RIP PFC MILLER
It's been a long time since I've attended a soldier's memorial service. Germany, if my memory serves. A long time.
Today, a local soldier, PFC Cale Miller, was laid to rest at the on-post cemetery. The entire post kinda stopped its hustle and bustle, and hundreds of people holding American flags lined the route the motorcade would take to the cemetery.
BabyGrok was in a horrible mood before we even left for the procession, and I considered just skipping it and letting her nap, but it was too important to skip. She did decently while we were there, despite delays in the timeline. She liked the motorcycles and lights, but she didn't understand why I was making her be quiet, nor did she understand why she couldn't run out into the street. I don't think she had any idea why I kept telling her she was doing something special, and she really didn't like that I kept telling her to stop dragging her little flag on the ground.
And she thought the most important part of the day was that I let her eat a piece of pizza.
It's absurd to take a 2 year old to a funeral. But we do it because it is important. We do it because PFC Miller deserves it.
And we do it because I need to do it. It's been too long since I've felt the sting of war, and my complacency is too comfortable.
My husband is in DC for the funeral service for the soldier in his company who was killed on deployment.
We had an FRG meeting last week, and the unit provided details for the families who would be heading to Arlington for the service. As I sat there holding my new baby, the baby who looks just like my husband, all I could think about was this soldier's wife. His pregnant wife. Pregnant with a little girl...
When I thought I'd go into labor before my husband came home, I had a meltdown. I couldn't make myself go to the hospital. I was packing my suitcase while weeping, in agony that things had not gone as I'd wanted them to go, that it wasn't supposed to be this way, that he was supposed to be here with me and for me. I wanted to stay in complete denial and refuse to go to the hospital. I felt deep in my bones that I just couldn't have that baby without him, that despite how capable I am, this was the one thing I couldn't handle on my own.
And I think of this woman whose husband won't be there at all when her baby is born, and I can't stand it. I am sick for her. Just sick.
Posted by: Connie at April 06, 2010 07:37 PM (L6nIP)
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When Mrs. P lost her husband a few weeks ago, knowing he never met his little girl, I sobbed. I sobbed for the inequity of it. I was angry for her and for the life that was taken from them. And for the last few weeks, every time I've gotten angry at my husband I thank God that he's here to annoy me. And I thank God that there isn't a doubt that he'll be in that delivery room to hold my hand. And for the first year of his son's life. You know what's in store for us at the end of this training, and I keep thinking, if something should happen, at least I had this time. At the very least I had this time.
Posted by: Sara at April 06, 2010 08:36 PM (Z8H9d)
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I would've bawled and bawled in your position as well. I have this complete and utter fear that what happened to your friend may happen to me. This military is such a different fear than civilian life. Everytime I see a photo of a military widow being handed a folded flag by an Honor Guard member my heart melts. They are our friends and our family ... if by branch alone. I know two things to be true that if my husband or one of my two sisters ever pass away the world will stop spinning on its axis. Hold your baby and cling to the hope that only that small life brings you. I try and think that the only thing that could ease the pain of my husband passing would be if I had a child to look at and remember him by. His legacy. Now that we are adopting it will be nature versus nurture if that.
Posted by: Darla at April 06, 2010 11:05 PM (RAPsl)
Posted by: Guard Wife at April 09, 2010 10:50 PM (UI/tE)
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I also had a friend from my husband's company who lost her husband this deployment while she was pregnant with their first baby girl. They hadn't even been married a year. My heart ached for her, too. Still does. I pray for her and her beautiful little girl (born right around the same time as your little darling) every day, and am thankful that she has oodles of loving family and friends and faith to support her. After all she's been through, I think she is probably one of the strongest people I know, and I hope and pray that I never have to find my strength the hard way, as she did.
Posted by: Leofwende at April 10, 2010 12:28 AM (28CBm)
HE IS NOT THERE TO "SERVE" THEM
I still don't know what I think is the right move in Afghanistan. I still see an enormous difference in potential between Iraq and Afghanistan, and moves I thought were a good idea in Iraq don't always seem so good in Afghanistan. I personally think that counter-terrorism seems to fit Afghanistan more than COIN does, but I don't know my hat from a hole in the ground, so my opinion doesn't really count for anything.
But I can't help but keep thinking about firebombing Dresden vs vaccinating goats. It's such a different tactic. And I fear that we're starting to mistake the hearts-and-minds missions as being the end, not the means.
There are people even within Civil Affairs who think that their tasks are the end-goal. There are people who think that how many goats they vaccinated and how many school supplies they dropped off are their accomplishments. My husband, however, always takes a long-term, big-picture view of the world. The goal is not vaccinated goats but whether helping that goatherd made Special Forces' job easier and thus helped advance the cause of defeating our enemies. The healthy goats are the means, not the end.
It's a fascinating way to look at his job, and sadly it takes a confident person to accept that role. Civil Affairs as a branch doesn't want to see itself as just a tool for Special Forces. Some in the branch look askance at my husband when his briefings show the Civil Affairs work as Phase 2 and what SF built out of their work as Phase 3. They want to feel like their role is important. It certainly is, but only if it helps get us closer to the bad guy.
Happy, healthy goats in Afghanistan shouldn't be our goal; winning should.
The reason we are in this war is to stop terrorists from killing Americans. The point is to prevent another 9/11, to cut off the funding for and state-sponsorship of terrorism, and to kill as many al Qaeda and terrorists as possible. We vaccinate the goats because hopefully that will help nice Afghans and Iraqis point out where the bad guys are, or take up arms and help us fight them. We don’t vaccinate the goats because we want to do charity work for them.
Don’t get me wrong, plenty of soldiers have a vested interest in the people they’ve been working with for years now. Most Americans are compassionate people who want third-worlders to have a better life than they do now; that's why American citizens pull money out of their own pockets and mail school supplies and sneakers overseas. On a personal level, we all want Afghan girls to go to school and Iraqi businesses to be successful.
But that’s not the military goal. We have to remember that that is a means to an end: a better educated and more economically sound populace should lead to less people joining al Qaeda out of desperation, or becoming a suicide bomber for the money. I want Iraqis and Afghans to flourish, but I have an ulterior motive for that desire. I am not just blindly altruistic in my support for these missions and programs. They have to advance the cause of the US military, otherwise they're missing the point.
I guess Gen. Petraeus could sum it up better than me, but he sent me an e-mail last year and he had read "Three Cups of Tea," and he said there were three lessons from the book that he wanted to impart to his troops. No. 1, he said, we need to listen more; No. 2, we need to have respect, meaning we are there to serve the good people of Afghanistan; and No. 3, we need to build relationships. "Three Cups of Tea" now is mandatory reading for all senior U.S military commanders, and all special forces deploying to Afghanistan are required to read it. [emphasis mine]
And I see that right there as an epic FAIL.
My husband is not there to "serve" the people of Afghanistan. He is there to creatively find ways to do compassionate missions, with the end goal always tucked away in the back of his mind that it only makes sense to run the mission if it will somehow benefit the American military agenda. If he wanted to build schools for needy people, he could've just joined Habitat For Humanity.
The Mortenson advice is all well and good if you are an NGO or just an kindhearted fella who wants to open schools in Afghanistan. His goal is to help those people; he "serves" them. The military doesn't; the military serves the interests of the United States. The American military is not one big money tree that Afghans can keep coming to to get "served." Or at least it shouldn't be. But every soldier working in Iraq and Afghanistan has a horror story of following Mortenson's Rule #1 and asking the local people what they need...and then getting an earful of upgrades. "We need power restored to the entire remote village." Well, have you ever had power before? Did you have power back when Saddam ran the country? No? Then how, pray tell, do you expect us to "restore" it? My husband visited a school last year and asked them what they could use; they gave him plans for a state-of-the-art kitchen they wanted installed in the cafeteria. Scale it back a bit, folks; Uncle Sugar isn't going to turn your hot plate into Paula Deen's kitchen. Especially not if it's not going to get us anything in return. I want to be assured of quid pro quo before we vaccinate anybody's goats, or at least have a pretty good idea that we'll get something for our effort.
The US military is not one big charity organization trying to fix Afghanistan. Let the Gates Foundation do stuff like that. Our missions need to have purpose and need to be grounded in some sense of how this helps the overall goals of our fighting force: If I vaccinate this goat or build this school, will ol' Farzad in the village let us know is he hears rumors of the next planned attack? If not, then Farzad can find his own damn vaccination.
We are not there to "serve" him.
UPDATE:
Related thoughts from Ralph Peters on TV. Clip here. Relevant quote:
In 2001, we didn't go to Afghanistan to turn it into Disneyworld. We didn't go there to buy retirement homes. We went there to kill al Qaeda and punish the Taliban for harboring them. Mission accomplished by late spring of 2002. Imperfect? Hey, the world's an imperfect place. But...we stayed, because we convinced ourselves that -- although we still haven't rebuilt the Twin Towers -- that we were going to build a modern, wonderful Afghanistan. Ain't gonna happen, ain't worth the effort, even if it worked we get nothing out of it. Judge, the purpose in 2001 was right: kill al Qaeda wherever they are.
