treatment within a year, they fare much better.

    Van Antwerp has been a patient at Walter Reed since November 2005.     He is one of 704 outpatient soldiers who are injured or ill and are waiting to make their way through the red tape of the medical evaluation board process at the medical center, according to officials there.     The board determines if the soldiers will remain in the Army, or if they will receive a lump-sum separation payment, medical retirement with benefits for life, or nothing at all.     They remain in the medical hold unit until their paperwork is complete.

Editorial:     Someone "smell a rat"???     How about a bear?!     In civilian terms, we would call that "harrassment," or "duress."     Keep them confind, can not go home, until they come to less than desireable terms.

    A soldier goes before a physical evaluation board if a medical evaluation board — a team of doctors — determines he is not able to do his job because of his injury.     The physical evaluation board then determines again if the soldier should stay in the military and, if not, how much the Defense Department will compensate the soldier.     If the soldier receives a disability rating of 30 percent or higher, he gets a disability retirement check based on years of service, rank and the rating percentage.     He and his family will also receive medical benefits for life.     If the rating is lower than 30 percent, he gets a one-time severance payment.

    Since the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan began, the number of soldiers wading through the paperwork, physicals and appointments has doubled at Walter Reed.     According to a Defense Department directive, it should take a total of 120 days from start to finish, but the average stay for Walter Reed soldiers is 270 days.     The soldiers navigate a complicated system with the help of counselors with little more experience — or rank — than they have, and who lack training, according to a March 2006 Government Accountability Office report.

    On March 2, 2006, Col. Robert Norton, deputy director, Government Relations, for the Military Officers Association of America, told the Senate Committee on Veterans Affairs that since October 2003, medical evaluation boards have averaged 67 days and physical evaluation boards have taken between 87 and 280 days.

    “Taken together, the convalescence, [medical evaluation board] and [physical evaluation board] processes appear to average between nine and 15½ months for Army soldiers,” he said.

    ‘We’re trying to do what’s best’     Editorial:   Who said that?!

    But Col. Ronald Hamilton, commander of the medical center brigade at Walter Reed, beamed when asked about the work done through the medical evaluation board.

    “I think it’s being handled extremely well,” he said. “There are some outliers, where it takes longer than we would expect it to, but we’re not saying, ‘You’re at 365 days — we need to process you out.’     We’re trying to do what’s best for each soldier.”

    He came to Walter Reed in June and said he’s proud of the work being done, though he acknowledged changes need to be made to handle the influx of wounded troops.     Officials “didn’t anticipate the amount of patient care” the war would bring, he said.     The Defense Department has reported 11,116 service members wounded in action from October 2001 to Feb. 10, 2007, who were not returned to duty in theater.

    Army-wide, the Government Accountability Office reported that the physical evaluation board caseload grew from 7,218 physical evaluation board cases in fiscal 2001 — before the wars began — to 13,748 cases in fiscal 2005.     The number of soldiers waiting to go through the process nationwide averages 5,000.

    Col. Andy Buchanan, head of the Physical Disability Agency, which handles the soldiers’ cases, said disability cases spend an average of 37 to 42 days within the Physical Disability Agency.     Because Walter Reed receives the extreme cases — multiple injuries, amputations and head injuries — the process can take longer.

    “It is a really fair process,” Buchanan said. “I don’t think we rush people through.     I don’t think we let them sit around.”

    But he said the system is complex, and talked about ways he hopes to improve it:   Easy-to-understand pamphlets that break the process down, a requirement that doctors say specifically why a soldier is being rated a certain way rather than a simple “unfit for duty,” and a five-day required “adjudicator course” for everyone involved in the process.

    An Army official who requested anonymity proposed that part of the problem may be that soldiers just don’t understand what part of the system they’re in:   They think they’re in the medical evaluation board process, but they’re actually still in recovery.

    The soldiers say that’s not the case.

    In a classroom at Walter Reed Army Medical Center, the first sergeant * for the medical holding company lined up three soldiers to talk about their experience with the physical evaluation board.     Soldiers going through the physical evaluation board process report to the medical holding company for accountability, to be assigned jobs that work with their injuries, and to have a first sergeant and company commander who can speak up for them when they’re having problems.

* First Sergeant is relieved of duty as scape goat at Walter Reed.     See above article.

