When you declare an epidemic, and then put no resources behind it, Madison will just become one city in a long list of those ripped apart by opioids...
3
I have family that lives in Madison, Indiana and after reading this article I am a little worried for them. I visit the scintillating city every year and I always thought that Madison was a cute little town that was filled with gaiety and exuberance. It was staggering when I read this because I never thought that this was such a main problem there. I agree with you that kids that have a lot of down time definitely have the higher risk of committing suicide, taking pills, or getting in some sort of trouble and the reason why they have downtime is mostly because their parents have to work late or they have multiple jobs so they are barely home.
I feel like more people need to be contributing to this situation because in this article it is only talking about the boys on the football team. What about everyone else? What could we do to help the others? It's tragic to read and hear about all of this violence and this needs to come to an end. I hate turning on the news and the first story that pops up is violence-related. I mean seriously!! I am sure everyone else in this world feels the same way. Trump needs to do something about this. He is the one leading us to a deep and dark hole that nobody can crawl out of.
2
I'm as liberal as they come, and at the end of this article my first thought was, How can I help? This article helped me set my politics aside with incredible clarity: we are all neighbors, and we should all be doing what we can to make sure these kids (and kids everywhere) get the best possible future - and the love and support they deserve.
9
Feeling great again Madison?
Seriously? I'm no Trump fan, but this goes much deeper and snark is the last thing these folks need. We're all Americans, right? Let's start acting like it.
9
Trump reaps what he sows.
1
"couples canoodling on benches." WOW this must have different meanings around different parts of the country. You would go to jail for canoodling in public here.
3
My thoughts while reading this article:
This is great for these boys but what about the ones who aren't on the team and (and this is a big one) what about the girls?
Why give selective help? I know the coach can only do so much and I commend him for what he's doing. Who's helping the other kids?
1
If you want resources, you'd better elect a new government. The current administration is hell bent on putting addicts in jail, and throwing away the key.
The doctors who push the drugs and the manufacturers who spend billions on marketing? Good luck holding them accountable.
9
This is what happens when you remove hope from a community. The US made its choice in the 70's to grant hegemony to "the market" and this is what the market has assigned as value to most of rural America.
8
what is the point of this story? in so many ways, it seems only about self inflicted pain, and first world problems. me me me.
1
What's first world about having parents who have to work two and three jobs to put food on the table and a roof over their kids heads? They neglect their children because they can make enough money at one job. Children are killing themselves, how about a little compassion?
8
New Hampshire in the NE & now Madison,Indiana in the Mid West have turned into "den of drugs".
It's an balmy Sunday afternoon for me,i always look forward to reading a few articles.
It gives me solace & i experience the world vicariously albeit with an bit of detached indifference.
Not so,this article.It tugs my heart.The pain of a family losing a child is heartrending.I am at loss to understand what it takes for a child to say enough is enough.I cannot even imagine the guilt & remorse the parent goes through,the constant reminder that something could have been done to save the child.
It's an tragedy,a folly of allowing peddlers of death in all corners of the road selling drugs & making it an cultural "in thing" to experiment with disastrous consequences.
Unless very tough decisions are taken,this tragedy will spread.
I hope Congress budgets for the WALL & increases personnel for deporting Schemers & illegal aliens on war footing.
Substantial drop in crime & peddling should take place.Hopefully.
May God give peace to the bereaved families.
1
The Patriots lost too, kids. Keep going.
How ironic that both VP Mike Pence and Indiana Gov. Eric Holcomb both went to Hanover College, just a few miles from Madison. Will either bring their respective government resources to bear on the problem. Not likely!
6
As we recently did an intervention on a family member, who gladly accepted a three month drug rehab program, our 17 year nightmare ended for the time being. The descent into opiates and heroin lasted for over 7 years. As the "Cassandra" in the family, I knew this person was using heroin and it was a horrible weight to bear, as it is a life or death drug, or a "dark spirit" as the Native Americans call that drug. We are fortunate to be able to afford this rehab, as the Affordable Care Act was never filled out and the cost for a three month rehab for detox, psychiatric and group therapy and job, work resume skills is no joke. It is no joke that school counselors, not just social workers have to be available for students in elementary, junior high and high school. Mental health screening must become the new norm with no shame and no blame for people with addiction and other afflictions. And there has to be an influx of well paying jobs in the arts, industry, manufacturing, health, sports, the environment, construction, and higher education that does not cost the price of buying a home.
8
This article was gut wrenching. So horrific. So sad. I kept reading in horror. I hope this town can get the resources needed to bring the situation under control.
6
This is life and death in trump's America. He's driving the country into a ditch.
4
Please try to be compassionate and open-minded. Trump didn’t cause this problem; it had already started before he took office. It’s a lot more complicated than an easy blame-game. Those of us fortunate not to live in this situation should open our hearts and ears instead of repeating easy answers.
6
This is the type of journalism that I grew up with reading The NY Times. Thank you for expending he resources for an investigational story of this nature. Unfortunately, your incessant Orwellian ads for "Truth" marred my educational experience. I wish you'd reconsider that your readers are not 3 year olds.
5
Problems festered under Mike Pence's administration and are being ignored by Trump's.
14
I myself am not from Madison, Indiana. Yet, after looking at these comments I can't help but feel mad, extraordinary mad.
Why does it matter that they are mostly white? That the population are mostly Christians? The article talks about about an American city that is in turmoil.
Don't try to put politics in this, I myself am a liberal, a young Asian liberal from the northeast (a small town near Princeton). And I can't help but be appalled.
We should be putting our differences to help fellow americans.
Not belittling and hurling insults at a town of Americans, one of us who are in one of the worst situations possible.
PUT YOUR DIFFFERENCES ASIDE.
No matter liberal or conservative, white or black, gay or straight, we all want the same things for fellow americans.
Not stop arguing with eachother and come together AND DO SOMETHING ABOUT THIS CRISIS THAT IS DESTROYING AMERICAN TOWNS AND CITIES.
To my fellow liberals, we often get awfully mad at conservatives calling them racists calling them "white supremacists" (I concede that they do DEFINITELY exist, but why are we painting a whole group of people with one brush?). Now let us look at the comment section here blaming such a crisis because they are white, and they like guns (I personally like gun control, but why bring it up?).
We are being racist back, two rights do not make a right my friends.
10
When I read this story I also was left hoping for these young people to get help. But what do so many people say about cities like Chicago? The continuing refrain I hear when a majority black city is beset by problems is often “black on black crime”, “why don’t you stop killing each other” and the like. So I agree that when we see a story like this about another community which happens to be majority white that we should seek solutions and not focus on race. But let’s do the same when it’s a black or other non white community.
3
It matters because if they weren't white, this story would never have been written.
1
Agreed, we can't approach people/cities differently, just because they have a different race, religion, or something of that sort.
Though you must concede that the opiod crisis has hit the Midwest the hardest, which is prodominatly white.
Don't bring yourselves down to their level and keep on the never ending cycle of hate.
Though I have to agree on the fact we don't see enough journalism about how unjust the criminal system is in America, how even when the general amount of juvenile delinquents are going down, the incarceration of black juvelinile delinquents have risen. Black youth are 300% more likely to be arrested for simple assault, The most common reason teens are arrested. Also there was this study recorded by Jennifer L. Eberhardt, a professor from Stanford. The study had shown that people (no matter what side of the aisle) support putting a black juvenile to death than their white counterparts.
The reality is that in Amercia there are a lot of problems we have to solve, we should stop focusing on what religion, race, or party affiliation they are and focusing on helping them.
Simultaneously heart-crushing and depressing, yet beautiful and uniquely human; this is one of the best pieces of journalism I think I’ve ever read. Thank you.
3
maybe marijuana is a gateway drug after all. now that folks can grow their own pot legally, established smuggling rings simply introduced a new product
Build the wall,break the cartels..if Mexico likes it or not.
Did the reporter try to find out why this small town has been flooded with these powerful prescription drugs? An investigation into the medical services in this community seems warranted. When my son broke his leg in college athletics, he told the surgeon he didn’t want opioids. Despite this, he was given a 30 day supply at a full dose of a powerful opioid after being released from the hospital 15 hours after having a titanium rod put through his bone. When he refused to take the drugs, and asked for a non-opioid painkiller, he was told over the counter acetaminophen was his only option. And this was at a highly respected urban research hospital. If this is what happens under excellent care, I have to wonder what happens at the other end of the care spectrum?
16
This article simply leaves me speechless. I can't help but believe that the disappearance of civility and common decency throughout the ranks of public life is a major contributor to this needless human tragedy and community decay.
Hats off to the selfless Patric Morrisons of the world. The supply of adults like Patric is so overwhelmed by demand for them, that the departure of the boomer generation can't come soon enough.
Young people, it's time to take over with brooms to sweep your elders out the door.
3
We need more Patric Morrisons in this world, in whatever field of endeavor they choose. Coach Morrison, keep up your beautiful work, in spite of the heartbreak. What you are doing is important; you are saving and shaping lives. Thank you.
4
Patric Morrison - the hero in this story, keep up the great work.
10
Joblessness, working at 2 or 3 of the low quality jobs remaining, despair; all this after the offshoring of our productive jobs 10 or 20 years ago. Now we face the advent of conscious robots and thinking machines taking away the remaining jobs and a society with no plans for that future, as we earlier faced a society with no plans to help those people whose jobs went to China or Mexico.
I am both vindicated and incensed by this article. We have known this town was smoldering with drug abuse, neglect, and mental illness. However, throughout the past 10 years, it's as though someone poured gasoline on the smoldering pit and that wildfire is still burning. As an employee of this school system for years, I know that teachers have been told that the special services referral rate was too high so we had to refer less. We've watched as school counselors fumble through their careers with no accountability. We've watched as children have been neglected by drug addled parents. We have accepted all students in the classroom and then been charged with the duty of implementing a positive behavior system with many violent children with no consequences whatsoever.
We expect nothing from the parents in this town and that's exactly the amount of parenting we are receiving...none. Teachers have watched, cried, and even become physically ill from all of it. What can we do?
I am driven to the sad fact that I won’t be able to, nor would I want to, see my own children return to live in this community, and they are currently some of this community’s most positive products and hope. I’m angry about how abused we are as classroom teachers in this system that has become a breeding ground for the disease described in this article. I am sad and I am tired.
23
This article is a beautiful example of what one caring adult can do.
I’m an East Coaster and the mean spiritedness and contempt displayed in some of these comments just horrified me.
I’m thinking of the children in this article and the people of this town who bravely told their stories suddenly on a national/world stage going online to read these comments and my heart breaks.
We are all Americans. This town needs our kindness, empathy and support.
