The North Carolina MSM has been busy today . . . pimping for both Elizabeth Edwards (her book is coming out in paperback) and Crystal Gail Mangnum (the Durham police/DA are giving her a hard time over arson & attempted murder charges because of "preconceived notions that people have about me concerning about another case" . . . hummmmmmm . . . I wonder what she's talking about?).
It never ends. It just never ends.
Wednesday, June 30, 2010
On Elena Kagan
I know I'm a woman and supposed to all gung-ho when a woman is nominated for the highest Court in the land, but I SIMPLY CANNOT BELIEVE that, barring a miracle, Elena Kagan is the woman who will be given the job (by Obama's drones).
Following her confirmation hearings has been painful.
Following her confirmation hearings has been painful.
Tuesday, June 29, 2010
Watch Your (Anonymous) Mouth
I've been making some pretty nasty allegations in this blogosphere for five years and signing my name. Yet somehow, I've not been SLAPP-sued again (it's not exactly rocket-science to figure out why). Late last year, local blogger, Jeff Martin, trying to embarrass/libel me into silence, had a great deal of fun at my expense. Alas, par for the course, a Randolph County judge let him walk (Randolph County not exactly being the ideal location for any "test case" of any kind).
That's why this report tonight on WRAL tonight intrigues me (the plaintiff in the case is an ex-Vance County Commissioner). I expect a cold chill just went down a lot of backs in the blogosphere . . . maybe even the backs of some folk who aren't anonymous.
That's why this report tonight on WRAL tonight intrigues me (the plaintiff in the case is an ex-Vance County Commissioner). I expect a cold chill just went down a lot of backs in the blogosphere . . . maybe even the backs of some folk who aren't anonymous.
Medical Economics In Asheville And Asheboro: Hospital Administrators Manipulating/Crushing Doctors Is Just "Business"
Note to Housecalls Readers: I've reset the publish date on this post to 6/29 (as opposed to Sunday, June 27) as I want it to sit front and center on the blog's home page while I take a short break. It's gotten some traffic - probably because I'm way-beyond-done withholding names to protect the guilty. I've also played with it a little bit today and added some links. I'm working on several projects, including getting Randolph Hospital CEO, Bob Morrison to cough up some public information I asked for seven months ago (like so many CEO's these days, Bob has a CHRONIC PROBLEM with providing "honest services" and giving ordinary citizens information that he has no right to withhold. But it's a perfect demonstration of how twelve years of this young professional's life got sucked away- in small increments - by a bunch of self-important small-town bullies running my hometown hospital.)
Edward Martin, who writes for Business NC is one of those rare journalists who looks beyond who-is-who and the easy sound bite.
He actually interviewed me way back in 2006 . . . less than a year after I had entered the GSO blogosphere (at the behest of another bunch of journalists - who turned out to be blowing nothing but hot air) . . . about what happened to me in Asheboro . . . for an article he did on the arguments for and against malpractice tort reform.
My argument has always been that the medical profession will not get tort reform until it demonstrates to a skeptical/hostile public that it can do a much better job at policing its own. And in North Carolina, home to some of the nation's best medical centers, it just ain't happening.
Our Medical Board, run by lawyers, is a toothless joke. Really toothless. No, I mean really, really toothless. And our Medical & Pediatric Societies, too busy chasing reimbursements as the be-all-and-end-all of the profession's survival do not "do" individual advocacy. Stories like mine - which do not exactly showcase the inherent nobility of medicine - make the leadership very uncomfortable.
No one wants to admit that Marcus Welby is dead.
The sad fact is that for well-over-a-decade I've screamed for help until my vocal cords were raw in a professional vacuum encased by an almost impenetrable White Wall of silence that makes anything going on at the Greensboro Police Department look like a garden party.
Ed Martin's work is, of course, is offered in stark comparison to that of my own hometown newspaper, The Courier Tribune . . . whose publisher, David Renfro (married to Bonnie Renfro over at the Randolph County Economic Development Corporation) did everything he could to bury my story-of-woe.
We can't have anyone saying anything bad (albeit true) about one of Asheboro's biggest employers.
When Renfro ultimately could not totally bury the story (because Dr. Mary would not just tuck her tail, roll over, "get over it" and "go away"), he headlined it in a way to humiliate Dr. Mary and promote Randolph CEO/Bob Morrison's WARPED viewpoint . . . Bob's viewpoint being that the Bowman-Gray-trained, Board-certified Pediatrician with professional & personal ties all over the Piedmont - a woman who stood up to him/his left-hand man (Steve Eblin) in order to save the life of an infant whose care had been BOTCHED by a Family Practitioner (a Cone-owned physician that Randolph Hospital had falsely-marketed as something he was not) deserve to be fired . . . destroyed . . . slandered and libeled and drummed out of town.
And in all honesty, all of that was very easy to do . . . to a young physician-barely-free-of-two-and-a-half-years-of-indentured-servitude-to-both-the-state-and-Federal-governments . . . a young physician employed by Randolph Hospital's "controlled affiliate" . . . a young physician living in a mill-town and a "right-to-work" state . . . a young physician who simply could not be allowed to establish her own private practice (as her agreements with the state & Federal governments were supposed to allow her to do) and compete with either the hospital's "controlled affiliate" or the well-established family-practices in Asheboro . . . populated with well-named & well-connected physicians who (prior to letting her get kicked to the curb) had never thought twice about calling in the Pediatrician to clean up their messes . . . so they could get back to the office and make money.
Pushed into every ugly corner by people who were just using her to their own profitable/selfish ends, Dr. Johnson, on back-up call 24/7 for everyone, wasn't ever supposed to be human . . to show her frustration/exasperation or get testy or be just plain exhausted. No. She was supposed to just absorb every sling and arrow . . . demurely smile and say, "Please, Sir, may I have some MORE?".
And/so, Dr. Mary Johnson, the very first physician recruited to Asheboro under Bob's campaign to populate Asheboro with doctors that Randolph Hospital more-or-less "owned", was also the first of a mass exodus of young professionals who became disenchanted with "the team's" heavy-handed, suck-up-to-the-"right-people"-ways.
But Dr. Johnson's exit wasn't because she decided or wanted to go.
It did not matter that this particular Pediatrician was raised in the town, and, after a year of soul-searching, had come home with the intent to stay (nobly thinking that maybe she could prevent what had happened to her at Randolph from happening to other children). No. Dr. Mary Johnson had committed the unpardonable sin of stepping outside of the mill town box - of not knowing her place . . . and she was a threat to Bob Morrison's status quo.
And if anyone, including Dr. Jim Kinlaw - the man who laid the bait to bring me home, tells you otherwise, THEY ARE LYING TO YOUR FACE (something this hospital is very good at).
Indeed, if he's asked, good "Christian" Jim is gonna smile and side-step and try to throw you off the fecund stench-of-it-all by telling you that Mary is "a little whacky" (never mind what his partners said). But don't EVER kid yourselves about what really happened here. What Jim Kinlaw (a "most-favored" doctor who served on Randolph Hospital's Board-of-Directors) sat back and allowed to be done to one of his young colleagues had NOTHING to do with "normal turnover", and everything to do with preserving his own white-bread "market share".
You see, in the fair mill-town of Asheboro, one does not challenge Bob Morrison - or his hand-picked buddies on Randolph Hospital's Board of Directors & Corporate Membership (fine, upstanding people like Bill Redding and J.B. Davis and Keith Crisco and Mike Miller and Jim Kinlaw - I've left out more than a few but you get the drift). NOBODY talks back to these people - not even young professionals who know their stuff. And if you do, you are toast.
Ergo, it's the reason that these days I tell young medical professionals checking the place out to "Run, Forrest! Run!!!" from any job offer in Asheboro.
From that standpoint, Google is a wonderful thing. These newbies don't have to look very far to know that Steven Eblin thinks, "Good Pediatricians are a dime-a-dozen" . . . or that Asheboro has certainly treated them that way.
[I know it's been twelve years, but I've always wanted to look Eblin in the eye and ask him, "How's that dime-a-dozen theory working out for you, you OILY, CLUELESS, ARROGANT ASSHOLE?".]
Before we continue, let's be clear on one thing. It was NEVER about the money for me. It was about the principle of being crap-canned by a bunch of greedy morons (after working my butt off for nearly three years in order to build something we all could be proud of) . . . all because I didn't play the "right people" games and roll over/go back-to-sleep/let a baby die . . . and was not inclined to let the guy who screwed-up off the hook.
It was about about the catch in my Mother's voice when I first called her to tell her I had been fired . . . and (later) the pain in my Daddy's eyes upon reading in his hometown newspaper that the liars running the local hospital had added insult to injury by calling his daughter a liar.
It was about EVERY regulatory body and state/Federal agency that was charged to care NOT CARING one bit about what had been done to me . . . and DOING NOTHING to fix it.
It was about watching my friends & colleagues leave town one-by-one as their hopes for something very special in a Mayberryish setting died . . . about seeing so much promise rot on the vine because NO ONE had the guts or the moral fortitude to stand up to Bob Morrison and Steven Eblin.
You see, back then (1998) was not now. Incredibly naive and stupid (to believe that "the system" would protect and vindicate me), I played by all the "collegial" rules you were supposed to play by. I quietly filed the complaints with peer review and the Medical Board and JCAHO and DHHS (i.e. keeping the medical ugly behind "the veil") and relied upon the system to check & balance itself. I kept my mouth shut in public venues . . . and let my (as it turns out, negligent/useless) lawyer do the talking to the press. And I turned to the Courts.
But the sad fact is that even when I technically "won" (but not really), I lost. And that was mostly because the local press was asleep at the wheel.
You see, my "vindication" in civil Court did not grab the hometown headlines that being called a liar (ironically, by liars) had. The (as it turned out fraudulent) settlement in my favor was "reported" as a second-page short-take - as throwaway news. Indeed, many of my parents' friends would not have known about my legal "victory" against the hospital had my parents not told them. And God knows most of my patients' parents never got the low-down. Thanks to the Courier deftly covering Bob's tracks, from their viewpoint, Dr. Johnson had disappeared from the landscape - and abandoned them. The practice/hospital executives (wanting to keep "the business") most certainly had not told them the truth . . .
. . . and Asheboro's newspaper was the LAST place on the planet where they would find the truth of what really happened to their child's doctor . . . a doctor brought home with . . . and then eviscerated courtesy of . . . their tax dollars.
And/so, to this day, although she maintains a home in Asheboro, Dr. Mary makes her living on the road. It's a much harder living than the one she envisioned. And very, very lonely. And it's also VERY STUPID in terms of the bigger picture . . . because she could be doing the same thing she's doing on the road in her hometown . . . were it not for a bunch of bullies encased in Teflon that would be the envy of Ronald Reagan (may God rest his soul).
Yet Dr. Mary's classmates-still-in-Asheboro cannot understand why she's not tripping over herself to get to that high-school reunion.
Alas, the big dawgs in Asheboro can NEVER, EVER admit that they screwed up. They cannot make amends unless they are dragged to it kicking and screaming (I will be working on that later this year). It's just not done. A friend of mine, a young professional also raised in Asheboro, and who also came home only to be treated very badly, likens these men and the shows they put on (we've both heard the, "we're partners" thing before) to the "dance band on the Titanic".
But that's the way the Bill Reddings and Keith Criscos and J.B. Davises and and Mike Millers and Bob Morrisons work. They sit on the Boards and crush people's lives (using someone else's money if the can) as they collect their phat paychecks, and live VERY well, and laugh at their inside jokes about "Crazy Mary" at their carefully-staged/scripted healthcare forums. And we-the-ordinary-people, paying for a bad party, are supposed to be grateful for the crumbs they throw, and clap when they give themselves awards.
The problem IS that Dr. Mary isn't crazy at all . . . never was. She was just true to herself, her Oath and THEIR MISSION.
I've digressed. Let's get back to Ed Martin - who probably is my favorite journalist ever . . . because he does not cower or run from the ugly-of-medicine . . . because he openly challenges the notion that it takes a hundred years to change anything of import in the profession.
Here's the excerpt from Martin's 2006 article, entitled "Athwart Torts" (referencing a story yet to be told by the Courier Tribune or the Greensboro News & Record). During the interviews, conducted by phone, Martin could not have been more gracious or understanding of my predicament . . . willing to get beyond the soundbite and hear explanations . . . never putting me down or on the defensive:
Many (malpractice/personal injury) lawyers paint it in a word: scary. They scoff at opponents' claims that competition in the marketplace and government regulators protect the public. Asheboro pediatrician Mary Johnson offers an example.
The setting is Randolph Hospital in 1998. She answers a page from a nurse, but by the time she reaches the newborn unit, a baby is blue from the chest down and in shock - dying. "I've been cleaning up messes like this right and left," she thinks. As she struggles to clear bile and other wastes from the child's lungs, she decides to file a complaint, alleging incompetence and lack of training of the attending physician, with the hospital's peer-review committee. Such panels, which operate out of the public eye, are supposed to be the first line of defense against bad doctors. The baby, rushed to a larger hospital in Winston-Salem, survives. Johnson, who says she had been told by administrators not to complain about other doctors, finds herself the center of controversy. "Two weeks later, I'm out of a job fired."
Complaints to the N.C. Medical Board, the state agency that licenses and disciplines doctors, fell on deaf ears, she says. No fan of lawyers she also filed complaints with the State Bar alleging misconduct of hospital lawyers during the dispute - she nevertheless says peer review is, in her words, a joke. "There's little or no protection for doctors who blow the whistle." A hospital spokeswoman, citing confidentiality rules, declined to comment.
Bob and Steve always draped themselves in privacy and confidentiality. It's very convenient to use something that's supposed to protect patients to shield themselves.
Anyway, Ed Martin had a new story out in the April 2010 edition of NC Business Week - this time writing about the ouster of the CEO of Mission Memorial in Asheville, North Carolina.
The only reason I know about the article is because the CEO of the rural hospital where I currently work had the cover of NC Business's April edition proudly displayed on a hospital bulletin board . . . since the hospital where I currently work (along with its parent company) was listed amongst North Carolina's best hospitals in several aspects of patient care.
