Posted on 03/24/2014 8:27:08 AM PDT by Kaslin
After young and healthy Marine Matt Parker fought for his country in the Middle East, he mysteriously came down with tumors. Now, he finds himself without adequate help from the country he fought for. I’ve known Matt since he was a small child; our families grew up together in church, and in high school I taught his sister violin lessons. Matt is a straight shooter; a bright, honest guy raised with solid values by outstanding Christian parents.
Matt enlisted in the Marine Corps in 1994 at age 19. He told KOMO News 4 in Seattle, “ I wanted to be a part of the best fighting force in the world.” Desert Storm and the majority of the fighting in Iraq had ended by then, and so Matt went to the Middle East as part of Operation Southern Watch, which was more of a recovery and rebuilding mission. His unit was tasked in part with arming Cobra helicopters in Kuwait with special 20mm rounds tipped in depleted uranium. No one instructed the Marines to wear gloves or protective clothing.
Upon finishing his service and returning to civilian life a few years later, he started having mood swings, joint pain, insomnia and severe headaches. Sinus infections led to a seizure in 2011, and after he was rushed to the hospital, doctors discovered a massive tumor in the front of his head. The doctors successfully removed the tumor, and asked him if he’d been exposed to radiation.
Matt contacted Marines in his former unit to see if others had developed similar health issues, almost 15 years after their service together. One of them, Dan Paris, told Matt he’d also developed what appeared to be a tumor growing in his head, and had similar physical symptoms.
Neither vet has a history of brain trauma in their families. Matt and Dan served together from late April 1994 until about September 1997. Together, they realized they had both come down with what has been labeled Gulf War Syndrome, a “chronic multi-symptom disorder affecting returning military veterans and civilian workers of the Gulf War.” One of its main causes is considered to be exposure to depleted uranium, which was used in 30mm and smaller caliber machine-gun bullets on a large scale for the first time during the Gulf War. Investigative journalist Christopher Bollyn discovered that “40 percent of the soldiers in one unit were found to have malignant cancerous growths when they returned from a tour of a year and a few months in Iraq.”
Matt’s family life started to fall apart as his health deteriorated. His marriage ended in divorce, and he lost his home to foreclosure. He developed a second tumor.
Dan’s tumor is practically inoperable. If removed, it will very likely affect regions of his brain associated with motor function, speech and higher learning. So far, he is delaying the inevitable; putting up with increasing levels of pain as the tumor continues to grow. Dan applied for disability, which was denied without even the courtesy of a notification. He has been granted 100 percent disability assistance for a shoulder injury, but has only been able to receive 40 percent disability assistance for his other ailments.
Matt applied for disability with the Veterans Administration in 2012, citing the exposure to depleted uranium as the reason for his disability. The VA denied his request, claiming there was no connection between his tumor and the exposure. They also bizarrely claimed that Matt had never been stationed in the Ali Al Saleem area in Kuwait where the exposure to depleted uranium took place. This isn’t true, because he’d been in a bus accident in Kuwait, resulting in a hospital stay - as well as teasing from his unit. The VA inexplicably lost the paperwork documenting the hospital stay.
Matt got nowhere until he went to the media with his plight. Nevada congressional leaders in Washington, D.C., including both U.S. Senators, began looking into the situation. Veteran's Advocate and retired Army sergeant, Dan Swafford of Phoenix, Ariz., put together an 80-page rebuttal to the VA’s turndown, which he turned in to the VA in Reno, Nev., last September.
Shockingly, when Sen. Harry Reid’s office requested an update recently from the VA on Matt’s case, the VA representative told them they had lost his 80-page appeal. Hopefully it was just incompetence, but the level the VA has gone to avoid recognizing the correlation between depleted uranium exposure and health problems is extremely troubling.
Many of the vets who have been exposed to depleted uranium have very little time left to live. Army veteran Dustin Brim is one of the casualties of depleted uranium. He worked on contaminated vehicles in Iraq in the early 2000s, without gloves or any protection. He died in 2004 at age 22 of lymphoma, with tumors in his body. Off the record, for fear of retaliation, nurses urged his mother to research the connection to depleted uranium. One nurse warned, "Dustin is not the first and he won't be the last."
Patti Redd, a civilian contractor who worked for a company that dumped contaminated military hardware in the Pacific Ocean, succumbed in 2012 from exposure to depleted uranium. She maintained a blog, Dying With Dignity, documenting her ongoing horror story, including before and after photos as the contamination destroyed her body. Unfortunately, there are more tragic stories like these.
If there was any doubt that exposure to depleted uranium causes tumors, the strikingly similar cases of Matt and Dan, who served together under the exact same circumstances, should provide compelling evidence of that correlation.
Astonishingly, the U.S. Department of Defense claims that no human cancer of any type has occurred as a result of exposure to either natural or depleted uranium. Additionally, numerous studies have been done claiming that there is no correlation - but how many of those studies were funded by the government?
It is time for answers and for help for our valiant veterans. It is bewildering why the government claims there is no link between exposure to depleted uranium and severe health problems such as the development of tumors in young healthy people. It makes you wonder if there is some kind of cover up going on to protect certain powerful bureaucrats and crony politicians who should have known better. Matt, Dan and the other suffering veterans don’t deserve this mistreatment for serving their country.
The new America. Serve your country, get screwed.
Nothing new. The VA has a long history of denying claims from veterans exposed to radiation. My dad being one of them.
not the “ new America “
Our veterans have been $crewed by our government since Washington was Presidenr
How encouraging.
The gummit did the same thing with agent orange. It took an act of congress to fix it.
