representing federal employees from any us government agency

OPM Disability Retirement: A Day Does Not a Life Make, Nor a Decade

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The tragedy of extinguishment is the failure to recognize future potentiality. We often gauge the value of a lifetime based upon the quality of any given day. Yet, what happens in an arbitrary period of a life, whether viewed randomly on a day, or even assessed and evaluated over a decade, will rarely reflect the comparative worth of a lifetime as analyzed on a linear continuum. Youth is a wasted period of emergence; […]
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Federal Disability Retirement under FERS & CSRS: Reduction and Emergence

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The fear in most instances is that the latter will not follow upon the former; that the state of diminution will become permanent, and the potentiality promised by a subsequent stage of linear progression will instead reflect a downward spiral or, worse, remain in a state of stagnant immobility. And, indeed, neither in physics nor in human living, is there a stated and inevitable law of nature which mandates that following a period of reductionism, emergence of a greater state of affairs will occur. […]
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OPM Disability Retirement Law: Loss of Meaning

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What it is that motivates a person to achieve greatness; whether the factor of that which does, or purports to be, and to what extent the outward articulation of the elements of a driving force corresponds with the esoterically objective truth underlying the learned and expected statements for public consumption; these, we may never know. Most of us engage in repetitive monotony of actions; whether by fear of societal retribution, the judgment of peers, a sense of responsibility and obligation; or, perhaps […]

 
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Federal Disability Retirement: Peripheral Vision

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Something catches one’s notice; perhaps an odd movement, a dotted color scheme of minute origins and insignificant except in contrast to the toneless surroundings; or, because of a survival instinct still active from a forgotten history of evolutionary need, a signal of caution that danger may be lurking.  The eyes shift; the attempt to focus upon that which was noticed through one’s peripheral vision, is suddenly lost forever. […] Read More …

FERS & CSRS Disability Retirement: Making the Legal Argument

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Legal arguments are merely a subset of ordinary ones; as variations of the facetious quip goes, if the facts are not on the lawyer’s side, then he will argue the law; if the law is not, he will argue the facts; if neither, then he will attempt to confound and obfuscate both. […] Read More …

Federal Disability Retirement: Game Changers

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Often, it is not the substantive material submitted, but the approach to an endeavor which alters the character of an encounter, and results in victory by acceptance and submission, in contradistinction to victory and defeat. Such is the essential difference between the games of chess and of Go — the latter, originating in ancient China some 2,500 years ago, and employing a strategy of subtle surroundings, rarely including a direct frontal assault. The Game of Go requires a perspective of the whole; and while (like chess) anticipation of future moves can help, it is the last move in relation to the whole of all prior moves, which will determine the future success. […] Read More …

OPM Disability Retirement: The Three Little Pigs

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We are all familiar with the fable of the anthropomorphic three little pigs and the materials used in building their respective houses. The point of the story itself, however, concerns not the elements used, but the craftsmanship employed, and the effort expended, which reveals the underlying values and provides for fertile fodder in teaching the importance of hard work, careful application and sufficient preparatory labor in securing one’s future. […] Read More …

OPM Disability Retirement Attorney: Stress in the Federal Workplace

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Stress is a natural and inherent part of everyday and ordinary life. For the Federal and Postal employee who is considering filing for Federal Disability Retirement benefits through the U.S. Office of Personnel Management, whether one is under FERS or CSRS, one needs to always consider its form, content, extent and significance of inclusion in a Federal Disability Retirement application. […] Read More …

OPM Medical Retirement: Days of Sisyphean Drudgery

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The Myth of Sisyphus is well known, both because of the philosophical essay written by Camus, as well as through the Greek mythological narrative of the condemned figure to toil in endless meaninglessness, by rolling the boulder up the hill, only to watch it go down, and to repeat the process all over again. For Camus and the existentialist viewpoint, it is in the very act of absurdity itself that meaning and significance can be derived; for the Greek citizen of yesteryear, it was perhaps the circularity of the human condition which provided for relevance in the telling of the myth. […] Read More …

The “Other” Civil Service System

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Information concerning Federal Disability Retirement benefits will often refer to the universe of “FERS” employees (acronym for Federal Employees Retirement System, which was enacted by Congress in 1986 and became effective the following year), with little to no information concerning its replacement system, the Civil Service Retirement System (CSRS). […] Read More …