I have to wonder if this was set up to excuse the continuation of The War on Terror. There were no-brainer warning signs, there was foreknowledge...

Sympathy? Is what comes to your mind? Regardless if he snapped from pressure to kill as troubled muslim american soldier or a muslim american soldier with terrorist links. you should be sympathetic to the people that fell victim to this violence. Can you blame the reporting of speculating it was terrorist motivated; of course! Who knows? hopefully the truth will come out. Currently their are reports now that he was in communication certain terror cells in the middle east. If that becomes a fact, would you recant your statement? No you wouldn't because you must not be rational. Why quickly judge the news media or fox news, but not the man responsible for all this destruction. Especially when its only human nature to assume he could be involved with international ties. Just to be partial I do hope he was't a terrorist, it would make this tragedy seem much worse.

The military is one arena where I couldn't care less about diversity. White, black, gay, straight, male, female, none of them should be enlisting.

General George Casey, Army Chief of Staff, said on Sunday that he hoped the incident won't harm the Army's policy of promoting diversity. That's a courageous thing for a person like him to say at this time, but I doubt he considered what it really means. Although Hasan's actions can't be excused, they do reflect the disagreement of many people, especially non-Caucasian and non-Christian, in the Army and in our larger society, about U.S. Middle East policy. It's irrational and hypocritical for Casey to say he values diversity while at the same time ignoring the perspectives of the Muslims and Arabs he says he wants serving in the U.S. military. [This comment was revised.]

One can only imagine the prejudice he faced being an Arabic Muslim in the U.S. military too. If gays and women have it rough in there...

Those who have been raised in abusive homes by wounded blunted and periodically hysterical adults are quite familiar with the model this country operates on from day-to-day. Every twisted and distorted fact, every innuendo will be employed to support whatever pre-existing agenda may be operating at that time.

In this case the "name" tells you everything, convicts the man on the spot, don't need any "facts" and if you disagree, if you contradict, if you even attempt to refute, then you get slapped in the face, placed in the doghouse, and punished for the next two weeks. Sends a message to all the other children...and aren't we all these days...

I have already had one retired Army officer tell me about soldiers who are primed, who are told they will die or spend the rest of their lives in jail; while their families, their children, their homes, education, health care and jobs will be taken care of for the rest of their lives - now here's the mission....Dictated by whom? For what purpose?

We have reached the point much like in the days of the Romanoffs when agents of the Okrana acting as agent provocateurs among Russian radicals assassinated the Tsar's cousin. The Tsar, I am told, was much perplexed even though it provided a much needed pretext to round up and execute another batch of "bad guys". Practically post-modern.

And we are. Another round of murders and we will never likely know what it was ever all about, but we can watch the ripples and notice who profits from the event...people like Pierre and others who write here help greatly....but for what purpose? An impotent daily chronicle of our descent into Hell On Earth? Or something else...do what you can...was there ever anything else you could do?

Peace...

On the other hand, when there's an abortion clinic bombing, people on the left always make a connection to that and the bomber's Christian fundie roots. I'm just sayin'.

I'll admit that when I first heard the shooters name on the radio I said to myself, "oh no." I knew that it would become a lightning rod for Islamophobes and racist right-wingers.

I also admit that considering the kind of war Empire is fighting, combined with the ethnicity of those Empire is killing, the shooter's background wasn't surprising to me.

That's not to say that Arabic people or Muslims are inherently violent. No group truly is. I would never suggest that. I know that, and I know how unfairly they are being persecuted for what a minority of their own have done. But under the circumstances, it unfortunately makes sense here.

How would you feel if you were being told to murder those who share your background and religion, let alone anyone else?

You combine that with all the horrible truths that have come to light about the Terror War since it began, and you have a recipe for bloody dissension within the ranks of the military.

It's going to keep happening unless we end all the wars. Bring them all home. Create a new army to build windmills, solar panels, and new affordable homes for people to live in. To me that would prove anyone's loyalty to America. Killing other people in other parts of the world wouldn't make me feel good about being an American at all.

Muslim, non-Muslim? To whom does it matter?

Read the November 12 issue of Rolling Stone account of the Fort Carson, Colorado killing spree by three Iraq Invasion veterans. They were not Muslim. Neither was Timothy McVeigh. How much we ignore or choose to forget, lost in these little screens, amusing ourselves to death.

