Fort Hood shooting wasn’t a PTS-related issue, dumbasses
So what does the LA Times have in common with the Iraq Veterans Against the War-funded Under The Hood coffee shop in Killeen, Texas? They both think that the shooting in Texas is an opportunity to talk about PTS, post-traumatic-stress. The problem is that the shooting had nothing to do with PTS.
The shooter, Ivan Lopez, didn’t have PTS. He told the doctors that he had it, he also told doctors that he had a TBI – traumatic brain injury – but the facts don’t support either claim. He was being treated for depression, anxiety and sleeplessness, but his PTS and TBI were undiagnosed – they were self-reported. That doesn’t stop the LA Times from leaning on the “crazy vet” meme to explain the whole incident to us;
The disorder alone does not make a combat veteran or anyone else more prone to premeditated violence, experts say. But it can severely strain relationships or lead to a firing or demotion at work — events that can push someone over the edge.
And some conditions associated with PTSD — depression, anxiety, anger, substance abuse, suicidal thoughts — are also associated with those who commit mass shootings.
“It’s easy to identify possible predictors of a rare tragic event after the fact,” Richard J. McNally, a psychology professor at Harvard University, said in an email interview. “It is much harder to predict it.”
The 34-year-old Lopez had been examined by a psychiatrist last month and was prescribed Ambien, among other drugs, while undergoing evaluation for PTSD.
“We have very strong evidence that he had a medical history that indicates unstable psychiatric or psychological conditions,” Army Lt. Gen. Mark Milley, the Ft. Hood commander, told reporters. Yet Lopez was not placed under any restrictions, according to the Army.
Several studies have found that combat veterans diagnosed with PTSD are two to three times more likely than other combat veterans to commit domestic violence or other violent acts, said Dr. Prakash Masand, a former Duke Univeristy [sic] psychiatrist who has studied the disorder.
Not exactly true. PTS makes veterans withdraw from social contacts which means that their violence is directed inward, not outward. The LA Times tries hard to say that even though the shooting at Hood isn’t PTS related, it really is.
Meanwhile in Killeen, Texas, Under The Hood coffee clatch manager, Cindy Thomas is also blaming PTS for the shooting;
For her part, Thomas grapples with the harsh media spotlight that tragedies like the Fort Hood shooting generate, but weighs it against the awareness it brings to the struggles of everyday soldiers.
“We’ve been seeing these things happen on a smaller scale for years, soldiers killing spouses in houses, domestic violence” – the things Americans outside the military community don’t hear about.
“We have talked about it until we’re blue in the face,” she says. “These are the kinds of things that happen when we don’t take care of our soldiers.”
Dependopotamus Thomas doesn’t mention that her husband, a careerist in the Army, divorced her ass when she started Under The Hood against his wishes. Things like her behavior probably contribute more to domestic violence in Fort Hood than any reaction to the soldiers’ participation in war.
Yes, I’ll agree that troops talking to each other about their experiences is the best treatment, but troops talking to Matthis Chiroux and the other border-line criminals, like Carl Webb who are attracted to Under The Hood doesn’t help anyone – except Cindy Thomas and the IVAW.
I’ll remind you that Jason Abdo, the failed Fort Hood bomber, a client of James Branum, the anti-military lawyer who was a regular at Under The Hood, was probably supported by Under The Hood and IVAW while he was hiding out from Fort Campbell child porn charges.
Category: Iraq Veterans Against the War
More brilliance from one of the pillars of the Left! All vets are barely-repressed mass-murderers ’cause of the PTSD! The horror!
Never mind facts, never mind measurable statistics, never mind common sense! They know what they’re talking about, ’cause they’re, like, smart, yo!
I kinda wonder if I should go on their comment section and tell them the that I’m a firefighter who’s been diagnosed with PTS, and that I know from personal experience that it neither makes you violent (at least not towards others) nor is it unique to veterans. Maybe even point out that it’s actually far more common in rape victims than in combat vets.
Then again, I’d just be wasting time and bandwidth arguing with idiots.
Dumbasses.
I just watched CNN’s Fareed Zakaria claim that the shooter, whom lived off base, failed to register his pistol with the base. Last I checked, anyone living off base isn’t required to register their firearms with the base.
Fareed? I thought CNN dumped him. What the hell does he know? Nothing. Does he ever shut that yap of his? No.
From Wikipedia:
Temporary suspension for plagiarism[edit]
He was suspended for a week in August 2012 while Time and CNN investigated an allegation of plagiarism[8] involving an 20 August Zakaria column on gun control with similarities to a New Yorker article by Jill Lepore. In a statement Zakaria apologized “unreservedly,” saying that he had made “a terrible mistake.”[9][10][11] Six days later, after a review of his research notes and years of prior commentary, Time and CNN reinstated Zakaria. Time described the incident as “isolated” and “unintentional”; and CNN said, “we found nothing that merited continuing the suspension…. Zakaria has apologized for a journalistic lapse.