Randolph did not make any of those lists. (Cue meow.)
The kind of stories that Ed Martin is writing DID NOT EXIST fifteen years ago . . . or even ten years ago. And they're still very rare now.
But they are getting written now. And Martin does them better than anyone else. Describing Mission Memorial, he could have been describing any mid-sized county hospital in North Carolina . . . including and especially, Randolph:
“Historically, 20 to 25 years ago, physicians were the No. 1 go-to for hospital administrators. They had a much larger say in the management.”
Then, most hospitals stood alone, governed by rubber-stamp boards of businessmen and run by CEOs hand in hand with local doctors whose portraits would hang in the hallways after they died. Hospitals rarely competed.
But, as Martin goes on to write, things change. More physicians are employed these days. And over the years, smaller hospitals have sold out to conglomerates . . . or merged into networks . . . or forged "cooperative relationships" . . . in my case, the kind of relationship that allowed Bob Morrison and Steven Eblin to sacrifice a homegrown Pediatrician who did the right thing by a patient - in order to stay in the good graces of the larger hospital (that would be the Moses Cone Healthcare System) which then "owned" the FP who did the wrong thing.
[As I've noted on Housecalls before, according to the former Director of RMA (Mike Bridges), "his" Pediatricians were supposed to refer all of their patients to Cone (instead of Brenner's) too. Never mind that requiring phyisicans to refer to one institution or another as a condition of employment is illegal.]
According to the article, Misson's CEO, Joseph Danmore, like Morrison & Eblin, was a fan of buying up practices - and/or forming hospital-owned entities (which would then compete with existing private practices - not exactly endearing the hosptial doctors to the existing private practices) . . . of keeping physicians under "control" by employing them.
There's a big upside for executives. In a "right-to-work" state, employed doctors (already second-class members of the medical staff) who prove to be "disruptive" can easily be disposed of.
The thing about that is that doctors don't school & train for (at the very least) eleven years . . . or do the indentured servitude to pay off their loans . . . only to come out and be treated like Darth Vader's drones. It ain't Star Trek and my shirt isn't red.
Danmore's tactics turned doctors off - to the point that nearby smaller hosptials aligned themselves with Mission's larger competitor - and a Trauma Surgeon resigned (Trauma Surgeons being much more important to a hospital's bottom line than Pediatricians).
It's fascinating reading, especially given that I've worked in western North Carolina and witnessed the politics first-hand. And I could continue to summarize, but I would invite you to read Martin's piece . . . since, as a journalist (and unlike the David Renfros and John Robinsons and Edward Cones of the Piedmont), he saw relevance in things going on right under his nose.
The story even includes a blog.
I wish blogs had been an option way back when - a place where my parents and colleagues and friends on the nursing staff could go (as opposed to a tone-deaf newspaper). I think the medical landscape in Asheboro (and my life) would have been very different.
As it is, I'm blogging about history (unless, of course, I sue somebody) and the winners write the textbooks. (God knows that Ed Cone-of-THE-Cones and "Mr. Citizen Journalism", John Robinson are not going to bite the hand-that's-fed the trust fund and the advertising budget.)
Make NO mistake, Bob and Steve won. Because they did not play fair and none of Asheboro's "right people" (Davis and Crisco and Redding and Kinlaw and that ilk) called them on it. Nor did all the noble folk in public office - you know, the people who keep telling us they'll stand up for "the small people". And the area's MSM journalists moved off the fouth estate for more comfortable digs long ago (it's working out for them about as well as the "dime-a-dozen" theory did for Eblin).
Destroying Mary's life in Asheboro was just "business".
The thing about that is, if you screw enough people over, doing your business is a whole lot harder because no one wants to do business with you. [It's a theory that North Carolina's current Commerce Secretary (formerly a member of Asheboro's City Council), Keith Crisco, has yet to grasp or appreciate. I'm pretty sure Keith once served on Randolph Hospital's BOD or Corporate Membership. But, of course, Bob Morrison has not been willing to provide the lists.]
Make no mistake, Randolph Hospital has a reputation. It's not a good one.
Edward Martin, who writes for Business NC is one of those rare journalists who looks beyond who-is-who and the easy sound bite.
He actually interviewed me way back in 2006 . . . less than a year after I had entered the GSO blogosphere (at the behest of another bunch of journalists - who turned out to be blowing nothing but hot air) . . . about what happened to me in Asheboro . . . for an article he did on the arguments for and against malpractice tort reform.
My argument has always been that the medical profession will not get tort reform until it demonstrates to a skeptical/hostile public that it can do a much better job at policing its own. And in North Carolina, home to some of the nation's best medical centers, it just ain't happening.
Our Medical Board, run by lawyers, is a toothless joke. Really toothless. No, I mean really, really toothless. And our Medical & Pediatric Societies, too busy chasing reimbursements as the be-all-and-end-all of the profession's survival do not "do" individual advocacy. Stories like mine - which do not exactly showcase the inherent nobility of medicine - make the leadership very uncomfortable.
No one wants to admit that Marcus Welby is dead.
The sad fact is that for well-over-a-decade I've screamed for help until my vocal cords were raw in a professional vacuum encased by an almost impenetrable White Wall of silence that makes anything going on at the Greensboro Police Department look like a garden party.
Ed Martin's work is, of course, is offered in stark comparison to that of my own hometown newspaper, The Courier Tribune . . . whose publisher, David Renfro (married to Bonnie Renfro over at the Randolph County Economic Development Corporation) did everything he could to bury my story-of-woe.
We can't have anyone saying anything bad (albeit true) about one of Asheboro's biggest employers.
When Renfro ultimately could not totally bury the story (because Dr. Mary would not just tuck her tail, roll over, "get over it" and "go away"), he headlined it in a way to humiliate Dr. Mary and promote Randolph CEO/Bob Morrison's WARPED viewpoint . . . Bob's viewpoint being that the Bowman-Gray-trained, Board-certified Pediatrician with professional & personal ties all over the Piedmont - a woman who stood up to him/his left-hand man (Steve Eblin) in order to save the life of an infant whose care had been BOTCHED by a Family Practitioner (a Cone-owned physician that Randolph Hospital had falsely-marketed as something he was not) deserve to be fired . . . destroyed . . . slandered and libeled and drummed out of town.
And in all honesty, all of that was very easy to do . . . to a young physician-barely-free-of-two-and-a-half-years-of-indentured-servitude-to-both-the-state-and-Federal-governments . . . a young physician employed by Randolph Hospital's "controlled affiliate" . . . a young physician living in a mill-town and a "right-to-work" state . . . a young physician who simply could not be allowed to establish her own private practice (as her agreements with the state & Federal governments were supposed to allow her to do) and compete with either the hospital's "controlled affiliate" or the well-established family-practices in Asheboro . . . populated with well-named & well-connected physicians who (prior to letting her get kicked to the curb) had never thought twice about calling in the Pediatrician to clean up their messes . . . so they could get back to the office and make money.
Pushed into every ugly corner by people who were just using her to their own profitable/selfish ends, Dr. Johnson, on back-up call 24/7 for everyone, wasn't ever supposed to be human . . to show her frustration/exasperation or get testy or be just plain exhausted. No. She was supposed to just absorb every sling and arrow . . . demurely smile and say, "Please, Sir, may I have some MORE?".
And/so, Dr. Mary Johnson, the very first physician recruited to Asheboro under Bob's campaign to populate Asheboro with doctors that Randolph Hospital more-or-less "owned", was also the first of a mass exodus of young professionals who became disenchanted with "the team's" heavy-handed, suck-up-to-the-"right-people"-ways.
But Dr. Johnson's exit wasn't because she decided or wanted to go.
It did not matter that this particular Pediatrician was raised in the town, and, after a year of soul-searching, had come home with the intent to stay (nobly thinking that maybe she could prevent what had happened to her at Randolph from happening to other children). No. Dr. Mary Johnson had committed the unpardonable sin of stepping outside of the mill town box - of not knowing her place . . . and she was a threat to Bob Morrison's status quo.
And if anyone, including Dr. Jim Kinlaw - the man who laid the bait to bring me home, tells you otherwise, THEY ARE LYING TO YOUR FACE (something this hospital is very good at).
Indeed, if he's asked, good "Christian" Jim is gonna smile and side-step and try to throw you off the fecund stench-of-it-all by telling you that Mary is "a little whacky" (never mind what his partners said). But don't EVER kid yourselves about what really happened here. What Jim Kinlaw (a "most-favored" doctor who served on Randolph Hospital's Board-of-Directors) sat back and allowed to be done to one of his young colleagues had NOTHING to do with "normal turnover", and everything to do with preserving his own white-bread "market share".
You see, in the fair mill-town of Asheboro, one does not challenge Bob Morrison - or his hand-picked buddies on Randolph Hospital's Board of Directors & Corporate Membership (fine, upstanding people like Bill Redding and J.B. Davis and Keith Crisco and Mike Miller and Jim Kinlaw - I've left out more than a few but you get the drift). NOBODY talks back to these people - not even young professionals who know their stuff. And if you do, you are toast.
Ergo, it's the reason that these days I tell young medical professionals checking the place out to "Run, Forrest! Run!!!" from any job offer in Asheboro.
From that standpoint, Google is a wonderful thing. These newbies don't have to look very far to know that Steven Eblin thinks, "Good Pediatricians are a dime-a-dozen" . . . or that Asheboro has certainly treated them that way.
[I know it's been twelve years, but I've always wanted to look Eblin in the eye and ask him, "How's that dime-a-dozen theory working out for you, you OILY, CLUELESS, ARROGANT ASSHOLE?".]
Before we continue, let's be clear on one thing. It was NEVER about the money for me. It was about the principle of being crap-canned by a bunch of greedy morons (after working my butt off for nearly three years in order to build something we all could be proud of) . . . all because I didn't play the "right people" games and roll over/go back-to-sleep/let a baby die . . . and was not inclined to let the guy who screwed-up off the hook.
It was about about the catch in my Mother's voice when I first called her to tell her I had been fired . . . and (later) the pain in my Daddy's eyes upon reading in his hometown newspaper that the liars running the local hospital had added insult to injury by calling his daughter a liar.
It was about EVERY regulatory body and state/Federal agency that was charged to care NOT CARING one bit about what had been done to me . . . and DOING NOTHING to fix it.
It was about watching my friends & colleagues leave town one-by-one as their hopes for something very special in a Mayberryish setting died . . . about seeing so much promise rot on the vine because NO ONE had the guts or the moral fortitude to stand up to Bob Morrison and Steven Eblin.
You see, back then (1998) was not now. Incredibly naive and stupid (to believe that "the system" would protect and vindicate me), I played by all the "collegial" rules you were supposed to play by. I quietly filed the complaints with peer review and the Medical Board and JCAHO and DHHS (i.e. keeping the medical ugly behind "the veil") and relied upon the system to check & balance itself. I kept my mouth shut in public venues . . . and let my (as it turns out, negligent/useless) lawyer do the talking to the press. And I turned to the Courts.
But the sad fact is that even when I technically "won" (but not really), I lost. And that was mostly because the local press was asleep at the wheel.
You see, my "vindication" in civil Court did not grab the hometown headlines that being called a liar (ironically, by liars) had. The (as it turned out fraudulent) settlement in my favor was "reported" as a second-page short-take - as throwaway news. Indeed, many of my parents' friends would not have known about my legal "victory" against the hospital had my parents not told them. And God knows most of my patients' parents never got the low-down. Thanks to the Courier deftly covering Bob's tracks, from their viewpoint, Dr. Johnson had disappeared from the landscape - and abandoned them. The practice/hospital executives (wanting to keep "the business") most certainly had not told them the truth . . .
. . . and Asheboro's newspaper was the LAST place on the planet where they would find the truth of what really happened to their child's doctor . . . a doctor brought home with . . . and then eviscerated courtesy of . . . their tax dollars.
And/so, to this day, although she maintains a home in Asheboro, Dr. Mary makes her living on the road. It's a much harder living than the one she envisioned. And very, very lonely. And it's also VERY STUPID in terms of the bigger picture . . . because she could be doing the same thing she's doing on the road in her hometown . . . were it not for a bunch of bullies encased in Teflon that would be the envy of Ronald Reagan (may God rest his soul).
Yet Dr. Mary's classmates-still-in-Asheboro cannot understand why she's not tripping over herself to get to that high-school reunion.
Alas, the big dawgs in Asheboro can NEVER, EVER admit that they screwed up. They cannot make amends unless they are dragged to it kicking and screaming (I will be working on that later this year). It's just not done. A friend of mine, a young professional also raised in Asheboro, and who also came home only to be treated very badly, likens these men and the shows they put on (we've both heard the, "we're partners" thing before) to the "dance band on the Titanic".
But that's the way the Bill Reddings and Keith Criscos and J.B. Davises and and Mike Millers and Bob Morrisons work. They sit on the Boards and crush people's lives (using someone else's money if the can) as they collect their phat paychecks, and live VERY well, and laugh at their inside jokes about "Crazy Mary" at their carefully-staged/scripted healthcare forums. And we-the-ordinary-people, paying for a bad party, are supposed to be grateful for the crumbs they throw, and clap when they give themselves awards.
The problem IS that Dr. Mary isn't crazy at all . . . never was. She was just true to herself, her Oath and THEIR MISSION.
I've digressed. Let's get back to Ed Martin - who probably is my favorite journalist ever . . . because he does not cower or run from the ugly-of-medicine . . . because he openly challenges the notion that it takes a hundred years to change anything of import in the profession.
Here's the excerpt from Martin's 2006 article, entitled "Athwart Torts" (referencing a story yet to be told by the Courier Tribune or the Greensboro News & Record). During the interviews, conducted by phone, Martin could not have been more gracious or understanding of my predicament . . . willing to get beyond the soundbite and hear explanations . . . never putting me down or on the defensive:
Many (malpractice/personal injury) lawyers paint it in a word: scary. They scoff at opponents' claims that competition in the marketplace and government regulators protect the public. Asheboro pediatrician Mary Johnson offers an example.
