Ret. Air Force Col Saw Disability Check Fly Away?

Local veterans report that their disability payments have been hijacked
FLORIDA TODAY
John McCarthy
April 27, 2018

Bill Grooten was surprised to receive a letter from the Department of Veterans Affairs last month confirming the change he made to banking information where his monthly VA disability check would be deposited.

The reason he was surprised was that he had made no such change.

Grooten, a retired Air Force lieutenant colonel, immediately contacted the VA. But by then, his $3,500 monthly disability check had already been deposited in Bank of Internet USA, an online bank headquartered in San Diego.

The VA told Grooten that his bank might have been the site of the breach. But the Bank of America said it found no evidence of unauthorized activity with Grooten's account.

Chip Hanson, who is active in the local chapter of Disabled American Veterans, said that he has heard of as many as 75 veterans in Central Florida having had similar problems.
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WFLA News Got Vietnam Veteran Justice

Target 8 helps misdiagnosed veteran get his benefits
WFLA 8 News
Steven Andrews
April 26, 2018

Stationed on Guam in 1971 during the Vietnam War, Lonnie claims his work near airfields exposed him to the herbicide Agent Orange.

TARPON SPRINGS, Fla. (WFLA) - An enormous weight has been lifted off the shoulders of a Pasco County veteran and his family.

Following a series of Target 8 reports, the Department of Veterans Affairs reversed its previous denial and approved Agent Orange benefits for Navy veteran Lonnie Kilpatrick.

"Words can't even say how much we appreciate what you have done," said Lonnie's daughter Keri Ackerson.

After eight years of delays and denial, the VA reversed course.

It approved Lonnie's claim that exposure to the toxic defoliant Agent Orange left him 100 percent disabled.
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Save a firefighter in your own house

Superior mayor announces cause of fire battalion chief's death
Duluth News Tribune
By Lisa Kaczke
Apr 24, 2018

A Superior Fire Department battalion chief who retired just a few weeks ago died on April 18 after "a long and brave struggle" with mental illness, Mayor Jim Paine said on Tuesday.

Erik Sutton, 46, who had served on the Superior Fire Department for 20 years, took his own life, Paine said. Sutton had sought and received care prior to his death. Paine said he has offered his condolences and support to the fire department leadership and Sutton's mother.

"We have all agreed that while the price of his service was too high, none of us will allow his death to pass in vain," Paine said in a statement. "We will put his memory to work for our bravest civil servants as diligently as he put his own life to work for all of us and commit ourselves to ensuring that every firefighter and police officer in our service not only has full access to the care that they need, but that they feel the support to seek care when necessary."
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But he is not the first.

Local firefighter’s widow mission to save lives, numbers show firefighter suicide rising

On October 15, 2016, fallen Indian River County Fire Chief David Dangerfield said goodbye to his wife on the phone first, and then on Facebook.

After a 27-year career, Chief Dangerfield wrote in his suicide post that it was due to PTSD on the job. He posted on Facebook:

"PTSD for Firefights is real. If your loved one is experiencing signs get them help quickly. 27 years of death and babies dying in your hands is a memory that you will never get rid off. It haunted me daily until now. My love to my crews. Be safe, take care. I love you all."

This was released last month.
81 Percent of firefighters fear they will be seen as weak

The survey also found that 81 percent of firefighters fear they will be seen as weak or unfit for duty if they talk about the emotional toll of their job, and 87 percent said it keeps them from getting the help they need.

When it comes to saving lives, you need to begin in your own house to see who is in danger at the fire station.

Truckers lined up to save a life!

Truck drivers help stop a man from committing suicide
ABC News 9
By Matthew Witkos, WJRT
Apr 25, 2018

Genesee County (WJRT) -- The powerful images have been making the rounds on social media Tuesday.

Michigan state troopers out of metro Detroit say they've done this before. Several truck drivers say they've never seen or heard of this before. But without a moment of hesitation, they would do this if called up for action.

13 semi-trucks lined up underneath a metro Detroit overpass above I-696.

State troopers put them there to shorten a fall of one man attempting suicide early Tuesday morning.

These truck drivers are always on a tight schedule and are often pulling long hours to make their stops.
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Old timers need to go old school and fight back!

We didn't shut up then, why do it now?
Combat PTSD Wounded Times
Kathie Costos
April 25, 2018

Just got done reading and ranting about what was written for the generation of veterans and families forgotten about, yet again, and was so pumped up, I forgot to do this part, so that is the update. Now for the old news.....us!
Caregiving for veterans who have PTSD, at any age

Jeanette Steele at San Diego News Tribune is at least trying to get people to open their eyes that the majority of veterans and families in this country have been forgotten about. Yes, that means us!

