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Thursday, February 2, 2012. Chaos and violence continue, Nouri's war on
Iraqiya continues, and the US Congress flaunts ignorance in every way possible
in a Subcommittee hearing.
You join the National Guard or Reserves. The government calls you to
active duty and deploys you outside the United States. This requires you to go
on leave from your job for nine months. You make it through your deployment,
return home and attempt to return to your job but despite the law protecting
your job your employer's rigged it so that you no longer have a job. For some
members of the Guard and Reserves, this has been a too common experience. For
it to happen to even one member of the Guard or Reserves is unacceptable and
against the law. In DC today, the House Veterans Subcommittee on Economic
Opportunity held a hearing. US House Rep Marlin Stutzman is the Subcommittee
Chair. US House Rep Bruce Braley is the Ranking Member.
Chair Stutzman: [. . .] [M]embers of the Guard and Reserves have
born a significant share of the combat since 9-11. Clearly there are no longer
weekend warriors -- if there once was. It also means that employers, especially
small business owners, have seen labor challenges not seen since WWII and by and
large have supported their employees. Unfortunately active duty call ups
combined with a bad economy have created historically high unemployment rates
among the guards and the reserves. Even more unfortunate, you will hear some
employers have used what I believe are less than ethical tactics to terminate
members of the Guard and Reserves. As the owner of a small business, I
understand the pressures on employers that the loss of a critical employee
creates. But in the end, the question I always ask is who is making the greater
sacrifice? The employer or the service member who is literally going in harms
way and that member's family who must cope with all the stresses of a
deployment?
Wow. What a hearing that must have been, right?
Wrong.
The hearing was divided up into three panels. The first panel was the
President and CEO of VetJobs Theodore Daywalt and The Manufacturing Institute's
President Emily DeRocco. The second panel was composed of: MG Terry M. Haston,
Adjutant General Tennessee National Guard; MG Timothy E. Orr, Adjutant General
Iowa National Guard; BG Margaret Washburn, Assistant Adjutant General, Indiana
National Guard; BG Marianne Watson, Director; Manpower and Personnel, National
Guard Bureau; Richard Rue, State Chair, Iowa Employer Support of Guard and
Reserve; Ronald Young, Family and Employer Program and Policy, Dept of Defense.
The third panel was the Dept of Labor's Junior Ortiz.
You see veterans in that mix?
No, you don't. But we heard Daywalt and excuses and pleas and business
needs this tax break and they need this and they need that and . . . Is VetJobs
focused on employers or veterans? Yeah, if the federal government will
subsidize private employer health benefits for members of the Guard and
Reserves, they probably will get hired more often (and more often than civilians
-- was he trying to create a two-tiered group of citizens?) but that's not
addressing the issue. It's tossing money at it and if we want to do that, fine,
but let's be honest about it and honest about what Daywalt's proposing will
do.
It will mean that most employers would lay off not Guards and Reserves in
order to save dramatically on medical expenses.
That will reduce veteran unemployment and it will aslo put a ton of people
out of work.
How can you be the a subcommittee for the House Veterans Affairs and hold a
hearing in which no one from the VA [Veterans Administration] and no veteran
testifies?
This was a tactical error in terms of the press. There's really nothing
for most people to write up or show on TV from the hearing. The stories that
needed to be shared were the veterans stories and when they're not invited to
the table, their stories aren't told.
This was an embarrassment. And that falls on the Subcommittee Chair
Stutzman.
In addition, a witness and two members on the Subcomittee seemed unaware
that it was against the law for companies to give away the jobs of the National
Guard and Reserves. Since the US government allegedly isn't rolling in the
dough (there's more than enough money for weapons and war), might the answer not
be to prosecute existing laws instead of creating yet more write-offs for
businesses?
