Sunday, November 29, 2009
Saturday, November 28, 2009
"The Luckiest Son-Of-A-Bitch On The Planet"
Our family is still processing a medical diagnosis made on one of our very young ones this past week. The AML has been classified as "M7" or Acute Megakayroblastic Leukemia. It is very rare, and it is going to be a real bear to fight.
It goes without saying that we will do everything we can to kick "M7's" evil tail.
But we also got some good news in our other family medical crisis. My "Uncle" Ralph (he's actually Dad's cousin) had an MI (myocardial infarction or "heart attack") at the wheel of his car last week . . . crashed the car and shattered a leg. He survived, and it appears he will be fine.
I am rather fond of "Uncle" Ralph. You could say he is one of the "bad boys" of the family. His favorite hobby at family gatherings/events is to gang up on me (with Dad's younger brother Reid - who is not a whole lot older than I am) and tease me (for any reason they can come up with). It's long been the theory of the women in the family (I've not been the only target) that the teasing is a coping mechanism . . . because our clear intellectual superiority intimidates the men.
I digress. There is more to the story of Ralph's miraculous survival.
But first some background:
Years ago, while he was still in his 40's (if memory serves), my now dearly-departed Pops . . . continuing the long/un-settling tradition of Johnson men with bad hearts . . . began having chest pain. His Father had had several massive heart attacks before he passed away, and on top of that, Pops had a history of rheumatic fever (it's what got him more or less thrown out of the Army after 18 days of boot camp). Dad went to the doctor and did the dance of cardiac enzymes, and in-house observation, and the more-or-less obligatory cardiac catheterization.
After all the studies were done, we were told that Pops was "the luckiest son-of-a-bitch on the planet" (I believe those were the cardiologist's exact words). You see, Pops had a (?congenitally?) malformed AND completely occluded left anterior descending artery. Any other ordinary mortal would have been taken directly from the cath-lab to the operating room for immediate by-pass.
But angels had been sitting on Dad's shoulder (for all that they had to hang on for dear life). Pops' heart had formed collateral vessels around the occlusion. His heart had fixed itself!?! There was no need for surgery.
Dad was placed on meds for blood pressure and cholesterol and really did not give his ticker a whole lot of thought until the day he died - one week short of turning 70 - I believe of a pulmonary embolism brought on by complications of injuries suffered in an auto accident several weeks before he died.
We still joke about Dad's incredible medical luck. But it now seems that Uncle Ralph may have eclipsed Dad's status as the "luckiest son-of-a-bitch on the planet".
You see, as my Uncle Reid explained it to me on the phone, if the MI had happened while our dear, crusty Ralph was at home on the couch watching TV, he would have died right then and there . . . and I would have been trying to figure out how to arrange emergency holiday call-coverage in order to attend the funeral.
But Ralph was at the wheel of his car. And when the Grim Reaper tapped him on the shoulder, his car crashed (it was a single-car accident - no one else was hurt).
And while his leg took a very nasty hit, the "shock" of the crash "jump-started" his heart!?!
A pace-maker has been implanted and doctors prognosticate that, with time and TLC, Uncle Ralph is going to be fine (although rehab is going to be a bear).
I know I keep referencing bears. But that's another tale and another Uncle.
As Reid finished relating the story, I burst out laughing and uttered a few explicatives (ala, "I do not BELIEVE that!!! You are *&^%$#@ kidding me!"). Reid was briefly perplexed by my reaction, but quickly realized I was processing the news/story by relating Ralph's incredible good luck to Dad's.
After having a good chuckle himself (and both of us imagining how Pops might have reacted to his status being usurped), he got very serious again. "We shouldn't laugh, Mary. Bad stuff comes in threes," he said.
"Yeah, Bub. Well go get yourself a check-up," I said. "Because, I think I'm good for three."
Then, I got my Uncle up-to-speed on what he may be shortly to read all about in "Yes Weekly".
My Uncle, the Teamster, was not amused. And his reaction was the same as all of the other non-blogging outsiders looking in on this "spectacle" (who I've discussed the matter with) . . . "He did WHAT? Why isn't this (insert explicative-laden description-of-choice) in jail?"
Thinking to myself, I thought, "Well, Reid, the local cops thought it would be okay for him to have his out-of-state Thanksgiving first. Besides interstate cyber-assault makes the case Federal." But this is what I said:
"I'm okay, Reid. Really," I said. "I'm just patiently waiting on the Randolph County Sheriff's Department to serve up some real 'civility' in the Greensboro blogosphere with their warrant. And look on the bright side. As the truth comes out . . . all of it . . . maybe we'll finally get lucky and finally crack this story (the "real" one about Dr. Mary vs. Randolph Hospital - as opposed to the one about Dr. Mary's cyberstalker) wide open."
It's long overdue.
It goes without saying that we will do everything we can to kick "M7's" evil tail.
But we also got some good news in our other family medical crisis. My "Uncle" Ralph (he's actually Dad's cousin) had an MI (myocardial infarction or "heart attack") at the wheel of his car last week . . . crashed the car and shattered a leg. He survived, and it appears he will be fine.
I am rather fond of "Uncle" Ralph. You could say he is one of the "bad boys" of the family. His favorite hobby at family gatherings/events is to gang up on me (with Dad's younger brother Reid - who is not a whole lot older than I am) and tease me (for any reason they can come up with). It's long been the theory of the women in the family (I've not been the only target) that the teasing is a coping mechanism . . . because our clear intellectual superiority intimidates the men.
I digress. There is more to the story of Ralph's miraculous survival.
But first some background:
Years ago, while he was still in his 40's (if memory serves), my now dearly-departed Pops . . . continuing the long/un-settling tradition of Johnson men with bad hearts . . . began having chest pain. His Father had had several massive heart attacks before he passed away, and on top of that, Pops had a history of rheumatic fever (it's what got him more or less thrown out of the Army after 18 days of boot camp). Dad went to the doctor and did the dance of cardiac enzymes, and in-house observation, and the more-or-less obligatory cardiac catheterization.
After all the studies were done, we were told that Pops was "the luckiest son-of-a-bitch on the planet" (I believe those were the cardiologist's exact words). You see, Pops had a (?congenitally?) malformed AND completely occluded left anterior descending artery. Any other ordinary mortal would have been taken directly from the cath-lab to the operating room for immediate by-pass.
But angels had been sitting on Dad's shoulder (for all that they had to hang on for dear life). Pops' heart had formed collateral vessels around the occlusion. His heart had fixed itself!?! There was no need for surgery.
Dad was placed on meds for blood pressure and cholesterol and really did not give his ticker a whole lot of thought until the day he died - one week short of turning 70 - I believe of a pulmonary embolism brought on by complications of injuries suffered in an auto accident several weeks before he died.
We still joke about Dad's incredible medical luck. But it now seems that Uncle Ralph may have eclipsed Dad's status as the "luckiest son-of-a-bitch on the planet".
You see, as my Uncle Reid explained it to me on the phone, if the MI had happened while our dear, crusty Ralph was at home on the couch watching TV, he would have died right then and there . . . and I would have been trying to figure out how to arrange emergency holiday call-coverage in order to attend the funeral.
But Ralph was at the wheel of his car. And when the Grim Reaper tapped him on the shoulder, his car crashed (it was a single-car accident - no one else was hurt).
And while his leg took a very nasty hit, the "shock" of the crash "jump-started" his heart!?!
A pace-maker has been implanted and doctors prognosticate that, with time and TLC, Uncle Ralph is going to be fine (although rehab is going to be a bear).
I know I keep referencing bears. But that's another tale and another Uncle.
As Reid finished relating the story, I burst out laughing and uttered a few explicatives (ala, "I do not BELIEVE that!!! You are *&^%$#@ kidding me!"). Reid was briefly perplexed by my reaction, but quickly realized I was processing the news/story by relating Ralph's incredible good luck to Dad's.
After having a good chuckle himself (and both of us imagining how Pops might have reacted to his status being usurped), he got very serious again. "We shouldn't laugh, Mary. Bad stuff comes in threes," he said.
"Yeah, Bub. Well go get yourself a check-up," I said. "Because, I think I'm good for three."
Then, I got my Uncle up-to-speed on what he may be shortly to read all about in "Yes Weekly".
My Uncle, the Teamster, was not amused. And his reaction was the same as all of the other non-blogging outsiders looking in on this "spectacle" (who I've discussed the matter with) . . . "He did WHAT? Why isn't this (insert explicative-laden description-of-choice) in jail?"
Thinking to myself, I thought, "Well, Reid, the local cops thought it would be okay for him to have his out-of-state Thanksgiving first. Besides interstate cyber-assault makes the case Federal." But this is what I said:
"I'm okay, Reid. Really," I said. "I'm just patiently waiting on the Randolph County Sheriff's Department to serve up some real 'civility' in the Greensboro blogosphere with their warrant. And look on the bright side. As the truth comes out . . . all of it . . . maybe we'll finally get lucky and finally crack this story (the "real" one about Dr. Mary vs. Randolph Hospital - as opposed to the one about Dr. Mary's cyberstalker) wide open."
It's long overdue.
Thursday, November 26, 2009
An Unwanted Guest At The Thanksgiving Table
It will be a very somber Thanksgiving at the Johnsons' this year. An unwanted guest has taken a seat at our table.
That guest is childhood cancer. Last evening, the barely two-year-old extended family member I referrenced in Tuesday's post was diagnosed with Acute Myelogenous Leukemia (AML). We adults are still processing it.
I've been practicing Pediatrics for 18 years, and I've seen and dealt with a whole lot of badness in my time, but I'm still not very good at processing stuff like this.
But as bad as we all feel, and as hard as we know this road is going to be, I am thankful that an evil disease that would have rapidly killed this child not-so-very-long ago is treatable, and that she has a more-than-decent chance to be sitting at our table next Thanksgiving.
If you say prayers, please say one for this little girl. And thank you for doing so.
That guest is childhood cancer. Last evening, the barely two-year-old extended family member I referrenced in Tuesday's post was diagnosed with Acute Myelogenous Leukemia (AML). We adults are still processing it.
I've been practicing Pediatrics for 18 years, and I've seen and dealt with a whole lot of badness in my time, but I'm still not very good at processing stuff like this.
But as bad as we all feel, and as hard as we know this road is going to be, I am thankful that an evil disease that would have rapidly killed this child not-so-very-long ago is treatable, and that she has a more-than-decent chance to be sitting at our table next Thanksgiving.
If you say prayers, please say one for this little girl. And thank you for doing so.
Tuesday, November 24, 2009
The Spectacle Of It All
It's been quite a week so far.
Apart from what I do for a living (let's just say there's a whole lot of newborn baby pathology in Eastern N.C.), I've got one elderly relative with a shattered leg in a local ICU - after having had an MI at the wheel of his car . . . and one toddler in our extended family at Duke - having just been diagnosed with leukemia (we are waiting on the definitive diagnosis).
The child, an adorable little girl, had actually been seen for her two-year-old check-up within the last week or so - but the doctor did not notice anything amiss (I must add the caveat here to parents that physicians are not psychic . . . if you're worried about something at a check-up, SPEAK UP!). My sister-in-law called me the night before last with a list of symptoms, and asked me what I thought and what to do. As she rattled off the list, an ominous chill ran down my spine. I did not tell her exactly what I thought (it's best not to instill terror if one does not have to), but I told her what to do and to do it very fast.
When I hung up, I felt sick at the other end of the phone. I still feel sick.
Yesterday, the "baby" went back to the doctor. They put her in an ambulance and sent her straight to Duke. As I type this, she is been introduced to the world of bone marrow biopsies and permanent central lines and blood & platelet transfusions and all manner of exotic chemicals being pumped into her tiny body. It's all to save her life . . . a life that hasn't even started yet.
And now, I am crying.
It's very frustrating, because I am working several hours from home (for all of the reasons I blog about) . . . "on-call" for Thanksgiving . . . and cannot be there to support/advise people I love.
The only reason I mention these things before continuing on with this post is to emphasize the point that those of us that sit at these keyboards have private lives and families and stuff going on.
We fordamnedsure don't need cyber-stalkers . . . one of our supposed own . . . dishing out their ugly/mean/sick/warped CRAP on top of all that.
So the reader is going to have to forgive me if I'm just not in the mood to spend what little spare time I do have pounding away at a computer screen for the "entertainment" of others.
But hey, for the moment, I'm going to indulge some of you. Let's move on along to the "spectacle"!
Having made the (inaccurate) assessment that "nobody else" was talking about it online, the GSO blogosphere's resident lawyer, Sam Spagnola, with whom I've had differences before, put up a post entitled "The Fec and Mary Show".
In the interest of the "civil discourse" that everyone in the GSO blogopshere says they care so much about, it was very important for our Sam to offer up his opinion on "the spectacle" (as opposed to maybe waiting for the facts and submitting a legal opinion on the case). By God, it was his Constitutional right! The "participants" did not need to comment but everyone else could. It was also his contention that both "participants" should be banned from commenting on any of the local blogs . . . never mind that one of the "participants" will shortly be taking the Fifth or pleading insanity . . . and the other is just DONE being run-over by this bait-and-switch garbage.
Sometimes Sam is so full of it that I just want to scream.
You can read the post/thread for yourself. Sam is being Sam. He's a lawyer, trained in the "art" of being adversarial, and he doesn't know how to beat a clean retreat when his argument has been shot full of holes.
Today, in particular, I am very tired of Sam. This is my last comment on that post (and it will be my last one there - I could care less about whatever comeback he offers):
Sam, in terms of "annoying characteristics", pots and kettles. You're putting on quite the show here.
Since YOU brought it up (I so do not want to re-hash this with you either): Legal opinions that one does not pay for are usually not worth a whole lot. Most of us cannot afford the learned opinions of the really big guns in your profession (especially after we've already been raped by turkey-buzzards-disguised-as-eagles).
And OBTW, yes, it is my opinion (you can have one - so can I) that you ARE a part of the problem if (like apparently a huge chunk of the legal world), you think that not prosecuting perjury (which has NO statute of limitations) is okay . . . unless it's done to boost the career of some political wannabe in Raleigh or Washington.
I think and hope that the Medical Board & NCAG's office are waking up on this case and will begin work to fix some of the important issues it raises (if you don't mind too terribly much, I'll wait until they're fixed to "move on") . . . but I honestly don't have my hopes up. Legal action will likely be necessary to get the agencies involved to "move".
Unfortunately, as our current economy bears out, we cannot expect oversight agencies to oversee.
As for what happened last week, I know that I'm supposed to just sit around and "just watch" (Hi Ed!, Hi Roch!) when "that SMELL" has one of his manic meltdowns at the computer keyboard. But this time I simply could not do it. Mike Baron, suffering from terminal cancer and just out of the hospital, did NOT, in ANY way, deserve what Jeff Martin dished out on Vie de Malchance. Neither did any of the other "evil booger-eating morons and lunatics" at which Martin spewed his bile.
And, in the wake of that despicable post, spare me the scolding for "baiting" the-character-known-as-Fecund-Stench. I was playing by his rules. "The show" could have stayed over at Vie de Malchance had "that SMELL" not started deleting the comments of those who objected to what he was doing.
