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Political Bullshit
Sep. 14th, 2006 12:48 pmSo Monday I was down at MEPS all day with a guy we're putting in as a nuke. He had a couple of things to finish up with Medical, then we were waiting for about an hour before the Nuke folks got there. Or, rather, the paper-pusher they've got working in the Nuke office. He arrived, started telling our guy what he needed to write out in terms of getting his waivers sent up, and disappeared. I translated, helped him write the waivers, and started getting everything ready to fax them to Headquarters in Tennessee. Meanwhile, another prospective guy came in about half an hour later, just as JeanPierre got back, and they sat down to talk about the Nuclear Power Program. I was at the next desk working with my guy, and Deguzman, the Scheduling Coordinator at MEPS (who also happens to be a nuke I went through Power School and Prototype with) was at her desk not too far away.
It was painfully obvious that our old buddy the PS was way out of his league. The applicant had to repeatedly ask for clarification, and any questions he asked were met with blank stares. Finally, I walked over and took over talking to the kid while JeanPierre went to call Kristina, to find out when she'd be arriving at MEPS. As soon as he was out of earshot, Deguzman turned to me.
"Shit, you haven't even gone through the training and you're doing this guy's job for him better than he is!"
I sighed and rolled my eyes. "I know. Don't get me started on that one."
JeanPierre came back long enough to get the guy set up on the test just as Kristina walked in and sent him to go get us lunch. As soon as he was gone, Deguzman and I filled her in on everything that had gone on before she got there- then got to work fixing the paperwork he'd screwed up (pretty much everything I hadn't touched). While we were working, I found out why our brilliant Assistant Chief Recruiter had sent somebody so obviously unqualified and in over his head to work at the job that should have been mine.
Apparently, when our boy JeanPierre first took his orders to the district, he was supposed to be taking a job as a Classifier, those people who work at MEPS that talk to the kids after they finish all the tests and medical exams, help them pick a job, fill out their contracts, and schedule them a date to leave for Boot Camp. Now, when he reported to Classifier School in Pensacola (all the schools are in the same building), somebody mis-read his orders and put him in a recruiting class. About a week into the school, JeanPierre noticed that he was in the wrong class, and called the Assistant Chief Recruiter of our district to get his help fixing it. He said he'd take care of it, then pretty much ignored the problem. (Something else I've noticed about how things work with our upper enlisted chain of command- if you're not Hispanic or Filipino, you're pretty much ignored 98% of the time.) JeanPierre finished recruiting school and came back to San Diego, where they sent him to a station not too far away. Apparently, after about a couple of months in the field, he started complaining that this wasn't the job he signed up for, he should be working at MEPS, etc etc. I guess he was threatening to get the higher- ups (over the ACR's head) involved to get the situation fixed, etc etc.
So, the ACR gave him the job in the Nuke Office as a way to shut him up and cover his own ass at the same time. Our Chief Recruiter is due to retire in November, and he'll be taking over her job at that time- had word of what happened gotten out to the wrong people, it would have cost him his job.
Now here's the best part of all of this: we had a change of command (new Captain comes in) last month. The outgoing Captain would never have let shit like this go down- he would have realized that there was something shady going on, and he would have stopped the whole thing before it got rolling. Our new Captain, on the other hand, isn't quite as...um...strong as our old one, so the ACR waited until almost immediately after the change of command, while the new CO was still getting settled in, and pushed everything through then. Shit like this sickens me like nothing else.
To make things even better, the new CO has tasked the Nuke office with an almost-impossible goal for the month. Having only 1 1/2 people working that office makes it that much harder. Yes, the ACR's decision is going to bite the district in the ass very soon, but of course he'll be able to avoid taking any of the blame for it, and just turn it on the Nuke shop. Now, my biggest question (and the one my family has asked me about the most) is whether or not I might still have a chance of getting in there in the future. To be honest, I don't know right now- Kristina gets out of the Navy in May of next year, and she and her husband have been trying for a while to have a baby. I'm the only one currently working in the field who wants the job. The problem is, I've already acquired a bit of a reputation for not taking anybody else's shit and have even called a couple of chiefs on it when they've tried to pull one over on me- including the Assistant Chief Recruiter. He knows that I can see through his shit, and I can tell from the look in his eyes whenever I see him that he doesn't trust me, and might even be slightly afraid of what I could potentially do. On a positive note, the new XO (Executive Officer, second in command) is a former Nuke, and Kristina took her case directly to him. He's more than a little pissed off about the whole situation from what I hear, and he told Kristina he's looking into it. Hopefully that'll be sooner than later. In the meantime, I'm just counting the days until March 8th, 2009. I can't get out of this place soon enough for my liking.