To continue to ask men and women to kill, maim and destroy in a war based upon lies is beyond understanding and beneath contempt. When does each of us become as guilty as Dr. Hasan of killing US soldiers and the many others who will die unless we bring an end to this madness? At what point do we become and how long will we remain the "Good Germans?" I suspect that its as long as protest and complaint is no more than pixels on a screen and until we take our resistance to the streets.

Some are posing the return of the draft. If it were, perhaps this war would end --- once we the exempt and our all of our fathers,mothers, brothers, sisters, neighbors and friends face what Dr. Hasan and his victims faced, once the war is brought home to each of us.

Then to the barricades?

Extremely religious.
Extremely religious and muslim in a christian culture.
A military man.
And an American, one of the most aggressive countries in the world.
Now add all of these up and you have a nitroglycerin type personality, very unstable and highly explosive.

Everyone wants to show how tolerant and acceptant they are so as to not disturb the delicate balance of their own highly invested religious beliefs. no one wants to be seen as the one who was somewhat mentally successful at christian compassion but a total failure at living that compassion in their hearts. Those christians not in the military are conducting their own private psychic war with islam. to be honest and overt about is to appear the hypocrite and the sinner waiting at the doors of hell. no need to worry about 'going' to hell, we have long since arrived.

It's indisputable that an avalanche of warped speculation has been triggered by the Fort Hood incident; IMO, this raises a tangential issue, to wit:

Despite a lifelong penchant for glazing over at numbers and mathematical concepts, which effectively forestalled study in scientific disciplines, I retain a geeky fascination for "popular science".

I recently watched a NOVA episode that touched upon an anthropologist who decided to break from exploring well-travelled sites in Eastern Africa, and test his hypothesis that West Africa might prove a fruitful source of hominid and proto-hominid fossils and artifacts.

He hit the jackpot... after EIGHT YEARS of patient annual exploration! Eight freaking YEARS, comrades!

My point is that I believe that contemporary reporting and analysis is terminally deformed by a phenomenon reminiscent of Future Shock: in a nutshell-- I really am spitballing as I write-- our corporate media reporters and infotainwhores are locked into an absurd process of Figuring It All Out in real-time.

It's natural and straightforward enough that an episode of catastrophic wholesale violence in Amerika, especially one involving a Muslim suspect, and a military officer to boot, is going to have everyone leaping out of their chairs and running around squeaking like rats on methamphetamines.

It's not necessary to describe the process and well-known motivations for the frenzied orgy of hyper-reporting that mushrooms within minutes of the first news of the event. Suffice it to say that there are many reasons why careful, deliberate, quality-oriented investigation and publication is no longer possible.

It "just doesn't work that way".

Instead, there is an increasingly irrational and absurd impulse for each information source, from government and law enforcement agencies to corporate media news organizations, to "button down" the REAL truth and score points by getting the debacle framed and mounted for public viewing ASAP from the instant the story became public.

What a contrast! Truly rational and reliable knowledge, and certainly enduring wisdom, is yielded in proportion to the soundness of the epistemological methods used. Eight long, boring, tedious, "insignificant" years to find ONE lousy fossilized skull, and a badly crushed one at that!

On the other hand, the corporate media-- and, alas! the analysts and opinionators bobbing along in the foaming wake of typically hysterical and irresponsible coverage-- compete madly to issue the Definitive Explanation within eight hours.

That's why I only skim, if that, through even thoughtful articles like this. I'm not blaming the writers, but insights produced on the run, in a race to provide the correct perspective on a murky incident, invariably reflect more heat than light.

Even thoughtful pundits can't find balance in the initial, surging Garbage In/Garbage Out undertow.

· Yr Obd't Servant

It think the least common denominator is that Major Hasan decided his real enemies were those who were sent to kill his own race.

"Instinctive craving for crisis". The best description yet for what "news" networks are cultivating.

Preview this!

We all need to keep in mind the principles of Anglo Saxon code of jurisprudence which require that we assume anyone charged with a crime is innocent until proven guilty, and beyond that to be more than a bit skeptical of such official sources as this lieutenant general and commander at Ft Hood who surely has his axe to grind as does all the US military/national security/industrial complex. These liars for hire have a hard time telling the truth. Think the Vietnam War, Watergate, and the Iran Contra affair.

