Tuesday, December 27, 2011

Brain Wars

Looks like I've got a theme today.

Pro Publica

More than 115,000 soldiers have sustained mild traumatic brain injuries, also called concussions, in the wars when shock waves from bombs rippled through their brains. Most have recovered quickly, but some have suffered lasting cognitive problems, from headaches and dizziness to problems with memory and reasoning.
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In January, Sen. Claire McCaskill, D-Mo., questioned the Pentagon's decision to deny cognitive rehabilitation therapy to troops with brain injuries. Her inquiry came after a story we did about how the Pentagon based its decision not to pay for such care on a much-criticized report from the ECRI Institute. Following the story and McCaskill's inquiry, the Pentagon solicited the help of the Institute of Medicine, which released a report in October urging the Defense Department to do more research on the therapy before offering it more broadly.

"More research". Very similar to the response from Japanese motorcycle manufacturers many years ago when told their bikes were such evil-handling pieces of shit that they were killing American kids by the truckload - "must study" - which we took to be Japanese for "fuck you".

Now, as then, expenditure on used-up soldiers is to be avoided so there's more taxpayer money available for profit on Cold War weapons systems we no longer need, and jobs for retired Generals.

It's a lot cheaper to say these soldiers had pre-existing personality disorders or they wouldn't have crashed the motorcycles in the first place.

No pull trigger, no get food.

Million-dollar wound...

Multiply this by 40,000 and the non-physical trauma by 300,000 to get an idea of what the two wars have wrought which will be with us for three generations at least.

Wounded Marine inspires AP photographer's search

Inside the medevac helicopter in Afghanistan, U.S. Marine Cpl. Burness Britt bleeds profusely from his neck. He and two other Marines have just been hit by shrapnel, with Britt's injuries the most serious. The medevac crew chief clutches one of Britt's blood-covered hands as he is given oxygen. I take hold of the other.
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In my 20 years as a photographer, covering conflicts from Bosnia to Gaza to Iraq to Afghanistan, injured civilians and soldiers have passed through my life many times. None has left a greater impression on me than Britt.

When we finally met Dec. 13 at the hospital, I saw him in the distance. He walked with difficulty, trying to control his right arm and leg. He was wearing a plastic helmet to protect his head where part of the skull had been removed. His brain had swollen to nearly twice its size because of his injuries and doctors had to open the skull to relieve the pressure.

His helmet had a camouflage cover on it emblazoned with the 3rd Marine Division emblem on its side.
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He had just started to regain his speech, working his way back from months of "thumbs up, thumbs down conversation," says his 22-year-old wife, Jessica.

He will undergo more surgeries next year to rebuild his skull.

I'm glad Cpl. Britt is on the mend and don't mind even a bit helping pay the tab for, quite literally, his "million dollar wound".

We better not let Repugs get in power. They know military funerals are a lot cheaper and they love to see the flag draped over a coffin a lot more than they like to see Disabled American Veterans, the leeches who take money for care that the Repugs would rather have in their pockets.

Remember ...

The somewhat ongoing (Where is Oily Taintz now anyway?) President Obama birth ceretificate 'debate'?  Well, Res thinks we should do the same (a return in kind, as it were) to the Mittser:

You know how dumb @$%^s shrieked at Obama to "Release the birth certificate" for years?

Our cry in 2012 should be for Mittens to release his tax returns.

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Quote of the Day


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The fact that the GOP presidential field is only capable of coughing up a gang of clownish shysters and a laughably phony hack indicates that the GOP is not a political party, but Fox News by other means.
...

I was a little under the weather over the holiday.  Sorry for the absence ...

Monday, December 26, 2011

San Diego naval hospital testing unusual PTSD treatment

LATimes

Naval Medical Center San Diego is studying whether an anesthetic used during childbirth could help relieve symptoms of post-traumatic stress disorder.

"If we don't get PTSD under control, our crime rate and social disability are going to be out of control," said Lipov, founder of Chicago's Advanced Pain Centers.

