Random media commentary

For the love of butter biscuits....first jon stewart is leaving the daily show and now this.


Whats next santa and mrs santa getting a divorce?

 

doctor scams patients and get 45 years

http://abcnews.go.com/US/wireStory/judge-sentence-detroit-area-cancer-doctor-fraud-scheme-32353615

DETROIT — Calling the scheme "horrific," a judge sentenced a Detroit-area cancer doctor to 45 years in prison Friday for collecting millions from insurance companies while poisoning more than 500 patients through needless treatments that wrecked their health.

U.S. District Judge Paul Borman this week heard stories of brittle bones and fried organs as patients chillingly described the effects of excessive chemotherapy at the hands of Dr. Farid Fata.

Fata "shut down whatever compassion he had as a doctor and switched it to making money," Borman said.

Moments earlier, the judge called it a "huge, horrific series of criminal acts."

Fata, 50, offered no excuses before getting his punishment. Stone-faced all week in court, he repeatedly broke down in loud sobs as he begged for mercy Friday.

"I misused my talents, yes, and permitted this sin to enter me because of power and greed," Fata said. "My quest for power is self-destructive."

He said his patients knocked on his door for "compassionate care" but "I failed, yes, I failed."

Fata pleaded guilty last year to fraud, money laundering and conspiracy. He didn't strike a deal with prosecutors, so Borman needed much of the week to hear details about treatments. Patients and relatives hired a bus to get to court to watch.

"He preyed on our trust, our exhaustion, our fears," said Ellen Piligian, whose late father, a doctor, was administered powerful drugs he didn't need for a tumor in his shoulder.

Prosecutor Catherine Dick had asked for a 175-year prison sentence, while Fata sought 25 years.

"It is not mob justice. It is appropriate for this crime," Dick told the judge, referring to the extraordinary request.

Outside court, many former patients, dressed in yellow in solidarity, were disappointed with the punishment.

"Prosecutors did a fantastic job — and he got 45 years. It's a lifetime sentence for the rest of us," said Monica Flagg, 53, who was treated for cancer before doctors examining a broken leg found she had no cancer. "What about all the grave markers out there that all the victims' families have to look at?"

Defense attorney Christopher Andreoff described Fata, a native of Lebanon, as a broken man without family after his wife and children left the U.S. while the case was pending.

"But his family is still alive," said Liz Lupo, who held a picture of her late mother, Marianne Lupo, outside the courthouse. "I lost my only family."

The sentence, she said, is "not justice at all."

The government identified 553 victims, along with insurance companies. Medicare and insurers paid at least $17 million.

"For most cancer patients, the enemy is the disease they vow to fight," U.S. Attorney Barbara McQuade told reporters. "In this case, the doctor was the enemy in disguise."

Fata will get credit for about two years served in custody since his arrest in 2013. His stay in the federal prison system also could be shortened with good behavior.

His clinic, Michigan Hematology Oncology, had seven offices in the Detroit area and a related business that performed tests to look for cancer. Testifying for the government, two experts from Harvard Medical School said they were troubled after looking at a small portion of patient files.

 

Despicable. Death penalty is appropriate here, screw jail time. That's attempted murder and murder. He's a serial killer, don't care if he says he did it out of greed for money.

 

Rambo takes on ISIS: Sylvester Stallone reveals iconic movie hero will fight terrorists in Syria and Iraq in final movie Last Blood. Filming to begin soon.

 

He better hire some bodyguards.

 

I saw the script.

Hes gonna use his wheelchair thats loaded with a rpg with a scope. Then he has an m60 mounted on the front.

He often screams "ehh? Cant hear ya sonny."

To draw them in and capture them. Then he tortures them with stories when he was young and how the young uns just dont get the art of war.

he did this and that so he can get intel.

 

Other communities/countries in trouble

With all due respect to the Greeks and their economic crisis, is anyone wishing there was more attention being paid to other socioeconomic crises in the world, like the Haitian citizenship/residency human rights crisis in the DR, Puerto Rico's debt crisis, Detroit's ongoing financial receivership and asset firesale, Ecuador's debt crisis, etc?

 

Do you even need to hear why none of its being covered at this point. Just prepare accordingly my friend.

 

This Haitian expulsion really has me pissed, and it's so rarely touched on in the news. You have to watch FSTV to get even cursory coverage. Only Edwidge Danticat and Junot Diaz are speaking forcefully stateside.

Detroit and PR are more insolvent every day. And can you believe that they're still going to use public funds to finance a sports stadium in Detroit, even after privatizing nearly every public asset?

 

Detroit does get coverage...
I remember seeing a headline about the DR expelling some of its people, and that's it ...so what's going on there?

 

I know there's some Detroit coverage, but not nearly enough for a major US city, in my opinion. It speaks to a central crisis of democracy: does a financial crisis justify stripping the people of their democratic representation? What voice shall reign supreme in a representative democracy? Markets or people? And now PR is facing a similar fiscal insolvency that could worsen conditions on the island. Across the US in general, there are several cities facing structural deficits and budget-cutting pressures. The State of Illinois is another. Financial markets are demanding cutting everything that benefits working people, even though working people had no say in these choices that got the state coffers into these straits.

