RIP CARMELO RODRIGUEZ

The MOST DEPRESSING STORY EVAH
Category: Jobs, Work, Careers


There is nothing good about this story, but it must be told. It is gut-wrenching. Nothing has ever affected me so dramatically in such a quick second. Emotionally I was drawn into this family as was most of the nation. please see picture 1 -then picture 2 We watched him die, on tv, on the CBS news tonight, Thursday evening. It was horrible. The screams of the family. So, we give him the tools to sacrifice his life? But we won't give him the tools to help him save it? The doctor wrote on his first medical report -melanoma. BUT they did not tell Carmelo-and they did not make any attempts to help him. Had they removed the mole and began any treatments, Mr Rodriquez may very well be with us today :-( I'd venture to say -there will be so much response to this story that CBS may re-run it, pay attn. They did w/the boy playing basketball that time, remember?
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2008/01/31/eveningnews/main3776580.shtml

A Question Of Care: Military Malpractice?
One Marine Who Served His Country With Care


ELLENVILLE, N.Y., Jan. 31, 2007


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Sgt. Carmelo Rodriguez III was a father, a soldier, an artist and an actor. He loved life and the Marines. But skin cancer ravaged his body, whittling it down to 80 lbs in 18 months. He died before CBS News correspondent Byron Pitts could interview him. (CBS)



.. sphereit start -->Carmelo Rodriguez was dancing with his niece just last year. By all accounts Rodriguez, a 29-year old, loved life, his family and the Marine Corps. He was also an artist, a father, and a part-time actor. He once appeared with Katie Holmes in a scene on the TV series Dawson's Creek.

An image of Sgt. Rodriguez with his Marine buddies in Iraq in 2005 shows him as a fit, gung-ho platoon leader.

CBS News correspondent Byron Pitts met Rodriguez two months ago. That once-buff physique had been whittled down to less than 80 pounds in 18 months by stage 4 melanoma. He was surrounded by family, including his 7-year-old son holding his hand. It was Rodriguez's idea we meet.

When Sgt. Rodriguez was in Iraq, military doctors, he says, misdiagnosed his skin cancer. They called it "a wart."

Eight minutes after Pitts met Sgt. Carmelo Rodriguez, and CBS News was preparing to interview him, he died.

At his family's insistence, Pitts and the camera crew stayed. With his body in the very next room, Pitts sat down with his relatives.

Pitts asked: "Why have us here for such a painful moment for your family?"

"His wish to have this known, because he doesn't want any other soldier to fight for his country and go through what he had to go through," said Rodriguez's uncle, Dean Ferraro. "To be neglected."

"He said, 'don't let this be it. Don't let this be it. Fight!'" his sister, Elizabeth Rodriguez, said. "That's what we're doing. We're gonna fight for him."

The "fight," as they call it is over what's known as the Feres Doctrine, a 1950 U.S. Supreme Court ruling that bars active-duty military personnel and their families from suing the federal government for injuries incidental to their service. In other words, unlike every other U.S. citizen, people in the military cannot sue the federal government for medical malpractice.

"When he enlisted in 1997, from his initial medical checkup - you know what I mean, physical - the doctor documented that he had melanoma, but never told him 'have anyone follow up on it,'" Ferraro said. "And that was back in '97. If we would have known back in '97, he would still be with us."

CBS News was given a copy of that medical report. The doctor notes skin as "abnormal." In further details he describes it as "melanoma on the right buttocks." There's no recommendation for further treatment.

Eight years pass. Sgt. Rodriguez is in Iraq.

"If a birthmark is about that big [she holds up two hands], and … it has a raise like that and is pussing, just let it go and say it's a wart??" his sister, Elizabeth, said. "Who does that; how does that happen? It's not right. It's not right."

His uncle Wilfredo Negron said: "Twenty-nine years old! You know all his life is good. Never into drugs, never into partying. Served his country faithfully. Served his Lord faithfully! He held on positive because he's a warrior. He's a Marine. He fought for his country and also for his family."

According to a veterans group that tracks soldiers who are misdiagnosed, there are hundreds of misdiagnosed cases across the country.

Twenty-five-year-old Air Force Staff Sgt. Dean Patrick Witt was one of them. Witt's family says his appendicitis was repeatedly misdiagnosed. After emergency surgery, Witt ended up brain dead.

He later died.

Pitts spoke with Military law expert Eugene Fidell, who is an attorney.

"You talk to military families who believe they have a malpractice case against the military and you tell them what?" Pitts asked.

"It's very very difficult when I get these calls, and I get these calls repeatedly over the course of a year. I probably get one ever couple months," Fidell said. "These people have to be made to understand that the law simply doesn't permit them to bring a lawsuit. They can bring a lawsuit, but their lawsuit will be a complete waste of time."

Pitts showed Fidell a copy of Rodriguez's medical records.

Military emails show that Sgt. Rodriguez's commanding officer, Lt. Col B.W. Barnhill, quotes a military nurse who called Rodriquez case "a major screw up."

An email also reads: "He should have been immediately seen and the wart removed and we may not have gotten to where we are now."

Pitts said to Fidell: "When he's in Iraq, the doctor says we'll have someone look at it when you get back to the states in five months."

