Trump trying to stay awake to listen to question from a veteran. Monday, we wrote about Donald Trump saying this to a newly formed wingnut PAC calling itself a veterans' group: When you talk about the mental health problems, when people come back from war and combat and they see things that maybe a lot of the folks in this room have seen many times over and
See, I wanted to be charitable about it too like "Trump is a jackass, but he's trying to say the accurate thing that there is a mental cost that comes with military service and that's good for him to be thinking about," but I just can't get past the "folks in this room can handle it" because that just has the air of "my people are strong and better." And that just sums up what Trump is all about, I'm the best, everyone associated with me is the best, and if you're not on the Trump train, you're a loser and it's ok to treat you like shit. Even when he is trying to make a genuine and touching point about suicides in the military, he can't stop himself from showing that nastiness.
God the more I think about this, the angrier I get. I don't even know anyone in the military just the ridiculously arrogant "well my supporters would never be afflicted by mental illness" thing has stuck under my craw bad.
Right there in the paragraph under the link to Rachel Maddow. You are apparently your own little reading-free zone so I'll quote it for you:
The veteran who asked Donald Trump that question says he wasn’t offended or hurt by Trump’s answer. But a lot of veterans and their families were, and we’re pretty fucking sure we should listen to them.
Note that the link in that first line goes to a story that includes Staff Sgt. Robichaux's full comment.
Do you want to talk about that comment? If so, I'll talk to you about it. I appreciate Robichaux's service. I'm glad that he was able to deal with his own PTSD and I greatly admire the fact that he's worked to help others. What he's doing is incredibly important. That doesn't change the fact that Trump's framing of the issue is extremely problematic and I find it difficult to believe that Robichaux doesn't know that. Many other people working in PTSD treatment and suicide prevention certainly do.
Also, his comment about it being "sickening that anyone would twist Mr. Trump’s comments to me in order to pursue a political agenda,” is completely ridiculous. The entire event was in pursuit of a political agenda. A candidate for president was speaking at an event hosted by a political action committee. Politics, it's right there in the name.
Trump obviously doesn't understand that every person wearing a uniform in our military service became a hero on the day that he or she signed an enlistment form and volunteered to risk their life in defense of this country... and not one should ever be criticized for being captured or suffering from PTSD by any person.
My grandfather was an infantry captain in World War 2 and suffered PTSD for the rest of his life. (It wasn't exactly diagnosed so much in those days.)
To give you an idea of the kind of weak-willed sap he was: he was a pack-a-day-plus smoker for about forty years before his doctor convinced him to quit. His process for quitting a decades-old heavy smoking habit involved "throwing the rest of his cigarettes away" and "then never touch another because he had decided not to and no he did not care for any ridiculous 'physical addiction' claims being issued by his body, the decision had been made".
He'd been wounded (he met my grandmother while recovering from shrapnel wounds), and returned to battle. He was an officer commanding soldiers in the ground war of the invasion of Europe, driving the Nazis out of Italy. He saw terrible, terrible things, because the civilian population were not in a good place by then.
He was an absolute, unquestionable hero. (He also loved golf and was very very good at it - for most of his life his handicap was zero - but I don't think he'd have been caught dead at one of Trump's courses. Grandad had taste.)He was strong of will and of character, but no-one is too strong for PTSD.
The insurance companies strenuously resist reclassifying PTSD as a medical condition, because then they would have to cover it at a higher level, just like any other medical condition. Long term disability insurance is the worst in this regard.
Fact free zone? I think you're looking for Sean Hannity.
What in the hell are you talking about?
That speech by Veep Biden was Sorkinesque.
For once I don't even think Trump meant to insult a group of people, but he still managed to be a total asshole. He's got a special gift.
Hopefully, he'll do the right thing, and NOT vote for Trump. Tell him that even my mother, the die hard Republican, is not voting for Trump.
I'd love for him to get caught on a hot mic talking about what idiots his supporters are, you KNOW he thinks they're idiots.
I won't sleep well until she wins.
I lived in NYC in the 1980s and 1990s, and I was sick of him back then. I hated him before it was cool to hate him. :-)
But he sacrificed so bigly by being a real estate developer, on the mean streets of Fifth and Madison Avenues.
I just searched on Wikileaks and OctoberSurprise. It was hilarious.
See, I wanted to be charitable about it too like "Trump is a jackass, but he's trying to say the accurate thing that there is a mental cost that comes with military service and that's good for him to be thinking about," but I just can't get past the "folks in this room can handle it" because that just has the air of "my people are strong and better." And that just sums up what Trump is all about, I'm the best, everyone associated with me is the best, and if you're not on the Trump train, you're a loser and it's ok to treat you like shit. Even when he is trying to make a genuine and touching point about suicides in the military, he can't stop himself from showing that nastiness.
God the more I think about this, the angrier I get. I don't even know anyone in the military just the ridiculously arrogant "well my supporters would never be afflicted by mental illness" thing has stuck under my craw bad.
Right there in the paragraph under the link to Rachel Maddow. You are apparently your own little reading-free zone so I'll quote it for you:
The veteran who asked Donald Trump that question says he wasn’t offended or hurt by Trump’s answer. But a lot of veterans and their families were, and we’re pretty fucking sure we should listen to them.
Note that the link in that first line goes to a story that includes Staff Sgt. Robichaux's full comment.
Do you want to talk about that comment? If so, I'll talk to you about it. I appreciate Robichaux's service. I'm glad that he was able to deal with his own PTSD and I greatly admire the fact that he's worked to help others. What he's doing is incredibly important. That doesn't change the fact that Trump's framing of the issue is extremely problematic and I find it difficult to believe that Robichaux doesn't know that. Many other people working in PTSD treatment and suicide prevention certainly do.
Also, his comment about it being "sickening that anyone would twist Mr. Trump’s comments to me in order to pursue a political agenda,” is completely ridiculous. The entire event was in pursuit of a political agenda. A candidate for president was speaking at an event hosted by a political action committee. Politics, it's right there in the name.
Trump obviously doesn't understand that every person wearing a uniform in our military service became a hero on the day that he or she signed an enlistment form and volunteered to risk their life in defense of this country... and not one should ever be criticized for being captured or suffering from PTSD by any person.
Gene Grossman, author - www.LegalMystery.com
My grandfather was an infantry captain in World War 2 and suffered PTSD for the rest of his life. (It wasn't exactly diagnosed so much in those days.)
To give you an idea of the kind of weak-willed sap he was: he was a pack-a-day-plus smoker for about forty years before his doctor convinced him to quit. His process for quitting a decades-old heavy smoking habit involved "throwing the rest of his cigarettes away" and "then never touch another because he had decided not to and no he did not care for any ridiculous 'physical addiction' claims being issued by his body, the decision had been made".
He'd been wounded (he met my grandmother while recovering from shrapnel wounds), and returned to battle. He was an officer commanding soldiers in the ground war of the invasion of Europe, driving the Nazis out of Italy. He saw terrible, terrible things, because the civilian population were not in a good place by then.
He was an absolute, unquestionable hero. (He also loved golf and was very very good at it - for most of his life his handicap was zero - but I don't think he'd have been caught dead at one of Trump's courses. Grandad had taste.)He was strong of will and of character, but no-one is too strong for PTSD.
As a person with a mental health disorder who also works with the mentally ill, I was pissed at what he said.
The insurance companies strenuously resist reclassifying PTSD as a medical condition, because then they would have to cover it at a higher level, just like any other medical condition. Long term disability insurance is the worst in this regard.