8
stories like this are why sports matter.
20
Yes, but stories like this demonstrate why caring matters, too
1
While I'm in complete agreement that well-run sports programs are a fantastic way to provide structure and support to those who need it most, along with build valuable skills.
However, with so much new information about the long-term brain damage caused by football, does it really seem like the best sport we can encourage teenagers to get involved in?
5
When the unemployment rate is 4% but the child poverty rate is 20%, that's why despair is driving people to seek relief in drugs or escape through suicide. Hamsters on a wheel, that's what too many of our neighbors are these days. Working and working but getting nowhere. It's depressing to read about. Think if you had to live it.
32
Being an 18 year old in Madison. it's kinda disappointing to see some of these comments almost trying to make us feel like we're doing something wrong just because of where we grew up. you'll never live where I do. How I do. Like I do. I've seen the addiction. The drugs. I've seen my friends die. and all you care to do is speculate and criticize. I hope you all have more humanity towards other people. I hope you're child never goes through what my high school has been through in the past 4 years alone.
90
I visited Madison two years ago on a cross country trip and it seemed the All American story with great history and community. https://instagram.com/p/BHYCjELDXX8/
5
I live in Jeffersonville and I love Madison, such a beautiful place. I see the hope and resilience in this story and I hope you do, too. Sending you much love <3
13
Please know that there are many more people who read this article and would like to help, not criticize. My brother has been an addict since he was 17. He is now 54 and still struggling. We are a white, middle class family on the east coast. Addiction does not discriminate.
6
Aren't these "super-predators'" though? (Irony). The Rockefeller Drug Laws, mandating long prison sentences, began due to an inner-city heron epidemic in N.Y., in 1973.
John Ehrlichman, speaking of his time in the Nixon administration, said: "We knew we couldn't make it illegal to be ... black, but by getting the public to associate the ... blacks with heroin ... and then criminalizing (them) heavily, we could disrupt (their) communities. ... Did we know we were lying? Of course we did."
When Lenny Bias overdosed, the hammer came down on crack and laws were changed. Crack offenders could be sentenced (literally) 100 times more harshly times than powder cocaine offenders. Is it time to have a compassionate, empathetic discussion/reaction/plan to address the drug problem?
Why now?
21
The book Dreamland, by Sam Quinones, puts names and faces to who profits.....a must read.
18
Thoughts and prayers.
8
I love how "thoughts and prayers" has taken on a new meaning! The sarcasm is a result of our disdain for this useless, dismissive, empty sentiment.
2
"Thoughts and prayers" is the Alt-Right rallying cry. It should be criminalized.
There are a lot of loose ends in this story - I was reading with particular interest about the story's connection to opiod abuse, but that wasn't covered in a coherent or thorough fashion. What are the fatality data for opiod overdoses in this community? More importantly, suicide does not get proper attention as an urgent public health issue, and it's not because interventions are impossible or unworkable, just not a priority.
7
I guess nobody else will say it, so I will. Is the answer really football? Do these people not pay attention to the concussion and CTE crisis afflicting the game? Is not the picture of the injured star quarterback not indicative of the effect on the bodies and brains of developing teenagers? I know there are few ways of engaging kids in tribal (socially cohesive?) activities, but we should be able to do better than this. Trading drug abuse and suicide for debilitating, lifelong injuries does not seem like much of a choice.
21
Isn't there a way to make this sport safer? This coach does a fantastic job keeping students engaged and busy. I'm sure the school offers other sports as well. I doubt that you can reach the same crowd with tennis or tap dancing.
The question is why do so many people get hooked on opioids. I just don't get it. It's unbelievably sad.
Today a young boy at the school where I teach told me his favorite book, the only book he has read cover to cover, is "My Life in Prison."
He does not like to read, books are not part of his life,- his brother is in jail and he wants to understand how to get by if he goes too. Arturo is 13.
I will buy him a football book as that is his interest. I also know, the US education and support for young people is a massive systemic failure.
43
Why is a public institution to blame for this? When parents are addicts or imprisoned, when they abdicate their responsibility for bringing children into this world, how can schools and teachers possibly fill the gap?
21
We need to fund our institutions and start stocking them with psychologists and socials workers. We do the best we can, with increasingly less money every year. I see so many of my teaching colleagues, and my own kids' teachers and coaches, in this wonderful man. Teachers and coaches and librarians never stop caring.
16
When parents aren’t there for the children - because they’re dead, or in prison, or addicted to drugs - it is in our society’s interest to fill to fill the void. When we turn our backs to any child, it is detrimental to all of us. We profess to be pro-life, but our money isn’t where our mouth is. I don’t have answers. I have ideas that might be helpful - or not. For me, the bottom line, is that too many Americans have come to believe their lives are worthless. We need to start asking why.
16
The sad part of the story reflects on how Suicide can be seen as an infectious disease in a community- (not a medical infection) one suicide increases the risk of more, and more suicides in that community
here is a link to research into the "clustering" of suicides
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK207262/
10
Back in late 1980's on the far SW side of Chicago - we had close to a dozen plus suicides of teenagers in a year period. Kids from well to do families - none that I knew were struggling in any significant way. Their was also a huge explosion of Cocaine going thru the neighborhood High Schools.
Then all of sudden it stopped and things quickly went back to normal. It was a strange thing and something I'll never forget and can't explain.
3
This has happened in the suburban area I live in, too. The suicides are not reported in the media for this reason, although people tend to hear about them just the same.
1
While you guys debate what cannot be completely captured in a news article, I just want to go hug those kids who severely need the love.
27
Buried nearly at the end of this story is the comment that too many parents work multiple odd shift jobs.
This IS the cost of non-living wage jobs. Families are shredded by the forced separation and the lack of time to nurture their children. Kids do not do well on “auto-pilot”.
71
I'm both disappointed and alarmed that the NYT would apparently ignore the research which shows that presenting a story in this manner will likely encourage more suicide attempts. While the NYT has a responsibility to tell the story, it also has to do so in a responsible manner, and this is very far from that.
We know that for some reason, some areas can become 'hotspots' for suicide; it's also been understood - at least here in the UK - that media coverage can extend perpetuate and extend such an event. This is exactly the kind of reporting which will feed it - much use of the word 'suicide', details - sometimes graphic - of how suicides were attempted or carried out.
The National Union of Journalists in the UK has a set of research based guidelines https://www.nuj.org.uk/news/mental-health-and-suicide-reporting-guidelines/ aimed at trying to ensure professional reporters can report the story without causing more harm.
17
Just to echo - stories about suicides have outsize interest and influence on people who are thinking about it. I’m always impressed by Guardian articles and other UK outlets that include a hotline and info at the end. There Are so many angles to this article - the clustered suicides, the despair, the economic plight (even in a low unemployment time), the mission of the coach ....at least maybe put a resource note at the end for the most triggering one. It’s deadly stuff.
19
Story is pretty clear. Town loses at football, and soon addiction sets in. Everybody has nice families too -- unless they don't.
Thanks for the profound explanation, NYTimes!
3
The residents of red states endure their torment willingly. By living in a 'Conservative Cult', their tragic 'end story' is already written. By listening to hate radio and Fox 'news' 24 hours a day, seven days a week, white 'victimhood' is constantly reinforced - and the result is depression, resentment, and anger. It's constant, and relentless. It's no wonder that suicide and opioid addiction are legitimate methods of coping. You've been sold out by your 'preachers' and your republican 'representatives'. Sure, factories have closed. Unions have been decimated. But ignorance is never the answer. Never. But as long as you think trump, Mike Pence, and Sean Hannity have the answers you will continue to suffer the same fate.
23
Of course ,there are no drugs or murder in the Liberal bastion of Chicago, no only the highest rate in the country.and in every Liberal run city from the states of Ohio to the east coast.By listening to and with the awareness of the last Presidents failure on nearly every social issue ,of course they're still incredibly distraught.
3
Markymark, did you really just write that? Wow.
No Chicago doesn't have the highest drug or murder rate in the country, it's just a city you RWs use to deflect from your own failures, but even if it did. Chicago doesn't vote Republican or Trump ie for the folks in control who are doing absolutely nothing about this drug/suicide crisis.
1
Many people wonder why schools compete in athletics. This is why. Sports are not only fun but they can be life saving. Coach Morrison is not just a coach. In reality he is teacher. He classroom may consist of weight rooms and a football field, but what he is teaching is the game of life. These players will be there for each other for life and have coach who will always be there for them, no matter what heir need. This is what sports can do for young athletes at it best. Will the coach be able to save everyone? Probably not, but even if all he can save in one, it is better than what most people will do.
11
What matters most is not why? but what next? Despair, drug addiction, and community breakdown is an American reality that runs counter to the American Dream and American exceptionalism that have animated this country since its founding. Any citizen who is at all moved by the sadness of this story and the stories of so many other communities in urban and rural settings in Blue and Red States, should ask how I can do my part to make a small difference. This is not simply a policy issue for politicians, but a human one. The champion of the story is the football coach and there are many more like him seeking to do something positive. The ranks of champions has to swell if this is to be reversed.
4
If you grow up in a small rural town like Madison, IN you have two choices - stay or go.
If you stay, there are not enough paying jobs to ensure a decent life, because no-one is offering incentives to companies to relocate there. What is the State of Indiana doing about this?
If you go, you find yourself poorly equipped to deal with communities that are not like the one you came from, resulting in loneliness. How much exposure did you have to the world outside growing up? What is the State of Indiana doing about this?
My point is that the Madison is too small to solve this problem on its own. It will take a larger population, and tax dollars. Are the citizens of Indiana willing to give up money to help their neighbors? Does the government of Indiana recognize its obligation to support all its citizens?
10
In 1980 the country decided to prioritize the ability for a few to get rich and stay rich over having a more economically balanced society. This is just another side-effect of that.
Capitalism is the source of almost everything that ails America, yet there is no better alternative to Capitalism, except to have a moderating, intellectual force as a counterbalance to it. That force used to be and is supposed to be the government and our elected officials.
The Pharma industry and doctors are to blame for the opioid epidemic. That drugs are advertised on TV is just an astonishing state of affairs that can only be explained by greed and lack of oversight by the government. One of the main purposes of the government is to be a counterbalance against capitalism, not to destroy it, but to keep it in check. That is what was thrown out the window when Reagan came aboard, and now more than a whole generation thinks this is the way it's supposed to be.
It will take a complete overthrow of the GOP to reverse this effect. But even that won't help because the Dems are only a little better. They sold their soul in 1992 so that they could get back into power, and yes they've done WAY better than the GOP every time they've been in power since Reagan, but still, the country has moved so far to the right in the intervening years that a little commonsense is now called "extreme leftist policy".
