The NYT is

[ProSense]

really pissing me off!

May 28, 2006

Bringing It All Back Home

By SCOTT ANDERSON

Snip...

"It was the weirdest damned thing," he told me. "I didn't want to get out of bed. I didn't want to leave the house. I didn't want to do anything. I knew something was wrong, so I went up to the V.A. hospital." Doctors there quickly diagnosed post-traumatic stress disorder, or PTSD.

Snip...

With the benefit of seven months of hindsight, Norris has also grown more reflective on his Iraq experience. While still supportive of the war effort, he says that he increasingly feels it was a mistake for the military to put him and the rest of Alpha Company in the Sunni Triangle. "Not that we weren't trained for it or couldn't handle it," he said, "but we weren't a bunch of 20-year-olds with a thirst for action. Most of us were older guys with families. We didn't want to kill anyone. So why drop us right in the middle of the Triangle? I think they kind of did wrong by us."

If current troop rotation schedules are kept, Alpha Company could be called back to Iraq as early as 2008. Should that call come, Norris already knows what he will do.

"It's a contract I signed," he told me. "If they decide they need me, I'll go."

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/05/28/magazine/28vets.html

2008? Again, 2008? Why is it important to include the comment about returning to battle in an article about PTSD? These soldiers need counseling!

Ten-page article and no mention of what Congress or the Bush administration is doing to ensure that these soldiers receive the treatment they deserve? Support the troops!

[sandnsea]

1. So much wrong with that article

What jumps right out is the attitude of that guy. Why in the world does he think a bunch of 20 year olds would be able to handle killing people better than balanced, middle-aged people. That's got to be one of the craziest things I've ever read. Sure a 20 year old thinks he's being rambo when he slaughters a bunch of people, that's why he often doesn't realize what he's done until middle age. And feels doubly betrayed because he knows he was just a naive kid that they manipulated into doing that shit. Some of these people, I swear I'd just like to smack them right in the nose.

[ProSense]

2. It's the same

bravado that was prevalent in the media during the run up to the war and demonstrated by Bush every day! They pretend that in the all volunteer army, soldiers, especially young soldiers, knew what they signed up for. I believe in the case of the Iraq war they're saying the soldiers signed up to fight a war based on a lie! A war that caused more damage than anyone could have imagined! A war that didn't need to be fought that has now cost 2,465 soldiers their lives, left tens of thousands of Iraqi and Americans families grief-stricken, and diverted billions and billions of dollars away from worthy causes to wreak havoc on Iraq.

[k j]

3. Exactly...

an all-volunteer army might not have risked their lives to go to Iraq, young or not.
BushInc needed to blind the young Rambos and he (they) did.

At the time the local guard troop was being deployed (first time since WWII), I had a brand new job of my dreams as a small town reporter. I covered the deployments and there were several. I took pictures, interviewed people, etc. While the f*cking (sorry, no other word will do) "dignitaries" (as the representatives for Republican Congress and Senate were called), spoke and linked 9/11 to Iraq, I stood on the sidelines and burned inside. I was so, so pissed, and so, so used to speaking my mind as a peace activist in the months before, but, fearing for my new job and my husband's new position, I stood on the sidelines and didn't say a word.

I regret that. If I could do it over again, I would have quit my job and caused a scene. Just on principle.

*typos. always typos, especially when pissed*