They can start with the Uniformed Services Employment and Reemployment
Rights Act which basically holds the job of the active-duty while he or she is
serving. The Labour Dept is supposed to enforce this law. And Junior Ortiz
could have educated them but after the snooze-fest that was the second panel, a
number of Subcommittee members left (the eight members on the Subcomittee were
reduced to five). But maybe he wouldn't have. In his opening statement, the
only time he controls what he declares, he reduced enforcement to two passing
sentences. Those sentences were: "The last piece I want to discuss is DOL's
efforts to educate about and enforce the provisions of the Uniformed Services
Employment and Reemployment Rights Act. Vets enforcement programs investigate
complaints filed by veterans and other protected individuals under USERRA,
assess complaints alleging violation of status requiring veterans' preference in
federal hiring, and implement and collect information regarding veterans
employment by federal contractors." Though he claimed he wanted to talk about
it, the fact is in writing, this appears in the opening of the final section but
although four more paragraphs follow, they have nothing to do with enforcement,
he provides no figures on convictions or settlements. He has no interest in the
matter.
Nor did members of the Subcommittee. Ranking Member Braley made time to
joke with the witness about his use of "Junior." There's a time when Congress
wouldn't have found that at all funny. They would have tolerated it from a
citizen, but a government employee that came in wanting to be called by a
nickname? They would have cited the status of the Congressional record and
called him "Ishmael" Ortiz throughout the hearing.
But Braley had time to laugh about it and how it must be because everyone
trusts a guy named "Junior." Thanks for wasting our time, Braley.
For 25 minutes Ortiz appeared before the Subcomittee -- appeared as the
sole witness on the third panel -- and not one of the five men who chose to stay
for the third panel had a question about whether the law was being enforced,
what the law said, statistics on it, etc. They never mentioned the law. It
only popped up in those two sentences as Ortiz read his prepared remarks.
What does Congress do?
The legislative branch passes laws.
Why is Congress passing laws if they hold a hearing where they express
alarm that Guard and Reserves are returning from active-duty to find they have
lost their jobs and no one wants to discuss the law?
You pass a law, it better need to be enforced or you've wasted tax payers
time and money.
Is Congress bored with their job? If so, remember that all members of the
House are up for re-election this November (unless they're not seeking
re-election).
If the hearing was about Guard and Reserves losing their jobs, it failed by
not providing a face to the issue (allowing those who had lost their jobs -- or
had to fight to keep them -- to share those stories) and it failed by refusing
to address if the laws are being enforced. And how stupid do you have to be to
be on the Subcommittee. I'm being really kind and not naming names but it was
more than one member who, by their own remarks during the first panel,
demonstrated they were unaware that it was against the law to fire a Guard or
Reserve member who was on active-duty. How do I know that for sure? Because the
second time it came up, I stepped out during the first panel to call a friend at
the Justice Dept and ask if the law had changed? (No, it had not.) I thought
surely that members of Congress, hearing about an issue they supposedly cared
about would know the basics of the law. I was very much wrong.
Remember the alarmist rate that some were applying to veterans unemployment
and how, when we checked with the Labor Dept statistics, the statistics didn't
back up the claims?
Ortiz testifed in his opening statements, "According to the Bureau of Labor
Statistics (BLS), in 2010, recent Veterans who served during the post-9-11 era
had an unemployment rate of 11.5 percent, compared to a 9.4 percent rate among
civilian non-veterans. Unemployment rates were particularly high among recent
Veterans who have served or continue to serve our nation in the National Guard
and Reserve forces. These Veterans had an unemployment rate of 14 percent in
July 2010, almost five points above the civilian unemployment rate."
That's 2.1 percent more for the overall rate for the year 2010, 2.1%
greater. Now iin an ideal world, the two figures would be equal. But 2.1% more
than the general population figure? That's not a crisis, that's not as alarming
as it was repeatedly made to be in order to pass legislation. We heard figures
as high as 16%. (Sometimes with a subgroup of post 9-11 veterans attached to
it, sometimes.) Those figures came from somewhere but they didn't come from the
Labor Dept. As we've repeatedly noted throughout the Great Recession, neither
Congress nor the White House has pushed to do a damn thing for
African-Americans. The highest unemployment rate for the Great Recession -- any
year -- has been young, male African-Americans. But no one was troubled by
that, no one was concerned, no one thought to address it with any programs or
any monies. Among elected officials, no one cared. This summer, the unemployment rate for African-American teens
(male and female) hit over 40%. And no one rushed to create a program or do
a damn thing on the federal level.