The setting is Randolph Hospital in 1998. She answers a page from a nurse, but by the time she reaches the newborn unit, a baby is blue from the chest down and in shock - dying. "I've been cleaning up messes like this right and left," she thinks. As she struggles to clear bile and other wastes from the child's lungs, she decides to file a complaint, alleging incompetence and lack of training of the attending physician, with the hospital's peer-review committee. Such panels, which operate out of the public eye, are supposed to be the first line of defense against bad doctors. The baby, rushed to a larger hospital in Winston-Salem, survives. Johnson, who says she had been told by administrators not to complain about other doctors, finds herself the center of controversy. "Two weeks later, I'm out of a job fired."
Complaints to the N.C. Medical Board, the state agency that licenses and disciplines doctors, fell on deaf ears, she says. No fan of lawyers she also filed complaints with the State Bar alleging misconduct of hospital lawyers during the dispute - she nevertheless says peer review is, in her words, a joke. "There's little or no protection for doctors who blow the whistle." A hospital spokeswoman, citing confidentiality rules, declined to comment.
Bob and Steve always draped themselves in privacy and confidentiality. It's very convenient to use something that's supposed to protect patients to shield themselves.
Anyway, Ed Martin had a new story out in the April 2010 edition of NC Business Week - this time writing about the ouster of the CEO of Mission Memorial in Asheville, North Carolina.
The only reason I know about the article is because the CEO of the rural hospital where I currently work had the cover of NC Business's April edition proudly displayed on a hospital bulletin board . . . since the hospital where I currently work (along with its parent company) was listed amongst North Carolina's best hospitals in several aspects of patient care.
Randolph did not make any of those lists. (Cue meow.)
The kind of stories that Ed Martin is writing DID NOT EXIST fifteen years ago . . . or even ten years ago. And they're still very rare now.
But they are getting written now. And Martin does them better than anyone else. Describing Mission Memorial, he could have been describing any mid-sized county hospital in North Carolina . . . including and especially, Randolph:
“Historically, 20 to 25 years ago, physicians were the No. 1 go-to for hospital administrators. They had a much larger say in the management.”
Then, most hospitals stood alone, governed by rubber-stamp boards of businessmen and run by CEOs hand in hand with local doctors whose portraits would hang in the hallways after they died. Hospitals rarely competed.
But, as Martin goes on to write, things change. More physicians are employed these days. And over the years, smaller hospitals have sold out to conglomerates . . . or merged into networks . . . or forged "cooperative relationships" . . . in my case, the kind of relationship that allowed Bob Morrison and Steven Eblin to sacrifice a homegrown Pediatrician who did the right thing by a patient - in order to stay in the good graces of the larger hospital (that would be the Moses Cone Healthcare System) which then "owned" the FP who did the wrong thing.
[As I've noted on Housecalls before, according to the former Director of RMA (Mike Bridges), "his" Pediatricians were supposed to refer all of their patients to Cone (instead of Brenner's) too. Never mind that requiring phyisicans to refer to one institution or another as a condition of employment is illegal.]
According to the article, Misson's CEO, Joseph Danmore, like Morrison & Eblin, was a fan of buying up practices - and/or forming hospital-owned entities (which would then compete with existing private practices - not exactly endearing the hosptial doctors to the existing private practices) . . . of keeping physicians under "control" by employing them.
There's a big upside for executives. In a "right-to-work" state, employed doctors (already second-class members of the medical staff) who prove to be "disruptive" can easily be disposed of.
The thing about that is that doctors don't school & train for (at the very least) eleven years . . . or do the indentured servitude to pay off their loans . . . only to come out and be treated like Darth Vader's drones. It ain't Star Trek and my shirt isn't red.
Danmore's tactics turned doctors off - to the point that nearby smaller hosptials aligned themselves with Mission's larger competitor - and a Trauma Surgeon resigned (Trauma Surgeons being much more important to a hospital's bottom line than Pediatricians).
It's fascinating reading, especially given that I've worked in western North Carolina and witnessed the politics first-hand. And I could continue to summarize, but I would invite you to read Martin's piece . . . since, as a journalist (and unlike the David Renfros and John Robinsons and Edward Cones of the Piedmont), he saw relevance in things going on right under his nose.
The story even includes a blog.
I wish blogs had been an option way back when - a place where my parents and colleagues and friends on the nursing staff could go (as opposed to a tone-deaf newspaper). I think the medical landscape in Asheboro (and my life) would have been very different.
As it is, I'm blogging about history (unless, of course, I sue somebody) and the winners write the textbooks. (God knows that Ed Cone-of-THE-Cones and "Mr. Citizen Journalism", John Robinson are not going to bite the hand-that's-fed the trust fund and the advertising budget.)
Make NO mistake, Bob and Steve won. Because they did not play fair and none of Asheboro's "right people" (Davis and Crisco and Redding and Kinlaw and that ilk) called them on it. Nor did all the noble folk in public office - you know, the people who keep telling us they'll stand up for "the small people". And the area's MSM journalists moved off the fouth estate for more comfortable digs long ago (it's working out for them about as well as the "dime-a-dozen" theory did for Eblin).
Destroying Mary's life in Asheboro was just "business".
The thing about that is, if you screw enough people over, doing your business is a whole lot harder because no one wants to do business with you. [It's a theory that North Carolina's current Commerce Secretary (formerly a member of Asheboro's City Council), Keith Crisco, has yet to grasp or appreciate. I'm pretty sure Keith once served on Randolph Hospital's BOD or Corporate Membership. But, of course, Bob Morrison has not been willing to provide the lists.]
Make no mistake, Randolph Hospital has a reputation. It's not a good one.
Monday, June 28, 2010
Cough It Up, Bob
Regular readers will recall that back in December, I requested public records from Randolph Hospital . . . specifically, copies of IRS 990's for RMA and Randolph Hospital for the last three fiscal years, as well as comprehensive lists of the "non-profit's" Board members/Corporate Membership (by year) since 1995 (the year I began work for RMA).
I've actually found copies of the 990's I requested in a misplaced box of files. But I still want the lists of Randolph's Board members and Corporate Membership . . . which, "to the best of his knowledge", Bob says he is not required to provide (?!?). Even if the information was not public information (and it is) . . . I'm still not understanding why Randolph Hospital's Board members would be so cagey about their "honorary" positions.
Well, actually, I do understand. Too much rubber has probably burned off their rubber stamps . . . and these guys have figured out they/their hospital actually may have to answer for some of the things they let Morrison and Eblin do to me.
Last week, the N.C. Supremes issued a decision that contradicts Bob's knowledge.
Public records are owned by the people. And once again, the Board Members and Corporate Membership of a "non-profit" hospital are, by definition, public record. Translation: If you accept the taxpayer's largess, you also accept their scrutiny.
Another letter to Morrison is being drafted this week. The premise is simple: If you are an executive of the "non-profit" you don't have the right to withhold public information. So cough it up, dipwad. And at this point in your little game of smug, never-ending oneupmanship, I'm not real inclined to pay the postage. But if you insist on being a jerk, I'll be happy to pay it just to be clear on the names of the fine, upstanding community leaders who rubber-stamped all the despicable/amoral/illegal things you did.
Of course, you're not supposed to have the right to lie in Court about (in effect withhold) your financial records either . . . or negotiate a deal on false information . . . well, unless you're a "right person" living and working under the jurisdiction of the habitually-intemperate Garland Yates.
And I WILL be taking up the matter of Bob & Steve repeatedly lying under Oath about the confidentiality-of-things-that-were-not-confidential with various oversight agencies and the state of North Carolina later this year.
"Crazy Mary", you see, was not so "crazy" after all.
I've actually found copies of the 990's I requested in a misplaced box of files. But I still want the lists of Randolph's Board members and Corporate Membership . . . which, "to the best of his knowledge", Bob says he is not required to provide (?!?). Even if the information was not public information (and it is) . . . I'm still not understanding why Randolph Hospital's Board members would be so cagey about their "honorary" positions.
Well, actually, I do understand. Too much rubber has probably burned off their rubber stamps . . . and these guys have figured out they/their hospital actually may have to answer for some of the things they let Morrison and Eblin do to me.
Last week, the N.C. Supremes issued a decision that contradicts Bob's knowledge.
Public records are owned by the people. And once again, the Board Members and Corporate Membership of a "non-profit" hospital are, by definition, public record. Translation: If you accept the taxpayer's largess, you also accept their scrutiny.
Another letter to Morrison is being drafted this week. The premise is simple: If you are an executive of the "non-profit" you don't have the right to withhold public information. So cough it up, dipwad. And at this point in your little game of smug, never-ending oneupmanship, I'm not real inclined to pay the postage. But if you insist on being a jerk, I'll be happy to pay it just to be clear on the names of the fine, upstanding community leaders who rubber-stamped all the despicable/amoral/illegal things you did.
Of course, you're not supposed to have the right to lie in Court about (in effect withhold) your financial records either . . . or negotiate a deal on false information . . . well, unless you're a "right person" living and working under the jurisdiction of the habitually-intemperate Garland Yates.
And I WILL be taking up the matter of Bob & Steve repeatedly lying under Oath about the confidentiality-of-things-that-were-not-confidential with various oversight agencies and the state of North Carolina later this year.
"Crazy Mary", you see, was not so "crazy" after all.
Thursday, June 24, 2010
The N.C. Supremes Rule On Public Records: And It Only Fuels My Fire
Author's Note: This post has been edited & updated.
My criminal beef with Randolph Hospital executives, Bob Morrison and Steven Eblin, is that these two "non-profit" executives repeatedly lied under Oath in interrogatory responses filed during the discovery phase of their own SLAPP-suit . . . saying that financial information (very relevant to my damages claim) included on IRS 990 returns (public record, and actually posted on the Internet when they filed their responses) was "highly confidential".
Of course, the big-shot hospital attorneys, banked by all those taxpayer dollars and supposedly "experts" on the ins-&-outs of "non-profits", should have known better than to file false interrogatory responses on behalf of their clients (I believe it's called suborning perjury) . . . not that the North Carolina State Bar cares.
The lies, un-corrected by Morrison/Eblin/Randolph's attorney's, and un-challenged by my oh-so-stellar (NOT) attorney, Steven Schmidly (who became the strangest of bed-fellows with the hospital executives he once sued in their unifying zeal to bring alcohol to Asheboro . . . doctors obviously needing to drink heavily in order to stay here), allowed Morrison and Eblin to get off very inexpensively at settlement.
The State Bar didn't sanction Schmidly for his gross negligence either.
Perjury has no statute of limitations.
This ruling by the North Carolina Supreme Court only enforces the argument I've made all along: Public records are owned by the people!!!
And We-The-People should not have to beg to get them. We should not be lied-to when we request them.
Moreover, people charged with the public good . . . say like the executives running "non-profits" and charities . . . should NEVER be allowed to LIE during a court proceeding . . . negotiate a fraudulent deal upon their LIES . . . and totally GET AWAY WITH IT!
Their Board Members shouldnot be able to play the "we know nothing" game either.
I am more and more inclined to return to Court later this year. Simply put, I'm tired of this crap. The state of North Carolina has a responsibility to protect its citizens from this kind of garbage . . . particularly citizens who were fired for doing their duty as defined by the gutless/spineless North Carolina Medical Board.
The way the Randolph County District Attorney (Garland Yates) has "handled" this case is despicable and inexcusable. He has totally pandered and sold out to "the right people". Like so many others in Asheboro, he forgot what "community" really means, and who he's supposed to serve.
And, as a "victims advocate" the North Carolina Attorney General's office (Roy Cooper) could not have been more useless. These days, it's supposedly all about "healthcare reform". And the NCAG is lawyer to NCDHHS (which directly "oversaw" one of the programs I served in . . . and pimped for the other one . . . AND hands out boatloads of the taxpayer's money/Certificates-of-Need/etc.) . . . the North Carolina Secretary of State reports to the AG . . . and the Medical Board asked for assistance last year . . . but Cooper's "special prosecutors" cannot find a way around Randolph County's habitually intemperate DA and into this case . . . in order to hold a "non-profit" accountable and make it play by the rules the rest of us have to cower to? Who is Roy Cooper trying to kid?
What I've been put through for doing the right thing by a sick baby twelve years ago is just absurd/sick/warped and fundamentally WRONG.
Friday Afternoon Update: Don't ya just LOVE it when the same very important people who sat on the big, bad local Boards FOR YEARS and looked the other way while hospital executives lied and bank presidents drove local institutions into the ground, throw themselve parties and give themselves awards?
And OBTW, it makes great sense to me (insert sarcasm) that the leaders-of-a-mill-town who treated a homegrown Pediatrician SO-HORRIBLY-for-no-good-reason-other-than-she took-a-"risk"-and-challenged-the-status-quo-of-a-bunch-of-greedy-power-mongering-bullies . . . a mill-town with a newspaper that only just updated its website & discovered public comments (yet still censors anything that might reflect negatively on bad leadership by the aforementioned power-mongering bullies) . . . thinks that our town would be a great attraction/draw for medical manufacturing & Internet/technology (industries that, by definition, attract/require more highly-educated young professionals).
Try though she might, Bonnie Renfro's "thirty second" presentations (who in the blogosphere does that sound like?) are going to have a hard time masking twelve years of leadership-sanctioned ugly.
I'm thinking that today's "young professionals" are looking for a little more light and air . . . and a little less good-ole-boy BS.
I'M ALSO THINKING (CALL ME "SCARY") THAT MAYBE THOSE YOUNG PROFESSIONALS WANT TO RAISE THEIR KIDS IN A "COMMUNITY" WHERE THE DOCTORS TAKING CARE OF THEM ARE NOT THREATENED AND/OR FIRED FOR REPORTING PROBLEMS AT THE LOCAL HOSPITAL . . . AND/OR SAVING SICK CHILDREN'S LIVES.
And/so get real Keith.