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I think this article deserves wider circulation. Come on, bloggers. Link away!
It also deserves an entire article in response. I don't have the time to write it right now, so I'll just quote Ruth:
Remember, well at least I am old enough to, the Marshall Plan? We made sure we won and then we sent the money. Seems like a good way to do it to me.
In short, giving comes second. We should pay Afghans after they pay us with info. No freebies.
Posted by: Amritas at December 04, 2009 03:50 PM (+nV09)
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Along the lines that Amritas said. Someone needs to remind the military higerups that the military is the "War" department not the Peace Corp. If the Civil Affairs group wants to be the end all, then they need to send idealistic young liberals to do the work instead of warriors that want to get the mission done and go home.
Posted by: SciFiJim at December 05, 2009 09:59 AM (oyiPt)
FLOORED BY COINCIDENCE
I am just absolutely reeling right now. Floored by coincidence.
I have a friend in my knitting group whose husband died as a contractor in Iraq. She has never been forthcoming with details, and I certainly have never wanted to pry. But last week she let me know that an episode of Battlefield Diaries would be on the Military Channel, and that it was the attack her husband was killed in.
I had no idea he was killed in the convoy where Matt Maupin was captured. Nor did I have any idea that I knew the lieutenant who led that convoy; Matt Brown and I were in youth group together in high school.
"LOOK AT YOUR MAP"
Last night I was interviewed for an article called "Families Await News From Afghanistan." I only played a small role in the article, probably because I wasn't sure exactly what was expected of me. Truthfully, I felt that giving my opinion before Pres Obama's speech was a waste of time, because the specifics of what he'd say is what really means something. Who cares what I think the night before I know what's going on? The reporter -- who was very nice and professional and quoted me accurately (except that I know for a fact I always called him "President Obama" and not just "Obama," as I was quoted as saying. Out of respect for the office of the presidency, I make a point of never calling him just by his last name.) -- asked me what I thought of the proposed additional 30,000 troops and what I thought about the inclusion of an exit strategy. And my answer, which is not conducive to news articles, is that it depends.
What I answered was that it depends on what the 30,000 will be used for. Will they be sent to urban or rural areas? Will they be doing counter-insurgency or counter-terrorism? And as far as an exit goes, I said it depends on whether Pres Obama announces what the end game is. Will he state concrete goals? Will he announce a victory strategy? It makes no sense to denote an arbitrary end to a war based on running out the clock; what does victory look like to the Obama administration?
And I obviously over-thought the substance of the article, because I was apparently over-expectant on the substance of the speech.
I wanted details. I can't form any opinions on whether we're making the right move if I don't know the specifics. And I feel like I didn't learn anything new from listening to Pres Obama's speech tonight than what I already knew from what got leaked ahead of time. (Except I learned there is something called a "tool of mass destruction." Which sounds more like a witty insult than something serious.)
What I wanted was Perot or Beck-style charts and graphs. I wanted another version of FDR's fireside chat On the Progess of the War.
That is the reason why I have asked you to take out and spread before you (the) a map of the whole earth, and to follow with me in the references which I shall make to the world-encircling battle lines of this war. [...] Look at your map. [...] Heavy bombers can fly under their own power from here to the southwest Pacific, either way, but the smaller planes cannot. Therefore, these lighter planes have to be packed in crates and sent on board cargo ships. Look at your map again; and you will see that the route is long – and at many places perilous – either across the South Atlantic all the way (a)round South Africa and the Cape of Good Hope, or from California to the East Indies direct. A vessel can make a round trip by either route in about four months, or only three round trips in a whole year.
In spite of the length, (and) in spite of the difficulties of this transportation, I can tell you that in two and a half months we already have a large number of bombers and pursuit planes, manned by American pilots and crews, which are now in daily contact with the enemy in the Southwest Pacific. And thousands of American troops are today in that area engaged in operations not only in the air but on the ground as well.
In this battle area, Japan has had an obvious initial advantage. For she could fly even her short-range planes to the points of attack by using many stepping stones open to – her bases in a multitude of Pacific islands and also bases on the China coast, Indo-China coast, and in Thailand and Malaya (coasts). Japanese troop transports could go south from Japan and from China through the narrow China Sea, which can be protected by Japanese planes throughout its whole length.
I ask you to look at your maps again, particularly at that portion of the Pacific Ocean lying west of Hawaii. Before this war even started, the Philippine Islands were already surrounded on three sides by Japanese power. On the west, the China side, the Japanese were in possession of the coast of China and the coast of Indo-China which had been yielded to them by the Vichy French. On the North are the islands of Japan themselves, reaching down almost to northern Luzon. On the east, are the Mandated Islands – which Japan had occupied exclusively, and had fortified in absolute violation of her written word.
Read that and imagine any recent president talking to us citizens this way. Imagine being treated like you have a brain in your head, and that you're a part of what's taking place. Imagine your president asking you to follow his complex speech on a map or with pen and paper.
Instead, we got "We will not target other people...because their faith or ethnicity is different from ours." And praise for teachers, community organizers, and "Peace Corps volunteers who spread hope abroad."
That's all well and good, but I wanted details about Afghanistan.
he’s decided to send an additional 30,000 troops for 30 months. That’s not a strategic decision. That’s a new-car warranty.
Bad writing. Lame delivery. Tepid response — from cadets ORDERED to be nice. And a strategic vision equal parts High School Essay Content and low-rent public relations.
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I'm chicken, I didn't listen. I am prone to high blood pressure, no need to aggravate it. I can read it. Every time I watch him I wonder why SNL doesn't copy that swing the head from side to side to read the teleprompters. And the cadenced speech, just catching up with the next line. If one of the famous newsreaders did it that badly they wouldn't be where they are.
Posted by: Ruth H at December 01, 2009 11:15 PM (zlUde)
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I listened to it on the radio. I have difficulty taking him seriously when he talks. I'd love to give him a blank slate and give him credit where credit is due, but the main thought that came to me as I was hearing him talk about military strategy was, "What on earth does he know about military strategy, REALLY?"
He says all the pretty things people want to hear, but I can't help but think it's because someone In The Know wrote it for him -- not because he actually knows or believes what he's talking about. It saddens me that a man in charge of our nation can be so disappointing, especially when it comes to the safety and security of our nation and those who volunteer to go out and lay their lives on the line -- often multiple times -- for that safety and security.
I had a wailing baby in the background for most of the speech, so I didn't get to hear it all, but I did try to listen without getting my hackles up. That's hard. The sound of P. Obama's voice alone gets my hackles up, even in parody.
Posted by: Deltasierra at December 02, 2009 12:33 AM (+Fbnb)
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"He’s decided to send an additional 30,000 troops for 30 months. That’s not a strategic decision. That’s a new-car warranty."
I SO stole that.
Posted by: Chuck Z at December 02, 2009 12:40 AM (bMH2g)
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"That is the reason why I have asked you to take out and spread before you (the) a map of the whole earth,"
You know, most people at that time actually HAD a map of the whole earth. Now most people wouldn't know how to read a map much less keep one available for study.
Posted by: Pamela at December 02, 2009 03:46 AM (sZIUh)
I can't form any opinions on whether we're making the right move if I don't know the specifics.
One could argue that Obama couldn't reveal the specifics because he didn't want the enemy to know his strategy. The trouble with that argument is that he did reveal when the troops will leave. I bet the enemy is planning right now what to do until 2011 - and beyond.
Why 2011? Why 30,000? Why these seemingly arbitrary numbers? How does he know the mission will be accomplished by adding X number of troops by date Y? This seems to be an attempt to reassure the American public - don't worry, our troops won't be there forever - while at the same looking as if he is Doing Something. Which he is, but that's an unacceptable third choice to me. Here are the only two I like: Win and Leave ... or Just Leave.
And what is that Something, exactly? Sounds like Afghanization to me.
Taken together, these additional American and international troops will
allow us to accelerate handing over responsibility to Afghan forces,
and allow us to begin the transfer of our forces out of Afghanistan in
July of 2011.
[...]
We will continue to advise and assist Afghanistan's Security Forces to
ensure that they can succeed over the long haul. But it will be clear
to the Afghan government – and, more importantly, to the Afghan people
– that they will ultimately be responsible for their own country.
What makes Obama think all this - and more! - can be done in 18 months? How much more?
And we will also focus our assistance in areas – such as agriculture –
that can make an immediate impact in the lives of the Afghan people.
Our forces have to protect and feed Afghans?
What General McChrystal, Sec Def Gates and President Obama need to
remember is that they are sworn by oath to defend this country and our
people - not protect the civilian population of another country or
rebuild their country with our tax dollars and the blood of our
children!
Part of the strategy should be World War II Rules of Engagement.
[...]