In addition to calling out the claims on the actual rate, we also noted
that no one wanted to give a break down on the numbers for female veterans.
Ortiz didn't provide that information today. But US House Rep Linda Sanchez did
raise the issue of female veterans in the hearing. It's really the only
exchange worth noting from that hearing.
US House Rep Linda Sanchez: I'm going to start with Mr. Day. You
offered many suggestions in your written testimony to improve the National Guard
unemployment rate. And I want to sort of focus in in this large group of
National Guardsmen who are a group in need of ways to help them over some
hurdles to unemployment. I want to focus actually on a subset of women veterans
because I think they may experience unique possibilities of overcoming
additional obstacles other than the fact that they are serving in the National
Guard. And I want to talk about specifically the fact that that age group tends
to be a group that may be mothers of future mothers. And sometimes that, in and
of itself, is a barrier to employment for women. Do you think it's reasonable
that a female National Guard member may face even greater obstacles when
attempting to find a job because of those two factors combined?
Theodore Daywalt: On a case by case basis, yes, They probably have
more things that they have to face. [. . .] And there are job boards that are
out there just for women, in the civilian sector, identifies a need pretty fast
and they can move quick. And many of us identied the fact that people weren't
getting the help that they need when they came out. Many have said that TAP is
broken, I'll let others make that decision but that's why Vet Jobs is there. And
to the women, especially if it's a single mother. Maybe it's because I"m an old
fart, I cannot imagine being a single mother, being in the Guard, trying to get
a job and raising a child or two or three children all at the same time. I mean,
my hat goes off to them.
US House Rep Linda Sanchez: Well I have to tell you I am the mother
of a 2-and-a-half-year old. And I travel bi-coastally with him to do this job
which is more than, you know, 40-hour-a-week job. And I have a respect for
single mothers that do that. I think that they are super women in evvery sense
of the word.
Theodore Daywalt: Yes they are.
US House Rep Linda Sanchez: But what I'm trying to focus in on and
this is something that kind of gets lost in the shuffle, you talk about the
higher unemployment rate for National Guard members than the general
unemployment rate in many of these states and I'm wondering if there's been an
effort to try and extrapolate what that rate might be based on gender because I
suspect -- and this is just a suspicion on my part -- that for young female
National Guard member that unemloyent rate is probably even higher than it is
for the general population?
Theodore Daywalt: Ma'am, two weeks ago, I remember seeing a press
article and I remember that it did say -- and I'm sure they got their
information from BLS -- that female veterans have a higher unemployment rate
than male veterans.
US House Rep Linda Sanchez: Right. And I suspect because they
face these additional obstacles. And the reason I raise that is because in my
home state of California there was an Assembly bill that passed in 2004 which
would essentially create a voucher system by which child care vouchers would be
available to veterans seeking employment and it would be a way to try to help
ease the cost of childcare and, you know, provide that. We're budget-challenged
in California so that the funding hasn't necessarily been there but I'm thinking
of these practical solutions and it seems to me that type of concept of helping
with some of those barriers to employment which would be reliable and affordable
child care might be something that we could do to reduce that.
Theodore Daywalt: When I get on the phone and counsel with a single
mother, I generally try to point them to more forward-thinking companies that
are labeled as a "employer of choice" something that their [. . .] group could
stop. One thing that's in there and it's a fact that so many companies do offer
child care on the premise in order to bring in qualified employees. And that's a
smart employer that does that and we try to steer them towards the employers
that do stuff like that. Trouble is, it's not always apparent who offers that
and who doesn't and that's where vet jobs and some of the other military sites
become the intermediary because we know these companies. Someone comes to me
and says, "You know, you would reallly do well at UPS. They need secretaries or
they need this or they need a manager and by the way they have child care on the
premises." A lot of the health care have gone to that. It's the only way they
can draw nurses and the health care people they need and they start offering
child care and that's an ideal spot but they don't always know that that's out
there.
