NEW ARTICLES ON THE VIRGINIA TECH KILLINGS

CHO, THE VIRGINIA MURDERS, AND THE DRUG QUESTION

APRIL 18, 2007. Reports have surfaced that the accused murderer of 33 people at Virginia Tech was briefly under medical care for depression. So the question naturally arises: was he taking SSRI antidepressants? Prozac? Zoloft? Paxil?

These drugs are known to cause suicides and murders. That is, the person taking them kills himself or others.

Glaxo, the maker of Paxil, has been under the gun for some time now, because it knew Paxil had problems and concealed those problems from the FDA and doctors and the public.

The lawsuits against Glaxo, sitting in line like ships waiting to dock, have mainly concerned so-called "discontinuation syndrome." This is a fancy euphemism for "withdrawal effects." In other words, the drug makes addicts. And when people try to withdraw from it, even gradually, all sorts of hell can break out.

But under the surface, there is more. I'll lead up to that by quoting from an excellent April 26, 2006, article published at Scoop, and written by Evelyn Pringle. My comments are in brackets.

"The withdrawal syndrome is real and in fact, it is now known that infants of women who take SSRIs in the last 3 months of pregnancy, may experience symptoms of withdrawal, including convulsions, according to a study published in the February 4, 2005 issue of the journal Lancet.

[DID YOU GET THAT? CONVULSIONS IN INFANTS. JR]

"In addition, experts warn against the use of Paxil and other SSRIs with children. According to Fred Baughman Jr, MD, an adult and child neurologist in private practice for 35 years, 'most antidepressants have not proved effective in treating depression in children and some studies suggest they may cause some children to become acutely suicidal.'

"Yet in 2002, Dr Baughman says, 'nearly 11 million prescriptions for the drugs were given to children, 2.7 million of them to children under 12.'

[IT ISN'T JUST STREET DRUGS, FOLKS. JR]

"A report by an expert witness , previously sealed with a protective order, reveals how Glaxo concealed and manipulated data concerning Paxil-induced suicidality and how suicide attempts in studies by patients on Paxil were underreported and attempts by people taking a placebo were inflated.

[HELLO. GLAXO SAID SUICIDES WERE FEWER THAN THEY WERE. THEY ALSO CLAIMED SUICIDE ATTEMPTS IN THE CONTROL GROUP, THE PEOPLE TAKING A SUGAR PILL, WERE HIGHER THAN THEY REALLY WERE. TO MAKE IT SEEM THAT PAXIL DID NOT POSE A THREAT TO COMMIT SUICIDE. GET IT? JR]

"Excerpts from the report were published by psychiatrist, Peter Breggin, MD, in Ethical Human Psychology and Psychiatry, (Volume 8, Spring 2006, pp. 77-84). Dr Breggin is a founder of the International Center for the Study of Psychiatry and Psychology (ICSPP) and the author of the Antidepressant Fact Book (2001).

"His report also documents how Glaxo hid the incidence of akathisia (agitation with hyperactivity) and stimulation, which he says, are known risk factors for suicidality and violence.

Dr Breggin's original report was based on a 3-day review of Glaxo's sealed files, and was written for the California case of Lacuzong v GSK, and attached to a July 21, 2001, affidavit submitted in a case filed by the widow of a man who drowned their two children and himself in a tub after taking Paxil for three days.

[A MAN TAKES PAXIL FOR 3 DAYS AND THEN KILLS HIS CHILDREN AND HIMSELF. JR]

"At Glaxo's insistence, the report remained sealed. However, in the more recent case of Moffett v Glaxo, in the US District Court for the South District of Mississippi, the report was filed in the public record.

"'The drug companies,' says Dr Breggin, 'settle almost all legal cases brought against them in order to seal incriminating scientific data.'

[IN ORDER TO HIDE THE TRUTH. THE DRUG COMPANY AGREES TO PAY THE PLAINTIFF A LOT OF MONEY, ON THE CONDITION THAT THE DETAILS OF THE RELEVANT REPORTS ARE BURIED. JR]

"'The publication of a previously sealed medical expert report is a rare event,' he explains, 'the first in my experience.'"

End of Scoop snip

How do you like those apples? "Well, sure, some people who take our drug kill themselves or other people, but that's OUR information. We don't have to tell anybody about it. I mean, the drug is our property, so then all the information pertaining to it that we discover is ours, too."

So the question again: was Cho taking one of these SSRI antidepressants?

Following me so far? I hope you are. I have one more wrinkle to feed you.