My criminal beef with Randolph Hospital executives, Bob Morrison and Steven Eblin, is that these two "non-profit" executives repeatedly lied under Oath in interrogatory responses filed during the discovery phase of their own SLAPP-suit . . . saying that financial information (very relevant to my damages claim) included on IRS 990 returns (public record, and actually posted on the Internet when they filed their responses) was "highly confidential".
Of course, the big-shot hospital attorneys, banked by all those taxpayer dollars and supposedly "experts" on the ins-&-outs of "non-profits", should have known better than to file false interrogatory responses on behalf of their clients (I believe it's called suborning perjury) . . . not that the North Carolina State Bar cares.
The lies, un-corrected by Morrison/Eblin/Randolph's attorney's, and un-challenged by my oh-so-stellar (NOT) attorney, Steven Schmidly (who became the strangest of bed-fellows with the hospital executives he once sued in their unifying zeal to bring alcohol to Asheboro . . . doctors obviously needing to drink heavily in order to stay here), allowed Morrison and Eblin to get off very inexpensively at settlement.
The State Bar didn't sanction Schmidly for his gross negligence either.
Perjury has no statute of limitations.
This ruling by the North Carolina Supreme Court only enforces the argument I've made all along: Public records are owned by the people!!!
And We-The-People should not have to beg to get them. We should not be lied-to when we request them.
Moreover, people charged with the public good . . . say like the executives running "non-profits" and charities . . . should NEVER be allowed to LIE during a court proceeding . . . negotiate a fraudulent deal upon their LIES . . . and totally GET AWAY WITH IT!
Their Board Members shouldnot be able to play the "we know nothing" game either.
I am more and more inclined to return to Court later this year. Simply put, I'm tired of this crap. The state of North Carolina has a responsibility to protect its citizens from this kind of garbage . . . particularly citizens who were fired for doing their duty as defined by the gutless/spineless North Carolina Medical Board.
The way the Randolph County District Attorney (Garland Yates) has "handled" this case is despicable and inexcusable. He has totally pandered and sold out to "the right people". Like so many others in Asheboro, he forgot what "community" really means, and who he's supposed to serve.
And, as a "victims advocate" the North Carolina Attorney General's office (Roy Cooper) could not have been more useless. These days, it's supposedly all about "healthcare reform". And the NCAG is lawyer to NCDHHS (which directly "oversaw" one of the programs I served in . . . and pimped for the other one . . . AND hands out boatloads of the taxpayer's money/Certificates-of-Need/etc.) . . . the North Carolina Secretary of State reports to the AG . . . and the Medical Board asked for assistance last year . . . but Cooper's "special prosecutors" cannot find a way around Randolph County's habitually intemperate DA and into this case . . . in order to hold a "non-profit" accountable and make it play by the rules the rest of us have to cower to? Who is Roy Cooper trying to kid?
What I've been put through for doing the right thing by a sick baby twelve years ago is just absurd/sick/warped and fundamentally WRONG.
Friday Afternoon Update: Don't ya just LOVE it when the same very important people who sat on the big, bad local Boards FOR YEARS and looked the other way while hospital executives lied and bank presidents drove local institutions into the ground, throw themselve parties and give themselves awards?
And OBTW, it makes great sense to me (insert sarcasm) that the leaders-of-a-mill-town who treated a homegrown Pediatrician SO-HORRIBLY-for-no-good-reason-other-than-she took-a-"risk"-and-challenged-the-status-quo-of-a-bunch-of-greedy-power-mongering-bullies . . . a mill-town with a newspaper that only just updated its website & discovered public comments (yet still censors anything that might reflect negatively on bad leadership by the aforementioned power-mongering bullies) . . . thinks that our town would be a great attraction/draw for medical manufacturing & Internet/technology (industries that, by definition, attract/require more highly-educated young professionals).
Try though she might, Bonnie Renfro's "thirty second" presentations (who in the blogosphere does that sound like?) are going to have a hard time masking twelve years of leadership-sanctioned ugly.
I'm thinking that today's "young professionals" are looking for a little more light and air . . . and a little less good-ole-boy BS.
I'M ALSO THINKING (CALL ME "SCARY") THAT MAYBE THOSE YOUNG PROFESSIONALS WANT TO RAISE THEIR KIDS IN A "COMMUNITY" WHERE THE DOCTORS TAKING CARE OF THEM ARE NOT THREATENED AND/OR FIRED FOR REPORTING PROBLEMS AT THE LOCAL HOSPITAL . . . AND/OR SAVING SICK CHILDREN'S LIVES.
And/so get real Keith.
The Gulf Oil Spill: Darkness Visible
I've blogged before on my distaste with bloggers calling other bloggers names like "bat-shit crazy", "moron", "lunatic", "criminally-insane" . . . or making slurs against someone's sanity, grasp-of-reality, and/or character as they make their "arguments" . . . sometimes kicking people when they are way-beyond-down.
It was, in fact, the tipping point in deciding to press charges against Jeff Martin for cyber-stalking. What Martin did last November was deliberate and vicious - hardly the act of a "friend" (as Martin's lawyer portrayed his actions in Court). He compounded it with libel (something that did not come out in Court). And were I not made of much studier stuff than Martin clearly ever gave me credit for, the things he did/said might have caused irreparable harm.
Ergo, I do not regret making the stand.
For reasons that hit very close to home, the story of charter-fishing captain Allen Kruse is heart-breaking to me. The darkness that enveloped the waters of his beloved Gulf became too visible . . . too much to bear.
And I'm wondering tonight. Do the same kind of people who so liberally throw around the nasty names and hurl the horrible slurs (I'm sorry, I don't buy the argument that it's some kind of "service" to the community) think that Allen Kruse, obviously the victim of horrible overwhelming/circumstances, was "batshit crazy" to have done what he did?
I hope not.
And if they do, should I/we really care what they think?
It was, in fact, the tipping point in deciding to press charges against Jeff Martin for cyber-stalking. What Martin did last November was deliberate and vicious - hardly the act of a "friend" (as Martin's lawyer portrayed his actions in Court). He compounded it with libel (something that did not come out in Court). And were I not made of much studier stuff than Martin clearly ever gave me credit for, the things he did/said might have caused irreparable harm.
Ergo, I do not regret making the stand.
For reasons that hit very close to home, the story of charter-fishing captain Allen Kruse is heart-breaking to me. The darkness that enveloped the waters of his beloved Gulf became too visible . . . too much to bear.
And I'm wondering tonight. Do the same kind of people who so liberally throw around the nasty names and hurl the horrible slurs (I'm sorry, I don't buy the argument that it's some kind of "service" to the community) think that Allen Kruse, obviously the victim of horrible overwhelming/circumstances, was "batshit crazy" to have done what he did?
I hope not.
And if they do, should I/we really care what they think?
"Honest Services"
I'm still trying to decide if today's U.S. Supreme Court decision narrowing the scope of the "honest services" law (that prosecutors have used to pursue corruption charges against such stellar examples of corporate leadership as Jeffrey Skilling and Conrad Black) is a good thing or a bad thing.
Maybe this is the push that federal legislators need to further flesh-out/define/expand the law.
On the other hand, after almost twelve years of what I can only describe as a-nasty-pile-of-medico-legal-BS-topped-off-with-a-double-scoop-of-the-jurisdictional-dodge, I don't have a lot of faith in legislators (or lawyers) . . . I feel as if too much of the lives and money and time of "small people" have already been cruelly wasted . . . moreover, it would be very disheartening if this decision means that dirtbags like John Edwards and Mike Sleazely could walk.
Of course, when it comes to the prosecution of white-collar corruption cases in North Carolina, I am not certain that making things any more "specific" is going to help.
Because you see, my allegations against Randolph Hospital executives Robert Morrison and Steven Eblin could not be more specific . . . and the evidence (of a crime with NO statute of limitations) could not be more "in your face" . . . in the black & white of sworn discovery responses.
These men, executives of a "non-profit" and supposedly held to the highest standards of honesty, KNEW they were lying when they lied. And they ultimately benefited from the lies.
What's more, the very important (dare I say, "right") people in Asheboro who sat on the hospital's Board of Directors & Corporate Membership and who were supposed to oversee what these administrators were doing - and why they were doing it - KNOW that their executives lied.
We're talking about fine, upstanding, stellar "right people" like Mike Miller of First National Bank (OBTW, here's a real-time stock quote on the local institution he drove into the ground).
Miller's "mistakes and minor transgressions" are a real downer now for FNB's shareholders . . . people who flew high and in the other direction whilst I got pummeled for doing the right thing. Now, they're throwing fits and wanting answers because they got burned flying too close to Miller's sun. Money matters now, because it's their money.
But these people need to get in line . . . BEHIND the homegrown Pediatrician & former public servant who's been told for over a decade that her life and career did not matter . . . that demanding just compensation for the cluster-screw she endured in order to serve a cover-up was somehow base and unseemly . . . that what happened to her is "irrelevant" . . . to "get over it" . . . and to "move on".
But let's face it. Honest service does not matter - to ANYBODY - particularly not those who are charged with protecting the "small" and the "ordinary" people.
And I just don't get it. What does it take?
Maybe this is the push that federal legislators need to further flesh-out/define/expand the law.
On the other hand, after almost twelve years of what I can only describe as a-nasty-pile-of-medico-legal-BS-topped-off-with-a-double-scoop-of-the-jurisdictional-dodge, I don't have a lot of faith in legislators (or lawyers) . . . I feel as if too much of the lives and money and time of "small people" have already been cruelly wasted . . . moreover, it would be very disheartening if this decision means that dirtbags like John Edwards and Mike Sleazely could walk.
Of course, when it comes to the prosecution of white-collar corruption cases in North Carolina, I am not certain that making things any more "specific" is going to help.
Because you see, my allegations against Randolph Hospital executives Robert Morrison and Steven Eblin could not be more specific . . . and the evidence (of a crime with NO statute of limitations) could not be more "in your face" . . . in the black & white of sworn discovery responses.
These men, executives of a "non-profit" and supposedly held to the highest standards of honesty, KNEW they were lying when they lied. And they ultimately benefited from the lies.
What's more, the very important (dare I say, "right") people in Asheboro who sat on the hospital's Board of Directors & Corporate Membership and who were supposed to oversee what these administrators were doing - and why they were doing it - KNOW that their executives lied.
We're talking about fine, upstanding, stellar "right people" like Mike Miller of First National Bank (OBTW, here's a real-time stock quote on the local institution he drove into the ground).
Miller's "mistakes and minor transgressions" are a real downer now for FNB's shareholders . . . people who flew high and in the other direction whilst I got pummeled for doing the right thing. Now, they're throwing fits and wanting answers because they got burned flying too close to Miller's sun. Money matters now, because it's their money.
But these people need to get in line . . . BEHIND the homegrown Pediatrician & former public servant who's been told for over a decade that her life and career did not matter . . . that demanding just compensation for the cluster-screw she endured in order to serve a cover-up was somehow base and unseemly . . . that what happened to her is "irrelevant" . . . to "get over it" . . . and to "move on".
But let's face it. Honest service does not matter - to ANYBODY - particularly not those who are charged with protecting the "small" and the "ordinary" people.
And I just don't get it. What does it take?
That's A Nobel "Crazed Sex Poodle" To You Sweetheart
Somewhere, safe from civil sex-tape subpoenas in the solitude of a gated community in Hillsborough, Johnny Reid Edwards must be seething at the unfairness of it all.
Back in 2006, the DA didn't take the case very seriously (that pesky "prosecutorial discretion" again). A newspaper did not report.
And in 2007, noble Albert "Crazed Sex Poodle" Gore won the Nobel Prize.
Life just aint' fair.
Back in 2006, the DA didn't take the case very seriously (that pesky "prosecutorial discretion" again). A newspaper did not report.
And in 2007, noble Albert "Crazed Sex Poodle" Gore won the Nobel Prize.
Life just aint' fair.
More On Elaine Marshall For U.S. Senate - And Other Stuff
I'm kinda free-associating this morning.
In these days of citizen journalism, often-times the best part of a newspaper story is not the story that the paper prints but what readers say in the comments on the story. The following delicious comment (posted by someone going by the moniker of NANA SIX) was in the thread of yesterday's N&O story on Elaine Marshall's U.S. Senate primary victory . . . and it pretty much sums up my experience with the North Carolina Secretary of State's track record of policing non-profits.
In short, there IS no policing (I have corrected the mere ordinary person's spelling lest the "fact-checkers" pounce):
Elaine Marshall has cost our state millions of dollars in lost revenue as a result of her total neglect and dereliction of duty in handling state records. In thousands of cases, she has done nothing since taking office 13 yrs ago. I've stayed on their back for months now, when they send a notice it's usually for the wrong number of reports due the state. She has literally destroyed state records. If you doubt me, go to her website and check out a few corporations . . . many are shown as current & active, when they are many years in default. This is fraudulent reporting that could put our state in a very liable position. She allows out of state corporations to go years without filing on their Certificate of Authority, with several having been revoked or Adm. dissolved in the state issuing the Certificate.
You cannot imagine the multitude of things she's done and the position she's put us in. She can't run a state office, we sure don't need her in DC making decisions that could affect everyone in the U.S. Please check this out . . . she is literally dangerous to every American Citizen.
You know, all that most of us "ordinary"/"small" people have wanted over the years is for the people who run our state and our country to play fair and enforce the rules for everybody (as opposed to letting "the right people" run wild) . . . and to BE rather than seem competent.
They don't/aren't. But every time they run for something, they tell us things are going to be different when they're on the job. They'll answer the letters. They'll take the calls. They'll do something when doing nothing has been the rule of the last decade.
It's old.
Like I said, I don't have much use for Richard Burr. But sending Marshall to Washington seems to me to be a lot like sending Obama to Washington:
Lightweights. And not the change so many had hoped for.
On a related "right people" note, Community One's stock dropped as low as 0.78 on NASDAQ yesterday. It's penny stock, people.
It never ceases to amaze me that all the right people lecturing us on what is wrong with Asheboro are the same people who steered the place into the toilet in the first place.
