"The Death Dealers took my life!"

Salon.com has a series running all this week called "Coming Home", researched and written by Mark Benjamin and Michael de Yoanna.

The following is the description and lead in information on the series:

"Coming Home" is a week long investigative series on preventable deaths at Fort Carson, a U.S. Army post in Colorado, among troops who have returned from combat tours in Iraq.

Salon national correspondent Mark Benjamin and Colorado-based journalist Michael de Yoanna reviewed more than two dozen incidents of suicide, suicide attempts, prescription drug overdoses and murder involving Fort Carson troops and examined 10 of those cases painstakingly. They interviewed troops, their families and survivors of suicide attempts, studied thousands of pages of medical and Army records and conducted a prison interview with a soldier convicted of being an accessory to the murder of one of his comrades. They learned that much of the violence could have been avoided if the Army did a better job of recognizing and treating the symptoms of PTSD.

A friend sent me the first in the series, which was posted yesterday, 2.09.09, called "The Death Dealers took my life!"

Army Pvt. Adam Lieberman attempted suicide on October 30, 2008, leaving a suicide note scrawled on the wall of his Fort Carson, Colorado barracks.

Adam Lieberman tried to kill himself when he returned from Iraq. Only then did the Army take his mental health seriously.

This is the first story in a week long series called "Coming Home." Read an introduction to the series here; see photos of Heidi Lieberman painting over her son's suicide note, and a copy of the "Hurt Feelings Report," here.

The first page of this report starts out thus:

Feb. 9, 2009 | FORT CARSON, Colo. -- The day before Halloween 2008, Army Pvt. Adam Lieberman swallowed handfuls of prescription pain pills and psychotropic drugs. Then he picked up a can of black paint and smeared onto the wall of his room in the Fort Carson barracks what he thought would be his last words to the world.

"I FACED THE ENEMY AND LIVED!" Lieberman painted on the wall in big, black letters. "IT WAS THE DEATH DEALERS THAT TOOK MY LIFE!"

With more following, about his unit, what happened, his mother and commander, leading into the second page, I am a queer; I am a little bitch; I am a cry baby; I want my mommy; All of the above. Leading to the third and final page of installment number one, "I wanted to rip her jaw off and scrape the skin off her face with her Goddamn teeth"


The second in the series comes on 2.10.09 is called "Kill yourself. Save us the paperwork":

Pfc. Ryan Alderman in Iraq in an undated photo.

Pfc. Ryan Alderman, now deceased, sought medical help from the Army. He got a fistful of powerful drugs instead.

This is part of the second installment in a week long series called "Coming Home." Read Ryan Alderman's sworn statement, written a week before his death, here, and a description of three other suicides of Fort Carson-based soldiers here. See the introduction to the series here.

The second, in this series, starts out with the following:

Feb. 10, 2009 | FORT CARSON, Colo. -- It was unseasonably warm for November in Colorado as Heidi Lieberman approached the door of the Soldiers' Memorial Chapel at Fort Carson. She walked past a few of the large evergreens that dot the chapel grounds and then entered the blockish, modern beige and brown chapel topped with a sharp, rocketlike steeple.

Inside, the chapel was hushed. Camouflage-clad, crew-cut young men packed the pews. Up in front, an empty Army helmet hung on the butt of an upright M16. A pair of brown combat boots sat below, as if they had been tucked under a bunk. A soldier handed Heidi a program for a memorial service. On the front was the image of a soldier, kneeling in prayer below an American flag and illuminated by a beacon of light from above. The inscription just below the kneeling soldier read, "Lord, grant me the strength ..."

It had been five days since Heidi's son Adam, 21, a soldier at Fort Carson, swallowed handfuls of prescription sleeping pills and psychotropic drugs in the barracks, trying to die. With a can of black paint, Adam brushed a suicide note on the wall of his room. The Army, Adam wrote, "took my life."

Adam had lived. Pfc. Timothy Ryan Alderman wasn't so lucky. Alderman had been found dead of a similar drug overdose in his room in the barracks at Fort Carson in the early-morning hours of Oct. 20, 10 days before Adam Lieberman made his suicide attempt.

Heidi, who was at Fort Carson to deal with the aftermath of her own son's suicide attempt, had decided to attend Alderman's funeral although neither she nor her son had known him. She sank into a pew and tried to reconcile two warring thoughts.

