Free Republic

Maj. Nidal Malik Hasan, the Army psychiatrist charged with killing 13 people in a shooting spree at Fort Hood and wounding dozens of others, begins an arduous legal process today that could end in his death. The Article 32 proceeding, as it is called, could run for more than a month with Col. James Pohl sifting through the evidence. Pohl's task will be to gather evidence and then tell higher-level commanders if a trial should be ordered. It isn't clear how Hasan's lawyer, himself a former military judge, will counter testimony, likely from GIs in a crowded Fort Hood deployment...

At the end of Sunday’s Face the Nation on CBS, host Bob Schieffer offered commentary on the cause of the mass shooting at Fort Hood: “That doctor [Major Nidal Hasan] should not have been at Fort Hood. I don’t care how hard-up the Army is for mental health professionals....sadly, this shows the Army still does not take protecting soldiers’ mental health as seriously as it does training them to shoot.” Schieffer went on to argue: “And then there is the other part that often happens in government. Don’t deal with the problem, shuffle it off to somewhere else. When he...

“U.S. intelligence agencies were aware months ago that Army Major Nidal Hasan was attempting to make contact with people associated with al Qaeda, two American officials briefed on classified material in the case told ABC News.” http://abcnews.go.com/Blotter/fort-hood-shooter-contact-al-qaeda-terrorists-officials/story?id=9030873 “Months ago”!!! Yet Hasan was allowed to remain in the Army and, for all we know, was not placed under heavy surveillance!? WHY!? Just like when it comes to light that a school district or a church kept a known child-molester on staff and covered it up by shuffling him or her around, the powers that be in our military, political and intelligence...