Forget Casey, Remember Maj. Nidal Hasan…

On and on goes Nancy Grace. She is consumed with Casey Anthony. She calls her “Tot Mom”. Remember Caylee is her mantra.  Grace is not necessarily advocating revenge for Ms. Anthony’s daughter, but she sure is overtly saying it to the millions that watch her show. It seems to be repeated all night between Dr. Drew and another annoying “yenta” shouting for Casey Anthony’s hide on CNN. And, as they used to say in the sixties, the beat goes on.

Since 1875 “our” government has operated the U.S. Disciplinary Barracks at Fort Leavenworth, KS – the USDB. Better known as the “Castle”, it is the only maximum security prison within the Department of Defense. It presently “houses” approximately 450 male inmates, 10 of whom are serving life sentences without parole and 6 are on death row. Female prisoners are held at the Naval Consolidated Brig in San Diego, CA.

Only enlisted prisoners with sentences over five years, commissioned officers, and prisoners convicted of offenses related to national security are incarcerated at the “Castle”. Enlisted prisoners with sentences under five years are housed in smaller facilities, such as the Regional Correctional Facility at Fort Knox, KY or the Marine Corps Brig at Quantico, VA.

Sexual offenses presently represent 50% of the inmates crimes. The last execution was back in 1961. Army private, John Bennett, was hanged for raping and the attempted murder of an 11-year old girl. The execution of Army private Ronald Gray, who has been on military death row since 1988, was approved by President George W. Bush in July 2008. Gray was convicted of the rape, two murders and an attempted murder of three women, two of them Army soldiers and the third a civilian taxi driver whose body was found on the post at Fort Bragg. In November 2008, a federal judge granted Gray a stay of execution to allow time for further appeals.

On November 5th 2009, Fort Hood, outside Killeen, TX, a gunman killed 13 and wounded 43 people. U.S. Army major, Nidal Malik Hasan, 39 years old, serving as a psychiatrist, was wounded and taken into custody. As a result, he is paralyzed from the chest down. Hasan, an American born Muslim of Palestinian descent, has been charged with 13 counts of premeditated murder and 32 counts of attempted murder under the UCMJ – the Uniform Code of Military Justice.

Yesterday was his arrangement, one year and eight months, after (NYT) “one of the deadliest mass shootings ever to unfold at an American military base”. The judge set the trial date for March 5th 2012. Military law prohibits defendants charged in capital punishment cases from pleading guilty. Major Hasan is being held at the Bell County Jail, in Belton, TX, roughly 20 miles from Fort Hood. Nancy Grace remains in Orlando.

At about 1:34pm, Hasan entered the Soldier Readiness Center within the Fort. According to eyewitnesses (Wikipedia) he bowed his head for several seconds and then opened fire shouting “Allahu Akbar!” He shot into a crowd of soldiers gathered for a college graduation ceremony in a nearby theatre. He was armed with a FN 57 semi-automatic pistol, purchased at a civilian gun store. He has a .357 Magnum as a backup weapon. He fired at people as they ran and tried to take cover. The “incident” lasted about 10 minutes. Hasan was shot by civilian policeman Sergeant Mark Todd who then kicked a pistol out of Hasan’s hand and placed him in handcuffs. Of the 13 Hasan (allegedly) murdered, Private First Class, Francheska Velez, of Chicago, IL, was pregnant.

The murder of Casey Anthony’s daughter was a tragedy. The trial was held and she was determined to be not guilty. That verdict cannot be changed. Some members of the media, I referred to Nancy Grace earlier, seem “passionate” about determining Anthony’s whereabouts and making what life she does have miserable. This “effort” seems “misguided” to me. The arrangement of Hasan did not even make the evening news. The hot weather took priority. The anger over what Hasan is accused of should not “disappear” from the public consciousness. We cannot let Casey Anthony “cloud” our sensibilities nor “Murdock” style “journalists like Nancy Grace, set our priorities.

For a complete account of the Ft. Hood shootings go here FtHood/LOTR/Wiki and to read the latest piece from The New York Times about the arrangement go here NYT/FTHOOD/LOTR.