The drug companies definitely do NOT want a very clear law to pass WITH MUCH PUBLICITY---a law that states they CAN conceal any information they want to about their drugs. Why not? Because then it would be open hunting. People, doctors, whoever, could say, "Screw you. Since you can hide any adverse effects you want to, we won't use your drugs." The drug companies want to slime along the fence in the dark, without publicity, without notice. They want to exist in a gray area between some revealing and some concealing. And they're willing to pay for this privilege with big cash settlements in lawsuits. They know the numbers. They've figured out how much they can give away and still make out like bandits on the sales of their drugs.

An interesting business, the drug business.

JON RAPPOPORT www.nomorefakenews.com

"HE LOOKED AT ME CROSS-EYED IN THE HALL"

APRIL 18, 2007. And now come the profilers. Seems the Secret Service (??) did a 2002 study on school shootings in the US. Based on the results, MSNBC reports that:

"In more than three out of four school shootings, the attacker had made no threat against the schoolteachers or students. But most attackers engaged in some behavior prior to the incident that caused others concern or indicated a need for help. The attackers posed a threat even though they hadn't made a threat."

"'Schools can do a lot more to deal with such concerns,' said one of the authors of the study.

"'The notion that a concerned teacher who tries to get someone to counseling and that there are no other options if the student refuses to go - that seems much too limited,' one of the report's co-authors, psychologist Robert A. Fein, told MSNBC.com on Wednesday. He has consulted with federal agencies on targeted violence, including terrorism, school shootings and workplace violence.

"'I understand that students in college are not high school kids,' Fein said, 'but schools should be able to do better than that. This is not to cast blame on anyone. There's no cookie-cutter solution, and there probably are lots of "right ways," but the notion of having a team that can gather and examine information and determine "we may have a problem here" and then work to figure out what to do, or ask others, or keep working on it, still makes sense to me.'"

end of MSNBC snip

The idea here is that the "team" of teachers, dept. heads, counselors, psychologists and cops would---working from a profile match provided by teachers and students---anticipate a crime and a criminal.

You can see what would evolve, given that the basic profile is so vague. Another item emerged in the MSNBC story. Administration concerns at Virginia Tech about Cho---before he went on his rampage---could not be reported to his parents. There is some law against that. Wonderful. Suddenly, the student is cut loose from his family. Who the hell thought up that one? Colleges are worried about whether their insurance covers parents suing them for "wrongful pre-concern" about their kid?

Anyway, the snitch culture just got another boost.

"Fred just posted a poem about me at MySpace. It was a sullen poem. I think he imagines me when he, you know, does himself. And he flashed his cell phone at me the other day outside the dorm. I don't know whether he took a picture of me or not. I thought you should know. I hear he's spent the last three Saturday nights alone in his room. He won't drink beer at pep rallies. I saw him carrying a copy of Catcher in the Wheat, or whatever that porno book is…"

JON RAPPOPORT www.nomorefakenews.com

STUDENTS: FROM NOW ON, WRITE ABOUT FRUIT

APRIL 18, 2007. Suddenly this kid Cho is not only a murderer, he's a writer. NBC got an eyeful today. Everybody has an interpretation. Persecution complex. Dark soul. No one can know what pain he felt. Madman. Profane. Twisted. Malevolent. Thinks he's Jesus.

I can just hear a creative writing teacher somewhere out in a college in Indiana: "Mr. Jones, what did you mean when you said 'America kills its own.'"

"Were you feeling angry when you wrote that? Where do you think that anger comes from?"

"Have you considered seeing a psychologist? Because it seems to me you're expressing some borderline dangerous ideas in your piece."

"Excuse me, I have to call campus security."

"We have a WRITER here who has made some threatening comments in an essay he turned in. All the other students wrote about bananas and how good they taste, or the bed and breakfast they stayed in with their parents on summer vacation in New Hampshire…"

"And by the way, he also made a reference to President Bush. He said his IQ was on a par with a lamp. Do you want to call the Secret Service…oh, Homeland Security. Good. We'll all be here. I don't think he's armed."

That's the teacher. The student is thinking: "Should I leave that sentence in my story? The instructor might think I'm a nutcase. And what about this phrase over here? Maybe I'd better re-write the whole thing. Make it about bananas."

Cho, the accused murderer, and Cho the writer. The crime was murder. The writing was writing. Of course, everyone's a psychologist now. Everyone has a handle on inner problems, and the right phrases to describe them. Clinical phrases. Bullshit phrases.

