TV News LIES

Handsome and friendly, Clay Hunt so epitomized a vibrant Iraq veteran that he was chosen for a public service announcement reminding veterans that they aren't alone.

The 28-year-old former Marine corporal earned a Purple Heart after taking a sniper's bullet in his left wrist. He returned to combat in Afghanistan. Upon his return home, he lobbied for veterans on Capitol Hill, road-biked with wounded veterans and performed humanitarian work in Haiti and Chile.

Then, on March 31, Hunt bolted himself in his Houston apartment and shot himself.

The Army is facing a "critical" shortage of neurologists, partly because of recent policy changes designed to improve diagnosis and treatment of mild traumatic brain injuries, according to a new military medical memorandum.

The policies, issued last June, require soldiers who have suffered three or more mild traumatic brain injuries in a year to receive a comprehensive evaluation by a neurologist or similarly qualified doctor. The military also set up a clinic in Afghanistan last year specifically to treat traumatic brain injury and mandated rest periods for soldiers exposed to blasts.

A U.N. torture investigator says he is frustrated at being denied an unmonitored visit to a U.S. Army private suspected of giving classified material to WikiLeaks. Juan Mendez says the U.S. government "has not been receptive to a confidential meeting" with Pfc. Bradley Manning.

Mr Mendez said in a statement on Monday that a monitored conversation would be counter to the practice of his U.N. mandate.

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With the stress of ongoing combat in three nations now roiling the military, Capitol Hill lawmakers are concerned that America's armed forces might be facing yet another strain — getting high.

Two longtime senators on Wednesday made their case that synthetic marijuana is taking an especially heavy toll on troops — and they urged the military to play a bigger role in getting the problem under control.

In a letter last week to Defense Secretary Robert Gates, Sens. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., and Charles Grassley, R-Iowa, said the drugs "pose a risk to the operational readiness of our armed forces."

The cliche notwithstanding, there are atheists in foxholes.

In fact, atheists, agnostics, humanists and other assorted skeptics from the Army's Fort Bragg have formed an organization they hope will be a pioneering effort to ensure fair treatment and win recognition for nonbelievers in the overwhelmingly Christian U.S. military.

"We exist, we're here, we're normal," said Sgt. Justin Griffith, chief organizer of Military Atheists and Secular Humanists, or MASH. "We're also in foxholes. That's a big one, right there."

An Army effort to reduce suicides by sharing more of soldiers' personal therapy information with squad, platoon or company leaders — even in cases where there is no threat of self-harm — is pushing the limit of privacy laws, say civilian experts on medical records restrictions.

Soldiers may be discouraged from seeking care if they fear their privacy will be violated, says Mark Botts, an associate professor of public law at the University of North Carolina who specializes in the privacy of behavioral health records.