THE 13 MURDERED:

1. Mike Cahill, 62,Civilian Physician Assistant, Spokane, WA

2. Libardo Caraveo, 52,  Major, Woodbridge, VA

3. Justin  DeCrow, 32, Staff Sergeant, Plymouth, IN

4. Fred Greene, 29, Specialist, Mountain City, TN

5. Jason Hunt, 22, Specialist, Tipton, OK

6. Amy Krueger, 29, Staff Sergeant, Kiel, WI

7. Aaron Nemelka, 19, PFV, West Jordan, UT

8. Mike Pearson,22, PFC, Bolingbrook, IL

9. Russ Seager, 51, Captain, Racine, WI

10. Francheska Velez, 21, PFC, Chicago, IL

11. Juanita Warman, 55, Lt. Colonel, Pittsburgh, PA

12. Kham Xiong, PFC, 23, St. Paul, MN

13. John Gaffaney, 56, Captain, Serra Mesa, CA

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Trying To Remember

As I get older and I deal with some chronic health issues, the fact that my memory is loosing power frightens me. Not so long ago it was my long-term memory that was called into question. My family would talk about some event when I was young and I would have no memory of the incident. Then it got to where my kids would talk about something when they were young and I would have no memory. When this would happen it would bother me. Other people’s memories seemed so much clearer than mine or I was just plain lost as to what they were talking about.

In the past four to five years the long-term memory process has worsened. People will tell about conversations I had with them and I absolutely do not know what they are talking about. Here is a comical example. My husband likes “tractor-pulls”.  You go and watch tractors of all sizes and models pull large heavy objects. I personally do not see the need to even remotely sit through such a thing as that. I can enjoy a  drag strip visit every few years, but the tractor pulls?  No thank you.

My husband swears he took me to a tractor pull in the early years of our relationship, before we got married. I solemnly swear I do not think I have ever attended a tractor pull. I mean not even an inkling of some fuzzy memory. I personally think he is making it up just to try and lure me back to one of those events. He claims I enjoyed it. That statement in itself raises red flags about whether it is true.  Either way if I did somehow get myself talked into such a way to spend my time, I have no memory of it.

Now my short-term memory is loosing power. I know the aging process, stress, medications and all kinds of other variables can affect your memory. I also know that part of my health issues is known to cause memory problems, more so with remembering words. Which is very frustrating when tying to carry on an intelligent conversation and I suddenly stop, mid sentence, trying to grab the word from my memory. It can be embarrassing.

Here lately, more than ever, I will have moments about events or conversations and I don’t know if I dreamed it or if it really happened. 

Before I go further, I am not in a corner somewhere in the fetal position not able to function or remember my name. It is not extreme, but it is noticeable. It really, really bothers me. I work all kinds of word puzzles because I heard it helps keep your brain moving so to speak. I do a large amount of reading and I will make myself work at remembering something I am having trouble recalling.

Alzheimer’s scare me more than cancer, heart attack or just about anything else. The thought of completely loosing my memory to the point of not knowing my kids or everyday tasks such as getting dressed really scares me.

Today I read an article about a new test of spinal fluid that may be able to detect Alzheimer’s early. They say this test may have the ability to separate normal reduction in memory as we age to actual onset of Alzheimer’s. There are two proteins that are off balance in people who have Alzheimer’s. They tend to have low levels of beta amyloid and higher levels of tau protein.

Researchers at the Technical University, Munich, Germany tested 58 subjects who had slight memory problems, called mild cognitive impairment in medical terms. Now here is the results I find disturbing; 21 people in that study developed Alzheimer’s. Does that not seem high to you?  21 out of 58 went from slight memory problems to confirmation of Alzheimer’s.

27 still had slight memory problems and 8 people went back to their normal cognitive health. The study showed those who advance into Alzheimer’s have high levels of soluble amyloid precursor protein beta in their spinal fluid than those who did not later advance to Alzheimer’s. I don’t know the bio-chemistry around that protein, so I will just leave it up to the scientist who do.

I learned that some 26 million people have Alzheimer’s.  The disease is fatal and is the most common form of dementia. Current drugs only help symptoms, but as of today there is not a drug that can arrest Alzheimer’s.

I will be going back to my doctor in just a few weeks and I have never talked to him about my memory problems. I think I sub-consciously am afraid to discover something. Silly I know, but I think it is a form of denial. This visit however, I am going to talk to him about it. It may be nothing. I am nearly 50 and maybe it is normal. I don’t know what  50 year old folks should be feeling. Inside I still feel very young. The rest of me stubbornly changes with the movement of time. I am of the opinion that getting old is not for the weak.

I pray that research finds a way to detect this disease very early and then I pray they find an answer of how to completely stop this very scary disease.

I hope you are well, take care and stay safe,

KJ

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