US House Rep Linda Sanchez: Right.
Theodore Daywalt: So that's where we come in and try to
--
US House Rep Linda Sanchez: And my suspicion would be that
employers who would offer that generally are of a certain size, many small
companies are excluded from that --
Theodore Daywalt: Very difficult for companies --
US House Rep Linda Sanchez: -- expensive. If the Chairman will
indulge me for just one last, quick question. Ms. DeRocco, you mentioned
efforts to partner with community colleges to help get the skills that veterans
need in order to go into the skilled manufacturing sector. The district that I
represent is very working class, urban and one of the things is that they would
like to get those skills but the cost is a barrier for them so I'm intrigued
when you talked about the paid internships and I'm sort of envisioning something
where employers who have the need for skilled employees who have the soft skills
of reliability and folks who will do what they're told. Is it crazy to think
that maybe there might be some way to structure something that's almost like an
apprenticeship system where employers would sort of finance an acquiring of
those skills and they'd be working in the meantime while they're trying to
complete those programs?
Emily DeRocco: Very insightful. A couple of points, we actually
are beginning with [Oakland's] Laney College, a college in the Bay Area of
Calfironia with the integration of these education pathways that are
competency-based pathways to jobs in manufacturing because of the high
concentration of small machine companies in that area which will offer
extraordinary jobs. We spend about $18 billion a year in this country on
workforce investment, workforce development, another $800 billion in public
education. What we are doing is actually just directing a very small percentage
of those funds to building the educational patheways in high schools and
community college, the result is credentials which have value in the workplace
labor market. So to date there's never been a question about money available to
have the educational pathways in place. All federal aid programs cover any cost
associated with the individual credentials and in every instance, employers are
driving the educational reform by being full partners as facutly, curriculum
development advisors, paid internships, mentors and even the equipment
and requirements for the educational pathway to be successful. So, yes, we are
encouraging much stronger business edcucation partnerships. Actually, it's the
only we're going to change education in this country .
US House Rep Linda Sanchez: Great. Thank you and I thank the
Chariman.
Daywalt worded an early statement in such a way that it might have appeared
to some he was saying that "most" employers offer child care. That's not true
(nor is it what he was saying). For statistics you can refer to [PDF format
warning] this Sloan Work and Family Research Network list.
After the hearing, a friend on the House Veterans Committee -- but not on
the Subcommittee -- asked me what I thought of the hearings and reminded me that
I called out Jeff Miller here this time last year over the light and slow to
plan hearing schedule. I did do that, I'd forgotten. In that judgment, I also
attempted to note that Miller was new to the post. Control of the House flipped
in the 2010 mid-term elections. Prior to that, from January 2007 to January
2011, US House Rep Bob Filner was the Chair. Few can match Filner as a Chair.
He's dedicated and that dedication included showing up for a scheduled hearing
when nearly all of Congress -- House and Senate -- was attempting to get out of
DC. So that's a high mark set by the now Ranking Member of the Committee. Too
high for Miller to have matched in this short period of time; however,
Miller adapted and grew in his role throughout 2011 and seems on top of the
issues and the scheduling in 2012. Stutzman would do well to study the way
Miller runs his hearings.
Ali al-Tuwaijri
(AFP) reports that Nouri's forces arrested
Ghabdan al-Khazraji, the Deputy Governor of Investments Diyala Province, and
attempted to arrest the Deputy Governor of Administrative Affairs Talal
al-Juburi.but he's now in the Kurdsitan Regional Government. The two are Sunni
and they are also members of Iraqiya. The arrest follows Wednesday's arrest.
Margaret Griffis
(Antiwar.com)
explained, "Baghdad Provincial Council Vice
President Riyadh al-Adhadh was arrested on terrorism
charges and stands accused of financing
a terrorist group in Abu Ghraib. Adhadh is a Sunni
doctor who founded a free clinic in Adhamiya and is
the focus of an English-language documentary on Iraq.
The Iraqi Islamic Party condemned the action and called it an "unprecedented
escalation" in the political
arena."
