Halliburton Has Lied Conspicuously and Continually To Congress, Oversight Committees, The Military & The Press

But their lies to their stock-holders might just be the straws undoing the camel's spinal chord:
{From TruthOut.Org (which I support with a small, monthly donation of $10, and encourage anyone to do the same)}:

Halliburton Accused of Cooking Its Books

Investors have shrugged off almost all the bad news at Halliburton Co. the past few years - accusations of overbilling the Army and bribing foreign officials, along with scrutiny over business dealings in Iran and non-competetive bids on government work. None of it cost them anything, and the Regime cast a blind eye.
(Shit, Darth Cheney STILL collects an annual, hundred-thousand dollar stipend from 'em, in acknowledgment of his vital role in their 'bidness' dealings. With this kind of juice, you just shut up and collect your dividends.)
But the same investors might take notice, if Halliburton's financial statements were in doubt, and a former company accounting executive says they are.

To read all about it, follow the link embedded in the headline of this post...To explore the latest of the Halliburton fiascoes in Iraq, click here.

US/VA shoddy treatment of Vets: "A Blue-Print For Social Dislocation"

It is disgraceful that the USer military establishment views the soldiers it creates, uses, and then drops as if they were refuse. Why do veterans of USer military service constitute between 25% and 33% of all the homeless men in Murka?
Because, once the military has used you up, physically and psychologically, the bureaucracy tosses you aside like a piece of shit.
Some folks are noticing, finally.
Here's an editorial from Daytona Beach, Fla, which ends:

The numbers, the lost lives and broken promises to veterans ought to be a national shame for a country so gushy with "Support Our Troops" rhetoric toward men and women who supposedly "live in honor among us, or sleep in valor beneath this sacred ground," as President Bush described them in a speech from Arlington National Cemetery last Veterans Day. That so many veterans end up in more proximity to gutters than honors shows to what extent the rhetoric is less than what it seems with its $2 yellow-ribbon stickers on the back of cars and a veterans' mental care system stuck in the middle of the last century.

The standing army is a threat to democracy, always has been.
But just discarding the injured and the wounded is a threat to our humanity.

They Called It "Malingering" In The Last Couple Of Wars

When soldiers fresh from the battlefield exhibit signs of extreme psychological distress, the brass ALWAYS suspects 'malingering,' first. So the first instinct is to ignore the soldier's complaints. Cuz the battlefield is SUCH a crappy, horrible, horrible place, the brass knew/know that any sane person would do ANYTHING to get out of having to go back there... If this is unclear, there's a whole book about it: Catch-22. Still as relevant today as when it was first published 46 years ago. I read it on the transport plane taking me overseas, in '65.

Walter Reed Patients Say Mental Care Falls Short
(Another piece of what should be Pulitzer-winning reportage by the WaPo's two best: Anne Hull and Dana Priest; via Truth-Out.Org)

Every month, 20 to 40 soldiers are evacuated from Iraq and Afghanistan because of mental problems, according to the Army.
Most are sent to Walter Reed along with other war-wounded.
For amputees, the nation's top Army hospital offers state-of-the-art prosthetics and physical rehabilitation programs, and soon, a new $10 million amputee center with a rappelling wall and virtual reality center. Nothing so state-of-the-art exists for soldiers with diagnoses of post-traumatic stress disorder, who in the Army alone outnumber all of the war's amputees by 43 to one.

Because of it's associations with 'shirking' or 'malingering', the military bureaucrats are often loathe to allocate many resources to the repair of what they are almost always SURE is dishonesty.

Of course, most of the pencil-jockeys have never stained their shorts in a fire-fight, either.
Fuck the RAMFs!

Walking Wounded: Psychologically Traumatized Vets Desperately Seek--But Don't Get--Help

This is just a fucking DISGRACE!!!!

The War Inside
Troops Are Returning From the Battlefield With Psychological Wounds, But the Mental-Health System That Serves Them Makes Healing Difficult

I put up a similar post up here on Friday.

