Fort Carson WTU WTF?, Pope Benedict Brand Condoms

P J O'Rourke
Mark Hyman MD

"America has made the mistake of letting the A student run things. It was A students who briefly took over the business world during the period of derivatives, credit swaps, and collateralized debt obligations. We’re still reeling from the effects." - P J O' Rourke

"Jan has always been a tough cookie and very partisan. I think what led her to this decision on the immigration bill was political, cold calculation. She felt the Hispanic community would not matter." - Mary Wilcox

T"Here's some depressing recent medical news: Antidepressants don't work. What's even more depressing is that the pharmaceutical industry and Food and Drug Administration (FDA) have deliberately deceived us into believing that they DO work. As a physician, this is frightening to me. Depression is among the most common problems seen in primary-care medicine and soon will be the second leading cause of disability in this country." - Mark Hyman MD

The Federal Reserve reported that it turned over $474.4 billion in surpluses to the US Treasury. It seems that the financial crisis and bailing out all of those banks ended up being great business for the Fed. I plan on going to all of the more conservative blog sites in Colorado and posting this factoid. It's turning out that all of the complaints they had about the bailouts are wrong, and the correct actions were taken.
The five biggest banks in the US reported a total of $17 billion in profits for the first quarter of 2010.

Unfortunately, this doesn't translate well as it trickles down to "Main Street." People are still foreclosing on their mortgages, the banks are ending the programs they created to help the owners get by, businesses are still laying folks off from their jobs (41 last week at my brother-in-law's workplace), and next year many cities and possibly a few states will be bankrupt.

The beautiful city where I live is no exception. The lawns and plants in the parks are dying, and it will cost hundreds of thousands of dollars to eventually replant. City workers are being laid off, police are being laid off, and they are even having trouble finding asphalt to fill in the potholes that blossom every Spring. The quick expansions and contractions of the tarmac when the weather swings over 40 degrees in a day, and the bad habit of throwing a few shovelfulls of hot asphalt into the resulting potholes only ends up making things worse each succeeding year. Much like what our local Army Base does to the soldiers who come back from Iraq and Afghanistan with physical and emotional problems.

In fact, Fort Carson made the front page of the NY Times.: "Created in the wake of the scandal in 2007 over serious shortcomings at Walter Reed Army Medical Center, Warrior Transition Units were intended to be sheltering way stations where injured soldiers could recuperate and return to duty or gently process out of the Army. There are currently about 7,200 soldiers at 32 transition units across the Army, with about 465 soldiers at Fort Carson’s unit.


But interviews with more than a dozen soldiers and health care professionals from Fort Carson’s transition unit, along with reports from other posts, suggest that the units are far from being restful sanctuaries. For many soldiers, they have become warehouses of despair, where damaged men and women are kept out of sight, fed a diet of powerful prescription pills and treated harshly by noncommissioned officers. Because of their wounds, soldiers in Warrior Transition Units are particularly vulnerable to depression and addiction, but many soldiers from Fort Carson’s unit say their treatment there has made their suffering worse."

The Army tries to deny responsibility for any problems that soldiers experience during war. Look how long it took for them to be dragged kicking and screaming up to the mirror, and they had to admit that there was such a thing as Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, or shell shock, as it used to be known. The current experiment, lamely called the Warrier Transition Unit, is failing. It's failing because it refuses to man up and address the situation head-on, and over-medicates instead of providing the right personnel to help the individuals involved. As a result, Fort Carson has the highest suicide rate, and our community of Colorado Springs has the higghest homicide rate committed by soldiers and ex=soldiers. I guess we're supporting our troops by being fodder for their homicidal fantasies.

"For many soldiers, they have become warehouses of despair, where damaged men and women are kept out of sight, fed a diet of powerful prescription pills and treated harshly by noncommissioned officers... At Fort Carson, many soldiers complained that doctors prescribed drugs too readily. As a result, some soldiers have become addicted to their medications or have turned to heroin. Medications are so abundant that some soldiers in the unit openly deal, buy or swap prescription pills."

“These kids change their medication like they change their underwear, they can’t even remember which pills they’re taking.”

Because the soldiers are coming back from Iraq and Afghanistan, they bring heroin with them. It may be easier to obtain heroin on the Army base than it is downtown. This is another problem that is largely ignored by the Army brass and bigwigs.

“We’re all on sleep meds, anxiety meds, pain meds. The heroin is all that, wrapped into one.”

Since 2007, the Warrior Transition Units have treated over 50,000 people. That's potentially 50,000 soldiers they have failed. And if it's true that antidepressants really don't work, they just mask the problem, then we have a major problem. Millions of people now take antidepressants on a daily basis, from medicated children up to lonely 90 year old grandmothers, all drugged out and typing on keyboards, using their computers in lieu of any real, human connections. It really is a brave, new world we have created, and this is the mess we have at home, it is much, much worse what we leave behind in the hot desert sand...

gop hopefuls...

I know that you will be disappointed to know that Scott Brown will not be running as a Republican candidate for President come 2012. So far everyone else has been coy, out dancing by themselves before announcing anything final, but Tim Pawlenty, Mike Huckabee, Newt Gingrich, Sarah Palin, and Mit Romney have shelled out over $600,000 to make web sites.: "The online competition has taken a variety of forms. Palin has hired the two young founders of a fan site that zealously defends her honor and upbraids her critics. Pawlenty has hired online consultants from the 2008 presidential campaigns of Romney and Ron Paul. Gingrich has developed a sophisticated in-house micro-targeting operation. And Huckabee has deployed volunteers to man social networks.

And, though each potential candidate insists the efforts – online and otherwise – are intended to boost conservatives headed into the 2010 midterm elections, their web operations suggest a keen awareness of the Internet’s importance for organizing, messaging and raising money – and certainly could help lay the groundwork for their own prospective bids in 2012."

Remember, there are some places where free elections don't occur:

takin' a poke at the pope...
Some wags in the British Foreign Office were goofing around and created a memo on what kinds of activities they could provide for the Pope's next visit to Britain this September. Then, it was mistakenly put into a press kit and released.

Among the highlights were the suggestions that the Pope could distribute "Benedict" brand condoms, open an abortion clinic, and bless a gay marriage... Oh, those wacky, fun-loving Brits!

The person responsible was given some time off, and the BBC gave out some more of the memo, in all of its stodgy glory: "It suggested Benedict XVI could show his hard line on the sensitive issue of child abuse allegations against Roman Catholic priests by "sacking dodgy bishops" and launching a helpline for abused children.
The document went on to propose the Pope could apologise for the Spanish Armada or sing a song with the Queen for charity.
It listed "positive" public figures who could be made part of the Pope's visit, including former Prime Minister Tony Blair and 2009 Britain's Got Talent runner-up Susan Boyle, and those considered "negative", such as Manchester United striker Wayne Rooney and prominent atheist Richard Dawkins." Got all that? Have a blessed Sunday...