    In August 2004, as Spc. Karl Unbehagan, 29, reported to his new unit at Fort Benning, Ga., he developed intense migraine headaches.     Doctors told the infantry soldier he was not used to the humid weather.   &nbap; A couple of months later, they ran a CAT scan.

    “I had a tumor in the third ventricle of my brain,”    Unbehagan explained, pointing to the shunt that runs from the scar on his head down to his stomach to relieve the pressure in his brain.    “They realized it had nothing to do with the weather.”
 
    The physical evaluation board rated him at zero percent, saying the tumor was a pre-existing condition.     Unbehagan has been in the Army for four years, and his doctors found no proof the tumor existed before he joined, he said.

    Editorial:     have these administrators read the law, ie, Sec. 1111. Presumption of sound condition in Title 38 of the U.S.C.

    Rather than face the civilian world with no benefits, he talked with a free counselor from Disabled American Veterans who told him how to fight the discharge, reclassify as an electronics and satellite repair specialist, and stay in the Army.     The process took eight months, which he spent in the medical hold company.

    His board was restarted three times:  First, his medical profile was lost.     Then, somebody forgot to counsel him — a required part of the process.     And finally, no one made his file active after he changed his job field, so no one saved him a slot at the repair school, he said.

    Spc. Cari Uyttewaal, 24, is an operating-room technician who had been stationed at Walter Reed before beginning her physical evaluation board process. About a year ago, she began having back problems. Doctors discovered she had a herniated disc and recommended she be processed out of the Army because she could not stand for the 10-hour shifts required in the operating room.

    But even a soldier who works in the system didn’t make it through without mishap.

    “After five months, nothing had been done,” she said.   “So my first sergeant transferred me [to the medical hold company] and said it would move faster.”

    It took an additional five months before she accepted her informal physical evaluation and a 10 percent disability rating.

    Pfc. Martin Jackson, 30, spent 16 months in Iraq as a supply sergeant with 4th Brigade, 27th Infantry Battalion. Two years ago, while running from a mortar round in Balad, Iraq, he tripped and twisted his leg.

    “I thought it was just an ankle sprain,” he said. “One day I woke up and just couldn’t move.”

    He had twisted his spine.     Now the soft-spoken soldier cannot sit or stand for too long, or lift anything over 10 pounds, which limits his work as a supply clerk.

    He has spent two years at Walter Reed going through rehabilitation and waiting for his discharge, which means he hasn’t lived with his wife of 10 years for more than three years.

    “She’s been talking about a divorce,” he said. “ ”I just signed [my rating] so I could go home and be with my family.”

    He said his physical evaluation board counselor was another private first class.     “She didn’t know what she was doing,” he said. “Sometimes I had to tell her what was going on.”

    The Army awarded him 20 percent disability — no medical retirement for his war injuries, and no insurance for his family.

Editorial:   and all of this, after two years, three years from his wife and family and almost a familty (divorce) tragedy???

    “It’s frustrating when you know the love you used to have for the military, and then you lose that,” he said.     “This is their job:  It shouldn’t take months to give a person the same percentage you gave someone else with the same injury last week.”

    Buchanan said cases can take longer if a soldier presents new information about his case, or if he asks to continue on as a reservist, or if his rank changes.     But those tasks, he said, are outside the Physical Disability Agency’s realm.

    “We’re implementers of policy,” he explained.     “We walk a fine line, and we do make errors.     But we have a fine quality assurance system that keeps the rates way down.”

    About 30 percent of all cases are reviewed, he said.     He explained which cases:   all general officers, anyone rated for PTSD and anyone who doesn’t concur with his rating.

    But that doesn’t take into consideration the everyday soldier who signed his rating without realizing he could talk to a lawyer, without understanding that doctors make mistakes, and without having read the thousands of pages of policy that apply to medical disability evaluation boards.

    Fewer resources

    Part of the problem is that the system is understaffed.

    On Feb. 17, 2005, Lt. Gen. Franklin Hagenbeck, former deputy chief of staff for personnel, told the House Committee on Government Reform that the Army did not have nearly the resources it had during the Vietnam War.     He said the Army processed 15,000 cases in 2004 with three physical evaluation board systems and a total of 70 employees.