23
I always wonder how many suicides are related to head trauma. If kids are drowning from head traumas do we give them more water by continuing to play tackle football or head the soccer ball? This is a place where the medical examiner should be doing CTE autopsies. So sad and tragic.
4
This article made me wonder if there’s a connection between sports injuries, and beginning a cycle of drug theorapy that leads to dependence and despair.
It seems cruel that the only oasis of caring for these children seems to come with hurtling their bodies at each other. It’s a healthier outlet for aggression than gun play, but what a cycle when solace routinely includes pain.
From the area. Suicide is a general problem that has plenty of factors in the area that I feel goes farther than I feel I can speak to. The drug and rehabilitation issue however seems to start with a police force's focus on "busting" drug users along with a court that focuses on harsh punishment rather than any discussion of rehabilitation, see the kid brother who it sounds like had a first offense and was sentenced to 9 years. I know plenty of folks in their 40s-50s that will proudly speak about their former intake of drugs or alcohol and those are the same that bought into an attitude that anyone, even younger people, must be punished first. And, like the article states, it does not help that there's an easy movement of drugs trying move through the area, but that again is an area wide issue in drug addiction without treatment in surrounding counties as far as I'm aware. Then there is the fact that the majority of the jobs in the area that are available to people under-35 pay something closer to $25000, they don't offer health insurance (I personally worked 2 jobs and stayed on my parents' insurance), there are few options for psychological treatment in the area if you had the insurance, and there is a refusal to acknowledge a terrible problem in the area proven by the small protests at town halls any time they try to open a rehabilitation site as any proposed site is shot down since they all cry that no one wants to live near recovering drug users.
50
I always wonder how many suicides are related to head trauma. If kids are drowning from head traumas do we give them more water by continuing to play tackle football or head the soccer ball. This is a place where the medical examiner should be doing CTE autopsies. So sad and tragic.
I think stories like these, if they represent anything close to the truth, put the lie to the idea of an American heartland that is shot through with the virtues that made America great. But the people who believe in that myth most of all won't listen carefully or examine its relationship to the reality of lives in places like Madison. They'll listen to NYC real estate magnate and tv personality, who lies to them, and doesn't even understand the truths that underlay the myth once, long ago.
7
Thanks to the Coaches and others who are there for those kids.
10
This is happening everywhere. Even in Park City, an affluent town. My own daughter, 19 (now in a college outside of Utah) knows many peers who talk about suicide. Summit county has a higher suicide rate than the norm. And drugs are everywhere. My daughter tells me how easy it is to obtain them. It is so scary. But, where are the drug treatment centers? Where is there counseling for kids available? I will tell you. No where. And Insurance doesn't cover it much, if you have insurance. And in the schools, when I was a teen in the 70's, there was a professional, full time nurse there with an office and rooms where you could go to rest and to talk. The nurse knew each student, medical history and medications and knew their parents and their home situation. They saw the kids and sensed changes in behavior and demeanor. School nurses barely exist anymore. I can tell you that I think they are important. But that was cut too, along with the arts, which is also important. Sports are great, but they cost a lot of money these days. And are more competitive to get onto teams.
These kids, I want to hug them all. It breaks my heart.
37
Cut school nurses. Cut arts programs. Cut counselors. Arm teachers and add metal detectors and guards. Allow wages to stagnate for decades while corporate profits become obscene, and while healthcare and housing expenses skyrocket. Flood the area with narcotics, prescribed and otherwise. Send parents to jail. Poor children. Poor America. This is our future.
1
A couple of thoughts. First, as has been noted by others, the article has a gaping hole; there is no explanation attempted for why this town has this problem to a degree so much greater than comparable places.
Second, I agree wholeheartedly with the comments that note, angrily or cynically, that the drug crisis affecting working class rural or small town whites is covered very differently than the one affecting urban blacks; it's now portrayed as a tragedy rather than a threat.
Third, I am struck by the meanness of spirit of many of the comments below, which boil down to "serves the stupid fundamentalists right for voting for Trump and Pence." Like it or not, these people are your fellow Americans; they're not going to die off or disappear any more than the undocumented immigrants are going to self-deport.
104
What a wide open article! The juxtaposition I get is that there is a crack or two there and what is it a part of? Is it drugs in sports? Is it drugs in general? What about absent parents at work or otherwise? Or the seemingly dead end dish-washing jobs in a world that demands higher education hurdles to move beyond? Or violent video games, Or social media? You know where you can go on and on and it's like talking into a hole? Should I go on?
5
Decent vocational training has pretty much vanished from most high schools in this country, with resources being redirected to the college-bound minority. Look to Germany, which has a healthy and happy populace, strong labor unions and robust vocational training for teens, most of whom are not college material. The idea that everyone should be prepared for college upon high school graduation is a pipe dream that has created a lot of despair and hopelessness.
43
I moved from the west coast to a midwestern town/County almost identical to this one in Indiana, except in MN. MN still a blue state and barely hanging on in the north. This county does not have quite the same problems among teens but here is where it came to my attention that life skills are no longer taught in high school. Life styles include some ability to cope with lives challenges like how to prepare food to fill ones belly, how to figure out transportation options, services in your community, mend your clothes, how to prepare to find a job, maybe how to improve yourself, etc. Jobs are numerous but it seems poverty is common. This is a community that has generous support to its residents. I am an avid very liberal retired volunteer so have a decent view of reality. I just do not believe teenagers who are not four year college material (plenty I’d guess) are being prepared to make it in life. Dreaming of careers in mining is not a goal any longer, but are real possibilities being presented in schools? Not what I am seeing so far...the CEO of our local Chamber of Commerce told me last winter that “hockey is all that matters”. A far share of successful athletes have originated from the area but is not a realistic employment opportunity. I will make sure my grandchildren are given a realistic view for their and their friends future.
5
This! I've watched this for decades: kids either fast tracked to early entry in community colleges, or left on their own with no support for their futures.
One of the dads, a master electrician, would come to high schools to give speeches on the value of skilled blue collar jobs....and that was it for "career counseling" for all those students.
Add the lack of support for unions and the loss of manufacturing- and all of us are paying for that, economically and politically.
The white collar elite looks down on these people- and we wonder why they vote like they do.
10
M Davis - You say "look to Germany" ....for its vocational programs, strong labor unions, and a healthy, happy populace. Many of our brightest and most thoughtful young are now looking to other, truly progressive countries, for opportunities that are harder to find here - including a "healthy, happy" populace. As for the notion that academic high school/college prep is what all students should recieve, it is just wrong.
1
To think that all of these synthetic opioid drugs as well as guns were all legally manufactured for profit is tremendously sobering. Poor kids bear the brunt, but such a nation that does this as a whole is suicidal.
27
That last sentence is so true for so many kids who play high school football.
“I’m crying because it’s over.”
With all due respect to all the other sports ... football is king for a reason.
7
Football is king in head traumas. This story is not really about football.
8
I wonder if this has to do with the prevalence of broken families in these "stellar (white) communities", where the football coach becomes the father figure?
18
I live in Madison, and I am as left as they come. However, the comments I am reading here are disparaging. The problem with these comments is that you berate them and call them stupid by blaming their religion, location, ethnicity, guns, etc... This is why the left never does well in Midwestern America. Maybe if liberals would reach out with an open heart to help and not belittle them, then Democrats could win in the Midwest.... Offer constructive help, not insults.
104
Thank you. I’m as liberal as you. I didn’t read the article from any political point of view. But as someone who cares about the kids. They are all innocent. They need support and guidance, not criticism. There seems to be a few in town who care and are doing something. There needs to be more.
7
This upriver Cincinnati lefty wholeheartedly agrees. The coastal left need to get out in "flyover country" and walk around a little, have a beer and burger at a local eatery, and then offer that constructive help. The rightist Reps, such as mine, offer nothing but fealty to their campaign benefactors, demagoguery and vote to cut Medicaid and other funds that are at least trying to ameliorate this crisis. While Pence in Indiana did zero and worse, at least GOP Kasich here in Ohio is attempting to do something positive. He started by taking the Medicare expansion which so many Midwestern GOP governors, whose states are badly opioid affected, turned down. The Dems have an opportunity here if they would only wake up.
11
Thank you Chris for call a spade a spade. Come on people, let’s love our neighbors and give a helping hand, not a judgemental put down.
4
So many of these articles focus on high school football teams. So by definition they focus on teenage boys. Specifically, sad white boys. Whatever precious little sympathy and help this country is handing out to the working class goes to these kids. Hard to know whether to laugh or cry.
11
It seems to be a self-culling of the gene pool. People that have that much despair should not be passing that on or even consider breeding. Look, it is not either a better or worse place to grow up in Madison. High suicide rates ? Why ?
Who knows why? These things go in cycles and the tide will eventually turn........ or everyone will be dead.
My $0.02
5
Suicide is not a “culling”. It is a waste of potential and devastating to everyone around the person who dies. God bless this coach and all the young people he works with.
Many of us who read the NYT and get to put their “two cents” in - including me - are not doing well because we are somehow better through “evolution”. A lot of it is pure accident of birth to a family that benefitted from the post WWII economy. What pulled my family out of poverty was a job for my grandfather at Douglas Aircraft in the 1950s.
This generation coming up through the high schools in our country is the next “greatest generation”. Like the kids at Parkland Florida, they will decide to act and work for change where the older generations have failed.
2
The next time someone wants to start up with football-is-dangerous and football-should-be-banned and they're-just-a-bunch-of-gladiators, they should read this story before they spout.
6
Sorry, but it's weak thinking to take an example of a single rural town, and then begin bleating about their race, their religion, or their locale. Here's a quote from an African American physician, published just hours ago: The current drug addiction crisis began in rural America, but it’s quickly spreading to urban areas and into the African-American population in cities across the country.
“It’s a frightening time,” says Dr. Edwin Chapman, who specializes in drug addiction in Washington, D.C., “because the urban African-American community is dying now at a faster rate than the epidemic in the suburbs and rural areas.”
So, please take your biases against whites, or the faithful, or those living in rural and suburban areas, or those of a different political party, somewhere else. It's not only remarkably shallow, but entirely misplaced.
14
What a bizarre article. Don't worry, VP Pence and the rest of the GOPers from Indiana will save the day.
Marijuana shouldn't be mentioned in the same sentence as all the other drugs the police found in the car.
The town has the same unemployment rate as the national average, which is low by historic standards. The median household income is also at the national average, and one assumes the cost of living is lower in a small Hoosier town. So what gives exactly?
Did the county vote for Trump, like most of rural Indiana? If so, shouldn't the suicide rate have dramatically improved over the last fifteen months? Or are the residents tired of all the winning already?