This is part of the targeting of Iraqiya by Nouri al-Maliki. Riyadh
al-Adhadh is in the news. Trudy Rubin (Philadelphia Inquirer) who
explains the medical doctor Riyadh al-Adhadh is the latest victim in Nouri's
power grab and how she met the doctor over eight years ago through US Col Joe
Rice:
Could Rice imagine the doctor helping terrorists? I asked him this
week, by phone. "No, I cannot," came back the firm reply. "He was in there
dissuading them, telling them there was another way. He was part of the
solution, not part of the problem."
So why has the Maliki government arrested a doctor who risked his
life to work within the system? This question brings us to the heart of the
matter - Iraq as a budding police state.
The U.S. invasion of Iraq upended decades of rule by the Sunni
minority. Yet for the democratic process to work in Iraq, the Shiite majority
must accept a political role for Sunnis, so long as they play by constitutional
rules.
Yet, as U.S. troops were leaving Iraq, the Shiite-led Maliki
government, fearful of a Sunni resurgence, began arresting Sunni
parliamentarians; they also rounded up many Sunnis who had abandoned militancy
and fought with American forces. Moreover, the government still refuses to honor
a pledge to share power with the Sunni-dominated Iraqiya party, which won a
narrow majority of seats in the last elections.
Trudy Rubin rightly notes that the White House should be calling for the
doctor's release and that is has leverage with all the weapons its selling to
Iraq. We're arming the thug (that's me, not Rubin). Human Rights Watch issues
an alert last week about Iraq moving towards a police state and that doesn't
slow down the deals or stop the White House from backing Nouri. Every time this
administration talks about human rights, they are lying because they did nothing
while Nouri's thugs targeted Iraq's LGBT community (even with some members of
Congress demanding actions, the White House did nothing); they are lying because
while they were calling for an Arab Spring in some countries, Nouri was
unleashing his forces on peaceful demonstrators and journalists, having them
kidnapped and tortured. And still the White House backed him. During the Bush
era, Nouris' secret prisons were well established. Ned Parker (Los Angeles
Times) continued to expose those prisons after Obama became president. Nouri
running secret prison meant nothing to the White House. They have backed him
over and over.
Nouri has refused to follow the Constitution and that didn't matter to the
White House either.
Dar Addustour's reported Monday
on Iraq's Supreme Court. Prime Minister and Thug of the Occupation Nouri
al-Maliki took a simmering political crisis and brought it to a boil in
mid-December by targeting Iraqiya politicians. He demanded that Deputy Prime
Minister Saleh al-Mutlaq be stripped of his title. He demanded that Vice
President Tareq al-Hashemi be arrested for terrorism. I the time since, there
have been multiple airings of 'confessions' on Nouri's favorite TV station. But
this week the Supreme Court issued a statement making clear that they were not
responsible for the airing of the confessions. Nouri then insisted publicly that
this wasn't his decision, he'd spoken with the judiciary and they approved.
Their statement makes very clear that they did not grant approval, their
statements makes very clear that "innocent until proven guilty" is a judicial
principle the court must follow and that they pin the blame on "the executive
branch" -- Nouri.