But we're supposed to keep hanging on their every word . . . believing everything they say . . . acknowledging that they know best . . . despite the fact that many of them lied and cheated and stole to get their way (or craned their necks looking the other way while the lying and cheating went on), and have not been held accountable in ANY fashion by people like Elaine Marshall (and Bev Perdue and Roy Cooper and Richard Burr and Kay Hagan and all of the other politicos who were going to finally fairly represent you and me).
OBTW, the half-assed cap is off and oil keeps gushing into the Gulf. Wouldn't it have been nice if someone in government had enforced the rules BEFORE the rig blew?
In these days of citizen journalism, often-times the best part of a newspaper story is not the story that the paper prints but what readers say in the comments on the story. The following delicious comment (posted by someone going by the moniker of NANA SIX) was in the thread of yesterday's N&O story on Elaine Marshall's U.S. Senate primary victory . . . and it pretty much sums up my experience with the North Carolina Secretary of State's track record of policing non-profits.
In short, there IS no policing (I have corrected the mere ordinary person's spelling lest the "fact-checkers" pounce):
Elaine Marshall has cost our state millions of dollars in lost revenue as a result of her total neglect and dereliction of duty in handling state records. In thousands of cases, she has done nothing since taking office 13 yrs ago. I've stayed on their back for months now, when they send a notice it's usually for the wrong number of reports due the state. She has literally destroyed state records. If you doubt me, go to her website and check out a few corporations . . . many are shown as current & active, when they are many years in default. This is fraudulent reporting that could put our state in a very liable position. She allows out of state corporations to go years without filing on their Certificate of Authority, with several having been revoked or Adm. dissolved in the state issuing the Certificate.
You cannot imagine the multitude of things she's done and the position she's put us in. She can't run a state office, we sure don't need her in DC making decisions that could affect everyone in the U.S. Please check this out . . . she is literally dangerous to every American Citizen.
You know, all that most of us "ordinary"/"small" people have wanted over the years is for the people who run our state and our country to play fair and enforce the rules for everybody (as opposed to letting "the right people" run wild) . . . and to BE rather than seem competent.
They don't/aren't. But every time they run for something, they tell us things are going to be different when they're on the job. They'll answer the letters. They'll take the calls. They'll do something when doing nothing has been the rule of the last decade.
It's old.
Like I said, I don't have much use for Richard Burr. But sending Marshall to Washington seems to me to be a lot like sending Obama to Washington:
Lightweights. And not the change so many had hoped for.
On a related "right people" note, Community One's stock dropped as low as 0.78 on NASDAQ yesterday. It's penny stock, people.
It never ceases to amaze me that all the right people lecturing us on what is wrong with Asheboro are the same people who steered the place into the toilet in the first place.
But we're supposed to keep hanging on their every word . . . believing everything they say . . . acknowledging that they know best . . . despite the fact that many of them lied and cheated and stole to get their way (or craned their necks looking the other way while the lying and cheating went on), and have not been held accountable in ANY fashion by people like Elaine Marshall (and Bev Perdue and Roy Cooper and Richard Burr and Kay Hagan and all of the other politicos who were going to finally fairly represent you and me).
OBTW, the half-assed cap is off and oil keeps gushing into the Gulf. Wouldn't it have been nice if someone in government had enforced the rules BEFORE the rig blew?
Wednesday, June 23, 2010
America's Orchestra: The Boston Pops
When I was a young girl, Sunday afternoon meant listening to Arthur Fiedler and the Boston Pops. My Pops, who also traveled for a living, had an album called "The Pops Goes Country" (which featured Chet Atkins) and he would listen to it while doing his "homework" and smoking his pipe (before he quit smoking). That old piece of vinyl was scratched and threadbare to the point it became almost unplayable.
Years later, I was very proud of myself when I found a pristine copy of the album (and its successor - neither of which were commercial or critical successes compared to other Pops albums) in an old record bin in a small town in western North Carolina. I had the tracks transferred to CD and gave them to Dad a couple of Christmases before he died. I have both the vinyls and the CD's now.
I still try to catch the Pops concert on TV every July 4th.
There was a nice bit tonight on UNC-TV . . . just finished up . . . on the history of the Boston Pops.
And it was just a nice way to end a long day.
Years later, I was very proud of myself when I found a pristine copy of the album (and its successor - neither of which were commercial or critical successes compared to other Pops albums) in an old record bin in a small town in western North Carolina. I had the tracks transferred to CD and gave them to Dad a couple of Christmases before he died. I have both the vinyls and the CD's now.
I still try to catch the Pops concert on TV every July 4th.
There was a nice bit tonight on UNC-TV . . . just finished up . . . on the history of the Boston Pops.
And it was just a nice way to end a long day.
On Elaine Marshall For U.S. Senate: More Of The Same
N.C. Secretary-of-State Elaine Marshall (D) will be running against Richard Burr (R) for his U.S. Senate seat in November.
Let me be clear that I have NO LOVE for Richard Burr.
The drooling N&O article heralding Marshall's victory had this to say: Marshall won her party's nomination by tapping into voter discontent with Washington and promising to be a voice for ordinary North Carolinians.
Sayeth this ordinary North Carolinian:
HOW MANY TIMES HAVE I HEARD THAT BEFORE? Hunt. Sleazely. Edwards. Perdue. Cooper.
As Secretary of State, Marshall has the DUTY to ensure that corporations (including "non-profits") are in compliance with the statutes governing their creation.
Yet SOMEHOW, when this "ordinary" North Carolinian reported to Marshall's office that two non-profit executives repeatedly lied under Oath in a court proceeding (in order to save themselves some money by defrauding said ordinary person), and PLEADED for help, NOTHING HAPPENED. Make no mistake that Marshall was a very good friend to this particular corporation.
There's not a "choice" here. Just more of the same.
Let me be clear that I have NO LOVE for Richard Burr.
The drooling N&O article heralding Marshall's victory had this to say: Marshall won her party's nomination by tapping into voter discontent with Washington and promising to be a voice for ordinary North Carolinians.
Sayeth this ordinary North Carolinian:
HOW MANY TIMES HAVE I HEARD THAT BEFORE? Hunt. Sleazely. Edwards. Perdue. Cooper.
As Secretary of State, Marshall has the DUTY to ensure that corporations (including "non-profits") are in compliance with the statutes governing their creation.
Yet SOMEHOW, when this "ordinary" North Carolinian reported to Marshall's office that two non-profit executives repeatedly lied under Oath in a court proceeding (in order to save themselves some money by defrauding said ordinary person), and PLEADED for help, NOTHING HAPPENED. Make no mistake that Marshall was a very good friend to this particular corporation.
There's not a "choice" here. Just more of the same.
Tuesday, June 22, 2010
Cease And Delist
Given the way I was treated by "the right people" when I came home to Asheboro and tried my damnedest to do the right thing by all of my patients (as opposed to just those fancying themselves VIP's), I would be lying (and contrary to the nasty legal tactic that made all the hometown headlines years ago courtesy of the Courier Tribune's David Renfro, I don't lie) if I said that it's not been SWEET to see what went around come around for some of them. While I am very sorry for all "the small people" getting caught in the crossfire, what's going on now is a larger, karmic kind of justice that kind of gives me hope.
"Community" stopped meaning something to many of these people a long time ago. Ergo, for being true to myself and my profession, I somehow got "delisted" and exiled from the town where I was raised for the horrible sin of saving a child's life.
I still marvel that it happened . . . especially that it was allowed to happen . . . by people who profess to be Christians. It also amazes me that pretty much to this day, no one cares . . . and that, when it comes to healthcare in Asheboro, the things that really need to be reformed have not been.
And/so, speaking of "Community", here is an article that is appearing more and more relevant with every passing day.
"Community" stopped meaning something to many of these people a long time ago. Ergo, for being true to myself and my profession, I somehow got "delisted" and exiled from the town where I was raised for the horrible sin of saving a child's life.
I still marvel that it happened . . . especially that it was allowed to happen . . . by people who profess to be Christians. It also amazes me that pretty much to this day, no one cares . . . and that, when it comes to healthcare in Asheboro, the things that really need to be reformed have not been.
And/so, speaking of "Community", here is an article that is appearing more and more relevant with every passing day.
Monday, June 21, 2010
Journalists Putting Words In People's Mouths: From NC Lawyers Weekly To The Greensboro N&R/Edward Cone
Ed Cone continues to be . . . well . . . Ed Cone.
Cone's column in this past Sunday's paper N&R sank to new levels of journalistic muck-racking when liberal/"progressive" Ed continued his not-subtle-at-all character assassination of fellow conservative blogger, Dr. Joe Guarino, AND put words in Nathan Tabor's mouth. Two birds. One stone. The proverbial blood of people-Ed-would-have-you-believe-are-INTOLERABLE-racists on the streets of Greensboro with the stroke of a pen.
Tabor had the audacity to contact the N&R and object to how Ed/the N&R presented their facts (how DARE he demand truth and reconcilliation!?!). Cone (of course) followed-up with a snarky post . . . attempting to justify his tactics with punctuation, labelling Tabor, "the eternal victim".
Hummmmmmm . . . now where have I heard THAT before?
Sayeth Ed Cone:
"The lack of quotation marks makes it clear that it's not a direct quote, and the parentheses indicate the specific insertion of the columnist's voice."
Newspapers, I'm told, maintain an 6-8th grade reading level. And I'm fairly certain that the average 6-8th grader/N&R reader would not pick up on the subtleties of "the columnists voice".
Moreover, I'm quite certain that, as a journalist, Edward Cone inserted his inflammatory accent knowing that most readers wouldn't make the distinction.
Now we're going to jump back a week to another set of journalists.
These journalists happen to be lawyers. And, as we've established, I have no use for most of them.
But I've in fairly good company. As noted in a previous post . . . on Asheboro's leaders cherry-picking scripture to justify healthcare reform) . . . even St. Luke (a Greek-speaking Syrian physician) had no use for lawyers (Luke 20:46-47):
"Beware of the teachers of the law . . . They devour your widows' houses . . . Such men will be punished severely."
Reiterating, even when Jesus Christ walked this earth over 2000 years ago, doctors hated lawyers.
That brings me to N.C. Lawyers Weekly.
A few weeks back, I blogged about my disgust with the North Carolina State Bar (after Nifong, the citizens of North Carolina really need to form a club or support group for people screwed by the lawyers that our state's chief legal eagles refuse to police) . . . and a recent North Carolina Court-of-Appeals ruling upholding a BOGUS disciplinary action against former judicial candidate, Rachel Hunter.
As you might recall, with all of the evil esquires walking about our state undisciplined for their crimes, Rachel was sanctioned by the North Carolina Bar for the horrible, awful sin of . . . hold on to your hats . . . using her longtime nickname/moniker, "Madame Justice" online during her campaign . . . as a (recognized/accepted) method of achieving name recognition.
Rachel not being born with a name like . . . say . . . Cone.
Rachel lost the election. So, even if you could make the case for misleading voters (again, incredibly stupid voters who probably would not pass the eighth grade) there's just NOTHING to go on in terms of "fraud". But losing the election was not enough for her enemies . . . among whom you can count Ed Cone (in Ed's world, you see, calling people with brain tumors "batshit crazy" makes you cool. It raises the dialogue and is something for the kids to be proud of).
The Bar's sanction of Rachel was based on anonymous complaints and the premise that North Carolina voters (that means you and me) are incredibly stupid and gullible . . . and that the moniker would mislead them into thinking she was already a Justice.
I pulled no punches in the post, and took no prisoners and make no apologies. It's crystal clear to me that Rachel has been singled-out for state-sanctioned, cowardly, blatantly un-Constitutional retaliation for having the audacity to challenge the good-ole-boys who run the North Carolina legal system. For Rachel Hunter threatened their status-quo.
The gutless, cowardly, unpublished opinion (meaning: it applies ONLY to Rachel!?!?!?) has gotten noticed . . . Lawyers Weekly featured the Appellate Court's pummeling of Rachel front-page/above the fold in both its online and print editions last week. In my humble opinion, the story was a shameless hatchet-job.
But the story did not stay front-page/above-the-fold (at least online) for very long. And there is a reason for that.
Lawyers Weekly, you see, is down-playing a mistake.
This is from the first paragraph of the story, written by Paul Tharp:
Hunter did not return calls for comment, but a post on her website - purportedly by Hunter - described the decision as, "the latest cowardly, two-faced, politically-motivated, flat-out WRONG decision handed down yesterday by the North Carolina Court of Appeals in the case of the N.C. State Bar vs. Rachel Hunter.
I feel reasonably comfortable quoting from the copyrighted, locked, password-protected article because the quote was NOT from Rachel Hunter but from me - and the aforementioned Housecalls post . . . which was featured on Rachel's website with my permission AND properly credited to me.
In other words, the so-called Lawyers Weekly journalist who lifted the quote, obviously did NOT delve into the story beyond a sound bit (in other words, they totally FAIL to recognize the ominous implications for free speech) . . . did not read the entire post . . . and did not bother to take the extra twenty seconds it would have taken to point, click and get the who of the matter right.
Reminds me of another journalist once affiliated with the N&R . . . who put words in a man's mouth and destroyed his life.
As soon as I heard about the story, I did my Nathan Tabor impersonation and placed a phone call to Lawyer's weekly - using my "columnist's voice" to complain about the newletter's sloppy work . . . and then followed up the conversation with an e-mail (which I am now putting on-the-record):
Ms. Mathis/Mr. Froom,
I wanted to follow-up my phone conversation of this morning with an e-mail.
As the author of online commentary incorrectly attributed by your reporter to Rachel Hunter (in your front-page LW/NC article on the appellate Court's ruling favoring the State Bar's actions against her), I must insist that the article be immediately corrected online - and the remarks your reported incorrectly attributed to Rachel credited to me/my blog (website address included) - NOT just deleted.
I also expect the correction in the print edition to be printed prominently (not on some back page), and to offer the web address of my blog.
Since you quoted someone who was not a lawyer, it would also be appropriate to "unlock" this story for the largely-kept-in-the-dark masses to link and read.