With all the articles in the NYT about Chronic Traumatic Encephalopathy, a fancy term for brain damage caused by concussions from contact sports like football, perhaps playing on the team is the last thing they need.
When it was poor people of color dying from shooting up heroin and smoking crack in dangerous neighborhoods and ghettos, move along nothing to see here folks. Now that it's white folks in Norman Rockwell settings, we have a slew of articles in the paper of record.
23
This is a tragic story. It's too bad Mike Pence didn't spend more time devising job training programs instead of gay conversion therapy. Unfortunately, the same thing is happening in many deep-red states. Decades of regressive social policies eventually take their toll. I guess a God, guns, and gays strategy isn't enough to sustain local communities in the real world.
26
Attorneys must read the NYT articles and get ideas of "who to sue next". I read one about Nakesha, a homeless person. I must say, I got some of those lawsuit ideas. ---- But, to decrease this problem described, Students clearly deserve more. Students need to be tracked and supported more. That means, additions to the School System. Those additions are planned, (but not by The Current White House/ Congress People). I don't want people to think that Trump/Pence are responsible for these positive changes to The School System, because they aren't. -------- Also, Towns like this are going to be Mainstreamed. Perhaps all Towns will be doing something New. I suppose there will be a new Mainstream Class, if there isn't already. New Products are going to hit the Market, and will be a part of this Mainstream Culture Class. These Towns are going to have to change, and become more Worldly. People who make money with trash products, will be put out of business more often. Basic everyday items will become less vulnerable to the Dumb People putting trash products on The Market. Intelligence is Power. ---- I suppose if people want to buy art that others would not buy, they can, as long as the art is legal. Art is an entertainment luxury, not a necessity.
2
America's adversaries must be chuckling themselves silly to see how efficient the American Hateland's self-destructive impulses really are. It is as if America were currently undergoing a major potlatch across the nation, deliberately wasting youth, health and wealth as part of some sort of twisted ceremony of atonement. That is how I interpret the careless slide into addiction and resignation with massive suicides in America today. Life has no value there, really.
6
To the Editors:
Excellent profile of the town and its people. Thanks for it. The Times has run a few similar articles over the last year.
Now I am requesting the editors to put a big focus on who profits from all these drugs and all this death. And not just in broad brushstrokes like "the pharmaceutical industry".
We need to know the names and faces behind all this, starting with the individuals in Madison who are selling drugs to their high school classmates and all the way up the ladder to the top, wherever that takes us.
Some of these pathways will take us into corporate America, into the pharmaceutical companies and the doctors who sell their wares. Other pathways will take us to the Central American drug cartels and even to the Taliban and their opium fields.
Shine the light.
33
I read a comment some years back that the drug problem would not be solved easily, because there were individuals in high levels of government, both in the USA and other countries, who were reaping immense rewards for drugs. So there's that in addition to the problems you mentioned.
3
Yes. I can believe this happens in the “heartland”. It’s when you lose all perspective and have phony values.
11
As a progressive ex-Hoosier who graduated high school just a few years before meth gave way to opiods, and nearly lost my sister to heroin, it's difficult to read some of these comments and not instantly fall back of the stereotype of the haughty coastal snobs. These are kids with no hope and no opportunity; the glee and schadenfreude over a suicide epidemic borders on infuriating. Consider that these are real, actual people dying; they may not share your opinions, but they're dying all the same.
39
They've been offered other solutions, they keep rejecting them. So, thoughts and prayers is all they get now. It's all they're willing to give anyone else, anyway.
All on the 'coast' are no more gleeful at Madison's social problems that are all of Madison's residents promoters of those social problems. I'm pretty sure we share the same issues and underlying causes in varying degrees.
2
I read this and I was inclined to blame the politics of these rural Indiana folk. But I won’t. Mostly because I feel these suicides are emblematic of a great cultural shift where politics are a symptom and not a cause.
Let me explain with a factoid--Latinos are one of the two major demographic groups with the highest average life expectancy in the U.S. (the other being Asian-Americans). It's surprising to hear this because Latinos are on average poorer and less educated than whites, and suffer from much greater unemployment. However, they enjoy an average life expectancy of 82 years in comparison to the white average of 78 year (which is now trending downward as of 2015). And Latinos have way lower suicide rates. What gives?
Two things—a severe fraying of family relationships and a culture of hyper-individualism and greed. The first came about in the 1960s and 1970s, slowly at first and then faster and faster. Family was no longer as heavily emphasized in white American culture. And white children now bear the brunt of this shift. The second came in the 1980s--the evangelical prosperity gospel, that lots of money means God favors you; the libertarian belief that communal bonds tie you down instead of lift you up; the mass media barrage that over-consumption will lead to happiness.
Latinos have not been infected as much by this hyper-individualism and fraying of family ties as whites. Family and community are still central to most Latinos. Hence the better metrics.
29
Although I think viewing drug addiction with compassion is a good thing - I wish the nyt would go through it's archives and notice how it reports on the mostly white, mostly rural opioid addicts. Then do a comparison with the way addiction in the African American community was treated for so many years.
26
After Trump kicks out all the illegal immigrants, let's send these kids to work in the fields and chicken processing plants. They think life is tough, sounds like to me they have too easy. Maybe a little break-backing work and sweat in the hot sun is what they need to gain a new perspective and appreciate the privileges they have by sheer accident of birth.
8
Because the circumstances described here are not all that unusual in this country, in places that journalists were somehow unable to locate for the past twenty years despite Google Maps, reading stories like this makes you realize just how broken our society is.
But you draw some hope from the sincere and highly commendable efforts of people like Patric Morrison, who can be found all over this country, in all different colors.
And then you read the comments section, and after reading the sophisticated ignorance and raw hatred being spewed by the highly-educated superior people who have everything figured out, you realize that things are even worse than you could have possibly imagined.
14
I feel badly for the folks of Madison, Indiana. However, this “despair” to habitual drug use to suicide is real. Bravo, to the high school football coach who is trying his best to stem the opioid tide!
10
There is obviously something more at work in all this than opioids, something spiritual for lack of any other word. All these suicides, not overdoses but suicides by gun or rope.
14
Parents working two jobs is not a good thing. Does Indiana"s state government care or does it just send a thought and a prayer? I have a vague recollection that a former governor allegedly trafficked in cocaine while attending Princeton.
2
Legislators in Indiana seem to think that they need to keep Indiana as a business-friendly state by doing everything to keep wages as low as possible and taxes as low as possible by cutting back on anything that might benefit people. There tactics don't work, because businesses are not motivated to locate in areas that have terrible schools, terrible roads, starved libraries and miserly safety nets. Counseling and drug rehabilitation are only offered if they're structured in a way that benefits the owners, not the clients.
5
I am shocked at the number of hate-filled comments and also shocked that the paper decided they were fit to print. I think the commenters missed the part about people having to work two jobs. And by the way despite rhetoric huge amounts of money were spent providing addiction treatment in the inner cities in the 1990s.
11
We need addiction treatment in all parts of this country-urban, rural, suburbs- fans from coast to coast. Nowhere have addiction treatment been sufficiently researched or funded and we are losing too many people.
1
Incredibly powerful story by a brilliant writer whose columns from the best and worst of Tour de France used to enjoy so much. She captures the complexity and interconnectedness of the all too prevalent issues of addiction, adolescent anxiety, inadequate mental health resources, and the challenges of adapting to a rapidly changing world at all levels- from the roles of teachers, parents and students to society’s institutions and government at all levels. The contrast between the struggles of this community and so many others around the country and the inspiring behavior of this champion Coach is poignant. As a career educator myself I am ever so aware that the influence of a motivated teacher/counselor/ coach in young people’s lives can be so disproportionally large versus the value American society invests in the profession of teaching compared to so many other societies. Juliet indirectly raises many essential questions and gives all sides of the political spectrum common ground for pause about matters which affect every family. Thank-you.
11
After reading several comments and being taken aback about the lack of understanding or empathy, maybe the real read to this story is that even in so called fly over country there a decent,hardworking and yes white middle class people who have lost or are losing there middle class status due to corrupt politicians and big business. While the members of both sides of congress look the other way,point fingers across aisle and pocket corporate money. All to the glee of the 1% club. We all suffer no matter who or what we may be or identify as.
19
Sorry. This isn't a "drug epidemic." This is the fruit of generations--perhaps many generations--of people emotionally and nutritionally unprepared for conception, and the brain miswiring of their children that's often too subtle to be detected without sophisticated screening and diagnostic tools.
In the olden days, surplus populations of impulsive young men--their brains miswired because of poor nutrition and substance use or abuse by their parents--were skimmed off by endless wars, by dangerous initiation rituals in some cultures, and by good old-fashioned recklessness. Reckless young women were often skimmed off by death in childbirth or post-parturition, and by other risky behaviors.
These modern drugs are just more efficient at killing people. But we've always had alcohol abuse, and many of the kids profiled here have undoubtedly been affected by even moderate use of alcohol by their parents. Remember the "recent" finding--or rather re-finding--that no amount of alcohol consumption is safe during pregnancy?
Fix families, ensure all fertile people are educated on the urgency of taking excellent care of their bodies whether or not they are planning to procreate, provide good healthcare to them, and this problem will greatly lessen.
3
I understand there is a social contagion to suicide. Also, maybe this is completely crazy, but is it possible there is some environmental component or toxin contributing here?
7
This article is beautiful, compelling and so very sad.
The opioid epidemic is a national tragedy. Opioid addiction is NOT a choice. It is a physical illness caused by often irreversible changes in the brain. Opioid addiction is a death sentence. Some addicts die sooner than others.
I am dismayed at the many snarky comments here. Mark my words snarky people, you, too, will likely be touched by an opioid overdose death. A friend or relative's son or daughter, your own son or daughter or grandchild or brother or sister. I don't wish this experience on anyone but more people died in 2016 from opioid-involved overdoses than all of the Americans who died in the entire Viet Nam war. That will be the case in 2017 when those numbers are finally tallied, and likely in 2018. You will be touched. Maybe that'll take the "snark" out of you.
This is what I suggest instead:
1, Be compassionate.
2. Do your part in your community to save lives and change lives.
3. Don't let your docs give you or your family prescriptions for opioids. Studies show acetaminophen and ibuprofen work just as well in most cases.