As I said in my original post at Housecalls, I was not interested in - or trying to start - a "blog-war". But I am not going to stand by and "just watch" while a good-man-already-down is stomped for sick/warped sport. Some things don't get to float in the ether unchallenged or unanswered.
So. Don't call me out. STOP. It's a simple word.
And yes, it WAS a spectacle. But we've have a lot of spectacles here in this blogosphere and as far as I know, NONE of them have escalated into one of the participants sending threatening e-mails to other bloggers (more than one person - I'm told you know about this) . . . e-mails that threaten the other bloggers' personal safety and/or livelihood . . . e-mails that play nasty head games.
And that wasn't the end of it. As far as I am concerned, every horrible/LIBELOUS post referring to me that was put up at VdM since Jeff Martin made his threats is an extension of the crime . . . Jeff actually carrying through on his threats . . . trying to do me harm.
You're still determined to rationalize the notion that I somehow "deserved" this. I don't know what planet you live on to equate what ALL of us do in our blogging (at one time or another) with cyber-stalking.
I really don't.
I agree with you. This IS a milestone AND newsworthy (for all that the standard-bearers of "citizen-journalism" at the GSO News & Record are masking their desire to keep the lid on this UGLY can-of-worms under the guise of the story being "too complicated"). And that's mostly because I had the presence of mind to blog what was happening as it happened . . . which led to Jeff Martin CONFESSING to the crime online.
You've been fishing, so here you go: I am informed that warrants were issued last Thursday in the case (the jurisdiction is the home address typed into "that SMELL's" e-mail header . . . an address in Randolph County). I did not have to "swear out" anything - a magistrate found probable cause.
But Jeff Martin, apparently knowing full well what was coming, left town. So the warrants will be sent to Greensboro for the GPD to handle.
I'm not wild about the jurisdiction being Randolph County. Tell me, Spag, do you think I will get a fair shake there?
The other blogger involved is in a different jurisdiction and I cannot/will not speak to what will happen there.
I know you're very happy now. You've got "the scoop".
Maybe you can run with it in a fashion different than you have been.
You are not so hard to predict either Sam.
And now you're just being a sexist pig. How many times have I watched you and Roch or Ed or Bubba or any of the rest of our lot lay the bait in these blogs and say horrible/nasty things to one another?
Let me ask you this, when any of YOU boys did it, would "Give it your best shot" mean that any of you could start threatening one another's personal safety or livelihoods in e-mails?
YOU are the one who keeps rehashing our differences over my case. You keep trying to justify what Jeff Martin did (by referrring back to the way I've defended my positions - often after "a great many other people" laid the bait) and you just can't make that connection.
But you have a God-given right to have an opinion on the spectacle!
You cannot have it both ways. Perjury is a crime or it isn't. If someone victimized by the act (especially when it's done by people who work for public or "non-profit" institutions) wants to prosecute, they should have avenues to do so. That's been my argument all along - a fairly simple one. All the doors have been slammed in my face and it has been your position that it's okay - that I need to accept the injustice and move on. I'm sorry it tires you so much. But then again, you did not take the hit.
Perhaps I do need to take a course on English as a second language - because a lot of people in this blogosphere seem to be talking out of both sides of their mouth.
Comments on this post are closed.
Apart from what I do for a living (let's just say there's a whole lot of newborn baby pathology in Eastern N.C.), I've got one elderly relative with a shattered leg in a local ICU - after having had an MI at the wheel of his car . . . and one toddler in our extended family at Duke - having just been diagnosed with leukemia (we are waiting on the definitive diagnosis).
The child, an adorable little girl, had actually been seen for her two-year-old check-up within the last week or so - but the doctor did not notice anything amiss (I must add the caveat here to parents that physicians are not psychic . . . if you're worried about something at a check-up, SPEAK UP!). My sister-in-law called me the night before last with a list of symptoms, and asked me what I thought and what to do. As she rattled off the list, an ominous chill ran down my spine. I did not tell her exactly what I thought (it's best not to instill terror if one does not have to), but I told her what to do and to do it very fast.
When I hung up, I felt sick at the other end of the phone. I still feel sick.
Yesterday, the "baby" went back to the doctor. They put her in an ambulance and sent her straight to Duke. As I type this, she is been introduced to the world of bone marrow biopsies and permanent central lines and blood & platelet transfusions and all manner of exotic chemicals being pumped into her tiny body. It's all to save her life . . . a life that hasn't even started yet.
And now, I am crying.
It's very frustrating, because I am working several hours from home (for all of the reasons I blog about) . . . "on-call" for Thanksgiving . . . and cannot be there to support/advise people I love.
The only reason I mention these things before continuing on with this post is to emphasize the point that those of us that sit at these keyboards have private lives and families and stuff going on.
We fordamnedsure don't need cyber-stalkers . . . one of our supposed own . . . dishing out their ugly/mean/sick/warped CRAP on top of all that.
So the reader is going to have to forgive me if I'm just not in the mood to spend what little spare time I do have pounding away at a computer screen for the "entertainment" of others.
But hey, for the moment, I'm going to indulge some of you. Let's move on along to the "spectacle"!
Having made the (inaccurate) assessment that "nobody else" was talking about it online, the GSO blogosphere's resident lawyer, Sam Spagnola, with whom I've had differences before, put up a post entitled "The Fec and Mary Show".
In the interest of the "civil discourse" that everyone in the GSO blogopshere says they care so much about, it was very important for our Sam to offer up his opinion on "the spectacle" (as opposed to maybe waiting for the facts and submitting a legal opinion on the case). By God, it was his Constitutional right! The "participants" did not need to comment but everyone else could. It was also his contention that both "participants" should be banned from commenting on any of the local blogs . . . never mind that one of the "participants" will shortly be taking the Fifth or pleading insanity . . . and the other is just DONE being run-over by this bait-and-switch garbage.
Sometimes Sam is so full of it that I just want to scream.
You can read the post/thread for yourself. Sam is being Sam. He's a lawyer, trained in the "art" of being adversarial, and he doesn't know how to beat a clean retreat when his argument has been shot full of holes.
Today, in particular, I am very tired of Sam. This is my last comment on that post (and it will be my last one there - I could care less about whatever comeback he offers):
Sam, in terms of "annoying characteristics", pots and kettles. You're putting on quite the show here.
Since YOU brought it up (I so do not want to re-hash this with you either): Legal opinions that one does not pay for are usually not worth a whole lot. Most of us cannot afford the learned opinions of the really big guns in your profession (especially after we've already been raped by turkey-buzzards-disguised-as-eagles).
And OBTW, yes, it is my opinion (you can have one - so can I) that you ARE a part of the problem if (like apparently a huge chunk of the legal world), you think that not prosecuting perjury (which has NO statute of limitations) is okay . . . unless it's done to boost the career of some political wannabe in Raleigh or Washington.
I think and hope that the Medical Board & NCAG's office are waking up on this case and will begin work to fix some of the important issues it raises (if you don't mind too terribly much, I'll wait until they're fixed to "move on") . . . but I honestly don't have my hopes up. Legal action will likely be necessary to get the agencies involved to "move".
Unfortunately, as our current economy bears out, we cannot expect oversight agencies to oversee.
As for what happened last week, I know that I'm supposed to just sit around and "just watch" (Hi Ed!, Hi Roch!) when "that SMELL" has one of his manic meltdowns at the computer keyboard. But this time I simply could not do it. Mike Baron, suffering from terminal cancer and just out of the hospital, did NOT, in ANY way, deserve what Jeff Martin dished out on Vie de Malchance. Neither did any of the other "evil booger-eating morons and lunatics" at which Martin spewed his bile.
And, in the wake of that despicable post, spare me the scolding for "baiting" the-character-known-as-Fecund-Stench. I was playing by his rules. "The show" could have stayed over at Vie de Malchance had "that SMELL" not started deleting the comments of those who objected to what he was doing.
As I said in my original post at Housecalls, I was not interested in - or trying to start - a "blog-war". But I am not going to stand by and "just watch" while a good-man-already-down is stomped for sick/warped sport. Some things don't get to float in the ether unchallenged or unanswered.
(UNLESS, OF COURSE, YOU'RE A TWO-FACED, GREEDY, LYING EXECUTIVE AND/OR RUBBER-STAMPING BOARD MEMBER OF "NON-PROFIT" RANDOLPH HOSPITAL . . . OR ONE OF THE LAWYERS IN THIS CASE . . . AND YOU'RE GUILTY AS CHARGED!)
When I'm called out, I'm gonna come out. When "that SMELL" does it . . . or when you do.So. Don't call me out. STOP. It's a simple word.
And yes, it WAS a spectacle. But we've have a lot of spectacles here in this blogosphere and as far as I know, NONE of them have escalated into one of the participants sending threatening e-mails to other bloggers (more than one person - I'm told you know about this) . . . e-mails that threaten the other bloggers' personal safety and/or livelihood . . . e-mails that play nasty head games.
And that wasn't the end of it. As far as I am concerned, every horrible/LIBELOUS post referring to me that was put up at VdM since Jeff Martin made his threats is an extension of the crime . . . Jeff actually carrying through on his threats . . . trying to do me harm.
You're still determined to rationalize the notion that I somehow "deserved" this. I don't know what planet you live on to equate what ALL of us do in our blogging (at one time or another) with cyber-stalking.
I really don't.
I agree with you. This IS a milestone AND newsworthy (for all that the standard-bearers of "citizen-journalism" at the GSO News & Record are masking their desire to keep the lid on this UGLY can-of-worms under the guise of the story being "too complicated"). And that's mostly because I had the presence of mind to blog what was happening as it happened . . . which led to Jeff Martin CONFESSING to the crime online.
You've been fishing, so here you go: I am informed that warrants were issued last Thursday in the case (the jurisdiction is the home address typed into "that SMELL's" e-mail header . . . an address in Randolph County). I did not have to "swear out" anything - a magistrate found probable cause.
But Jeff Martin, apparently knowing full well what was coming, left town. So the warrants will be sent to Greensboro for the GPD to handle.
I'm not wild about the jurisdiction being Randolph County. Tell me, Spag, do you think I will get a fair shake there?
The other blogger involved is in a different jurisdiction and I cannot/will not speak to what will happen there.
I know you're very happy now. You've got "the scoop".
Maybe you can run with it in a fashion different than you have been.
Wednesday Morning Update: The head-games continue . . . in comments posted to this blog. The information I have on "123 . . . 123" has been forwarded to the Randolph County Sheriff's Department.
It's not a dance, Jeff.
More Wednesday Morning Sam: I really wasn't planning on going back, but Sam is still trying to make the case that I somehow deserved what happened two Friday nights ago (and what is still going on) . . . that "baiting" our poor "SMELL" in the blogs somehow justifies threats and sick head games.
And I'm sorry, at this point, it's like telling a girl who was wearing a short skirt that she deserved to be raped. Sam's bloviating ain't playing with Dr. Mary.
My retort:
I really didn't plan to come back, but like I said, some things don't get to just stand in the ether.You are not so hard to predict either Sam.
And now you're just being a sexist pig. How many times have I watched you and Roch or Ed or Bubba or any of the rest of our lot lay the bait in these blogs and say horrible/nasty things to one another?
Let me ask you this, when any of YOU boys did it, would "Give it your best shot" mean that any of you could start threatening one another's personal safety or livelihoods in e-mails?
YOU are the one who keeps rehashing our differences over my case. You keep trying to justify what Jeff Martin did (by referrring back to the way I've defended my positions - often after "a great many other people" laid the bait) and you just can't make that connection.
But you have a God-given right to have an opinion on the spectacle!
You cannot have it both ways. Perjury is a crime or it isn't. If someone victimized by the act (especially when it's done by people who work for public or "non-profit" institutions) wants to prosecute, they should have avenues to do so. That's been my argument all along - a fairly simple one. All the doors have been slammed in my face and it has been your position that it's okay - that I need to accept the injustice and move on. I'm sorry it tires you so much. But then again, you did not take the hit.
Perhaps I do need to take a course on English as a second language - because a lot of people in this blogosphere seem to be talking out of both sides of their mouth.
Comments on this post are closed.
Sorry folks. This part of the show is over. I've bled enough.
Saturday, November 21, 2009
As The Stench Clears
*Note to Readers: This post has been modified somewhat after the Sunday Morning coffee.
**This post has been updated (see below).
I spent the day with the YaYas at the Carolina Renaissance Festival in Concord. It was a glorious day. And I really needed a day out/off with my girls and green men and talking trees and fairy creatures.
I even had a beer (or two). Harp to be exact. Of course, it's okay because it was not purchased in Asheboro;)
I am waiting for confirmation on something that was supposed to have occurred on Thursday night - or Friday.
Once I have that confirmation, knowing all-too-well how the law really works, I will post it and then probably not have much to publicly say. But for now I do not have confirmation (as I don't take the Courier, and "eternal victims" of crime in North Carolina don't have many resources to help keep them updated with what is going on).
I sincerely believe that facts speak for themselves.
Of course, one of the facts that speaks volumes to me is how so many of the "big-gun" Greensboro bloggers in our little online "community" sat on the sidelines and (as far as I know) did NOTHING in terms of using their influence with "he-who-I-shall-not-name" to STOP what was going on.
No sir. No ma'am. It was funny "just watching" someone being actively terrorized and then figuratively raped online.
And it's just a JOY to still be able to read what's online - still online because it was/is a pitiful/SICK/WARPED attempt to extort a retreat on my part.
Nevermind that I play by all of Ed Cone and "THE-SMELL-who-I-shall-not-name's" own blogging rules. You see, I have a blog. And when "THE-SMELL-who-I-shall-not-name" took the free-association and potty-mouthing WAY beyond the realm of ANY COMMON DECENCY on his blog (and started deleting/banning the comments of those who objected - something he has previously railed against when it was done to him), I rebutted here at Housecalls.
And for that horrible sin, I deserve to be cyber-raped. It's a "hoot".
I'm sorry. The psyche is still a little RAW.
Another fact speaking very clearly is how quickly the Greensboro News & Record folds when something is "complicated". But, hey, we knew that. Of course (as I've said before), it's not 1998 and I'm not Jack Perdue.
And still another is how quickly some anonymous sharks (pun intended) with grudges (and their own agendas) from Asheboro, smelling my blood in the water, were stupid enough to cozy up to "he-who-shall-not-be-named" (perhaps they should do some due diligence first) and pump him full of God-only-knows-what-but-it-wasn't-in-discovery . . . priming his loose, libelous online cannon even more.
And, in the wake of that online exchange, it's fairly clear that "he-who-shall-not-be-named" need not worry too much about getting a fair shake.
Indeed, it would seem the deck at the Randolph County courthouse is stacked in his favor. Wink. Wink. Wink. (One each for Garland, King and Andy). And a collective nod. Of course, I knew that going in.
This morning, Sam Spagnola had this to say:
"I might as well comment on it because nobody else has."
It was classic Cone-worthy arrogance.
Actually Sam, apart from the thread on the preceding Housecalls post, not to mention the post that took on "he-who-shall-not-be-named" vicious assault on another local blogger, people have commented. So have local bloggers . . . here and here and here.
They're NOT nobodies.
Tonight when I got in and started my evening Internet surf, I found a new post up on this subject. And I'd like to share.
Somebody gets it. They really get it.
Thanks, Dale.
And thanks for nothing, Sam.