I can assure you that the opinion was entirely mine, and that I don't parrot anybody.
For the record, in my opinion, your article was horribly one-sided and only contributes to the opinion of myself/others (on the outside of the legal profession looking in) that the North Carolina Bar is beyond corrupt and carrying out some kind of sick/warped vendetta against Ms. Hunter. You yourself admitted that the reporter did not even bother to READ the entire Housecalls dissenting commentary posted on Hunter's website - which was properly credited to me and used with my permission.
That's just LAZY and totally unprofessional - by journalists covering lawyers - people who, one would think, would take extra special care to get it right.
While I do not agree with all of Rachel Hunter's political/personal opinions, the last time I looked, the United States still had a Constitution - and Free Speech is covered in Amendment Number One. I often go by the nickname of "Dr. J", but people don't assume I'm a basketball player. Rachel has taken enough slings and arrows for daring to stand up to the useless/worthless North Carolina State Bar. It's time the judicial system understood she's not going to stand alone.
I did not pull any punches in my commentary, and my remarks in support of her, if attributed incorrectly to her, could have very negative consequences.
Ergo, your publication's actions were negligent and careless in the extreme. It was very sloppy work.
Sincerely,
Mary H. Johnson, M.D. FAAP
http://www.drjshousecalls.blogspot.com/
This was Mr. Froom's response:
Dr. Johnson:
Again, thank you for bringing this matter to my attention.
We have already corrected the online version of the article, citing you as the author of the remarks that were ultimately re-posted on Rachel Hunter’s website. In addition, a correction will appear in the next print edition of North Carolina Lawyers Weekly. We usually print corrections within the first five pages of the paper. The correction will also go out at the top of tomorrow morning’s daily e-mail alert.
Please don’t hesitate to contact me or Tonya if you have further questions.
Best regards,
Gregory A. Froom, Esq.
Note how, in his response, Froom signs his name Esquire (translation, "That's Doctor of Law to you, sweetheart"). I think I'm supposed to be scared.
Cone's column in this past Sunday's paper N&R sank to new levels of journalistic muck-racking when liberal/"progressive" Ed continued his not-subtle-at-all character assassination of fellow conservative blogger, Dr. Joe Guarino, AND put words in Nathan Tabor's mouth. Two birds. One stone. The proverbial blood of people-Ed-would-have-you-believe-are-INTOLERABLE-racists on the streets of Greensboro with the stroke of a pen.
Tabor had the audacity to contact the N&R and object to how Ed/the N&R presented their facts (how DARE he demand truth and reconcilliation!?!). Cone (of course) followed-up with a snarky post . . . attempting to justify his tactics with punctuation, labelling Tabor, "the eternal victim".
Hummmmmmm . . . now where have I heard THAT before?
Sayeth Ed Cone:
"The lack of quotation marks makes it clear that it's not a direct quote, and the parentheses indicate the specific insertion of the columnist's voice."
Newspapers, I'm told, maintain an 6-8th grade reading level. And I'm fairly certain that the average 6-8th grader/N&R reader would not pick up on the subtleties of "the columnists voice".
Moreover, I'm quite certain that, as a journalist, Edward Cone inserted his inflammatory accent knowing that most readers wouldn't make the distinction.
Now we're going to jump back a week to another set of journalists.
These journalists happen to be lawyers. And, as we've established, I have no use for most of them.
But I've in fairly good company. As noted in a previous post . . . on Asheboro's leaders cherry-picking scripture to justify healthcare reform) . . . even St. Luke (a Greek-speaking Syrian physician) had no use for lawyers (Luke 20:46-47):
"Beware of the teachers of the law . . . They devour your widows' houses . . . Such men will be punished severely."
Reiterating, even when Jesus Christ walked this earth over 2000 years ago, doctors hated lawyers.
That brings me to N.C. Lawyers Weekly.
A few weeks back, I blogged about my disgust with the North Carolina State Bar (after Nifong, the citizens of North Carolina really need to form a club or support group for people screwed by the lawyers that our state's chief legal eagles refuse to police) . . . and a recent North Carolina Court-of-Appeals ruling upholding a BOGUS disciplinary action against former judicial candidate, Rachel Hunter.
As you might recall, with all of the evil esquires walking about our state undisciplined for their crimes, Rachel was sanctioned by the North Carolina Bar for the horrible, awful sin of . . . hold on to your hats . . . using her longtime nickname/moniker, "Madame Justice" online during her campaign . . . as a (recognized/accepted) method of achieving name recognition.
Rachel not being born with a name like . . . say . . . Cone.
Rachel lost the election. So, even if you could make the case for misleading voters (again, incredibly stupid voters who probably would not pass the eighth grade) there's just NOTHING to go on in terms of "fraud". But losing the election was not enough for her enemies . . . among whom you can count Ed Cone (in Ed's world, you see, calling people with brain tumors "batshit crazy" makes you cool. It raises the dialogue and is something for the kids to be proud of).
The Bar's sanction of Rachel was based on anonymous complaints and the premise that North Carolina voters (that means you and me) are incredibly stupid and gullible . . . and that the moniker would mislead them into thinking she was already a Justice.
I pulled no punches in the post, and took no prisoners and make no apologies. It's crystal clear to me that Rachel has been singled-out for state-sanctioned, cowardly, blatantly un-Constitutional retaliation for having the audacity to challenge the good-ole-boys who run the North Carolina legal system. For Rachel Hunter threatened their status-quo.
The gutless, cowardly, unpublished opinion (meaning: it applies ONLY to Rachel!?!?!?) has gotten noticed . . . Lawyers Weekly featured the Appellate Court's pummeling of Rachel front-page/above the fold in both its online and print editions last week. In my humble opinion, the story was a shameless hatchet-job.
But the story did not stay front-page/above-the-fold (at least online) for very long. And there is a reason for that.
Lawyers Weekly, you see, is down-playing a mistake.
This is from the first paragraph of the story, written by Paul Tharp:
Hunter did not return calls for comment, but a post on her website - purportedly by Hunter - described the decision as, "the latest cowardly, two-faced, politically-motivated, flat-out WRONG decision handed down yesterday by the North Carolina Court of Appeals in the case of the N.C. State Bar vs. Rachel Hunter.
I feel reasonably comfortable quoting from the copyrighted, locked, password-protected article because the quote was NOT from Rachel Hunter but from me - and the aforementioned Housecalls post . . . which was featured on Rachel's website with my permission AND properly credited to me.
In other words, the so-called Lawyers Weekly journalist who lifted the quote, obviously did NOT delve into the story beyond a sound bit (in other words, they totally FAIL to recognize the ominous implications for free speech) . . . did not read the entire post . . . and did not bother to take the extra twenty seconds it would have taken to point, click and get the who of the matter right.
Reminds me of another journalist once affiliated with the N&R . . . who put words in a man's mouth and destroyed his life.
As soon as I heard about the story, I did my Nathan Tabor impersonation and placed a phone call to Lawyer's weekly - using my "columnist's voice" to complain about the newletter's sloppy work . . . and then followed up the conversation with an e-mail (which I am now putting on-the-record):
Ms. Mathis/Mr. Froom,
I wanted to follow-up my phone conversation of this morning with an e-mail.
As the author of online commentary incorrectly attributed by your reporter to Rachel Hunter (in your front-page LW/NC article on the appellate Court's ruling favoring the State Bar's actions against her), I must insist that the article be immediately corrected online - and the remarks your reported incorrectly attributed to Rachel credited to me/my blog (website address included) - NOT just deleted.
I also expect the correction in the print edition to be printed prominently (not on some back page), and to offer the web address of my blog.
Since you quoted someone who was not a lawyer, it would also be appropriate to "unlock" this story for the largely-kept-in-the-dark masses to link and read.
I can assure you that the opinion was entirely mine, and that I don't parrot anybody.
For the record, in my opinion, your article was horribly one-sided and only contributes to the opinion of myself/others (on the outside of the legal profession looking in) that the North Carolina Bar is beyond corrupt and carrying out some kind of sick/warped vendetta against Ms. Hunter. You yourself admitted that the reporter did not even bother to READ the entire Housecalls dissenting commentary posted on Hunter's website - which was properly credited to me and used with my permission.
That's just LAZY and totally unprofessional - by journalists covering lawyers - people who, one would think, would take extra special care to get it right.
While I do not agree with all of Rachel Hunter's political/personal opinions, the last time I looked, the United States still had a Constitution - and Free Speech is covered in Amendment Number One. I often go by the nickname of "Dr. J", but people don't assume I'm a basketball player. Rachel has taken enough slings and arrows for daring to stand up to the useless/worthless North Carolina State Bar. It's time the judicial system understood she's not going to stand alone.
I did not pull any punches in my commentary, and my remarks in support of her, if attributed incorrectly to her, could have very negative consequences.
Ergo, your publication's actions were negligent and careless in the extreme. It was very sloppy work.
Sincerely,
Mary H. Johnson, M.D. FAAP
http://www.drjshousecalls.blogspot.com/
This was Mr. Froom's response:
Dr. Johnson:
Again, thank you for bringing this matter to my attention.
We have already corrected the online version of the article, citing you as the author of the remarks that were ultimately re-posted on Rachel Hunter’s website. In addition, a correction will appear in the next print edition of North Carolina Lawyers Weekly. We usually print corrections within the first five pages of the paper. The correction will also go out at the top of tomorrow morning’s daily e-mail alert.
Please don’t hesitate to contact me or Tonya if you have further questions.
Best regards,
Gregory A. Froom, Esq.
Note how, in his response, Froom signs his name Esquire (translation, "That's Doctor of Law to you, sweetheart"). I think I'm supposed to be scared.
A Correction was issued via e-mail alert to Lawyers Weekly subscribers the next day:
- CORRECTION -
An article on page 1 of the June 14, 2010, issue of North Carolina Lawyers Weekly entitled “Court upholds reprimand of ‘Madame Justice’” incorrectly attributed to Rachel Lea Hunter the text of a post on Hunter’s website. The comments cited in the article were actually re-posted on www.rachelforjustice.com after first appearing on Dr. Mary Johnson’s blog, http://drjshousecalls.blogspot.com/. Johnson - not Hunter - wrote the comments.
As I perused yet another post today (at Joe's) that details how Doctors of Law are screwing-over the world, I'm beginning to wonder if lawyers are all members of this organization.
A friend told me that I should be honored that a non-physician's opinion (talking back to the NC Appellate Court) was featured so prominently in a newsletter read by lawyers all over the state. His tongue was very firmly in his cheek.
You don't have to put words in my mouth there: Not so much.
I'd be far happier if the multiple lawyers who screwed me over in my case got a small portion of the discipline meted out to Rachel Hunter for her comparatively INSIGNIFICANT offense (if you can even call it that).
Sunday, June 20, 2010
Missing Pops
Father's Day ain't what it used to be. I recently commiserated with my good-friend-blessed-with-the-very-old-"right"-Asheboro-name.
This morning, this was in my Inbox . . . word-for-word, no edits.
I lost my father almost 30 years ago, exactly that come next March. My wife lost her father a little over 20 years ago, just a few months after her youngest was born. And, you are also a member of this club. I don't readily extend a welcome, it is a dubious membership.
For every third Sunday in June since 1981, I've had to realize that I have no one to call, no card to buy, no gift to purchase. There never was anyone that became a father figure to me, so all those cards that Hallmark makes for our diverse family arrangements are wasted. It became so much just another Sunday.
But, this year I got a phone call from a young Marine boarding a landing craft heading out to join the USS Wasp anchored off of Morehead City for a routine training exercise in Canada. This phone call wasn't much, we discussed the usual things that men discuss, but at the end, he said, "I just wanted to call and say Happy Father's Day, I didn't get a chance to get a card, and I'm having to get ready to board, but I wanted to tell you before I got out to sea".
And now Father's Day is a bit more for me than it has been. I suddenly see things differently. Those fathers that live among us, they live for now, but those that lived among us, they live forever in our hearts.
Happy Father's Day Doctor Johnson. My hope for you today is that it brings back the very best of times, and comforting memories. Just because our fathers don't walk among us doesn't mean that they aren't with us.
This morning, this was in my Inbox . . . word-for-word, no edits.
I lost my father almost 30 years ago, exactly that come next March. My wife lost her father a little over 20 years ago, just a few months after her youngest was born. And, you are also a member of this club. I don't readily extend a welcome, it is a dubious membership.
For every third Sunday in June since 1981, I've had to realize that I have no one to call, no card to buy, no gift to purchase. There never was anyone that became a father figure to me, so all those cards that Hallmark makes for our diverse family arrangements are wasted. It became so much just another Sunday.
But, this year I got a phone call from a young Marine boarding a landing craft heading out to join the USS Wasp anchored off of Morehead City for a routine training exercise in Canada. This phone call wasn't much, we discussed the usual things that men discuss, but at the end, he said, "I just wanted to call and say Happy Father's Day, I didn't get a chance to get a card, and I'm having to get ready to board, but I wanted to tell you before I got out to sea".
And now Father's Day is a bit more for me than it has been. I suddenly see things differently. Those fathers that live among us, they live for now, but those that lived among us, they live forever in our hearts.
Happy Father's Day Doctor Johnson. My hope for you today is that it brings back the very best of times, and comforting memories. Just because our fathers don't walk among us doesn't mean that they aren't with us.
"That Thing Could Really Tow The-Boat-I-Don't-Own Up The-Mountain-I-Don't-Live-Near"
Yesterday, as we compared the non-existent gas mileages of our respective trucks, I tried to tell my brother about this Jon Stewart clip, but much was lost in translation.
So here it is:
So here it is:
| The Daily Show With Jon Stewart | Mon - Thurs 11p / 10c | |||
| An Energy-Independent Future | ||||
| ||||
Wednesday, June 16, 2010
Thoughts On The HealthCare Forum In Asheboro That I Did Not Attend: Leviticus And Luke
My "ex" begged me to go. He pleaded - just for the sheer entertainment value of watching blood pressures rise. But for a world of reasons, it just seemed like sorting my sock drawer might be better use of my time (it's an inside joke).
