Imagine my disgust when I read Ann Coulter's editorial today. She was "blasting" the New York Times for running an article on violent crimes committed by returning Iraq/Afghanistan vets (I assume this one, as it's the only one I can find from Jan. 2 on the subject). Not only does she miss the whole point of the article, but she also uses it as an excuse to whine about unwed mothers and how "liberals detest the military."
Imagine my disgust when I read Ann Coulter's editorial today. She was "blasting" the New York Times for running an article on violent crimes committed by returning Iraq/Afghanistan vets. I'll give you a quote:
The Treason Times' banner series about Iraq and Afghanistan veterans accused of murder began in January last year but was quickly discontinued as readers noticed that the Times doggedly refused to provide any statistics comparing veteran murders with murders in any other group.
So they waited a year, hoping readers wouldn't notice they were still including no relevant comparisons.
What, for example, is the percentage of murderers among veterans compared to the percentage of murderers in the population at large -- or, more germane, in the general population of young males, inasmuch as violent crime is committed almost exclusively by young men?
Rest of the article can be found here.
Ms. Coulter basically goes on with some suspicious logic to ultimately come to the conclusion that single mothers are responsible for more murders than returning GIs. She closes by saying the Times loves single mothers and the erosion of traditional marriage, and hates the military.
In my opinion, she missed the entire point. Let me tell you a story.
I graduated high school with a very dear friend named Mike. Mike and I were friends all through high school, but somehow lost track of each other afterward. It wasn't until two years after graduation I learned he had joined the Navy. I don't really know what all he did while he was in the Navy. I know he spent some time somewhere in the Middle East, and I know he spent a lot of time in New Orleans during the clean-up and rescue phase immediately after Katrina hit. He doesn't talk about his experiences. He obtained a psych discharge about a year and a half ago. Since being discharged, he's struggled to hold down a job. He is currently going through a divorce, and he's struggling every day to deal with the things he won't talk about.
Mike self-medicated for a while, first with alcohol and then with certain controlled herbal substances. He realized he couldn't keep doing that to himself and has since been placed on Prozac by the VA. Unfortunately, that's all the VA is doing for him.
Mike calls himself "The Hulk" because, if angered enough, he will black out and wake up hours later at the center of a bar brawl he doesn't remember starting. One of the reasons his wife is divorcing him is she says she no longer feels safe around him because of this "Incredible Hulk" -like problem.
Mike called me the other night and told me he thinks he knows how to solve all his problems. I thought he meant he was going to go to an intensive, month long PTSD therapy session he had mentioned to me the last time he called. I was wrong. Apparently, according to the recruitment office, just because the Navy says he's too crazy to serve doesn't mean the Army doesn't want him. As long as he stays on the Prozac and he gets a note from the VA saying he's stable on meds, he can join the Army. "I need to go somewhere that things make sense," he said to me. "I need structure and stability."
Mike's problems, as well as the problems of all Iraq/Afghanistan vets, are the point of the Times' article. The point is not to blame murder on the kids coming home from the war instead of blaming murder on whatever right-wing scapegoat happens to be hanging around. The point is to draw attention to the plight of these kids suffering from PTSD. The point is to show that things like multiple deployments can cause PTSD, and therefore contribute to the occurrence of violent crimes committed by returning vets.
In my opinion the Times is far from detesting the troops, as Ms. Coulter accuses them (and all liberals) of doing. I think rather that the Times is showing that they support the troops both when they're in a war zone and when they come back home.