    “The last time we had that many cases was in 1972, when [we] processed 19,000 cases,” he said.     “At that time, there were six [physical evaluation boards] across five states and the District with a total of 260 employees.”

    Buchanan said that number has grown to 95 employees since the hearing, though he is only authorized 61.

    Opportunities for trouble

    The wait can cause other problems.

    On Christmas Day, six soldiers spent their time at Walter Reed picking up trash, mopping floors and emptying garbage.

    “I was planning to go home for the holidays,” said Spc. Ruben Villalpando, who dropped from sergeant rank when he came up hot for marijuana on a urinalysis while at Walter Reed.     “There’s a 100 percent urinalysis policy for med hold.”

    In other words, every soldier in the medical hold company is tested for drugs.

    The other five soldiers also came up hot, he said.     Not only did Villalpando lose his holiday, the reduction in rank means that if he does receive a disability payment, it will be lower than it would have been a month before.

Editorial:   it is very difficult to sympathize those that have an addiction to such drugs as MJ.     They brought it upon themselves, imho.

    Ray Parrish, director of the military counseling service for Vietnam Veterans Against the War, helps soldiers through the medical and physical evaluation boards and has worked as a counselor since his days as a soldier.     The long wait can be a problem, he said, especially for soldiers suffering from PTSD.     Those soldiers have a tendency to self-medicate, as well as act out in anger.

    “During that six- to eight-month wait, you’re just sitting around,” Parrish said.     “It’s quite literally an opportunity to get in trouble.”

    And soldiers discharged with other-than-honorable stamped on their DD214s can’t get benefits from VA.

    Randy Reese, national service director for Disabled American Veterans, also works with soldiers going through the process.     He said he understands why they take the first rating they get:   “They’re in the hospital for a long time away from their friends,” he said.     “A lot of people will do whatever they have to do to get back home, and they’re missing out on a whole world of retirement benefits that could be available to them.”

Note:   Villalpando story is given above, separate from the comments below.

    Villalpando arrived at Walter Reed after forcing a fistful of antidepressants down his throat.   &nbps; While Villalpando was in Iraq in May 2005, his cousin, Marcos Omar Nolasco, was electrocuted in a faulty shower in Baghdad.

    “He came back from a mission, and he took a shower, and he got electrocuted,” Villalpando said, surrounded by his own artwork and a Morrissey poster at the barracks across the street from Walter Reed.     “It did a good number on me.     I was so close to him.   &bsp; I spent the remainder of my tour on antidepressants.”

    The 7th Field Artillery, 1st Infantry Division, soldier said he attempted suicide to try to get help after falling into a depression.

    Now his end term of service date has passed — he was to get out in August — and still he sits at Walter Reed.

    In his case, there have been clerical errors, such as a mis-typed Social Security number that meant his paperwork had to be processed again, he said.

    “This place gets so depressing,” he said.     “I’m frustrated. I’m tired.     I’m angry.     I want to go home.”

    Navigating the medical boards, The medical evaluation process, can be confusing, but understanding it can mean the difference between staying in the military or being kicked out, as well as getting medical benefits after being discharged — or not.

    Here’s how the process works:

    • A physician evaluates the soldier’s injury or disease.

    • The doctor’s report initiates the medical evaluation board process.     At least two doctors informally decide whether that soldier can return to duty.     If so, he goes back to work — process over.     That’s all supposed to happen within 30 days of the first diagnosis, according to Army regulations.

    • If not, the medical evaluation board doctors forward their evaluation of the solder deemed not fit to return to duty to the physical evaluation board.     The soldier selects a counselor, either from the Army or a civilian provided by the Disabled American Veterans.     Without the soldier present, the physical evaluation board conducts an informal assessment.     Three voting members — a combat arms colonel, a personnel management officer and a physician — look at the evidence and decide whether the soldier is fit for duty.     If so, the soldier is returned.     If not, the board assigns that soldier a disability rating, based on injury- or disease-specific factors.

    • If the disability rating is at least 30 percent, the soldier gets medical benefits for life as well as the same percentage of base pay.

    If it is lower, the soldier receives a one-time severance payment, calculated by multiplying his number of years in service by his monthly pay and then doubling the total.

    • The soldier then talks with his counselor about whether he should accept the recommendations or request a formal hearing.     The government does not argue its case against the soldier — the board is there to hear the evidence from the soldier.