It was painfully obvious that our old buddy the PS was way out of his league. The applicant had to repeatedly ask for clarification, and any questions he asked were met with blank stares. Finally, I walked over and took over talking to the kid while JeanPierre went to call Kristina, to find out when she'd be arriving at MEPS. As soon as he was out of earshot, Deguzman turned to me.
"Shit, you haven't even gone through the training and you're doing this guy's job for him better than he is!"
I sighed and rolled my eyes. "I know. Don't get me started on that one."
JeanPierre came back long enough to get the guy set up on the test just as Kristina walked in and sent him to go get us lunch. As soon as he was gone, Deguzman and I filled her in on everything that had gone on before she got there- then got to work fixing the paperwork he'd screwed up (pretty much everything I hadn't touched). While we were working, I found out why our brilliant Assistant Chief Recruiter had sent somebody so obviously unqualified and in over his head to work at the job that should have been mine.
Apparently, when our boy JeanPierre first took his orders to the district, he was supposed to be taking a job as a Classifier, those people who work at MEPS that talk to the kids after they finish all the tests and medical exams, help them pick a job, fill out their contracts, and schedule them a date to leave for Boot Camp. Now, when he reported to Classifier School in Pensacola (all the schools are in the same building), somebody mis-read his orders and put him in a recruiting class. About a week into the school, JeanPierre noticed that he was in the wrong class, and called the Assistant Chief Recruiter of our district to get his help fixing it. He said he'd take care of it, then pretty much ignored the problem. (Something else I've noticed about how things work with our upper enlisted chain of command- if you're not Hispanic or Filipino, you're pretty much ignored 98% of the time.) JeanPierre finished recruiting school and came back to San Diego, where they sent him to a station not too far away. Apparently, after about a couple of months in the field, he started complaining that this wasn't the job he signed up for, he should be working at MEPS, etc etc. I guess he was threatening to get the higher- ups (over the ACR's head) involved to get the situation fixed, etc etc.
So, the ACR gave him the job in the Nuke Office as a way to shut him up and cover his own ass at the same time. Our Chief Recruiter is due to retire in November, and he'll be taking over her job at that time- had word of what happened gotten out to the wrong people, it would have cost him his job.
Now here's the best part of all of this: we had a change of command (new Captain comes in) last month. The outgoing Captain would never have let shit like this go down- he would have realized that there was something shady going on, and he would have stopped the whole thing before it got rolling. Our new Captain, on the other hand, isn't quite as...um...strong as our old one, so the ACR waited until almost immediately after the change of command, while the new CO was still getting settled in, and pushed everything through then. Shit like this sickens me like nothing else.
To make things even better, the new CO has tasked the Nuke office with an almost-impossible goal for the month. Having only 1 1/2 people working that office makes it that much harder. Yes, the ACR's decision is going to bite the district in the ass very soon, but of course he'll be able to avoid taking any of the blame for it, and just turn it on the Nuke shop. Now, my biggest question (and the one my family has asked me about the most) is whether or not I might still have a chance of getting in there in the future. To be honest, I don't know right now- Kristina gets out of the Navy in May of next year, and she and her husband have been trying for a while to have a baby. I'm the only one currently working in the field who wants the job. The problem is, I've already acquired a bit of a reputation for not taking anybody else's shit and have even called a couple of chiefs on it when they've tried to pull one over on me- including the Assistant Chief Recruiter. He knows that I can see through his shit, and I can tell from the look in his eyes whenever I see him that he doesn't trust me, and might even be slightly afraid of what I could potentially do. On a positive note, the new XO (Executive Officer, second in command) is a former Nuke, and Kristina took her case directly to him. He's more than a little pissed off about the whole situation from what I hear, and he told Kristina he's looking into it. Hopefully that'll be sooner than later. In the meantime, I'm just counting the days until March 8th, 2009. I can't get out of this place soon enough for my liking.
