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Thursday, April 3. 2014

Fort Hood again

Every comment I have read or heard about this terrible incident is ignorant beyond belief.


In fact, all too ignorant and stupid for me to respond to. This time, I have neither the time nor the inclination. It's tragic, unavoidable. There is no perfect safety from either nature or from human nature, and any perfect safety would be a living death.


Posted by Dr. Joy Bliss in Hot News & Misc. Short Subjects at 13:48 | Comments (19) | Trackbacks (0)

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Just a big heartbreak, all over again, Dr. Joy.

Imagine telling the military that they cannot go armed, these men (and women) who actually have combat training with firearms, they just do it. Imagine telling the cops that? They would throw a hissy fit and most of them aren't fit to carry a side arm.

Cops get a free pass on carry for the rest of their lives, no need to get a license for them. Not so our military, that sign up to have many of their rights taken away so they can defend ours...

Baah. It makes me filthy mad...
#1 Cap'n Jan on 2014-04-03 13:55 (Reply)
With all due respect I have to disagree. I spent 2 yrs in the Army,1970-72, including 6 months in RVN as an 11B (LT. Weapons Infantry). Having everyone check weapons in and out of arms rooms every time they went on or off duty would be hugely time consuming. Allowing weapons with live ammo off duty would be just plain scary. There are a lot of young men around an Army post who do not always make wise choices concerning what they ingest. And then there are just plain accidents. Anyone who has served much time in a combat zone where troops do carry live all the time can tell you stories. Even highly trained, experienced troops make mistakes. As the Dr. there are no easy solutions and sometimes none at all. Just my take on it.
#1.1 RickinNC on 2014-04-03 14:12 (Reply)
You're right. Just a knee jerk reaction by me. Apologies.
#1.1.1 Cap'n Jan on 2014-04-03 16:04 (Reply)
No apology necessary. It a very difficult problem. Maybe weapons for supervisors and a larger, and more widely spread, MP footprint. These days they seem to mostly guard gates and investigate traffic accidents.
#1.1.1.1 RickinNC on 2014-04-03 17:09 (Reply)
We had rifles in our lockers in high school, rifle club meets with other schools, carried the rifles on the school bus, without incident.

In Hillside NJ, around 1958.

Guns weren't always pure danger.
#1.1.2 rhhardin (Link) on 2014-04-03 16:15 (Reply)
Very interesting. Did you also carry live ammo back and forth with the rifles or was that passed out at the firing point? In any case, as I think you would agree the 50's were another world.
Some time ago, I think at James Lilek's Bleat, there was a post from Life Magazine in the 50's showing High School rifle club guys with their weapons in the classroom. When I forwarded it to my liberal friends they all insisted it was photo shopped.
And I agree that "guns are not pure danger." I was trying to point out the practical and administrative difficulties of arming all uniformed personnel.
#1.1.2.1 RickinNC on 2014-04-03 17:04 (Reply)
Yearbook picture
https://www.flickr.com/photos/rhhardin/2439558798
#1.1.2.1.1 rhhardin (Link) on 2014-04-03 18:43 (Reply)
It just was his imaginary PTSD acting up again. This guy should have simply ignored all the flashbacks and nightmares, reminded himself that he was faking it to scam benefits out of the U.S. Government, and then told himself to 'toughen up'.

If he had done that, he would have snapped right out of it. Problem solved. I mean, that would have fixed everything...right, Dr. Bliss?
#2 JM01 on 2014-04-03 16:31 (Reply)
The guy was in Iraq for 4 months near the end of the conflict and saw NO action. He did not have PTSD due to war experiences. He was mentally unbalanced before he ever got sent there.
#2.1 MissT on 2014-04-03 16:33 (Reply)
Sounds like the killer had mental problems before he ever signed up to be in the military. I think they need to do a better job of screening before allowing people into the military to begin with.
#3 MissT on 2014-04-03 16:32 (Reply)
I don't know. There were people at my engineering college who were straight-A students for five or six semesters, and then they disappeared, and then you saw some guy with a Rasputin beard living out of a shopping-cart by the river and wondered why he looked familiar, until he greeted you by name and you knew exactly who it was.

I don't think it is at all unusual for such symptoms to apparently pop up out of nowhere at age 18 - 23.
#3.1 Douglas2 on 2014-04-03 17:43 (Reply)
You'd want a certain number of soldiers armed, not all of them.

Just enough so that there's always a gun or so nearby.
#4 rhhardin (Link) on 2014-04-03 16:57 (Reply)
Yes - but big Army is too rule driven to find the happy medium.

When I deployed in the Marines in 1990, our NCOs and better officers actually distributed store-bought ammo to some of the more dependable Marines while we were in transit - so we weren't sitting ducks.

Unfortunately this is going to keep happening and the Army isn't going to do anything.
#4.1 NJSoldier on 2014-04-04 08:37 (Reply)
Our local schools are now allowing teachers or security guards with guns, depending on the school. Come on, this is a Army base. Wasn't the guy stopped by someone with a gun. How many lives could have been saved?
#5 Rosalie on 2014-04-03 17:52 (Reply)
The Army is absolutely paranoid about keeping soldiers disarmed on American bases. Kind of ironic after spending months abroad armed to the teeth.
#5.1 NJSoldier on 2014-04-04 08:45 (Reply)
The guy was stopped by a female MP. Who behaved as any soldier is trained to do. Good for her. http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2595777/It-clearly-heroic-did-Brave-female-police-officer-applauded-stopping-Fort-Hood-shooter.html

But I am sure plenty of people still think women don't have what it takes to handle combat....
#6 retriever on 2014-04-03 21:22 (Reply)
When I was in the military a long time ago the paymaster would pay the troops in cash in the field. So this 2nd lieutenant would show up carrying tens of thousands of dollars in small bills and set up a small table to pay the hundreds perhaps thousands of troops. Usually a military policeman stood beside him but not always. But the 2nd lieutenant had a 45 auto with him and usually placed it on the table in front of him. This guy was no different then any other military guy. That is he had some training with weapons and was from a normal typical American background and yet somehow the military deemed him capable and indeed essential that he carry a weapon to deter and prevent a crime. I'm not suggesting that everyone in the military be issued guns and carry them everywhere but I am suggesting that some number of military personal in addition to the police) could be issued a gun and wear it as part of his/her uniform on a regular basis.
#7 GoneWithTheWind on 2014-04-04 10:19 (Reply)
Common sense doesn't seem to exist today, especially in government.
#7.1 Rosalie on 2014-04-04 17:08 (Reply)
Yes, arming the soldiers would carry the risk of one or more accidents happening. But the carnage of these rampages and the potential for even greater mayhem, in my opinion is a much greater actuality than the possible risk of a soldier having an accident.
#8 Front toward enemy on 2014-04-05 06:20 (Reply)

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