    If the soldier is still not satisfied, he can appeal to the Physical Disability Agency — the Defense Department’s oversight agency.
 

    Out of the blue, on a Sunday, I get a call from a veteran with PTSD disability.     Keeping his anonymity, I guess it wouldn't hurt to indicate that he is from Houston, Texas.     It seems there are quite a few problems with the VSO Program in Texas, aka Texas Commission by county and if someone is not happy with their specific county representative, changing same.

    In any case, besides VSO issues and "passing things along," ie, "rubber stamping," the V.A. uses intimidation factors on veterans filing claims and in the system.     This (disabled) vet of "Desert Storm" has been in the V.A. Healthcare System since 1999, unhappy with the psychiatric care he is receiving and with his wife taking care of him, and private insurance, has been able to get care outside the V.A.

    Recently, the V.A. sent him a notice regarding his competence to handle his own affairs and a quaisi-demand that his spouse become his fiduciary.     The VSO wasn't much help and basically wanted to "rubber stamp" the demand, and sign off accepting their terms so as "not to make waves."

    After speaking with the veteran's spouse, that was more coherent because of his disability, I could see through the legalese and advised her to get the three (3) pscyhiactric opinons that they had that her husband is competent and send copies to the V.A. in rebuttal; let that county VSO know that you do not agree with any change of that nature.     The V.A. is not going to be in any position, medically or otherwise, to argue the findings of their three private professional opinions.

    This case is open and when I find out more, I will publish it here.     You have to ask yourself, though, is why would the V.A. attempt to jerk this veteran's strings?     Is this the kind of life-long harrassment veterans in the disability system can expect?

       
 



“Personality Disorder”: A Deliberate Misdiagnosis To Avoid Veterans’ Health Care Costs!
- Congressional House Veterans' Affairs Committee

.. finds that veterans given a Personality Disorder diagnosis by the military are unduly prejudiced when they seek VA health care and benefits     July 25, 2007

    Washington, D.C. – Chairman Bob Filner (D-CA) held a hearing to examine how the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) addresses the military diagnosis of Personality Disorder.   In the last six years, the military has discharged over 22,500 service members due to Personality Disorders.   The Committee found that once a service member is diagnosed with a Personality Disorder, he or she has a much more difficult time receiving benefits and treatment at the VA.

    Service members discharged due to a Personality Disorder, rather than PTSD or some other mental health condition, are generally not provided military disability benefits because the military classifies Personality Disorders as existing prior to entry into military service.   The service member must show that his prior existing condition was aggravated or worsened by military service which is difficult to do.   Service members can seek veterans’ disability benefits, but again they must show that their condition was aggravated by military service.

    “Providing veterans with the correct medical diagnosis is important for a variety of reasons, ranging from receiving proper treatment to eligibility for military and veterans benefits,” said Chairman Filner.   “My concern is that this country is regressing and again ignoring the legitimate claims of PTSD in favor of the time and money saving diagnosis of Personality Disorder.   I am not satisfied with the standards by which the VA accepts or denies disability claims from our veterans diagnosed with Personality Disorders.”

    Joshua Kors, a journalist that been reporting on Personality Disorder for the last ten months, stated that a Personality Disorder discharge is a “contradiction in terms.   Recruits who have a severe, pre-existing condition like a Personality Disorder do not pass the rigorous screening process and are not accepted into the Army.”   Kors interviewed soldiers that passed the first screening and were accepted into the Army.   “They were deemed physically and psycho-logically fit in a second screening as well, before being deployed to Iraq, and served honorably there in combat,”   said Kors.   “In each case, it was only when they came back physically or psychologically wounded and sought benefits that their pre-existing condition was discovered.”

    The committee also reviewed the recent report by the Institute of Medicine on VA Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) claims and discussed the VA’s plan for implementation of recommendations in the report.   Current estimates show that approximately one-third of Iraq and Afghanistan veterans may show signs of PTSD.

    “The nation’s veterans’ health care system is strained to the breaking point,” said Chairman Filner.   “The Institute of Medicine reports that the VA needs to replace its narrowly defined and unevenly applied criteria for PTSD screening with broader standards based on the latest knowledge about psychiatry.   I intend to work with the VA to address these recommendations and provide the appropriate care for our veterans.”