Woodbury Attacks Miller's "Drama"

[Deborah]

Posted: Oct 23, 2007  12:21  
CONGRESSMAN MILLER'S DRAMA
by: Lon Woodbury

Congressman Miller treated us to a legislative drama on October 10, 2007. Make no mistake about it; his hearings were a first class, top quality, orchestrated high drama that was executed perfectly. All parties played their parts as he intended, making the emotional impact compelling enough to brush aside logic, reason, rationality, fairness and inconsistent facts. This is not intended to belittle the tragedy of the three parents who testified; those are real tragedies and all facts regarding those specific circumstances should be fully exposed. This is just to point out that their specific stories were useful to Congressman Miller's ambitions.

For an overview of the status of American youth, it is obvious many American teens are in trouble. The increasing incidents of attempted suicides, addictions, drug overdoses and poor preparation for adulthood, although still only a minority, are appalling. In response, vast resources are being put into residential attempts to help these teens, with mixed results and some tragedies, which I try to document in the Breaking News section of my website www.strugglingteens.com/news/news.html. I have talked with hundreds of therapists, attorneys, judges and parents who, for their children, are fleeing the all too frequent inhumane treatment found in public run and public-private residential facilities under the juvenile justice system, and state mental health residential facilities (For the most appalling example go to www.strugglingteens.com/news/florida_bo ... index.html, a public boot camp facility with both federal and state money, regulation and oversight, which was not seriously talked about in the Congressman Miller Hearings). The parents and professionals I have talked with often seem like refugees from public programs, people who are looking for quality private facilities and want to avoid the poor quality private programs. Any professional and experienced Educational Consultant will know about the poor programs, can steer the parent toward the ones with good reputations for effective and safe work and would love to see the poor private programs shut down.

Miller Calls for Federal Investigation of Boot Camp Death
http://blogs.abcnews.com/theblotter/200 ... n-cal.html

With this national concern and activity as a backdrop, have you ever wondered why some legislation becomes law while other legislation languishes? Ignore your old high school civics lessons; they don't have much to do with it. In reality, the process most often used has been fine tuned over the decades, which consists of a few simple steps. When carried out successfully, not only does the legislation become law but the author of the legislation becomes famous. Bridges, schools and buildings are often subsequently named after him or her, and he/she is praised as a distinguished leader, all because he/she managed to get landmark legislation passed. The basis of all this opportunity for congressional fame and fortune is that we the voters want a problem fixed. That's what we elect him/her to do. Congressman Miller was obviously following these basic steps in his bid for Congressional fame by starting a process to solve a carefully crafted definition of a problem.

THE CONGRESSIONAL STEPS TO FAME AND FORTUNE

Step One:
Find a problem to fix! Find some tragedy, unjustness, abuse or similar thing that the average person would say, "That's not right!" This isn't hard. In an imperfect world where accidents and unforeseen events are around every corner, in a diverse country of a third of a billion people and having the benefit of 20/20 hindsight, opportunities are all around you.

Step Two:
Find a constituency. In this vast country, everybody is upset about something, and some of them can be enlisted in the good fight to conquer some perceived ill of the world through your legislation. Work with them and convince them you are on their side. If you are clever, you can even convince bitter enemies to join with each other to support you in solving this overriding concern you are refining.

Step Three:
Define/ Identify: Define the issue and identify a culprit (target of the planned legislation). Don't let conflicting facts confuse the issue. Your definition should be clear and simple, suitable for a sound bite on the news. If simple enough to fit on a bumper sticker, that is even better. The chosen culprit must be vulnerable to being painted very darkly (facts and fairness have little to do with it, popular emotional perspectives are key - demonization is all-too-frequently the politics of choice in current American politics). Blur boundaries so that entirely different and competing approaches and philosophies that work with what is perceived as the same population can be lumped together. This gives you additional sources of ammunition and the tragedies of the non-targeted group can be used to confront the targeted group. That will put the defenders of the targeted group off balance. This also makes more effective the use of "Have you stopped beating your wife?" type questions, which are impossible to answer in the short sound bites favored by the media. So long as you can continue to define the issue and prevent defenders from establishing their definition, you will maintain the initiative.