"Dear Louella, Last night I went to a rock and roll concert. The lead singer took off his pants. I thought it was disgusting. But my feelings aside, do you think it might have been a symptom of something more troubling? Might he be getting ready to do something violent? I believe in prevention. If there is a way to stop people before they do terrible things, we should intervene. How else can we protect ourselves? Anyway, cleanliness is next to godliness. The lighting in the arena was dim, but I thought I saw a stain on his underwear."

JON RAPPOPORT www.nomorefakenews.com

A NATION PROGRAMMED TO GRIEVE AND CONCEAL THE CRIME

APRIL 18, 2007. Do you ever get a weird feeling when the candlelight vigil and the healing slogans come zooming in so soon after the mass crime? I do.

Who sets up these phony ceremonies? And why?

Speaking for myself, I'd be monumentally pissed off after a mass murder. I'd be shocked, sure, but I'd also want to find out what really happened. Wouldn't you?

Don't you think the 25,000 students at Virginia Tech want to know a few things, before they hold hands and sway to the sounds of some authority-figure summing up the whole deal for them?

But you see, anger is out of fashion. We're supposed to be smug---or in the absence of that, grief-stricken. The smug people are the ones who are bankable. They have their cars and their houses and their security systems and, most of all, their professional reputations. They think they know something. They really know very little, but that doesn't stop their Onslaught of bullshit pretense. They're crafty enough to realize they can't afford to get down in the dirt and really investigate a crime of this kind.

A crime is an interesting thing. It has answers. You can find them if you look hard enough. The cops normally don't look very hard. They assemble a pile of crap details, most of which are irrelevant. They have to look like they're working. Sometimes, they have to cover for other people.

I wonder what the 25,000 students at Virginia Tech would think if they learned that this kid had been taking SSRI antidepressants---and if on top of that they found out those drugs cause some patients to commit murder. I wonder what they'd do. Probably nothing. Because they were zombies before they became Zombies.

Students are mostly zombies.

The grief vigil and the artifact called mass healing are jive. Let's face it. They're a lot like religion: a truckload of promises and not much delivery. Mainly, people just tell themselves healing is happening.

"Well, 33 people died, but in the aftermath I did make a few new friends, so that was good."

Welcome to the new and improved America.

"The networks are covering the vigil tonight. Let's go."

These events are, of course, staged to deflect people from the crime. They're fill-in. They substitute for the truth. On many levels.

Maybe the drug companies have reps to handle setting up the candles and the lights and the guitar player and the word in the president's ear that he should fly down and offer a few meaningless mumbles out of his mumble jar.

LET'S FIND OUT WHO REALLY DID THIS or LET'S FIND OUT WHY HE DID IT is replaced quickly by LET'S ALL GRIEVE TOGETHER and LET'S HEAL.

I see it as shoveling dirt on top of the corpses as fast as possible.

And if one or two parents of the dead students fly into a rage, there are people who show up to advise them: channel your emotion into more gun control.

STUDENT---PSYCHIATRIC DRUG---MURDERER….learning that mantra must be prevented…can't let that cat out of the bag.

I don't care if someone found God in the aftermath. I really don't. I don't care if people think they feel better because they lit candles. I don't care what the authorities are phoning in. I don't care what the suddenly sad-sack newscasters are laying on.

The nation has to heal together and move on. When did that horseshit start? What happened at Virginia Tech isn't about the nation. It's about whoever pulled the trigger.

Assuming this kid Cho did it (and I never automatically believe what I see on the tube), what made him kill people he didn't know? What made him blow half of his own head away? What made him so proficient with two guns? Start there. Forget "the nation." The nation is going down the toilet all on its own.

Meanwhile, down in Virginia, the grief counselors are riding over the hill with the remedies. It's all about post-traumatic stress and other related mumbo-jumbo. Calm everybody down. Get some of these kids on SSRIs.

I'm waiting for the mass shooting where a few of the survivors, newly loaded on the drugs, feel their brains scramble and then go out and do the same thing. Gives a new meaning to the term serial murder.

This is all about mass conditioned response. Ring the bell, the dogs drool. A few dozen people die, let's have a grief/healing ceremony and come together. And then "pick up the pieces and move on."

You can do that, you know. You can condition a whole population to respond in the way you want them to, no matter how insane it is. Stage enough grief vigils after mass murders and people EXPECT that to be the sequence.

"Now is the time for grief, sharing, caring, and healing."

"Oh, goody. I can do that. Let's go."

And then if you DON'T go along with the prescribed response, people say, "What's wrong with you? Don't you want to do the right thing? Don't you want to show sympathy and support? Are you indifferent? Are you inhuman?"

It's all a stage play. And this one will close down after a few weeks. Short run. Until the next time.

www.nomorefakenews.com