The Dance Of Religious Hypocrisy And Public Charity (Subtitled: Ode to Steven E. Eblin, Chairman Of Randolph County United Way)

This post has been updated (on 9/15 and 9/16).  Scroll to bottom.

It was a weekend to brood.  Darkness was almost visible . . . just over the hill.  I'm a little put out with both Muslims and Christians behaving badly today, so I'm going to vent.

First, expounding in an expansive fashion on one of the messages in Saturday's 9/11 offering, I've got to say that all of the angry, not-so-peaceful Muslims out there beating their chests about their inalienable rights (in this county as opposed to countries run by Muslims), and burning Bibles and flags and threatening death & destruction because somebody in the U.S. had the bright idea (not really - although for a very brief moment it did appeal to me) to exercise their free speech by burning a Koran, are fundamentally, hypocrites of the worst order (not that it registers with them).

In all of the comments that this infidel/lapsed Baptist/Christian Agnostic read Saturday - on 9/11 blog posts and news stories from all across the political spectrum (it's the first anniversary I've really had the resolve to dive into all that) - one theme kept playing out . . . as an inconvenient truth screaming over the smoke and rubble of thousands of lost/broken American lives . . . WHAT ARE THE PRESUMED BILLIONS OF "PEACE-LOVING", "MODERATE" MUSLIMS OUT THERE REALLY DOING TO QUELL THE EVIL BREEDING IN THEIR MIDST . . . EVIL FINDING ITS JUSTIFICATION IN THEIR HOLY BOOK?

Honestly, I don't have any kind of "agenda" when it comes to asking this question, but since I do know people currently in (or going to) Afghanistan, I just want to know.  Where are the armies that these peace-loving folk raised against the "hijackers" of their faith?  Where are the rank-&-file's protests against the terrorists who have corrupted their religion's message of peace (because I've gotta say, if they have a "silent majority" it's been pretty damned silent)?  Why are American servicemen & women doing all of their dirty work (and the bleeding & dying) for them?

Moreover, if the terrorists themselves are calling it a "jihad", how can anyone in our government . . . especially our Commander-in-Chief . . . insist that this is not, in its sick/warped way, a "holy war"?  I'm thinking that all of the high-minded/politically-correct notions on our side of the equation don't mean a pile-of-bloody-sand to the people screaming "Death to America!" (yeah, we got that message already).

I don't get it.  I really don't.  Of course, not only am I an "infidel" I am a woman.  Second-class citizen.  Piece of property (not even a good piece of property since I cannot bear children).  Can't set foot in many mosques.  Fit only to be covered with a tarp-with-eyeholes . . . or, better yet, stoned for my heretical views.

Of course there are all kinds of stoning.  And that brings us to the Christian side of the hypocrisy aisle . . . a lot closer to home . . . in a small all-American Southern town called Asheboro . . . in a county called Randolph . . . and a "non-profit" charity called the United Way . . . and its 2010 campaign co-chairman, Steven E. Eblin (Steve's wife Rhonda, is the other chair).

A friend of mine (this time it wasn't Buzz-Armfield-of-the-Asheboro-Armfields-whose-family-name-is-on-Steve's-cancer-center) sent me a hard-copy of Friday's Courier Tribune featuring a fourth-page short-take on the life and times of my ex-boss, Steve Eblin, Vice President of Corporate Planning & Development (I like to call it Vice President of Vice) at Randolph Hospital.

That position translates into Steve strategically ciphering how to "win" our little part of the world for Randolph Hospital . . . to totally dominate the medical landscape.  He's been trying to do it for all of his seventeen years here.  The problem with Steve's very tired, very old, very heavy-handed/strong-arm approach is that if you really want a medical community to thrive and grow . . . if you want to attract creative, principled young professionals-who-by-their-very-nature-are-not-mindless-drones . . . you need to STOP trying to control everyone and own everything in it. You've got to let the fresh ideas in.  You must have standards that don't bend to expediency or mill town cliques.  You've got to really care about the people - as opposed to the money they can make for you.  Of course, in all of that, you've got to look to the long-term and exercise some common sense.  Bob and Steve don't get that.

