Daniel Somers was an Iraq war veteran who took his own life
This is a clip of his band. This music is particularly good.
http://blogs.phoenixnewtimes.com/uponsun/2013/06/dan-somers-death-lisa-savidge.php
Daniel was just 30 yeas old. He left this letter
.........................
You must not blame yourself. The simple truth is this: During my first deployment, I was made to participate in things, the enormity of which is hard to describe. War crimes, crimes against humanity. Though I did not participate willingly, and made what I thought was my best effort to stop these events, there are some things that a person simply can not come back from. I take some pride in that, actually, as to move on in life after being part of such a thing would be the mark of a sociopath in my mind. These things go far beyond what most are even aware of.
To force me to do these things and then participate in the ensuing coverup is more than any government has the right to demand. Then, the same government has turned around and abandoned me. They offer no help, and actively block the pursuit of gaining outside help via their corrupt agents at the DEA. Any blame rests with them.
Beyond that, there are the host of physical illnesses that have struck me down again and again, for which they also offer no help. There might be some progress by now if they had not spent nearly twenty years denying the illness that I and so many others were exposed to. Further complicating matters is the repeated and severe brain injuries to which I was subjected, which they also seem to be expending no effort into understanding. What is known is that each of these should have been cause enough for immediate medical attention, which was not rendered.
Lastly, the DEA enters the picture again as they have now managed to create such a culture of fear in the medical community that doctors are too scared to even take the necessary steps to control the symptoms. All under the guise of a completely manufactured “overprescribing epidemic,” which stands in stark relief to all of the legitimate research, which shows the opposite to be true. Perhaps, with the right medication at the right doses, I could have bought a couple of decent years, but even that is too much to ask from a regime built upon the idea that suffering is noble and relief is just for the weak.
However, when the challenges facing a person are already so great that all but the weakest would give up, these extra factors are enough to push a person over the edge.
Is it any wonder then that the latest figures show 22 veterans killing themselves each day? That is more veterans than children killed at Sandy Hook, every single day. Where are the huge policy initiatives? Why isn’t the president standing with thosefamilies at the state of the union? Perhaps because we were not killed by a single lunatic, but rather by his own system of dehumanization, neglect, and indifference.
It leaves us to where all we have to look forward to is constant pain, misery, poverty, and dishonor. I assure you that, when the numbers do finally drop, it will merely be because those who were pushed the farthest are all already dead.
And for what? Bush’s religious lunacy? Cheney’s ever growing fortune and that of his corporate friends? Is this what we destroy lives for
Since then, I have tried everything to fill the void. I tried to move into a position of greater power and influence to try and right some of the wrongs. I deployed again, where I put a huge emphasis on saving lives. The fact of the matter, though, is that any new lives saved do not replace those who were murdered. It is an exercise in futility.
Then, I pursued replacing destruction with creation. For a time this provided a distraction, but it could not last. The fact is that any kind of ordinary life is an insult to those who died at my hand. How can I possibly go around like everyone else while the widows and orphans I created continue to struggle? If they could see me sitting here in suburbia, in my comfortable home working on some music project they would be outraged, and rightfully so.
I thought perhaps I could make some headway with this film project, maybe even directly appealing to those I had wronged and exposing a greater truth, but that is also now being taken away from me. I fear that, just as with everything else that requires the involvement of people who can not understand by virtue of never having been there, it is going to fall apart as careers get in the way.
The last thought that has occurred to me is one of some kind of final mission. It is true that I have found that I am capable of finding some kind of reprieve by doing things that are worthwhile on the scale of life and death. While it is a nice thought to consider doing some good with my skills, experience, and killer instinct, the truth is that it isn’t realistic. First, there are the logistics of financing and equipping my own operation, then there is the near certainty of a grisly death, international incidents, and being branded a terrorist in the media that would follow. What is really stopping me, though, is that I simply am too sick to be effective in the field anymore. That, too, has been taken from me.
Thus, I am left with basically nothing. Too trapped in a war to be at peace, too damaged to be at war. Abandoned by those who would take the easy route, and a liability to those who stick it out—and thus deserve better. So you see, not only am I better off dead, but the world is better without me in it
This is what brought me to my actual final mission. Not suicide, but a mercy killing. I know how to kill, and I know how to do it so that there is no pain whatsoever. It was quick, and I did not suffer. And above all, now I am free. I feel no more pain. I have no more nightmares or flashbacks or hallucinations. I am no longer constantly depressed or afraid or worried
I am free.
I ask that you be happy for me for that. It is perhaps the best break I could have hoped for. Please accept this and be glad for me.
Daniel Somers
Also this band is on facebook .
= new reply since forum marked as read
Besides living with the "crimes against humanity" that he was forced to participate in, is he referring to the way that the DEA has
scared Dr.'s into not prescribing adequate pain medicine?
I have been a victim of this also. Many Dr.'s, including my previous one, have chosen to quit "medicine" because he DEA makes their life hell if they prescribe adequate amounts of pain medicines. If you protest these DEA imposed rules, then you are deemed a "drug seeker." It does not matter how much proof (MRI's, etc..) that you have to document your injuries.
A new medical specialty has grown out of these restrictions. "Pain management" is a new specialty. The one time that I went to one of these clinics, I was appalled. These (hugely overpriced) Dr.'s were treating their patients like junkies. They joked among themselves, dehumanizing things about their patients. One Dr. made his patient do some "exercises" ?) that were obviously meant to aggravate his
physical ailment, and then spoke down to him as if he were a toddler.." guess you earned an oxy for that."
I left. I refused pain meds for over a year while I deteriorated. Finally my family Dr. at the time (he has since passed on) explained to me the difference between addiction and dependency for a proven medical injury (chronic). This same (great) Dr. had set up free outpatient rehab centers in the community to get addicts off of drugs. He also founded a church with outreach programs for addicts and people in need.
I had voluntarily sought out a pain management clinic because the $700 a spinal shot had ceased to give me relief and NSAIDS were anathema to my heart disease when they worked.
Over the passage of time it has become almost impossible (in TN.) to be treated by my family physician for my chronic injuries. They want you to go to pain management clinics and be treated like junkies, because the DEA monitors ALL opioid prescriptions and makes the prescribing Dr. jump through hoops every month, even though he is treating a well documented, chronic condition.
If you are wealthy, I am sure there are different guidelines.
This poor man had it coming from all angles in America, Inc.
extremely sad. They are trying to rehab bushmonkey's legacy? This is his and Cheney's legacy. Rumsfeld, Rice. Do you know what 4-5-6 deployments to a zone of war can do to a person? I spent thirteen months, in Viet Nam, at a base camp in the boonies, with frequent trips, as 'convoy' shotgun, to other bases. I was not wrapped too tight upon returning home. These men and women veterans of the Oil War in Iraq were done wrong. In the beginning they were sent into harms way WITHOUT the proper equipment by rumsfeld, no proper armored vehicles, body armor and much more egregious neglect of our troops. How as a veteran can I respect a system like this that has done irreparable harm to veterans like Daniel Somers. I hope there is an everlasting 'hell' of suffering, after death, for these people that caused this type of personal suffering.