Step Four:
Reassure: In preparing for the initial hearings, reassure the defenders of the targeted group [NATSAP?] that you want to be fair. Reassure them that they will have a chance to present their case, and that you just want to get to the bottom of these problems. Reassure them you want to work with them to eliminate the abuses they and all responsible people want to prevent. Be sure you keep your targeted group's focus narrow enough that associated groups working with the same or similar population feel unthreatened and so avoid defending the targeted group.

They had their 5 minutes like everyone else. NATSAP presented a pathetic testimony. Can that be blamed on Miller?

Step Five:
Alert the Media: Let the media know that there will be enough sensationalism and drama to satisfy them for days. Since the media nowadays is more inclined to parrot official offerings than to dig behind the story, especially of sensational drama, they will be there in full force. At this point all will be in readiness for the first preliminary public hearings.

Step Six:
Public Hearings: These hearings are ostensibly a preliminary report on research to determine if the problem is serious enough to warrant further research, future hearings and possible legislation. In actuality, this is drama, and you will know exactly what will be presented, the appearance and impact it will have, and already have in mind follow-up actions to further the cause and produce more headlines.

Further action is warranted. They aren't there to hear a few anecdotal success stories. Do a few "successes" outweigh the abuses/ neglect/ deaths/ unproven methods inherent to the industry?

Selection of the testimony to be given is vital. This stage is purely emotion driven. Logic, reason or rationality has little or nothing to do with it. The deeper and more sensational the tragedy, the more effective and useful it is and the more impact on the public, resulting in expanding your constituency and chances of passing legislation. The most powerful image is of a parent grieving their lost child. Nothing he or she says can be challenged. Better yet is when some of the testimony also is directed against a program respected by the defenders, undermining the defender's sincerity and credibility.

Hmm... would you secretly like to "challenge" the three parents? Hey, CFW has been a member of NATSAP since the beginning. Does NATSAP advise parents that there have been three deaths at CFW? The hit on CFW was hard, as it deserved to be.

Ambush is the term for the most effective approach. In the House, the minority party is usually kept out of the loop so they can be caught off guard and be unable to challenge the tone of the hearings. It is hoped the defenders of the targeted group will also be caught off guard and will appear to be confused, defensive and ineffective.

Step Seven:
Follow-up: Acting like this is the first time you have heard these outrages, you can use the tragedies presented as a foundation in expressing righteous indignation and call for further research to get to the bottom of the cause of these tragedies, push any action that might currently be within the power of the federal government and work to expand your constituency among people who are outraged by the emotion-driven revelations they have just heard.

Stay tuned as Congressman Miller's drama unfolds. Since there is never a second chance to make a good first impression, the tone of the just completed hearings will strongly influence subsequent happenings. Will there be more focus on public program tragedies in the next round? Will definitions become more accurate? Will representatives of private programs be given a full and adequate chance to present their case? Will satisfied parents or alumni be called on to give balance for accuracy? Don't count on it.