Ironically, yesterday, at the ReniFest, I wore a lovely maroon raincoat with a hood that I purchased over a year ago at the retail store of "THE-SMELL-who-shall-not-be-named's" wife". I did not remember the connection until I hung the coat back up in the closet this morning.
It needs to go ahead and rain. Maybe that will finish clearing the Stench in the ether.
Sunday Evening Update: I've been on the road this evening and have not been able to follow threads/comments.
It was a rough week and I'm not going to mince any words. After putting up his (aforelinked) post, entitled "The Fec And Mary Show", expressing his uninformed lawyerly opinion, Sam Spagnola has been doing damage (to his ego) control all day.
But I'm the one who is "obsessed".
Sam calls what happened a "milestone" for Blogsboro.
On that point we agree. The "blog-battle" spilled over into Joe Guarino's blog because I had the presence-of-mind to blog about what "the-SMELL-who-shall-not-be-named" was doing as it was happening. Real time.
We also have a confession to the crime by the perpetrator posted online (again in real time).
So yeah, Sam, it's a bit of a milestone. Any other brilliant legal insights? Would it pump your ego (as it pumped someone else's last week) to infer that I'm "crazy" just one more time?
Like I said before, somethings speak for themselves.
I'm addressing Jeff Sykes' question (posed at Sam's). Mr. Martin lives in Greensboro. But the jurisdiction of cyber-crimes falls at the home address of the person receiving the threats.
In this case, the home address typed into the header of the e-mails Mr. Martin sent was in Randolph County (not Asheboro).
But as I've indicated, two jurisdictions could ultimately be involved because threatening e-mails went out to more than one person.
**This post has been updated (see below).
I spent the day with the YaYas at the Carolina Renaissance Festival in Concord. It was a glorious day. And I really needed a day out/off with my girls and green men and talking trees and fairy creatures.
I even had a beer (or two). Harp to be exact. Of course, it's okay because it was not purchased in Asheboro;)
I am waiting for confirmation on something that was supposed to have occurred on Thursday night - or Friday.
Once I have that confirmation, knowing all-too-well how the law really works, I will post it and then probably not have much to publicly say. But for now I do not have confirmation (as I don't take the Courier, and "eternal victims" of crime in North Carolina don't have many resources to help keep them updated with what is going on).
I sincerely believe that facts speak for themselves.
Of course, one of the facts that speaks volumes to me is how so many of the "big-gun" Greensboro bloggers in our little online "community" sat on the sidelines and (as far as I know) did NOTHING in terms of using their influence with "he-who-I-shall-not-name" to STOP what was going on.
No sir. No ma'am. It was funny "just watching" someone being actively terrorized and then figuratively raped online.
And it's just a JOY to still be able to read what's online - still online because it was/is a pitiful/SICK/WARPED attempt to extort a retreat on my part.
Nevermind that I play by all of Ed Cone and "THE-SMELL-who-I-shall-not-name's" own blogging rules. You see, I have a blog. And when "THE-SMELL-who-I-shall-not-name" took the free-association and potty-mouthing WAY beyond the realm of ANY COMMON DECENCY on his blog (and started deleting/banning the comments of those who objected - something he has previously railed against when it was done to him), I rebutted here at Housecalls.
And for that horrible sin, I deserve to be cyber-raped. It's a "hoot".
I'm sorry. The psyche is still a little RAW.
Another fact speaking very clearly is how quickly the Greensboro News & Record folds when something is "complicated". But, hey, we knew that. Of course (as I've said before), it's not 1998 and I'm not Jack Perdue.
And still another is how quickly some anonymous sharks (pun intended) with grudges (and their own agendas) from Asheboro, smelling my blood in the water, were stupid enough to cozy up to "he-who-shall-not-be-named" (perhaps they should do some due diligence first) and pump him full of God-only-knows-what-but-it-wasn't-in-discovery . . . priming his loose, libelous online cannon even more.
And, in the wake of that online exchange, it's fairly clear that "he-who-shall-not-be-named" need not worry too much about getting a fair shake.
Indeed, it would seem the deck at the Randolph County courthouse is stacked in his favor. Wink. Wink. Wink. (One each for Garland, King and Andy). And a collective nod. Of course, I knew that going in.
This morning, Sam Spagnola had this to say:
"I might as well comment on it because nobody else has."
It was classic Cone-worthy arrogance.
Actually Sam, apart from the thread on the preceding Housecalls post, not to mention the post that took on "he-who-shall-not-be-named" vicious assault on another local blogger, people have commented. So have local bloggers . . . here and here and here.
They're NOT nobodies.
Tonight when I got in and started my evening Internet surf, I found a new post up on this subject. And I'd like to share.
Somebody gets it. They really get it.
Thanks, Dale.
And thanks for nothing, Sam.
Ironically, yesterday, at the ReniFest, I wore a lovely maroon raincoat with a hood that I purchased over a year ago at the retail store of "THE-SMELL-who-shall-not-be-named's" wife". I did not remember the connection until I hung the coat back up in the closet this morning.
It needs to go ahead and rain. Maybe that will finish clearing the Stench in the ether.
Sunday Evening Update: I've been on the road this evening and have not been able to follow threads/comments.
It was a rough week and I'm not going to mince any words. After putting up his (aforelinked) post, entitled "The Fec And Mary Show", expressing his uninformed lawyerly opinion, Sam Spagnola has been doing damage (to his ego) control all day.
But I'm the one who is "obsessed".
Sam calls what happened a "milestone" for Blogsboro.
On that point we agree. The "blog-battle" spilled over into Joe Guarino's blog because I had the presence-of-mind to blog about what "the-SMELL-who-shall-not-be-named" was doing as it was happening. Real time.
We also have a confession to the crime by the perpetrator posted online (again in real time).
So yeah, Sam, it's a bit of a milestone. Any other brilliant legal insights? Would it pump your ego (as it pumped someone else's last week) to infer that I'm "crazy" just one more time?
Like I said before, somethings speak for themselves.
I'm addressing Jeff Sykes' question (posed at Sam's). Mr. Martin lives in Greensboro. But the jurisdiction of cyber-crimes falls at the home address of the person receiving the threats.
In this case, the home address typed into the header of the e-mails Mr. Martin sent was in Randolph County (not Asheboro).
But as I've indicated, two jurisdictions could ultimately be involved because threatening e-mails went out to more than one person.
Sunday, November 15, 2009
Cyber-Stalked: When A Fecund Stench Invades Your Home
(*11/19 Author's Note: A couple of my friends are not all that used to blogging. They are used to reading what I post every day or so . . . and have complained that they know I'm posting updates to this situation, but they cannot find them. Updates are posted at the bottom of this post. I apologize for any confusion.)
Today feels like that Kris Kristofferson song. Not that this hangover is about anything I've had to drink.
It's from blogging . . . "citizen journalism" . . . an activity I turned to four years ago to get some help . . . because I had been the victim of a series of un-investigated/un-prosecuted white-collar crimes.
[Pssssssst Fec, the North Carolina Medical Board already knows I'm here . . . so does every local, state and Federal law enforcement agency from Asheboro to Washington . . . and, in this era of healthcare "reform-that-isn't", the VERY LAST thing ANY of them want is public attention cast on this case.]
"Victim." I despise using that word to describe what I am. It isn't what I am.
As many folks by now know, I was the victim of a cyber-stalking incident on Friday night - courtesy of Jeff Martin, aka "Fecund Stench" of Vie de Malchance. I blogged his abuse as it happened . . . here on Housecalls (in the comments on the post linked below) and at Joe Guarino's.
Real time . . . not that I could really keep up with it.
I very much appreciate the calls and comments of everyone who has since had advice to give. I am taking that advice on Monday morning (like the Greensboro police department doesn't have enough to do).
"Mr. Stench" was upset because I had dared to "post-back" on a malicious/warped piece he put up on Mike Baron of "Dam Scam" (I refuse to link Fec's post again - or even go back to his blog - which has now been deleted from my sidebar links).
I was sick & fricking tired of coming home after bad or busy days at work (four hours from my real home no less - for all of the reasons given on this blog) . . . doing what I do (which sometimes really is saving children's lives) . . . and reading that I/others were "booger-eaters" and "morons" and "whack-jobs" and "crazy" and "evil" and "lunatics", etc.
I hear I'm now a "banshee" too.
Well, you had better give me a broom and a megaphone, because I am not going to stand silently by and watch a LOATHSOME attack (Joe's most excellent description) on a very good man battling terminal cancer (multiple myeloma) who is telling the truth . . . a truth that does matter to many of our Greensboro bloggers as long as they have their "potable water" long after Mike Baron is gone.
And Mr. Martin, if taking Mike's back (knowing only a small portion of his pain because I do not have terminal cancer) makes me a "borderline personality", well then, by God, that's what I'll be.
On this blog, I moderate comments, but for the most part I let people say what they think. And people did. A lot of people are weary of "Fec The Terrible's" act.
In addition to what he was doing on the blogs, Fecund Stench (and he IS) played his head games and hurled invective (a word his idol, Edward Cone, likes to use) into my Inbox for well over an hour. He started with a not-so-veiled threat (i.e. typing my home address in an e-mail subject header with a cryptic question in the body of the mail), and when that did not elicit whatever response he was looking for, he really started going for the jugular - by threatening to report me to the North Carolina Medical Board (because, you see, I'm "mentally ill").
Of course, in the course of my blogging, I've already been there and done that.
When these things did not work, Mr. Martin began listing all of the things he had done for me in the blogosphere. I was supposed to understand and forgive him because his modus operandi is to "attack and apologize". He's "well-known for it".
In the course of approximately one hour, I got 27 e-mails.
It wasn't the "you broke Ed Cone's heart" line that burned my butt most of all (one has to wonder where Mr. Cone was when all of this was going down), it was this gem:
"I can count the times I've been to your blog on one hand."
And that, ladies and gents, is when your hands stop trembling and your heart stops racing and you stop being scared and you just get really angry (all over again) and you CONSIDER THE SOURCE.
If this man . . . or any of the Greensboro bloggers he worships and was obviously trying to please . . . was EVER my "friend", I do NOT need enemies.
I have enough of those.
;) and nod (that was for you, Roch). That is, of course, the trademark of the progressive Greensboro blogging elite . . . the well-connected and the well-named who crane their necks looking away from train wrecked-lives like mine and Mike's.
OBTW, I am well aware this keeps me on Fec's "radar" . . . the one I'm supposed to now duck and run from.
As the blips go, I'm one of the big girls.
Sunday Afternoon Update (with after-thoughts added):
Surfing "We101/Greensboro" just now (it appears I'm back on there) I saw the heading for this post at Vie de Malchance (which appears to have gone up sometime last night), and took the bait and looked.
I agree with Mr. Martin. The post was "unwise". And the e-mail copy I made of it (in the event his sainted wife can talk some sense into him and it gets deleted) will be included with 27 other e-mails his alter-ego sent me Friday night . . . in in the complaint I swear out with the Greensboro police tomorrow morning.
As for it being so "easy" to Google my address (in "Fec's" pee-brain, this apparently justifies his actions), and "stupid" for me to allow it, as a physician licensed in North Carolina (a physician that Mr. Martin seems so determined to libel), I am required by law to list my home address with the North Carolina Medical Board.
My home address is my corporate (public) address.
And the Medical Board, in its infinite wisdom, offers no leeway for privacy to those of us who are incorporated as individuals and make our livings (again, something Mr. Martin seems determined to endanger as he endeavors to be "helpful") as independent contractors.
It's just another one of those things that no one in Raleigh thought of when they decided to be so "transparent" to the public . . . especially those members of the public that might be off their medication . . . one of those things that might need to be reformed.
I am informed that home addresses are also listed with the local tax department and are public record.
Mr. Stench, who has now reverted back to his "I'm just a normal guy" act (the one he always resumes once he's knows he's gone too far), is very "concerned" about the family of the unconvicted felons I pummel for their crimes on this blog . . .
. . . the unconvicted felons and their families who have moved right on along with their happy little lives, unencumbered by ANY consequences for their actions.
And/so, I'm not moved.
I have family too - who have suffered for YEARS with me because of what those unconvicted felons did. On Saturday morning, I had to tell my Mother what was going on (after she got back from an Aunt's funeral that I could not attend because I am on-call).
My house-sitter (one of the YaYas/my best friends) . . . who was actually in the house whose address Mr. Stench Googled when this was all going down . . . called to see if she needed to take protective measures and/or leave.
In his post, Mr. Stench is also feigning "concern" about my state of "anxiety". Funny, how he waited a whole day to "get the word" to me that he had not sent anything to the Medical Board.
And OBTW, this one ain't about anyone's politics. Be he a Democrat, or Republican, or Independent, or Mean-spirited-Moronic-Under-medicated-Booger-eater, this was just WRONG.
Filing the criminal complaint won't give me any "peace".
But let's just say I don't negotiate with terrorists, Mr. Martin.
Keep your post up. Take it down. Whatever. It's just more evidence.
Late Sunday Evening Update:
Predictably, when the "To Mary Johnson" post did not extort the desired end (again, I'm not as emotionally fragile as he imagined), Mr. Martin posted another entitled "Sit and Spin" (it doesn't get a link), which totally dropped the "normal guy" facade and revealed his true colors.
I've copied and e-mailed the posts to myself . . . to add to the file (29 and counting) . . . to give to the police tomorrow morning.
You-all have a good night.
Monday Afternoon Update:
It took a while to sort out the jurisdiction (it's the home address of the person on the receiving end of the e-mails), but the initial complaint has been filed with the Randolph County Sherrif's Department.
As this plays out, there may be something filed with the GPD as well.
The "character" of Mr. Stench continues to post vitriol over on his blog. He's going to dissect my psyche for your entertainment (if I am interpreting the data on StatCounter correctly, he's spent hours on my blog all weekend doing "research") and I'm supposed to quake in fear . . . I will retreat if he pushes the right button. Mr. Martin really needs to read the statute. It's not about what's on the blogs (although with every new post he puts up since sending his e-mails, he's digging the hole deeper).
It's about what he did Friday night.
And what Jeff Martin did Friday night crossed a line that sane people in this society do not cross. It was a crime. There is no excuse he can make, or rationalization he can employ to justify the act.
If it had been done to you, or your Mother, or your Sister, or your Daughter, or your Wife, it would not be "funny" at all.
And anyone who supports that - or thinks it is funny - is as sick and warped as he is.
But hey, pass the popcorn!
As of this morning, there have been other developments relevant to my case. I'm not going to blog about them.
Monday Evening Update:
In the "it-don't-get-richer-than-this" department, I just got an e-mail from the N&R . . . for a "possible interview". I'll go on-the-record here with part of my off-the-record response:
Let me get this straight.
I've been in the blogosphere for four years . . . blogging about being professionally raped/robbed and left for dead by a local non-profit hospital . . . multiple ethics violations and (as yet unprosecuted) felonies . . . pleading for an investigative journalist to take a look . . . and you want to interview me about Jeff Martin?
Oh manoman, it's been a long, interesting day.
Today feels like that Kris Kristofferson song. Not that this hangover is about anything I've had to drink.
It's from blogging . . . "citizen journalism" . . . an activity I turned to four years ago to get some help . . . because I had been the victim of a series of un-investigated/un-prosecuted white-collar crimes.
