Another reason why dogs are man's best friends: Service dogs help vets deal with PTSD

You only have to look in that box titled "AMERICAblog Reader Pets" in the upper right hand corner of this site to see how much we all love their pets. We've received hundreds and hundreds of pet photos -- and they keep coming. Last week, John -- finally -- joined the rank of pet owners. So, all the animal lovers should read this article from today's New York Times about dogs who have come to the aid of vets dealing with PTSD:

The dogs to whom they credit their improved health are not just pets. Rather, they are psychiatric service dogs specially trained to help traumatized veterans leave the battlefield behind as they reintegrate into society.

Because of stories like these, the federal government, not usually at the forefront of alternative medical treatments, is spending several million dollars to study whether scientific research supports anecdotal reports that the dogs might speed recovery from the psychological wounds of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.

In dozens of interviews, veterans and their therapists reported drastic reductions in P.T.S.D. symptoms and in reliance on medication after receiving a service dog.

The article is really worth a read. And, hat tip to Senator Al Franken:

Under a bill written by Senator Al Franken, Democrat of Minnesota, veterans with P.T.S.D. will get service dogs as part of a pilot program run by the Department of Veterans Affairs. Training a psychiatric service dog and pairing it with a client costs more than $20,000. The government already helps provide dogs to soldiers who lost their sight or were severely wounded in combat, but had never considered placing dogs for emotional damage.

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Senegal unveils expensive, sexist eyesore statue

(AFP/Getty photo)
Besides looking as ugly as just about every statue around the world by a communist country artist, it's ridiculously sexist. At a minimum, let's hope the proceeds actually make it to the children. Read the rest of this post...

Florida doctor who posted sign about not wanting Obama supporters has no idea what's in health reform bill

Teabaggers will be teabaggers no matter how much education they have. Audio of the interview inside the link. Alan Colmes:

Cassell: Hospice cuts in 2012…Does the government want people to die slowly?
Colmes: Do you really think the government wants people dead?
Cassell: Well I think that they’re cutting all supportive care, like nursing homes, ambulance services…
Colmes: What to you mean they’re cutting nursing homes?
Cassell: They’re cutting nursing home reimbursements
Colmes: Isn’t what they’re cutting under the Medicare plan what was really double dipping; they were getting credits and they were getting to deduct them at the same time.
Cassell: Well you know, I can’t tell you exactly what the deal is.
Colmes: If you can’t tell us exactly what the deal is, why are you opposing it and fighting against it?
Cassell: I’m not the guy who wrote the plan.
Colmes: But if you don’t know what the deal is why are you speaking out against something you don’t know what the deal is?
Cassell: What I get online, just like any other American. What I’m supposed to understand about the bill should be available to me.
Colmes: It is; it’s been online for a long time; it’s also been all over the media…

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Vatican again plays the 'petty gossip' card for Easter mass

They don't get it and they won't. When stories from around the world of raping children and hiding the accused keep emerging, it's serious. When the Pope himself is linked time after time, it's well beyond another simple problem for the church. The longer they punt on this issue and blame everyone else instead of accepting responsibility and showing serious actions, the faster they will drive people away. The Vatican has yet to realize the victims here are not inside the Vatican walls, but around the world. They raped children and then focused on protecting their own interests instead of the kids. Absolutely clueless.

A leading cardinal, making an unusual address in defense of Pope Benedict at the start of Easter Sunday Mass, said the Church would not be intimidated by "petty gossip" about sexual abuse of children by priests.

The surprise speech by Cardinal Angelo Sodano was believed to be the first time in recent memory that the ritual of a papal Easter Sunday Mass was changed to allow someone to address the pope at the start.

The change of protocol indicated just how much the Vatican is feeling the pressure from a growing scandal concerning sexual abuse of children by priests and reports of a possible cover-up that have inched ever closer to the pope himself.

"Holy Father, the people of God are with you and will not let themselves be influenced by the petty gossip of the moment, by the trials that sometimes assail the community of believers," Sodano said.

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Sunday Talk Shows Open Thread

Good morning and Happy Easter to all who are celebrating.

In the wake of some good news about job creation last week, the talk shows today are focusing on the economy today. ABC's "This Week" hosts two of the people who set us on the path to fiscal destruction: Larry Summers and Alan Greenspan. Both were advocates of the deregulation and profiteering that led to the financial meltdown. Summers, representing the Obama administration, is on CNN, too. Christine Romer, who chairs the White House Council of Economic Advisers, makes an appearance on "Meet the Press."

CBS has no real guests, but is hosting one of those all-important journalist roundtables.

Here's the full lineup. Read the rest of this post...

Elvis Costello - Shipbuilding

So what are the plans for Easter where you are? Jojo arrives back in town later today and we're meeting her family for Easter dinner. Hopefully there is a leg of lamb involved and maybe a piece of chocolate or two.

Outside is looks like yesterday morning. The sky is gray and it looks like rain at any minute. I took a chance and ran out between rain storms yesterday and my luck ran out a few kilometers from home. I made it back soaking wet and cold. Somehow the sun popped out for the rest of the day around 30 minutes after arriving. The forecast said rain all day. Oh well, I'll try again today and hope the sun opens up while I'm out there. Read the rest of this post...

Senior Tory politician: gays allowed at big name hotels, but not necessarily B&Bs;

So basically they're the slimy types that everyone expected from the beginning. What else are they lying about in order to win the next election? Recently there had been a problem with a British B&B; who refused a gay couple, which is against the law. The Tories, who are very likely to win the elections later this year, have been trying to renovate their image as upper crust windbags who refuse to change. It increasingly appears as though nothing has changed at all. What kind of bizarre logic is this?

The Tories were embroiled in a furious row over lesbian and gay rights on Saturday after the shadow home secretary, Chris Grayling, was secretly taped suggesting that people who ran bed and breakfasts in their homes should "have the right" to turn away homosexual couples.

The comments, made by Grayling last week to a leading centre-right thinktank, drew an angry response from gay groups and other parties, which said they were evidence that senior figures in David Cameron's party still tolerate prejudice.

In a recording of the meeting of the Centre for Policy Studies, obtained by the Observer, Grayling makes clear he has always believed that those who run B&Bs; should be free to turn away guests.

"I think we need to allow people to have their own consciences," he said. "I personally always took the view that, if you look at the case of should a Christian hotel owner have the right to exclude a gay couple from a hotel, I took the view that if it's a question of somebody who's doing a B&B; in their own home, that individual should have the right to decide who does and who doesn't come into their own home."

He draws a distinction, however, with hotels, which he says should admit gay couples. "If they are running a hotel on the high street, I really don't think that it is right in this day and age that a gay couple should walk into a hotel and be turned away because they are a gay couple, and I think that is where the dividing line comes."

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