FERS & CSRS Disability Retirement: The mistakes we make

There are those who make it their life’s goal not to have remorse for decisions made; but is that truly a worthwhile achievement?  At the end of it all, is there a special space on the unwritten tombstone that lists the mistakes avoided, the embarrassments averted, and the admissions of deficiencies concealed?  Is that not where much of Shakespearean web of deceits are constructed from – of attempting to cover up the insufficiencies otherwise already apparent in the foreboding appearances we attempt to portray? […]

Experience and Federal Disability Retirement Benefits

The vicious circularity of having or not having “experience” is comprised of the following: If too much weight is placed upon it and one is passed over because of its lack, then one will never be able to attain the experience needed in order to qualify; in order to attain experience, one must be given the opportunity to grow by trial and error; but such trial and error only reveals the lack thereof. […]

FERS & CSRS Disability Retirement: Learning from Experience

The problems inherent in filing a Federal Disability Retirement application under FERS or CSRS are multi-fold and multi-tiered. Even today, after years and years of practicing in this particular area of law […]

Federal Disability Retirement Application: Lost…

One’s age can be revealed as to whether, in the privacy of one’s thoughts, the ellipses is replaced with — “Lost in Space”, or even The Swiss Family Robinson.  The former is a television series that ran between 1965 and 1968; the latter, a novel by Johann David Wyss published in 1812 that few of us read anymore.  Another television series recalled from the dustbin of history’s classics; another novel and writer no longer read, remembered or studied. […]

Federal Disability Retirement: Landmines undetected

Landmines, or other similar devices left undetected, whether improvised to explode and damage, harm or otherwise maim and kill, are constructed and implanted precisely for the purpose of being hidden until it is too late — until, unaware and unconcerned, the unwary enters into the foray of the device and suffers from the resulting potency of mayhem. […]

Federal Disability Retirement Claims: Methodological approach

We hear about the various approaches — of “quantitative analysis”; of systems created for a specific outcome-based determination; of numeric, qualitative, cost-benefits balancing, etc.; and all the while, we presume that there is a “methodological” underpinning that girds the analytical viewpoint, thereby systematizing the approach into a coherent consistency in order to limit and restrict human error. […]

FERS Medical Retirement: Absurdity with an explanation

According to Quine, the great mathematician and logician, that is the definition of a paradox.  It is an event or a concept that seems at first glance to be an impossibility, or a conundrum of some complexity, but can be explained to unfold the absurdity first displayed.  Thus — of the man who has walked the earth for decades but is technically only 9 years old, until one realizes that his birthday falls on the 29th of February, a date that appears only once every 4 years; this is a paradox, […]

Federal Employee Disability Information: Bumps along the road

On any trip or travel, how many bumps are felt or experienced along the road?  Many are imperceptible; some are noticeable; a few may be jarring to the effect that it jolts one from the automatic-consciousness-mode of how most people remain while driving.  But what impact does the entirety of the aggregate have upon both the vehicle being driven and the individual sitting behind the wheel? […]

Federal Employee Disability Retirement: Expertise

What constitutes it, and who determines the status of when it is achieved?  We hear about people who are “experts” in this or that, referring to either experience, association or credentials, and based upon that, we accept their status of being an “expert” in the field.  Can that be undermined by personal experience?  Say a person has a Ph.D. in a given field, has worked in the capacity of that field for 30 years, […]

Federal Disability Retirement Representation: Conversations

What is a conversation?  Or, is it an empirical phenomenon that — only when we are in the middle of it — we know as we experience it, but otherwise is undefinable?  If there are 5 people in a room but only 1 is doing the talking, is a conversation ongoing?  Must there be a “back and forth” give and take, or must something more be involved?  If the same 5 people are in the same room, and all of them are talking all at once, […]