And Asheboro has paid a very high price.

Now admittedly on this blog, I've been giving Randolph Hospital CEO, Bob Morrison (as captain of the ship), a much harder time than his left-hand man, and my ex boss, Steve. 

I think it's time that changed. 

Steve Eblin, after all, was the President of Randolph Medical Associates - one of the people who recruited me home to Randolph Hospital.  Steve Eblin was the man who made most of the promises to we "dime-a-dozen" Pediatricians, and then systematically broke every one (HE IS A HABITUAL LIAR and a contract he signs isn't worth the spit it takes to rub any smudged ink off your finger).  Steve Eblin was the businessman who had no clue how to run a practice himself (so he hired incompetent out-of-town managers to do it) . . . . the corporate genius who approved the threats his minions issued (on a pile of trumped-up rubbish), and who ultimately fired me for doing-the-job-he-recruited-me-home-to-do and saving a sick newborn's life.

Steve was behind the hospital's advertsing that presented Mick Irwin as something he was NOT.

And apparently, in our three-year association, Steven Eblin never ever comprehended what Mary Johnson was about.  His bad. 

Actually (to coin an Asheboro City Councilman's sputters in Court), his STUPID.

Steve would be the same ex-boss who told my colleagues that "Good Pediatricians are a dime a dozen" . . . the same boss who did not want to market our "non-profit" to the East side of town (those people could go to the Health Department) . . . the same ex-boss who basically told this young professional to "shut up or else" when she complained about problems in Pediatrics at the hospital she had been hired to help "clean up" . . . the same ex-boss who expected this doctor to put "right people" first . . . the same ex-boss who fired this Board-certified Pediatrician after she answered a terrified nurse's phone call in the middle-of-the-night to rescue a Cone-owned Family Practitioner-who-fancied-himself-a-neonatologist and save a newborn baby's life . . . the same ex-boss who methodically destroyed this young Pediatrician's practice (never mind what his agreements with the Federal government said) to absorb as his own . . . the same ex-boss who brazenly lied to the doctor's patients and colleagues (and rubber-stamping hospital Board members) about what had actually happened . . . the same ex-boss who sued the Pediatrician for telling the truth to the government she served . . . the same ex-boss who lied repeatedly under Oath about matters relevant to the Pediatrician's damages claim in order to get out of his own despicable SLAPP suit (designed to humiliate the Pediatrician and destroy what was left of her reputation in her own hometown) on the cheap . . . the same ex-boss who, with help of his "right people" friends (may of them attending Asheboro's prominent churches), has avoided accountability for his EVIL deeds.

I'm sure I've left something in the saga out, but you get the drift.

The God's-honest truth ladies and gentlemen, is that, despite my loan-repayment-for-service agreement with the National Health Service Corps (an agreement that RMA's first practice manager apparently signed without internalizing or ever intending to honor) . . . an agreement designed to recruit and RETAIN Pediatricans to Asheboro . . . and despite what he told anyone who would listen while he legally muzzled and man-handled me . . . Steven Eblin NEVER intended to allow me to break off from Randolph Medical Associates and form my own private practice (much less take Laurie Anderson with me). 

He wanted me gone - and to keep "the business" for himself.

Steve didn't kill me.  But if I had been a weaker being . . . made of the "crazy"/less-than-steely/"stupid" stuff that he and another Steve and a cyber-stalker/his lawyer would have you think I'm made of . . . he might have.  Not a drop of blood would have been spilt - and it would not have been Steve's fault.

(Strategically speaking, you have to ask yourself, is it really in the best interest of psych patients/their beleaguered families to be ANYWHERE NEAR Randolph Hospital?)