Right now, American soldiers and Marines are dying in Iraq and
Afghanistan in spite of the fact that we have the most powerful
military in the world and the enemy is a joke militarily. Why? Because we are afraid to use our military assets for fear of bad public relations from media and foreigners who hold us to ridiculously high standards while holding the enemy to no standards at all. The enemy deliberatelytargets innocent civilians
who have no military value. We would not do that. But neither should we
let Americans and our allies continue to die in order to avoid being
bad-mouthed by hidden-agenda-driven, hair-trigger critics who apply a
double standard [and who hate us no matter what we do -A]
[...]
When the Rules of Engagement get too extreme, as in this case, the
mission is no longer a military one. Prohibiting the military from
using their guns is ridiculous. If the military cannot use their guns
to accomplish their mission or protect their troops, they should not be
there at all.
Guess what, General [McChrystal]? The United States of America has already tried improving
Afghan safety and quality of life, and on a colossal scale, and it just
didn't stick. And back then, between 1946 and 1979, there was no
Taliban "insurgency" complicating the social work of nation-building.
Yet the Great Society lives on!
"[...] see if what passes for US military strategy doesn't sound an awful lot like Great Society addle-pated liberalism."
Nation-building
is the ultimate form of socialism. American conservatives resent
liberals' attempts to rebuild America, even though the two groups have
a lot more in common than Americans and Afghans. If America cannot be
transformed through socialist programs, how can America transform other
countries through socialist programs? We might as well terraform Mars.
As an analytical exercise, try to understand Afghanistan as a hostile planet to which we have been forced, in self-defense, to deploy military colonies.
[...]
This is a "war of the worlds" in the cultural sense, a head-on collision between civilizations from different galaxies.
And the aliens don't come in peace.
But they can come to America! Our open door is our greatest weakness. Obama said,
In the last few months alone, we have apprehended extremists within our
borders who were sent here from the border region of Afghanistan and
Pakistan to commit new acts of terror.
This is news to me. But I'm not surprised by enemy infiltration, or by Obama's failure to declare the closing of the doors.
We
don't just need WWII rules of engagement. We need WWII immigration
policies. How many Axis immigrants came to the US during 1942-1945?
It's been said ad infinitum that we fight them over there so we don't have to fight them over here. The trouble is that the enemy is already over here. And by "the enemy", I don't mean random Muslims. I mean jihadis.
I actually agreed with Obama when he said,
We have to invest in our homeland security, because we cannot capture
or kill every violent extremist abroad. We have to improve and better
coordinate our intelligence, so that we stay one step ahead of shadowy
networks.
No more blind eyes to jihadi warning signs. No more Fort Hoods.
We must send a clear message to jihadis:
You
are not wanted in this country. And if you dare to threaten us from
abroad, we will be back in the Middle East, and you will end up like
Saddam. DEAD.
As Sha'i ben-Tekoa wrote about Iraq back in 2003,
It
is always possible to return, if necessary. An “in-and-out†strategy
might be more successful and cheaper in blood and money in the long
term than an indefinite occupation taking casualties all the time.
But no.
Instead of clearly defined, doable short-term operations, we're told to expect miracles in 18 months while our weak spot remains vulnerable. Why should we believe Obama? As Deltasierra asked,
What on earth does he know about military strategy, REALLY?
Obama is just a teleprompter-reading prop. Who wrote his script? Who came up with what Vodkapundit described as "a strategic vision equal parts High School Essay Content and low-rent public relations"? Who is responsible for the men and women hurt or killed for the sake of a ... "new car warranty"!?
Whose fault is this?
Forget them for a moment. What if you (Sarah, anybody) wrote Obama's speech for him? What would you have wanted him to say?
Sarah asked,
[W]hat does victory look like to the Obama administration?
I'd like to ask you and your readers, "What does victory look like to you?"
Posted by: Amritas at December 02, 2009 04:13 AM (u0BIk)
One of Hasan's commanding officers at Walter Reed Army Medical Center,
Lieutenant Colonel Melanie Guerrero, told investigators she had
considered failing him as an intern but "decided to allow him to pass
since he was going into psychiatry and would not be doing any real
patient care."
Wow, Army. I didn't think it was possible for you to look worse in this fiasco, but you've gone and outdone yourself. I think that's the most appalling thing I've ever heard.
No wonder soldiers hesitate to get treated for PTSD, if that's the attitude of the commanding officer of psychiatry services for the military.
I hope LTC Guerrero's attitude is unusual rather than typical. As I told you in my email, I think she believes that only things like surgery and physical therapy "count" as "real patient care." I have no idea if Hasan's other commanding officers agree with her, but the idea that physical work is more "real" (i.e., important) than mental/verbal work is unfortunately widespread.
Eowyn,
There's nothing merciful about a "mercy pass."
I never gave any when I was a professor. And no, I wasn't a meanie. I gave a lot of As. But they were all deserved. So were the Fs and every other grade in between. I set numerical standards on day 1 and stuck to them. No favoritism, no soft grading.
Posted by: Amritas at November 23, 2009 12:02 PM (+nV09)
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Did you hear that he actually told his paitents with PTSD to turn themselves in for committing war crimes? Pathetic. And I've heard that his good performance ratings and not being kicked out were because his superiors didn't want to deal with the paperwork. Really?
Posted by: Christa at November 23, 2009 02:19 PM (2qSbp)
VETERANS
I had dinner with a veteran last night. My father-in-law was an MP at Fort Hood in the 70's. I kept thinking about what it would have been like for him to be an MP there last week...
I also talked briefly on the phone to a veteran: my husband's brother. He's out of the Army now but he was deployed to Iraq in 2004 at the same time my husband was.
And I will eat dinner with another veteran tonight. Time spent with Chuck Z is always appreciated.
I did not get to hear from my favorite veteran of all yesterday...but hopefully soon.
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TEASING IN THE MILITARY
I am not in the Army. You can take this post with a grain of salt if you like. Or correct me if you think I'm off base. But something about the Hasan shooting has been bugging me to no end.
[Question from] Rockville, Md.: Dear Mr. Kenniff, As the wife of a former
military officer, it strikes me as odd that the shooter, who was a
major in the Army, claimed that he was being harassed for his religious
beliefs. While some types of harassment and teasing (which could be
serious or not) are surely not uncommon among enlisted men and women,
it is harder to envision it happening in the officer ranks. Enlisted
soldiers would know not to harass an officer and it is difficult to
envision this individual being "made fun of" (the term I saw in the
newspaper) by other officers. This seems inconsistent with the norms in
that professional context. What is your sense of this claim? Thanks.
Thomas Kenniff: I couldn't agree more and that was one of the
points I tried to make on Larry King last night, as Dr. Phil dronned on
about PTSD. This is a person who out ranked 95% of the military, and
occupied a position of prestige both in the military and as a civilian.
Doctors are treated like gold in the Army.
My experience with this is limited, but it runs counter to these two people's experiences. I think perhaps it might have to do with the fact that JAG and the medical corps are a little different from, say, combat arms. I imagine there's less foul-mouthed insults being hurled in the hospital than there are in my husband's corridor.
Yes, I very seriously doubt that some PFC walked up to MAJ Hasan in the hospital and started ragging on him for being a Muslim. Not likely. But to say that officers are above teasing and making fun of folks? My husband apparently doesn't live on the same planet as this lady's husband did.
Officers are human beings. Human beings, in an in-group setting, tease each other. Especially males. About anything and everything that can be used for fodder. Off the top of my head, I know my husband has been made fun of for a variety of things: his beard, his car, his larger-than-average head, his use of big vocabulary words, his lack of tattoos, his never-heard-of-it alma mater, and yes, even just the mere fact of being an officer is grounds for teasing at times (because officers go home and roll around in their big money piles like Scrooge McDuck, you know). And in his current career field, where no one uses rank and everyone gets called by first names, the enlisted soldiers get plenty of cracks in at him. No one is exempt, not the First Sergeant, not the commander, no one. (And Lord help you if you are a female in this career field. You have to have very thick skin.)
I've seen officers tease on ethnicity. A few years ago, my husband invited some other lieutenants over to the house and then told a Chinese-American lieutenant, "But you can't come, you'll oppress my Tibetan dog." The guy laughed and thought that was pretty clever, saying that he usually just gets accused of wanting to eat people's dogs.
I really doubt that Hasan was directly teased about being a Muslim. He might've been if he had gotten close enough to other guys in his unit where they felt comfortable ribbing him, but my guess is that enough people felt Hasan was a bit off and didn't think it'd be wise to poke fun at him. My husband served with one such Muslim before, and everyone was careful to give this guy some space.
I think what's more likely is that Hasan heard indirect comments against Muslims in general and took it personally. In treating soldiers' mental states, he might've heard them say generic things about how they don't get Islam, or they don't like haji, or whatever. And Hasan took it personally. I would bet that a closeted homosexual deals with the same thing in the military. Same as a non-vocal atheist. They would be surrounded by casual conversation against their lifestyle, and I'm sure that's not easy to swallow over and over. I am guessing that's what Hasan meant by saying he felt harassed or made fun of. He heard anti-Muslim comments just by being in the military and took them to heart. Understandable, but quite different from being openly mocked for being a Muslim himself.