Basically this is a good article attacking Islamaphobia though. What we have to do is keep a skeptical eye out on this one until all the facts come out and maybe even until a fair trial has taken place for this person accused of this crime. That's the highest ideal of US democracy. It's called due process for you neo cons out there in your parallel universe of fascism and other loony right/far right weirdo excrement.

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We all need to keep in mind the principles of Anglo Saxon code of jurisprudence which require that we assume anyone charged with a crime is innocent until proven guilty, and beyond that to be more than a bit skeptical of such official sources as this lieutenant general and commander at Ft Hood who surely has his axe to grind as does all the US military/national security/industrial complex. These liars for hire have a hard time telling the truth. Think the Vietnam War, Watergate, and the Iran Contra affair.

Basically this is a good article attacking Islamaphobia though. What we have to do is keep a skeptical eye out on this one until all the facts come out and maybe even until a fair trial has taken place for this person accused of this crime. That's the highest ideal of US democracy. It's called due process for you neo cons out there in your parallel universe of fascism and other loony right/far right weirdo excrement.

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These reports from the mainstream US media are beginning to sound like they're about as reliable as the Gulf of Tonkin incident coverage. Look below at the CNN coverage.

Surviving Fort Hood shooting suspect arrested at golf course, officer says
November 5, 2009 -- Updated 2334 GMT (0734 HKT)
STORY HIGHLIGHTS
Senior officer tells CNN he saw one of the surviving suspects in base shooting arrested
The suspect was arrested at a golf course 2.5 miles from the installation
MPs ordered soldier to lie on ground and open his uniform, officer says
Man was surrounded for 25-30 minutes, then taken away
RELATED TOPICS
Fort Hood
Shootings
U.S. Armed Forces
(CNN) -- A senior officer who was playing golf Thursday near Fort Hood, Texas, told CNN he witnessed the arrest of one of the two surviving suspects of the shooting at the Army installation.
Shortly after the shooting, the officer said, military police told him to clear the course and he saw other MPs surround the building that held the golf carts, he said.
The senior officer said he ducked into a nearby house for cover as 30 to 40 cars carrying MPs approached.
He said he saw a soldier in battle-dress uniform, his hands in the air. The MPs ordered him to lie on the ground and open his uniform, presumably to ensure he was not carrying explosives, the senior officer said.
He said an MP told him that authorities considered the man to be a suspect in the shootings after having overheard the man say he was with the shooter.
The man was surrounded for 25 to 30 minutes, until a convoy of vehicles arrived, led by a Ford Crown Victoria and carrying men in suits, and he was taken away, the senior officer said.
The golf course is about 2.5 miles from Fort Hood, the officer told CNN.

Now the commander of this installation is saying that only shooter was involved and he's alive. But he was supposedly dead. Gee, what else did these big shots get wrong? What ever happened to the old slogan from the 1960s of "Question authority?"

Other mainstream media have been reporting roughly the same story. Now all of a sudden we have one gunman, and he's "conveniently" a Moslem. Gee, now it all "makes sense." They "hate our freedom." Those 'terrible Moslems" are "out to get us." They're all a part of "left wing/Moslem/European socialist plot."

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Fox news is still at it today , insinuating that Hasan may have had links to terrorist organizations, and the despicable Joe Lieberman pushing the idea that criticism of the wars is anti American propaganda, so that makes Hasan a terrorist, instead of what normally would be called a crazed gunman and murderer.

I disagree with the author characterizing this as terrorism. Although, I guess it depends on how you define terrorism, which the author doesn't do. It was a crime, but terrorism? I think Columbine is a better comparison. Blowback is a bitch. Shit doesn't happen in a vacuum.

There was a recent story that missed the mainstream media. It came out of Colorado where a particular military unit had seen heavy combat in Iraq and a large number of returning soldiers were committing all kinds of horrible acts. Murder, drug abuse, rape, assault and suicide. I bet if one of those soldiers had a muslimy sounding name the MSM would have picked up the story and ran wild with it.

I can't even watch the corporate news outlets with regard to this story. It makes me want to puke. Come to think about it, I can't watch them cover any news story.

