Friday, March 02, 2007

Fired Walter Reed General Had Questionable History

Buzzflash

Instead of accepting any blame for the Walter Reed Hospital scandal, the White House instead scapegoated its commander, Maj. Gen. George Weightman. Of course, the Bush Administration shares in the responsibility too because it also oversees the hospital and the appointment of the military's top brass.

We searched through the depths of the internet to try to find more about just who Weightman is and why he was entrusted with so much power. There is not much out there, but what we did find was quite troubling.

"How many really banged-up, mangled bodies can you take care of before, all of a sudden, you just get numb or can’t handle it anymore?" Weightman asked while serving in his previous post. "We refer to that as 'compassion fatigue'."

Did Weightman himself suffer from "compassion fatigue?" Maybe he was just a victim of his own suggestion: "If you want to retain military physicians, deploy them."

That astonishing allusion to "stop-loss" sounds eerily reminiscent of Bush speak, but not quite as much as when he said on 6/9/03, when he was one rank lower, that Operation Iraqi Freedom "was the most successful military operation in history."

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