I think all this shock that an officer killed these people is a bit ridiculous. Officers are people too. Some of them are jerks. Some of them are ignorant or immature. Some of them are malicious and messed up in the head. They're not somehow above murder just because of their rank.
And they're not above joking and teasing either.
Come on, you really think Chuck Z conducts himself at all times like a complete gentleman? I bet he can let an off-color insult rip like no one's business...
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I'm not in the military, but apparently I do live "on the same planet as this lady's husband did." It is possible for men to work together without resorting to "teasing." So I think
Human beings, in an in-group setting, tease each other. Especially males.
is too broad a generalization, though I believe you are accurately describing your husband's situation. Was it Hasan's situation? Is Kenniff just covering up the truth to preserve the military's image for a civilian audience?
Let's suppose the scenario you described is correct:
I think what's more likely is that Hasan heard indirect comments against Muslims in general and took it personally.
That does sound likely to me. My question is: How many nonwhites, women, homosexuals, et al. in the military hear such comments and react the way Hasan did? My guess is zero. If such people had gone berserk, the media would have lectured us about it. If the military is full of "teasing," how can it promote those who can't take it? Such sensitivity is anything but "Army Strong."
Posted by: Amritas at November 07, 2009 02:45 PM (G4Rx6)
2
I totally agree with this. I had a [short] conversation on Facebook with a friend and her sister (I think), because they were both expressing concern over the fact that "everyone" was making a big deal over his being a Muslim or of Middle Eastern descent, when it was the harassment that drove him to kill. Besides, there are "plenty" of Muslims in this country who don't kill people (like that matters, for some reason), and [apparently] the news media "never" makes a big deal when a "radical Christian" commits this kind of act (which, according to her, happens all the time).
I told her I didn't care if he was the freakin' Pope – he targeted innocent people and killed them in rage. In addition to that, he has a body of evidence pointing to the fact that he is, in fact, a radical Muslim who took very seriously the parts of the Koran that encourage jihad. It doesn't matter if other Muslims are denying having anything to do with him – he doesn't have to be part of a sleeper cell to commit jihad. Neither does "harassment" make a good excuse for mowing down forty people (whose lives he had supposedly sworn to protect, in more ways than one) – it doesn't make him a victim, it makes him a heinous murderer, and we shouldn't ignore that just because he had his feelings hurt.
I haven't gotten a reply yet.
It's really REALLY bugging the heck out of me that people are totally willing to forgive him, because "he's a VIIIIICTIM!"
Poor, poor terrorist. The evil Americans are SOOO mean to you. It doesn't matter that you're an adult with the choice to suck it up/grow a pair/turn the other cheek – OBVIOUSLY killing is the only solution, and we should feel sorry for you.
GRRR. >
Posted by: Deltasierra at November 07, 2009 02:57 PM (/Mv9b)
Very astute observation towards the end. Perhaps in other occupations the teasing isn't so intense. My personal experience being the only female in an entirely male, oil and gas company was that they interacted entirely on the basis of giving each other a hard time. Always.
Mark being infantry is always being teased. I don't need to go into details but it's over everything. And they like it. It's how they bond, I guess. And more so, the teasing gets bad if they don't respect or truely hate a fellow officer. If they outrank him, it happens behind the guy's back but it probably circles back to him anyhow.
What's astute is that as the listener, he probably heard the honest opinion of many soldiers regarding the muslim religion. And your comparisons are right on. I'm on your side with this.
Posted by: Sara at November 07, 2009 10:02 PM (MYUXb)
4
I hadn't read that sort of commentary, and I'm glad, although I think I'll pass it along for my husband the boat wardroom to read. If they're not supposed to be teasing and harassing each other, they missed that memo, bigtime. Of course, they're sub guys...
Posted by: Tara at November 07, 2009 10:07 PM (BuzKj)
I have never, ever, conducted myself otherwise, despite rumors of my wearing a banana hammock around the pool at the vegas hilton, or shouting "hooker" in a vegas bar until an "independent contractor" appeared, or calling her later with a group of other nefarious types and asking if she had a clown suit, or putting fly bait in my 1SGs HMMWV, or telling a buddy that the rattling sound his new mini van made was the sound of his nuts rolling around in the ash tray.
For that matter, I'd never sell a t-shirt that says "my imaginary friend can beat up your imaginary friend." I'd never tell the lab tech who commented on the color of my pee that "It tasted fine to me" or ask for a magazine when given a (urine) specimen cup, and mention it may take a while if they want it filled. I'd never say "the jews" every time someone asks who is responsible for anything. I'd never, ever make fun of someone for being retarded, but I might call someone a retard when they are acting retarded.
I would never make fun of someone because of their gender, or mention that female paratroopers should wear jockstraps so they don't whistle on the way down. I'd never say that female west pointers don't wear skirts because their balls hang out.
I would never make fun of someone for being a member of the religion of peas, because if they don't want to eat meat, that's their choice.
I would never make someone I didn't know feel uncomfortable by telling them racist jokes on an elevator, while they stood right next to a black friend of mine, who tried to look angry without cracking up.
Nope. Not me.
Posted by: Chuck Z at November 08, 2009 01:47 AM (bMH2g)
Posted by: Sarah at November 08, 2009 08:20 AM (gWUle)
7
Dick and I talked about this, he said... "I just made fun of 2 people yesterday for being from Iowa"...
My Husband also gets made fun of for having an abnormally large head...
Posted by: awtm at November 08, 2009 09:01 AM (ZU1VI)
8
It's not so much that I'm surprised that an officer is human. That teasing happens and that someone of that rank could be 'evil.' My surprise at hearing that he was a Major has more to do with the question: How did someone who seemed to have a vendetta against the nation he was serving fly under the radar that long? That is what shakes me and shocks me about his rank.
Posted by: Val at November 08, 2009 08:41 PM (5btL/)
I would have to disagree about the "Officers are people, too."
Yes, they are. But officers are in charge, and, as an enlisted, we take an oath to obey orders of officers appointed over us. Just as improper it is to cheat on your wife, it's that much MORE improper to have some oral sex in the oval office.
Definitely held to a higher standard. Sorry....
Posted by: allicadem at November 09, 2009 10:35 PM (Iu+5p)
10
Held to a higher accountability, yes; to a higher standard, shouldn't be. You wear a uniform just like I do and I have the same expectations of your actions as I do of my own and my peers.
Posted by: Tracy at November 11, 2009 12:58 AM (z1v+g)
11
Same difference, really. Accountability could equal Standard. Officers are saluted and we obey. I expect higher from my officers than I do from any dude off the street. Period.
Posted by: allicadem at November 14, 2009 10:30 AM (Iu+5p)
VALOUR-IT 2009
I haven't mentioned the Valour-IT fundraiser yet because I figured the big push would be at the beginning and I'd post a reminder more towards the end of the drive.
Read about the origins of Valour-IT, as written by Chuck Z's wife.
UNFATHOMABLE
All I keep imagining is my husband being murdered while preparing to deploy, either getting his power of attorney or his flu shot or whatever they do before they leave.
It makes me sick.
I have long been confused by the irony that military installations are gun-free zones. Every person in that readiness center could've shot back. Every soldier is trained, and I'd bet many of their wives are decent marksmen too. And yet Hasan was the only one with a gun.
Guns. And time to reload.
Awful.
And a mental health specialist. Unfathomable.
UPDATE:
It sounds like he's still alive. Good. He doesn't deserve to die before facing the horror he inflicted. Try him, and then fry him.
And I hope it hurts his feelings that he was shot by a girl.
1
It makes me sick too.
I said the same thing to my mother on the phone tonight--if any of the other people in that SRP center had been armed, you can bet Hasan wouldn't have been able to do as much damage as he did.
So. very. sad.
Posted by: Lucy at November 05, 2009 08:57 PM (YNvUz)
2
It's infuriating, but this will be used as a reason to keep them unarmed on bases.
Posted by: Mob at November 05, 2009 09:41 PM (e/sow)
3
IDF are always armed. And they live in the general population of the country.
Why are we different? I don't know. I just don't. It's a stupid, stupid rule.
Posted by: airforcewife at November 05, 2009 09:47 PM (uE3SA)
Continuing to pray and hold good thoughts for the families at Ft. Hood and those who love them.
Posted by: Guard Wife at November 05, 2009 11:25 PM (p4/8e)
5
I also hope it hurt his feelings that he was shot by a woman. My heart hurts for the Fort Hood family and all the relatives of the dead and wounded. My head hurts from trying to take in the reality of such actions.
Posted by: Pamela at November 06, 2009 12:42 AM (k95zf)
6
"I have long been confused by the irony that military installations are gun-free zones."
Me too. In Israel he never would have gotten that far; your weapon is considered part of your uniform. If you are caught in uniform without your weapon you go to jail.