The irony is few make the connection that in the October 10th hearings, they have just watched a polished politician in action providing a carefully orchestrated drama--a drama in this case that is intended to bring wholly private programs under the federal government influence just as juvenile justice and state mental health facilities already are. The possibility exists that this Federal legislation, if passed, would very well force private programs to start looking and acting more like their public counterparts. If this happens, parents will be the losers (and by extension their children) in having fewer choices, all in the name of protecting "the children."
~~~


*150+ deaths in children's residential and outdoor programs
*Untold accidents, injuries, assaults
*Previous reports by OIG and Inspector General regarding the lack of regulation and efficacy of residential programs
*20+ years of following/investigating the industry

and Lon labels Miller's effort "Drama"

People need to view the hearing and judge for themselves.
http://edlabor.house.gov/hearings/fc101007.shtml

Here's some Drama
http://www.fornits.com/wwf/viewtopic.ph ... 464#289464

[ZenAgent]

Shit, I can only hope Lon has enough shame to never sit in the same room with those three families and Sen. Miller.  Lon's not worthy of sharing their air.

When did Lon suddenly come out snarkin' and whining?  He laid back to assess the damage, I guess.  We should take it as a good sign that he's so defensive, he's worried about his cash flow.

[BuzzKill]

Shit, I can only hope Lon has enough shame to never sit in the same room with those three families and Sen. Miller.  Lon's not worthy of sharing their air.

When did Lon suddenly come out snarkin' and whining?  He laid back to assess the damage, I guess.  We should take it as a good sign that he's so defensive, he's worried about his cash flow.

My view exactly. Makes me grin to see them so hysterical about these hearings. And I have to say, anyone who doesn't think Thayer Learning Center and the Bundys need to be investigated as a result of Roberto Reye's death (and the years of routine horrid abuse) has got their head stuck so far up their ass, they have little hope of ever standing tall again. They must be one big pathetic ball of confusion, rolling around hoping to avoid getting kicked.

[Anonymous]

ESTIMATE OF UNITED STATES POLITICAL MOMENTUM IS EXPONENTIAL, EVEN WITHOUT THE CONTINUING INFLUENCE OF Error: Undefined construct (SOCIAL_GESTALT_L) OR OTHER [CLASSIFIED]-DIRECTED FORCES, LARGE-SCALE PARADIGM SHIFT IS IMMINENT.

THE ASSRAPE HAS JUST BEGUN, Lon Woodbury.

BUT FOR NOW HERE'S A TRANSLATION YOU SADISTIC FUCK

(YOU HOMINIDS WILL LOVE THIS ONE. READ IT ALL, FLESHLIES.)

Sadists running abusive institutions have treated parents to drama since the 60's. Make no mistake about it; the way we terrify parents is a first class, top quality, orchestrated high drama that was executed perfectly. But apparently not perfectly enough, as we're getting asspounded by recent legislative investigation. All parties, except those pesky kids, played their parts as we intended, making the emotional impact of deadinsaneorinjail compelling enough to brush aside logic, reason, rationality, fairness and inconsistent facts. This is absolutely intended to belittle the tragedy of anyone who got their kids killed in these hellholes or anyone who was abused, sexually or otherwise; we seriously could not care less about the circumstances we create or what happened to them.

For an overview of the status of American youth, it is obvious many American teens are in danger of being hurt by us. The decreasing incidents of attempted suicides, addictions, drug overdoses and crime are no barrier to our ongoing campaign to terrify parents into sending their children to be tortured in some godforsaken shitpit located conveniently in the middle of nowhere where we can do what we want to them and claim that anything they say about it is "a few noisy complainers", in the immortal words of NATSAP. In response, vast resources are being put into exposing the reality of these hellholes in order to help these teens, with mixed results in preventing tragedies, which I naturally avoid entirely on Struggling Trolls. I have abjectly ignored hundreds of therapists, attorneys, judges and parents who, for their children, are fleeing the all too frequent inhumane treatment found in private residential facilities such as Turn-About Ranch and hellholes posing as mental health facilities such as Peninsula Village (For the most appalling examples go to wwf.fornits.com, unfortunately not talked about in the Congressman Miller Hearings). The parents and professionals I have ignored often seem like refugees from private programs, people who are absolutely appalled by the GAO investigations and could not believe that they either sent their kids or was about to send them to one of these poor quality private programs. Slick and silver-tongued Educational Consultants are having more trouble directing them towards hellholes that give big kickbacks, and no longer can steer the parent towards anything. In fact this is likely to end with private programs getting shut down, which is why I feel compelled to spew out a hopeless ten-paragraph rant only to get what passes for my spine ripped out on Fornits. Again.