Oh, sure, we were not the ones who invented PTSD, but we did invent the awareness of what it is and what it does. I've been in this for 36 years now, but others were ahead of me. This generation wants to take away a letter because they don't like it? We don't like what it has been doing to OUR FAMILIES and if they freak out with the word "disorder" then how the hell are they going to be tough enough to fight the actual fact that anything can get out of order until people know what they are doing to PUT IT BACK INTO PLACE!

We did it the old school way, of writing to newspapers, and mostly by word of mouth. You know, that thing we did on the phone with the cord we now call a landline and used for a lifeline and used out mouths to communicate instead of fingers. Hell, the only time I use my fingers other than on my computer, is still to use the middle one. (Care to guess what I'm doing right now?)

Cut through the part where we get the stupid pins, and displays of appreciation. Sure, that's all nice, but when we hear anyone talk about taking benefits away because we're old, talk about sending our veterans into the private healthcare system the rest of us have to deal with, then manage to eliminate the majority of the majority of our families from benefits they give to newer generations, that is more salt into our very old wounds. 

When will this country wake up to the fact that our veterans and families, like mine, ask for nothing more than we were promised? When did it become OK with anyone to have different classes of veterans who merited more than those who came before them, with the same wounds, and waited longer but not getting the same benefits?

They want to talk about things they have no clue about and most reporters just say, I'll print that, without ever asking a single question. That is how the rumor of "22 a day" took over social media, while the rest of us were running into stupid claims that it was only the OEF and OIF generation they were concerned with. Well, look what happened after that! Groups popped up all over the place, collecting money for talking about something they had no clue was a big-fat-lie!

Yep, the report they failed to read was chocked full of facts, like the majority of the veterans committing suicide (at least the ones they knew about from the measly 21 states in the report) WERE OVER THE AGE OF 50~

Are you willing to settle for any of this? Then get old school on them and WRITE TO THE NEWSPAPERS SO MORE REPORTERS ACTUALLY DO SOMETHING LIKE THIS ONE DID!!!!

Congress wants military kids to go to private schools?

Sorry for the repeat graphic, but it is one of those days!!!

Democrats fight effort to divert public school funds for military families to private vouchers
STARS AND STRIPES
By CLAUDIA GRISALES
Published: April 24, 2018

WASHINGTON – Dozens of House Democrats are fighting an effort to use the massive defense policy bill to divert public school funding for military families to private schools instead.

In letters to the chairpersons of two key committees, more than 40 House Democrats wrote Tuesday that they would strongly oppose the Education Savings Accounts For Military Families proposal or any school voucher or privatization effort from being included in the annual National Defense Authorization Act.

An estimated 80 percent of children in military families attend public schools, the lawmakers wrote in letters to Rep. Mac Thornberry, R-Texas, chairman of the House Armed Services Committee and Rep. Virginia Foxx, R-N.C., chairwoman of the Education and Workforce Committee.

The move “would strip funding from 1,200 school districts and 10 million students,” the Democrats wrote. “Any amendment that diverts resources from public schools would be detrimental to the majority of military-connected students.”
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That may be a problem, especially when the report out of Florida show how little we know about the "quality" education those kids will be getting.

Convicted criminals working as teachers. Welcome to voucher schools in Florida
Orlando Sentinel
Scott Maxwell
August 24, 2018

Last year, the Orlando Sentinel exposed scandals, violations and gaffes galore at voucher schools in this state.

There were teachers without degrees, schools caught falsifying safety reports, schools run by people accused of crimes and schools that were such financial messes they were evicted from their campuses in the middle of the school year.

Demonize public schools all you want. There won’t be a day when you take your kid to an Orange County school only to find the school is no longer there.

It was a culture of dereliction at private schools funded with public resources.
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Bigger problems that claims against Ronny Jackson

Trump's VA secretary nominee Ronny Jackson withdraws

That is the update, but doubt will ever get any answers. (4/26/18)

Question is, who got fired for not doing anything about this guy who was supposed to be keeping 3 presidents healthy if this was going on?

Did the Secret Service do anything to warn President Obama of the stunt in the hallway?

Did the people who saw him giving out drugs like "candy" do anything to warn anyone about him and what he was supposed to be doing?

I don't think he is right for the job, but looks like there are a lot of other people not right for their jobs either! Where are the hearings on who failed 3 Presidents if all of this is true?