THE MOTHERFUCKING BUREAUCRATS DO EVERY-FUCKING-THING THEY POSSIBLY CAN TO PREVENT INJURED VETS FROM GETTING THE FUCKING BENEFITS THEY FUCKING EARNED TO MAKE THEM FUCKING WHOLE AGAIN.

Jeezis, I hate Hate HATE these fuckers...

Combat Trauma: Injured Vets Find Scant Concern, Little Care, But LOTS of "Command Hostility"

From the Seattle Times, via TruthOut.Org
By the end of his tour in Iraq, Command Sergeant Major Thomas Adams was crushed by memories. Too many memorial services for dead soldiers. Too many visits to the wounded in hospital wards. Too many innocents - men, women and children - blown up by insurgent bombs or killed inadvertently by his Fort Lewis brigade. "What I'm telling you is that there's absolute carnage out there," Adams said. "We have to be ready for the trauma of today's battlefield."

This is an important story. Sgt. Major Adams is right at the top of the NCO Hierarchy. And the story comes on the heals of reports recently that USer Military and Veterans services for psychologically and brain-damaged victims of combat traume in Iraq were NEVER up to the task of helping returning vets, even in peace-time. Reports in USA Today, and other news sources tell of lack of care, substandard treatment, scarcities of professionals to treat returning vets, and attitudes in the command structure itself which punish injured soldiers for 'weakness' if they seek help.

This is exactly the situation faced by vets of the Vietnam conflict. Not coincidentally, mentally/psychologically injured vets comprise as many as 40% of the nation's perpetual homeless. This is not a recent phenomenon, either. This headline, from 2005, proclaims "Republican Budget Cuts Target Veterans…again". The theme was repeated again, barely a year later, under the headline, Dean: "Bush Balancing Budget on Backs of Wounded Veterans

For the second time in a week, the Bush Administration will deliver a major address to the nation's largest veterans' group the day after the Associated Press revealed drastic cuts to veterans' benefits in the President's budget. Vice President Dick Cheney addressed the American Legion's annual convention today, one day after the Associated Press reported that "draconian" cuts in the Bush budget will mean that "at least tens of thousands of veterans" will face "delayed or even denied care" in coming years. [Associated Press, 2/27/06]

I'm a vet--who fortunately was spared the kinds of combat which takes such a horrific toll--and I take this betrayal of injured troops personally.
(Fookin BRILLIANT poster by Micah Wright, http://www.micahwright.com/propaganda/)

Supporting The Troops (Cont'd): Bushevik Homefront Insurance Program Refuses/Reduces Vets' Counseling Expenses

Tricare, the Govt. program that covers out-care for returning vets, is stretched thin, and is cutting payments to therapists counseling returning vets. This is of a piece with the standard reply of the military to soldiers' complaints of 'battle stress'/PTSD, which the hierarchy regards as a species of malingering.

Via Truthout.Org:

By Kimberly Hefling - The Associated Press
Posted : Monday Jun 11, 2007 13:29:04 EDT

WASHINGTON — Soldiers returning from war are finding it more difficult to get mental health treatment because military insurance is cutting payments to therapists, on top of already low reimbursement rates and a tangle of red tape.

Wait lists now extend for months to see a military doctor and it can takes weeks to find a private therapist willing to take on members of the military. The challenge appears great in rural areas, where many National Guard and Reserve troops and their families live...

Roughly one-third of returning soldiers seek out mental health counseling in their first year home. They are among the 9.1 million people covered by Tricare, a number that grew by more than 1 million since 2001.

Tricare’s psychological health benefit is “hindered by fragmented rules and policies, inadequate oversight and insufficient reimbursement,” the Defense Department’s mental health task force said last month after reviewing the military’s psychological care system.

The Tricare office that serves Fort Campbell, Ky., and Fort Bragg, N.C. — Army posts with heavy war deployments — told task force members that it routinely fields complaints about the difficulty in locating mental health specialists who accept Tricare...

Not unlike the way the Pukes are pro-life right up until birth, these egregious Fucktards are 'pro-troop,' until they get home. Then they're on their own.

These fuckers just disgust me.