Anyway, afterwards I got a report. And it was much more in-depth report than was offered by Bob Williams/The Courier Tribune.
But before I even get started on that, there is a scene from the TV series West Wing that underlines my great respect for anyone who knows - really knows - their Bible . . . especially what we Christians call the Old Testament.
Such people are not to be trifled with.
(Can I just say again that Martin Sheen is an AMAZING actor?)
And the reason I bring that up is because the speaker at Bob's forum cherry-picked a passage from Leviticus (23:22) to back up the need for healthcare reform, Obama style.
"When you reap the harvest of your land, do not reap to the very edges of your field or gather the gleanings of your harvest. Leave them for the poor and the alien. I am the LORD your God."
That immediately brought back memories of sacred assemblies.
I read Bob William's "story" in the Courier Tribune the following morning and it was hard not to choke on the uber-delicious-homemade-chocolate-cupcake-left-over-from-a-First-Baptist-function-my-Mama-gave-me that I was having with my morning coffee.
(Did I mention the cupcake was uber-delicious? Those Baptist church-ladies can cook!)
I saw nothing about Leviticus in William's piece. I did see a lot of clap-trap about leveraging community spirit and leaders demanding data (presumably from the past we're supposed to "move on" along from) in order to transform our way to a brighter future.
Yeah right. The data might be "available". But like Bob & "the right people" (you know the ones who put Asheboro on life support in the first place) are EVER going to do that.
(Wait. Spirits? Transformation? I thought that's what the booze was for!?!)
For the reader's edification, I'm linking a site that posts lots of Biblical goodies on our responsibilities to the poor from Leviticus . . . and Exodus . . . and Deuteronomy . . . and Isaiah . . . and Psalms . . . and Proverbs . . . and Ezekiel . . . and Jeremiah . . . well, you get the drift.
It even crosses over into the New Testament.
There's a lot to think about. Some of it downright contradictory and confusing. God doesn't make it easy.
I particularly like this New Testament verse (Luke 20:46-47):
"Beware of the teachers of the law . . . They devour your widows' houses . . . Such men will be punished severely."
Luke was a physician, you know;)
And/so it's just amazing to me. Even when Jesus Christ walked this earth over 2000 years ago, doctors hated lawyers.
Alas, I'm still waiting for Luke's promise to be fulfilled. Meanwhile, on temporary furlough from tending to the poor & under-served down East (instead of in my hometown) . . . the folks down East (and the institution that currently signs my checks) taking care of the poor so much better than anyone in the Piedmont, I'm sorting socks on the sidelines of a debate that I've lived for twelve years and watch the local bumpkin newspaper force-feed the gullible-purposely-kept-in-the-dark-mill-town-masses the "wisdom" of the very men who devoured my house parading themselves as examples of stalwart community leadership and virtue.
Since we're quoting, here's another passage from Leviticus (19:15) I like:
"Do not pervert justice; do not show partiality to the poor or favoritism to the great, but judge your neighbor fairly."
Call me "scary" but I think that probably precludes lying under Oath in Court proceeding.
I digress. The thing about all of those Bible verses is that I was under the impression that God was speaking through the writers to individuals and/or churches, not earthly governments. And we're to ponder these things in our hearts and make use of them in our daily lives.
Faith, hope, love, charity . . . it's all there.
And I'm thinking what a much nicer/safer/cleaner world we would have if everyone (including the poor) just listened to God . . . and paid heed to his instructions for a good/meaningful/productive life . . . instead of indulging their every impulse and shirking even their most basic responsibilities as human beings and citizens.
Having given it quite a bit of thought, I'm also thinking that governments are for governing . . . and taking care of the really big picture . . . not being everyone's sugar-Daddy when our inalienable (dare I say God-given?) right to pursue happiness does not make us happy.
What I'm saying is (in a very big picture way), how's about we NOT change the rules? How's about we actually play by the ones we've had for centuries . . . rules literally carved in stone?
And how's about we CAN some of the over-paid/over-rated community "leaders" who spat on the rules for their own gain/selfish ends (instead of giving them more print-love in the newspaper)?
So, with regards to the use of Leviticus in the context of Bob Morrison's healthcare forum, let me share with you an e-mail exchange between a good friend-formerly-of-Asheboro-born-with-a-really-good-old-Asheboro-name and myself the day after the forum and the "reporting" of it:
Mary . . . seriously . . . after reading today's Housecalls . . . does Asheboro even have a newspaper? Really, I mean they ran an article that said absolutely nothing new, or relevant, or that hasn't already been trotted out a dozen times across the country in various other venues.
How do they stay in business? I'm stunned. I can only surmise that used car advertising is their bread and butter.
An (edited/expounded upon) excerpt from my response:
It never ceases to amaze how the government will kick God out of the schools and the Courtrooms, but when you want to justify a fiscally-stupid/thoughtless/irresponsible/fundamentally-unjust social policy, let's pull out the Old Testament.
I'd like to bring this post to a close with an observation from someone else who was there (paraphrasing and removing expletives . . . Why IS it that Randolph County drives so many people to curse and spit?):
Based on the way they've behaved as community leaders - and treated/used good folks, some of the people on that podium probably have never picked up a Bible as anything more than a prop.
Yep. That brings back a memory too . . . from back in the RMA days . . . when Bob & Steve wanted to offer incentives to physicians for going to church (community involvement brings in the bacon, dontchaknow).
And those, ladies & gents, are my thoughts on Leviticus and Luke and Bob Morrison's healthcare forum (or, as I like to call it, "a meeting of Asheboro's ignorant tight-ass club" - with no offense intended to those who attended the event as opposed to sitting on its panel).
I have several stories to tell this week. But I must pace myself.
You-all have a nice day.
Anyway, afterwards I got a report. And it was much more in-depth report than was offered by Bob Williams/The Courier Tribune.
But before I even get started on that, there is a scene from the TV series West Wing that underlines my great respect for anyone who knows - really knows - their Bible . . . especially what we Christians call the Old Testament.
Such people are not to be trifled with.
(Can I just say again that Martin Sheen is an AMAZING actor?)
And the reason I bring that up is because the speaker at Bob's forum cherry-picked a passage from Leviticus (23:22) to back up the need for healthcare reform, Obama style.
"When you reap the harvest of your land, do not reap to the very edges of your field or gather the gleanings of your harvest. Leave them for the poor and the alien. I am the LORD your God."
That immediately brought back memories of sacred assemblies.
I read Bob William's "story" in the Courier Tribune the following morning and it was hard not to choke on the uber-delicious-homemade-chocolate-cupcake-left-over-from-a-First-Baptist-function-my-Mama-gave-me that I was having with my morning coffee.
(Did I mention the cupcake was uber-delicious? Those Baptist church-ladies can cook!)
I saw nothing about Leviticus in William's piece. I did see a lot of clap-trap about leveraging community spirit and leaders demanding data (presumably from the past we're supposed to "move on" along from) in order to transform our way to a brighter future.
Yeah right. The data might be "available". But like Bob & "the right people" (you know the ones who put Asheboro on life support in the first place) are EVER going to do that.
(Wait. Spirits? Transformation? I thought that's what the booze was for!?!)
For the reader's edification, I'm linking a site that posts lots of Biblical goodies on our responsibilities to the poor from Leviticus . . . and Exodus . . . and Deuteronomy . . . and Isaiah . . . and Psalms . . . and Proverbs . . . and Ezekiel . . . and Jeremiah . . . well, you get the drift.
It even crosses over into the New Testament.
There's a lot to think about. Some of it downright contradictory and confusing. God doesn't make it easy.
I particularly like this New Testament verse (Luke 20:46-47):
"Beware of the teachers of the law . . . They devour your widows' houses . . . Such men will be punished severely."
Luke was a physician, you know;)
And/so it's just amazing to me. Even when Jesus Christ walked this earth over 2000 years ago, doctors hated lawyers.
Alas, I'm still waiting for Luke's promise to be fulfilled. Meanwhile, on temporary furlough from tending to the poor & under-served down East (instead of in my hometown) . . . the folks down East (and the institution that currently signs my checks) taking care of the poor so much better than anyone in the Piedmont, I'm sorting socks on the sidelines of a debate that I've lived for twelve years and watch the local bumpkin newspaper force-feed the gullible-purposely-kept-in-the-dark-mill-town-masses the "wisdom" of the very men who devoured my house parading themselves as examples of stalwart community leadership and virtue.
Since we're quoting, here's another passage from Leviticus (19:15) I like:
"Do not pervert justice; do not show partiality to the poor or favoritism to the great, but judge your neighbor fairly."
Call me "scary" but I think that probably precludes lying under Oath in Court proceeding.
I digress. The thing about all of those Bible verses is that I was under the impression that God was speaking through the writers to individuals and/or churches, not earthly governments. And we're to ponder these things in our hearts and make use of them in our daily lives.
Faith, hope, love, charity . . . it's all there.
And I'm thinking what a much nicer/safer/cleaner world we would have if everyone (including the poor) just listened to God . . . and paid heed to his instructions for a good/meaningful/productive life . . . instead of indulging their every impulse and shirking even their most basic responsibilities as human beings and citizens.
Having given it quite a bit of thought, I'm also thinking that governments are for governing . . . and taking care of the really big picture . . . not being everyone's sugar-Daddy when our inalienable (dare I say God-given?) right to pursue happiness does not make us happy.
What I'm saying is (in a very big picture way), how's about we NOT change the rules? How's about we actually play by the ones we've had for centuries . . . rules literally carved in stone?
And how's about we CAN some of the over-paid/over-rated community "leaders" who spat on the rules for their own gain/selfish ends (instead of giving them more print-love in the newspaper)?
So, with regards to the use of Leviticus in the context of Bob Morrison's healthcare forum, let me share with you an e-mail exchange between a good friend-formerly-of-Asheboro-born-with-a-really-good-old-Asheboro-name and myself the day after the forum and the "reporting" of it:
Mary . . . seriously . . . after reading today's Housecalls . . . does Asheboro even have a newspaper? Really, I mean they ran an article that said absolutely nothing new, or relevant, or that hasn't already been trotted out a dozen times across the country in various other venues.
How do they stay in business? I'm stunned. I can only surmise that used car advertising is their bread and butter.
An (edited/expounded upon) excerpt from my response:
It never ceases to amaze how the government will kick God out of the schools and the Courtrooms, but when you want to justify a fiscally-stupid/thoughtless/irresponsible/fundamentally-unjust social policy, let's pull out the Old Testament.
I'd like to bring this post to a close with an observation from someone else who was there (paraphrasing and removing expletives . . . Why IS it that Randolph County drives so many people to curse and spit?):
Based on the way they've behaved as community leaders - and treated/used good folks, some of the people on that podium probably have never picked up a Bible as anything more than a prop.
Yep. That brings back a memory too . . . from back in the RMA days . . . when Bob & Steve wanted to offer incentives to physicians for going to church (community involvement brings in the bacon, dontchaknow).
And those, ladies & gents, are my thoughts on Leviticus and Luke and Bob Morrison's healthcare forum (or, as I like to call it, "a meeting of Asheboro's ignorant tight-ass club" - with no offense intended to those who attended the event as opposed to sitting on its panel).
I have several stories to tell this week. But I must pace myself.
You-all have a nice day.
Tuesday, June 15, 2010
Grand Rounds Is Up: Our Hearts Take A Licking And Keep On Ticking
Apparently, my "intense dislike" of lawyers is not cause for alarm or considered in-ANY-way pathologic in the medical blogosphere.
Indeed, I am among friends.
My post, "I HATE LAWYERS (Subtitled: A Physician's Lament)" was featured on Grand Rounds today, courtesy of Steve, at "Adventures of a Funky Heart".
Indeed, I am among friends.
My post, "I HATE LAWYERS (Subtitled: A Physician's Lament)" was featured on Grand Rounds today, courtesy of Steve, at "Adventures of a Funky Heart".
But Not Today
Yesterday was a day. So will today be. There are stories to tell (lazy, irresponsible North Carolina lawyers & journalists figure prominently) . . . and a yet another opportunity to verbally-eviscerate the CEO of Randolph Hospital . . . for when it comes to pure, triple-distilled hypocrisy, Bob Morrison really needs to start bottling it. He'd make more money at it that trying to scrape the last dollar off the top of Medicare.
For those who are wondering, it was indeed a day. And at the end of the day, I decided that the best way to "win" with Morrison's much ballyhooed healthcare forum was not to play (particularly when the deck was stacked). On the other hand, the "ex" went, and his observations on the players and the tactics really do say it all.
Let's just say the drooling Courier Tribune didn't trouble themselves with too many details. But then again, much like Bob's triple-distilled hypocrisy, telling about 1/3 of the story is their own unique brand.
The stories won't be told today. But they will be told.
For those who are wondering, it was indeed a day. And at the end of the day, I decided that the best way to "win" with Morrison's much ballyhooed healthcare forum was not to play (particularly when the deck was stacked). On the other hand, the "ex" went, and his observations on the players and the tactics really do say it all.
Let's just say the drooling Courier Tribune didn't trouble themselves with too many details. But then again, much like Bob's triple-distilled hypocrisy, telling about 1/3 of the story is their own unique brand.
The stories won't be told today. But they will be told.
Monday, June 14, 2010
Bob Etheridge: Who Are You?
Wanna go viral on the Internet? Like I said, grab a video camera (or in this case, the guy whose friend is holding the camera) and act like an ass.
Who are you? Who are you? Tell me who you are. Tell me who you are.
Etheridge REALLY wanted to know.
Who are you? Who are you? Tell me who you are. Tell me who you are.
Etheridge REALLY wanted to know.
Extra, Extra, Read All About It (A Decade Too Late): How Healthy Is Your Bank . . . Hospital . . . Town?
One of the purposes of this blog is to speak truth-to-power in Asheboro - because virtually no one else does (well, except Ed Hyder;). And if they do, it's most certainly not going to be covered by Ray Criscoe and the Courier Tribune.