Posted by: David Boxenhorn at November 06, 2009 06:34 AM (OE8Ib)
Yeah, it might just be the Texan in me coming out but I was happy that man didn't die. I want him to talk so we can end the speculation. And when they finally do fry him, I hope it hurts. An easy death was too good for the bastard.
One news article said he was "mortified that he had to deploy". Mortified huh? I have a couple of choice words for that.
Posted by: Sara at November 06, 2009 01:08 PM (vK+Aj)
8
The sorrow I feel for the friends, family and co-workers is too deep to put into words.
Posted by: Lemon Stand at November 06, 2009 01:57 PM (HvJdb)
9
A lot of the early radio commentary up here (Seattle area) was of the opinion that it couldn't possibly have been a terror plot because only a moron would attack a military base where everyone is driving around in armored vehicles and carrying machine guns.
To me, that's a big illustration that the general public just has no clue whatsoever about what we do and the conditions under which we do it. It just about takes an act of Congress to get a weapon, a soldier, and a bullet in the same room. Most bases are designated target zones. And given the security that I used to see every morning on the way in to Fort Lewis during peak PT hours (i.e. hold up an ID-card shaped object, get waved through the gate; this went on for months), I feel safer living in the community.
Sig
Posted by: Sig at November 11, 2009 11:46 AM (D4fxj)
A senior military officer said the developing strategy adopted General
McChrystal’s central tenet. “We are no longer thinking about just
destroying the enemy in a conventional way,†the officer said. “We must
remove the main pressure that civilians live under, which is the
constant intimidation and corruption and direct threat from the
insurgency.â€
Am I missing something here? I thought we needed this new strategy
because only it would deny safe haven to al-Qaeda. Now, we are
evidently going to do counterinsurgency despite conceding at the outset
that it won't really work because the Taliban is "an indigenous force"
(translation: It has too much support among its fellow Afghan Muslims);
under "Biden for the country," we are going to cede the vast
countryside to the Taliban, which will then be free to give al-Qaeda
the safe-haven it was purportedly our objective to prevent (and you
know that's what we're doing because a "senior administration official"
felt it necessary to tell the Times, "We are not talking
about surrendering the rest of the country to the Taliban"); and under
McChrystal for the city, while we don't go after the Taliban because
“we are no longer thinking about just destroying the enemy in a
conventional way,†we're going to focus on solving the real challenge
to U.S. national security . . . Afghan corruption.
Iraq made sense to me. The stakes there were (and are) enormous. But
Afghanistan's a strategic vacuum that sucks in resources and lives to
no sensible purpose.
1
It makes me sick too. This is one (of many) time(s) that I just don't know what the right thing to do is. But I do know that I expect more decisiveness from our commander in chief. This is what it's all about, and he's dithering, no matter what you call it, and no matter what he ultimately does. My stomach does a slow roil just thinking about it.
Posted by: tibby at October 29, 2009 10:14 AM (S/Fac)
2
I'm sure the ideas and comments set forth in this article: (http://blog.stevenpressfield.com/wp-content/themes/stevenpressfield/one_tribe_at_a_time.pdf) will never be applied, but Major Gant has what I think is probably the only possible way to success in Afganistan.
Posted by: Rosie at October 29, 2009 02:08 PM (7pPiG)
3
Rosie -- I downloaded that article yesterday but haven't sat down to read it yet. Will do.
Posted by: Sarah at October 29, 2009 02:42 PM (gWUle)
Sarah just calculated that her husband has been deployed for 99 days. It's a good number for bottles of beer on the wall, but not so good for number of days being apart...
Also, he is being a total John Adams and hasn't sent me one single letter. "But we don't have outgoing mail out here" blah blah blah, like I believe that.
I'm tired of being in stores and seeing something I could give him for Christmas, and then putting it back because I realize that he won't be here for Christmas...
I'm tired of seeing myself in the mirror at night before bed and noticing how absolutely remarkable and amazing I look with my big, bare belly, and knowing he will never get to see it. I am not trying to be lewd, but I think the hardest thing about the pregnancy so far is that my husband doesn't get to see what I look like with no clothes on. The changes are pretty phenomenal, and I don't have anyone to share it with.
I just miss him.
I know, I know, "gold to aery thinness beat" and all, like I always say. But I'm feeling dull and sublunary today.
Sarah, I am sorry you are going thru this alone, especially after all you both went thru to get "here". My idea/suggestion won't "take the place" of your husband being there w/you, but wondering if you can take weekly/monthly pictures of the amazing changes, then put them in a book (like snapfish advertises - you could do a nice leather bound or something) and the you can give to your husband when he returns? Your comment about body changing doesnt sound lewd, but maybe you could photograph it and create a book for him to enjoy and recollect/reflect.
Just an idea...
Posted by: Keri at October 20, 2009 01:59 PM (dtvJC)
3
Maybe you might like to splurge for the gorgeous belly shots by a professional photographer?
I was an awful pregnant lady - I looked like an elephant. I always envied people who looked cute enough to get those gorgeous pregnant belly shots. You could totally pull that off.
Also, I was never pregnant when they were manufacturing cute preggers clothes. Somehow, whenever I was knocked up it was all about plaid or horizontal stripes, or else stuff that Mrs. Roper would have worn on Three's Company.
Posted by: airforcewife at October 20, 2009 03:22 PM (9sMSe)
And ya know what? If you see something your Husband might want, or need? Buy that sucker up! Who says Christmas has to be in December. You can have Christmas when he is home, safe and sound!
Posted by: jw at October 21, 2009 10:14 AM (spEu4)
8
I like the idea of the preggers pics too.
And, the buying of the Christmas gifts. Why not?
And, if anyone were to have to come to my house at any point this week, I'd be in TROUBLE. Between traveling, M2 being sick, me being sick and never being home in the evenings, this place is running off the rails!
I hope you hear from him soon!
Posted by: Guard Wife at October 21, 2009 11:20 AM (p4/8e)
1
I have to agree. I think deployments are way easier for me than other wives on my husband's boat. We have two kids and now I'm in law school. I HAVE to live my life and can't sit around. I mean, I get pouty for about 5 minutes if I miss a phone call, but then a kid needs feeding, or there's soccer practice, or I have paper deadline and I keep on trucking. Those who sit around waiting for an email to hit the computer or a "o hai it's a port" phone call seem to have a much harder time.
I lurk mostly, but I'm glad you're doing well, and just had to say "I agree."
Posted by: Tara at October 13, 2009 02:18 PM (er6nW)
MY AFGHANISTAN SIGHS
I don't like thinking about Afghanistan. I don't like reading about it, I don't like stressing about it. One of my friends said she was worried all weekend that I hadn't heard from my husband because she had read about some local soldiers being killed. I didn't even know it had happened. I have busied myself with domestic issues and ostriched myself to the war. And since my husband cannot tell me what he does and cannot talk about his life, it's easy to forget that he's not just away at summer camp.
But now with discussions of whether Obama will send additional troops, I have been forced to think about it a little. But reading and thinking about it just ruffles me more. Like this:
Hence nation-building would be impossible even if we knew how, and even
if Afghanistan were not the second-worst place to try: The Brookings
Institution ranks Somalia as the only nation with a weaker state.
Notwithstanding al-Qaeda’s departure, the idea now seems to be that we
should substantially escalate our military involvement in Afghanistan
to replicate the experiment that supposedly worked so well in Iraq.
It’s the age of Obama, so our commanders are talking not about combat
but about a stimulus package to fight the “culture of poverty.†As
military officials described it to the New York Times,
“the overriding goal of American and NATO forces would not be so much
to kill Taliban insurgents as to make ordinary Afghans feel secure, and
thus isolate the insurgents. That means using force less and focusing
on economic development and good governance.†This is consistent with
the delusional belief that terrorism is caused by poverty, corruption,
resentment, Guantanamo Bay, enhanced interrogation tactics, Israel — in
short, anything other than an ideology rooted in Islamic scripture. But
before we all laugh George Will out of the room, we might remember that
the Taliban was not our reason for invading. We would not have gone to
war to save Afghanistan from the Taliban — which is to say, to save
Afghanistan from itself.
Fred Barnes said last night that it's telling that McChrystal, who is at heart a counter-terrorism guy, is requesting additional troops for counter-insurgency. I hope he knows what he's doing. I hope he gets it right.
Posted by: Erin at September 22, 2009 09:34 AM (pK1qw)
2
Me too. My son is over there. I avoid the news, I avoid the blogs, I try not to know. Because there really isn't anything productive that I can do. So I make him peanut butter fudge and don't think.
Posted by: tibby at September 22, 2009 09:45 AM (S/Fac)
1
And we finally found an issue where we disagree 100% with President Obama. Kanye West is a herO for standing up to Europpression. Beyonce's video was better and you all know it. Copy Kanye!
HE MAY NOT GET TO SEE ITDeployments are like snowflakes: they're all snow, but no two are alike. And this one is weird so far.
On my end, I am entirely too preoccupied with worrying about our baby's death and feeling morning sick all day long to miss my husband very much. I just haven't dwelled on it. I am too busy trying to find foods I can actually eat to sit around and miss him too much.
