The recent murders in Fort Hood shocked us all. They could have been avoided, however. The killer had poor performance reviews, he wanted out of the army, he had displayed some irrational behaviors, he was a vocal opponent of the current wars, and had hired a lawyer to file a suit to keep him from being deployed to Iraq or Afghanistan.
Why was he assigned to counsel soldiers on their way overseas?
That makes no sense, whatsoever. I often make the half-joke that if a government policy makes sense, we won’t be doing it for long. Why is it now such a painful observation? If anything, the man should have been placed in a posting where he would not have contact with soldiers.
I’m not asking for a review of the policy that somehow allowed this to happen. That’s not nearly enough. As a people, we have to look at the way we want our government to run: do we want it as it is now, or do we want it to make sense?
Yea, I dont understand why they would ever hire a person like this. I heard that he had very strong Islamic ideology, what does that mean? the religion affected his actions? I just dont understand why he went into an army base and killed the people that are suppose to protect our nation..insane
He was a trauma psychiatrist right? Maybe all the stress and horror of the job drove him insane.
It was making him crack, and the signs were readily apparent.
Exactly. Yet I have seen the same stupid video play on every ultra con. channel of him walking into a store wearing a traditional islamic garb. As if that had something to do with his breakdown instead of his own personal circumstances.
Intelligence agencies has known for months that Hasan was trying to contact al-Qaeda members, but when the army was told, they did nothing at all. Also the seeds of his current ideology may have been planted by a man named Anwar Aulaqi, who was an iman at the mosque that Hasan went to while he lived in Virginia. Anwar Aulaqi had contacted 2 9/11 hijackers.
I don’t mean to sabotage Mr. Webb’s original questions but here’s a little quote i thought was sort of interesting, although tangential enough: (out of an article describing interviews with Hasan’s former class mates as to his extremist islamic views)
“”His presentations were laced with extremist Muslim views, one source said.
“Is your allegiance to Sharia law or the United States?” students once challenged Hasan, the source said.
“Sharia law,” Hasan responded, according to the source.
The source recalled another instance in which Hasan was asked if the U.S. Constitution was a brilliant document. Hasan replied, “No, not particularly,” according to the source.”(CNN)
Now whoever places the US above his/her faith isn’t very faithful. And he must be anti american if he doesn’t believe that the const was brilliant. Just thought their argument was interesting.
ANYWAY
American bureaucracy needs a face lift if not a complete renovation. Issues like this (ex. unstable people in gov’t [as if stable is the norm in government]) need to be probed into effectively and personally instead of pencil pushing and filing reports that get lost in some cabinet.
I dont know what he was thinking when he joined the military but even the little kid down the street knows that if you join you will serve over seas. this attack was a total failure on the military’s part because the red flags on this guy was so huge you could see them from space. this i think would be classified as an EPIC fail. the goverment may never make sence but it must be made simpler. for goverment to make any sence we must grab it and shake it violently so that the current leaders will OBEY the masses and not the select few who think that the are number one. i dont mean going and shooting up capitol hill i mean for us to get a bunch of people that can represent each state and allow for them to look in to the peoples best intrests, peacefully. this is an immence task so get ready for bad times and some very angry people.
Getting back to the idea of him being a sign of worsening morale in the military, that’s the dirty little secret the Pentagon doesn’t want to come to terms with. If he’s a terrorist, our soldiers are fine. If he’s a disgruntled grunt, he’s the visible tip of the iceberg.