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Vets forced to sue VA for benefits
Veterans' Day in Court
By Michael Weisskopf
Time Magazine, Jan. 12, 2008
Now, however, a federal judge in San Francisco has cleared the way for a dramatic challenge to the constitutionality of the VA's claims system. Judge Samuel Conti of the Northern District of California ruled that the administrative system is not "adequate" for reviewing claims of organizations suing on behalf of a broad class of veterans (the class-action lawsuit was filed in July by two veterans organizations) .
See entire story
Behind the Veterans' Legal Battle
By Michael Weisskopf
Time Magazine, Jul. 24, 2007
Now Edwards, along with hundreds of thousands of other veterans, is part of class action lawsuit against the VA asserting that that just isn't good enough. Filed Monday by a California public interest group and law firm on behalf of vets diagnosed with PTSD, the suit is the first to accuse the federal department of constitutional violations and to seek sweeping changes in its processing of disability claims. The VA is charged with "shameful failures ... to meet our nation's legal and moral obligations to honor and care for our wounded veterans" who fought in Iraq and Afghanistan .
See entire story
Walter Reed is not the only problem: April 2007 report from The Nation
Number Of Iraqi Civilians Slaughtered In America's War? As Many As 1,206,950
Number of U.S. Military Personnel Sacrificed (Officially acknowledged) In America's War 4072
Cost of America's War in Iraq to Taxpayers
$310,510,773,916
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Consideration Number One:
Prior to enlisting
First, let's take a look at the DD4 that you signed or will sign when you enlist in the military.
Point One: Note the title, Enlistmentment Document... Enter "contract" in your computer's search function and you will find the word "contract" never appears.
Point Two: The words "injury," "disability," "wounded" no not appear either. What happens if you are injured? No promises in the document. Don't assume anything. If no promise is given, there is a reason.
Point Three: "The agreements in this section and attached annex(es) are all the promises made to me by the Government. ANYTHING ELSE ANYONE HAS PROMISED ME IS NOT VALID AND WILL NOT BE HONORED." This quote is from Page 1 and repeated again on Page 3 of the DD4 document . . . .
With these words Uncle Sam told you in writing not to believe your recruiter—He's covered!
Are you???
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Governors oppose letting president unilaterally federalize Guard in emergencies
Brett Murphy
JURIST—Legal News and Research
[JURIST] US governors attending the annual meeting of the National Governors Association [official website] that got under way Saturday in Charleston, South Carolina, are opposing a bill [NGA letter] in Congress that would allow the president to take over the National Guard [official website] without the consent of governors during emergencies. The House version [text] of the National Defense Authorization Act includes a measure removing the traditional requirement that the president gain the consent of governors before federalizing the Guard. Gov. Kathleen Blanco [official website] of Louisiana told reporters that "Federalization just for the sake of federalization makes no sense... Just making quick decisions can make things happen." Gov. Mark Sanford [official website] of South Carolina agreed, saying that "the idea of federalizing yet another function of government in America is a, the wrong direction, and b, counterproductive."
See Original Article in JURIST
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Parents and School Boards across the country are speaking up!
From New Jersey to California, from Pennsylvania to Oregon, from New York to Washington state, there is a movement for parents to take charge of their children’s fate when it comes to military recruitment.
Parents do not want do not want their children’s biographical and contact information released to the military. The high school administrations put themselves in a bind by signing on for Federal funds through the “No Child Left Behind” program. NCLB is a worthy program created to enable schools to serve the underprivileged of their community. Through questionable motives, a provision was passed by Congress in 2001 that requires public high schools to release student contact information, including addresses, ages and phone numbers, to branches of the military. Especially daunting since the provision comes with an enforcement penalty: a school that does not turn the information over to the military authorities would lose its federal funding.
However, some astute researchers found a loophole. An additional provision allows parents to opt out of releasing contact information to the military recruiters. Of course, they have to know that the option exists. . .
Click here for stories in the Press
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New York Daily News:
Small Victory for Ailing GI's
by Juan Gonzales
Staff Reporter
October 4, 2006
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Question: Does the Government keep its promises?
Answer: NO--and a Federal Court says they do not have to!
"The Appeals Court ruled against the plaintiffs on a technicality, arguing that promises by recruiters were invalid because only Congress could authorize military health care, which Congress had not done when the plaintiffs entered the service," said Van Hollen. "But although the retired colonels lost their case on that technicality, I believe they won their moral battle on principle."
The Court ruling said, in part, "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. . . . 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."