The friend who woke me up at an un-Godly hour last week to dish on Mike Miller's dancing skills sent me an e-mail yesterday morning. He had almost called me at 5:30 (AM) to tell me about the Greensboro N&R's latest article on the health of local banks.
(Who gets up that early on a Sunday morning when they don't have to?)
But my pal thought better of waking me up. When I am home and off-the-clock, NO ONE wakes me up at 5:30 AM . . . not even the grey tabby for whom I butler the house.
I actually went out and bought this paper. I know I took a vow against it, but I could not, in good conscience, ask my ex . . . who bought both a copy of the Courier and N&R earlier in the week (so I could have new pictures for pinning on the somehow-still-eerily-intact-16-year-old New Orleans voodoo doll) . . . to shill out any more chump-change on these rags. I wanted a hard copy if only for its value as a souvenir . . . and to wallow in the ambiance of "I told you people fricking so."
Meanwhile, the journalists, who also gave us Obama, and have ignored/banned our voices as we're supposed to crane our necks to hear theirs, STILL have their noses smugly stuck up in the air (really, Ed, five years after all of the hype & hoopla over "citizen journalism" this comment was TOO MUCH) and cannot understand why their newspapers are dying.
They let these people KILL us. In our system of checks and balances, the failure of the press is the biggest failure of all.
And we're supposed to say, "No biggie . . . Bygones . . . Thank you sir/ma'am, please, may I have some MORE? I'll even PAY for it!"
???
My greatest comfort in watching this from the firm foundation of "wrong peopledom" is that, despite all the cushion he's getting from his old friends, Mike Miller (like the Sleazelys and the Edwardses) is now going to have a small taste of what he sat back and allowed to be dished out to others . . .
. . . the only difference is that he will be the town pariah for good/true/just reason.
OBTW, speaking of local stories/bloggers the Courier and N&R have determinedly ignored, Mike Baron is still pounding away on his keyboard over at DamScam.
The friend who woke me up at an un-Godly hour last week to dish on Mike Miller's dancing skills sent me an e-mail yesterday morning. He had almost called me at 5:30 (AM) to tell me about the Greensboro N&R's latest article on the health of local banks.
(Who gets up that early on a Sunday morning when they don't have to?)
But my pal thought better of waking me up. When I am home and off-the-clock, NO ONE wakes me up at 5:30 AM . . . not even the grey tabby for whom I butler the house.
I actually went out and bought this paper. I know I took a vow against it, but I could not, in good conscience, ask my ex . . . who bought both a copy of the Courier and N&R earlier in the week (so I could have new pictures for pinning on the somehow-still-eerily-intact-16-year-old New Orleans voodoo doll) . . . to shill out any more chump-change on these rags. I wanted a hard copy if only for its value as a souvenir . . . and to wallow in the ambiance of "I told you people fricking so."
The numbers of it all made my eyes pop out of my head in disbelief. Let's just say that neither of us thinks Asheboro's Community One (formerly First National Bank) is very healthy.
Of course, I stopped banking at FNB long ago . . . after so many of Asheboro's "right people" put me on their crap list for standing up to the "non-profit" executives they were in-no-way over-seeing and saving a child's life . . .
. . . in very clear hindsight, ethics and common sense/deceny clearly not being high on their list of priorities.
It never ceases to amaze me how the Courier Tribune, in particular, CONTINUES to suck-up to, promote and shield/protect the people whose finely-honed business skills, reactionary & trend-chasing tactics, and in some cases, SHEER SELFISH EVIL literally put Asheboro on life support . . . the Mike Millers and the Bob Morrisons and the Keith Crisco's and David & Bonnie Renfros of this world.
No. In this particular wacked-out portion of the universe, they're "retired" and hosting healthcare "reform" seminars and now running the state into the ground (as opposed to just the mill town that all my friends say I've wasted too much time caring too much about).Meanwhile, the journalists, who also gave us Obama, and have ignored/banned our voices as we're supposed to crane our necks to hear theirs, STILL have their noses smugly stuck up in the air (really, Ed, five years after all of the hype & hoopla over "citizen journalism" this comment was TOO MUCH) and cannot understand why their newspapers are dying.
They let these people KILL us. In our system of checks and balances, the failure of the press is the biggest failure of all.
And we're supposed to say, "No biggie . . . Bygones . . . Thank you sir/ma'am, please, may I have some MORE? I'll even PAY for it!"
???
My greatest comfort in watching this from the firm foundation of "wrong peopledom" is that, despite all the cushion he's getting from his old friends, Mike Miller (like the Sleazelys and the Edwardses) is now going to have a small taste of what he sat back and allowed to be dished out to others . . .
. . . the only difference is that he will be the town pariah for good/true/just reason.
OBTW, speaking of local stories/bloggers the Courier and N&R have determinedly ignored, Mike Baron is still pounding away on his keyboard over at DamScam.
Sunday, June 13, 2010
UNC-TV: You Had Me At Calypso
I haven't donated to UNC-TV in years - not since practicing in Asheboro.
One of the great regrets of my life is not ever having seen John Denver live in concert. My Aunt, Mother of Bill, did once . . . it was an aniversary gift from her husband. She still talks about it with stars in her eyes . . . it was truly a magical evening.
Tonight, UNC-TV featured Denver in concert in Japan back in the eighties. It was while he was still young and before his troubles. He sang with such pure joy. And it was like magic - taking me back to another time and place - a time when I believed. Toward the end of the concert, tears were streaming down my face.
And UNC got me at Calypso. I'll get a CD/DVD set.
More tears.
One of the great regrets of my life is not ever having seen John Denver live in concert. My Aunt, Mother of Bill, did once . . . it was an aniversary gift from her husband. She still talks about it with stars in her eyes . . . it was truly a magical evening.
Tonight, UNC-TV featured Denver in concert in Japan back in the eighties. It was while he was still young and before his troubles. He sang with such pure joy. And it was like magic - taking me back to another time and place - a time when I believed. Toward the end of the concert, tears were streaming down my face.
And UNC got me at Calypso. I'll get a CD/DVD set.
More tears.
"Weighing In" On Greensboro's Most Recent Public Demonstration Of Inglorious Stupidity
It is bemusing to me how so many bloggers in Greensboro wait for Ed Cone to weigh in on something. And when he does weigh in, he says nothing at all.
He's left many of us wanting more for years. And not in a good way. So I'm thinking that we've got to stop giving Cone so much credit. There is a point that being among the first to do something doesn't matter if you do nothing at all with it.
The several-day Greensboro "Blagosphere" mud-fight that has ensued from two morons (one white & conservative and one black & liberal) pushing & slugging it out at a political protest last week (with most of the participants in the ethereal mud-fight weighing in predictably) is exasperating and almost sad to me.
I just got an e-vite to a rally in support of Mr. Tabor. Forgive me if I pass. I'm tired of being the punching bag.
But the bright note is that there is one point upon which almost everybody can agree (and that's progress in this ether). The only way to get local press attention is to grab a video camera and act like an ass . . . and even then, the News & Record isn't going to touch it until it's been plastered all over YouTube and debated on Fox News.
(Moreover, even when you act like an ass . . . and break the law . . . and give interviews to the press expounding on how much of an asshole you were/are . . . because being an ass is your "hobby" and your "right". . . you'll be found "not guilty" because the other party somehow deserved the punches you threw.)
On a semi-related note, there was a post a at Kevin's this week . . . featuring an essay in Newsweek . . . authored by a Pediatrician (Dr. Karen Li) who, frustrated with "bureaucratic impediments" and low reimbursement, left Pediatrics forever.
Forever. Think of what a WASTE that is.
I could not help but note the irony. Because for over five years . . . as a home-grown-Pediatrician-done-way-beyond-wrong-in-Asheboro-by-people-who-now-have-the-unmitigated-nerve-to-host-forums-on-healthcare-"reform" . . . as someone still practicing Pediatrics AND fighting for some resemblance of "justice" in her spare time . . . I have begged and pleaded with the journalists in the Greensboro blogosphere (an area of the country where "citizen journalism" was supposedly going to be "relevant" and make a real difference) for some substantive/real help in dealing with/exposing "bureaucratic impediments" that make Dr. Li's troubles look like a walk in the park on a cool & breezy spring day.
(Please remember folks, that there is a REASON I hate lawyers.)
But Dr. Li quits and immediately has an essay in Newsweek.
???
So, I asked an honest question at Kevin's . . . "What the hell does it take?". It's a question I've asked of Cone . . . and Robinson . . . and others.
An interesting back-&-forth ensued . . . including some of the same "arguments" I've heard before . . . and some very kind words (nice, for a change). But I still don't have an answer.
Well, actually I do. A friend of mine (talking about "justice" and journalism in Asheboro and Greensboro) said fairly recently (I'm paraphrasing from memory), "Mary, with this bunch of inbred jerk-offs & "right-people", you could slit your wrists in protest on the Courthouse steps with the original documents proving Randolph Hospital executives' crimes pinned to your shirt over your heart as the blood seeped out of its chambers . . . but law enforcement would hold their posts scanning suits for shanks just inside the Courthouse's air-conditioned doors . . . and the journalists would back their vans over your body on the way to interview the next poor-pitiful-victimized crack-head-and/or-crazy-woman-with-eight-babies-courtesy-of-seven-fathers who can't afford to feed them (and wants you to pay for their medical care & build her a house while you do) . . . or the dancing local bank President who "retired" after turning good stock into pennies . . .
. . . Oh, and the bloggers would tell your still warm corpse to start your own blog and/or tell it to Jerry Bledsoe."
While my opinion might not be nearly as important as Mr. Cone's, I "weighed in" at Joe's this morning on the latest demonstration of what I like to call "inglorious stupidity" in Greensboro:
You know (with no offense intended to anyone here) . . . it blows my mind . . . it really does . . . that two IDIOTS getting into a shoving match on a city street (again, where were the Greensboro police?) . . . one of them STUPID enough to throw a punch on camera . . . can generate this much intense/pointles debate/analysis and wailing/gnashing of teeth.
It's just inglorious stupidity, people.
And while you-all fight over two moron's "right" to act like assholes in public, you're one Pediatrician down, going for two.
Like I said, I'm gonna skip the rally.
He's left many of us wanting more for years. And not in a good way. So I'm thinking that we've got to stop giving Cone so much credit. There is a point that being among the first to do something doesn't matter if you do nothing at all with it.
The several-day Greensboro "Blagosphere" mud-fight that has ensued from two morons (one white & conservative and one black & liberal) pushing & slugging it out at a political protest last week (with most of the participants in the ethereal mud-fight weighing in predictably) is exasperating and almost sad to me.
I just got an e-vite to a rally in support of Mr. Tabor. Forgive me if I pass. I'm tired of being the punching bag.
But the bright note is that there is one point upon which almost everybody can agree (and that's progress in this ether). The only way to get local press attention is to grab a video camera and act like an ass . . . and even then, the News & Record isn't going to touch it until it's been plastered all over YouTube and debated on Fox News.
(Moreover, even when you act like an ass . . . and break the law . . . and give interviews to the press expounding on how much of an asshole you were/are . . . because being an ass is your "hobby" and your "right". . . you'll be found "not guilty" because the other party somehow deserved the punches you threw.)
On a semi-related note, there was a post a at Kevin's this week . . . featuring an essay in Newsweek . . . authored by a Pediatrician (Dr. Karen Li) who, frustrated with "bureaucratic impediments" and low reimbursement, left Pediatrics forever.
Forever. Think of what a WASTE that is.
I could not help but note the irony. Because for over five years . . . as a home-grown-Pediatrician-done-way-beyond-wrong-in-Asheboro-by-people-who-now-have-the-unmitigated-nerve-to-host-forums-on-healthcare-"reform" . . . as someone still practicing Pediatrics AND fighting for some resemblance of "justice" in her spare time . . . I have begged and pleaded with the journalists in the Greensboro blogosphere (an area of the country where "citizen journalism" was supposedly going to be "relevant" and make a real difference) for some substantive/real help in dealing with/exposing "bureaucratic impediments" that make Dr. Li's troubles look like a walk in the park on a cool & breezy spring day.
(Please remember folks, that there is a REASON I hate lawyers.)
But Dr. Li quits and immediately has an essay in Newsweek.
???
So, I asked an honest question at Kevin's . . . "What the hell does it take?". It's a question I've asked of Cone . . . and Robinson . . . and others.
An interesting back-&-forth ensued . . . including some of the same "arguments" I've heard before . . . and some very kind words (nice, for a change). But I still don't have an answer.
Well, actually I do. A friend of mine (talking about "justice" and journalism in Asheboro and Greensboro) said fairly recently (I'm paraphrasing from memory), "Mary, with this bunch of inbred jerk-offs & "right-people", you could slit your wrists in protest on the Courthouse steps with the original documents proving Randolph Hospital executives' crimes pinned to your shirt over your heart as the blood seeped out of its chambers . . . but law enforcement would hold their posts scanning suits for shanks just inside the Courthouse's air-conditioned doors . . . and the journalists would back their vans over your body on the way to interview the next poor-pitiful-victimized crack-head-and/or-crazy-woman-with-eight-babies-courtesy-of-seven-fathers who can't afford to feed them (and wants you to pay for their medical care & build her a house while you do) . . . or the dancing local bank President who "retired" after turning good stock into pennies . . .
. . . Oh, and the bloggers would tell your still warm corpse to start your own blog and/or tell it to Jerry Bledsoe."
While my opinion might not be nearly as important as Mr. Cone's, I "weighed in" at Joe's this morning on the latest demonstration of what I like to call "inglorious stupidity" in Greensboro:
You know (with no offense intended to anyone here) . . . it blows my mind . . . it really does . . . that two IDIOTS getting into a shoving match on a city street (again, where were the Greensboro police?) . . . one of them STUPID enough to throw a punch on camera . . . can generate this much intense/pointles debate/analysis and wailing/gnashing of teeth.
It's just inglorious stupidity, people.
And while you-all fight over two moron's "right" to act like assholes in public, you're one Pediatrician down, going for two.
Like I said, I'm gonna skip the rally.
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