Trump and PTSD
Yesterday, social media lost it’s mind again when Marine Staff Sgt. Chad Robichaux, president and founder of Mighty Oaks Warrior Programs, at a town hall style meeting with some veterans asked Donald Trump if he’d support using religion-based programs for helping veterans with PTS and TBI problems. Here is Trump’s complete response;
When you talk about the mental health problems when people come back from war and combat and they see things that maybe a lot of folks in this room have seen many times over, and you’re strong and you can handle it, but a lot of people can’t handle it, and they see horror stories, they see events that you couldn’t see in a movie, nobody would believe it. Now we need a mental health help and medical and it’s one of the things that I think is least addressed and it’s one of the things I hear — like your question — one of the things I hear most about when I go around and talk to the veterans.
So we’re going to have a very, very robust, very very robust level of performance having to do with mental health. We are losing so many great people that can be taken care of if they have proper care.
You know when you hear the 22 suicides a day, it’s a big part of your question, but when you hear the 22 suicides a day, that should never be. That should never be, So we’re going to be addressing that very strongly.
And the whole mental health issue is going to be a very important issue when I take over, and the VA is going to be fixed in so many ways, but that’s gonna be one of the ways we’re gonna help. And that’s in many respects going to be the number one thing we have to do because I think it’s really been left behind. Ok? Thank you very much.
Of course, most media outlets edited that response to appear as if Trump didn’t understand the problem and that he was calling veterans who suffer from PTS as “weak”. CNN even told it’s readers what to think about Trump in their opening paragraph of the report before presenting his response to the question;
Donald Trump suggested Monday that American soldiers and veterans who commit suicide do so because they can’t handle the post-traumatic stress of war.
CNN went on to ask the opinion of highly partisan Democrat operatives like Jon Soltz, of MoveOn.org’s VoteVets;
Jon Soltz, an Iraq War veteran and Chairman of the progressive VoteVets.org, called Trump’s comments “horrible” but “not shocking.”
“We’re talking about a person, in Trump, who believes that POWs aren’t real heroes, and that he’s made sacrifices akin to Gold Star Families who lost their loved ones in war,” Soltz said in a statement. “The constant disrespect Donald Trump shows towards our veterans and servicemembers is sickening, and completely and totally disqualifying.”
Paul Rieckhoff, of course, chimed in;
The Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America sent BuzzFeed News a statement about the importance of language when talking about PTSD.
“Every national leader has a responsibility to use accurate and appropriate language when talking about mental health and suicide especially,” IAVA CEO Paul Rieckhoff wrote wrote. “Terms like ‘killing yourself’ or ‘mental problems’ or any suggestion that suicide only impacts the weak, can promote contagion and may discourage people from getting help.”
He added that “getting help for a mental health injury is not a sign of weakness, it’s a demonstration of strength.”
Marine Staff Sgt. Chad Robichaux, the man who asked Trump the question, though, called the criticism of Trump “sickening” according to the Washington Times.
I think it’s sickening that anyone would twist Mr. Trump’s comments to me in order to pursue a political agenda. I took his comments to be thoughtful and understanding of the struggles many veterans have, and I believe he is committed to helping them. The nature of my question focused on a broken system that’s failing so many of our veterans and, as president, would Mr. Trump take a more holistic approach to health care for veterans.
I interpreted his answer to affirm that the system is broken and he would take the necessary steps to address it. After eight combat tours in Afghanistan I came home and was diagnosed with PTSD, and I struggled with it. Since my own recovery I’ve been privileged to help 1100 veterans who have graduated from our program; none of whom have committed suicide since graduating. It’s a very important issue to me, which is why I was thankful for the opportunity to ask Mr. Trump about it directly.
If the media is trying to make me vote for Trump out of spite, they’re doing a marvelous job.
Category: Politics, Veteran Health Care
Stars and Strips are “Social Media”?
http://www.stripes.com/trump-draws-fire-for-ptsd-comments-1.432178
No, Stars and Stripes is part of the traditional print media. Jonn was addressing both that and social media above, and that’s clear to those who actually read his article. You merely show your ignorance – or unmask yourself as a troll – by asking if Stars and Stripes is social media.