Anyway, moving on along (see, I can do it), the article (which wasn't posted online . . . I'm sure because the powers-that-be knew I would comment on it) waxed poetic on Steve's educational background (it's in blue because it's just so progressive - I've embellished in red):

Steve is the Vice President of Corporate Planning and Development at Randolph Hospital.  He a master's degree in (Evil) Business Administration from Xaiver University in Cincinnatti, Ohio, as well as a Bachelor's degree in (Evil) Hospital Administration from the University of Kentucky.

He currently serves as chair of the Randolph County United Way Endowment and the Randolph County United Way Board and president of Randolph Community College Foundation.  He also serves on the board of the YMCA Board of Trustees and is a member of First Presbyterian Church and the Asheboro Rotary Club.

He is past President and Vice President of the Asheboro/Randolph Chamber of Commerce, past chair of Asheboro's First Presbyterian Church Board of Deacons, a past board member of the Boys and Girls Club and a past board member of the MERCE clinic.

In short, Steve Eblin is "right people" and indeed, one of the people who helped put Asheboro on Forbes 2008 list of "fastest dying towns".

And that, ladies and gentlemen, is how you earn a glowing write-up in Asheboro's Courier Tribune, courtesy of Asheboro's own version of Lorraine Ahearn, Chip Womick.

(You really have to wonder what these posers are paying Chip on the side to write this tripe and pass it off as "news".)

Chip goes on to quote "Saint Steven" (again, with my own embellishments) . . .

"This community has been a wonderful place for us to live the past 17 years ( yeah I suppose so, especially when seven years ago your non-profiteering butt should have been indicted for perjury) . . .  One of the things that has always impressed both of us is the generosity of the citizens of the community in terms of both time and money (yes, indeed Steve, that's how you got the Cancer Center up - capitalizing on that generosity and siphoning off financial support from Hospice and Relay-For-Life).  We hope, with the help of many volunteers, that we can lead a campaign that will tap into that generosity, so that the growing needs of the community can be at least partially met through the United Way of Randolph County".

It really does feel like some things are coming around full circle (mostly because in Asheboro, the same "right" people rotate through the same jobs/boards over and over again).  You see, back in the day, when "dime-a-dozen" Dr. Mary roamed the halls of Randolph Hospital, Bob Morrison's wife, Peggy was Executive Director of United Way.

Bob ran Randolph Hospital and Peggy ran United Way (I guess they picked-up this non-profit tag-team technique at Bob's EVIL business school).  And during the fund-raising drives, RMA employees were told they had to attend "mandatory" lunch meetings where they were force-fed United Way presentations and coerced into donating.

I myself fell for it . . . donating $1000/year while I was employed by the hospital's "controlled affiliate" . . . designating my money (inasmuch as the United Way's schemes allow) to go to the women's shelter and other charities that pertained to animals or children . . . that is until the year Bob & Steve fired me. 

I had actually renewed my 1998 pledge (which put me in some kind of hot-shot "club" of donors) in January, but was fired on February 2nd (given only a five day notice when my contract spelled out six months).  So, after assessing my resources, I promptly retracted the pledge (as little things like paying my own mortgage and feeding my own animals fairly suddenly took precedence over charity), and when I did it, you would've thought Peggy was going to have a stroke. 

In Peggy's wacked-out world, in order to save face (like I care what these posers and liars think), I was supposed to keep right on giving to her charity with a big smile on my face . . . after her oily, carpet-bagging husband and his "team" of minions kicked me out onto the street for refusing to cover-up an ugly mess at the hospital-they-want-to-entice-all-the-locals-to-use (as opposed to Moses Cone or High Point or Baptist).

I digress.  While Steve Eblin enjoyed the last seventeen years of his Teflon-coated life in Asheboro, the home-grown Pediatrician he threw out on the street struggled mightily to stay afloat.  For a very long while, in order to pay the lawyers and make ends meet as I worked on the road, I had to fore go much in the way of charitable giving. 

It really hurt my heart. 