Just read two different catalyst versions in the paper, both go back to the “Human Resources Office”, I guess that means Personnel. One was he attended a meeting and didn’t like what he heard and the other making the rounds is the solider wanted a leave slip and was told to come back tomorrow. Is the Army computerized to the point they have to print out forms? Sometimes small things really piss off people and if someone told me to come back the next day to pick up a simple form that should be available by the truckload, it would lock my jaw. Sometimes a small, unnecessary display of “power” by a clerk has serious consequences. Where am I wrong here?
Club Manager: blank leave forms are readily available – you can print them yourself. However, except as a worksheet a self-printed version is pretty worthless.
I’m guessing that the reason he was told “come back tomorrow” was that (a) it was about the end of the duty day (nearly 1600, according to accounts I’ve read) and (b) his leave form hadn’t yet been completely processed – and likely wouldn’t be completed until after normal duty hours. I could be wrong.
I don’t believe the denial of leave form theory either. He came to the post with a gun and had intentions of using it that day. Otherwise he never would have brought the weapon with him.
Good point. This guy was a ticking time bomb just looking for a reason. You know he made up his mind days earlier when he purchased the weapon and extra clips.
I’m not so sure the leave issue isn’t a viable theory. Apparently, he made some post on facebook that he had been mugged or robbed. He could have had the gun in his vehicle for self defense and then acted impulsively, because he had means nearby, when he was dicked around on the leave issue.
The erroneous “reporting” about this horrific “PTSD” incident is as willfully ignorant as the “reporting” on the disappearance of Malaysia Airlines Flight MH370. They’re probably too damn dumb to be embarrassed.
We used to call stuff like this a cluster f**k.
Disgusting, all of it.
The few veterans I know are some of the best people I’ve ever met, yet the Left slanders them in a never-ending onslaught.
Someday, should I ever be President, by God the military is going to have a best friend. I’m sick of seeing honorable men lowered to the dust because they had the guts to live not for the government, but for the American Constitution and the people that are free because of it.
@Farflung Wanderer
You’ve got my vote as long as your name isn’t wanna be democrat Jeb Bush….or one of the many other republican, left leaning phonies out there!
WTF,Isee they have a Deserter from the Army during the Vietnam war on there board?Gerry Condon deserted from the US Army in 1969, after refusing orders to Vietnam.
PTS tends to make one a recluse. Many sufferers must be forced to seek care.
If the case were otherwise, murder would be the order of everyday.
WTF,I see they have a Deserter from the Army during the Vietnam war on there board?Gerry Condon deserted from the US Army in 1969, after refusing orders to Vietnam. Why is it that almost all of the Vets that I have run into over the past 12 years that are/were against war,are all non infrantry types,having never even see combat.I myself have 3 deployments to Iraq and 2 to Afghanistan.I am neither a screaming lunitic or a huffing mad boozer.Almost all of my battle buddies are doing just fine,a lot of the issues are out of lack of job’s and a fundamentle understanding of what it’s really like to be part of this brotherhood.Going to talk to a bunch of fat ass woman running a coffee shop who are not qualified in any type of PTSD/TBI to me it looks like another way to raise cash to push a uber left agenda.
I have been to the sandbox a few times, I do forget things, and I can get pissed off quickly. I must have a TBI and PTSD.
All this time I thought it was menopause.
According to several reports I have read, this guy was a truck driver who never saw combat. For all I know, he might have PTS, but it did not come from exposure to combat, as one might infer from the quoted section of the LA Times article.
Also, I see the guy was prescribed Ambien “and other drugs.” It’s about time the discussion about those other drugs was opened up. Ambien is a sleeping pill, which can be addictive and does have side effects. What about the other stuff? Antidepressants have different functions and different side effects. They can trigger suicidal episodes.
@JarHead Pat
Unlike you, I will resist the temptation to write exactly what I think and not insult your proud accomplishments in the Marine Corps. I’m happy you got home and even happier that you and your buddies managed to escape PTSD.
I don’t think it was your intention to insult, or diminish the service of those that came home from Iraq, Afghanistan or even Vietnam after experiencing combat, or perhaps female service members that were victims of sexual assault and then having to deal with post traumatic stress disorder….it’s real, believe me, I, as well as the Vet Group members that I meet with weekly for the last couple of years know it’s real. These guys are mostly former Jarheads, grunts, Air Cav and Armored Cav guys. I think part of the problem that we Vietnam Vets had was that over the years NOBODY, but NOBODY talked about it. We didn’t compare, joke or reminisce, mainly because we were all accused baby killers, rapists or drug addicts. Back in the 60’s and 70’s as a group, Vietnam Veterans were a pretty unpopular group
Other than that JarHead, I’m fine with your comment.