The treatment aims to affect the body's sympathetic nervous system through the nerves in the neck. The bundle of nerves that control the "fight or flight" syndrome in the brain are known as the stellate ganglion.

The injection, Lipov said, "resets" the nerve bundle to calm down the agitation and "hypervigilance" that are common to PTSD sufferers. Although denied federal funding, Lipov has received $81,000 from the Illinois Department of Veterans Affairs and has 10 veterans enrolled in his own study.

On one point all the researchers agree: PTSD will remain a medical challenge long after the end of the wars. McLay said PTSD, by different names, can be traced to the days of Achilles and the Spartans.

"I see Marines, SEALs, Green Berets — the toughest men on earth — and they still have PTSD," McLay said.

Best of luck to researchers and Veterans with this. Whatever works, although it may be a little hilarious to hear a tough old Vet holler "I WANT MY EPIDURAL!". Heh.

Oh, the irony...

Ironic Times

NORTH KOREANS STILL GRIEF-STRICKEN OVER DEATH OF KIM JONG-IL
Urged to report any neighbors not grief-stricken.

Reuters: 2011 “Year of the Tyrant”
2012 expected to be “Year of the Guy Who Overthrew the Tyrant.”

Koch Industries Hopes to Fill 2500 Jobs
Mostly in vote-suppression.

George H.W. Bush Says Romney is “Best Choice"
From a “pathetic field of losers.”

Sunday, December 25, 2011

Neut sights self, sinks same

Raw Story

Certainly no-one will ever accuse Newt Gingrich of having low self-esteem. Talking Points Memo is reporting that Gingrich’s campaign manager Michael Krull has taken to Facebook to vent about the Virginia Republican Party’s judgment that the former Speaker of the House did not qualify to appear on the March 6 primary ballot.

“Newt and I agreed that the analogy is December 1941,” he writes, comparing the campaign’s failure to acquire the 10,000 signatures necessary to compete in the Virginia primary to the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, Hawaii. “We have experienced an unexpected set-back, but we will re-group and re-focus with increased determination, commitment and positive action.”
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As Raw Story reported earlier, this is the third state primary for which the Gingrich team has failed to collect enough signatures or missed the filing deadline.

Difference being that the U.S. Navy didn't torpedo and sink itself.

Neutie, You ain't a pimple on the ass of a 17-year-old Seaman Third at Pearl Harbor. Don't hit yerself in the ass with the door on the way out.

We Like Sheep

Thanks to Paul Krugman.

Extra butter, please!

Thanks to YubaNet.

Christmas Is No Time to Talk About War and Peace

Truthout

Christmas Cancelled as a Security Measure

Ellis Island - The three wise men were arrested today attempting to enter the country. The Iraqi nationals were carrying massive amounts of flammable substances known as "frankincense" and "myrrh." While not explosives themselves, experts revealed that these two substances could be used as a fuse to detonate a larger bomb. The three alleged terrorists were also carrying gold, presumably to finance the rest of their mission.

Also implicated in the plot were two Palestinians named Joseph and Mary. An anonymous source close to the family overheard Mary bragging that her son would "bring down the mighty from their thrones and lift up the lowly." In what appears to be a call to anarchy, the couple claims their son will someday "help prisoners escape captivity."

"These people match our terrorist profile perfectly," an official source reported.

All of the suspects claimed they heard angels singing of a new era of hope for the afflicted and poor. As one Wall Street official put it, "These one-world wackos are talking about overturning the entire economic and political hierarchy that holds the civilized world together. I don't care what some angel sang; God wants the status quo - by definition."

Saturday, December 24, 2011

Oy Chanukah

I don't want to leave anybody out in the holiday season. This oughta do it.

The KlezMormons perform "Oy Chanukah" at Muse Music in Provo, Utah on December 15, 2009. For more information about The KlezMormons, search for "The KlezMormons" on Facebook or on Twitter at twitter.com/klezmormons.

Thanks to pyjingo.

Ahuna Ye Tswanang Le Jesu Kammatla

Ya in that Christmas funk, bunkie? This'll snap ya out of it! I don't think this is a Christmas song but I don't think it's inappropriate either. If I should find myself wandering lost and alone in the spiritual desert and stumbled into a church, I'd wanta stumble into theirs!