I am happy to report that that has changed over the last couple of years (as I now work for institutions that KNOW good Pediatricians willing to take the call and clean up the messes are MOST CERTAINLY NOT a dime-a-dozen), and I have resumed tithing and other charitable endeavors . . . to benefit the churches and institutions that fed my soul while users like Steven Eblin and Bob Morrison did everything they could to trample it . . . to destroy my life and career. 

They had to win . . . to dominate and control the medical landscape and all of the professionals in it.  It didn't matter how. 

And (key point) no one stopped them.  Remind you of anyone?

[I want to say right here and right now that I owe a lot to John Rogers, pastor of First Baptist Church.  And while I'm not yet the Baptist I should be (forgiveness does seem to be a BIG sticking point), the fact that I'm still a Baptist at all is a testament to his patience and labor, the faith of my Father and my Mama's prayer.]

Looking back on the wreakage of a dream-that-was-probably-doomed-from-the-start, I wonder what I (as a young professional) might have been able to accomplish in the last twelve years - if I had not been treated so badly by the lying, self-aggrandizing, over-paid, over-rated jerks running Randolph Hospital. 

I also wonder how many other young professionals have been turned off by word-of-mouth in the larger medical community - and decided to take their talents somewhere else.

Strategic Steve (whose "vision" always seemed a little short-sighted) set his example all right.

Long story short:  United Way of Randolph County will NEVER AGAIN see another dime of my money.  While I do understand the argument for United Way's existence . . . and I know that there are smaller charities that do have to stand under UW's umbrella in order to survive, these days and in this economy, I will KNOW where my money is going and what for.  And its distribution will NOT be managed by the likes of Bob & Peggy Morrison - or Steven & Rhonda Eblin.

As an anecdote to this story, as the lawsuits flew, I'll never forget what Peggy Morrison had to say about the generosity of locals back in 1999 - after a Hurricane named Floyd.  People down East still very reverently and sorrowfully refer to the storm as "the great flood".  But for Peggy-of-the-untouched-Piedmont it was an inconvenience that interfered with the mission of filling her own coffers.

I've digressed. Here's my biggest beef with Steve Eblin, and ALL of the church-going, "right people" like him in Asheboro . . . who tend to say one thing to the butt-licking newspaper reporters, yet do quite another on a day-to-day basis (between Sunday-morning-go-to-meeting times):

I'm thinking that the former chairman of the Board of Deacons at First Presbyterian Church ought not to put his hand on a Bible and swear a false Oath to God . . . an Oath that he then uses to swindle someone he cheated out of the hard-earned fruits of her labor in Court.

Thou shalt not steal and all that.

Carrying right along with that thought, I'm thinking that if the former Chairman of the Board of Deacons at First Presbyterian Church does swear out that false Oath to God . . . and then negotiates a deal on the lie (in effect, stealing) . . . then maybe he, being a God-fearing man (along with his boss - who did the same thing and who attends the Episcopal Church) ought to own up to it once he/they are caught.

And I'm also thinking that if the former Chairman of the Board of Deacons at First Presbyterian Church doesn't own up to it - and make amends - then maybe some of his right honorable fellow church-members ought to say/do something about that.

I'm also thinking that if his fellow God-fearing church-members don't shame him into doing the right thing by a doctor he wronged, then maybe his Board of Directors at the local "non-profit" hospital (a good many of them fine, honorable, church-going men) ought to fire Mr. Eblin for cause.  Because, you know, the officers of "non-profits" (like public officials) are answerable to the public that subsidizes their operation . . . and ought to be held to a higher standard . . . and really ought not to be able to lie/cheat/steal and get away with with it. 

(At least that's what Brooke Schmidly says about members of local ABC boards.)

And I'm thinking that if the Randolph Hospital Board of Directors cannot or will not do the right honorable thing, then the Court where the false Oath was sworn should pick up the slack, uphold the law and charge Mr. Eblin (and his boss) with perjury.

Perjury being a felony with no statute of limitations . . . a crime that has no statute of limitations because (everywhere else but Asheboro) perjury spits in the eye of justice . . .

. . . and of God.

