OPM Disability Retirement: The Winning Argument

Most arguments are not won by sheer force of logical persuasion; for, that would require the assumption that not only does everyone think “logically”, but that everyone also has been versed in the technicalities of propositional and syllogistic logic, has studied them and accepted them as overriding and dominant methodologies of discourse.

We like to harken back to the classical period of civilization’s cradle and cloak our biases with Aristotle’s dictum that we are all “rational animals” — implying thereby that our thought processes are powered by a predetermined set of algorithms characterized by the model of a supercomputer.  Yet, we — as fallible human beings ourselves — instinctively know better.  People do not think, leaving aside argue, by mere logical rules and discourses of such modalities; there are almost always other factors involved, whether of emotional ties, internal egoistical motivations or just the pure and unadulterated need to win at every engagement.

Aside from such human factors, however, is there an “objective” standard that characterizes a “winning argument”?

For Federal Employees and U.S. Postal workers who suffer from a medical condition such that the medical condition prevents the Federal or Postal employee from performing one or more of the essential elements of one’s Federal or Postal job, it is essential to put together a FERS Disability Retirement application with this in mind: How to effectively put forth your case with “the winning argument”.

The U.S. Office of Personnel Management is never there to “rubber stamp” a Federal Disability Retirement application.  They are there to parse, tear apart and potentially undermine, and it is important to recognize the pitfalls and shortcomings of your particular case before putting together arguments that will ultimately win your case.

Consult with an attorney who specializes in Federal Disability Retirement Law today so that you can begin to formulate “the winning argument” that will obtain an approval of your Federal Disability Retirement application.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire

Federal & Postal Disability Retirement Lawyer: Figures Larger than Life

Once, mythological figures and characters looming larger than life itself wandered amidst the common populace of everyday working folks; their very presence bestowed a greater sense of purpose, of a pride in knowing that better days lay ahead, and that even in the upheavals of tempestuous travails and turmoils which interrupted every economy and fiefdom because of the inevitable vicissitudes of economic activity, that somehow we would all survive through the common efforts of community.  But the pureness of the mountain stream became poisoned, diluted and polluted by egomaniacal intrusions of selfish constructs; “we” did not matter much, if at all, and the accolades of accretion demanded greater self-congratulatory spotlights of self-centered egoism.

Thus was the “selfie” born.  In the midst of such a society, empathy for the disabled will be wanting and rare; the saying that he would shove his own grandmother under a moving bus is not merely a warning, but a confirmation of normative character.  For Federal employees and U.S. Postal workers who suffer from a medical condition, such that the medical condition prevents one from performing one or more of the essential elements of one’s job, it is well to know who, and what, one is dealing with.

Agencies and Post Offices which may have shown care and comaraderie during better times, may not continue the surface-appearance of comity and cooperation when it becomes clear that the Federal or Postal employee can no longer remain as fully productive as in years past.  Human nature being what it is, the self-contradiction of man’s thought processes can always amaze and delude:  One believes that one is neither naive nor ignorant; concomitantly, that the world is generally an evil arena of life; but, somehow, one’s own friends, family, and agency are the exception, when the callous experiences of life have shown us otherwise.

Filing for Federal Disability Retirement benefits by the Federal employee or the U.S. Postal worker, whether the Federal or Postal employee is under FERS, CSRS or CSRS Offset, through the U.S. Office of Personnel Management, is a clear indication to one’s agency or the U.S. Postal Service that you are no longer “one of us”, and more to the point, can no longer contribute to the betterment of the agency, the Postal Service, or to the advancement of management’s careers and objectives.

You become considered as mere dead weight and fodder for the wasteland of problems and pecuniary penchants of piracy and pernicious paupers.  You become erased and digitally deleted from those seemingly happy images of office parties and ceremonial accolades where words of praise once were dispensed with generous helpings and heaps of adjectives and adverbs not often heard.  You become the nobody that you always were perceived to be behind those lying eyes, had always been, and forever considered; you just didn’t know it before the occurrence of confirmed establishment.

Perhaps we know too much today, because information is cheap and available; and perhaps giants never roamed the earth in epochs extinguished by time and modernity; for the figures larger than life are nowhere to be found, but in what we make of our lives through sheer effort, planning, and genuine concern for the man sitting right next to us.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire

 

Federal Disability Retirement Lawyer: The Wear of Medical Conditions

Some words have constrained, limiting and restricted meanings, available only in esoteric whispers of academic thunderings; others, of common and every day usage, but through monotony of repetition and sheer ordinariness, loses any luster of royal patronage; and yet others, because of the expansive and varied contextual applications, can be applicable afresh, when needs require service of exposure.

One can “wear” clothing; “wear” glasses or a smile; or pass the time tediously, as in, “The minutes wore onward with a tired sense of sadness”.  The word applies also when a person or object begins to diminish, to fatigue, or to slowly fade.  Medical conditions tend to do that, like worn furniture in a house dilapidated by time, where the tiredness of untempered souls and toils of life’s encounters begin to tear at the timeless tokens of tapestries, and one begins to give in to fatefulness.