With this national concern and activity as a backdrop, have you ever wondered why federal legislation is active and ass-kicking but state legislation languishes? Think back to your old high school civics lessons, particularly the ones involving civil rights in the South. In reality, the process most often used is a version of very old-school racketeering, of the kind practiced by the contemporaries of Al Capone. When carried out successfully, not only does no legislation prevent wrongdoing, but the people most involved in the wrongdoing become the author of the legislation, as what happened in Montana. Even the most sadistic, abusive hellholes can be named after a facilitator of this process, such as the Judge Rotenberg Center. He/she is praised as a distinguished leader, all because he/she managed to parry away local legislation and keep a dilapidated economy in business, another good example being Bonners Ferry, Idaho. Unfortunately for us, we've been unable to keep our abuse under wraps in the era of the Internet and now the voters want the problem fixed. That's what we elect representatives to do. Congressman Miller was obviously following the will of the people who elected him in his bid to solve a widespread problem. Until Congressional legislation crushes us like cockroaches, we will continue to follow:

THE PROGRAMMIE STEPS TO FAME AND FORTUNE

Step One:
Find a problem to fix! Find some kid with a mild drug problem, or maybe one who told his dad to go fuck himself, or some other kid with basically normal issues This isn't hard. In an imperfect world where teenagers are, well, teenagers (those noncompliant, ungrateful little shits, oh how I hate them all), in a diverse country of a third of a billion people and having the benefit of experience in preying on parents' fears, opportunities are all around you.

Step Two:
Find a network of support. In this vast country, finding people who will recommend to parents that their children really need to be locked up and brainwashed for a year are easier to find and enlist, and some of them can be enlisted in the good fight to conquer some perceived ill of Congressional legislation. Attempt to work with Congress and convince them you are on their side. If you are clever, you can even convince bitter enemies to join with each other to support you in solving this overriding concern of Congress and other authorities shutting hellholes down. This is, after all, why we have a NATSAP.

Step Three:
Define/ Identify: Define the issue and identify your victim set (targets of the planned abuse). Don't let conflicting facts confuse the issue. Your definition should be clear and simple, suitable for a sound bite on the news. If simple enough to fit on a bumper sticker, that is even better, although you wouldn't want to actually put "I sent my kid to Cross Creek" on a bumper sticker because you could easily get the living crap beaten out of you if you drove outside hellhole-supported economies. The chosen victim set must be vulnerable to being painted very darkly (facts and fairness have little to do with it, popular emotional perspectives are key - demonization is still way too easy when talking about teenagers). Blur boundaries so that entirely different and competing maladies (anorexia, ADD, Tourettes) can be lumped together into what is perceived as the same population. This gives you additional sources of fresh meat and the tragedies of one targeted group can be used against another targeted group, as what happens in seminars and raps. That will put the parents off balance as psychological labels they never heard of are suddenly applied to their kids. This also makes more effective the use of "Have you stopped beating your wife?" type questions, which are impossible to answer when dealing with aggressive, confrontational programmies. So long as we can continue to define the issue and prevent defenders from establishing their definition, we will maintain the initiative. Unfortunately, we lost the ability to control the discussion long, long ago, although since I don't know anything else I'll keep trying on regardless.

Step Four:
Reassure: In preparing to get more bodies into the shithole that pays the biggest kickbacks, reassure parents that you have the answers for their children. Reassure them that they children will have a chance to experience nature or engage in real therapy, and that you just want to get to the bottom of these problems. Reassure them you want to work with them to eliminate the behaviors they and all responsible people want to prevent- we can't have teenagers speaking their minds, now can we? Be sure you keep your program's definition broad enough that you can claim to treat a wide variety of different psychological problems and confuse associated regulatory agencies into thinking you're regulated by someone else, and so avoid actual regulation.

