By Neil Rubenstein
Observer Columnist
Did you know these statistics of the Vietnam War Memorial Wall? There are 58,267 names now listed. The names are arranged in order by year and then alphabetized.
The first casualty was Richard Fitzgibbon, killed on June 8, 1956. His son was killed on September 7, 1965. There are three sets of fathers and sons on the Wall. 49,885 were just 22 or younger; 8,283 were just 19; 33,103 were just 18 years old. 997 were killed on their first day in Vietnam; 1,448 were killed on their last day. There are 31 sets of brothers on the wall.
54 soldiers attended Thomas Edison High in Philadelphia. Eight women died nursing the wounded. 244 soldiers were awarded the Medal of Honor during the Vietnam War, and 153 of them are on the Wall. Beallsville, Ohio, with a population of 475, lost six of her sons. West Virginia had the highest casualty rate per capita in the nation with 711 West Virginians on the Wall.
For those who do not receive “The Jewish Veteran,” the official publication of the Jewish War Veterans of the United States of America (www.jwv.org), there was one article in particular that I found to be very informative in volume 69 number 1.
As a veteran, have you ever heard of the United States Court of Appeals for Veterans Claims? To be honest, neither had I, but if a claim was denied and you got new evidence or if your condition worsened, you may file with the court for another hearing.
The process was implemented in 1988 to assist veterans in obtaining a just decision and works like this. Papers and documents are sent to the Board of Veterans’ Appeals. They handle about 50,000 appeals per year.
The Board’s decision may be appealed to the court, and sometimes can be heard by a single judge within 90 days. The claimant also has the ability to ask the court to panel, which means it has the power to withdraw a single judge’s decision and rehear your claim.
In addition, there is the federally funded Veterans Consortium Pro Bono Program, designed to link veterans with lawyers to help veterans get their cases through the courts.
Are you concerned about getting liver cancer? If you drink three or more alcoholic drinks a day, you could be one of the 746,000 who die from this disease every year, according to the World Cancer Research Fund International, which released its analysis of 8.2 million adults. To prevent liver cancer, people should maintain a healthy weight and limit alcohol to no more than two drinks a day for men and one drink for women. Also, drinking coffee might protect people.
Latino lawmakers in Sacramento have endorsed AB278 (Hernandez), which would mandate city council elections by district. This just might be reality in five years or less.
The Journal of Human Reproduction had an interesting article by Alison Behie, a biological anthropologist at Australian National University in Canberra. Girls whose mothers smoked while pregnant entered puberty at a younger age, causing a higher risk for various cancers, asthma, type 2 diabetes and obesity.
Since 2010, the IRS has lost 13,000 employees and $1.2 billion in funding. It was so bad this year that the agency ran out of forms and even the paper to print more.
According to an article published in the Long Beach Press Telegram, 617 people were killed by law enforcement agencies in Los Angeles County since 2000.
If you need French fries to make your hamburger zing don’t come to Cassell’s. No Frenchies there, but wonderful potato salad to go with the best hamburger I’ve found within 20 miles. It’s at 3600 West Sixth Street, downtown Los Angeles (cassellshamburgers.com).
For a dozen Kaiser rolls, be the 16th person to answer this question: On May 27, 1937, what bridge was opened to the public? Of course, the right answer is the Golden Gate, now almost 78 years old.
The Obama administration will require companies that drill for oil and natural gas on federal lands to disclose chemicals used in hydraulic fracturing operations. This rule, to take effect in June 2015, also updates requirements for well construction and disposal of water and other fluids used in fracking.
It just seems to me every week we are learning more and more about Alzheimer’s. Just recently, the results of Biogen’s experimental drug BIIB037 provided the best evidence so far for a potentially effective treatment. They are getting closer to a cure.
Summer will be here before you can snap your fingers, and I know some of you are planning an Eastern European vacation. Perhaps you are unaware of a new museum that opened seven months ago in Poland. Located in what was once the heart of Jewish Warsaw – which became the Warsaw Ghetto during World War II – the POLIN Museum of the History of Polish Jews explores a rich chronicle, stretching from medieval times when Jews arrived as traveling merchants and thus began a 1,000-year history in Poland.
For those who missed an article, all my commentaries can be found at http://www.culvercityobserver.com by placing Rubenstein in that website’s search box.
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