Stars and Stripes is staffed with journalists, and is based in the DC area. Expecting political impartiality from that entity is like expecting to find chastity in a whorehouse. It can happen, but it’s rare.
In any case, the Stars and Stripes article is far closer to impartial than most of the rest of the stories published in the mainstream print and electronic media. Unfortunately, it begins with a misleading intro. Folks like yourself probably never read the entire article anyway, so that’s the only part they ever see.
I read stories from S&S almost daily on my Facebook feed. They have become nothing but a left wing rag. The bias in all their political stories is obvious and most of the time the comments are full of vitriol chastising them for it.
One of the last times I was deployed I actually tracked the left/right leaning stories in Stars and Stripes. This was a daily chore with almost 4 months of page by page tracking.
Well over 90% of the articles leaned or screamed left, virtually none to the right and the only nonpartisan stories were written by the military authors. I complained to the Pentagon – never heard back.
In my day Stars and Stripes was known as the official mouthpiece of the military establishment, just like the official radio and television service. If you wanted to know what was really happening you read other things like “Overseas Weekly” (if you could find it).
I get sick and tired of the lies and bullshyt coming out of the liberals..they will take anything Trump says and distort it, lie about and make he sound like an orge….they are destined for hell for lying! I have heard many, many of trumps speeches and I have never heard him say anything bad about Vets, or military, on the contrary, all I hear him saying is that he wants to help vets and improve the VA! Don’t be brainwashed by the lying assed media…take everything they say and flush down the toilet, because its all SHYT!!
Selective editing same as that done with the Zimmerman video when he delivered the taxpayer relief shot to St. Skittles.
Why would anyone be surprised at the lame attempts by the media to twist the responses of someone they disapprove of?
Well, it doesn’t change my mind at all about my vote. He’s getting better at off-the-cuff responses and that one was kind of rambling, but he did address the issue.
USA voters education 101. Unless you hear an entire speech DO NOT Trust the media to quite it in context.
The establishment has went so far out of its way to twist everything this man says that there is no way I’d vote for his opponent.
Absolutely. Thank God for CSPAN. Just watch something on CSPAN and then read/watch the media coverage of the same event. Not even close.
I believe we’ve identified our Fourth Column.
I’ve been in the “Communications Department” of our local U where they teach the next generation of mediots. Their self-righteous posturing is sickening.
In full context, Trump’s remarks were good. Partisans are so intent on playing “gotcha” that they’ll deliberately distort a perfectly reasonable statement. Both sides do it, of course. The other day a pro-Trump friend posted a lengthy anti-Hillary screed that she’d obviously copied and pasted without fact-checking; she and some of her other friends weren’t very happy with me when I pointed out a few of the lies and distortions in it. I replied that while I can’t stand Hillary, even people I dislike deserve to be defended against falsehoods. That goes for Hillary, Trump, or anyone else.
I’m with you on that, MrBill.
There is enough honestly wrong with Hillary to not need to make up things.
And Trump is flawed as well, and his flaws need an honest appraisal.
We’re not going to get honest evaluations on either one from the mediots.
“Mediots.” I am so stealing that, Gb!
I have also observed the descriptively apt term
“presstitute”.
Amen.
I disagree. We are in the middle of an ideological civil conflict, in which one side, the Left, believes the end justify the means, and lies and cheats every day using every tool at their disposal, like the media and the educational system.
While i refrain from reaching their levels by lying and cheating, i do believe we need to fight back with every lawful and moral tool we have, and this includes anti Hitlary propaganda.
We have to fight back in this ideological conflict or we will lose America and our children will inherit a 3rd world banana republic.
Media bias? Say it ain’t so!
I strongly dislike Trump as a candidate, but media coverage of this is a pretty low blow. As if there is a lack of legitimate ‘Trump shoots his mouth off’ moments to run stories on. In this one he just takes the scenic route to saying ‘don’t worry about details, I’ll fix everything, dood.’
In defense of Trump’s answer: it was not a place for a detailed analysis. It was an acknowledgement that the VA is not doing it’s job, and his intent is to address that and take care of veterans.