White House defends Ronny Jackson against "candy man" accusations
CBS News
Last Updated Apr 25, 2018

Jackson also faces allegations of drinking on the job. Tester told NPR that "in the previous administration, we were told stories where he was repeatedly drunk while on duty." 

The White House continues to defend President Trump's pick to be the next Veterans Affairs secretary, Ronny Jackson, despite mounting questions over Jackson's tenure as White House physician. While Mr. Trump suggested on Tuesday that Jackson would be better off withdrawing his name from nomination, he said the decision was "totally his," and he "would stand behind him."

According to two senior administration sources directly involved in the process, during an Oval Office meeting Tuesday, Mr. Trump also promised Jackson his support. Jackson says he wants a chance to defend himself in public.

Sen. Jon Tester, D-Montana, the top Democrat on the Veterans' Affairs Committee, has been talking to reporters about the allegations, among them, that Jackson loosely dispensed sleep-related prescription medications ambien and provigil. "In the White House," Tester told CNN's Anderson Cooper Tuesday, "they call him the 'candy man.'"
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British Army Chaplain "PTSD is wound that does not bleed"

Whanganui reverend and ex British Army padre speaks of wounds that don't bleed
New Zealand Herald
Liz Wylie
25 Apr, 2018

Reverend Stephen Van Os lives a quiet life in Whanganui these days but in previous years he was living on the edge of war zones.

As a padre for the British Army for 30 years, he was posted to combat zones in Bosnia, Iraq and Afghanistan where he gave spiritual support to combat personnel.

Although he was aware of Post Traumatic Stress Injury (also known as Post Traumatic Stress Disorder), it did not occur to him that he may be affected.

"It wasn't until I was back on 'civvie street' that I realised things were not right.

"This younger generation of veterans have to deal with many of the same life challenges of those earlier generations of servicemen and women but perhaps without the understanding of the public that they too had experienced some dangerous, stressful and personally distressing situations in their service for New Zealand."
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Judge told veteran PTSD nothing to be ashamed of

Former soldier who assaulted partner told his PTSD is nothing to be ashamed of by judge
Wales Online
By Jason Evans Court And Crime Reporter
18:07, 24 APR 2018

Judge Walters said: “Today is the day we are going to get a grip on this. You are not a bad person at heart, you are suffering from an illness and that should carry no shame - there is no shame in it.”

Richard Evans served with the Army in Afghanistan - and is "haunted" by some of the things he saw. A former soldier suffering with severe post-traumatic stress disorder who assaulted his partner has been told there is “nothing to be ashamed of” in the illness he is suffering.

Richard John Evans broke down in tears in the dock when told by a judge it was okay to talk about his mental health issues.

Swansea Crown Court heard that the 26-year-old had completed tours of duty in Afghanistan during which he saw children killed - an experience that “haunted him”.

The judge said he was surprised the after-care given to soldiers leaving the Army was so short.

Torn Scapens, prosecuting, said that in December last year an argument broke out between Evans and his partner at their home in Aberavon over the food she had cooked him.

Though the woman described their long-term relationship as “good”, Evans suffered from post traumatic stress disorder and in recent times had started lifting weights and taking steroids.
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Widow keeps mission and love going on and on

After his death, combat veteran's family keeps his mission going
News4Jax
By Mary Baer
Jodi Mohrmann Anchor Managing Editor of special projects
April 23, 2018

"Most people dream of the kind of love that I had and I feel blessed that even though it was cut short I had that much time with him." Kristle Helmuth

MIDDLEBURG, Fla. - Nate Helmuth came home from war with a traumatic brain injury and PTSD, but instead of giving up, the combat veteran chose to help others like him. With his wife, Kristle, and their two children by their side, they worked tirelessly helping one military veteran at a time.

The couple, both U.S. Army veterans, also instilled patriotism and country into their children.

Photos of their 12-year-old son Nate Jr., assisting in lowering the Stars and Stripes at Coppergate Elementary went viral last fall as Hurricane Irma approached.

Now, the father that taught his son Nate Jr. and his daughter, Kinley, to respect the flag, is gone.

"I think we always knew that there was that chance that things would be more serious than they were and maybe we would lose him," Kristle said.

They lost Nate just four months ago. On Jan. 6, the 36-year-old unexpectedly collapsed in their home; he lost his life to the wounds he suffered years earlier in Iraq.

Besides Nate's PTSD and his traumatic brain injury caused by an explosion in Iraq, he inhaled chlorine.

"Basically it just shredded his lungs," said Kristle. "He couldn't breathe."

They were injuries that dashed his dream to be a Blackhawk helicopter mechanic.
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