On his end, he is bored. The team hasn't started missions yet, they might change locations, and he has made a big proposal to completely change the type of missions his team would be used for, so the bigwigs are mulling that over. So they have no job yet, just playing X-box all day. Because he doesn't have internet access. Apparently super-secret FOBs are much tighter on communication. He has no access to my blog, no ability to IM or skype, and he can only email sporadically if he waits in a long line.
Figures, the one deployment where both of us look interesting -- him growing that absurd beard and me growing a belly -- and we'll never get to webcam.
So he'll probably never get to see this post, but still...
Happy Birthday, husband.
I'm saving your present to give to you when you get home. (Hint: it's a baby.)
Now this is probably obvious, but have you considered making a daily video diary and sending it to him at the end of each week? At least he'll get to see you, even if you can't see him...
Posted by: FbL at August 02, 2009 10:08 AM (HwqvF)
2
FbL has a great idea!
Definitely a present worth waiting for.
Posted by: Susan at August 02, 2009 10:23 AM (Y8ZGj)
3
I am a 40 year old mother of 4 going into the Army for the first time. I leave for Basic Training Aug 11th - I stumbled on your blog during a search and LOVE IT. I am excited to hear the pregnancy is going well so far and pray for you and your baby's health daily. Please, please please - let me know how things are going by getting my contact info from my blog - my husband will update it for me periodically while I am at Ft Jackson. He promises to post my contact info as soon as he gets it. My blog address is: http://combatbootsforartemis.blogspot.com/ I know you must be terribly busy - but I would love to know how things are going for you and your family. Blessings! Dee
Posted by: Artemis Dee at August 02, 2009 02:34 PM (m8F17)
4
For some reason that made me think of The Gift of the Magi. And other mushy stuff. Delighted that J. E. is doing well. You'll find something to eat, just keep trying little bits. The video diary sounds great Fbl, sometimes we overlook the obvious until it's pointed out. It would make a great birthday present for hubby (or an after his birthday present). Sarah, rest, relax, knit, watch some TV. Are you watching The Big Bang Theory? Funniest thing on TV. We watched Bill Cosby "Himself" last night and even though that was made more than 20 years ago it still makes me laugh hysterically. Praying that you will have a wonderful week.
Posted by: Pamela at August 03, 2009 02:39 AM (iWeXT)
5
Arg! I feel your pain! I'm so sorry! And that hint ... hehe ... Baby Elway is coming.
Posted by: Darla at August 03, 2009 08:46 PM (LP4DK)
I just thought I'd recap some of my experiences, which aren't that far off from what Crowder went through in Canada. A "greatest hits," if you will, of the past two years of my life.
I wish my husband wasn't unreachable in Afghanistan, because he has some good stories too. I seem to remember him needing a physical a while back and thinking he had a 7 AM appointment. It turns out that 7 AM was just the cattle call: every soldier who needed a physical that day turned up at 7 AM to sit and wait his turn. I remember him saying there was a sign in the room that said something to the effect of "Have a seat; this WILL take all day." Heh.
Sean Hannity expressed surprise that Crowder had to take a number like it was a butcher shop or something. We take a number so often in the military life that I didn't even bat an eye at that. In fact, I take a number every week when I go in to get my bloodwork done.
In my experience, I have had trouble getting actual human beings to answer my questions and give me the help I need. Last year when I had Miscarriage #2:
I went home. And the next day, which was Friday,
I was supposed to get a phone consultation with the doctor and a
prescription filled. I called at 10 AM and left a message. I called
at noon and left another message on a different machine. An hour
later, I got a call back from one nurse, saying she'd follow up and
make sure my prescription got filled. At 2 PM, I called the advice
nurse and asked if she knew what was going on. At 3:30, the advice
nurse goes home. At 4:20, no one is answering the phones in reception
any more. At 4:30, you can no longer leave messages on voicemail. I
called the pharmacy: no prescription had been called in. And now it
was the weekend. My mother said, "You mean NO ONE is available to help
you on the weekend?"
My mother was freaking out. "This is how things work for you? You
haven't talked to a human being all day long, just answering
machines!" But for me, this was totally normal. I never talk to human
beings when I call the hospital. I don't even know how to call a human
being, save the advice nurse. In fact, that's why I called her in the
afternoon, just because she's the only human being I know how to
reach! My mom was shocked that someone, anyone!, didn't call me during
the day to let me know what was going on.
My husband called from Iraq at 5:15 PM to see how things were going.
Five minutes later, the doctor beeped in. I had to hang up with my
husband from Iraq to talk to the doctor! If that doesn't suck, I don't
know what does.
Sometimes I've had trouble getting an actual human being to remember I'm being cared for. During Miscarriage #1, they wheeled my hospital bed back to the ultrasound room, and when they were done, they left me in the hallway and said somebody would take me back to the ER. Well, somebody forgot. They left me lying there alone in a hallway after just telling me my baby was dead for an hour. I begged anyone who walked by me to call someone to come get me, but still no one came.
Waiting...yep, I'm familiar with it.
A few months ago I went to the weekend clinic because I thought I might have strep throat. I had an appointment but still had to wait an hour past my appointment time to be seen. He looked at my throat, said he would test for strep, and sent me home. I was to call in 48 hours for the results, and if it was strep, they would then give me antibiotics. I called two days later and got an answering machine that said to leave a message and someone would call me back with my results within 48 hours. Two more days later, they called and said I didn't have strep. By that time, my symptoms had pretty much gone away, but thank heavens I didn't have strep, because then I would've had to go back in to get the meds. Four days to let me know if I had strep. The reason I went in on the weekend is because I deal with children in my job and didn't want to pass strep to them.
And we have the Canadian-style waiting that Crowder experienced. I had to go to the ER on a Friday night back in January:
Since it was a Friday night and I wouldn't be able to reach my
doctor or nurse until Monday, we decided we'd better head to the ER.
Luckily we ate dinner first, because we had no idea what we were in for.
I expected to be there until midnight. I didn't expect to be there
until 4:30 AM. During that time, I had less than ten minutes of actual
medical care -- take blood pressure, ask about my symptoms, quick
pelvic exam -- and was eventually told...drumroll..."Geez, I don't know
anything about fertility stuff, so just call your doctor Monday
morning."
In the meantime, while we were sitting around all night, I also wrote about the family next to us:
The gist is that the daughter had a chronic problem that had been
happening for months. The parents were separated and the mother was
"too lazy" to make the kid an appointment. The dad said that he works
here in the hospital and had asked colleagues about his daughter's
problem, but since it persisted, they wanted to have it checked out.
On a Friday night. In the ER.
There was no emergency, no sudden change in her condition that made
them feel that treatment was necessary, nothing like that. This dad
just brought his three kids in to spend the night in the ER. My husband
and I were there for eight hours, until 5 AM, and this family had
arrived before us and was still there when we left.
That is not an emergency.
This family was clogging up the ER and making me and, more importantly,
other people with more pressing problems wait longer. They were sapping
resources. If you work in the hospital, can't you find the time to make
an appointment for your daughter? Why are you taking care of a child's
chronic health problem in the middle of the night on a Friday?
Because you don't have to pay anything either way, that's why.
Why make a regular doctor's appointment during the week, and have to
ask for time off work and take the kid out of school, when you could
just bring everyone to camp out in the ER all night. There is no cost
difference, so it's just easier to do it off hours.
No wonder it took me so long to be seen. And I feel even worse for the
guy with the gall stones; he really would've liked to have been treated
faster.
I am sure that this family isn't the only one of its kind. They bog
down the system for all of us. A problem that's been going on for three
months is not something that requires ER care on a weekend. Make a
normal appointment and free up that ER doctor for someone who really
needs him.
And that, I think, is the crux of the problem. We don't pay for any of our care, so for most people, it's easier to take care of things on nights and weekends than it is to do it during the week. What's the difference, we don't pay either way. And I'm guilty of abusing the system as well: if I had had to pay $100 to go in and find out if I had strep or not, I probably wouldn't have. I would've taken a cough drop and dealt with it. But I used resources because they were free.
Or at least, free to me. Somebody paid.
After Miscarriage #2, the doctor was telling me my options. These words actually came out of his mouth: "Well, we could do another D&C surgery, but that costs the taxpayers an awful lot of money, so maybe you could consider miscarrying naturally?"
Don't let anyone tell you that medical decisions won't be made based on cost once the government is in charge. I have already experienced it firsthand in the military system.
2
AWTM, can you imagine if Sarah were mentioned on Glenn Beck? "Here's a story by a military wife who's experienced socialized medicine firsthand ..." Then he reads part of her post. And what if that clip were immortalized on YouTube?
Posted by: Amritas at July 21, 2009 01:02 PM (+nV09)
3
When I worked in a MN clinic we had numerous Canadian patients that paid out-of-pocket for cardiac surgery because they had been put on several year waiting lists in Canada.
2-3 years to wait for open-heart surgery? I can't even begin to say how ridiculous that is.