"the horrifying routine of American violence"

Two points: First: Bush said that we were fighting them over there, so we don't have to fight them over here. (How disgusting is that?) Well, they may not have invaded us, but we are suffering the consequences of our actions anyway. The military is falling apart, the economy is busted, the political system is fatally corrupt, and the environment is reaching the tipping point of no return. What goes around, comes around, you can't escape karma. Second: I read that Major Hassan was being persecuted because he was muslim. People who knew him said that his car had been keyed, and a religious decal had been torn off of it. A fellow soldier had been arrested for the crime. Why is this not being told by the media? Does anybody really believe that there is no prejudice in the military toward muslims? I think that this is a terrible tragedy, but I don't believe this man acted without reason. It may be that his PTSD patients were telling him about their violence toward the people in Iraq and Afghanistan. They are muslims, and he would surely feel a bond with them. Let's not forget, these wars were not necessary, and these people are defending their land. I'm sure that there are a lot of American muslims who see the injustice, Major Hassan was not able to control himself, and thus we have a massacre.

I have already seen at least one major news service try to tie Major Hasan to the mosque that supposedly sheltered three of the 9/11 suspects.

The vilification and persecution of Muslims in the US continues unabated, and the lies and propaganda that created two illegal wars continue to murder and maim innocents in Iraq and Afghanistan spread and multiply.

No doubt, in the days and weeks to come Glenn Beck, Limbaugh and the rest of the rabid right wing will try to tie Hasan to 9/11 as a sleeper agent waiting for the right time to strike. They will do their best to inflame public sentiment, whipping the gullible idiots that are their audience into a hate-filled frenzy that will, eventually, only lead to more tragedy and bloodshed.

This is a tightening spiral. And we are all going to pay the price. Sooner or later, a rabid demagogue is going to emerge that will give voice to all the bitter little thoughts of those who are losing everything, and a new cornpone fascism will arise in the US.

Then the real bloodshed will begin...

All in the name of 'Democracy (tm)'.

The empire of War is in such a fall
while the whole world is watching
One and All.

As Buff and Pierre Tristam indicate, the killing of these soldiers by another soldier is a direct result of the wars and the U.S. occupations of Afghanistan and Iraq. It has been reported that Hasan was due to be deployed to the Middle East. In all probability Hasan informed his superiors that he was not at all comfortable going to that area. But since the military is running out of bodies Hasan's pleas most likely fell upon deaf ears. What most likely added to his decision was the fact that he was counseling soldiers who had to deal with the effects of PTSD. These would seem to be quite valid explanations as to why Hasan snapped by killing those soldiers.

When an event like this happens it seems that all the so-called experts, from the military to the talking heads on television, are just shocked, shocked!, that something like this could occur. Obama declared, not very surprisingly, that this was a tragedy. But what would be a surprise is to see if any of these alleged experts and Obama ever actually decided to analyze WHY Hasan did what he did and what caused him to act in the manner that he did. The shock is that more of these incidents do not happen more frequently as the government and the military simply do not give a damn of how the consequences of war might affect those who are exposed, or who will be exposed, to the horrors of war.

What these people who are so quick to condemn Hasan's actions need to do is read some of the poetry by the trench poets of World War I in order to gain at least some understanding of the effect that war has on people. But that is probably a forlorn hope as the last thing that these people desire to do is have empathy for the victims of war and especially those who have felt the wrath of America's bombs and drone missiles in the Middle East.

i'm glad the author sees the irony and the racism at work here

11 dead and 31 wounded

hell if i were one of those drone operators sitting in nebraska and dropping bombs on a wedding party in pakistan i wouldn't even need approval to go ahead with that

i could on my own authority and analysis - kill them all with impunity

the cut off for approval requires 30 dead bodies - then a corporal at a computer screen needs a go ahead from a junior officer

i know i know - this is us and that is them

they don't matter - after all they don't have fathers, mothers, sisters or brothers or children

bottom line is even of they did - who cares

our corporations want the oil and gas and that is all - next - discussion over

we have the same mindset as our mini-me fascist brothers in israel vis a vis the palestinans

our returning vet are not only killing others - all accross america - they are killing themselves in record numbers

at this moment 300,000 are seeking but not getting treatment for ptsd and head injuries

they are queued up in line after the vets from vietnam - who in turn are right behind the few remaining vets from korea

but its all good - the corporations have got the oil and gas

mission accomplished...