4. If you have prescription opioids in the house, contact the local Health Department on how to dispose of them safely.
3. Read "Dreamland" by Sam Quinones. It answers almost all of the questions commenters here have asked.
20
I grew up in southern Indiana. Some of the comments I'm reading on here sadden me. My hometown of 7,000 people was a place where you could make a living in the 60's or 70's. The rise of superstores and Walmarts killed the local merchants and associated jobs. Consolidation of agriculture into huge mega companies killed the farming. The few manufacturing jobs went to lower cost countries. Now those who have a job work in fast food places and nail salons. It's an economic desert. No wonder people have lost hope. Those that casually toss off comments about flyover state ignorance should walk a few miles in those shoes first.
34
Ban Fox 'News' in Indiana and the suicide rate will drop by half the very first year. When susceptible people listen to 'white victimhood' propaganda 24 hours a day, seven days a week, they're going to stay depressed, resentful, and angry until they slip over the edge. If you choose to stay in a Red state, you're life is going to be miserable. And short. Republicans don't care about you or your problems. Wake up.
4
the root cause is that some people do not follow good advice and never start using drugs. later, those addicted of drugs have to decide whether they prefer being an addict or prefer to get clean. without the decision to quit and go to all lengths to get and stay clean, there is no hope. if a person commits to get clean then there is hope.
placing blame on the government or others won't do it. there is no magic bullet.
1
There is alot in this article, I taught school for many years, and was involved with sports of all kind for longer. I have lived in the city and in the country. We are missing something as a people, as a nation, as a culture. This community is losing its next generation. I know families who badly want to move to this knid of 'idillic' place to raise the kids, should they? We look for singular solutions, Church alone will not fix this, nor will more $$$. The solutions need to be grass roots up and local in nature. I wish I could make it ok and I'm not sure how, I do know this town should not be exploted for political gain, right or left. Who ever runs for office make them do something not just talk.
8
Public companies require high growth rates for their executives to keep increasing their compensation. That means that pharmaceuticals must keep distributing more and more product. So they hire more salespeople to visit more doctors who prescribe more pain meds for more patients. Insurance even covers the cost of getting addicted. How about publishing statistics on which doctors are writing the prescriptions for the people who are dying?
1
Frequent commenter Socrates points out that in 2016 President Trump carried Madison’s Jefferson County by a roughly two-to-one margin. Other commenters echo a similar theme. If our all-wise Mr. Socrates and these others want to somehow blame these problems on President Trump and the GOP I guess they can.
But here's a question. If the Democrats (I am one) are supposed to be the party of the common person, how could they have fallen so far away from their roots that these good working class people who should be voting Democratic would turn to a phony like Trump in such numbers? You can blame the GOP, you can blame the people themselves, I suppose, but I think as Democrats we have to look in the mirror and ask ourselves if we have abandoned these people. You can say what you want about Trump, but in 2016 at least he talked about the problems of the middle class. Meanwhile the Democrats were on some other wavelength, and so Trump was able to pull off the greatest con job of all time. No, the GOP is not going to help these people—but are the Democrats?
Our country is in great trouble, the GOP will not save us, Trump will only make things worse, so to me our only hope is that the Democrats are motivated to get their act together and work to get us back on the long road to the greatness we once enjoyed.
8
Hillary Clinton talked a lot about the middle class. Instead of lying and saying she could bring back coal, she made practical plans to retrain workers whose industries have died. But the disenfranchised voters preferred the fairytales handed out by David Dennison. They actively chose to believe in a patently false dream.
I'm tired of the Democrats being accused of being out of touch with middle class voters. It's Democrats who work for fair labor practices, access to education and medical care, protections from rapacious corporations. If that's not enough to lure voters away from an obvious con artist, it's not the fault of Democrats.
31
Raph, I'm here in Wisconsin, the state Trump won by the smallest margin--30,000 votes. If 15,001 voters had gone the other way, Hillary would have won. And if there were similar swings in Ohio, Michigan, and Pennsylvania she'd be president today.
On the Friday night before the election the Hillary TV ad that was showing over and over here was all about how awful Trump was--how he ridiculed the disabled, etc. I was thinking OK, I guess we have to get that out there, and now we have the rest of the weekend to talk about how we're going to fix the problems that so many in our state are suffering from. Yet by Monday night we were still running that same stinking ad. In the meantime the Trump forces were running their fairy tales. Did Hillary talk about the middle class? If so, she didn't do a very good job of making sure people heard that part of her message; I know I didn't hear much of it, and I was listening.
But that's ancient history. The big question is how next time we can form a clear vision of where our country needs to go AND communicate this to the people who need to hear it.
2
I'm finding it difficult to not agree with some of the more negative comments, especially with respect to the comp to the urban crack epidemic, where the predominant reaction, especially amongst conservative communities, was that the appropriate answer was incarceration, because the victims are criminals, animals, morally deficient, and not worthy of empathy or understanding, mostly because core conservative ideology dictates that bad things don't happen to good people; they happen to bad people because bad people make bad decisions and should live with them. In other words, give me a reason not to care, and I will take it willingly.
So perhaps 10 years of this crisis might do something for our collective empathy, our ability to understand that other people's problems are real and complex, and not simply a matter of moral failure and where punishment isn't the only option.
However, I think that whatever the underlying cause is, I guarantee that the party in power has no interest in it whatsoever. As Aaron Sorkin once wrote, they have two interests - to make you afraid of it, and to point the blame at somebody for you to focus on. They certainly don't have a solution for it, if for no other reason they simply don't believe in public policy in the first place. And certainly not policy that involves spending money, money that could better be given back to the donor class in tax cuts.
I wish there a viable solution here. But I strongly doubt it under this administration.
10
Do I know Madison? No. But I'd like to ask how many times the citizens of Madison voted against their, and their childrens', best interests because of political posturing?
My small town, population ~6500, and county, population ~20,000, have consistently voted down just about every tax proposal that would improve local public education, health and safety. We have the lowest property tax assessment in the state. Doubling the assessment would still leave it below state average. Any moment the county will be bankrupt and at danger of having its offices taken over by the state. But every election, its the samo, samo. Need I say what political party dominates elections?
Too many people, locally as well as nationally, have drunk the same Kool-Aide with the same results. Pity, yes. Surprise, no.
22
A grid tracking where kids got there first drugs from would be very useful - from an opiate after a sports injury? in the woods or outside the mall with a bored group of kids? at someone's house with no parent home or unaware parents? pill parties in abandoned warehouses?
Once the brain chemistry is altered by drugs, standard messaging about not using drugs don't apply - real rehab is needed. Big data could help track where it's starting.
And this coach sounds like a great man, but I'm not comfortable with the high praise of football, especially with the photo of the young quarterback in a knee brace - when sports injuries have been leading to drug abuse after the pain is gone but the chemical need for painkillers stays behind.
"A seven-month Sports Illustrated investigation found overdose victims in baseball, basketball, football, golf, gymnastics, hockey, lacrosse, soccer, softball, swimming, tennis, volleyball and wrestling—from coast to coast."
Bring in lots of non-sports activities for connecting kids - their minds matter - debate club, chess club, robotics, sculpture...and split club time with intramural non-traditional sports with very low injury rates to keep their bodies healthy and whole.
9
I am ashamed at how we as a culture have failed to protect our children from the trauma surrounding school shootings and the despair of the prescription drug overdose epidemic.
I've seen towns in the areas around this town over a 50 year period transition from a refuge for traditions to becoming barren main streets with empty store fronts. The causes are complex, but we shouldn't have forgotten about the children.
7
Alison, I'd like to add one more thought to your excellent comment - the police need to get the dealers who are targeting a town and getting away with it. Surveillance cameras need to be everywhere - state funded police - cash rewards for reporting dealers and it should also be a crime to pressure kids to use. And then state funding for more crisis rehab centers to help deactivate the chemical demands in the bodies of the addicted.
1
I know how important sports are in helping keep kids out of trouble and just give them something to do. But I also know from experience there is a growing opioid addiction problem because of sports, especially football. Kids get hurt and then get put on painkillers. In a community I lived in, nearly an entire class was addicted to opioids and it started in the basketball locker room. So while I would never advocate getting rid of sports, there's just so many facets to the problem.
5
Social media magnifies bullying and propagates an impossible standard as the norm with the resulting shame leading to greater isolation and disconnection. Capitalism's dismantling of unions and the rightful place of labor has lead to widespread wage slavery, robbing children of adequate time to develop the necessary resilience derived from the deep ties developed from parental presence and attunement. People are not machines. They attach. When the presence of loving adults is denied, many of the young will seek relief in mind boggling substances and tragically, suicide.
7
The key line in the article seems to be, "Madison, in southeastern Indiana, is at the center of a drug-trafficking triangle connecting Indianapolis, Cincinnati and Louisville." However, we need more context of why a town where drug is being trafficked is so overwhelmingly affected? Is it because drugs are cheap and easy to get? Is it because residents can make a living selling drugs? What are the root causes of the despair and death here?
26
There are poor communities, infested with drugs, all around this country and all around the world. Why is it that this community, which isn't even that poor, has so much hopelessness and despair? There seems to be a big deficit of love. a condition this coach is trying to address. Why aren't the parents able to love themselves, or their children?
11
Your questions raise the possibility that the "deficit of love" goes back beyond current parents to previous generations, i.e., the culture of the town. Nothing in this article looks at that. This phenomenon does not come out of a vacuum and probably not from one generation.
2
You buried your lead: 'Madison is a swing shift town where most people work two or more jobs.'
These are well-meaning hardworking people, and maybe very loving at heart, but when people work two jobs, their kids are neglected. Addiction is a disease of neglect and lack of connection where drugs stand in for attachment.
53
Addiction can strike in any situation, even ones with stay-at-home parents. But it is so much easier to blame it on working class parents, isn't it?
6
In my era it was pot, and some did occasional LSD and powder cocaine. Everyone survived, because those drugs aren't particularly lethal. People gave up their drug habits when they went to college, because college was hard. We majored in things like Literature, History or Physics. We'd done our drugs and had our drinking binges in high school. We'd seen "The French Connection" and "Death Wish" and knew heroin was a death sentence; we were terrified of it. What happened? Doctors normalized opiates for any little thing and normalized daily pill popping of tranquilizers, anti-depressants, ADHD meds etc. Many started selling their pills. Kids can't buy beer but they can buy their friend's Adderall or steal their mom's Tramadol. What to do: Lower the drinking age to 18, send kids to counselors not doctors, and put afterschool sports and recreational activities in middle schools as well as high schools. When the interscholastic sports got canceled in my junior high, the drug use shot up. Everyone knows the solutions; we just have trouble implementing them.
31
Sports are only the most obvious answer in this Midwestern town. Countless other outlets could also do the job, but the town apparently has developed along more superficial values, not only economic, and has not created meaningful community engagement, i.e., building relationships.