PS – I went through that period in my life as a “screaming lunatic or a huffing mad boozer” as you describe so well……I finally grew up at age 66 years….which is my current age.
LIRight..You miss my point dude,The people who run that coffee house are all a bunch of left wing hippie douches who claim to care about the vets,but all they are doing is pushing there agenda,sorry that you were treated so bad as a returning vet,but such is life,me Icould fucking care less what a bunch of limp dick civies think of me or my battle buddies,I didn’t do it for them,it was our job,and the job is more or less over,in the words of a very great Marine Ionce served with harden the fuck up pogy bait lololol.
They won’t stop until they get their “damaged Vet” meme to describe all Vets from these wars. They are trying, in their own worthless way, to bring back the salad days of the 60s-70s Winter Soldier bullshit and all the movies it spawned of the “damaged Vet” like Coming Home, the Deer Hunter, First Blood, etc.
The shooter, Ivan Lopez, didn’t have PTS. He told the doctors that he had it, he also told doctors that he had a TBI – traumatic brain injury – but the facts don’t support either claim. He was being treated for depression, anxiety and sleeplessness, but his PTS and TBI were undiagnosed – they were self-reported.
John, I love ya brother, but I self reported both a TBI and PTSD that were then diagnosed, and I am receiving treatment for both along with injuries that I was medevaced for. Sometimes self reporting is the only way to get help friend.
My point was that the media is acting as if the PTS and TBI were a legitimate diagnosis, and they weren’t. No more than Mathis Chiroux’ PTS is a legitimate diagnosis. I understand that self-reporting is how doctors find PTS.
I still want to know why he was only in Iraq for 4 months. Someone suggested it was because of the mass pullout of troops. I am hoping he wasn’t sent home early because that could support some of the TBI claim. But it could also mean he’s a piece of shit. I know of a soldier who was sent to the rear because he threatened to shoot his CO while over in Iraq. Last I had heard, he filed some sort of OIG complaint against the CO because they took his weapon from him and handcuffed him at the COB. He started screaming to OIG, “How could I defend myself if we were attacked?!” But you can’t just take that stuff lightly considering that he made the verbal threat and he had the means to do it. I don’t know what became of him when they got him back to the states, but they sure as hell didn’t keep him in Iraq. I’d be very curious to have some sort of confirmation as to why he only spent 4 months there.
Drudge Report had a picture of him up for several days in which he was wearing blue jeans and a T-Shirt while standing in a guard tower and manning an automatic rifle (Mk48 I think?). I am not a vet, but I have never seen any US Soldier in a guard tower not in proper uniform and wearing full battle rattle. It struck me as very odd.
Here is the picture: http://www.thegatewaypundit.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/04/ivan-lopez1.jpg
A unit I was working with at COP Sayed Abad had a nice article in the newspaper about them (Washington Post I think), very complimentary and etc. I saw the Battalion CO in the DFAC and I remarked about the good press that his soldiers had received. He made a grimace and winced, then told me he was really disappointed that some of the pictures showed his guys out building outposts with their sleeves rolled up, not wearing their kevlar, etc. Never in a million years in the AO that I worked in, would you see a soldier dressed like Lopez is in that picture. Of course, I might be wrong. Just my 2 cents.
I’m pretty sure that picture was taken when he was on the Sanai peacekeeping mission. They are allowed to wear civvies off duty. He was probably off and had a buddy take a quick picture. Not really anything important.
http://www.missionvalor.org/?p=145
I think I got PTSD from all the PTSD stories.
I absolutely love the “stop the war” sign too. As though it’s some extracurricular activity that means nothing.
Another episode of the well intentioned, misguided left. If conscription was reinstated we’ll have less of these fools running screaming about “our” vets, thinking that they’re “supporting the troops” when they’re just tarnishing their reputations. Next up, another story of “rape culture” within the military and how Big Army condones rape. Oh wait, they’ve already gone and done it.
http://www.theatlantic.com/national/archive/2013/09/how-the-militarys-bro-culture-turns-women-into-targets/279460/
I’m still in shock… who knew there were all those killings in Killeen that the media didn’t report? It must be a really dangerous place, maybe even the murder capital of the world… all those guys with PTS(D), all those brutal murders no one ever reports…. must be bodies on every block./sarc
I’ve met a lot of people from Under The Hood and I really do think they mean well and want to help veterans. Unfortunately, anything left leaning tends to attract the likes of Jason Abdo and Matthis Chiroux.