This story pisses me off more than I am allowed to say on a site open to all ages. When I read it, all I could think about what all the years members of the military were abused by their own and the abused by the departments that was supposed to help them and give them justice. I think about the older veterans I've know over the years suffering this triple betrayal, and the younger ones who followed because nothing was done before they were even born. Now this part from a USA Today article made my head explode with all of their voices screaming for justice!
"The drop-off in focus on such claims at the VA coincided with a national uproar over a massive backlog in benefits claims at the agency. The backlog, which reached as many as 600,000 claims in 2013, had been reduced to 80,000 by the end of last year."
The crucial reality is, everyone did not care enough over a decade ago...and we need to take a seriously look at how much we really do care! Sexual trauma claims by veterans wrongly denied by VA, investigation finds USA TODAY Donovan Slack Aug. 21, 2018
Such pledges were met with caution Tuesday among veteran advocates and assault survivors like Ruth Moore. She was raped twice by a supervisor in the Navy and endured repeated denials of her claims by the VA over 23 years.
WASHINGTON – The Department of Veterans Affairs improperly denied hundreds of military sexual trauma claims in recent years, leaving potentially thousands of veterans suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder without benefits, a VA inspector general investigation found.
Last year alone, the investigation found the agency mishandled as many as 1,300 sexual trauma claims. Some 12,000 veterans file for sexual trauma-related PTSD benefits each year.
The inspector general found the VA failed to order required medical exams in more than half the cases, didn’t obtain necessary records to back up the claims in hundreds of cases or denied claims despite contradictory evidence.
The agency neglected to provide adequate training to employees vetting the claims. It stopped conducting quality audits of the sexual trauma claims process in 2015. And the following year, it shunted the claims into a national queue where staff without any specialized knowledge processed them.
The VA has specialized processing for other types of claims, including those related to traumatic brain injuries or from prisoners of war.
The inspector general recommended the agency review denied claims, reintroduce specialized vetting and audits, and provide better training for claims processors.
In response to the findings, Paul Lawrence, the VA’s top benefits official, said the agency will comply with the recommendations. read more here So where was the outrage in 2006?
Fire Captains talk post-traumatic stress injury in firefighters KUSI San Diego Carlos Amezcua August 20, 2018
Last year, 108 firefighters took their lives. It is estimated that 40% of suicides within the firefighter community go unreported due to the stigma placed on mental health issues.
Post-traumatic stress injuries are having a devastating impact on all of our first responders, including firefighters.
Carlos Amezcua sat down with Fire Captain Jeff Griffith and Jeff Dill from the National Firefighters Behavioral Health Alliance to talk about firefighter PTSI and suicide prevention.
Post-traumatic stress injury (PTSI) is a mental health injury and is the leading cause of death for first responders. PTSI occurs with repeated exposure to life altering events, such as being on the front lines of repeated disaster. Fires, homicides, mass shootings, and domestic violence are just a few of the traumatic events firefighters face on a regular basis.
These are life changing events, not only for the individual civilians involved, but also for the first responders who address these issues regularly in the line of duty. According to Jeff Dill, firefighter suicides out pace line of duty deaths by 50%, in other words, half of all deaths in the firefighting community are suicides. read more here
Kansas man gets letter by mistake, helps reunite Vietnam Veterans KAKE News written by Annette Lawless
The three met this week. It turns out the James and Jimmy had a lot in common. Not only do they share the same name, but they are both pilots and have also worked for Cessna. Jimmy’s wife’s name is Mary. James’s mom’s name is also Mary.
A handwritten note changed everything for James Porter.
This summer, James got an unexpected piece of mail from California. In it, a man named John Washe wrote a plea to find a friend who served in the Vietnam War.
“I’m attempting to locate an x Army buddy named Jimmy Lee Porter of Wichita. Worked for Cessna,” he wrote in the note, dated July 19. “He is in his very early 70’s now, was stationed as a draftee in Ft. Hood between 1966 and 1968. If this is the correct Jimmy, pls let me know.”
This is the second note John would send to Porter. The first letter came 15 years ago, but James was motivated this time around to help out the man.
James contacted several military organizations, like the Veterans of Foreign Wars and the Veterans Administration. Some told him that Jimmy Lee Porter wasn’t in their record books. James contacted KAKE’s Annette Lawless for help, fearing the man may be dead.
Yet, days later, James found Jimmy.
It was perfect timing, as John had plans to drive through Kansas soon. read more here
Homeless veteran lived in the shadow of downtown Gazette Extra By Neil Johnson Aug 19, 2018
“He was a Vietnam vet and one of the guys whose mind never came home from the war,” John Eccles said. “Two minutes in a firefight can change your life.”
Dan Eccles
A troubled man Eccles, 68, was a Vietnam War veteran. While still a teenager, he served in the 27th Infantry Regiment of the U.S. Army, a group of fighters nicknamed the “Wolfhounds,” his family said. He fought in Cù Chi in South Vietnam in 1968, fending off surprise attacks from a vast network of enemy, underground tunnels dug by the North Vietnamese and Viet Cong armies.
Dan Eccles’ body was pulled from the Rock River near the Centerway Dam, just downstream from a spot on the river bank where he was known to crawl into the weeds to sleep at night.
Eccles’ world, such as it was, spanned a quarter-mile, unpaved trail along the west side of the Rock River near downtown Janesville. The heavily wooded section of the Ice Age Trail runs north of Centerway, along the tangled railroad hillside just east of Mercyhealth Hospital and Trauma Center.
In that area across the river from Traxler Park where the Rock Aqua Jays perform, observers say they had seen Eccles and still see other homeless men in the woods and along the trails. Some are drunk and dirty. Others sleep on old couch cushions and mattresses in plain view. Some take to the bushes and stay under blue tarps or in tents. read more here
Trump and Omarosa Had a ‘F*cking Weird’ Fight With Vietnam Vets The Daily Beast Asawin Suebsaeng 08.17.18
As if having Omarosa heading up veterans’ issues wasn’t strange enough, President Trump started arguing with Vietnam vets about napalm and Agent Orange.
Source present at the time tell The Daily Beast that multiple people—including Vietnam War veterans—chimed in to inform the president that the Apocalypse Now set piece he was talking about showcased the U.S. military using napalm, not Agent Orange.
Trump refused to accept that he was mistaken and proceeded to say things like, “no, I think it’s that stuff from that movie.”
Early on in the Donald Trump administration, the president vested many of his nearest and dearest with tasks they were woefully unprepared for—and Apprentice superstar Omarosa Manigault-Newman was no exception.
Long before she was his chief antagonist, Manigault-Newman was tapped by President Trump to handle veterans’ issues for the White House—causing immediate backlash from vets organizations who read this as a slap in the face and a betrayal of his campaign rhetoric about “taking care of our veterans.” read more here