The first page leads into the second, givin this title at the bottom link to: "It looked like a slaughterhouse operation to me", which than leads to the third, "That's shitty. That breaks all the rules. He was overmedicated"

Please go over and read these two reports, than follow this extremely important series. I'll be updating this post as each days report is posted.

With the long running occupations continuing, and as the multiple tours start weighing on some of these soldiers, add on the economic problems of the country, their families sacrificing and trying to carry on a normal existence while waiting, over and over, and we're just witnessing the beginning of what may be coming!

Just as those of us who served in another long running occupation, without having to serve more than one tour, watched as our own brothers and sisters returned, never leaving behind what they had experienced nor completely returning home!

Take In A Deep Breath America

As far as suicides among active duty soldiers
and veterans of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan
are concerned,
we in America have just seen the tip of the iceberg.
Two tours will be twice the chance of suicide.
Three tours will be triple the chance of suicide.
Four tours will be four times the chance of suicide.
These soldiers will be deleted by this country like
unwanted e-mails.
Why?
Because the American people do not support the troops.
Nobody wants to do the math.
Take in a deep breath America,
the wars are coming home to the stuffed closets of your
mind.
When you fall asleep at the wheel,
people die in your neighborhood.
Eventually,
they may die in your own home.
When I was in Vietnam toward the end of the war,
this is what I saw.
Blood on my hands,
brains in my lap.

Mike Hastie
U.S. Army Medic
Vietnam 1970-71
February 9, 2009

Penny Coleman - Suicide Epidemic Amoung Vets

Journalist Tells Congress About Suicide Epidemic Among Vets

By Penny Coleman, AlterNet. Posted January 2, 2008.

A testimony at congressional hearings in response to increasingly ominous reports of soldier and veteran suicides.

On Dec. 12, at 10 in the morning, I was sitting in room 345 of the Cannon House Office Building, as Rep. Bob Filner called to order the Veterans Affairs Committee hearing on "Stopping Suicides: Mental Health Challenges Within the Department of Veterans Affairs."

The hearings were in response to increasingly ominous rumors of soldier and veteran suicides (which the DoD and the VA have continued to deny), culminating in the dramatic CBS News report about veteran suicides released in late November. Finally, an entity with some insider clout had produced some hard numbers that attest to an epidemic of monstrous proportions. Even so, the bad guys, like Dr. Ira Katz, who is head of mental health at the VA, quibble about whether or not this is "an epidemic" or a "major problem." "Why hasn't the VA done a national study seeking national data on how many veterans have committed suicide in this country?" Katz was asked by the CBS reporter. "That research is ongoing," Katz replied, looking a lot like Lucy promising not to snatch the football away again.

So, on Dec. 12, I and three other citizens found ourselves scheduled for the morning panel: Mike and Kim Bowman, whose son Tim, a veteran of the Iraq war, took his own life a year ago; Ilona Meagher, author of Moving a Nation to Care: Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder and America's Returning Troops; and me -- all of us, by the way, suicide survivors. We were to be followed by a second panel consisting of Katz and fellow apologists, who were supposed to eviscerate the CBS report and skewer us with their conflicting numbers. Without, of course, appearing callous, slimy or cruel.

Mike Bowmen spoke first, his wife Kim sitting beside him. Kim didn't speak, but kept her hand on Mike's back. It was such a simple gesture, but one that spoke volumes: Mike is capable of doing the talking, because Kim makes it possible. They are absolutely there for each other. And for their son's memory. And for all the other parents who have already -- or will someday -- have to find ways to survive a death like Tim's.

The Bowmans are devastated. Their grief is huge and terrible, and together they have found ways to give public meaning to their personal tragedy. Aside from giving such an inspiring human face to statistics so awful anyone would want to become numb and turn away from them, Mike mined his own experience and his son's for those moments that had seemed most senselessly counterproductive if not just plain stupid. You can read the whole of his testimony on the Veterans Affairs Committee website, but two points, at least, I think are worth sharing. This first reminds me of those rebate offers that make things sound like such a deal, but are really so complicated and time-consuming to fill out that they know you'll never do it: The VA currently protests that it can't possibly be asked to take responsibility for veterans who have not registered with the system. They don't know where to find them. Well then, Mike asked, "Why isn't the VA sitting there when they get off the bus?" Why don't they have somebody … with a computer and a desk, registering them before they can go home? They're coming out of combat. You know that they're going to need help. Sign them up right there. That way, you know where they are, you know who they are, and they're in the VA system right away. Don't make it so that the soldier has to go to the VA. Make the VA go to the soldier." So simple. So obvious.

