Sour Grapes

By

JC Smith, MA, DC

 

The Germans have a term, Freudenschade, which means taking delight in your opponent’s misery. I’m sure George Dubya was feeling this way when Saddam was captured, just as I felt the same way when Big $id was deposed at Life (which is still a dumb name for a college). Now I’m feeling Freudenschade over Terry Rongberg’s string of unsuccessful legislative failures on Capitol Hill, the latest being his failure to sway the VA decision to his simplistic and self-serving chiropracTIC model of care.

 

Once again the mainstream chiropractic profession should take delight in another legislative victory with the recent announcement by Sec. of the DVA Anthony Principi this week concerning the authorization of all but two of the VA Committee’s recommendations. After years of politicking first to get the VA legislation passed, then the last two years to get the implementation plan developed and approved, the opening of a market of 70 million Americans is a feather in the cap of our Beltway Boys and VA Committee members who made this achievement happened.

 

Unconscionably, while the mainstream DCs are delighted, the radical fringe of a few chiropracTORs/vendors have cast dispersion on this great success with a cloud of gloom and doom rather than a ray of hope. Of course, I’m referring to the infamous impersonator Terry Rongberg and his band of merry misfits. While the VA member DCs proclaim this as a huge breakthrough, TR is beside himself with his Chicken Little, “the sky is falling” attitude. His failed attempt to meddle in this VA legislative effort in which his special interests and those of his cronies were defeated is reason enough to enjoy the angst he now exhibits in his tabloid and email letters.

 

Incredulously, after Principi’s announcement, TR then had the gall to send him a nasty email complaining about his decision to include DCs as NMS specialists in the VA system. TR first urged via his WCA rep on the VA Committee that DCs should be PCPs rather than secondary-level specialists although he constantly contradicted himself when she touted,  “chiropracTORs can only detect and correct VSC.” Oddly, this position has constantly said DCs are not full-body diagnosticians, but they still demanded primary direct access by VA patients to DCs since only chiropracTORs can detect subluxATIONs. Although everyone else saw the convoluted logic in this argument, to this day TR and his band of sycophants still cannot understand the contradiction this position poses to every legal and ethical consideration of the role of a PCP.

 

Personally, if I were a DC working within the VA system, I’d relish the thought of a qualified PCP screening my patients for red flags to improve patient selection and rule out dangerous conditions not palatable to spinal adjusting, but that’s just me. I’m willing to admit my so-called education at Life was inferior rendering me incapable of presuming the role of a PCP diagnostician, so I’ll take all the professional help offered to screen patients properly to insure patient safety and better patient outcomes.

 

TR also recommended that every VA site purchase a Subluxation Station sold by his sock puppets, Kent and Gentempo, another idea vetoed by the committee. The conflicts of interest are obvious in every political move TR makes now in that either he, his family, or his friends will profit by selling insurance, seminars, products, services or by fomenting chiropracTIC demagoguery among the rank and file with misinformation. As Chris Quigley of the ICA leadership accurately described Rongberg:

“I do see you as divisive and self-serving. I see you as a self-promoter disguising his for-profit businesses as having altruistic purposes.”

 

Sour Grapes!

Indeed, this VA decision should be heralded by every DC as a major breakthrough into a huge market, but only TR can throw a cloud of doom on this victory—no doubt his negative reaction easily viewed by rational DCs as simply sour grapes. TR just can’t stand to admit his fringe view is politically incorrect on Capitol Hill nowadays. Instead, he continues with his yellow journalism to denigrate the ACA and ACC’s accomplishments whether it is this VA decision or the Medicare Demonstration Project that TR tried to kill with his insipid Manzullo bill.

 

TR is so politically naïve, this prez-for-life of a buyer’s club called the WCA that is nothing less than a blatant impersonation of a representative association, that he cannot stand not having his every wish accepted by Sec. Principi. TR then had the audacity to write to him,

“I would rather see chiropractors excluded from the entire program rather than included for the wrong reasons.  I am respectfully requesting that you reject this recommendation and accept the ‘minority recommendation’ which represents the wishes of the majority of doctors in my profession and respectfully request you allow DIRECT access for VA beneficiaries to doctors of chiropractic.”

 

Rather than having both feet in the VA door for the first time in history, TR is will to cut off his nose to spite the face of chiropractic. He flaunts the democratic process by requesting the “minority recommendation,” i.e., his WCA and ICA reps, be accepted instead of the majority’s recommendations. Indeed, TR just doesn’t get this democracy thing, ya folla?

 

Adding more stink to TR’s situation, when Sec. Principi shared TR’s sentiments with his VA Committee aide, Sara McVicker, who then shared it with the VA Committee recently, TR flipped his lid that his cover of deceit had been blown and wrote another nasty letter to Principi:

“Of course I understand you can share a private letter with anyone on your staff, however it seems highly inappropriate for your assistant to hand it out to the committee and ask them how to respond. 