[Pssssssst Fec, the North Carolina Medical Board already knows I'm here . . . so does every local, state and Federal law enforcement agency from Asheboro to Washington . . . and, in this era of healthcare "reform-that-isn't", the VERY LAST thing ANY of them want is public attention cast on this case.]
"Victim." I despise using that word to describe what I am. It isn't what I am.
As many folks by now know, I was the victim of a cyber-stalking incident on Friday night - courtesy of Jeff Martin, aka "Fecund Stench" of Vie de Malchance. I blogged his abuse as it happened . . . here on Housecalls (in the comments on the post linked below) and at Joe Guarino's.
Real time . . . not that I could really keep up with it.
I very much appreciate the calls and comments of everyone who has since had advice to give. I am taking that advice on Monday morning (like the Greensboro police department doesn't have enough to do).
"Mr. Stench" was upset because I had dared to "post-back" on a malicious/warped piece he put up on Mike Baron of "Dam Scam" (I refuse to link Fec's post again - or even go back to his blog - which has now been deleted from my sidebar links).
I was sick & fricking tired of coming home after bad or busy days at work (four hours from my real home no less - for all of the reasons given on this blog) . . . doing what I do (which sometimes really is saving children's lives) . . . and reading that I/others were "booger-eaters" and "morons" and "whack-jobs" and "crazy" and "evil" and "lunatics", etc.
I hear I'm now a "banshee" too.
Well, you had better give me a broom and a megaphone, because I am not going to stand silently by and watch a LOATHSOME attack (Joe's most excellent description) on a very good man battling terminal cancer (multiple myeloma) who is telling the truth . . . a truth that does matter to many of our Greensboro bloggers as long as they have their "potable water" long after Mike Baron is gone.
And Mr. Martin, if taking Mike's back (knowing only a small portion of his pain because I do not have terminal cancer) makes me a "borderline personality", well then, by God, that's what I'll be.
On this blog, I moderate comments, but for the most part I let people say what they think. And people did. A lot of people are weary of "Fec The Terrible's" act.
In addition to what he was doing on the blogs, Fecund Stench (and he IS) played his head games and hurled invective (a word his idol, Edward Cone, likes to use) into my Inbox for well over an hour. He started with a not-so-veiled threat (i.e. typing my home address in an e-mail subject header with a cryptic question in the body of the mail), and when that did not elicit whatever response he was looking for, he really started going for the jugular - by threatening to report me to the North Carolina Medical Board (because, you see, I'm "mentally ill").
Of course, in the course of my blogging, I've already been there and done that.
When these things did not work, Mr. Martin began listing all of the things he had done for me in the blogosphere. I was supposed to understand and forgive him because his modus operandi is to "attack and apologize". He's "well-known for it".
In the course of approximately one hour, I got 27 e-mails.
It wasn't the "you broke Ed Cone's heart" line that burned my butt most of all (one has to wonder where Mr. Cone was when all of this was going down), it was this gem:
"I can count the times I've been to your blog on one hand."
And that, ladies and gents, is when your hands stop trembling and your heart stops racing and you stop being scared and you just get really angry (all over again) and you CONSIDER THE SOURCE.
If this man . . . or any of the Greensboro bloggers he worships and was obviously trying to please . . . was EVER my "friend", I do NOT need enemies.
I have enough of those.
;) and nod (that was for you, Roch). That is, of course, the trademark of the progressive Greensboro blogging elite . . . the well-connected and the well-named who crane their necks looking away from train wrecked-lives like mine and Mike's.
OBTW, I am well aware this keeps me on Fec's "radar" . . . the one I'm supposed to now duck and run from.
As the blips go, I'm one of the big girls.
Sunday Afternoon Update (with after-thoughts added):
Surfing "We101/Greensboro" just now (it appears I'm back on there) I saw the heading for this post at Vie de Malchance (which appears to have gone up sometime last night), and took the bait and looked.
I agree with Mr. Martin. The post was "unwise". And the e-mail copy I made of it (in the event his sainted wife can talk some sense into him and it gets deleted) will be included with 27 other e-mails his alter-ego sent me Friday night . . . in in the complaint I swear out with the Greensboro police tomorrow morning.
As for it being so "easy" to Google my address (in "Fec's" pee-brain, this apparently justifies his actions), and "stupid" for me to allow it, as a physician licensed in North Carolina (a physician that Mr. Martin seems so determined to libel), I am required by law to list my home address with the North Carolina Medical Board.
My home address is my corporate (public) address.
And the Medical Board, in its infinite wisdom, offers no leeway for privacy to those of us who are incorporated as individuals and make our livings (again, something Mr. Martin seems determined to endanger as he endeavors to be "helpful") as independent contractors.
It's just another one of those things that no one in Raleigh thought of when they decided to be so "transparent" to the public . . . especially those members of the public that might be off their medication . . . one of those things that might need to be reformed.
I am informed that home addresses are also listed with the local tax department and are public record.
Mr. Stench, who has now reverted back to his "I'm just a normal guy" act (the one he always resumes once he's knows he's gone too far), is very "concerned" about the family of the unconvicted felons I pummel for their crimes on this blog . . .
. . . the unconvicted felons and their families who have moved right on along with their happy little lives, unencumbered by ANY consequences for their actions.
And/so, I'm not moved.
I have family too - who have suffered for YEARS with me because of what those unconvicted felons did. On Saturday morning, I had to tell my Mother what was going on (after she got back from an Aunt's funeral that I could not attend because I am on-call).
My house-sitter (one of the YaYas/my best friends) . . . who was actually in the house whose address Mr. Stench Googled when this was all going down . . . called to see if she needed to take protective measures and/or leave.
In his post, Mr. Stench is also feigning "concern" about my state of "anxiety". Funny, how he waited a whole day to "get the word" to me that he had not sent anything to the Medical Board.
And OBTW, this one ain't about anyone's politics. Be he a Democrat, or Republican, or Independent, or Mean-spirited-Moronic-Under-medicated-Booger-eater, this was just WRONG.
Filing the criminal complaint won't give me any "peace".
But let's just say I don't negotiate with terrorists, Mr. Martin.
Keep your post up. Take it down. Whatever. It's just more evidence.
Late Sunday Evening Update:
Predictably, when the "To Mary Johnson" post did not extort the desired end (again, I'm not as emotionally fragile as he imagined), Mr. Martin posted another entitled "Sit and Spin" (it doesn't get a link), which totally dropped the "normal guy" facade and revealed his true colors.
I've copied and e-mailed the posts to myself . . . to add to the file (29 and counting) . . . to give to the police tomorrow morning.
You-all have a good night.
Monday Afternoon Update:
It took a while to sort out the jurisdiction (it's the home address of the person on the receiving end of the e-mails), but the initial complaint has been filed with the Randolph County Sherrif's Department.
As this plays out, there may be something filed with the GPD as well.
The "character" of Mr. Stench continues to post vitriol over on his blog. He's going to dissect my psyche for your entertainment (if I am interpreting the data on StatCounter correctly, he's spent hours on my blog all weekend doing "research") and I'm supposed to quake in fear . . . I will retreat if he pushes the right button. Mr. Martin really needs to read the statute. It's not about what's on the blogs (although with every new post he puts up since sending his e-mails, he's digging the hole deeper).
It's about what he did Friday night.
And what Jeff Martin did Friday night crossed a line that sane people in this society do not cross. It was a crime. There is no excuse he can make, or rationalization he can employ to justify the act.
If it had been done to you, or your Mother, or your Sister, or your Daughter, or your Wife, it would not be "funny" at all.
And anyone who supports that - or thinks it is funny - is as sick and warped as he is.
But hey, pass the popcorn!
As of this morning, there have been other developments relevant to my case. I'm not going to blog about them.
Monday Evening Update:
In the "it-don't-get-richer-than-this" department, I just got an e-mail from the N&R . . . for a "possible interview". I'll go on-the-record here with part of my off-the-record response:
Let me get this straight.
I've been in the blogosphere for four years . . . blogging about being professionally raped/robbed and left for dead by a local non-profit hospital . . . multiple ethics violations and (as yet unprosecuted) felonies . . . pleading for an investigative journalist to take a look . . . and you want to interview me about Jeff Martin?
Oh manoman, it's been a long, interesting day.
Wednesday Afternoon Update:
In the course of doing my job, I was up a good portion of last night (I'm sure the parents of those sick newborns would very much appreciate what their Pediatrician was having to deal with on the side), and my day is far from done, so we will keep this short and sweet.
Blogging is blogging and we all take our lumps. Mr. Martin, for all of his obfuscating and back-tracking and pathetic excuses, crossed every line (not just with me) and it is not going to stand.
You can like me or you can hate me, but what he did was wrong. It is against the law.
And I've got news for the Fecund Stench. I've been on the Randolph County Sheriff Department's "radar" for a very long time. Just like the Asheboro Police Department (as I was tossed from jurisdiction to jurisdiction), the RCSD poo-pooed my criminal allegations against Robert Morrison and Steve Eblin . . . did not conduct ANY KIND of investigation itself . . . and instead of referring the case out to the N.C. Attorney General's office (where it should have gone in 2003), deferred completely to the stone-walling and habitual intemperance of the Randolph County District Attorney's office.
It's not quite "eternal", but there you are.
THERE WILL BE NO "DEALS".
Thursday Morning Update
There's a break in the baby action this morning, so I thought I'd update everyone on what's been going on from my end.
Concerned/outraged friends in Asheboro continue to send me e-mail copies of Mr. Martin's posts. And I continued to forward the posts, which are an escalation of his e-mail assault, to the Randolph County Sheriff's Department.
I'd like to thank everyone for their calls and e-mails. I'm o-kay. I'm hanging in.
Jeff can say, "I don't know what she's talking about" all he likes, but Tuesday night (I think it was Tuesday night), I was offered a "deal" by the RCSD officer "investigating the case" (who did not seem to understand the difference between blog commentary and communicating threats). The deal was silence for silence. I refused. For that caves to the psychological terror tactics . . . and the on-going online rape of my reputation (such as it is after the professional rape dished out in Asheboro).
Not gonna do it. Wouldn't be prudent.
And if a Randolph County magistrate is too dense to get past the not-so-deft snow-job and figure out the difference between blogging and the cyber-terrorism Fec has been dishing out, well, we do have a problem with law enforcement in Asheboro.
Of course, we who live here have known that for a long time.
The GPD is also involved at this point . . . because of threatening e-mails Mr. Martin sent to someone else. They seem to be taking it more seriously.
The SBI was notified last night.
With regards to "the real story" (which Mr. Martin claims to know all about - and to have shared with Ed Cone - implying that I am "not well"), this week there have been what has been billed to me as positive developments with that as well. There will be no further comment until I see how that pans out.
And/so things are far from "dead".
Mr. Martin has spent days on Vie de Malchance trying to justify his actions (nevermind that he's admitted what he did - and that he was wrong to do it). He's continued to lob invective and innuendo trying to get me to "crack" . . . to give up . . . to walk away with my tail tucked.
I was "mean" to our poor, perpetually petulant Fec on his blog. I allowed others to be mean here on Housecalls.
Nevermind the the horrible, awful, cruel things he's said to-and-about me/others over the years. He's the "real" victim.
But here's the thing about that. Bloggers blog. We put up our stuff and we invite commentary. We fight and we spew. We can moderate comments, we can block comments, we can hide comments, and we can delete comments. For all his "pings" now, Mr. Martin played that game until someone stood up last week and flat out told him he was wrong . . . way beyond out-of-line. Fec verbally eviscerated a man with terminal cancer (Mike Baron) who came to our little "community"-in-the-ether because he wanted to tell his side of a story that's gotten short shrift.
Of course, that's my fault too. I should've told Mike it was a waste of time. You can't make his story 100 words-or-less . . . and/or something that a first-grader-suffering-from ADD could understand.
Our Fec could not be bothered with the specifics or the facts. No. Instead, our hero told a man with terminal cancer that he was "criminally insane" (Lex Alexander also chimed in) . . . and to move on along with his life and get over it . . .
. . . just as he did with this "whack-job" on so many occasions . . . without apparently even reading this blog.
Meanwhile, those of us who dared defend Mike were "booger-eating morons" and "lunatics".
Friday night, Jeff Martin/his alter, "Fec" crossed a line. As a very wise nurse put it to me this morning . . . he escalated from wanting to shake the baby into silence, to actually doing it.
Most of the rules we play by in the Greensboro blogosphere are rules Jeff Martin and Edward Cone (whose name he keeps invoking) helped make. In the past, the GSO blogosphere has railed in righteous indignation for far lesser offenses against the livelihoods and reputations of bloggers. But not now.
There's been a whole lot of radio silence from the progressive and enlightened this week.
Readers here on Housecalls have commented on Fec's mental status, but I have done my level best to refrain from adding my two cents. I don't have a clinical relationship with him. I've met him once (while shopping in his wife's old store). And I think that what he's done - both now and in the past - speaks for itself.
As Mr. Martin well knows, I've not returned fire in kind. I've made no threats against him or his wife (someone I've made a point of repeatedly praising on this blog) or their livelihoods - although there are several "fat girls" from Randolph County who will not be setting foot in Jodi's store ever again.
But what Jeff Martin has been doing since Friday is illegal and this time he is not going to be getting a free pass.
Of course the story in the News & Record is dead. I would not participate in Mr. Martin's "fun" by giving an interview. Indeed, I pretty much put them on notice that I was not Jack Perdue.
This is NOT about a "blog war" . . . or two "crazy people" going at it online. It's a relatively simple story about a vicious blogger-on-blogger cyber-assault that's been going on for almost a week.
Ergo, OF COURSE, the Greensboro N&R cannot handle it.
This IS serious, folks. But not in the way Jeff Martin would like you to think.
Very Late Thursday Evening Update
This afternoon, I was notified of new developments that should be published in Randolph County's "law log" shortly. I just got home tonight, and have had time to peruse what friends sent me earlier in the day.
And once the case is really underway, perhaps the cyber-cops will be able to determine who "In The Line of Fire" is. This person seems to be holding a serious grudge over my stance in Asheboro's alcohol referendum (can't imagine who that might be;). But that's old news. I pissed-off a lot of "right people" by taking the online backs of the "anti" forces.
No apologies. No regrets.
The really interesting/curious/problematic thing for Garland, King & Andy now is that, in his (or is it a her?) comments at Fec's, "In The Line of Fire" implies that Mr. Martin will have his legal back covered by droves of adoring insiders in Randolph County law enforcement and Asheboro's legal system . . . the system that's already done me dirty more than once.
Perhaps it IS time to call in the SBI. Smells like Lincolnton to me.
As for "the real story", that all came out in the discovery portion of two lawsuits . . . lawsuits that Randolph Hospital ultimately ran from . . . and lied repeatedly during . . . in order to get out-from-under-on-the-cheap.
But hey, our Fec never lets the facts get in his way.
Every nasty post Jeff Martin has put up/directed my way since this attack began on Friday night are simply an extension of his e-mails . . . and an attempt to extort my silence. Ergo, they're actually evidence . . . while previous blog posts and commentary are . . . well . . . bloggers being bloggers.
"In The Line of Fire", an obvious blogging "newbie" suffering from delusions of anonymity, should be fairly easy for local-law-enforcement-determined-to-prove-its-ability-to-be-fair-and-impartial to "ping".
