Post-traumatic stress disorder

[Dr. Winston O'Boogie]

Yesterday's events at Ft. Hood were perpetrated by an army psychologist about to be sent to Iraq.

At the same time, I'm reading an article in Rolling Stone about an infantryman diagnosed with PTSD going on a crime spree in Colorado.

These events have got me thinking. We hear a lot more about soldiers today coming back from war and freaking out than we did in prior wartime eras. Why? Is it because the warfare is so radically different? Is sweeping a village that different in Iraq than it was in Vietnam? Than it was in Germany? Or are we treating our soldiers differently? Training them differently?

Or is it another case of the age of media (and selective memory)? Do we hear about more cases because there are more cases to hear about, or because there is more media to report on it?