Crossposted from Flopping Aces

The NYT’s continues in their long storied tradition of complete and utter bias by running a front page story that portrays our war veterans as a bunch of psychotic murderers:

Town by town across the country, headlines have been telling similar stories. Lakewood, Wash.: “Family Blames Iraq After Son Kills Wife.” Pierre, S.D.: “Soldier Charged With Murder Testifies About Postwar Stress.” Colorado Springs: “Iraq War Vets Suspected in Two Slayings, Crime Ring.”

Individually, these are stories of local crimes, gut-wrenching postscripts to the war for the military men, their victims and their communities. Taken together, they paint the patchwork picture of a quiet phenomenon, tracing a cross-country trail of death and heartbreak.

The New York Times found 121 cases in which veterans of Iraq and Afghanistan committed a killing in this country, or were charged with one, after their return from war. In many of those cases, combat trauma and the stress of deployment - along with alcohol abuse, family discord and other attendant problems - appear to have set the stage for a tragedy that was part destruction, part self-destruction.

Armed Liberal takes the Times to the woodshed in their basic statistic analysis, based on this Salon article that lists over a million war veterans in 2005:

From the October 1, 2001 start of the Afghanistan war, that’s about 26,000 troops/month. To date (Jan 2008) that would give about 1.99 million.

That means that the NY Times 121 murders represent about a 7.08/100,000 rate.

Now the numbers on deployed troops are probably high - fewer troops from 2001 - 2003; I’d love a better number if someone has it.

But for initial purposes, let’s call the rate 10/100,000, about 40% higher than the calculated one.

Now, how does that compare with the population as a whole?

Turning to the DoJ statistics, we see that the US offender rate for homicide in the 18 - 24 yo range is 26.5/100,000.For 25 - 34, it’s 13.5/100,000.

See the problem?

And a commenter to Armed Liberals post:

Even without the data, we can do some sensitivity analysis.

Let N be the number of Iraq/Afghanistan veterans.

The murder rates would be identical if

121/N = 26.5/100,000

That is, if N is approximately 457,000. If N is greater than 457,000, then the murder rate among I/A veterans is less than the general population (age 18-24), and if it is less, the murder rate is greater.

If all veterans were in the 25-34 age range, then the break-even point becomes about 896,000. We can be pretty confident that the actual break-even point is somewhere in between.

Bottom line: If we can be reasonably confident that the number of Iraq/Afghanistan veterans currently in civilian life is more than about 500,000, then AL is right.

Since we know there was well over 500,000 war veterans we now also know the Times narrative is false. The murder rate for Iraq/Afghanistan war veterans is UNDER the rate of the general population.

Does the Times report on that fact? Nope. Instead they do their very best to propagate another false narrative, as they falsely did to our Vietnam veterans, that they are nothing but psycho’s looking to kill.

Anything to show the world that Iraq = bad, Bush = wrong. Neither is true, but the narrative must be spread. Who cares if they slander our troops, who cares if they ignore stat’s that go against the narrative.

Is it any wonder their paper is going down the tubes?

also:

Get Ready For The PC Show

This latest Obama racism charge against Hillary should be taken as a warning that come the general both barrels of the PC Double Standard shotgun are going to be loaded and ready to blast holes into the Republican contender.

Sen. Barack Obama’s presidential campaign has prepared a detailed memo listing various instances in which it perceived Sen. Hillary Clinton’s campaign to have deliberately played the race card in the Democratic primary.

The memo, which was obtained by the Huffington Post and has been made public elsewhere, is believed to have been given to an activist and contains mostly excerpts from different media reports. It lists the contact info and name of Obama’s South Carolina press secretary, Amaya Smith, and is broken down into five incidents in which either Clinton, her husband Bill, or campaign surrogates made comments that could be interpreted as racially insensitive.

The document provides an indication that, in private, the Obama campaign is seeking to capitalize on the view - and push the narrative - that the Clintons are using race-related issues for political leverage.

Now here is the thing. The MSM isn’t going all gung-ho on this issue yet because, well, it’s Hillary. Once the two candidates have been decided you can bet your ass that the MSM will be unloading on the white Republican contender if Obama is the Democrat nominee. Anything the Republican says will be answered with RACIST!

But for now we get to eat popcorn and watch as the double standards get strewed around like this typical episode noticed by Allah:

See, for example, this comically anguished semi-apology from Josh Marshall to his readers for even covering the racial angles, urging them to exercise caution in jumping to conclusions about ill intent and command and control. This is the same guy, you’ll recall, whose outfit gleefully accused the GOP of racism last year for running an ad targeting Harold Ford that dared to feature timpani — drums — in the background.

We all remember that episode. The horror! Timpani drums!

Now imagine what will happen in the general.

But if Obama loses and Hillary is the nominee guess what kind of calls we will get? Sexism!

Ace:

So that’s where the Democrats’ fifty years of identity politics have gotten them: If Hillary loses, the party is sexist. If Obama loses, the party is racist.

What a sad and pathetic state the Democrat party is in.