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Sickened Iraq vets cite depleted uranium
By Deborah Hastings
The Associated Press
Saturday 12 August 2006
New York - It takes at least 10 minutes and a large glass of orange juice to wash down all the pills - morphine, methadone, a muscle relaxant, an antidepressant, a stool softener. Viagra for sexual dysfunction. Valium for his nerves. Four hours later, Herbert Reed will swallow another 15 mg of morphine to cut the pain clenching every part of his body. He will do it twice more before the day is done. Since he left a bombed-out train depot in Iraq, his gums bleed. There is more blood in his urine, and still more in his stool. Bright light hurts his eyes. A tumor has been removed from his thyroid. Rashes erupt everywhere, itching so badly they seem to live inside his skin. Migraines cleave his skull. His joints ache, grating like door hinges in need of oil. There is something massively wrong with Herbert Reed, though no one is sure what it is. He believes he knows the cause, but he cannot convince anyone caring for him that the military's new favorite weapon has made him terrifyingly sick. In the sprawling bureaucracy of the Department of Veterans Affairs, he has many caretakers. An internist, a neurologist, a pain-management specialist, a psychologist, an orthopedic surgeon and a dermatologist. He cannot function without his stupefying arsenal of medications, but they exact a high price. "I'm just a zombie walking around," he says.
Reed believes depleted uranium has contaminated him and his life. He now walks point in a vitriolic war over the Pentagon's arsenal of it - thousands of shells and hundreds of tanks coated with the metal that is radioactive, chemically toxic, and nearly twice as dense as lead.
More of this story
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We at Truth-in-Recruiting believe that public service to our great country is a duty and honor for every American. There are many ways to serve America; and certainly, to risk one’s life in military service is regarded as the highest duty of citizenship. However, that duty also extends to our government. It has a duty to be truthful, honorable and just with the patriotic citizens who enter the military, both while serving in active duty and later as veterans. Most citizens are not aware of serious problems concerning military service. The purpose of this website is to make you aware of some of those problems, so that you can to protect yourself. |
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Why We Fight
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A film by Eugene Jarecki's
Get informed about the military-industrial complex that the 5-star General/U.S. President Dwight Eisenhower warned against. Who is getting wealthy from wars? This award-winning film provides an inside look at the anatomy of the American war machine in which you are being asked to be a pawn. What do you think?
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When considering enlisting in the military service, there are three primary areas on which to focus with potential problems that could devastate your life. Those areas are as follows:
1. PRIOR to enlisting in the military. Read the Enlistment Document carefully. Pay attention to what it does not say.
2. DURING active duty military service. Learn about how the Feres Doctrine protects the government should you be injured or raped. Inform yourself about potential dangers because of the use of depleted uranium in weapony.
3. AFTER military service: If you are injured while serving in active duty military service, how does the Government Bureauracy treat wounded veterans? Make and keep a copy of all medical records while in service and your discharge papers.
Hopefully, this site can give you many of the answers you need to make an informed decision.
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Consideration Number Two:
During active duty
There are two principal potential problems:
1) With today's ammo there is potentially harmful
exposure to radiative gases.
2) If you suffer any injury, including rape, even death, through the neglect of the Armed Forces, you or
your survivors cannot sue for damages.
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Excellent Series on Depleted Uranium in Lone Star Iconoclast:
What is Depleted Uranium?
"Depleted uranium (DU) is heavy, cheap, abundant, and is provided free of charge to arms manufacturers as a way of disposing of the material.
DU rounds are used in a variety of high intensity weapons and is used in a variety of forms. Since the projectiles are so powerful, the DU gets hot and oxides into aerosol-like particles that can be less than 10 microns or smaller than a white blood cell and are, therefore, easily inhalable."
A Scientific Perspective
The U.S. has blocked any accountability at international and national levels. There’s a total cover-up just like with Agent Orange, the atomic veterans, MKULTRA, the mind control experiments the CIA did. This is more of the same, but the issue is much, much worse because the genetic future of all those contaminated is effected. Now vast regions around our world, as well as our atmosphere, are contaminated with the depleted uranium.
A Scientific Perspective
"It violates United Nations laws and regulations. It doesn’t even pass common sense to take tons and tons of solid radioactive material and throw it in someone else’s back yard, refusing to give medical care although it’s been ordered, refusing to clean up the environmental contamination, although it’s required. And they keep getting away with it."
A Survivor's Perspective
Sterry recently testified before state lawmakers in Connecticut on the effects of depleted uranium in support of a bill, introduced by State Rep. Patricia Dillon, that requires that Connecticut National Guard troops now serving in Iraq and Afghanistan be properly screened and treated for depleted uranium contamination.