All that the forum of the question needed or required. Other times and places we may want more details, but in a Q&A session? Not necessary.
I thought it was a very good answer. Everyone who deploys to a war zone is affected in some way. Everyone from the PV2 in finance to the SFC leading Infantry door kickers. Some can walk away from deployment with little or no ill effect, others need outside help. Trump saying that some “can’t handle it” doesn’t imply weakness.
I didn’t take it as Trump calling me weak.
PS: Paul Rieckhoff can eat a dick.
I’m thinking that he should suck on the left nut of a dead skunk like the majority of the leftie media…
I don’t have any major problems with the response. I think it’s possible to argue that ‘strong’ was a poor choice of words to use to describe people who are handling what life has thrown at them simply because it does invite the comparison to ‘weakness’ in people who aren’t, and that mindset is a big impediment to some people who might otherwise benefit from help.
But at the same time, his intention clearly wasn’t to insult and he acknowledged that this is an area of weakness for our VA. The primary problem, in my opinion, isn’t the unintended and unspoken notion that weak people are the ones who suffer from PTSD, but rather that the answer was devoid of any specific plans. Which is par for the course on both sides of the aisle.
I’m not a trump fan, I cringe at the idea of him being a presidential candidate, but I’m 90% sure he has my vote just because of how much he pisses off progressives. Hes a big government, liberty trampling, liberal. Only difference between him and hillary is what they want big government to do, and who’s personal freedom gets trampled. I figure we are fucked with either choice, and Gary Johnson has gone off the deep end to pander to sanders supporters. I’ll vote trump just to see the writhing death throws of progressives when he is sworn in.
If you were a Gary Johnson fan and are from his home state, Nate Silver has run an interesting simulation where Johnson wins his home state and Clinton and Trump fall short of the 270, throwing the Presidential pick to the House and the VP pick to the Senate which could get fairly entertaining.
As usual CNN et al took a long, hard, professional journalistic view of a particular topic and came away with an entirely incorrect assessment.
This is the state of journalism today. No one is actually impartial anymore and it would appear they are not being trained to be impartial. Part of that comes from having five or six people who own pretty much every single major news outlet in the nation. They spin their corporate interests through the outlets they own and they don’t waste time reporting anything that doesn’t suit them.
I found the interview between Cuomo and Biden on CNN interesting in the questions that were not asked….as an example at one point while Biden is expounding on how Trump was talking about taking advantage of the tax code to benefit personally Biden made one of his typical stupid comments. He stated, “Can you imagine if Warren Buffet said that? The right would go crazy.”
Cuomo sat there like a fucking moron and when Biden was done Cuomo said next question….why didn’t Cuomo simply state, “Mr. Vice President, Warren Buffet in fact did say exactly that and not a single reporter or outlet on the right was outraged. They weren’t outraged because they understand the tax code is designed to reward certain economic behavior which would theoretically benefit either society at large or the government in particular.”
That simple exchange tells you a great deal about isn’t being said and perhaps why it isn’t being said.
As Hondo likes to point out in so many of his articles, when you follow the money the math almost always leads to the answer even if it was an answer you didn’t want or expect.
I’ll probably vote for Trump out of spite. The media has bullied Trump a lot and I don’t like that.
I opened up my COW on a few people and I called my local radio shows to put the kibosh on this shit. People tried to use the “he wasn’t in the service” …line, too. My problem with that is that his observations were spot on. Some people just can’t handle the Military, let alone see combat and come home completely unscathed. Some have better tools and make it look easy, others, well, you know what happens. I do patently reject that the Military is now focusing on Transfuckinggender handbooks and dollars to change the sex of people and ignoring suicide hotline calls. WE ARE AN ELITE FIGHTING FORCE,FFS!!! Stop with the social experimenting already.
Robichaux’s response was better than Trump’s.
I didn’t even take Trump’s media-edited response as being bad… perhaps unartful, but not condescending or disrespectful. Then I found the entire response and it was even clearer that he was acknowledging the seriousness of the condition and the inexcusable failings of the VA. I, too, am not enthralled with The Donald as a candidate, but it’s going to be my privilege come November to vote against Hillary.
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