Thanks to joashstilltheman, U.S., from Nairobi, Kenya.

Tiếng chuông ngân nhạc Nguyễn Ngọc Thiện-Giọt Sương Long Lanh

I didn't know I understood Vietnamese. Heh.

Thanks to HatSuongLongLanh.

Go Tell It

Let's try to remember on these most Commercial of Holy Dollar Days that the Jewish carpenter whose birth we commemorate had a message of peace and brotherhood that got him killed for pissing off and scaring the establishment of His day, and Who did not espouse the hate spewed in His name that is so accepted by some as "Christianity" today.

A traditional recording of "Go tell it on the Mountain" by Peter Tosh/ The Wailers/ Bob Marley & The Wailers or whomsoever it may be. Tosh singing lead.

Thanks to Tonesullock, Eire.

Asterisk*

*Where would the GOP be without it?

Saturday Emmylou Blogging

Thanks to aztecwarrior113.

Friday, December 23, 2011

California Girls!

Havin' a little trouble gettin' enthused ta get off the couch and do that pesky last minute Xmas shopping, bunkie? These gals'll get ya going!

Manpreet & Naina representing California's Bay Area performing @ Warrior Bhangra 2011. This was an exhibition performance. Barso Re Megha Hindi Dance.

Warrior Bhangra was put on by California State University Stanislaus.

Thanks to harjothundal, Yuba City CA. Mucho Bhangra!

The 12 Lies Of Christmas

Cut to the chase:

On the twelfth day of Christmas
Republicans told me
Government takeover of health care's coming
Your guns Obama's swiping
WMD Saddam's a-keeping
Medicare they're enhancing
Wall Street's not bilking
Government Reagan was trimming
Half the people no taxes paying
Tax cuts more revenues bring
We don't torture
Thank the one percent
Gay marriage is like box turtle love and
Obama's born in another country.

The Repugs are crackin' up...

They're crackin' me up too! Fun to watch. Robert Reich says it's a bad thing. Good piece, though. I'll disagree with him later.

The underlying conflict lies deep into the nature and structure of the Republican Party. And its roots are very old.

As Michael Lind has noted, today’s Tea Party is less an ideological movement than the latest incarnation of an angry white minority – predominantly Southern, and mainly rural – that has repeatedly attacked American democracy in order to get its way.
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America has had a long history of white Southern radicals who will stop at nothing to get their way – seceding from the Union in 1861, refusing to obey Civil Rights legislation in the 1960s, shutting the government in 1995, and risking the full faith and credit of the United States in 2010.

Newt Gingrich’s recent assertion that public officials aren’t bound to follow the decisions of federal courts derives from the same tradition.

This stop-at-nothing radicalism is dangerous for the GOP because most Americans recoil from it. Gingrich himself became an object of ridicule in the late 1990s, and many Republicans today worry that if he heads the ticket the Party will suffer large losses.

It’s also dangerous for America. We need two political parties solidly grounded in the realities of governing. Our democracy can’t work any other way.

Here's where I disagree with him: We don't have two parties solidly grounded in the realities of governing. We have one that can barely find its ass with both hands and one that's grinding itself to powder in front of our eyes. A lovely process to watch, I might add.

There's a reason to have two motorcycles too. When one of them is so badly broken it won't run, you ride the other one exclusively until the broken one gets fixed. Difference is, with political parties we have to wait until election day to get parts.

Let's hope we get the right ones. We can ride just the Democrats for a time while the Repugs are getting rebuilt and still get where we want to go until the Dems break down too. Then we're screwed.

A third "bike" maybe? Whee! Let's get an "Arrest Me Red" Italian Fastacci Sumbicci!

Well, maybe not...

Maybe what we need is some Repugs who will listen to reason. Until the day that pipe dream comes true, maybe we need a solidly Democrat Congress for a coupla years. As badly as the Teabaggers have fucked things up, how much worse could they do? Don't answer that...

Ethics? Don't need ethics!