It's a Lie

At the right, see that middle section, signed by "Robert Channey MD" and the logo of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services? The man a local chiropractor calls Robert Channey is supposedly an "assistant surgeon general of the United States." Well, he isn't.

How do I know? Old Word Wolf called the federal Department of Health and Human Services, (202) 690-7694, where Rebecca Ayer and Jennifer Koentop, public information officers, were happy to conduct an extensive search. After a weekend-long search last fall, they called me back to report neither of them could find any record or evidence of anyone with that name having worked at HHS, and neither has anyone by that name been designated an assistant U.S. Surgeon General. "And we went pretty far back into some very old records," Ayer said.

Furthermore, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services doesn't endorse products and doesn't like its logo being used to imply that such an endorsement exists, she said.

So, the chiropractor wants you to trust him. But he -- who heard from OWW about this apparently fictional physician back in September -- is willing to plaster a known lie all over his advertising. (Do an Internet search. Every hit on the name leads back to the spine-stretcher's manufacturer. There is no reference to such a person apart from the manufacturer, testimonials for this particular product, and Stephen Stoke's advertising.)