3 thoughts on “Making Light of Troop Deaths”

  1. The story was taken by the Indian web site from CBS News. It’s been around for a while, I know, because this month’s edition of a motorcycle magazine I read has a column on the subject. And that magazine’s production schedule is at least two months behind breaking news. It’s quite possible CBS found it the same place I did.
    The story is clearly intended to mislead from the first two paras. Initially, we are told that more returning troops have been killed riding than were killed fighting in Afghanistan. The next para immediately injects Iraq into a possible explanation, though nothing has been said about the rate of motorcycle deaths of returnees from Iraq! (See: motorcycles more dangerous than Iraq!)
    The interesting statistics to have would be:
    (1) the proportion of all combat-ready troops who ride
    (2) the proportion of those who suffer motorcycl accidents
    (3) the proportion of those who are fatally injured
    These could then be compared to similar figures for returning troops. I’d like to know whether combat experience in these wars makes risk-taking behavior even more likely than it is among the overall peer group of combat-ready soldiers.
    It might just be that a large number of motorcycling deaths among returnees is yet another *result* of Bush’s war.

  2. Well, the right-wing blogs would do that, wouldn’t they? It’s called ‘compassionate conservatism’, I believe ..

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