There is very little scientific data linking depleted uranium to cancers or any other health problems.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?Source=GovD&v=w4yj6dmZPsw
http://www.youtu.be/PlTcYr91tj4
Rep Jackie Walorski: “The words Veteran and backlog should never be in the same sentence.”
I've sent many emails asking folks to raise their voices in outrage over the disgraceful backlog of claims at the VA. What is most outrageous are the bonuses handed out at the VA when the average wait times for claims processing is at 333 days!!! Rep Jeff Miller of Florida, Chairman of the Veterans Committee, has held hearings on the shenanigans at the VA and the disgraceful rewarding of poor performance with outrageous bonuses. The following article highlights Chairman Miller's efforts and his attempt at exposing the growing problem of rewarding failure at the VA:
From reports I've seen and emailed out to all of you, these two really take the cake:
Diana Rubens, VA executive in charge of the 60 offices that process disability compensation claims, she received almost $60,000 in Bonuses with a seven-fold increase in backlogged claims!!! Or how about this one: Glenn Haggstrom, as VA construction chief received almost $55,000 in bonuses (performance bonus mind you!) even though there have been year long delays on projects totaling 1.5 billion in overruns! Talk about rewarding bad behavior?!!!
My appreciation to Chairman Miller, Speaker Boehner, Rep Jackie Walorski and most of all, I thank Concerned Veterans for America for taking on this effort for accountability at the VA. http://www.vaaccountability.org/. Please visit their website, sign up and please forward to all your lists. They are doing remarkable work for our Veterans!
Below are the bills in the House and the Senate that would enable VA Secretary Shinseki to fire Senior level management whose disgraceful job performance continues to lead to outrageous backlogs and so much suffering among our Veterans. They served this country and they deserve their benefits, treatment and care as was promised to them and they certainly should not have to wait 333 days for their claims to be processed. This is an outrage and this is no way a nation should allow it's brave defenders to be treated.
https://www.govtrack.us/congress/bills/113/hr4031
https://www.govtrack.us/congress/bills/113/s2013
We really need your help on these bills. Note that on the House bill, there are currently 47 Republicans signed on, and only 2 Democrats! On the Senate side, the bill, sponsored by Marco Rubio, has just 3 Republican signers.
You all helped so much on the Doolittle Tokyo Raiders bill to receive the Congressional Gold Medal of Honor, and I am hoping you will do the same on these bills to help make the VA more accountable! We all know if we performed as poorly on our jobs as this VA, we would be fired! Veterans are dying waiting for care and treatment and we as grateful Americans can pick up our phones and help put a stop to this shabby treatment of the men and women who have risked everything to keep us safe.
Please click on the bills above. They list all the signers and if your Congressmen and Senators are not listed, please pick up your phone this week and ask them to please support our Veterans and sign these bills! Employees at the VA should not be receiving bonuses while Veterans are dying waiting for their claims to be processed!
Our Veterans Fought for us and now it is time for all of us to fight for them! 4 phone calls from each of us can make a world of difference for all of them!
Thank You For Your Help!
Beverly Perlson
The Band of Mothers
http://www.thebandofmothers.com/
http://www.derrickmiller.org/
Ronald Reagan spoke these words about POW Jeremiah Denton, who passed away on Friday. Jeremiah Denton endured 8 years of immense torture as he was held prisoner during the Vietnam War. I am in awe of the bravery of this great American Hero who truly loved America and endured much pain and horrendous conditions as a prisoner of war. I can only imagine the pain in his Warrior heart when Jane Fonda showed up in Hanoi in 1972, sat on an anti-aircraft battery and held court with the Vietnamese, calling our military “war criminals”. This reckless traitor hurt so many Americans who risked their lives to give her the freedom to be an ungrateful idiot! I have no doubt this Great American Hero is in Soldier Heaven now and well let's just say, I wouldn't want to be Jane Fonda. She's up there in age and her day of reckoning is coming soon.
Below are some links about this true American Hero:
I hope you will read this story about the very brave POW, Rear Admiral and former Senator from Alabama, Jeremiah Denton, whom the Democrats refused to allow on the California Assembly floor to celebrate the 4th of July back in 2004. Gov Swarzenegger offered his meeting room and the story goes the room was overflowing with people and only one elected Democrat attended. What a disgusting and disgraceful bunch these Democrats were back in 2004 and in my opinion, this ungrateful, unpatriotic attitude among Democrats toward America and those who risk their lives to defend her is far worse now!
http://www.snopes.com/politics/religion/denton.asp
As we head into the November elections, it is my hope that all Conservatives get out and vote this time and send the Democrats packing in droves. We have brave men and women in the military on a battlefield far from home right now who are counting on Conservatives to honor the freedom they risk their lives to provide and protect. They are counting on all of us to exercise our precious right to vote and I believe they are hoping we vote out all those who undermine brave men and women who risk their lives to always be allowed to mouth the words GOD BLESS AMERICA!
I leave you with the poem read by Rear Admiral Jeremiah Denton, on that 4th of July, back in 2004, through eyes clouded in tears:
It is the Soldier, not the reporter,
Who has given us freedom of the press,
It is the Soldier, not the poet,
Who has given us freedom of speech.
It is the Soldier, not the campus organizer,
Who has given us freedom to demonstrate.
It is the Soldier, who salutes the flag,
Who serves beneath the flag,
And whose coffin is draped beneath the flag,
Who allows the protester to burn the flag.
Amen. GOD BLESS AMERICA!
And May God Forever Bless The Men and Women of the United States Military! As Ronald Reagan said, “We Don't Have To Turn To Our History Books for Heroes, They Are All Around Us”
Beverly Perlson
The Band of Mothers
http://www.thebandofmothers.com/
http://www.derrickmiller.org/
5.56mm
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