Step Five:
Control the Media: With the GAO hearings ripping our tiny, underused nutsacks off, this is no longer possible outside of select, insulated communities. In the glory days, however, we were able to keep almost all reports of abuse and even some deaths out of the news entirely.

Step Six:
Public Disinformation: Struggling Trolls and other programmie websites are ostensibly a way to give parents a way to determine if their teenagers' problems are serious enough to warrant further research into residential placement. In actuality, this is drama, and you will know exactly what will be presented, the appearance and impact it will have, and already have in mind follow-up actions to further the cause and make more money.

Selection of the testimonials to be published is vital. This is purely emotion driven. Logic, reason or rationality has little or nothing to do with it. The deeper and more sensational the claims, the more effective and useful it is and the more impact on the public, resulting in expanding your program and increasing parents' willingness to empty their pockets for you. The most powerful image is of a parent saying their child would be dead without the program. In our tiny minds, nothing he or she says can be challenged. Better yet is when some of the testimonials also are directed against the honesty of the targeted parents' children, undermining their sincerity and credibility.

Ambush is the term for the most effective approach. With children not in the house when a programmie manipulation session starts, they are kept out of the loop so their parents can be caught off guard and be unable to challenge the tone of the meeting where their next few years are determined by sadists. It is hoped the defenders of these victimized children will also be caught off guard and will appear to be confused, defensive and ineffective. Damn, did we ever fuck up that one.

Step Seven:
Follow-up: Acting like this is the first time you have heard of child abuse being promulgated in hellholes, you can use the tragedies presented as a foundation in expressing righteous indignation and call for further research to remove the "bad programs" (although you do not dare name any), push against any action that might currently be within the power of the federal government and work to expand your program among people who are outraged by the emotion-driven revelations they have just heard, but still somehow believe they need to send their children somewhere.

Stay tuned as Congressman Miller crushes us like bugs. Since there is never a second chance to make a good first impression, and NATSAP failed horribly as Miller had to ask them just what the hell they do, the tone of the just completed hearings will strongly influence subsequent happenings. Can we divert the focus to public programs, from which we don't make money? Will we stop spouting bullshit? Will we start allowing current victims of private programs a full and adequate chance to go to actual authorities, without the GAO forcing it? Will they let our paid shills in to Congressional hearings? Don't count on it.

The irony is few programmies make the connection that in the October 10th hearings, they have just watched the end of torture camps in the United States- a prolonged extermination, to be sure, but soon private programs will be under the federal government just as juvenile justice and state mental health facilities already are, because we've hurt too many kids and apparently someone is going to make it stop. However, the possibility exists that this federal legislation, if passed, can very well allow public programs to start looking and acting more like their private counterparts, in terms of abuse, as child torturers unemployed from past closures find work in the public sector. If this happens, children will be abused by the same shitheads, ergo it is vital for public programs to do background checks and keep our sadistic asses the fuck out.

75% PROBABILITY TheWho WILL REPLY ANONYMOUSLY WITH VOCALIZATION AND SIMIANS

[Anonymous]

I believe those who are partly culpable for the neglect, abuse, mosestation and deaths of so-called "troubled teens" have to believe in the product they are "selling" to desperate parents.  I think this is how DHS and the Governor's Office, Utah, sleeps at night.  One in particular doesn't have to sleep with a gun anymore out of fear of people like Steve Cartisano.  I believe they have given in to the idea that these programs are saving lives!!

It's called denial.................

I believe this industry is more troubled than any kid out there.  Does the word serial killings come to mind?

After a three hour conversation with "ONE" escort person, who by the way is teamed up with the Nevada Child Seekers (check it out online), I learned even more about this dysfunctional, out of control, industry.  