1
Why are the people in Madison so miserable? Drugs aren't the problem; they're a symptom of the problem. The article really makes no attempt to explain the root cause. And why don't the people in the town move if they're so miserable? It's just incomprehensible to me why people stay in dead-end towns.
8
change in location is not the answer. the addicted person is the same unless he changes. i do agree that the addiction might be a symptom(if drugs are like alcoholism). i really do not know about drugs.
1
Hard to sell your house in a dead end town where everyone wants to leave. Hard to abandon all the friends you've ever known. Hard to uproot your family. Plenty of reasons. Lot of folks in the Indiana town where I grew up who are stuck due to at least one of them.
14
Interesting that this story is set in a town in Indiana, Indiana being the home of Eli Lilly Pharmaceutical Company. Lilly has for years made many billions on sales of classes of drugs (antidepressants, antipsychotics, and so on) that can cause the people taking them to die from various terrible side effects. Lilly is expert at telling doctors and the public about the wonders of these drugs and hiding the side effects, as well as paying off families who want to take them to trial - so that the news is hushed up. Some dramatic side effects include behavior changes in the person taking them, changes that can lead the person to commit homicide or suicide.
Politicians are also well paid to keep the FDA weak and the laws lax, so that none of the executives from this industry are ever indicted. The LA Times ran a front page series of articles on Perdue Pharmaceutical's lies, yet nothing has happened to the executives of this family owned business. It's a shameful thing, akin to a mafia.
36
Economically, the pharmaceutical industry co-exists with the media. They need each other and cover for each other as with any co-dependent relationship. We need to call out both of these powerful affluent forces in our society. We are a society that goes along to get along: just pay the mortgage or the rent, put food on the table, and watch the Super Bowl.
2
Diud - yes, BigPharma does co-exist with the media. Only two countries in the world permit direct-to-consumer prescription advertising....the U.S. and New Zealand. Big Pharma has the largest lobby in Washington - and this is one of its plums.
12
"Our thoughts and prayers, ...." Maybe these families need hope and justice?
Wonder what would be done for them if this was a so-called democratic socialist country. Where is the economic justice in this "great" country?
9
The issue here, in this lily-white town, is not too little privilege, but too much. An easy life of low cost of living, no need to achieve academically, an overfunded high school with a bloated athletic and sports budget but minimal academics, I am sure.
No solution here that I can see. They need more family values, more education, less religion, less football. But life is easy, and when they find even a remote challenge, it is simply too much for their privilege to bear.
5
We are not lily white. There are many races, religions and political beliefs here.
We do not have a huge football budget. We are strong on academic standards. Many of our students take dual credit classed which allows them to start college as a sophomore.
Know what you are talking about before you speak.
1
As someone who grew up in this town, I would not characterize the school as overfunded at all. There was not much funding for any extracurriculars and in fact it was the school's academic teams who were the ones bringing home the state championships, not the sports teams. Yes, the town is very white, but it is still quite poor and fairly sheltered/remote. I think it suffers from the same issues that many rural towns face, those who are better educated move away to the cities for better opportunities.
3
Poverty in rural and small-town America is hardly a prime example of white privilege. Yes, Madison is white. There was no influx into Madison when six million African Americans were moving North to find jobs in the first 70 years of the 20th century--they went to Detroit, Chicago, New York, Oakland, i.e., other places where they could find work. (Madison was, during its heyday, an important stop on the Underground Railroad.)
The author of the article says that now, 'Madison is a swing shift town where most people work two or more jobs.' That does not sound to me like they are making out like bandits there, living the American dream. Madison hit its economic boom in the mid-19th century. That's when all of those beautiful historic buildings were constructed. Industry and transportation--based on railroads and the river--flowered in Madison between 1840 and the beginnings of the 20th century. That's history now.
I was born there and a number of people in my family visit there every year, overwhelmed by memories, nostalgia, and its natural beauty. Why don't any of us live there? Lack of employment opportunities that would enable one to support oneself and a family without each adult needing two jobs. Its beauty and its charm is based upon its historic past and relying upon that to support a modest tourist industry.
14
Most of these kids have a roof over their heads and food on the table. Compare this to the story of the kids in the biographical movie "Queen of Khatwe" about kids growing up in an African slum who learn to play chess and end up with great plans for their futures despite serious struggles just to survive. We need fewer TV shows about the Kardashians and their excesses and reports on Trumps Mar-a-Lago 3 million dollar weekends on taxpayers dimes and more about true winners of the world who come from nothing and accomplish so much. CNN heroes is a start but that show is on only once a year. How about more reports on these people?
8
Fantastic piece, Janet. This story has such a strong place for a collision sport that I have come to question. Wonderful job capturing the signature bright spot in a community plagued by tragedy. paul in bessemer, al.
8
Madison, IN is my hometown. I now live in Louisville and return often to visit my mother and other family members. I wasn't aware that the suicide rate in Madison was so elevated but I'm not entirely surprised either. Jefferson County borders Scott County which made the national news for an HIV epidemic tied to drug use. The issues plaguing the Jefferson and Scott counties are the same faced by many rural counties, specifically the lack of resources and robust economic opportunities. I'm not in a position to say what city leaders and school administrators have and have not done in terms of suicide prevention. However it is clear that too many people see it as their best option so more obviously needs to be done. As far as drugs, I think there is still a punishment-first attitude. In recent months there was an attempt to open a treatment facility but of course nobody wants it in their neighborhood.
One last note. Madison State Hospital used to house 1,100 patients on a campus that would remind me of a university campus. That number has dwindled to 100 and the patients are housed indoors with little time outdoors. A large part of the hospital campus has been turned into a medium security prison. The hospital had an addiction ward but it really wasn't a place where people would go for that type of treatment. However I think the change in focus from mental health treatment to imprisonment that happened in Madison is sadly one we've seen nationwide.
43
One of Pence's achievements as governor was to preside over a rural HIV epidemic in Indiana.
1
For most of these kids, the regular high-school biology class is a waste of time; for most, they will never remember the function of RNA reverse transcriptase. Along with We need a class called "How you, your parents, and friends will die".
We need to discuss drugs, violence, tobacco, and disease. Along the way, they will learn human biology.
The content needs to be frank and unflinching.
A great book is From Chocolate to Morphine: Everything You Need to Know About Mind-Altering Drugs by Andrew Weil (Goodreads Author) & Winifred Rosen.
6
Really?
Decades ago I was asked why I didn't move out of the city to the burbs or so called idyllic rural areas. It was because I had family, friends or coworkers who lived in those areas and knew they had the same problems that existed in cities. They just hid them better but that is getting harder to do.
Also, back then such issues were labeled as cultural (aka black people problems), urban and just basically due to a lack of moral or family values. Now it is labeled as a sad American problem, a crisis, an epidemic and a health issue.
I am old enough to remember lock em up and build more jails. Now it's order more Narcan, find them beds and give them a hug. Amazing.
10
That last line rings so true. So many HS players will not play college ball, so when it ends, it is difficult.
2
Incredibly powerful story by a brilliant writer whose columns from the best and worst of Tour de France used to enjoy so much. She captures the complexity and interconnectedness of the all too prevalent issues of addiction, adolescent anxiety, inadequate mental health resources, and the challenges of adapting to a rapidly changing world at all levels- from the roles of teachers, parents and students to society’s institutions and government at all levels. The contrast between the struggles of this community and so many others around the country and the inspiring behavior of this champion Coach is poignant. As a career educator myself I am ever so aware that the influence of a motivated teacher/counselor/ coach in young people’s lives can be so disproportionally large versus the value American society invests in the profession of teaching compared to so many other societies. Juliet indirectly raises many essential questions and gives all sides of the political spectrum common ground for pause about matters which affect every family. Thank-you.
6
Let's begin with having empathy towards this community. Despite their political and religious choices they are suffering. This same event happened to African American communities in the 1980s and 1990s with the crack epidemic, only the coverage was much more blaming towards them. In those communities there were strong people like the coach in this story who were important to the children. It brings to mind that we lack community and role models across generations to interact with. I come from rural America (and from a large farming family when the farming crisis hit). My dad had to leave the farm to work in the city. Luckily my parents valued education and though depressed and not sure what we were doing we all went on to college. A sense of spirituality is helpful along with curiosity and wonder towards the world. Sometimes that helps when hope doesn't exist.
23
Incredibly sad to read. Our youth need service opportunities, some involving manual labor, to keep them connected with community and grounded. Work can be a salvation, esp if the work involves making a positive difference in the lives of others. They need role models, also. The expectation that all will attend college and obtain 6-figure employment is setting our youth up for failure. And rampant materialism does not help.
7
This is a sad and tragic story about lost hope. It is also a story, combined with other stories in this web edition of The Times, that give possibilities for solution.
That means it also goes beyond Coach Morrison. This remarkable young man has stepped into the breach to do what he can. Yet he cannot do enough. The solution includes Coach Morrison and "WomanPriest" and so much more.
Included in this web edition is an op-ed piece on the relationship between right-to-work laws and GOP success. First, kudos to the researchers who have stumbled upon the obvious that labor educators (and GOP operatives) have been discussing for years.
Declining real wages as a result of de-unionization has resulted in increased working hours by parents and by children. More hours at work means less hours at home. It also means less hours engaged in school activities, less attendance at school sporting events, less hours in volunteer work. It means less.
The solution includes higher wages and a better standard of living, the basic security of health insurances and a pension, and affordable access to educations and training.
Anything short will leave us wringing our hand and wonder what the solution is.
22
I agree wholeheartedly however most of these red states end up voting for candidates who are anti-union. It Was the unions that created Americas middle class
2
I don't care who these people voted for. I don't care that this is a "red" state. The opioid crisis is indiscriminate in the misery it has caused and we should all be unified in our empathy for its victims and in our efforts to put an end to it. I find it troubling that after reading a story highlighting the heroic efforts of a small town football coach to provide refuge and solace from an overwhelming national trauma, so many comments here instead want to wag disapproving fingers at the region's politics.
If we are ever going to truly deal with amazingly complex problems like opioids we are first going to have to solve our ultimate crisis: our political polarization.
24
Thank you, Mr. Bowen. I agree 100%.
2
I"m with Stargazer. Very thoughtful comment. These problems are everywhere and Indiana and Jefferson County having voted for Trump has nothing to do with these issues. Madison does have many fine people and programs aimed at youth and many of our young people are successfully avoiding these problems. The front page of the Madison Courier this morning reports that the Math Bowl team from the Catholic grade school won the state competition. These are not problems stemming from politics and are not unique to Madison or any community.
1
I guess the Times can continue its onslaught on football, but what alternative would these kids prefer? Kids enjoy the game. They want a taste of friendship and perhaps a win. I doubt ballet of band would satiate these kids.