If the Iraqi officials do not hold him accountable, they can go ahead and
scrap the Constitution because it will be meaningless. All Iraqis are bound by
the Constitution. It makes no oath to serve Nouri but Nouri had to make an oath
to uphold it. Tuesday, Marco Werman (PRI's The World -- link is audio and text) spoke
with Jane Arraf about the political crisis. Jane Arraf: This is
being seen as the biggest political crisis since Saddam Hussein was toppled. And
the reason that the Kurds are involved is that we ended up here with a coalition
government -- engineered by the United States in part -- because no one could
really agree on who should form the government. Now the coalition includes the
Kurds, it includes the Sunnis and it includes Prime Minister Maliki's mostly
Shi'ite parties. And the Kurds have been the king makers. They're being looked
at here again as the people who could possibly solve this but there are so many
missing pieces in this puzzle that no one's entirely sure it actually can be
solved.Marco Werman: Well just a
few examples of the political crisis in Baghdad and then I want to ask you how
the Kurds might solve it. I mean we've heard about the Vice President's arrest,
Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki trying to fire his deputy for calling him a
dictator, no Interior or Defense Minister for almost two years. So what exactly
can the Kurds do?Jane Arraf: Well
the politicians who are supposed to be leading this country cannot sit down in
the same room and have a conversation. I spoke with Vice President Tareq
al-Hashemi who's in exile here in northern Iraq and he said the last time he
really spoke to the prime minister was a year ago. They've been communicating
through text messages and things like that. And also, of course, through arrest
warrants. So what the Kurds want to do is convene a conference that would bring
together the Kurdish president, the prime minister, the head of the Sunni-backed
party, possibly Moqtada al-Sadr and actually have them hammer out beforehand how
they're going to solve this.Jane Arraf states in the interview
that al-Hashemi is a guest of KRG President Massoud Barzani. Tony Barrett (Time magazine) writes about the
crisis and notes that Time investigated charges of al-Hashemi running a death
squad some time ago: Regularly
accused by the Shia of running Sunni death squads, we had to do our due
diligence and investigate whether or not he was really doing that or not. Turns
out nothing in our battle space, which included large parts of the Sunni
Triangle, indicated he was -- and that's where it would've come from. Also turns
out he may be smarter than anyone guessed.Hashimi has been in Irbil, capital of the
semi-autonomous Kurdish region of Iraq, ever since Maliki issued an arrest
warrant for him in December. While we might expect "Dog the Bounty Hunter" to go
get him, the reality is that Hashimi has played his cards brilliantly. There's
no way Maliki can send either Iraqi Army or Police to get him -- the Kurds have
experienced relatively little of the last decade of war in Iraq and there's not
a chance in Babylon that Maliki will risk starting a Kurdish secession over
Hashimi -- and the Sunni know it.So Rubin explains the doctor's
innocent and Barrett explains Time magazine long ago investigated
claims against al-Hashemi and found no truth to them. And still the White House
backs Nouri. Justin Raimondo (Antiwar.com) explains the
realities of Iraq today:
Well, then, what about the good will of the Iraqi people,who must
surely be grateful for their "liberation" at our hands? Well,
no -- instead, anti-Americanism is a force that all
Iraqi politicians play
to, and one can't help thinking the sentiment is
fully justified. After all, if some foreign army had killed hundreds of
thousands of Americans, and left our country in
ruins, what other sort of response would anyone have a right to expect?
The costs of the war range in the $1 - 3 trillion range. We are left
with tens of
thousands of horribly wounded veterans, many
fatherless and motherless children, and what do we have to show for it?
Iraq today is a crippled nation, which doesn't even have the capacity
to supply electricity to its citizens: it is a nation on the
brink of yet another civil war, so divided by tribe,
clan, religion, and politics that it threatens to come apart at the seams every
few months or so. In short, we have a country that really no longer exists in
any meaningful sense. To which the architects of this
war can add: "Mission
accomplished!"
Meanwhile, Aswat al-Iraq reports, "Iraqi
President Jalal Talabani discussed with Iraqiya bloc leader Iyad Alawi the
current political situation in the country, calling to solve pending questions
through the constitution and national partnership, according to a Presidential
statement." Al
Mada offers a look at various blocs and it's a political class
in disarray. (As Jane notes in her interview.) It's a hundred different demands
and counter-demands -- and the article's largely
Reuters notes an al-Zab sticky bombing
which claimed the life of 1 North Oil Company worker, a Tuz Khurmato sticky
bombing which left a police officer injured and, dropping back to last
night, Iraqi forces shot dead three suspects in Baghdad.
Finally in the US, the first ever Burn Pit Symposium takes place next
month.