AWTM, I hope he reads it too!
Posted by: Susan at July 21, 2009 01:10 PM (Y8ZGj)
I called my insurance company to ask which ER I should go to because I was having chest pain (from indigestion) they told me to dial 911. Which I was not going to do in the city. I took a cab instead. People had been waiting for so long they were ordering Chinese food and having it delivered to the ER waiting room.
But on the other hand when I was pregant and they thought it might be ectopic I got an emergency appt that day with the head of the practice (my friend who is a doc at that hospital was shocked they didn't give me to an intern), plus a trans vaginal and a regular ultrasound that day. No waiting.
I bitch about how expensive my insurance is but I will gladly pay for it.
5Don't let anyone tell you that medical decisions won't be made based on cost once the government is in charge.
Shhhh, Sarah, don't give away our game!
We think of all the money wasted on caring for Omegas, even Gammas and Betas. There are millions and millions of you and so few of us Alphas. If our freeee healthcare harms or even kills some lesser Omericans, we don't care. We can always import millions more from Mexico. And we are sure millions of Afghans and Iraqis would love to join our forces when they flee the Middle East. Imagine your tax dollars paying for Taliban freedom fighter healthcare in your town! Only we elites deserve the best treatments - funded by you. The rest are expendable.
"Half of China may well have to die" - Mao
To keep costs down, we could license 'doctors' from fly-by-night
medical 'schools'. Maybe even a few witch doctors. Literally. Anyone
who objects must be anti-diversity and arrested by the civilian
security fOrce. Omerica will only be following in the footsteps of South Africa:
A sangoma is a practitioner of herbal medicine, divination and counselling in traditional Nguni (Zulu, Xhosa, Ndebele and Swazi) societies of Southern Africa (effectively an African shaman) ... Public health specialists are now enlisting sangomas in the fight against the spread of HIV/AIDS ...
Sangomas far outnumber western-style doctors in Southern Africa, and
are consulted first (or exclusively) by approximately 80% of the
indigenous population.
Just imagine ... socialist sangomas! You'll pay for them, and yet they'll be 'free'!
Posted by: kevin at July 21, 2009 01:54 PM (+nV09)
6
Sarah, each of your stories shocked me when I read them in isolation, but
... when they're compiled into one post ...
... when I realize that you're not an exception, that there are many others who've gone through the same things ... or worse ...
I don't know what to say other than "no" to socialized medicine.
There are things I admire about the military, but this is definitely not one of them!
Posted by: Amritas at July 21, 2009 02:39 PM (+nV09)
At our hospital, folks would go to the ER because for non-emergent, but still urgent care that they needed to be seen for they couldn't get an appointment within two weeks to be seen. I'd call and say I need an appointment for my 1 year old who has a 104 degree fever. They'd say, "Hmmm... let's look at Peds. We have an appointment for a month from tomorrow. Will that work?" Well of course that wouldn't work. When I finally, 6 months in, came to terms with the fact that I had PPD, it was a month before I could get in to see my doctor. That was a LONG month.
So on base here, people would go to the ER for non-emergent care because the clinics couldn't or wouldn't see us in a timely manner. It was the only way we could be seen sometimes! And so yeah--you gotta believe the works were junked up.
And then don't get me started on the restrictions they impose on making appointments. You have to call at the right time--beause after the doctor releases their schedule, it's filled up for a month within two days, but if you call for a regular care appointment that you know you're going to need a month or even 2 weeks early to be sure you'll get in they'll say, "I'm sorry. We can't make appointments out that far."
So that's my experience. And, like you, because of my experience with military medicine, though God knows the 'price' has been a Godsend for us, I am firmly AGAINST universalized medicine--and that's even considering my lefty leanings.
8
I tell people all the time that yeah it'd be nice if everyone had healthcare but they DO.NOT.WANT. what we get. My doctor in bootcamp held an x-ray of my leg up to the ceiling light while he was seated at his desk and told me my leg wasn't broken (it was, in two places). Then he scheduled my next appointment for while he was on leave, which I only found out after I walked a mile and a half on the still broken leg to the clinic the day of my appointment. When I stood there in tears from the pain and asked the receptionist if I could see a different doctor, I was told no because he WAS my doctor. And what was I supposed to do? It's not like I could take my business elsewhere or complain to anybody who actually cared. It didn't even get casted for another five months when it was still broken and I failed my sea duty screening--which is the ONLY reason they allowed it to be casted. All told, three separate breaks and ten months to heal. Yeah, I want that for everybody!
Posted by: Ann M. at July 22, 2009 09:59 PM (+GQ3g)
9
I've spent almost my entire life going to the Naval hospital here in town . . . I have a LOT of stories! I was safe and happy in the OB department, which seems to have its act together. I wanted to stay as far away from Family Practice (or whatever they call it now) as I could.
So far, my favorite doctors are the civilians who work there.
Posted by: Deltasierra at July 23, 2009 01:55 AM (unCAk)
I remember when developed a sinus infection right out of basic training and had that infection for eight months. Doctor after doctor refused to give me antibiotics. Most insisted that I would go into septic shock, even though I had antibiotics for various diseases my whole life. Some claimed that prescribing me antibiotics would cause my body to mutate into an antibiotic-resistant blob, consuming millions of innocent victims before a new strain could be found.
The prescription was constantly "just take some over the counter antihistamines." When I would begin to tolerate them, they would tell me to increase the dosages. I took OTC antihistamines for so long I started having terrible nightmares and sleep problems, psychological problems, tremors, sweats.
Finally after eight months, one single military doctor prescribed antibiotics. Within a week my nose had cleared up. Depending on who you talk to the psychological and sleep issues took several months to improve, some of my friends and family claim I am different to this day.
Posted by: Phang at July 23, 2009 06:37 PM (5YBfn)
11
It's probably worth noting that the a significant portion of TriCare's customer base--the active duty military--is noticeably healthier on average than most of the citizenry. They had to be pretty healthy to get in, they have to stay pretty healthy (and pretty active) (and relatively thin) to stay in. And yet the stories I read (and have lived) demonstrate a level of care that many civilians would find absolutely unacceptable.
What happens when the same universal coverage is applied to the general civilian populace? Does anyone really think that their satisfaction with their health care is going to improve?
12
My spouse was an Air Force doc until recently. It is really easy to view the military MD as an evil villian and civilian docs working for Tri- Care as heroes. But the civ docs are like any civ working on base...it is a pretty sweet gig .... you get the benefits of working for a system without having the lawyers breathing down your neck and often a lot of benefits usually reserved to military members with the added benefit of treating a patient population that MUST comply or at least will be pressured to.....WITHOUT having to answer to administrative command who hold your entire career and lives in their hand and without having to live with deployments, recalls and constant SNAFU politically based policy shifting. They punch in and punch out....something most docs working in the private sector can't even do. The worst thing for medical care is to make it totally free.....medicaid patients are horribly (and accurately) notorious for abusing and clogging up the medical system. Example: The guy who walked into my husband's ER with a rash at 2AM (!). When asked how long he had had it........A COUPLE OF MONTHS! nice...
Posted by: hillbilly mama at July 25, 2009 12:07 AM (REtDW)
What happens when the same universal coverage is applied to the general
civilian populace? Does anyone really think that their satisfaction
with their health care is going to improve?
Civilians can pretty much get away with being ignorant about the military but this is one instance where a lack of knowledge could lead to a lot of hurt. None of the arguments I've heard for socialized health care ever bring up the military, probably because those who make those arguments know nothing about the military.
hillbilly mama,
Thanks for writing,
It is really easy to view the military MD as an evil villain
My mother is a civilian who has worked with military medical personnel for years. Most are good, while some are ... not as good. However, that describes people in general. The problem is not "evil" MDs - military or civilian - but the pitfalls inherent in a 'free' government-run health care system.
Posted by: Amritas at July 25, 2009 01:56 AM (h9KHg)
14
I will add that my military dentist in Germany was the best dentist I've ever had. The optometrist, not so much. I don't generally worry whether the doctor wears a uniform or not.
Posted by: Sarah at July 25, 2009 09:20 AM (TWet1)
I've been told by military Dr.s before that they don't care about their patients. They get paid the same amount whether or not they come in to work and even if they do their job right. They're not making the same money as civilian Dr.s, so why should they care.
They butchered my son in a surgery. They've told me for yrs that I'm depressed, etc so they don't have to waste time on me. Turns out that I'm not depressed, but have some major intestinal bacterial infection. They still after a yr. can't find what's causing it to continue. No one cares.
However, until the libs have their way with the health care, we're getting more civilian Dr.s in the military hospitals. They are paid more to care and you can clearly see the difference if you're lucky enough to see one.