“There are several people serving on the committee who represent other political groups and she is well aware of these circumstances and the harm it can do to my self when if it is publicized in the chiropractic media by my adversaries.”

 

 So, it doesn’t matter than TR sent the same online letter to his many minions asking them to send a similar spam sample letter to his office in protest, but when Principi shares the same letter to his staff and committee people for review, suddenly it’s “highly inappropriate” according to the double standards of TR.

 

TR did hit the nail on the head when he said, “…the harm it can do to my self when if [sic] it is publicized in the chiropractic media by my adversaries.” Geez, TR, what’s the problem? You make a big stink over the VA decision even asking for its revocation, but when your meddling is revealed, you run for cover to hide once again!

 

The fact is his meddling is not new inasmuch as 13 foreign countries have previously complained about his interference in their legislative matters. He remains the gnat in the ointment that annoys rather than contributes to anything this profession achieves if he doesn’t personally control or profit somehow.

 

It’s well known by now that TR is a great impersonator whose cover his blown:

• He pretends to be a president of a reputable member-driven, democratic, chiro association when, in fact, he’s the proprietary owner of a buyer’s club called the World ChiropracTIC Alliance that he is prez-for-life.
• It’s well known he impersonates a legitimate publisher when, in reality, his so-called journal is nothing more than a proprietary “Penny Pincher” tabloid filled with yellow journalism and articles written by his sock puppet columnists/vendor friends.
• It’s well known he is a publisher with a huge conflict of interest as an insurance broker.
• It’s well known his WCA is a farce as an NGO inasmuch as he refuses to participate in international diplomatic conferences as he did recently when he announced his WCA would not participate in the WFC’s Identity & Image conference.
• It’s well known by all on Capitol Hill that his Chiropractic Coalition is a farce that represents a small fraction of this profession. In fact, his WCA membership of supposedly 240 is 0.004% of this profession, a fact TR tries to hide from all.

 

I could continue with the many controversial and unethical practices of this radical loose canon, but I don’t want to go down that long road again, as I did when I wrote recently my 130-page treatise, “The Most Dangerous Man in ChiropracTIC.” TR’s track record is well known now by most informed DCs, and the more we can shine the light of truth on his nefarious actions, the more we can expose him as the diplomatic and journalistic fraud that he is. He’s simply a vendor/publisher with a bad anti-establishment attitude.

 

Testy Terry

The pressure must be getting to TR if his letters to Principi and his non-response to

my challenge to a Great Debate at COCSA are examples of his frustration. We can now add TR’s dilemma to the plight of those still suffering from the implosion of the Palmer-styled chiropracTIC icons—Big $id, Guy Riekeman, Fred Barge, Thom Gelardi—to name a few of those “philosophers” who’ve seen better days.

 

Recently one of my readers sent a note to TR asking him to print my response to his libelous “Most Dangerous” article and urged him to take my challenge to him for a Great Debate. This reader, Donald, also suggested that TR’s conflict of interest as a publisher/vendor and questioned the appearance of nepotism with his family-controlled CBS insurance brokerage. Perhaps TR was having a bad hair day, but his response revealed that he might be cracking up!

 

Terry A. Rondberg

 

Certainly TR’s response is not only obscene, but also indicative of his panic that’s starting to show. His yellow journalism doesn’t stop with journalistic fraud in his TCJ, but now in his email responses he lets his true sentiments and unprofessional attitudes shine forth. He lashes out at Sec. Principi, a dear friend of this profession who should be commended rather than criticized, and then he lashes out at my reader who confronts TR about his apparent conflict of interest, nepotism, and refusal to come out of hiding to debate these issues in front of a neutral audience like COCSA.

 

Of course, his demagoguery clearly shows his modus operandi—arouse emotions and prejudices in his followers, condemn and demonize his opponents, and proclaim a doomsday situation when his agenda isn’t followed. Certainly this bluster is nonsense and reveals how TR spits up his milk whenever his strategies fail as they often do. How many more respectable government servants will he offend, how many more naïve students or impressionable grads be conned by this propagandist/vendor, and how many more misrepresentations will he make as he meddles in our collective business?

 

The time has come for TR to put up or shut up. He doesn’t represent but 0.004% of this profession, smaller than most state associations. He shields his conflicts of interest, he’s open about his yellow journalism, and he’s shameless about his obstructionism and nepotism. In fact, he’s a loose canon who’s shot off his mouth too often, and one that needs to either stay closed or come to a Great Debate.

 

Which do you think he will do? Is he ready to play hardball or will he continue to hide and lash out as he spits up his milk?