As we approach Memorial Day

Post #308,970 by dmcarls 5/20/09 12:15:30 PM Reply	As we approach Memorial Day WarÂs Psychic Toll http://www.nytimes.c...on/19herbert.html [...] "Other studies have paralleled RANDÂs in spotlighting the psychic toll of these wars. A CBS News survey found that veterans aged 20 to 24 were two to four times as likely to commit suicide as nonveterans the same age. A Time magazine cover story last year disclosed that Âfor the first time in history, a sizable and growing number of U.S. combat troops are taking daily doses of antidepressants to calm nerves strained by repeated and lengthy tours in Iraq and Afghanistan.Â The comments section is closed, but some of the 255 existing comments are poignant. It's time to come home, isn't it?
Post #308,998 by Another Scott 5/20/09 9:46:02 PM Reply	Thanks. It's a huge problem, one that Bush and his administration was determined to sweep under the rug. But it's also a problem in society at large. For too many reasons, people who suffer stress or have psychological issues, do not get the help they need. A harrowing tale was relayed in Sullivan's blog today: http://andrewsulliva...health-ctd-1.html :-( I'm heartened that studies of the brain are gaining more visibility. NPR is having a series on All Things Considered on spirituality and the brain - http://www.npr.org/t...storyId=104240746 - and there have been recent stories on schizophrenia in the press - http://www.scienceda...in/schizophrenia/ Greater understanding by people, and their representatives, that there is often a biological basis for people's actions should help reduce the stigma and increase the availability of treatment. As for your closing question, I dunno the best solution. Supposedly plans are in place to increase the number of enlisted people over time, but my impression is that it's just a marginal change. We do need to find a way to reduce the number of rotations that people are forced to endure in combat zones, and increase their down-time. Webb's amendment in 2007 to require down-time failed. Something like that should be in place. If it means that we temporarily need even more troops, well then we should do that. If our government gets us involved in foreign actions that require prolonged troop commitments, then it should^w must ensure that the burden of carrying out that policy is not borne by a tiny fraction of the population. As a general principle, I agree that our troops should get out of Iraq ASAP (December 31, 2011 is the deadline at the moment - http://graphics8.nyt...L_AGREED_TEXT.pdf , it would be better to speed that up by at least a year), and we need to work to find a way to get out of Afghanistan more quickly as well. The devil's in the details, though. :-( One of the commentators on the Herbert OpEd at the NY Times said that we should institute a draft if the military involvement lasts longer than 6 months. That certainly does have some appeal... My $0.02. Cheers, Scott.
Post #309,025 by Ashton 5/21/09 5:29:47 PM Reply	One of many in a series of Wake-Up calls ignored Yes.. well - - - Virtually every memorably-profound homo-sap has passed on a hint about what we 'watch' ("impressions taken-in") and the effect upon a one's psyche of those cumulative images -- as they marinate within the sub- and other unexamined levels of consciousness (or, for vastly too many: "consciousness".) From the WW-II posters depicting buck-toothed Japs and the ditties about praise-the-lord and pass the ammunition -- we have all experienced the effects, so polished by Göbbels' Ministry of Propaganda and lately, the just-as-banal slogans of the past Eight Fucking Years ... and their effects on the mouth-breather plurality within our Stuff-clogged, inanity-besotted noncivilization. Mr. Herbert appends his particular angle-of-view to a vast array of similar pleas; all re the self-medicating means by which mobs of the historically illiterate never Hear such messages about how-it-is that their primitive psyches are so easily manipulated by the power-obsessed of every era: because nobody Likes to See-Self as just another mindless dupe, now Do We? (Besides, Mark Twain's War Prayer goes directly to the heart of the matter -- and look how LONG ago he wrote that! (and consider the cachet of his entire rep with the Murican Peepul du jour.) If THAT didn't slice through all propaganda, then and subsequent: What Would? But.. maybe ... Just maybe? Cheney's current bloviations about Keeping Murica Safe [from Itself] shall prove to be a litmus for what the entire mob has actually Learned since Condoleeeza's intelligence-assaulting depiction of mushroom clouds (and the Chimp's chirpy bloviations across the full Eight Years.) Cheney is Soooo Hoping for an explosion somewhere, SAP -- to somehow justify his depravity across all scales of that idea. He and the anus-joke fixated Rush + usual Shout Radio infotainers 'Rush Limbaugh's race to the bottom' http://www.salon.com...source=newsletter -- should provide a reasonable assessment of whether Muricans will next self-examine bravely enough to finally begin overcoming their perpetual sloth and adolescent gullibility [???] If Cheney does not manifestly self-destruct -shortly- on his campaign trail of tenuous tautologies: then we shall all know in just what state the Murican Psyche '09 exists. Scary.. waiting for the outcome. Palin + Vice-President Potatoe on the next slate? Then ... It's Dead, Jim. (And if it moves.. it's just another zombie at another zombie bank corner office and those 29.99% CC interest rates and Medico Insurance fat cats continue on into the palpable denouement -- hey, I may get to actually See That-all Happen.) Luck to us all. Can't count on Reason. We're all about Disneyland fantasies in thees parts.

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