P.S. Wanted to add an addendum before I go to bed. In the wake of the increased traffic spurred by recent events, I decided to move the profile up on my sidebar (it's that somewhere-around-100 word summary-of-my-case prepared just for Ed Cone), and move some things down/around. I also deleted some dead links and removed several old Housecalls posts in order to cut down on clutter. If you can't find something, you're free to search. Nothing has been deleted, and if it really trips your trigger, you can learn all about my experience as one of John Rohinson's recruits to the oh-so-progressive Greensboro blogosphere.
Saturday, November 14, 2009
"So How Will The Healthcare Reform Remedy This?"
From the N&O: More evidence of stellar healthcare oversight on the part of North Carolina state government and "non-profits" (not).
The best comment on the post is a question posed by a reader:
"So how will the health care reform remedy this?"
It won't.
The best comment on the post is a question posed by a reader:
"So how will the health care reform remedy this?"
It won't.
Kevin MD: Ro-Hacking For The AMA Again
In the midst of yesterday's not-fun-at-all and head games, I posted a comment at Kevin MD.
Kevin was once again giving "guest-columist" space to American Medical Association (AMA) President James Rohack - who was laying on the AMA's support of HR 3961 (not to be confused with last Saturday night's HR 3962) with a trowel.
"Democracy in action", he called it.
Nevermind that the AMA represents less than 20% of the practicing physicians in the United States.
As an aside . . . and in the wake of Jeff Martin's behavior last night . . . I cannot help but remember (with a sneer and an imaginary spit) . . . Randolph County ADA King Dozier's threat to "report" me to the AMA after I submitted my bill for expert testimony on his rape-case-that-wasn't, as he tried to renege on the fee. It was a bad move given the witness intimidation Dozier had employed to drag me away from covering the practice of a Virginia physician dying of cancer. The judge reviewing the fee agreed. Ignorant jerk (the "King", not the judge).
I digress. You needed boots to get through the reading of Rohack's latest piece of tripe.
What got to me most was Rohack's quoting of Teddy Roosevelt (it's in red because Teddy was an "evil" Republican):
“It is not the critic who counts, not the man who points out how the strong man stumbled, or where the doer of deeds could have done better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena; whose face is marred by the dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly.”
Based on timing, I believe my comment on the thread was the first. Kevin deleted it.
But by God, he could post the cheerleaders! One commenter on the thread enthused, "Non members need to join the AMA and help us all develop a health care system of which we can be proud."
As a "non-member" I seethed. But I have learned my lesson with Kevin, and had saved my comment. I posted it again.
He deleted it again.
And/so I'm posting it here:
I'm still not clear on how this "system-of-democracy" works for the very large chunk of American physicians who don't pay dues to the AMA for the privilege of being misrepresented.
And please, Dr. Rohack, don't lecture me because I'm a "critic" of "reform" as it is being rolled out. You see, I was "in the arena" advocating for patients before being in that arena was cool. And I was professionally eviscerated for it.
The AMA was NOWHERE to be found (it's the reason I stopped paying dues).
I've been biting at Kevin's ankles long enough for you (and Obama's White House) to know I'm here. You know I have a ugly story to tell (and it's actually kinda relevant to what happened at Fort Hood).
You know there are things that need to be fixed that your precious bill comes nowhere close to addressing.
I'm not going to support reform until it does.
Kevin was once again giving "guest-columist" space to American Medical Association (AMA) President James Rohack - who was laying on the AMA's support of HR 3961 (not to be confused with last Saturday night's HR 3962) with a trowel.
"Democracy in action", he called it.
Nevermind that the AMA represents less than 20% of the practicing physicians in the United States.
As an aside . . . and in the wake of Jeff Martin's behavior last night . . . I cannot help but remember (with a sneer and an imaginary spit) . . . Randolph County ADA King Dozier's threat to "report" me to the AMA after I submitted my bill for expert testimony on his rape-case-that-wasn't, as he tried to renege on the fee. It was a bad move given the witness intimidation Dozier had employed to drag me away from covering the practice of a Virginia physician dying of cancer. The judge reviewing the fee agreed. Ignorant jerk (the "King", not the judge).
I digress. You needed boots to get through the reading of Rohack's latest piece of tripe.
What got to me most was Rohack's quoting of Teddy Roosevelt (it's in red because Teddy was an "evil" Republican):
“It is not the critic who counts, not the man who points out how the strong man stumbled, or where the doer of deeds could have done better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena; whose face is marred by the dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly.”
Based on timing, I believe my comment on the thread was the first. Kevin deleted it.
But by God, he could post the cheerleaders! One commenter on the thread enthused, "Non members need to join the AMA and help us all develop a health care system of which we can be proud."
As a "non-member" I seethed. But I have learned my lesson with Kevin, and had saved my comment. I posted it again.
He deleted it again.
And/so I'm posting it here:
I'm still not clear on how this "system-of-democracy" works for the very large chunk of American physicians who don't pay dues to the AMA for the privilege of being misrepresented.
And please, Dr. Rohack, don't lecture me because I'm a "critic" of "reform" as it is being rolled out. You see, I was "in the arena" advocating for patients before being in that arena was cool. And I was professionally eviscerated for it.
The AMA was NOWHERE to be found (it's the reason I stopped paying dues).
I've been biting at Kevin's ankles long enough for you (and Obama's White House) to know I'm here. You know I have a ugly story to tell (and it's actually kinda relevant to what happened at Fort Hood).
You know there are things that need to be fixed that your precious bill comes nowhere close to addressing.
I'm not going to support reform until it does.
Viva la resistance!
Thursday, November 12, 2009
Something For The King Of The Greensboro Blogosphere's Petulant Children To Chew On
I really haven't had the time for this. We in Eastern N.C. are under the iron-grip of a deadly Nor'easter blustering over the entire middle-eastern seaboard. A cold rain has been coming down in sheets for 2 days, the wind is howling, creeks and basements and low-lying areas are flooded, the weather/situation is fore-casted to get much worse by nightfall, and I spent this morning at the hospital getting babies out as fast as we could.
In short, this "lunatic" physician has more important things to do than engage the king of the GSO Blogosphere's "petulant children" in an online pissing-contest. But, when I am called out, I come out.
And it's always been my curse not to hit like a girl.
Let me also say that I/others have been more than properly provoked. I intend to answer here but not return-fire-in-kind. I'm not interested in a blog-war. But, God help me, I'm not the sainted Joe Guarino either.
I left Fec's (aka Jeff Martin) blog a short while ago, and resolved not to go back. And except for commenting on one of his posts relevant to my on-going battle to hold the liars and cheats running Randolph Hospital accountable for their criminal actions (i.e. writing Congressman Howard Coble and expecting a quick/straight answer is pretty much a HUGE waste of time), I have not played the head games at Vie De Malchance.
For if it were in my nature to "behave", I would not be in the blogosphere.
Nor does "cheap grace" and/or "peace" at any price cut it. My beef with the News & Record's John Robinson and Edward Cone-of-THE-Cones is based on YEARS of empty rhetoric, broken promises, hidden agendas, determined/well-practiced ignorance, oftentimes cruel abuse and in-your-face journalistic malpractice. What's more, Jeff Martin knows it.
And, as far as "the game" stands now, until I see a front-page above-the-fold investigative journalism piece in the News & Record (writting by someone other than Lorraine Ahearn) detailing how a local Pediatrician in government service to a "non-profit" was done way-beyond-wrong, Fec can bleed with them or he can bleed with me.
I was drawn back in at Fec's by his recent way-beyond-mean-spirited attack on local blogger, Mike Baron (for more on Mike, read on).
It's not my fight, really. I just despise people stomping on others (as if it were some kind of sport) when they're obviously down. I REALLY despise it.
Of course, it's a signature behavior of the more "progressive" types in the Greensboro blogosphere.
Now, Fec's really not all that progressive and he's been down before. That's how (despite behaving like a total ass in the beginning) he ultimately crawled into that soft spot in my heart that I have for wounded souls and strays. Having felt the chilly embrace of the-darkness-that-is-visible himself, you'd think he'd tread more carefully.
I guess not.
Mike Baron worked as Greensboro's only water conservation manager back in the late nineties. He was "green" before "green" became cool. He was fired when his award-winning water conservation efforts became too successful and it began to cost the city money . . . and threatened future/imagined mega-profits from the proposed dam.
Apparently agreeing with the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (about costs vs. benefit) was bad form . . . and justified the destruction of his career.
Mike, who now has terminal cancer (it's always worked for Elizabeth Edwards), has a blog/website which raises a number of legitimate criticisms of the Randleman Dam project.
For this, Fec (with Lex Alexander, ex-N&R reporter & "medical-blogger", chiming in) dubbed Mike "criminally insane".
And that, friends & neighbors, ranks right up there with Edward Cone dubbing a woman with brain cancer "bat-shit crazy".
[No, I've not forgotten how ugly partisianship got before the current genius-who-isn't became President (thanks for the link, Spag).]
God forbid that anyone really try to tell the truth or educate the public/shake it out of its generally-ignorant stupor. If they do, they simply must be showered with what Cone likes to call "invective" (of course, it's only invective when someone is firing back at him).
It's bad enough that Fec pulls stunts like this. Worse still that when it happens, the so-called blogging elite do not intervene to stop it. Yet the blogging-geniuses-wanting-so-badly-to-be-relevant in Greensboro cannot figure out why more people aren't rushing to join their little "community".
What prompted Fec's latest rant, one might ask? Well, in classic, transplanted-Randolph-County-Good-Ole-Boy fashion, Fec has known the guy who runs the Randleman Dam project since childhood.
Ergo Mike's criticisms cannot be tolerated.
Fec's friend apparently has degrees from West Point and Duke (mine are from UNC-G and Bowman Gray . . . maybe we can thumb-wrestle . . . but only if he wears his uniform).
Moreover, as Fec spewed, he asserted that established facts and the specifics of Mike's case are not important. The "sloppy process" that ruined a man's life is of no consequence as long as city leaders did not really mean to be mean, and the Greensboro of 2075 gets its potatble water (no doubt at a fair price).
Cuz it ain't gettin it now.
It's apparently a far, far better thing to do a poor impression of that portulent gasbag Al Gore (for the record, Fec, if you wanna see polar bears all you'll ever have to do is come on down to Asheboro . . . as long as you buy a beer while you're here . . . it's for the economy).
Like I said, it wasn't my fight. I wasn't planning to do more than drop a couple of comments supportive of Mike. But Fec would not let up.
And it was making my skin crawl.
And/so I was compelled to drop a little bomb I've been holding in reserve about some ugly goings-on at Asheboro's city lake. Of course, in dropping it at Fec's, the story was unlikely to waft back and stain the pants of anyone at Asheboro's city hall. So I'm actually kinda grateful for the opportunity to drop it again here.
Randolph Hospital drops by at least once a day. So I know it will get back to someone.
You see, a few years back, right after I debuted the Asheboro Pediatrics website in 2004, a young man contacted me and asked for help. He told me that he lived on leased property near the lake and had witnessed the dumping of dead cows (where they could flavor our drinking water) . . . something that you'd think would make the hairs on our latest-convert-to-the-religion-of-global-warming's arm stand on-end.
The people who did the dumping knew that the young man knew, they wanted him GONE (not to mention quiet), and had resorted to all kinds of nasty retaliatory tactics. The young man told me he was terrified someone would hurt - or even kill - his wife & children.
I believed him because I could hear the fear in his voice (it was really my first personal encounter with domestic terrorism). He also told me that the Randolph County Sheriff's Department was in on some of the intimidation (on behalf of the people leasing his property to him . . . all "right people" types, I'm sure). As I was a "local" (not that being a local has lent me any kind of advantage), the young man wanted to know if there was anyone else to whom he might turn for help.
Alas, deeply mired in my own muck at the time, I didn't have much to offer him. God knows, you can't just pick up the phone and call Roy Cooper.
I did some minor poking round . . . talked to a few trusted confidants about it. They all agreed that I'd have to let it go.
As far as I know, the young man and his family wound up leaving the area (fortunately not in a pine box).
I'm fairly certain I could pull up e-mails and names of the principals from three computers ago if pressed to do so. But really, what's the point?
After all, I don't live in Lincolnton. Why names the names, and make myself a target, and risk spending another decade in a Court venue that has already done me way-beyond-dirty . . . a jurisdiction that that still sees fit to employ a rail-roading/witness-intimidating ADA who lied to defense attorneys and was disciplined by the State Bar?
Besides, here's an idea for anyone who wants to check out the veracity of what the young man told me: Maybe instead of secretly sending city employees over to Dave's Mountain to sample our ground water (the fairly transparent scheme being to "prove" we "need" sewer lines, ergo we must be annexed), Asheboro City Manager, John Ogburn, should get his minions to stake out the lake . . . or dredge up the rotting cow carcases.
The sad fact is (and Fec knows it) that right folks and wrong folks here in Asheboro/Greensboro drape sleaze and corruption around their shoulders like a comfortable old coat. And we for sure don't have any local newspapers that are going to buck the powers-that-be, and cut through the layers of dirty ooze.
As of yesterday afternoon, I am apparently banned at Fec's. Big whup. In true JohnRobinsonian fashion, he has deleted the comment for which I was banned. It seems I made some personal observations that hit too close to home.
Never mind the ragged heel-prints he freely leaves on everyone else's psyche.
After he deleted the comment, Fec also dropped me an e-mail.
"All comments will be deleted", it said (as if I'm going to try after he deleted the first one).
Of course, deleting comments he provoked totally fits the old cliche about dishing it out but not being able to take it.
I'm supposed to "chew on that".
I responded to Fec's e-mail and told him that deleting my comment was fine with me IF he deleted the entire post. Otherwise it was cowardice And I told him to chew on that.
Moderation after the fact does not ever sit well with me . . . just as it hasn't sat well with Fec in the past.
Alas, I did not copy/paste/save the comment-for-which-I-was-banned, and I have no idea how I might otherwise pull a snapshot of the very short-lived web-page off Google (or indeed my own computer files). It's a shame, because I worked on the comment for a while and it was a thing of beauty. I am incorporating some of what I can remember here.
I did try to find the comment. But Google kept booting me back to the current page of Vie De Malchance.
No thanks.
Unlike Ed Cone. I am not sorry. There isn't going to be an apology.
I am sick and fricking tired of working all day doing what I do (especially after having been put through the royal medico-legal cluster-screw at the hands of the blood-sucking carpet-baggers that now think they own my hometown), and coming home to read a fellow-blogger's increasingly mean-spirited, disjointed rants (which harbor NONE of the writing talent I know lies underneath) . . . calling me (and others in our local ether) names like (like "lunatic" and "evil" and "whack-job" and "racist" and "booger-eater").
The entire GSO blogosphere seems to live in fear of what Jeff Martin might say or do next . . . how they might be negatively splattered all over the Internet if they take him on.
I honestly don't care anymore.
Besides, Ed Cone & company have already done most of the heavy-lifting there.
As it stands right now, the grown-up, professional targets of this latest signature Jeff Martin verbal spew have more-than-enough grounds to sue him for libel (come to think of it, that might be another great way to get old Court documents proving perjury on the record in a venue outside of Randolph County).