Mike's other point was a simple intervention into military culture, and one that would go a long way towards undermining the age-old stigma that is the main reason soldiers don't ask for the help they need: Instead of shunning or punishing a soldier who admits to a combat stress injury and asks for help, hold him or her up as a model. "Grab that soldier and thank him for saying, 'I'm not OK' and promote him," he said. "A soldier that admits a mental injury should be the first guy you want to have in your unit because he may be the only one that really has a grasp on reality."

When Mike and Kim Bowman finished, the entire hearing room came to its feet, and one after another, the committee members fell all over themselves thanking them for their courage and identifying with their pain. Even the Republicans, though they couldn't quite hide their compulsion to hold soldiers responsible for their own pain. One of my favorites, Rep. Cliff Stearns from Florida, "in all candidness," told Mike Bowman, "You coming here is good for us, but it's probably good for you to talk about it." And then did himself even one better when he suggested that perhaps Mike and Kim hadn't quite lived up to their responsibility as parents. "The building up of the self-esteem is the key," he said, "and the parents somehow have to convince him or her that everything is going to be all right, we're going to work through it. And in this case it didn't happen, and so, tragic and sad." Gag me, Cliff.

Steve Buyer, the ranking Republican on the committee, shared a story about losing a childhood friend to suicide. "And there were no signs. There were no risk factors, he said. "It was just one of these bizarre strikes of the mind to just -- I don't have the answers." Knock, knock, Steve. It does seem that spending time in a combat zone is, in and of itself, a risk factor that screams to be taken seriously. But Steve isn't in an entirely conciliatory frame of mind. "As we delve into this issue, we have to also be very sensitive," he said, "because I recognize there are anti-war advocates that also want to say that these individuals that then therefore commit suicide, who have worn the uniform, are somehow victims. And that's not right either."

As one of the anti-war advocates he is referring to, I would like to point out that he is conflating two entirely different positions: anti-war and anti-this-war. The two are not mutually exclusive (and I am a proud example of that), but they are different, and pretending they are not is simply disingenuous. As disingenuous as it would be for me to call him pro-war, if I could be persuaded to sink so low.

In fact, aside from anti-war activists, the other thing that seems to terrify this crew is socialized medicine. The VA, properly funded, could actually serve as an example of how universal health care might work. In practice, it has been bearded to look like just any old hospital, replete with exclusionary practices that are a caricature of the most extreme behavior of a private insurance company gone mad.

When after two hours, congressman Bob turned the mike over to me and then to Ilona, we did our best. We did not shame ourselves. In fact, we both had important things to say and (very much to our relief) we said them well. But the Bowmans were a hard act to follow.

The second panel, however, didn't seem to have noticed. Anything. All Katz and crew wanted to talk about were the fine new programs that the VA has inaugurated -- programs that, as Filner repeatedly interrupted to point out, obviously are not enough to stem this outbreak of despair. Filner didn't even try to disguise his frustration and impatience with these apologists who complained bitterly about how mean CBS was being about sharing their research and the creative new outreach plans they have come up with to bring psychically injured veterans into the system: The agency, according to Katz, is writing a letter that should go out this week or next to all veterans, raising these issues." Right, Dr. Katz. A letter.

After only two of the four panel members had given their testimony, Filner cut the hearing short: "Throw this away and talk to the Bowmans, talk to Ms. Coleman, talk to Ms. Meagher, and say, What are we going to do about these issues? You're not doing that. I mean, you had the advantage of listening to them. Respond to them ... I still don't know what you're doing for those people ... You have not done the job. We're going to have another hearing on this. We're going to have another hearing on this. And I want you to come back with a better report. This is not very useful."

That was, I admit, a sweet moment.

There are countless examples, one more painful than the next, of ways this administration has cut corners on soldiers' and veterans' healthcare. They have, with consummate cynicism, decked themselves in yellow ribbons, mandatory lapel pins and cheap jingoistic rhetoric while simultaneously sucking and siphoning off the VA's already inadequate resources. Mike Bowman's testimony alone is a devastating indictment of those policies. And yet Katz continues to insist, as he did repeatedly during these hearings, that the VA has adequate resources to manage a crisis the parameters of which they have yet to determine and the measures to be taken that might actually intervene in the mounting death toll not yet articulated.

