Veterans for Common Sense

Please watch the news for more headlines about our VCS and Veterans United for Truth lawsuit against VA.  If you live in the San Francisco Bay Area, please consider attending a new court hearing scheduled for Tuesday, June 10 at 10:00 a.m. in Courtroom #1, at the U.S. Federal Building, 450 Golden Gate Avenue, San Francisco.

Here’s why there is another court hearing.  In May, a new VA e-mail surfaced where a PTSD clinic manager in Texas discouraged her staff from diagnosing veterans with PTSD due to staffing and budget constraints.  The VA’s Dr. Norma Perez advised VA psychiatrists and psychologists to improperly diagnose veterans with Adjustment Disorder, and this might prevent veterans from recieving VA healthcare and disability benefits. VCS is outraged at this callous treatment and misdiagnosing of our veterans.

Judge Samuel Conti, who is presiding over our lawsuit against VA, ordered VA into court this Tuesday to explain the e-mail. VCS believes VA misled the court by failing to release this e-mail during the trial. In his order, Judge Conti wrote, ” . . . the e-mail raises potentially serious questions . . . .”

Congress held hearings on Dr. Perez’ e-mail last week.  VCS supports strong Congressional oversight of VA. “Once again VA’s political appointees were taken to the woodshed by an alert Congress for repeatedly failing our veterans,” stated Paul Sullivan, VCS Executive Director.

The New York Times quoted VCS head attorney, Gordon Erspamer, as saying the VA e-mail is “part of a systemic pattern where there’s a divergence between the pristine world of the V.A.’s central office and what goes on around the country.”

Veterans for Common Sense works tirelessly in our lawsuit against VA. We are not asking the judge for financial compensation; rather, we are fighting to ensure our veterans receive the care they deserve and earned through their service to our country.

Please click here to make a monthly contribution supporting VCS and veterans throughout the year.

VCS filed our lawsuit against VA because of the many tragic news articles, such as Gary Connellis, who said: “I don’t know who to turn to, what else to do.”

VCS leads the way publicizing VA issues and changing VA policy to be more veteran-friendly.  Please set up a sustaining contribution and support veterans all year long.

Thank You,

Libby Creagh
Development Director
Veterans for Common Sense

VCS provides advocacy and publicity for issues related to veterans, national security, and civil liberties. VCS is registered with the IRS as a non-profit 501(c)(3) charity, and donations are tax deductible.

June 7, 2008 – I am upset and angry. My late mother, Susan, always told me to “tell it like it is,” so I will.

I read the Q&A with John Williams, director of the Erie County Department of Veterans’ Affairs (Erie Times-News, May 26). Let me be direct. I don’t believe the federal, state and local governments fight hard enough for our veterans.

I think they are afraid to create waves or ruffle feathers. I was told years ago by a staff member of the Post Traumatic Stress Syndrome Clinic in Batavia, N.Y., that he and other staff members really felt the heat when supporting vets.

It took me more than 10 years to get my benefits, and it was an uphill battle the whole way. Many veterans believe the Veterans Administration wants them to just go away. I almost quit my pursuit of benefits because VA referees kept changing my diagnosis. While many doctors and staff help vets, many retire or quit.

Today, many young vets of the Iraq war are given a diagnosis of “personality disorder,” not post traumatic stress disorder. They lose their bonuses and VA benefits. Many are severely disabled. They need the government and service organizations to create such a stink with the VA that claims are handled in a timely manner.

Many vets can’t handle this on their own, and they shouldn’t have to. At one point in my own case, I was told if I complained, they would pull my file, look at it, then put it on the bottom.

We need fighters for the vets at all levels of government. The VA is always supposed to give veterans the benefit of the doubt. I’d like to believe that.

National Briefing, California: A New Hearing in V.A. Case

June 7, 2008 – A federal judge presiding over a lawsuit alleging mistreatment of veterans has ordered a hearing regarding new evidence in the case.

The judge, Samuel Conti of Federal District Court in San Francisco, ordered the hearing, scheduled for Tuesday, after the emergence of an internal e-mail message that appears to urge Veterans Affairs clinicians to avoid making a diagnosis of post-traumatic stress disorder to save money.

The message was written by a V.A. psychologist in Texas, but it did not surface until after the trial concluded in April, prompting the plaintiffs to request that the case be reopened. “It’s part of a systemic pattern where there’s a divergence between the pristine world of the V.A.’s central office and what goes on around the country,” said Gordon Erspamer, a lawyer for the plaintiffs.

On Wednesday, a lawyer with the Justice Department wrote to Judge Conti contending that the e-mail message in question did not represent V.A.-wide practice or policy. Also on Wednesday, Norma Perez, the psychologist who wrote the message, told members of Congress that it was poorly worded and was meant only to suggest diagnostic options for doctors. The lawsuit was filed last year by veterans’ groups.

