Idiot of the Week: "Brain Injuries are not Serious"

https://dartcenter.org/content/brain-injuries-remain-undiagnosed-in-thousands-soldiers

There are no words for this week's idiot. Military Times reports that 109 of our Servicemen and Women in Iraq received traumatic brain injuries as a result of the Iran bombing of the U.S. military post in Iraq. This week's IDIOT doesn't consider traumatic brain injuries "serious." Following the idiot's words is a link to the Center for Disease Control's info about what these injuries do to a person. STORY>


Trump says he doesn’t consider brain injuries sustained by US troops during Iran missile barrage ‘serious’
Meghann Myers and Patricia Kime
Click for ARTICLE in MILITARY TIMES January 23, 2020

President Trump said Wednesday that he didn’t consider the traumatic brain injuries reported by U.S. troops following an Iranian rocket attack to be serious.

On Friday, more than a week after Pentagon officials reported no injuries in a rocket attack on an Iraqi base housing U.S. troops, reports surfaced that 11 service members had been flown out of the country to treat persistent symptoms of traumatic brain injury. Tuesday, military officials acknowledged even more troops were being evaluated for injuries.

“I heard that they had headaches, and a couple of other things,” he told a reporter during a press conference at the World Economic Forum in Switzerland. “But I would say, and I can report, that it is not very serious.”

CBS News

✔@CBSNews

When asked about the 11 U.S. servicemen injured in the Iran airstrikes, President Trump told @weijia he didn't "consider them serious injuries relative to other injuries I've seen." https://cbsn.ws/36nmHEI 

While most people who suffer concussion recover within seven to 10 days with appropriate treatment, severe or multiple concussions can have lingering and even lasting or progressive effects such as degeneration or brain changes that put aging veterans at risk for dementia, Alzheimer’s, Parkinson’s disease and other neurological conditions, according to researchers at the Department of Veterans Affairs Boston Healthcare System.

The Defense Department has been grappling with the issue of TBI throughout the Global War on Terror, as the sometimes invisible injury can be hard to detect, service members can be reluctant to report their suffering and the long-term damage can wreak havoc on mental and behavioral health.
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Info about Traumatic Brain Injuries from the Center for Disease Control:
Symptoms usually fall into four categories:

Thinking/ Remembering	Physical	Emotional/ Mood	Sleep
Difficulty thinking clearly	Headache Fuzzy or blurry vision	Irritability	Sleeping more than usual
Feeling slowed down	Nausea or vomiting (early on) Dizziness	Sadness	Sleep less than usual
Difficulty concentrating	Sensitivity to noise or light Balance problems	More emotional	Trouble falling asleep
Difficulty remembering new information	Feeling tired, having no energy	Nervousness or anxiety

Some of these symptoms may appear right away. Others may not be noticed for days or months after the injury, or until the person resumes their everyday life. Sometimes, people do not recognize or admit that they are having problems. Others may not understand their problems and how the symptoms they are experiencing impact their daily activities.

The signs and symptoms of a concussion can be difficult to sort out. Early on, problems may be overlooked by the person with the concussion, family members, or doctors. People may look fine even though they are acting or feeling differently.

See Getting Better, for tips to help aid your recovery after a concussion.

When to Seek Immediate Medical Attention

Danger Signs in Adults

In rare cases, a dangerous blood clot that crowds the brain against the skull can develop. The people checking on you should take you to an emergency department right away if you have:

• Headache that gets worse and does not go away.
• Weakness, numbness, or decreased coordination.
• Repeated vomiting or nausea.
• Slurred speech.
• Look very drowsy or cannot wake up.
• Have one pupil (the black part in the middle of the eye) larger than the other.
• Have convulsions or seizures.
• Cannot recognize people or places.
• Are getting more and more confused, restless, or agitated.
• Have unusual behavior.
• Lose consciousness.

RELATED ARTICLE:  Brain Wars: How the Military is Failing its Wounded

April 15, 2011 by T. Christian Miller, Daniel Zwerdling, Susanne Reber, Robin Fields

 This comprehensive multimedia investigation delves into the ramifications of the signature wound of today’s wars: traumatic brain injury (TBI). Originally published by ProPublica and NPR  in 2010. https://dartcenter.org/content/brain-injuries-remain-undiagnosed-in-thousands-soldiers

ON TAPE: Trump Jokes about Niger terrorists after 4 U.S. soldiers killed.

Trump said "They knew what signed up for."

ATTN Armed Service Men and Women ;  The president can be heard joking on tape about the
terrorists in Niger soon after 4 U.S. soldiers were killed.. Still want to support him and the Republicans who support him (98% of them)?
    Anyone who is in the military and supports Republicans need to think again. They have NO respect for you, (or the FBI, CIA, or any Law Enforcement).
   You've been persuaded into thinking they support you - they're only interested in military might, not the people making the sacrifices.

Trump Makes Light Of Terrorists Who Killed U.S. Soldiers In Omarosa Tape

 A newly released audiotape shows President Donald Trump seeming to make light of the deaths of four U.S. soldiers who were killed Oct. 4, 2017, in an ambush in Niger.

The tape was recorded about two weeks later by former White House aide Omarosa Manigault Newman during a meeting the president had with his communications team about the ambush and the movement of terrorists.

Manigault Newman played the tape Monday for MSNBC host Craig Melvin and said the way the president makes light of the situation shows just how “unhinged and inappropriate” he is.

On the tape, the president explains that the attacks were carried out by terrorists from the Middle East who went into Africa “to try and, you know, cause problems there.”

Trump then said that the goal of most of the terrorists is to get back to the U.S., “because this is where they really want to be.”

“So it’s a rough, uh, business,” he said, then to laughter he added, “I wouldn’t, I don’t think I’d want to be a terrorist right now. [laughter] It’s not a good life, but it’s, uh, the only thing that — What else is there?”

Manigault Newman told Melvin she felt Trump’s comments were disrespectful of the soldier’s deaths, especially when he and his staffers laughed at the remarks.

“They were laughing because he’s, like, making light of the situation, he’s saying, ‘Well, I wouldn’t want to be a terrorist,’ she said, “But it’s not a laughing matter. We lost four American soldiers and four of our allies, the Nigerien troops that we were fighting alongside.”

Manigault Newman said the president’s cavalier attitude toward the soldiers in Niger is even more insulting in retrospect, considering the way he spoke with Myeshia Johnson, the widow of Sgt. La David Johnson, one of the soldiers killed in the attack.

“He couldn’t remember my husband’s name,” Myeshia Johnson told ABC’s “Good Morning America.” “I heard him stumbling on trying to remember my husband’s name.”
The president also told Johnson that her husband “knew what he signed up for.”
Johnson added: “And it made me cry because I was very angry at the tone in his voice and how he said it.”

According to a report commissioned by The Guardian newspaper, about 200 heavily armed militants attacked U.S. and Nigerien forces on Oct. 4, 2017,  in the village of Tongo Tongo. Witnesses described hearing gunfire for six hours without any reinforcements showing up, despite the village chief’s repeated calls for help to Nigerien authorities. 

“Everything that happened could have been prevented if help had arrived sooner,” Karimou Yacouba, a local member of parliament, told The Guardian.

This tape isn’t the only one released Monday by Manigault Newman, formerly the director of communications for the White House Office of Public Liaison and a former contestant on Trump’s reality show “The Apprentice.”

She also played a recording on “The View” in which Trump could be heard ranting that his presidential rival Hillary Clinton is “getting killed now with Russia” and that the “real Russia story is Hillary and collusion.”