1st Annual Scientific Symposium on
Lung Health after Deplyoment to Iraq &
Afghanistan
February 13, 2012
sponsored by
Office of Continuing Medical Education
School of Medicine
Stony Brook University
Location
Health Sciences Center, Level 3, Lecture Hall 5
Anthony M. Szema, M.D., Program Chair
Stony Brook
University
Medical Center
2 WAYS TO REGISTER FOR THE CONFERENCE
* Download the registration form from:
fax form to (631) 638-1211
1st Annual Scientific Symposium on
Lung Health after Deployment to Iraq &
Afghanistan
Monday, February 13, 2012
Health Sciences Center
Level 3, Lecture Hall 5
Program Objective: Upon completion, participants should be able
to recognize new-onset of lung disease after deployment to Iraq and
Afghanistan.
8:00 - 9:00 a.m. Registration & Continental Breakfast
(Honored Guest, Congressman
Tim Bishop
9:00 - 9:30 Peter Sullivan, J.D., Father of Marine from The
Sergeant Thomas Joseph
Sullivan Center, Washington, D.C.
9:40 - 10:10 Overview of Exposures in Iraq, Anthony Szema,
M.D., (Assistant
Professor of Medicine and Surgery, Stony Brook
University)
10:10 - 10:40 Constrictive Bronchiolitis among Soldiers after
Deployment, Matt
King, M.D. (Assistant Professor of Medicine, Meharry Medical
College,
Nashville, TN)
10:40 - 11:10 BREAK
11:10 - 11:40 Denver Working Group Recommendations and
Spirometry Study in
Iraq/Afghanistan, Richard Meehan, M.D., (Chief of Rheumatology
and
Professor of Medicine, National Jewish Health, Denver,
CO)
11:40 a.m. - Microbiological Analyses of Dust from Iraq and
Afghanistan, Captain Mark
12:10 p.m. Lyles, D.M.D., Ph. D., (Vice Admiral Joel T. Boone
Endowed Chair of
Health and Security Studies, U.S. Naval War College, Newport,
RI)
12:10 - 12:20 Health Care Resource Utilization among Deployed
Veterans at the White
River Junction VA, James Geiling, M.D., (Professor and Chief of
Medicine,
Dartmouth Medical School, VA White River Junction,
VT)
12:20 - 1:20 LUNCH AND EXHIBITS
Graduate students Millicent Schmidt and Andrea Harrington (Stony
Brook
University) present Posters from Lung Studies Analyzed for
Spatial
Resolution of Metals at Brookhaven National Laboratory's National
Synchrotron Light Source
1:20 - 1:40 Epidemiologic Survey Instrument on Exposures in
Iraq and Afghanistan,
Joseph Abraham, Sc.D., Ph.D., (U.S. Army Public Health Command,
Aberdeen Proving Ground, MD)
1:40 - 2:10 Overview of the Issue Raised during Roundtable on
Pulmonary Issues
and Deployment, Coleen Baird, M.D., M.P.H., (Program Manager
Environmental Medicine, U.S. Army Public Health
Command)
2:10 - 2: 40 Reactive Oxygen Species from Iraqi Dust, Martin
Schoonen, Ph.D.
(Director Sustainability Studies and Professor of Geochemistry,
Stony
Brook University)
2:40 - 2:50 BREAK
2:50 - 3:15 Dust Wind Tunnel Studies, Terrence Sobecki, Ph.D.
(Chief Environmental
Studies Branch, U.S. Army Corps of Engineers Cold Regions
Research
and Engineering Laboratory, Manchester, NH)
3:15 - 3:45 Toxicologically Relevant Characteristics of Desert
Dust and Other
Atmospheric Particulate Matter, Geoffrey S. Plumlee, Ph.D.
(Research
Geochemist, U.S. Geological Survey, Denver, CO)
3:44 - 4:15 In-situ Mineralogy of the Lung and Lymph Nodes,
Gregory Meeker, M.S.
(Research Geochemist, U.S. Geological Survey, Denver,
CO)
Continuing Medical Education Credits
The school of Medicine, State University of New York at Stony
Brook, is accredited by the Accreditation Council for Continuing Medical
Education to provide continuing medical education for physicians.
The School of Medicine, State University of New York at Stony
Brooke designates this live activity for a maximum of 6 AMA PRA Category 1
Credit(s)TM. Physicians should only claim the credit commensurate with the
extent of their participation in the activity.
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