But again, what's the point of that? It's so not worth it.
For someone who wails and moans so much over the apathy and lack of civility/community in our local blogosphere . . . not to mention its abject failure to be "relevant" in terms of righting wrongs or stamping out corruption (although Joe Guarino & company might finally be off to a good start) . . . Fec himself, for all of his bloviating about leading revolutions, has recently set a very poor example.
Wanna talk about "evil"? Let's talk about evil.
Government/"non-profit" corruption is evil in one of its truest, albeit most insidious forms. It hides behind charity and the public good. It is hard to expose and almost impossible to bring down. That effort . . . "revolution", if you will . . . takes people of courage, conviction and dedication . . . people driven to persevere despite great adversity . . . people who are not always well-behaved . . .. people who are just a little bit crazy.
Mealy-mouthed, politically-correct fence-sitters need not apply.
That's why it's my theory that, in the evil department, government/"non-profit" corruption takes SECOND PLACE to the apathy and silence that allows it.
That's the kind of evil that buries stories like mine . . . and Mike Baron's . . . and endeavors to assasinate our characters and kill our will.
The success of any operation to bring down corruption also depends upon numbers . . . and amongst those numbers, strong allies who are reliable and willing to take one another's back.
It certainly helps to have the ear of principled local newspapers that are not afraid to take on the status quo.
And that's why the folks at Lake Norman Bath have been so successful. The people of Lincolnton rallied around the truth and the bloggers-telling-it. It didn't hurt that the underlying story . . . that of a Father determined to help his little-girl-done-wrong . . . tugs at the heartstrings. The bloggers , in turn, rallied around one another (instead of slamming and banning each other). Together, these people together were not afraid to charge in and take on the big guns (literally).
The effort crossed lines of political ideology and spoke to simple right and wrong.
Their cause has been buoyed by local newspapermen (one of whom was kind enough to e-mail me and offer empathy/advice) . . . real journalists who have not sold their souls to the highest bidder on the theory that economic development and/or sucking up to their big advertisers trumps all.
It's basically the idea that I thought the N&R's John Robinson was promoting when I accepted his invitation to jump into Greensboro's "citizen journalism" pool in February 2005 . . . the day after my Father died . . . a full two years after I had reported as yet un-investigated/un-prosecuted perjury, contempt and fraud to the Randolph County DA's office.
All wide-eyed and naive, I arrived in the blogosphere with bells on and the original sworn documents-proving-perjury-in-hand (documents that, in four years, a local journalist has yet to look at) to take on both Randolph and Cone Hospitals (one "non-profit" institution having fired me for saving the life of a newborn baby whose life was endangered and care was mismanaged by a doctor employed by the other).
Simple right and wrong. One would think it would tug on hearts.
But in Asheboro-Greensboro, we simply cannot take on the big money or the hallowed name of Cone.
And/so, my hoped-for vindication via Greensboro's brand of "citizen journalism" is an idea that has since died a very ugly death.
The reason it died was beautifully evidenced by Fec's ugly/vicious/despicable/warped post on Mike Baron.
As he spewed, Fec reasoned that if Mike Baron's allegations (as a whistle-blower) were true, the government had mechanism in place to protect him.
Now, that is not just a lie, it's A DAMNED LIE. In the comment Fec deleted, I suggested that, in the wake of Fort Hood, Fec should ask his West Point-educated Randleman Dam buddy how eager folks in the military and public service are to pucker-up and blow. In the alternative, after Fec stops slurping down his own boogers, maybe he should take up a cause and try it sometime.
He'd only get a nose-bleed.
Mr. Martin, for all of his obvious vast intelligence, doesn't seem to grasp a few simple points. Turning to the fledgling blogosphere wasn't an option when all of these ugly things went down over a decade ago - for Mike Baron or for me. And the applicable statutes of limitations ran out for Mike Baron long ago. Being without a job, he could not afford the lawyers that might have pressed his case (the practice of law being nothing like the practice of medicine). The only hope of vindication he has now is for someone somewhere to take note of his blog and give the story its due.
And despite Fec's lame premise that the end always justifies the means, in this case, the truth is way past due.
If perjury had a statute of limitations, legally, I would be in the same boat. But my case has some technical twists and turns which provide opportunity that Mike's does not. I can also demonstrate a broader pattern of determined/on-going negligence on the part of various medical regulatory agencies (like the Medical Board, like JCAHO, like DHHS) . . . agencies that just didn't care enough to lift a finger and protect a doctor-in-public-service doing the right thing by a dying-patient-not-even-her-own eleven years ago . . . agencies that, since that time, have not bothered to modify the antiquated/ineffectual laws that her case more-than-demonstrates need serious tweaking.
The state and Federal governments cannot move to fix problems BEFORE they blow up in someone's face. And/so this "lunatic" knows she is shortly gonna have to sue somebody. I should have done it long ago. I just wanted so badly for the *&^%$#@! system to work . . . and was crazy enough to believe that it would.
Heavy sigh.
The North Carolina Medical Board, in fact, has had to fend off a couple of such lawsuits in recent years. If I do say so myself, the lawsuit I file will make all others pale in comparison. Filing it in the midst of our beyond-clueless President's push for socialism-&-physician-indentured-servitude-in-the-guise-of healthcare-reform should make for interesting headlines . . . written, of course, by newspapers other than the Greensboro News & Record or Courier Tribune.
They missed their chance at a Pulitzer. But a few watered-down beers at the Flying Pig should drown their sorrows.
The sad truth (which Fec well knows) is that Lincolnton is NOT Greensboro or Asheboro . . . and it's comparative-newborn-baby-bloggers have put the much-longer-in-the-blogging-tooth-crowd-a-few-counties-away (a crowd that doesnt' know it all after all) to shame.
Cue Ed Cone jumping up and down whining, "Are we relevant yet? Why aren't we relevant yet?"
In my case, and Mike's, our lack of relative success (compared to LNB) comes down to location, location, location . . . AND the agendas of the blogger-elite we've been pleading our cases to. For Fec to compare the two situations (as if our cases have no merit because we have not been able to get what his useless buddy Cone calls "traction") . . . except as a study in stark contrasts . . . is to compare apples to oranges.
Like I said. I'm not interested in a flame-throwing blog war. This is all I plan to say. But some things just don't get to stand.
The thing that saddens me most about all of this is that I know and very much like Fec's wife (who by his own admission, does not read his blog). She is a warm and engaging woman who loves her husband very much and would like to see him find a better outlet for his writing . . . his gift . . . the one bubbling under the dark slime of ad-hominems and cruel invective he indiscriminately hurls into the ether. I have done business with her, and I know she would be genuinely horrified by a lot of what her husband says and does at Vie De Malchance.
As a local businesswoman ("the wife, I mean), I have to wonder if some of what Jeff has said/done online has hurt her. I wonder if he even thinks about it as he hurls.
Moreover, lectures on "hatred" from a man who lately does nothing but spew hate (unless he's grovelling to Edward Cone-of-the-Cones or pandering to the race-baiting "ngee") hold no water (Get it? Water? Dam?) for me.
Apart from the fact that my efforts over the years have been primarily/specifically/consistently directed against the non-profiteers who professionally eviscerated me . . . and the institutions/regulatory/law enforcement mechanisms (and so-called journalists) that failed me . . . the biggest difference between Jeff Martin and I is that my family and my friends read this blog EVERY day.
The Department of Homeland Security pops in occasionally too;).
And you know what? My family and friends are far from embarrassed. For you see, what happened to me did not happen in a vacuum. I was not the only person deeply hurt when Bob Morrison and Steven Eblin worked their evil magic. And everyone I know is DELIGHTED that I've found this outlet to give Randolph Hospital hell, keep other young/naive doctors from drinking the same Koolaid I did, and maybe even one day get that vindication . . . and thereby help change a small portion of what is wrong with medicine for the better.
My loved ones are very proud me . . . especially when I defy the warrior in my nature and decline to return unfriendly fire in kind.
Chew on that.
Late Evening Addendum: For the reader's further consideration, I present Dr. Joe Guarino's kinder and gentler rebuttal to Fec's work. It's a wicked (or should I say, "evil"?) post.
Friday The 13th Addendum: This post has been editied and tweaked this morning. I was tired yesterday when I got back to the apartment.
Home being in Asheboro and all.
In short, this "lunatic" physician has more important things to do than engage the king of the GSO Blogosphere's "petulant children" in an online pissing-contest. But, when I am called out, I come out.
And it's always been my curse not to hit like a girl.
Let me also say that I/others have been more than properly provoked. I intend to answer here but not return-fire-in-kind. I'm not interested in a blog-war. But, God help me, I'm not the sainted Joe Guarino either.
I left Fec's (aka Jeff Martin) blog a short while ago, and resolved not to go back. And except for commenting on one of his posts relevant to my on-going battle to hold the liars and cheats running Randolph Hospital accountable for their criminal actions (i.e. writing Congressman Howard Coble and expecting a quick/straight answer is pretty much a HUGE waste of time), I have not played the head games at Vie De Malchance.
For if it were in my nature to "behave", I would not be in the blogosphere.
Nor does "cheap grace" and/or "peace" at any price cut it. My beef with the News & Record's John Robinson and Edward Cone-of-THE-Cones is based on YEARS of empty rhetoric, broken promises, hidden agendas, determined/well-practiced ignorance, oftentimes cruel abuse and in-your-face journalistic malpractice. What's more, Jeff Martin knows it.
And, as far as "the game" stands now, until I see a front-page above-the-fold investigative journalism piece in the News & Record (writting by someone other than Lorraine Ahearn) detailing how a local Pediatrician in government service to a "non-profit" was done way-beyond-wrong, Fec can bleed with them or he can bleed with me.
I was drawn back in at Fec's by his recent way-beyond-mean-spirited attack on local blogger, Mike Baron (for more on Mike, read on).
It's not my fight, really. I just despise people stomping on others (as if it were some kind of sport) when they're obviously down. I REALLY despise it.
Of course, it's a signature behavior of the more "progressive" types in the Greensboro blogosphere.
Now, Fec's really not all that progressive and he's been down before. That's how (despite behaving like a total ass in the beginning) he ultimately crawled into that soft spot in my heart that I have for wounded souls and strays. Having felt the chilly embrace of the-darkness-that-is-visible himself, you'd think he'd tread more carefully.
I guess not.
Mike Baron worked as Greensboro's only water conservation manager back in the late nineties. He was "green" before "green" became cool. He was fired when his award-winning water conservation efforts became too successful and it began to cost the city money . . . and threatened future/imagined mega-profits from the proposed dam.
Apparently agreeing with the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (about costs vs. benefit) was bad form . . . and justified the destruction of his career.
Mike, who now has terminal cancer (it's always worked for Elizabeth Edwards), has a blog/website which raises a number of legitimate criticisms of the Randleman Dam project.
For this, Fec (with Lex Alexander, ex-N&R reporter & "medical-blogger", chiming in) dubbed Mike "criminally insane".
And that, friends & neighbors, ranks right up there with Edward Cone dubbing a woman with brain cancer "bat-shit crazy".
[No, I've not forgotten how ugly partisianship got before the current genius-who-isn't became President (thanks for the link, Spag).]
God forbid that anyone really try to tell the truth or educate the public/shake it out of its generally-ignorant stupor. If they do, they simply must be showered with what Cone likes to call "invective" (of course, it's only invective when someone is firing back at him).
It's bad enough that Fec pulls stunts like this. Worse still that when it happens, the so-called blogging elite do not intervene to stop it. Yet the blogging-geniuses-wanting-so-badly-to-be-relevant in Greensboro cannot figure out why more people aren't rushing to join their little "community".
What prompted Fec's latest rant, one might ask? Well, in classic, transplanted-Randolph-County-Good-Ole-Boy fashion, Fec has known the guy who runs the Randleman Dam project since childhood.
Ergo Mike's criticisms cannot be tolerated.
Fec's friend apparently has degrees from West Point and Duke (mine are from UNC-G and Bowman Gray . . . maybe we can thumb-wrestle . . . but only if he wears his uniform).
Moreover, as Fec spewed, he asserted that established facts and the specifics of Mike's case are not important. The "sloppy process" that ruined a man's life is of no consequence as long as city leaders did not really mean to be mean, and the Greensboro of 2075 gets its potatble water (no doubt at a fair price).
Cuz it ain't gettin it now.
It's apparently a far, far better thing to do a poor impression of that portulent gasbag Al Gore (for the record, Fec, if you wanna see polar bears all you'll ever have to do is come on down to Asheboro . . . as long as you buy a beer while you're here . . . it's for the economy).
Like I said, it wasn't my fight. I wasn't planning to do more than drop a couple of comments supportive of Mike. But Fec would not let up.
And it was making my skin crawl.
And/so I was compelled to drop a little bomb I've been holding in reserve about some ugly goings-on at Asheboro's city lake. Of course, in dropping it at Fec's, the story was unlikely to waft back and stain the pants of anyone at Asheboro's city hall. So I'm actually kinda grateful for the opportunity to drop it again here.
Randolph Hospital drops by at least once a day. So I know it will get back to someone.
You see, a few years back, right after I debuted the Asheboro Pediatrics website in 2004, a young man contacted me and asked for help. He told me that he lived on leased property near the lake and had witnessed the dumping of dead cows (where they could flavor our drinking water) . . . something that you'd think would make the hairs on our latest-convert-to-the-religion-of-global-warming's arm stand on-end.
The people who did the dumping knew that the young man knew, they wanted him GONE (not to mention quiet), and had resorted to all kinds of nasty retaliatory tactics. The young man told me he was terrified someone would hurt - or even kill - his wife & children.
I believed him because I could hear the fear in his voice (it was really my first personal encounter with domestic terrorism). He also told me that the Randolph County Sheriff's Department was in on some of the intimidation (on behalf of the people leasing his property to him . . . all "right people" types, I'm sure). As I was a "local" (not that being a local has lent me any kind of advantage), the young man wanted to know if there was anyone else to whom he might turn for help.
Alas, deeply mired in my own muck at the time, I didn't have much to offer him. God knows, you can't just pick up the phone and call Roy Cooper.
I did some minor poking round . . . talked to a few trusted confidants about it. They all agreed that I'd have to let it go.
As far as I know, the young man and his family wound up leaving the area (fortunately not in a pine box).
I'm fairly certain I could pull up e-mails and names of the principals from three computers ago if pressed to do so. But really, what's the point?
After all, I don't live in Lincolnton. Why names the names, and make myself a target, and risk spending another decade in a Court venue that has already done me way-beyond-dirty . . . a jurisdiction that that still sees fit to employ a rail-roading/witness-intimidating ADA who lied to defense attorneys and was disciplined by the State Bar?
Besides, here's an idea for anyone who wants to check out the veracity of what the young man told me: Maybe instead of secretly sending city employees over to Dave's Mountain to sample our ground water (the fairly transparent scheme being to "prove" we "need" sewer lines, ergo we must be annexed), Asheboro City Manager, John Ogburn, should get his minions to stake out the lake . . . or dredge up the rotting cow carcases.
The sad fact is (and Fec knows it) that right folks and wrong folks here in Asheboro/Greensboro drape sleaze and corruption around their shoulders like a comfortable old coat. And we for sure don't have any local newspapers that are going to buck the powers-that-be, and cut through the layers of dirty ooze.