In the DR, they are expelling nearly 200,000 Haitians and stripping them of their residency if they cannot show at least one Dominican grandparent. Many have been in the DR their entire lives (or even their parents' entire lives) and have no knowledge of Haiti. They were brought in to assist with sugar harvesting when it became unfashionable as employment for all but the very poorest Dominicans. These people have nowhere to go to when they get deported, and many have no family in Haiti at all.

 

I'm very much aware of what's going on in Detroit, because I was following their corrupt mayor, Kwame, who went to jail, as well as the water payment crisis going on in Detroit. and they were the first city to file for bankruptcy. You do sum it up well as far as the people of the victims and have no real power in the outcome of what happens to this city.

Thanks for jogging my memory as far as the DR expelling Haitians from the country.
Why are they doing this now?.. is it for economic reasons or is there a crime issue? I believe some Haitians also relocated there after the earthquake. That would be very cruel to do..Invite people to come work and live in your country and then tell them to leave through no fault of their own. Very cruel.

 

Yeah, Kwame really set that city back. I met him once years ago at a conference and his presentation was all "new breed of politician" and I had high hopes that the citizens would finally get someone who was both capable of governance and committed to the working people of the city. Too often when you get a member of the professional class in office, their interests are hostile to working class interests. It's a shame to see what he did. And he had even done much of the private sector's bidding before he got sent to the hoosegow. Now the city (and a couple of other black-governed municipalities in Michigan, including Benton Harbor) is under fiscal receivership and the people's chosen representatives have little to no power to take any actions on their own without state capitol oversight.

The DR thing is sickening as well. Of course they're blaming it on "crime", but there's always some unspecific, generalized claim of "increased crime" that is trotted out for justification of a mass violation of civil rights. It's also creating a worsening social crisis because of the history of colorism between Dominicans and Haitians, with Spanish mulattos and blacks against Haitian blacks (but I haven't seen much complaint from Haiti's light-skinned Francophone mulatto elite). The DR government created a mechanism for Haitians to get residency papers, but the office was understaffed and resulted in only a few thousand completing the process and nearly 200,000 facing emergency deportation. It's just sad, because both countries suffered from French, Spanish and US exploitation and intervention and yet they can't seem to get along or cooperate. The humanitarian aid extended to Haiti after the earthquake was a high point and I was hopeful, but it seems like this is causing a downward spiral in relations. The ongoing political crisis in Haiti definitely doesn't help things, either.

 

It sounds like a real mess in the DR..very depressing reading that. I do wonder though how long this has been building up...it does seem like this mass deportation attempt is sudden, yet the things you mentioned - colorism, classism and crime, just don't happen overnight.

Your anecdote on Kwame, coupled with your ideological aspirations for Detroit had me wondering, why don't you run for office somewhere? I think you would be able to really get your position across to your constituents... I would have to ask you also then, if you were to get into politics, do you think you would change by association and become like those politicians we often become disenchanted with?

 

Yeah, the deportation thing is a creature of the last few months in particular, but it builds on a history of animosity, colorism, nationalism, French vs. Spanish colonial issues, etc that have been in place for the last 200 years. (The Haitian Revolution is what freed Dominican slaves, etc)

As for running for office, I have been working in government and legislation for twenty years, both for elected officials and public agencies, and it has taught me to have a jaded view of elected officials generally. I was approached a couple of times when I was younger, but I think I can be more effective and philosophically sound (not to mention true to myself) advocating from outside and sticking to specific issues rather than involving myself with a politician or party.

In defense of politicians though, a lot of them aren't corrupt or guilty of any illegal action. It's just that the system is built to accommodate a lot of legal (but unseemly) maneuvering that allows for behavior that we as voters are often nauseated by. I think voters have become too complacent and we need to start agitating more.

 

The problem is that too many are stuck on stupid (sos).
They are not built on what right for all in other words not willing to give up something thats immediate.

 

Ouch! Lol. It's hard to pull people away from the idiot box to get focused on something that might have much more impact on their lives than the Survivor reruns (myself included).

 

"The Haitian Revolution is what freed Dominican slaves"..well how about that...!

I understand @ your political reservations. You do what's best for you. I thought you did some campaign work during election times for various politicians, didn't know you worked within agencies as well. Great experiences l'm sure.

Your 3rd comment...reminds me of the legal loophole of the H - 1B visa...morally bankrupt moves on technicalities. The thing is, if you don't do as the Romans do politically, you get left behind, or without. Such an awful, manipulative catch-22.

 

Lol.
I was referring to people who think that they dont need to sacrifice but everyone else should.

Goto go tmz is coming on.

 

I wonder if that's true anymore. Its not the days of old where you needed tv ads to get your face out there and the people relied solely on the information given to them in order to vote. Bernie Sanders is a great example of that dude is almost purely word of mouth, same with Elizabeth Warren. They don't need ads with things like twitter and facebook getting the necessary knowledge out to the people.
This could be a huge turn in politics because now the people are focusing in on people who have a track record of actually doing what's in the interest of the people and not just those who pay a shit ton of lip service and do nothing.