June 5, 2008 – President George W. Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney knowingly lied to Congress and the public about the threat that Iraq posed to the United States in the months leading up to the March 2003 invasion, according to a long-awaited report from the Senate Intelligence Committee.
Separately, a second report said former Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld set up an intelligence office within the Defense Department known as the Office of Special Plans “without the knowledge of the Intelligence Community or the State Department” to promote alleged links between Iraq and al-Qaeda and cooked intelligence about Iraq’s weapons cache.

The Office of Special Plans was headed by Douglas Feith, former Undersecretary of Defense for Policy and a chief architect of the Iraq War.

“Before taking the country to war, this administration owed it to the American people to give them a 100 percent accurate picture of the threat we faced. Unfortunately, our Committee has concluded that the administration made significant claims that were not supported by the intelligence,” said committee chairman, Sen. John D. Rockefeller IV, D-West Virginia.

The Senate report is the first document to state that Bush and Cheney knowingly made false allegations about the threat posed by Saddam Hussein, the Iraqi dictator who was overthrown in April 2003 and executed in December 2006.
 
“There is no question we all relied on flawed intelligence. But there is a fundamental difference between relying on incorrect intelligence and deliberately painting a picture to the American people that you know is not fully accurate,” Rockefeller said in a statement.

The Senate report confirms British intelligence assertions that surfaced in a document widely known as the Downing Street Memo that the facts against the threat posed by Iraq were being “fixed” around the Bush administration’s desire to invade Iraq.

The Senate report singled out erroneous statements that Cheney made during the run-up to war that the Vice President knew was not supported by the available intelligence, such as allegations that Mohammed Atta, the lead 9/11 hijacker met an Iraqi intelligence officer in Prague in 2001.

John Dean, former counsel to President Richard Nixon, made a case for impeaching Bush if he intentionally misled Congress and the public into going to war with Iraq, which is what the Senate Intelligence Committee report suggests happened.

“To put it bluntly, if Bush has taken Congress and the nation into war based on bogus information, he is cooked,” Dean wrote in a June 6, 2003 column for findlaw.com.

“Manipulation or deliberate misuse of national security intelligence data, if proven, could be ‘a high crime’ under the Constitution’s impeachment clause. It would also be a violation of federal criminal law, including the broad federal anti-conspiracy statute, which renders it a felony ‘to defraud the United States, or any agency thereof in any manner or for any purpose.’”

However, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-California, announced before the congressional elections in 2006 that “impeachment is off the table.”

June 5, 2008 – A secret deal being negotiated in Baghdad would perpetuate the American military occupation of Iraq indefinitely, regardless of the outcome of the US presidential election in November.

The terms of the impending deal, details of which have been leaked to The Independent, are likely to have an explosive political effect in Iraq. Iraqi officials fear that the accord, under which US troops would occupy permanent bases, conduct military operations, arrest Iraqis and enjoy immunity from Iraqi law, will destabilise Iraq’s position in the Middle East and lay the basis for unending conflict in their country.

But the accord also threatens to provoke a political crisis in the US. President Bush wants to push it through by the end of next month so he can declare a military victory and claim his 2003 invasion has been vindicated. But by perpetuating the US presence in Iraq, the long-term settlement would undercut pledges by the Democratic presidential nominee, Barack Obama, to withdraw US troops if he is elected president in November.

The timing of the agreement would also boost the Republican candidate, John McCain, who has claimed the United States is on the verge of victory in Iraq – a victory that he says Mr Obama would throw away by a premature military withdrawal.

America currently has 151,000 troops in Iraq and, even after projected withdrawals next month, troop levels will stand at more than 142,000 – 10 000 more than when the military “surge” began in January 2007. Under the terms of the new treaty, the Americans would retain the long-term use of more than 50 bases in Iraq. American negotiators are also demanding immunity from Iraqi law for US troops and contractors, and a free hand to carry out arrests and conduct military activities in Iraq without consulting the Baghdad government.

The precise nature of the American demands has been kept secret until now. The leaks are certain to generate an angry backlash in Iraq. “It is a terrible breach of our sovereignty,” said one Iraqi politician, adding that if the security deal was signed it would delegitimise the government in Baghdad which will be seen as an American pawn.

The US has repeatedly denied it wants permanent bases in Iraq but one Iraqi source said: “This is just a tactical subterfuge.” Washington also wants control of Iraqi airspace below 29,000ft and the right to pursue its “war on terror” in Iraq, giving it the authority to arrest anybody it wants and to launch military campaigns without consultation.

Mr Bush is determined to force the Iraqi government to sign the so-called “strategic alliance” without modifications, by the end of next month. But it is already being condemned by the Iranians and many Arabs as a continuing American attempt to dominate the region. Ali Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani, the powerful and usually moderate Iranian leader, said yesterday that such a deal would create “a permanent occupation”. He added: “The essence of this agreement is to turn the Iraqis into slaves of the Americans.”

Iraq’s Prime Minister, Nouri al-Maliki, is believed to be personally opposed to the terms of the new pact but feels his coalition government cannot stay in power without US backing.

The deal also risks exacerbating the proxy war being fought between Iran and the United States over who should be more influential in Iraq.