God's Son, Jesus, threw the money-changers out of His Father's temple.  As a woman who prefers old red Ford trucks to pricey Beemers, I really like that "rough & tumble/in-your-face" side of Jesus.  It speaks to me as the "cheap grace" so many in my hometown would-have-me-accept never has.  For make NO mistake.  2000 years ago, Jesus himself would have shown Steven Eblin and Robert Morrison the church door and told them to clean up their act before they came back.

But in Asheboro, these money-changers oversee our public charities.  They walk "arrogantly and cliquishly" above the law.

I simply cannot abide hypocrites and liars.  I will not pretend.  And I most certainly will not be silent or run scared any more.

Bottom line:  I guess I'm wondering where all the Christians and Rotarians are when it comes to policing their own.

Again, remind you of anyone?

Finally, in the spirit of charity, I'd like to close this post with a very special message for Brooke Schmidly.  If you or anyone else at your Courthouse or in County/City government has the ability to help people-who-shall-not-be-named-and-who-deserve-to-be-helped . . . and you/these mysterious others have any real inclination to help them, then HELP THEM.

STEP UP.  DO RIGHT BY THEM.  BECAUSE IT'S CRYSTAL CLEAR THEY WERE DONE WRONG.  Pretend you're Mary Johnson trying to assist a battered homeless woman when Cheryl Freeman calls . . . or Mary Johnson ignoring Steve Eblin's threats in order to help a very sick baby that needs you RIGHT NOW - not after you take a poll of fat-cat-wannabe executives at home alseep in their beds.

But DO NOT, I REPEAT DO NOT, send not-so-cleverly-engineered messages oozing poorly-veiled threats . . . by dropping not-subtle hints conveyed via third parties . . . that your important friends cannot lend a hand or offer a job because of what Dr. Mary Johnson (or even Henry Armfield) might be saying on the blogs.

Because that's not just a lie, IT'S A DAMNED LIE!  And I will call you OUT.

It's also just LAME.  What you're trying to pull off now is akin to holding someone hostage and them shooting them after you get what you want (which is my silence).  Mary's not playing.  (Or as they used to say in Washington, I don't negotiate with terrorists.)

Of course, going after me . . . or my well-named pal, Buzz . . . is a little too obvious AND problematic for you (as neither of us ever really cared about being in the cliques or snozzing at the clubs/bars, don't work in your county any more, and intimidation/out-right libel hasn't worked to scare us off), so you turn your sights on scared people in desperate straights (put there by the mysterious others you imply can now "help").

It's despicable.

If your Father didn't tell you anything else about me, he should have told you I do not respond well to threats.

Threats are what started this 12-year-old mess . . . a mess that wouldn't be a mess now if your Dad had done right by his client.

Author's note:  This post is dedicated to anyone who ever wanted to tell off their old boss . . . or "advise" a lawyer as to where to go . . . or help a friend done wrong and getting jerked around.

9/15 Update:  I'm thinking Morrison and Eblin met at (EVIL) Business School - as (according to this uber-nauseating 2008 puff piece by the Triad Business Journal) they both got their (EVIL) MBA's at Xavier University.  I've always wondered about the "Ohio connection".

9/16 Update:  We're gonna try a public records request ONE MORE TIME.  Sent to Randolph Hospital (via "amt") by e-mail this morning:

I have made this request before. This time I hope it is answered fully and promptly.

As a matter of public record, I would like to obtain a list of "non-profit" Randolph Hospital's Board of Directors and Corporate membership for every year since 1994.

I would also like a list of "non-profit" Randolph Medical Associates' Board of Directors.

I am happy to pay any associated copying or mailing costs (although it seems to me to be a fairly simple thing to type out/send). Feel free to advise by e-mail.

If I do not hear from you within the week, I will submit the request by certified mail. However, it is my hope that we can get this accomplished without any more obfuscation or games.

I am tired of the games in Asheboro.

Thank you,

Mary H. Johnson, M.D., FAAP