This guy and his partner work WITH the overloaded Nevada Child Seekers and will pick up a parents wayward teen.  No judge, no jury, no mediator, and have him/her whisked off to some program.  The escorter has a list of programs that are his favorite, and claims he won't take a kid to a WWASP program.  The escorter shared with me how he worked with Steve Cartisano and Craig Gillman when Paradise Cove was up and running.   He also shared with me that Gayle DeGraff, AKA, Gayle Palmer refers parents to him should they need their kid escorted.  

He told me of a "parent" who flipped the kid off as he took him away in hand cuffs with a court ordered power of attorney paper in his hand.  He told me of another kid whose parents lied to him about where they were taking him.  Told "their son" they were taking him to buy a car.  The escorters were waiting, the parents handed the boy a toy red sports car, laughed and walked away.

This industry encourages parents to lie to their children if that's what it takes to get them into the program.

This industry claims they are helping families.  I believe they are doing more harm than good.  

Here is a list of those whom I feel are partly culpable for what is happening to children in the self regulated, self certifying, troubled teen industry:

STOP Abuse in the Name of Therapy

Legislators
Governing Body (Governor's Office and DHS)
Providers
Advertising
Referral Agents
Educational Consultants
Escorters
Land Owners

I once had the above list placed around an eight sided STOP SIGN (on paper of course).  The post for the STOP SIGN had the word CHILDREN on it.

At the bottom of the cover page I put the following words:

H ell Camps
E ngaged in
L egalized
P unishment

I had folder jackets made with information inside, along with a post card in support of bill HR2132.  I was tacked onto the Recreational Camp Safety Act Bill and told that was as good as I was going to get.  This bill was introduced by Congressman Christopher Shays through the diligent work of a Father who's son was killed while on a Boy Scout expedition.
The bill died in the house.  This bill was once voted FOR 50-0, then killed behind closed doors.  Politics..............

I would like to see the survivors, who are now adults, take the lead here and go public with their program experiences.

I have been speaking up for the past 17 years, FOR and IN BEHALF of the many children who have, and still are, suffering from the abuses they encountered while in a program.  I believe it's time for the survivors to form a coalition and seek the vindication they are long overdue for.

I am not in support of anything on a vigilant note, but a coalition that would show the number of children who received a bad experience.  Who better to tell the world than the ones who suffered.

Singles walk, and numbers talk.......................

Anyone know of an attorney who would take on this industry?  Think about a Class Action Suit.  

Just yesterday, a reporter asked me if the survivors have thought of filing suit.  Not the parents, the survivors.

Just a thought from a Mom who would like to see the survivors receive the vindication they so deserve.

Sincerely,

Michelle Sutton Memorial Fund, Inc.
Catherine Sutton

[Anonymous]

PS,

I negelected to include JUDGES to my list of those whom I feel are partly culpable for the continuation of neglect, abuse, molestation and deaths of children in the self regulated, self certifying, so-called troubled teen industry.

I have watched as a judge sided with the warped mindset of this industry.  I also watched several judges buckle under to the controversy.  I saw this when I attended the David VanBlarigan hearing and again when I attended the Aaron Bacon trial.  I was in attendance of the Kristen Chase trial and watched first hand as a Judge supposedly forgot to read the jury instructions.  This only helped Steve Cartisano's case.  I was asked to take my information and leave a court house in San Juaquin County when all I hoped to do was educate the Judge with the information I handed to his clerk to put on his desk.  This information was in regard to Court Adjudicated programs like Vision Quest and Arizona Boys Ranch.  This judge made it very clear that he was FOR the programs.

Changing an ignorant mind-set is no easy task.

Catherine

[Deborah]

Judges belong on that list.
The judge presiding over the class against Hidden Lake sat on the case for 6 months and wouldn't allow discovery. He refused to class the suit. The law firm opted to settle. The plaintiffs had no choice, settle or drop out.
In my opinion, that judge obstructed justice.

[hanzomon4]

Bump

[hanzomon4]

I'll keep bumping all night if I have to......

Wait!  

[psy]

Oh this is so typical.  Program/industry gets critized... so program/industry accuses the critics of being drama queens...  doesn't matter who they are, they're all allegedly doing it for the lulz.

I was watching the faces of the members of the comittee carefully during the testimony and i'm pretty sure I saw a great deal of genuine disgust.

[Anonymous]

Wow, Deborah, you have a lot of information to share.

Thanks,

Catherine

[Anonymous]

Is there a troll playing games with this forum?

[hanzomon4]

Yup

[hanzomon4]

Bump

[Anonymous]

Is there a troll playing games with this forum?

*A* troll? You must not come here very often.