Although Iraqi ministers have said they will reject any agreement limiting Iraqi sovereignty, political observers in Baghdad suspect they will sign in the end and simply want to establish their credentials as defenders of Iraqi independence by a show of defiance now. The one Iraqi with the authority to stop deal is the majority Shia spiritual leader, Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani. In 2003, he forced the US to agree to a referendum on the new Iraqi constitution and the election of a parliament. But he is said to believe that loss of US support would drastically weaken the Iraqi Shia, who won a majority in parliament in elections in 2005.

The US is adamantly against the new security agreement being put to a referendum in Iraq, suspecting that it would be voted down. The influential Shia cleric Muqtada al-Sadr has called on his followers to demonstrate every Friday against the impending agreement on the grounds that it compromises Iraqi independence.

The Iraqi government wants to delay the actual signing of the agreement but the office of Vice-President Dick Cheney has been trying to force it through. The US ambassador in Baghdad, Ryan Crocker, has spent weeks trying to secure the accord.

The signature of a security agreement, and a parallel deal providing a legal basis for keeping US troops in Iraq, is unlikely to be accepted by most Iraqis. But the Kurds, who make up a fifth of the population, will probably favour a continuing American presence, as will Sunni Arab political leaders who want US forces to dilute the power of the Shia. The Sunni Arab community, which has broadly supported a guerrilla war against US occupation, is likely to be split.

May 27, 2008 – A U.S. Army Special Forces soldier based at Fort Carson was killed Sunday near Najaf, Iraq, according to the U.S. Department of Defense.

Sgt. Frank Joseph Gasper, 25, was killed when his vehicle was hit by an improvised explosive device during a resupply operation, according to Army officials.

Gasper was a radio operator assigned to the 10th Special Forces Group (Airborne), of the Headquarters Support Company, 3rd Battalion.

He was assigned to the 10th in April 2003.

Gasper, originally of Merced, Calif., had been in the Army since October 2002. None of Gasper’s family could be reached Tuesday for comment.

He was the fifth 10th Special Forces soldier to be killed in Iraq and the 238th Fort Carson soldier killed in Iraq.

June 3, 2008, St. Louis, MO – The father of the first female soldier from Missouri to die in Iraq wants Congress to force the Army to reopen its investigation into her death.

John Johnson, father of LaVena Johnson, said Tuesday that he met in April with Rep. Ike Skelton, D-Mo., chairman of the House Armed Services Committee, as well as others.

The Johnson family and their supporters collected signatures for petitions asking the House and Senate Armed Services committees to direct the Army to revisit the investigation of Johnson’s death.

“I could let it go, but then, someone will get away with murder,” John Johnson of Florissant told reporters Tuesday.

Army Pfc. LaVena Johnson was found dead July 19, 2005, in a small contractor’s tent in Balad, Iraq, after only eight weeks in the country. Army investigators and coroners ruled she had shot herself in the mouth with an M-16 rifle.

Johnson contends his daughter was attacked, raped and had her body dumped in the tent, where a fire was started in hopes of destroying her remains.

The House Armed Services Committee is looking into the case, but has not decided whether to hold a formal investigation, said spokeswoman Lara Battles.

The Senate Armed Services Committee did not immediately respond to questions about any plans to investigate the case.

LaVena Johnson died days shy of her 20th birthday. She graduated from Hazelwood Central High School in 2004, where she was an honor student, played the violin, and developed a social conscience.

Her family has described her as upbeat and not suicidal.

Christopher Grey, spokesman for the U.S. Army Criminal Investigation Command in Fort Belvoir, Va., said the Army stands by the command’s finding that Johnson’s gunshot was self-inflicted.

“We conducted a very thorough investigation that’s documented in the case file,” he said Tuesday. “It’s a very unfortunate, tragic case, and I completely understand the feelings of the grieving family.”

He said the command “stands ready to reopen any investigation” if someone presents new, credible evidence.

Johnson said he presented Skelton and others the names of nine other military women who were raped or murdered while in the service. He said he became aware of their stories as he investigated his daughter’s.

He said there’s a pattern, and “whoever is behind this must have significant rank or prestige.”

He said color photographs, documents and autopsy reports he’s obtained from Army investigators indicate his daughter was scratched, bruised and burned, and that her genital area showed evidence of lye “to destroy DNA evidence.”

An autopsy performed at Dover Air Force Base concluded that she died from a self-inflicted gunshot wound. The St. Louis medical examiner reached the same conclusion after Johnson had his daughter’s body exhumed for a second autopsy.

The Pentagon reported in March that men and women in uniform reported 2,688 sexual assaults last year. That compares to 2,947 reported the year before and 2,400 in 2005.

Michael McPhearson, executive director of the national Veterans for Peace, based in St. Louis, said Tuesday there’s an “epidemic of sexual abuse” in the military.

“In order to ensure our wives, daughters and aunts are safe, men have to hold men accountable for this behavior,” said McPhearson, who served in the first Gulf War.

“Women have to be advocates for themselves, but men have to say we can’t allow this.