Postscript to the Webb Amendment

“Why Don't Mommy & Daddy Come Home?”

Republicans.
Another edition of Short Answers to Foolish Questions:

Who voted down the Webb Amendment?

Main and Central

I'm Sorry, Brothers

We know many of you have a sense of belief in what you’re doing over there in what I’ve called “Mr Bu$h’s ego-war.” Some of you probably feel that it is the United States’ world-wide responsibility to step in and overthrow murderous dictators. Part of me agrees with you. I’d like to see the murderous dictators in lots of other countries overthrown, too. (I’m sure it’s only coincidence there’s no oil in those countries.) You deserve my respect for backing your beliefs with your lives, even if I disagree with you.

Some of you seem to believe that Saddam Hussein personally and individually went out and rounded up a bunch of lunatics, financed them, trained them, and sent them off to attack innocent Americans on September 11th. You might be right. But we haven’t found any evidence for that. But did you know that 15 of the 19 people who killed Americans on 9/11 were Saudis? I can’t help wondering why he didn’t recruit Iraqis, or alternatively, who did recruit the Saudis? In any case, I still respect you, even if your beliefs are illogical.

Some of you just love your country and are willing to back that love. Or maybe you’re just trying to get enough money in the bank to go to college. You have my respect.

A lot of you are tired. You’re on your second, third and fourth tours – now extended to 15 months, with a really good chance of them being extended again to 18 months - and your wives are dispirited, jumping every time the doorbell rings, and your kids cry at night, wondering where their Daddy is.

I’m sorry.

I know some of you stick it out because of pride in yourselves and your brothers. I know how that is because I remember how it was for me, too.

I wish you were allowed to read this because I wanted you to know we’re trying everything we possibly can to get you guys some slack. Jim Webb, a veteran and Senator from Virginia, has been trying to get an amendment passed to get you guys more slack. His plan is simple: for every month over there you get a month here in the States. Guaranteed. Time to relax a bit. Time to remind your wives that you love them. Time for your kids to relearn how their Daddy loves them.

We thought we had it nailed, this time. It looked like the Webb Amendment would pass yesterday. Even John Warner, a Republican Senator from Virginia, promised to support the amendment.

When the final vote count was revealed we could only marshal 56 of the 60 votes needed to invoke cloture and get the bill onto the Senate floor for a public vote. I know this will surprise you, but it was the Republican Party that didn’t want you to get treated humanely.

John Warner, who’d promised Jim Webb he would support the amendment, lied like a cheap Persian rug in a third rate Algerian bordello. He voted against the Webb amendment, even though he voted for it the last time. That sack of crap said, “I’m 80 years old, I’m going to retire, and I’m more afraid of George Bu$h and Dick Cheney than I am of the troops and the voters.” Or words to that effect. Fuck him twice.

Mel Martinez, one of my own particular bits of shame, said

“I think we would demean their service if we were to say to them that there had to be a parity between the time in service out of the country and the time at home.”

So Senator Martinez, who’s never had to put on a uniform, stand guard, hear the bee-buzz of bullets over his head, watch a buddy’s head explode into catsup, or hold someone tight as he bleeds out, asking for his mother, figures you’d just be “demeaned” if you caught a break.

Fuck him three times.

I’ll tell you who voted against the amendment: 43 Republican Senators. You know, the assholes who keep crowing how much they support the troops.

Fuck them all, four times.

Oh, and Joe Lieberman, the Republican from Tel Aviv who pretends he’s an Independent from Connecticut, who wants all your asses over there until each and every one of Israel’s enemies is destroyed,

Fuck him until the cows come home.

Sorry, brothers, we tried. We’ll try again, and keep trying until we get you treated like human beings.

Amen.

It's all talk to the Republicans; you, your children and loved ones, mean shit.

We'll get you home to your families. I don't know how yet, but I promise.

We'll get you all taken care of. This I vow. Count on it.

Hat tip Minstrel Boy

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Ain't nobody home

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Traumatic Brain Injury Is Major Iraqi War Injury

Thousands of returning soldiers are unable to do simple tasks -- go to the store for milk, remember to take out the trash, drive a car. They have Traumatic Brain Injury.

And the problem is getting worse.

Washington Post

Thousands of troops have been diagnosed with traumatic brain injury, or TBI. These blast-caused head injuries are so different from the ones doctors are used to seeing from falls and car crashes that treating them is as much faith as it is science.

"I've been in the field for 20-plus years dealing with TBI. I have a very experienced staff. And they're saying to me, 'We're seeing things we've never seen before,'" said Sandy Schneider, director of Vanderbilt University's brain injury rehabilitation program.

Doctors also are realizing that symptoms overlap with post-traumatic stress disorder, and that both must be treated. Odd as it may seem, brain injury can protect against PTSD by blurring awareness of what happened.

But as memory improves, emotional problems can emerge: One of the first "graduates" of Vanderbilt's program committed suicide three weeks later.

"Of all the ones here, he would not have been the one we would have thought," Schneider said. "They called him the Michelangelo of Fort Campbell" - a guy who planned to go to art school.

