In search of Hasan's Syndrome

J.R. Salzman shares his heartfelt disgust with the media coverage of last week's tragedy at Fort Hood.  There is strong language, but I am certain this soldier has earned the right.  From Scott Johnson at Powerline:

Nidal Hasan is the Army psychiatrist who went on a rampage of mass murder at Fort Hood this past Thursday. The liberal media have performed remarkable contortions to wrap his motives in mystery and tender Hasan himself as a possible victim. CNN, for example, has served up a story of anti-Islamic discrimination (from Jerusalem, no les) despite the fact that Hasan's continued presence in the Army suggests something closer to the opposite.
Given a little time to work up a theory of their own, the media have presented Hasan as a victim of something like post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). The New York Times put it at the top of James Dao's backgrounder on Hasan. Dao quotes cousin Nader Hasan: "He was mortified by the idea of having to deploy. He had people telling him on a daily basis the horrors they saw over there."

CNN pursued this theme, "drill[ing] down" deep to explain that "Treating trauma victims may cause its own trauma." The thesis of this chin pulling is that Hasan rampage is the flip side of his professional good works, and CNN is far from alone in pushing this line.

Distilling the essence of this nonsense, Canada's National Post asserted: "It is a cruel irony that the very mental disorder Maj. Hasan was trained to treat may have claimed him as a victim."

If there is a cruel irony here, it is that bona fide victims of PTSD have this nonsense inflicted on them at home. J.R. Salzman is one such victim as a result of the incident in which he was seriously injured in Iraq, and he is righteously unamused (via Hot Air).

Salzman responds to the likes of CNN with a pointed question or two: "If you can get PTSD from treating soldiers at Walter Reed Army Medical Center then why the hell haven't more people snapped? Why haven't all the therapists in physical therapy and occupational therapy, and all the staff on Ward 57 r[u]n around shooting up the place? They have seen far more wounded soldiers than this piece of shit ever did." Salzman also kindly answers his own questions: "Because you don't get PTSD from sitting on your ass around Walter Reed.

Read all of Salzman's post if you can.  It is important.