Posted by: Lisa Keyser at July 25, 2009 12:29 PM (uvsIW)
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There is neither happiness nor misery in the world; there is only the comparison of one state with another, nothing more. He who has felt the deepest grief is best able to experience supreme happiness. We must have felt what it is to die, Morrel, that we may appreciate the enjoyments of living. --The Count of Monte Cristo--
While our troops go out to defend our country, it is incumbent upon us to make the country worth defending. --Deskmerc--
Contrary to what you've just seen, war is neither glamorous nor fun. There are no winners, only losers. There are no good wars, with the following exceptions: The American Revolution, WWII, and the Star Wars Trilogy. --Bart Simpson--
If you want to be a peacemaker, you've gotta learn to kick ass. --Sheriff of East Houston, Superman II--
Going to war without France is like going deer hunting without an accordion. You just leave a lot of useless noisy baggage behind. --Jed Babbin--
Dante once said that the hottest places in hell are reserved for those who in a period of moral crisis maintain their neutrality. --President John F. Kennedy--
War is a bloody, killing business. You've got to spill their blood, or they will spill yours. --General Patton--
We've gotta keep our heads until this peace craze blows over. --Full Metal Jacket--
Those who threaten us and kill innocents around the world do not need to be treated more sensitively. They need to be destroyed. --Dick Cheney--
The Flag has to come first if freedom is to survive. --Col Steven Arrington--
The purpose of diplomacy isn't to make us feel good about Eurocentric diplomatic skills, and having countries from the axis of chocolate tie our shoelaces together does nothing to advance our infantry. --Sir George--
I just don't care about the criticism I receive every day, because I know the cause I defend is right. --Oriol--
It's days like this when we're reminded that freedom isn't free. --Chaplain Jacob--
Bumper stickers aren't going to accomplish some of the missions this country is going to face. --David Smith--
The success of multilateralism is measured not merely by following a process, but by achieving results. --President Bush--
Live and act within the limit of your knowledge and keep expanding it to the limit of your life.
--John Galt--
First, go buy a six pack and swig it all down. Then, watch Ace Ventura. And after that, buy a Hard Rock Cafe shirt and come talk to me. You really need to lighten up, man.
--Sminklemeyer--
You've got to kill people, and when you've killed enough they stop fighting --General Curtis Lemay--
If we wish to be free, if we mean to preserve inviolate those inestimable privileges for which we have been so long contending, if we mean not basely to abandon the noble struggle in which we have been so long engaged, and which we have pledged ourselves never to abandon until the glorious object of our contest shall be obtained -- we must fight! --Patrick Henry--
America has never been united by blood or birth or soil. We are bound by ideals that move us beyond our backgrounds, lift us above our interests and teach us what it means to be citizens. Every child must be taught these principles. Every citizen must uphold them. And every immigrant, by embracing these ideals, makes our country more, not less, American. --President George W. Bush--
are usually just cheerleading sessions, full of sound and fury and signifying nothing but a soothing reduction in blood pressure brought about by the narcotic high of being agreed with. --Bill Whittle
War is an ugly thing, but not the ugliest of things. The decayed and degraded state of moral and patriotic feeling which thinks that nothing is worth war is much worse. The person who has nothing for which he is willing to fight, nothing which is more important than his own personal safety, is a miserable creature and has no chance of being free unless made and kept so by the exertions of better men than himself.
--John Stuart Mill--
We are determined that before the sun sets on this terrible struggle, our flag will be recognized throughout the world as a symbol of freedom on the one hand and of overwhelming force on the other. --General George Marshall--
We can continue to try and clean up the gutters all over the world and spend all of our resources looking at just the dirty spots and trying to make them clean. Or we can lift our eyes up and look into the skies and move forward in an evolutionary way.
--Buzz Aldrin--
America is the greatest, freest and most decent society in existence. It is an oasis of goodness in a desert of cynicism and barbarism. This country, once an experiment unique in the world, is now the last best hope for the world.
--Dinesh D'Souza--
Recent anti-Israel protests remind us again of our era's peculiar alliance: the most violent, intolerant, militantly religious movement in modern times has the peace movement on its side. --James Lileks--
As a wise man once said: we will pay any price, bear any burden, meet any hardship, support any friend, oppose any foe, in order to assure the survival and the success of liberty.
Unless the price is too high, the burden too great, the hardship too hard, the friend acts disproportionately, and the foe fights back. In which case, we need a timetable.
--James Lileks--
I am not willing to kill a man so that he will agree with my faith, but I am prepared to kill a man so that he cannot force my compatriots to submit to his.
--Froggy--
You can say what you want about President Bush; but the truth is that he can take a punch. The man has taken a swift kick in the crotch for breakfast every day for 6 years and he keeps getting up with a smile in his heart and a sense of swift determination to see the job through to the best of his abilties.
--Varifrank--
In a perfect world, We'd live in peace and love and harmony with each oither and the world, but then, in a perfect world, Yoko would have taken the bullet.
--SarahBellum--
Freedom is never more than one generation away from extinction. We didn't pass it to our children in the bloodstream. It must be fought for, protected, and handed on for them to do the same, or one day we will spend our sunset years telling our children and our children's children what it was once like in the United States where men were free. --Ronald Reagan--
America is rather like life. You can usually find in it what you look for. It will probably be interesting, and it is sure to be large. --E.M. Forster--
Do not fear the enemy, for your enemy can only take your life. It is far better that you fear the media, for they will steal your HONOR. That awful power, the public opinion of a nation, is created in America by a horde of ignorant, self-complacent simpletons who failed at ditching and shoemaking and fetched up in journalism on their way to the poorhouse. --Mark Twain--
The Enlightenment was followed by the French Revolution and the Napoleonic wars, which touched every European state, sparked vicious guerrilla conflicts across the Continent and killed millions. Then, things really turned ugly after the invention of soccer. --Iowahawk--
Every time I meet an Iraqi Army Soldier or Policeman that I haven't met before, I shake his hand and thank him for his service. Many times I am thanked for being here and helping his country. I always tell them that free people help each other and that those that truly value freedom help those seeking it no matter the cost. --Jack Army--
Right, left - the terms are useless nowadays anyway. There are statists, and there are individualists. There are pessimists, and optimists. There are people who look backwards and trust in the West, and those who look forward and trust in The World. Those are the continuums that seem to matter the most right now. --Lileks--
The best argument against democracy is a five-minute conversation with the average voter.
--Winston Churchill--
A man or a nation is not placed upon this earth to do merely what is pleasant and what is profitable. It is often called upon to carry out what is both unpleasant and unprofitable, but if it is obviously right it is mere shirking not to undertake it. --Arthur Conan Doyle--
A man who has nothing which he cares about more than he does about his personal safety is a miserable creature who has no chance of being free, unless made and kept so by the existing of better men than himself. --John Stuart Mill--
After the attacks on September 11, 2001, most of the sheep, that is, most citizens in America said, "Thank God I wasn't on one of those planes." The sheepdogs, the warriors, said, "Dear God, I wish I could have been on one of those planes. Maybe I could have made a difference." --Dave Grossman--
At heart I’m a cowboy; my attitude is if they’re not going to stand up and fight for what they believe in then they can go pound sand. --Bill Whittle--
A democracy is always temporary in nature; it simply cannot exist as a permanent form of government. A democracy will continue to exist up until the time that voters discover that they can vote themselves generous gifts from the public treasury. From that moment on, the majority always votes for the candidates who promise the most benefits from the public treasury, with the result that every democracy will finally collapse due to loose fiscal policy, which is always followed by a dictatorship. --Alexander Tyler--
By that time a village half-wit could see what generations of professors had pretended not to notice. --Atlas Shrugged--
I kept asking Clarence why our world seemed to be collapsing and everything seemed so shitty. And he'd say, "That's the way it goes, but don't forget, it goes the other way too." --Alabama Worley--
So Bush is history, and we have a new president who promises to heal the planet, and yet the jihadists don’t seem to have got the Obama message that there are no enemies, just friends we haven’t yet held talks without preconditions with.
--Mark Steyn--
"I had started alone in this journey called life, people started
gathering up on the way, and the caravan got bigger everyday." --Urdu couplet
The book and the sword are the two things that control the world. We either gonna control them through knowledge and influence their minds, or we gonna bring the sword and take their heads off. --RZA--
It's a daily game of public Frogger, hopping frantically to avoid being crushed under the weight of your own narcissism, banality, and plain old stupidity. --Mary Katharine Ham--
There are more instances of the abridgment of freedoms
of the people by gradual and silent encroachment of those in power than by violent and sudden usurpations. --James Madison--
It is in the heat of emotion that good people must remember to stand on principle. --Larry Elder--
Please show this to the president and ask him to remember the wishes of the forgotten man, that is, the one who dared to vote against him. We expect to be tramped on but we do wish the stepping would be a little less hard. --from a letter to Eleanor Roosevelt--
The world economy depends every day on some engineer, farmer, architect, radiator shop owner, truck driver or plumber getting up at 5AM, going to work, toiling hard, and producing real wealth so that an array of bureaucrats, regulators, and redistributors can manage the proper allotment of much of the natural largess produced. --VDH--
Parents are often so busy with the physical rearing of children that they miss the glory of parenthood, just as the grandeur of the trees is lost when raking leaves. --Marcelene Cox--