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POINT TWO: BECAUSE OF THE "FERES DOCTRINE," THE GOVERNMENT IS NOT LIABLE FOR NEGLIGENCE IF THE VICTIM IS IN THE MILITARY
The United States government, or its the military, is not liable under the Federal Tort Claims Act for injuries to members of the armed forces sustained while on active duty and resulting from the negligence of others in the armed forces. Even if the government admits that its gross negligence caused injuries or death, you or your family cannot sue.
The principle on which the military and government stand is called the Feres Doctrine, referring to the U.S. Supreme Court decision in 1950 regarding the death while serving in the military of Lt. Rudolph Feres. Critics of the doctrine—including federal judges, legal scholars and angry soldiers and veterans—say it protects careless or incompetent military doctors and others who damage or ruin soldiers' lives.
Not liable for death caused by unsafe conditions or medical negligence... In the Feres v. United States case, the District Court dismissed an action by the widow of Feres against the United States to recover damages for death caused by negligence. The decedent perished during the 1940s by fire in the barracks at Pine Camp, New York, while on active duty in service of the United States. Negligence was alleged in quartering him in barracks known or which should have been known to be unsafe because of a defective heating plant and in failing to maintain an adequate fire watch. The Court of Appeals, Second Circuit, affirmed. One of the other cases involved a soldier who discovered that a military surgeon had sewn up his abdomen without removing an 18-by-30-inch towel.
This Feres precedent has been continually upheld by courts. Jonathan Turley, a George Washington University law professor who has studied the ”doctrine,” calls the ruling a travesty. The federal law is simply intended to shield the military from mistakes committed to soldiers while serving in the armed forces.
For the entire case, refer to Find Law
The perpertrators of rape are not prosecuted . . . .
Further, this “doctrine” is used as an excuse to neglect giving proper recourse to justice and even medical care to female soldiers who are raped. In 2004, rapes and assaults of American female soldiers were epidemic in the Middle East.Even after more than 83 incidents were reported during a six-month period in Iraq and Kuwait, the 24-hour rape hot line in Kuwait was still being answered by a machine advising callers to leave a phone number where they could be reached. "Nobody had a telephone number, for crying out loud," says Brig. Gen. Janis Karpinski, then commanding general of the 800th Military Police Brigade.
A Pentagon Report reveals that in the past two years alone, there were more than 2,100 sexual assaults throughout the U.S. military. In lawsuits brought by the victims of rape in state courts, the Justice Department often decides to represent the defendants, causing such cases to be moved to federal court. There the Department of Justice attorneys to say that such cases should not be brought to trial on the grounds that they constitute a threat to national security, representing a "disruption of good order, morale and discipline." Until Congress takes the responsibility to repeal Feres, rape will continue to be a significant problem in our military.
The case that has received media attention is that of Lt. Jennifer Dyer. In an interview on CBS 60 Minutes, she reported of the military officials, "They’ve done nothing but lie to me and treat me like a criminal," says Dyer.
Read the entire interview including testimony from other victims
Although the situation has been suppressed in the press, fortunately The New York Times spoke up in a recent editorial emphasizing the problem for female soldiers.
Disrespecting Women Soldiers
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Consideration Number Three:
After active duty
If you are injured—what then???
Read what prestigious law review journal "Legal Affairs" reported in Spring 2005 issue:
Insult to Injury
by Reynolds Holding
Servicemen and women disabled in the line of duty trust the government will provide for them. But many return home to find themselves facing a new enemy: the Department of Veterans Affairs.
More than 210,000 veterans like Johnson have served in Afghanistan or Iran since the war on terror and the war against Saddam Hussein began. Almost 40,000 have filed for disability benefits. At the end of 2004, a total of nearly 350,000 veterans awaited decisions on their claims—and 132,000 more awaited an outcome for their cases on appeal. . . .
(click here for entire article)
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If you are career military, what about your pomised lifetime medical care ??
“Over the past year the Courts have laid to rest the question of who is responsible for making good on promises of lifetime health care that were made to young men and women who joined the service during World War II and the Korean eras,” said Van Hollen.
“Recruits were promised by their own government that if they served a career of 20 years in military service, then they and their dependants would receive health care upon retirement. But while these career soldiers put their lives on the line for our country, the government did not keep its end of the contract.”
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Here are some examples of the sad reality:
In Wounded Men; Broken Promises, the author chronicles more than 50 years of a bureaucratic legacy replete with widespread scandal, poor or abusive medical care, questionable legislative authority, cronyism, and delays in implementation of critical medical and other health programs. In revealing interviews with vetreans from WWI to Vietnam War, Robert Klein recounts the personal ordeals of those who have answered America's call to arms only to find themselves trapped in the endless bureaucratic maze of Veterans Administration. |
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