As of yesterday afternoon, I am apparently banned at Fec's. Big whup. In true JohnRobinsonian fashion, he has deleted the comment for which I was banned. It seems I made some personal observations that hit too close to home.
Never mind the ragged heel-prints he freely leaves on everyone else's psyche.
After he deleted the comment, Fec also dropped me an e-mail.
"All comments will be deleted", it said (as if I'm going to try after he deleted the first one).
Of course, deleting comments he provoked totally fits the old cliche about dishing it out but not being able to take it.
I'm supposed to "chew on that".
I responded to Fec's e-mail and told him that deleting my comment was fine with me IF he deleted the entire post. Otherwise it was cowardice And I told him to chew on that.
Moderation after the fact does not ever sit well with me . . . just as it hasn't sat well with Fec in the past.
Alas, I did not copy/paste/save the comment-for-which-I-was-banned, and I have no idea how I might otherwise pull a snapshot of the very short-lived web-page off Google (or indeed my own computer files). It's a shame, because I worked on the comment for a while and it was a thing of beauty. I am incorporating some of what I can remember here.
I did try to find the comment. But Google kept booting me back to the current page of Vie De Malchance.
No thanks.
Unlike Ed Cone. I am not sorry. There isn't going to be an apology.
I am sick and fricking tired of working all day doing what I do (especially after having been put through the royal medico-legal cluster-screw at the hands of the blood-sucking carpet-baggers that now think they own my hometown), and coming home to read a fellow-blogger's increasingly mean-spirited, disjointed rants (which harbor NONE of the writing talent I know lies underneath) . . . calling me (and others in our local ether) names like (like "lunatic" and "evil" and "whack-job" and "racist" and "booger-eater").
The entire GSO blogosphere seems to live in fear of what Jeff Martin might say or do next . . . how they might be negatively splattered all over the Internet if they take him on.
I honestly don't care anymore.
Besides, Ed Cone & company have already done most of the heavy-lifting there.
As it stands right now, the grown-up, professional targets of this latest signature Jeff Martin verbal spew have more-than-enough grounds to sue him for libel (come to think of it, that might be another great way to get old Court documents proving perjury on the record in a venue outside of Randolph County).
But again, what's the point of that? It's so not worth it.
For someone who wails and moans so much over the apathy and lack of civility/community in our local blogosphere . . . not to mention its abject failure to be "relevant" in terms of righting wrongs or stamping out corruption (although Joe Guarino & company might finally be off to a good start) . . . Fec himself, for all of his bloviating about leading revolutions, has recently set a very poor example.
Wanna talk about "evil"? Let's talk about evil.
Government/"non-profit" corruption is evil in one of its truest, albeit most insidious forms. It hides behind charity and the public good. It is hard to expose and almost impossible to bring down. That effort . . . "revolution", if you will . . . takes people of courage, conviction and dedication . . . people driven to persevere despite great adversity . . . people who are not always well-behaved . . .. people who are just a little bit crazy.
Mealy-mouthed, politically-correct fence-sitters need not apply.
That's why it's my theory that, in the evil department, government/"non-profit" corruption takes SECOND PLACE to the apathy and silence that allows it.
That's the kind of evil that buries stories like mine . . . and Mike Baron's . . . and endeavors to assasinate our characters and kill our will.
The success of any operation to bring down corruption also depends upon numbers . . . and amongst those numbers, strong allies who are reliable and willing to take one another's back.
It certainly helps to have the ear of principled local newspapers that are not afraid to take on the status quo.
And that's why the folks at Lake Norman Bath have been so successful. The people of Lincolnton rallied around the truth and the bloggers-telling-it. It didn't hurt that the underlying story . . . that of a Father determined to help his little-girl-done-wrong . . . tugs at the heartstrings. The bloggers , in turn, rallied around one another (instead of slamming and banning each other). Together, these people together were not afraid to charge in and take on the big guns (literally).
The effort crossed lines of political ideology and spoke to simple right and wrong.
Their cause has been buoyed by local newspapermen (one of whom was kind enough to e-mail me and offer empathy/advice) . . . real journalists who have not sold their souls to the highest bidder on the theory that economic development and/or sucking up to their big advertisers trumps all.
It's basically the idea that I thought the N&R's John Robinson was promoting when I accepted his invitation to jump into Greensboro's "citizen journalism" pool in February 2005 . . . the day after my Father died . . . a full two years after I had reported as yet un-investigated/un-prosecuted perjury, contempt and fraud to the Randolph County DA's office.
All wide-eyed and naive, I arrived in the blogosphere with bells on and the original sworn documents-proving-perjury-in-hand (documents that, in four years, a local journalist has yet to look at) to take on both Randolph and Cone Hospitals (one "non-profit" institution having fired me for saving the life of a newborn baby whose life was endangered and care was mismanaged by a doctor employed by the other).
Simple right and wrong. One would think it would tug on hearts.
But in Asheboro-Greensboro, we simply cannot take on the big money or the hallowed name of Cone.
And/so, my hoped-for vindication via Greensboro's brand of "citizen journalism" is an idea that has since died a very ugly death.
The reason it died was beautifully evidenced by Fec's ugly/vicious/despicable/warped post on Mike Baron.
As he spewed, Fec reasoned that if Mike Baron's allegations (as a whistle-blower) were true, the government had mechanism in place to protect him.
Now, that is not just a lie, it's A DAMNED LIE. In the comment Fec deleted, I suggested that, in the wake of Fort Hood, Fec should ask his West Point-educated Randleman Dam buddy how eager folks in the military and public service are to pucker-up and blow. In the alternative, after Fec stops slurping down his own boogers, maybe he should take up a cause and try it sometime.
He'd only get a nose-bleed.
Mr. Martin, for all of his obvious vast intelligence, doesn't seem to grasp a few simple points. Turning to the fledgling blogosphere wasn't an option when all of these ugly things went down over a decade ago - for Mike Baron or for me. And the applicable statutes of limitations ran out for Mike Baron long ago. Being without a job, he could not afford the lawyers that might have pressed his case (the practice of law being nothing like the practice of medicine). The only hope of vindication he has now is for someone somewhere to take note of his blog and give the story its due.
And despite Fec's lame premise that the end always justifies the means, in this case, the truth is way past due.
If perjury had a statute of limitations, legally, I would be in the same boat. But my case has some technical twists and turns which provide opportunity that Mike's does not. I can also demonstrate a broader pattern of determined/on-going negligence on the part of various medical regulatory agencies (like the Medical Board, like JCAHO, like DHHS) . . . agencies that just didn't care enough to lift a finger and protect a doctor-in-public-service doing the right thing by a dying-patient-not-even-her-own eleven years ago . . . agencies that, since that time, have not bothered to modify the antiquated/ineffectual laws that her case more-than-demonstrates need serious tweaking.
The state and Federal governments cannot move to fix problems BEFORE they blow up in someone's face. And/so this "lunatic" knows she is shortly gonna have to sue somebody. I should have done it long ago. I just wanted so badly for the *&^%$#@! system to work . . . and was crazy enough to believe that it would.
Heavy sigh.
The North Carolina Medical Board, in fact, has had to fend off a couple of such lawsuits in recent years. If I do say so myself, the lawsuit I file will make all others pale in comparison. Filing it in the midst of our beyond-clueless President's push for socialism-&-physician-indentured-servitude-in-the-guise-of healthcare-reform should make for interesting headlines . . . written, of course, by newspapers other than the Greensboro News & Record or Courier Tribune.
They missed their chance at a Pulitzer. But a few watered-down beers at the Flying Pig should drown their sorrows.
The sad truth (which Fec well knows) is that Lincolnton is NOT Greensboro or Asheboro . . . and it's comparative-newborn-baby-bloggers have put the much-longer-in-the-blogging-tooth-crowd-a-few-counties-away (a crowd that doesnt' know it all after all) to shame.
Cue Ed Cone jumping up and down whining, "Are we relevant yet? Why aren't we relevant yet?"
In my case, and Mike's, our lack of relative success (compared to LNB) comes down to location, location, location . . . AND the agendas of the blogger-elite we've been pleading our cases to. For Fec to compare the two situations (as if our cases have no merit because we have not been able to get what his useless buddy Cone calls "traction") . . . except as a study in stark contrasts . . . is to compare apples to oranges.
Like I said. I'm not interested in a flame-throwing blog war. This is all I plan to say. But some things just don't get to stand.
The thing that saddens me most about all of this is that I know and very much like Fec's wife (who by his own admission, does not read his blog). She is a warm and engaging woman who loves her husband very much and would like to see him find a better outlet for his writing . . . his gift . . . the one bubbling under the dark slime of ad-hominems and cruel invective he indiscriminately hurls into the ether. I have done business with her, and I know she would be genuinely horrified by a lot of what her husband says and does at Vie De Malchance.
As a local businesswoman ("the wife, I mean), I have to wonder if some of what Jeff has said/done online has hurt her. I wonder if he even thinks about it as he hurls.
Moreover, lectures on "hatred" from a man who lately does nothing but spew hate (unless he's grovelling to Edward Cone-of-the-Cones or pandering to the race-baiting "ngee") hold no water (Get it? Water? Dam?) for me.
Apart from the fact that my efforts over the years have been primarily/specifically/consistently directed against the non-profiteers who professionally eviscerated me . . . and the institutions/regulatory/law enforcement mechanisms (and so-called journalists) that failed me . . . the biggest difference between Jeff Martin and I is that my family and my friends read this blog EVERY day.
The Department of Homeland Security pops in occasionally too;).
And you know what? My family and friends are far from embarrassed. For you see, what happened to me did not happen in a vacuum. I was not the only person deeply hurt when Bob Morrison and Steven Eblin worked their evil magic. And everyone I know is DELIGHTED that I've found this outlet to give Randolph Hospital hell, keep other young/naive doctors from drinking the same Koolaid I did, and maybe even one day get that vindication . . . and thereby help change a small portion of what is wrong with medicine for the better.
My loved ones are very proud me . . . especially when I defy the warrior in my nature and decline to return unfriendly fire in kind.
Chew on that.
Late Evening Addendum: For the reader's further consideration, I present Dr. Joe Guarino's kinder and gentler rebuttal to Fec's work. It's a wicked (or should I say, "evil"?) post.
Friday The 13th Addendum: This post has been editied and tweaked this morning. I was tired yesterday when I got back to the apartment.
Home being in Asheboro and all.
Wednesday, November 11, 2009
Fort Hood: This White Wall Is So Gonna Crumble
Physician colleagues and mentors of Dr. Nidal Malik Hasan at the Uniformed Services University of the Health Sciences in Bethesda are talking (anonymously, of course).
(As an aside, I actually applied to and was interviewed by USUHS. I was on their waiting list when I got the call from Bowman Gray.)
A military official familiar with discussions about Hasan said Hasan as a psychiatrist in training was belligerent, defensive and argumentative in his frequent discussions of his Muslim faith. He also had a reputation for being a mediocre student and lazy worker, a matter of concern for doctors at Walter Reed Army Medical Center and the Uniformed Services University of the Health Sciences military medical school, the official said.
Hummmmmmm . . . if all of that is true, do you think Dr. Hasan might have been categorized as "disruptive"? And if so, where was JCAHO?
With Senate hearings on the horizon, these un-named officers now posturing behind the scenes know that hiding behind confidentiality and privacy is so not going to cut it this time.
People are going to be subpoenaed and put under Oath.
This particular White Wall is going to be bull-dozed in front of the whole world.
I cannot wait!
I can only hope that the investigation expands into a broader look at physician discipline, as well as the generally negative consequences & ramifications of medical whistle-blowing within the military and public service branches.
Regular readers might be interested to know that the Department of Homeland Security stops by Housecalls on a pseudo-regular basis. They seem to be interested in one particular post (it's too bad nobody in Atlanta, D.C., or Bethesda was interested when it was all going down and I was screaming for their help).
This ex-National Health Service Corps physician . . . threatened over bogus accusations (no due process exercised - please see the one particular post above) . . . then fired for saving a baby's life and reporting it to hospital peer review/JCAHO/DHHS/the N.C. Medical Board . . . sued for telling the government she served the truth . . . and swindled at settlement by non-profiteers who lied under Oath about information on Federal tax returns (in order to protect their bottom line) . . . would be more than happy to give Joe Lieberman a piece of her very sound mind.
Maybe we'll finally get some of that "reform" everybody's been talking about.
Perhaps then the story of my eleven-year cluster screw . . . courtesy of Bill&Hill Clinton's "village" . . . will finally be deemed "relevant" enough to report by our local journalistic wizards.
(As an aside, I actually applied to and was interviewed by USUHS. I was on their waiting list when I got the call from Bowman Gray.)
A military official familiar with discussions about Hasan said Hasan as a psychiatrist in training was belligerent, defensive and argumentative in his frequent discussions of his Muslim faith. He also had a reputation for being a mediocre student and lazy worker, a matter of concern for doctors at Walter Reed Army Medical Center and the Uniformed Services University of the Health Sciences military medical school, the official said.
Hummmmmmm . . . if all of that is true, do you think Dr. Hasan might have been categorized as "disruptive"? And if so, where was JCAHO?
With Senate hearings on the horizon, these un-named officers now posturing behind the scenes know that hiding behind confidentiality and privacy is so not going to cut it this time.
People are going to be subpoenaed and put under Oath.
This particular White Wall is going to be bull-dozed in front of the whole world.
I cannot wait!
I can only hope that the investigation expands into a broader look at physician discipline, as well as the generally negative consequences & ramifications of medical whistle-blowing within the military and public service branches.
Regular readers might be interested to know that the Department of Homeland Security stops by Housecalls on a pseudo-regular basis. They seem to be interested in one particular post (it's too bad nobody in Atlanta, D.C., or Bethesda was interested when it was all going down and I was screaming for their help).
This ex-National Health Service Corps physician . . . threatened over bogus accusations (no due process exercised - please see the one particular post above) . . . then fired for saving a baby's life and reporting it to hospital peer review/JCAHO/DHHS/the N.C. Medical Board . . . sued for telling the government she served the truth . . . and swindled at settlement by non-profiteers who lied under Oath about information on Federal tax returns (in order to protect their bottom line) . . . would be more than happy to give Joe Lieberman a piece of her very sound mind.
Maybe we'll finally get some of that "reform" everybody's been talking about.
Perhaps then the story of my eleven-year cluster screw . . . courtesy of Bill&Hill Clinton's "village" . . . will finally be deemed "relevant" enough to report by our local journalistic wizards.
Tuesday, November 10, 2009
My First Marine Corps Ball
I forgot to tell a story.
A few weeks ago, I attended the Waters family reunion (Mama's family - the "normal/sane" part of my gene pool) in Eastern N.C. (near Bath). My Sister-In-Law picked up my Mother and drove her down (my brother was working) . . . . with Mama's new grandchild. Ergo, I did not have to drive back to Asheboro on Friday night, pick up Mama, and drive back down East Saturday morning.
Instead, I elected to "take the night off" . . . by having a friend baby-sit the cats at the apartment . . . driving down from my current assignment to New Bern . . . and spending Friday night at the harbor-front Sheraton-recently-turned-Hilton Hotel. The plan was to have a quiet room-service dinner (they have a veggie-ravioli dish I really love), sit out on the balcony with a book (and maybe with some Celtic music in the background) . . . and count the stars/boats. I would drive back up to Bath on Saturday morning.
