Record Suicides In the Army and Otherwise

It comes as no surprise to me to read in the news that "The number of U.S. Army soldiers who took their own lives increased last year to the highest total since 1993, despite a growing effort by the Army to detect and prevent suicides."

The situation over there looks pretty bleak and hopeless. I only hope the Iraqis are enjoying their new found freedom and liberty that ol' Georgie was told by the Lord to give them.

The article that reported this fact went on to state:

The Army rate is higher than the civilian suicide rate for 2003, which was 10.8 per 100,000, according to the National Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. But the Army number tracked closely with the rate for civilians aged 18-34, which was 12.19 per 100,000 in 2003.

I must say that last fact is a shame, but makes a bit of sense. People in that age group are entering "the real world" and are still trying to figure themselves and life in general out.

I know a guy that was headed for Iraq; I can only assume that is where he is now. He was a friend of my brother's growing up. I saw him around Thanksgiving, right before he was to head out. I was not going to preach to him about my views against this war. He has probably heard it enough from others. Who knows which side of the fence he's on anyway? A lot of the boys in the military, I feel, are simply lost and a guaranteed paycheck from the government doesn't sound half bad.

He told me the money was good for him and that the experience would help him get a job in law enforcement when he got out. Before he left, he was married. Who knows how long it will be before his wife sees him again?

One thing he told me stood out. As he said it, I saw the fear and uneasiness. He said to me, "They train you to be ready to die. I don't want to die, but I'm ready."

...Just for money and a future.

I can only imagine thousands of other lost boys like him. The fear must always be in them. Is this worth it? Why can't we take care of out issues here before interfering in other countries' affairs, which we fabricated in the first place as a threat to us?

I don't understand this at all.

At least the boys overseas don't have many nail guns. A 33 year-old Oregon man went into a hospital complaining of a headache. It turns out he got high on meth and shot 12 nails into his head with a nail gun trying to kill himself. Somehow his head wasn't permanently damaged much...from the nails.

How Not to Attempt Suicide--by Nailgun (photo from MSNBC-TV)

The article matter-of-factly states that "No one before is known to have survived after intentionally firing so many foreign objects into the head". We need to clone this guy and send those boys into the Middle East. Our new Army of meth crazed super freaks. That way we don't have to worry about the fragile mental state that we are putting them in.