2
If you go back further in years you'll find even more suicides. the first time I remember someone that I know killing themselves was when I was in 6th grade. the student was a year older than me and he hung himself and from then on the suicide problem has grown larger as well as a drug problem. Almost everyone I know including myself has talked about suicide or committing suicide at some point in their lives.
6
I find it very sad that everyone you know has talked about suicide. I also find it strange. I don’t know anyone who has committed suicide and while probably someone I know has thought about it, it is not something that is common
If, as stated, there is "no single reason for it", does a point which might be sighted as that of social divergence exist? Is there a time when lies take the reins of truth? Are these rhetorical questions? Yes.
While there is no basis to my claim beyond personal observation, I don't know, but suspect the misrepresentation of reality fostered by those in religious garb, contributes more than most want to think.
While I find no truth in the tenets of any religious faith, I have observed most who wear the garb are decent, if ill informed, people. An arrogant thought, but no less than touting the existence of a supernatural being. In fact, given the education of many who preach, it is difficult for me to consider they are as ill informed as they are invested.
Addiction may stem from the treatment of pain with narcotic or other drugs, but the mental inability to deal with that possibility has roots which are entwined by half truths originating in the acceptance of supernatural beliefs taught in childhood. We are made dependent, not on ourselves, but on an invention conjured long ago by righteous or opportunistic fellow humans.
We are inculcated with the idea of a more perfect life after death, rather than dealing with the reality of our finite existence.
Harping on these thoughts as I do may be considered arrogant in any way a person sees fit, but they are closer to the truth than one will ever find spilling from the lips of a spiritual advisor.
6
I am not aware of any mention that this coach " wore religious garb" or has any connection to religion.
There are lots of towns like this. And there are lots of gang-infested areas where black kids face similar problems. The best athletes among these kids try to get into Division I schools. And countless commenters are outrage because their SAT's aren't quite as high as those of their more privileged classmates.
2
Strip everything else out of this story, place, race, politics, especially the unrelated and sometimes cruelly snarky comments here, and we have a story of somebody who decided to make a difference, in a slice of the world where he saw a big need and knew he could. Patric Morrison of Madison, Ind. is my hero of the day today. Working against horrible challenges, throwing out lifelines wherever he can. Thank you for the article, and thank you Mr. Morrison for everything you do.
48
Being intimately acquainted with Madison I know for sure that there are many people within the community addressing the problem. I wish that this article would have included some interviews with community leaders/members who would have shared their perspective including what is being done, their opinion of what more needs to be done and what resources they need. It is not a hopeless situation! I find it unbelievable that so many comments are so judgmental, blaming and pessimistic. Find a way to be helpful: this is a national crisis!
5
I understand the anger arising from the difference in compassion shown towards drug addiction based upon race, rural vs. urban, etc. Sometimes I share in it. Still I am struck and saddened by the loss of life and more importantly, hope, that seems to be afflicting this community. At the end of the day, underneath it all, we are all human beings; suffering is suffering and loss is loss, for everyone, albeit in different measures. What is so wrong with our country, that these young people have no hope for a future? Where did we go so wrong that we drown ourselves in opiates rather than face reality of life? I have some ideas, pertaining to education, health care, family planning, living wages, but even then I expect the issues are deep. I'm so sad for these people's losses and the obstacles they continue face. And for us all, as we have lost the potential of these young people. Why?
75
I grew up in Madison, and I'm seriously disappointed in what I'm seeing in this comment section. People who know absolutely nothing about the lives lived there are making massive sweeping judgements about a town I still love in many ways. One of the biggest reasons I've seen for the suicide and drug use is that young people are stuck with a horrible choice, they can stay in Madison with the massive social supports available through family, friends, and a community where everyone knows you; or they can leave in order to escape the swing shift, two jobs to raise a family life. Economic development has stalled, leaving youth to choose between home and loved ones or working their lives away to never get ahead. I chose to leave, and when I was alone, far from home or anyone I had a real connection with, I hit my lowest and I did attempt suicide. I was unbelievably lucky woke up after, and I got help. But, now as a college senior with a fiance I love and a career ahead of me that makes me unbelievably happy, some days I still miss home. I miss knowing most of the people I see, I miss walking the bridge to Milton, I miss Chautauqua, and I miss the community, even though we are flawed, and we lack services for mental health and addiction. And those are part of the driving force for this. Not Trump, not religion, not the disappearance of the American Dream. It's that the town holds few opportunities, and the outside world never really feels like home.
233
Everything you say makes sense. Perhaps you could now explain why people in places like Madison are so deeply Republican when the sole purpose of the Republican Party is to throw money at rich people, generally at the expense of places like Madison.
9
Thoughts and prayers.
1
JD, I'm sorry you've had troubles; I can empathize as I tried to commit suicide as a college junior, many years ago. I'm glad to see you're feeling better w/a life to look forward to. I also have to say your town is far from being the only town suffering from a lack of jobs & economic development, where young people are faced w/the choice of staying w/their families & friends or moving away for a job, & this isn't a new phenomenon either. The small upstate NY city that I grew up near has been suffering from jobs flight for close to 40 years now (as has much of New York outside of the metro area), & for many people it was necessary to move to follow a job or move to find a job. But the suicide rates there didn't skyrocket the way they have in Madison. There's some sort of anomaly that this story hasn't explained as to why Madison is having the level of suicides that it is.
2
Jefferson County, Indiana November 2016 voting results
8,546 Trump
4,326 Clinton
Keep voting Republican, Indiana.
You're voting for your own slow-motion GOP Death panel.
https://www.nytimes.com/elections/results/indiana
20
It’s great that the Madison football coach is there for his team, but who’s there for the girls?
16
What a wonderful coach! His sincere concern is palatable to his students. VP Pence, are you there? This is your home state; do something!!!!!
22
Our drug crisis is horrible. Yes, we can call it an opioid crisis, and it is that, too, but the street drugs are still there, delivered pizza style or not. If it weren't for the journalists, many of us would not know the extent of it. Our young are the ones dying. Why do we continue to ignore this? Oh, that's right, Trump put Conway on it.
12
Though these issues exist everywhere--many families and communities have been devastated here in Massachusetts--there nevertheless seems to be a connection between rural and rust-belt communities of "Trump Country" and a toxic mix of chauvinism, bigotry, zenophobia, shame, blame and scapegoating that all play a part in the self-perpetuating problems described here.
16
As a strong DEM voter I'm disappointed that my party has not been aggressive at finding ways to help uplift rural and small town America. Look at the 2016 election map by county and you will see how DEMs are strong in the urban and wealthier areas.
It would seem, based on that, that where DEMs are in control, you also find prosperity. (And other things. Yes, crime rates are higher in urban areas.)
Where DEMs in areas like Oregon and California have failed is that they have not pursued policies that spread the benefits of the wealth of cities like Portland and San Francisco out to the rural communities.
In consequence, even in "liberal" California and Oregon you see strong voter support in rural areas for the GOP, who at least pay lip service to their concerns.
14
25 percent in manufacturing. Family income of 51k. Plenty of investment here. Its a cultural issue.
What does your point have to do with Madison, Indiana? Based on the story, it seems to be a fairly prosperous town. Also, I can think of several reasons (unrelated to your point) that many places in rural areas of the country tend to vote Republican.
Not much specifically to do with Madison, I admit. The article just reminded me of the growth of drug addiction in many rural and small town white communities across the country, communities that are being ignored by political power which is centralized in big cities.
The DEMs should be leading the way to improvement for those communities. But they aren't.
2
There just aren’t enough good reasons for young people to live their lives. We need positive goals as a society. We had; The West. We had; Space. We had; “go to heaven”. We had; marriage and family.
Now it’s; build an app, mine for bitcoins, be a Princess; all goals unattainable for the majority.
In old films it was always; boy meets girl and live happily ever after. Or in Westerns; good wins over evil in your town.
Now it’s: be a super hero, just you and a couple sidekicks save the universe: unattainable.
Maybe we need new goals and new leaders.
29
First I want to acknowledge and thank Patric Morrison and the people like him for their selfless work.
But I also want to address the lie that addicts of drugs like heroin are solely victims. Regardless of the circumstances of how they got addicted, their actions are criminal and have violent consequences.
Money spent by addicts on drugs goes in a straight line back to the criminal cartels in Central and South America. It is used to bribe government officials and police. It is used to purchase weapons and ammunition. It is used to order and carry out murders.
The money spent by a drug addict in Madison pays for a murder in Mexico or Colombia. Those 40+ students who "disappeared" in Mexico a few years back, of whom a few burned bodies were found, their murders were paid for by the money spent by American drug addicts on their drugs.
And in discussing heroin let's not forget the Taliban either, the ones who kill young teenage girls in school because they oppose education for women. They finance their operations with poppy growing. Afghanistan is the #1 source of heroin in the world and the addicts of the USA and western Europe are its #1 clientele.
I am a pragmatist. Whatever it takes to end the killings, I'm for it. And yes, the addicts need help. Treating them solely as criminals will not end their addictions. But let's not lie to ourselves. Let's not allow them to lie to themselves. They must understand the consequences of their actions.
(I lost a brother to heroin.)
59
Decriminalize opioids like the Swiss did and we can cut most of the link to crime, instead of blaming desperately addicted people for the crime currently associated with drug trafficking.
7
I'm open to any solution that reduces the numbers of deaths across the world, here in the USA, in the Afghan poppy fields and the villages and towns of Central America. But I doubt any "solution" is going to work until people understand the full consequences of their actions. For some reason, there is very little discussion about how the cash drug addicts spend on their fixes finances death and destruction across the world. It's always about how they are victims. I think it's long past time we all face that.
2
Absent parents, both either working two jobs, or one of which has abandoned the family unit. Kids left to their own devices will always get into serious trouble without a parent to provide guidance and discipline.
8
Unrestrained race to the bottom capitalism is what is at fault here. Parents are too busy scraping by to raise their kids.
I am sorry your brother had to go to prison for heroin. Maybe if we accepted the opiate epidemic and treated the people affected with science based treatment and behavioral therapy it would at least be a beginning. We need to set up medical clinics where the addicted can safely inject, be counseled and hopefully during a moment of clarity direct them to the support they need. All of this is just a hope now that we have the greedy, thoughtless Republicans and a your on your own government in place!