It was a good plan.
But as soon as I got there I knew the plan for a peaceful/quiet night on the harbor was done-for.
Three words: Marine Corps Ball
Now the Marine Corps Ball is simply a giant birthday party (the Corps is 234 today) that the Marine Corps throws for itself every year.
When I arrived at the hotel, the place was teaming with Marines of all ranks in full dress uniform . . . in addition to their formally-dressed/literally-glittering women (a great many of them having taken their fashion cues from Miss Dolly Parton - not that there's anything wrong with that). Music was blaring and beer was flowing. A smokey haze covered the lobby.
The timing of this party struck me as more-than-a-little-off (I was later informed that these particular Marines were scheduled to ship out to Iraq before the actual Marine Corps birthday, so the bash had been scheduled early).
It was late, and I didn't have a lot of choice except to check in and hope for the best.
Unfortunately, although this particular hotel has two wings - and all the rooms are harbor-front, the hotel did not book rooms in blocks. Instead, full-paying regular guests were interspersed amongst the rooms full of Marines (who no doubt had a discounted rate). I was sandwiched between two such rooms. My situation was made even worse by the fact that I was placed immediately above the pool and the party.
I unpacked, ordered my dinner (the order arrived cold and incomplete) and tried to make the best of it.
Let's just say peace and quiet and a good book (I was re-reading "The Shack") and Celtic music was out. Wired-beyond-words by what was going on around me, I surfed the Internet and was force-fed "boom-boom" music until the wee hours. The music was supposed to stop at midnight (according to the desk-attendant that I called at 11:30), but music was still wafting up until well after 1 AM.
I'm a non-smoker and I was in a non-smoking room. It didn't matter. Because the Marines and their women went out on their balconies to smoke - above and below my room and to either side. And with the balcony door open (my feeble/misguided attempt to enjoy the ambiance of the harbor) the smoke wafted in and stank up the whole place.
After closing the balcony door/curtain, and turning on the fan to clear the smoke & mask the noise, I fell into a fitful sleep sometime after 2 AM. But I was awakened shortly thereafter when my neighboring Marines brought their party upstairs. Two men and one woman were involved in the louder room. They were drunk - the men would fight and the woman would moan - between doors slamming and furniture periodically crashing. And the walls were thin.
You get the drift.
By 4AM, I had had enough. I called down to the desk:
This is Dr. Johnson in Room ***. If I have to get out of bed and go next door and knock, there are two Marines in this hotel who WILL NOT be going to Iraq.
The desk clerk apologized. Security was called. The noise abated, but did not completely die down. I managed to get back to sleep.
I got up at 7 AM. I had planned to have a leisurely breakfast downstairs at the restaurant, but instead elected to just pack up and get out. When I arrived downstairs shortly before 9, the place smelled of cigarette smoke and old beer, and there were bleary-eyed, hung-over Marines schlepping all over the place. The desk clerks were not-so-discretely sending bell-boys to check the Marine's rooms before they were allowed to check-out.
The clerk sheepishly asked me if I had enjoyed my stay. I offered that I did not get much sleep and was very tired. She averted her eyes, did not inquire further (apparently I was not the first guest to complain), mumbled a weak apology and handed my bill. I blinked for a moment at the hefty price . . . given that "the plan" had completely gone to hell . . . but I did not want to make a scene. I initialled the receipt and silently walked out.
Now I had ulterior motives in choosing New Bern for my get-away. I have lately visited the town on several occasions, and had been eyeing a piece of furniture in one of the shops there (for my new home office-library) for almost a year. Prior to making the trip I had decided to bite the bullet and make the purchase (a Discover Card is a wonderful thing). By showing up in person, I was able to barter down the price a bit - and arrange for free shipping.
That mission accomplished, I did some browsing downtown - killing time before I had to hit the road in order to get to the reunion.
In one of the shops, the owner recognized me from a previous visit (pretty amazing - but then again, I can be pretty memorable), and asked me if I had enjoyed this stay in New Bern.
I told her my sad story.
The lady was furious on my behalf. "You mean to tell me that you came here to rest and contribute serious big bucks to our economy . . . and the hotel could not even give you a good night's sleep? You go right back there right now and demand that your room be comped. And you tell them I said so."
"Comped?", I asked.
"Comped", she said. "That means you need to get substantial discount - or the room fee waived entirely - because the service was so bad."
I was not convinced, and after some more aimless browsing, I got in my car and actually started to leave town. But the more I thought about it, the madder I got. So I turned around before I got to the bridge, and went back to the hotel.
I handed the desk clerk my bill and told her how unhappy I was with the stay. She did not blink, she did not argue. She immediately cut the bill in half and forgave the room-service charge for my dinner . . . telling me that the hotel had tried to cut the Marines some extra slack (because of their impending deployment), but they had clearly gotten much too rowdy after the party.
I told her I understood. Given the circumstances, I did not begrudge the Marines their fun. But the hotel could have done a much better job of serving its regular (and in my case, repeat) customers.
She asked what the hotel could do in the future to prevent these kinds of problems. I told her that when I made the reservation, it would have been nice to have been told what I'd be walking into - I might have found a room at another, quieter hotel on the harbor. I also suggested that, in the future, when events of these nature were held, a block of rooms should be reserved for regular guests on one end of the hotel - away from the pool and the noise.
From her response, I don't think either suggestion will be taken seriously. The hotel may not have made as much money off of me for my unhappy stay.
But it made money.
I expect those Marines are in Iraq now.
The reunion was nice.
A few weeks ago, I attended the Waters family reunion (Mama's family - the "normal/sane" part of my gene pool) in Eastern N.C. (near Bath). My Sister-In-Law picked up my Mother and drove her down (my brother was working) . . . . with Mama's new grandchild. Ergo, I did not have to drive back to Asheboro on Friday night, pick up Mama, and drive back down East Saturday morning.
Instead, I elected to "take the night off" . . . by having a friend baby-sit the cats at the apartment . . . driving down from my current assignment to New Bern . . . and spending Friday night at the harbor-front Sheraton-recently-turned-Hilton Hotel. The plan was to have a quiet room-service dinner (they have a veggie-ravioli dish I really love), sit out on the balcony with a book (and maybe with some Celtic music in the background) . . . and count the stars/boats. I would drive back up to Bath on Saturday morning.
It was a good plan.
But as soon as I got there I knew the plan for a peaceful/quiet night on the harbor was done-for.
Three words: Marine Corps Ball
Now the Marine Corps Ball is simply a giant birthday party (the Corps is 234 today) that the Marine Corps throws for itself every year.
When I arrived at the hotel, the place was teaming with Marines of all ranks in full dress uniform . . . in addition to their formally-dressed/literally-glittering women (a great many of them having taken their fashion cues from Miss Dolly Parton - not that there's anything wrong with that). Music was blaring and beer was flowing. A smokey haze covered the lobby.
The timing of this party struck me as more-than-a-little-off (I was later informed that these particular Marines were scheduled to ship out to Iraq before the actual Marine Corps birthday, so the bash had been scheduled early).
It was late, and I didn't have a lot of choice except to check in and hope for the best.
Unfortunately, although this particular hotel has two wings - and all the rooms are harbor-front, the hotel did not book rooms in blocks. Instead, full-paying regular guests were interspersed amongst the rooms full of Marines (who no doubt had a discounted rate). I was sandwiched between two such rooms. My situation was made even worse by the fact that I was placed immediately above the pool and the party.
I unpacked, ordered my dinner (the order arrived cold and incomplete) and tried to make the best of it.
Let's just say peace and quiet and a good book (I was re-reading "The Shack") and Celtic music was out. Wired-beyond-words by what was going on around me, I surfed the Internet and was force-fed "boom-boom" music until the wee hours. The music was supposed to stop at midnight (according to the desk-attendant that I called at 11:30), but music was still wafting up until well after 1 AM.
I'm a non-smoker and I was in a non-smoking room. It didn't matter. Because the Marines and their women went out on their balconies to smoke - above and below my room and to either side. And with the balcony door open (my feeble/misguided attempt to enjoy the ambiance of the harbor) the smoke wafted in and stank up the whole place.
After closing the balcony door/curtain, and turning on the fan to clear the smoke & mask the noise, I fell into a fitful sleep sometime after 2 AM. But I was awakened shortly thereafter when my neighboring Marines brought their party upstairs. Two men and one woman were involved in the louder room. They were drunk - the men would fight and the woman would moan - between doors slamming and furniture periodically crashing. And the walls were thin.
You get the drift.
By 4AM, I had had enough. I called down to the desk:
This is Dr. Johnson in Room ***. If I have to get out of bed and go next door and knock, there are two Marines in this hotel who WILL NOT be going to Iraq.
The desk clerk apologized. Security was called. The noise abated, but did not completely die down. I managed to get back to sleep.
I got up at 7 AM. I had planned to have a leisurely breakfast downstairs at the restaurant, but instead elected to just pack up and get out. When I arrived downstairs shortly before 9, the place smelled of cigarette smoke and old beer, and there were bleary-eyed, hung-over Marines schlepping all over the place. The desk clerks were not-so-discretely sending bell-boys to check the Marine's rooms before they were allowed to check-out.
The clerk sheepishly asked me if I had enjoyed my stay. I offered that I did not get much sleep and was very tired. She averted her eyes, did not inquire further (apparently I was not the first guest to complain), mumbled a weak apology and handed my bill. I blinked for a moment at the hefty price . . . given that "the plan" had completely gone to hell . . . but I did not want to make a scene. I initialled the receipt and silently walked out.
Now I had ulterior motives in choosing New Bern for my get-away. I have lately visited the town on several occasions, and had been eyeing a piece of furniture in one of the shops there (for my new home office-library) for almost a year. Prior to making the trip I had decided to bite the bullet and make the purchase (a Discover Card is a wonderful thing). By showing up in person, I was able to barter down the price a bit - and arrange for free shipping.
That mission accomplished, I did some browsing downtown - killing time before I had to hit the road in order to get to the reunion.
In one of the shops, the owner recognized me from a previous visit (pretty amazing - but then again, I can be pretty memorable), and asked me if I had enjoyed this stay in New Bern.
I told her my sad story.
The lady was furious on my behalf. "You mean to tell me that you came here to rest and contribute serious big bucks to our economy . . . and the hotel could not even give you a good night's sleep? You go right back there right now and demand that your room be comped. And you tell them I said so."
"Comped?", I asked.
"Comped", she said. "That means you need to get substantial discount - or the room fee waived entirely - because the service was so bad."
I was not convinced, and after some more aimless browsing, I got in my car and actually started to leave town. But the more I thought about it, the madder I got. So I turned around before I got to the bridge, and went back to the hotel.
I handed the desk clerk my bill and told her how unhappy I was with the stay. She did not blink, she did not argue. She immediately cut the bill in half and forgave the room-service charge for my dinner . . . telling me that the hotel had tried to cut the Marines some extra slack (because of their impending deployment), but they had clearly gotten much too rowdy after the party.
I told her I understood. Given the circumstances, I did not begrudge the Marines their fun. But the hotel could have done a much better job of serving its regular (and in my case, repeat) customers.
She asked what the hotel could do in the future to prevent these kinds of problems. I told her that when I made the reservation, it would have been nice to have been told what I'd be walking into - I might have found a room at another, quieter hotel on the harbor. I also suggested that, in the future, when events of these nature were held, a block of rooms should be reserved for regular guests on one end of the hotel - away from the pool and the noise.
From her response, I don't think either suggestion will be taken seriously. The hotel may not have made as much money off of me for my unhappy stay.
But it made money.
I expect those Marines are in Iraq now.
The reunion was nice.
John Allen Muhammad: Pass The Dry Sponge And Roll On One . . .
A huge topic of conversation today in the place where I currently work was the impending execution of the "Beltway sniper", John Allen Muhammad, scheduled to take place at 9 pm tonight in the Commonwealth of Virgina.
My heart is not bleeding. There is no compelling reason for clemency. There is no evidence that Muhammad was racially "rail-roaded". There is, in fact, much evidence to prove that this man is the cold-blooded killer of 10 unfortunate souls he picked off completely at random during a three-week killing spree that terrorized a large portion of America's middle-Eastern seaboard. He was found guilty by a jury-of-his-peers. The appellate Courts have reviewed the case and made their rulings.
And/so I'm all for it. Caesar demands his due. But I'm wondering about the protocol and technicalities. In Virgina, is a doctor required to participate (i.e. be present to do something more than declare the condemned prisoner dead)?
I'm sure there are people in Raleigh who will be paying close attention tonight.
I wish there wasn't as much attention. I wish convicted mass-murderers could pass as quickly and quietly and undercover as our recent healthcare bill. It doesn't need to be on Larry King Live.
Today, one of my colleagues asked if Virginia would use lethal injection. I told them, I didn't know (as it turns out, the condemned can choose, with lethal injection being the default method), but that I'd just as soon they use electricity and a dry sponge.
She jabbed me on the arm and smiled as she exclaimed, "You watched 'The Green Mile' on TV the other night!"
Yep.
Eduard "Del" Delacroix did not go so gently into that night.
Call me blood-thirsty and far-from-politically-correct, but as I ponder what all the victims of this horrific crime (dead and alive) suffered (which is what we all should be pondering tonight), Del's end, I think, would be a much more fitting one for John Allen Muhammad, than the easy/more-or-less physically-painless slide into permanent slumber he will be getting tonight.
Roll on one . . .
PM Update: John Allen Muhammad is dead. At 9:11 PM.
My heart is not bleeding. There is no compelling reason for clemency. There is no evidence that Muhammad was racially "rail-roaded". There is, in fact, much evidence to prove that this man is the cold-blooded killer of 10 unfortunate souls he picked off completely at random during a three-week killing spree that terrorized a large portion of America's middle-Eastern seaboard. He was found guilty by a jury-of-his-peers. The appellate Courts have reviewed the case and made their rulings.
And/so I'm all for it. Caesar demands his due. But I'm wondering about the protocol and technicalities. In Virgina, is a doctor required to participate (i.e. be present to do something more than declare the condemned prisoner dead)?
I'm sure there are people in Raleigh who will be paying close attention tonight.
I wish there wasn't as much attention. I wish convicted mass-murderers could pass as quickly and quietly and undercover as our recent healthcare bill. It doesn't need to be on Larry King Live.
Today, one of my colleagues asked if Virginia would use lethal injection. I told them, I didn't know (as it turns out, the condemned can choose, with lethal injection being the default method), but that I'd just as soon they use electricity and a dry sponge.
She jabbed me on the arm and smiled as she exclaimed, "You watched 'The Green Mile' on TV the other night!"
Yep.
Eduard "Del" Delacroix did not go so gently into that night.
Call me blood-thirsty and far-from-politically-correct, but as I ponder what all the victims of this horrific crime (dead and alive) suffered (which is what we all should be pondering tonight), Del's end, I think, would be a much more fitting one for John Allen Muhammad, than the easy/more-or-less physically-painless slide into permanent slumber he will be getting tonight.
Roll on one . . .
PM Update: John Allen Muhammad is dead. At 9:11 PM.
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