As more troops return from the war, brain injuries are a growing burden - for them, for the few programs to treat them, and for taxpayers who pay for their care and disability if they cannot hold jobs.

Most TBIs are mild, and most of these patients recover within a year. But one-fifth of the troops with these mild injuries will have prolonged or lifelong symptoms and need continuing care, the military estimates. Nearly all of the moderate and severe ones will, too.

Though the full number of those suffering from TBI is still unknown, the problem is straining the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs. Until now, "they were dealing with a cohort of aging veterans with diabetes, heart disease, lung disease," said Dr. Jeffrey Drazen, editor-in-chief of the New England Journal of Medicine and a VA adviser.

Now, these young, brain-injured troops need highly specialized care, and how much it will help long-term is unknown, he said.

People with TBI have frequent headaches, dizziness, and trouble concentrating and sleeping. They may be depressed, irritable and confused, and easily provoked or distracted. Speech or vision also can be impaired.

Gen. Peter Pace, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said the military was "much smarter about this now," and urged troops to watch for signs of TBI and post-traumatic stress.

"They are every bit as much battle injuries as is a bullet or shrapnel. It is OK, it is OK to seek help for those kinds of war wounds, and I ask you all to help your buddies understand what you see in them," he said.

Journalism Now

“I went home - R&R for 10 days - and the day I got back is the day I got hit,” Bryan Malone said.

“It was two weeks, you moron. It was 15 days,” scolded his friend, Eric O’Brien, adding to others: “The problem with him is he’s as dumb as a box of rocks to begin with. We’ve got no baseline on him.”

Their jokes and sarcasm mask a serious worry.

These guys forget names, directions, appointments, where they put their keys, what they need at the store - things that are innocent memory lapses when they occasionally happen to normal people.

But their minds do not work like most people’s minds do. Not since an explosion left them with the “silent epidemic” of the Iraq war: traumatic brain injury, or TBI.

Some brain-injury cases have been misdiagnosed as personality disorders. Some with brain injury have lost jobs because of unrecognized and untreated symptoms.

“It’s the so-called invisible injury. It’s where a troop takes 10 times the normal time to pack his rucksack ... a complicated injury to the most complicated part of the body,” said Dr. Alisa Gean, a neurosurgeon at the University of California at San Francisco.

One of the interesting things about war is the advances made by medicine. From field sanitation to malaria, from trauma surgery to dustoff, trying to keep soldiers alive in the long run helps keep civilians alive as well.

A study reported in the New England Journal of Medicine points at possibly treating one of the causes of TMI. The typical combat soldier "gets their bell rung" once every 4-6 weeks. Concussion is one of the apparent precursors to TMI.

The Canadian Press

An unusual study by doctors treating blast victims at a field hospital in Iraq has found that ruptured eardrums may help reveal which troops are at risk of hidden brain injury.


The finding is important because many such brain injuries have been missed in the past, especially when more severe or obvious wounds demanded attention.

Researchers report their observation in a letter in Thursday's issue of the New England Journal of Medicine.

Diagnosing brain injury, especially mild damage, is based largely on subjective symptoms like irritability and forgetfulness. Imaging tests like CAT scans do not help, and neurological function tests are not very useful without baseline information.

Researchers led by Air Force Lt.-Col. Dr. Michael Xydakis checked all troops brought for treatment from roadside bombs and other explosions to the Air Force Theater Hospital in Balad, Iraq, during the last three months of 2005.

The study focused on the 210 surviving U.S. troops who were evaluated for eardrum rupture and loss of consciousness. Of those, 35 per cent had ruptures and 36 per cent had lost consciousness; the two were closely linked.

Those with ruptured eardrums had a nearly threefold greater risk of concussive brain injury.

The eardrum is only half a millimetre thick - thinner than a contact lens - and ruptures easily, Xydakis said. It is only half an inch from the brain, so "whatever hits the eardrum is going to hit the brain," such as the pressurized shock wave that follows an explosion, he explained.

At least a fifth of these soldiers will need lifetime care. At least.

Every day more and more soldiers are killed. More and more soldiers are injured. We can not win. Can't do it.

It's time to go. Now.

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Group News Blog Podcast #1

Back at the News Blog, Steve always made vets feel welcome and he himself could talk about the war and military issues in a way that was lacking elsewhere in the blogosphere. Because of this, quite a few of us found a home on the net to discuss the war. And in doing so we were able to open up discussions with folks who did not know much about the military and what the situation meant but who wanted to learn.

In that spirit the GNB is starting a new Podcast Series called VET's EYE VIEW. In our 1st of a series of 3 we are discussing withdrawal and looking at the current situation and what it means and how we got there. Folks on our podcast are myself, (Hubris Sonic) fellow vet Ceabaird and Terri in Tokyo. Our plan is to continue discussing military and other issues over the coming months. If you have ideas, questions, comments or suggestions please let us know.

Direct Link (mp3): Vets Eye View #1 25:40

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