I have hope that good things will come of these hearings, but if they did nothing else, they made a few things very clear. For one, the VA is a system in crisis. It has been deeply underfunded for way too long. It has a bureaucratic system that is adversarial to veterans. And though it employs many dedicated and humanitarian care providers, it is led by a bunch of flunkies who say whatever they think they can get away with to avoid taking responsibility for those Americans who honorably enlisted to defend their country.

The hearings also made it perfectly clear that people like me, a pro-peace activist, can find common cause with a military family like that of Mike and Kim Bowman. The Bowmans still support this war, at least in part because they need to believe that their beloved son died for a reason. I cannot support this war, but I too have a beloved son. I cannot begin to imagine the heat of the rage I would feel had my son died as a result of stupid bureaucratic neglect and mismanagement, not to mention skimping. I may not be in favor of this war, but I am fierce when it comes to taking care of those we sent to fight in our name. The architects of the war and those who implement their policies at the VA have to wake up in the morning and look at themselves in the mirror. With the deaths of so many of our children on their hands, I wonder how they manage.

Penny Coleman is the widow of a Vietnam Veteran who took his own life after coming home. Her latest book, Flashback: Posttraumatic Stress Disorder, Suicide, and the Lessons of War, was released on Memorial Day, 2006. Her blog is Flashback.

Sums It Up, Merry? Christmas

As to the present, Remember who had Total Control of Washington and what they were passing and saying in the leadup to the 'Shock and Awe', leaving out the Most Important Legislation and Funding!!

Their excuse for Walter Reed, "Oh it's closing in a couple of years!", as they were rubber stamping a War of Choice knowing Reed would be where many would pass through, was/is a Total Disgrace, another Deja-Vu Vietnam Era!!

It's simply, Powerfully, titled "The Disgraceful Treatment of our Veterans"

As you do your holiday shopping this year and think about a big turkey dinner and piles of gifts and the good life that most Americans enjoy, please spare a
thought for those who made it all possible: Those who serve in our military and the veterans who've worn the uniform.

Be it in justifiable? conflicts or Wars of Choice, benefitting only a few in ways No One should Prosper!

Bullets:

* An average of 18 veterans commit suicide each and every day of the year, according to recent statistics from the Veterans Administration (VA). That’s 126 veterans who kill themselves every week. Or some 6,552 who take their own lives each year. Our veterans are killing themselves at twice the rate of other Americans.
* One quarter of the homeless people in America are military veterans. That’s one in every four. Is that ragged man huddled on the steam grate in a brutal winter wind a Vietnam vet? Did that younger man panhandling for pocket change on the street corner fight in Kandahar or Fallujah?

Add to above All we've found out about, many of us already knew what was coming, these past six years!!

The next smarmy politician who shouts, “God bless our troops” ought to be tarred and feathered and ridden out of Washington on a rail for sheer hypocrisy.

As for the Greater Majority of this Country, the sheer numbers would leave the rails in total disrepair, but Shame should pass through All Our Thoughts, Shame at ourselves!

McClatchy Newspapers has been running a sreies of articles, this week. Kansans At War.

Twenty percent of the U.S. troops fighting in Iraq and Afghanistan come from the Army National Guard. Many are from small towns, and go to war alongside family and friends. This is Part One of a four-part story about one of those units, Bravo Battery of the Kansas National Guard's 161st Field Artillery, and one night in Iraq that changed many lives.

And pay a visit to Ilona Meaghers site PTSD Combat: Winning the War Within, she has this Free Downloadable Suicide Prevention Book posted up. Links to the Free Download can be found there along with a cut from the book, as well as this Video:



Oh ya, for those a little slow on the brain thrust or to involved arguing about who's the Bestest to lead this Troubled Nation, a lightbulb for you, Pass The Link To The Free Book Download On!!

Is 'Funding' Really For Troops?

What Happened To Funding and Oversite For Military/Veteran Care In Previous Congresses?

Bob Woodruff: TBI

Turning Personal Injury Into Public Inquiry

The ABC News Anchor Returns With a Candid Look at Brain Injuries and Veteran Care

They just had this on ABC News about Woodruffs injuries and comeback, along with a short report on a soldier who also lost an arm an had TBI, Tramatic Brain Injury.

He will be reporting on his story along with military personals similar stories, tomorrow and in coming months!!

With All that's been coming out, Finally, and my respect for his past reporting, my Hope Is That They Don't Constrain Him and Allow the Truth!!!!!

Go in and read the ABC Article!