He shook his head. "If I had a comparable condition myself, or a member of my family had, and somebody would have said, 'sorry, no one can see you for five months,' I would have fired the doctor!"

But Rodriguez didn't have that option.

"No, he didn't. I hope members of Congress are watching this show," Fidell said. "The law has got to change."

What's the military's response?

"I'm not prepared to discuss the Feres Doctrine," said Navy Capt. William Roberts, the medical officer of the Marine Corps.

Three weeks after CBS News' initial request, the Pentagon granted an interview with Roberts.

But he wouldn't discuss the Feres Doctrine, or Rodriquez's case, saying it was "under investigation."

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Find out more about how Byron Pitts reported this story at Couric & Co.
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As for how many cases like the sergeants?

"I do not have those numbers at all," Roberts said.

Is that because those numbers don't exist or he can't provide them?

"I certainly don't know them," he said.

"If Carmelo Rodriguez was a civilian, his family would have the right to seek damages," Pitts said.

"I am sorry but I can't comment on the legality of that type of redress," he said.

For the Rodriguez family - the best they can hope for is a final report?

"They will get a final report if they ask for it," Roberts said.

Because he was a Marine, Sgt. Carmelo Rodriquez received a military funeral. But, it was an honor his family paid for.

As it turns out, Rodgriquez was forced into retirement due to his illness. Since he was retired, the military was no longer obligated to pay for his funeral.

His son, Carmelo Rodriquez IV, was shown the gratitude of a grateful nation: An American flag - and 55 percent of his father's benefits.

For those who would say these young men and women sign that line saying I turn my life over to the U.S. Military, he willingly give up some of their rights?

"George Washington said that when a person puts on the uniform, he does not cede being a citizen," Eugene Fidell said.

Rodriguez was a citizen.

But to his family and his friends, he was a so much more.

Dayton Daily News Critic

Kid Rock show Critics Review
Current mood: loved
Category: Music


Kid Rock really rocked
By Ron Rollins | Tuesday, January 29, 2008, 11:38 PM

Love the guy or hate him, you have to give Kid Rock credit for at least one thing: In a world of copycats and bland pop wannabe's, there is absolutely nobody else like him.

Now, depending on where you fall on that love-hate spectrum, you may or may not find comfort in the idea of the guy's utter originality. But an original is what he is, and the sold-to-the-grungy-rafters crowd that packed Hara Arena Tuesday night knows what I'm talking about.

I mean that I've never seen a performer pay sincere homage to so many different kinds of music, acknowledge so many influences, and incorporate as many varied genres into a single act and pull it off. Not ever. And the way Kid Rock does it, with good cheer and effortless charm — for lack of a better word — makes for one darn entertaining rock concert.

Motown? This Detroit boy had it in there. Honky-tonk? Yessireebob. Rap-metal? Without a roof-shaking doubt. Old-school hip-hop? Mos def. Eagles-style country rock? Mid-70s rock-n-roll? Even a dash of Buffalo Springfield? All in there, too.

Kid Rock proudly reels off the names of his musical heros, rapping off about owing as much to Johnny Cash as to Grand Master Flash (uh-huh) and shamelessly ripping off Lynyrd Skynyrd riffs as he goes, singing in a voice that sounds like John Mellencamp before the heart attack and rapping with a slow, pre-gangsta rhythm that recalls Run-DMC.

In fact, there was Rev. Run himself — included in on the act, along with good old Peter Wolf, the WooferGrooverMamaToofer from the J. Geils Band, who bandied his skinny, leather-trousered butt onto the stage to share a spotlight with the Kid, much to the crowd's delight.

Yes, for those of you who find yourselves unable to get past Kid Rock's swaggering obnoxiousness, or his general and completely unrepentent lack of musical finesse, you may want to consider this: On Tuesday night, he displayed a marvelous generosity of spirit that one would have to call rare on a rock-concert stage. Wolf and Run weren't just there to be rolled out as oldie opening acts to warm up the drunken Shiloh Springs crowd.

Rather, they were a major part of the act, fully incorporated into the show to add credence to those acknowledged influences we mentioned a moment ago. Kid Rock came out at 7:45 and started playing a couple of his own songs before turning the stage over to Wolf. Later, they played a few old Geils songs together, when Wolf got a chance to reprise his classic "Repudah the Beauta" rap from "Blow Your Face Out."

Meanwhile, Rev. Run came out to rap with Kid Rock on a handful of songs, and they seemed to be having a blast getting everybody's hands in the air. To see the headliner share the stage this way was terrific … and frankly, I've not seen anybody do anything quite like it.

It made me like Kid Rock a lot more than I expected to, and I'd expected to like him pretty well. You think he's a bit too cocksure on "Cowboy"? Well, you're right. You think he makes a bit toooooo much of the old bad-boy pills/drugs/booze/chicks/gettin' busted shtick? Well, you'd be right about that, too. You think there's nothing remarkable about a guy who sounds like Bob Seger if he'd survived the Skynyrd plane crash and morphed into Snoop Dogg?

Well, you'd be flat-out wrong about that last one. Ask me: Was he any good, really?

No, not the way you might mean. But he was, in some very strange, last-of-the-rock-stars way, absolutely great. You might've had to be there to understand. But if you had been, you wouldn't need it explained.

February