For Federal employees and U.S. Postal workers who wear the face of normalcy, but who must contend not only with an underlying medical condition, as well as the hostility of a workplace and a world which grants no empathy, filing for Federal Disability Retirement benefits through the U.S. Office of Personnel Management is often seen as a surrender of sorts, a wearing of the proverbial white flag, and an admission and acknowledgment that time has worn the welcome of a bright future.

The wear of medical conditions indeed warrants a respite from the world of turmoil, and a more positive outlook is to simply grant the world its due, and instead to realize that filing for Federal Disability Retirement benefits is merely to access an employment benefit which is merely part of the larger employment compensation package signed on to at the beginning of one’s Federal or Postal career, and in accessing the benefit, as nothing more than to assert what is available.

To contend with the wear of a medical condition is a weary challenge; to wear one’s welcome is to withstand unnecessarily.  Wisdom is to recognize one’s time and to wear the wisdom of time when welcomes wither.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire

OPM Disability Law: Arguing by Logical Extension

Often, in legal argumentation, one must simply use the available evidence garnered, and make the best of it.  In many areas of law, especially in administrative legal venues involving Federal employees and U.S. Postal workers, the law favors agencies which hide behind the shield of “efficiency of the Federal Service”, in implementing sanctions, adverse actions, restrictions of leave usage, proposing and deciding upon removals (whether based upon reasons of medical conditions or other basis), etc.

In a typical OPM Disability Retirement case, however, there are just as many procedural and substantive legal precedents which can be utilized effectively to favor the Federal and Postal employee.

For Federal and Postal employees under FERS, CSRS or CSRS Offset, who intend upon filing for Federal Disability Retirement benefits through the U.S. Office of Personnel Management, the vast array from the arsenal of statutes, case-law, legal precedents and interpretive advantages gained through years and decades of predecessors to one’s present filing, should be recognized, researched and reapplied at every available opportunity.  For, if the greatest compliment that one can accord to another in the world of art, is one of mimicry and plagiarism, so in the world of law, it is to take the precedent of past legal victories, and to argue to the fullest the logical extension thereof.

That often occurs, unfortunately, only when it is a “hard case“, as opposed to the ones where there is little to no room for argument because of the overwhelming evidence available.  It is, in the end, an unfortunate circumstance that, often the test of brilliance manifests when the case is weak, and one must utilize the capacity available through means of arguing by logical extension, because that is precisely what is left — argument, logic, and extension of the first two principles.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire

 

Federal and Postal Worker Medical Retirement: The Unnavigable Epistemological Gap

The phrase itself is borrowed from Roger Scruton, who is perhaps one of the most influential philosopher of recent times.   To be “influential” is perhaps problematic, for if the general public denies knowledge of an individual, to what degree can influence be determined?   Public figures — known entertainers, authors of general fiction, news anchors and talk show hosts — are considered societal giants whose comments on culture, trends, values and norms demand attention and guru-like following.  But philosophers tend to be relegated to academic ivory towers of irrelevance.

From biodynamic farming to a proper appreciation of fine wines; from complex fiction to esoteric writings questioning cognitive dualism; Scruton covers the expanse of categories of thoughtful exchanges relevant to an era which denies significance to subjects, anymore.  The only thing that matters today is the individual and the fame of singularity.  And so it goes.  The concept of an unnavigable epistemological gap implies a barrier to knowledge and a chasm between what something is, and what can be known about it.  Or, in another sense, a privacy of concerns which cannot be verified in a strictly “objective” manner.

Medical conditions have a tendency to fall into such a category.  While MRIs, X-rays, and to a large extent, consistent clinical examinations over a long period of time may establish an objective medical basis for certain medical conditions, the problem still abounds as to how to convey, delineate and effectively narrate one’s statement of medical disability and the impact upon one’s Federal or Postal position in preparing, formulating and filing for Federal Disability Retirement benefits, whether the Federal or Postal employee is under FERS, CSRS or CSRS Offset.

As an OPM Disability Attorney who exclusively handles Federal Employee Disability Retirement claims for all civilian Federal and Postal workers, the concern is always in taking the medical condition as described by a doctor’s report, treatment notes, etc., then to interpret and fashion a narrative which effectively establishes the nexus, or bridge, between the medical condition and the positional duties of the Federal or Postal employee.

For the disabled Federal or injured Postal employee who tries such an endeavor without any prior experience, it is indeed one of an “unnavigable epistemological gap”, in that — not only must the proper bridge be created between one’s positional duties and the medical conditions described but, moreover — it must be presented to the U.S. Office of Personnel Management in such a way that persuasion and force will carry the day in order to attain the goal of efficacy:  an approval of an OPM Disability Retirement application for the Federal or Postal employee who can no longer perform all of the essential elements of one’s Federal or Postal positional duties.

Such an endeavor, indeed, is one which constitutes an unnavigable epistemological gap.

Sincerely,

Robert R. McGill, Esquire