9
I live in Madison, IN. We know we have issues here of despair and drug addiction and anything and everything. We also have a community that is trying so very hard to come together to provide support for children and adults affected by the twin plagues of suicide and opiates. We have a long way to go. There are not enough families to foster the children who need to be fostered (away from drugs, away from violence, or whose parents are in jail). There are not enough mental health counselors. There are not enough places for people to go for addiction treatment or rehabilitation. There are not enough after-school programs. And so on and so on. But we are trying to find answers. Please don't dismiss us or speak disdainfully. The reasons are multiple, the answers must be, too, but the suffering is all too real.
159
Thank you for your heartfelt and accurate assessment. I, too, am dismayed by the attitude of some (not all!) commenters on this piece. Some people seem to ascribe these losses of young people to addiction to their geographic location. There is no empirical basis for such assertions. Addiction is a complex web of biochemical, social, individual, and environmental factors. To blame these kids for being white, or semi-rural, or located in a midwestern state, etc., etc., is to blind us to the work we need to do and the work that others such as yourself are trying to do. Bon courage!
9
Carefully I suggest a program searching for inner truth in the gifts of service to others. My path centers around sobriety to break that bondage, but paths are endless in this realm.
We don't survive alone but we can find hope with sharing experience and strength.
9
I am a Licensed Clinical Social Worker in Kentucky and have applied twice for my LCSW in Indiana so that I can practice in Southern Indiana where I live and where there are not enough mental health therapists. Indiana's supervision requirements are less than those of Kentucky and even though I produced a certified copy of my LCSW application from the Kentucky Board of Social Work proving that I had met the supervision requirements (with supervisor signatures attesting to my hours) and that I had passed the LCSW test, the state of Indiana told me that they would not grant me a license until they received a current Indiana application with original signatures from my supervisors proving that I had met my supervision hours. I have been licensed in Kentucky for 18 years and some of my supervisors are now deceased. Southern Indiana does not have enough mental health therapists despite it's proximity to cities like Louisville, Kentucky. The protectionist practices of the Indiana Behavioral Health and Human Services Licensing Board are a big part of the reason why.
38
I worked as a case manager for an agency that served children and families for a time. The production aka billable time with kids and families as well as documenting visits is staggering. To meet production, your own family was a bit neglected.
1
I wanted to thank you for the article.
As the In School Suspension supervisor at Madison Consolidated High School where Coach Morrison coaches I can tell you that our staff is committed to our students. Every one of them.
I should not be surprised at the broad assumptions and generalizations about our town. We are a town of many races, religions and political beliefs. We have a wide range of education levels. Just like any city in the nation.
I do not know what caused the drug and suicide issues in our town. I am working to solve the problems by giving our students, especially the "bad kids", that are sent to my room, the tools they need to stay clean, sober and alive. I help them develop study skills, reasoning skills, anger management skills and conflict resolution skills to give them confidence and to be an asset to their future employers.
Being from a large city does not make you more qualified to judge what you don't know.
137
Thanks for the hard work you and others like you are doing!
3
Tina, I'm from a small town in NH, Henniker, pop 2000, now from a small city in NZ pop 43000. So is it alright if I'm critical. I hope it is because the criticism, partly directed at your own education values: the purpose of education is "to give them confidence and to be an asset to their future EMPLOYERS (emphasis mine) is at the bases of the despair in your city and others like it --as some commentators from Madison point out. The goal of education is to learn how to think critically and how to become a better person and a better citizen in a democracy. If you're teaching people so they can be better cogs in the corporate machine, small wonder they turn to drugs.
And I have sympathy for you, too. With a family dysfunctional because both parents have to work to support their "lifestyle," leaving little time for hanging out and passing on the values to their children, you, the educator, presumably a product of the same rat race have little opportunity or capacity to question what the whole thing is all about. The kids, though, are asking, with their behavior. Wake up before you drown.
1
Rxfxworld, employers was a poor choice of words on my part.
Society would have been a better choice.
You must understand that many of the kids that come to me struggle with learning issues, emotional issues, etc.
Yesterday I had conversations with two different students who don't see the point in being here at all because "I'm just going to go get a job." One said "I just want to make sure my little brother has everything I never dreamed of having." I am very proud of this young man for wanting to provide for his brother! However, an $8 an hour job isn't going to do that very well and without education, there's not much more he can do. Sure, he could start his own business. But people are going to expect him to be where he is supposed to be on time and do what he says he will do when he says he will do it.
As of now, he can't do that consistently. If a client wants him to build something a certain way and he says "But I want too." His business is not going to last long.
Very similar situation with the other student. He refused to go to class because "I don't feel like going to biology today."
I think we can all agree that sometimes in life we have to do things we don't want to do.
Part of education is learning to do want needs to be done when it needs done. That is what I was trying to say.
1
Make America great again, America was always great. Here, we have people sold into disillusion, pining for a life that never existed. Sold the lie that dreams were stolen and only Trump can save them. Religion is no longer the opiate of the masses, opiates are. The pain requiring relief is directed from the Trump dementia and later self inflicted and reinforced daily by Fox News. Herein is the horror of the Trump lie. These good people will be dismissed in a moral bankruptcy, no longer needed until the next election cycle. Slow death and moral decline is the reward of the true believers.
10
When will this country do something about the opioid epidemic. Approximately 175 people die every day overdosing on opioids. We need to look at the problem from ALL angles. From the drug manufacturers and distributors, to the clinics, hospitals, doctors, and pharmacies.
But we also need to study WHY there is such hopelessness in our society. When we in the US have such wealth (as compared to much of the rest of the world), what is leading to people to want to do drugs, and/or commit suicide?
6
Right, it's hopelessness that's the cause. I guess that's also why people become addicted to cigarettes and alcohol.
1
Coach Morrison is giving these guys membership into a brotherhood where they feel loved. No taxed funded program can provide that. It has to happen in each community organically, then maybe outside money can support such an effort.
But first each community has to care enough to invest emotionally in its young people. Start mentoring programs. Offer your couch. Drive them to detox and sobriety meetings. Team with local police to follow up with support services. Visit them in jail. Organize support groups for families. Become a recovery coach. Be willing to have your heart broken by their struggles and failures.
In frustration and despair we are looking for external quick fixes-"saviors". On the right, it's Trump, on the left its government programs. Time to get your hands dirty. I am an active part of a community that is slowly making a difference in death rates and people's lives by doing all of the above. There is hope. This is how we make things better. One Coach Morrison and his team at a time.
5
Coach Morrison’s football team IS a government program — that’s what public schools are. Schools need great teachers and role models, which means they have to pay for them.
11
Like another reader said, these stories frustrate me. They are just telling the story in one point of time. What makes these kids pick-up drugs? Why are they so available? Where did they get them? Why are they depressed? These questions never get answered in the same articles about every small rural town in America. I don't have a drug problem, so why should I care? Please explain.
4
Because, presumably, you can experience empathy. But if that isn't enough:
Because when a junkie ODs and gets hauled into the ER with no insurance you pay for it. Because when an addicted baby has to be taken into the care of the state, you pay for it.
Because when an HIV epidemic breaks out from shared needles, it's a public health crisis.
Because when drug addicts can't hold a job, that's a drag on the economy from lost hours and lost wages.
1
Wait a second......I thought The Heartland's Real Americans were living the good conservative life, going to church, baking cookies, and preaching abstinence. All the bad stuff happens on coasts where the elites have their orgies and everybody is a godless heathen. Please, say it ain't so.
142
Oh, dear, where is your compassion? Not everyone in each of these places fits that stereotype, and it is cruel. Did you miss the part about people's parents having to have two jobs to make ends meet? Is your community truly immune from the scourge of addiction? If so, please publish the information so that others can send representatives to see the miracle. In the meantime, plenty of people in the "heartland" are doing what this coach is doing, not lobbing sarcastic verbal bombs at the suffering.
33
It would help so much (my opinion) if America would "keep it real." The hypocrisy is what makes some normally caring and compassionate people become cynical.
Example: American prisons are full of black and brown people whose crimes were drug addiction...not drug dealing. Most came from poor, broken homes where generations had to live under systemic racism and discrimination, leading to hopelessness, etc. Nobody cried a river for them or saw them as victims; they were simply lazy low-lifes. Government programs to help them were
labeled as "liberal handouts." Saddled with criminal records, few have been able to recover their lives, even if they were lucky enough to beat their habits, cause they're color hasn't changed. So, yes, addiction knows no race or gender; it's a equal-opportunity killer. So, it's not the lack of compassion that leads many to statements like those of JP.
12
Have you ever been to the Midwest? You might change your tune. There's plenty to disagree with (God knows I had plenty of reason to leave Indiana), but it's mostly people, good and bad, trying to get by. Same as anywhere else.
4
I applaud this article. But whenever I read these in depth, nuanced articles about the opiate crisis in predominantly white towns I am struck by the contrast to past coverage of crack or heroin epidemics in predominantly African American communities. I can only hope this brings us together as a country vs dividing us further.
190
"I can only hope this brings us together as a country vs dividing us further."
I would hope so too but look at all the schadenfreude in the comments and the answer is still clearly 'no'.
10
The numbers are chilling juxtaposed a "normal" community, but obviously the community is not normal. Other than some mention of absent parents I don't read any attempt to dig for or even conjecture a reason. I hope there is a follow up story in the works.
20
I feel qualified to speculate as someone who attended middle and high school in a town that isn't this one but is very similar, aside from the accolades for being "beautiful". This community is not ABNORMAL. That's what should be chilling. These things are happening in rural communities across the country. 15 people from my graduating class overdosed, died by suicide, or overdosed under circumstances that well could have been suicide in the year following graduation. That number has continued to grow in subsequent years.
"Absent parents" have little to do with it. Many of them had actively present parents. It's boredom. It's feeling trapped - many of them didn't get into college or didn't have the means to go. It's insecurity and self doubt. It's lack of access to afforable mental health services and drug treatment. It's a community that disparages "millennials" and looks down upon those with substance abuse issues.
This is my perception, of course.
43
I mean only statistically abnormal. The writer makes a point of this county having an inflated per capita suicide rate. I guess I have read so many opioid books and articles I was hoping this one would take a stab the underpinning reasons even if it is something as predictable as "social media is making people feel more alone"
Compare this small town football coach/teacher against all those rich people who run the country and just got a huge tax break on his back, and tell me who is worth more to society.
278
Has anyone in Madison -- or the state capital -- considered the possibility that there's some sort of toxic contamination in the community -- possibly the water or an abandoned factory, that sort of thing? Seems very important to rule out.
19
Clearly contamination wouldn’t be the whole story, but it might contribute. Studies of lithium levels in the water of Texas counties showed higher levels were associated with lower levels of suicide and violence. (Note: low dose lithium can be found at any vitamin store.)
Chemical hormone disrupters in water or food could affect thyroid, testosterone and estrogen levels and hence mood.
And don’t forget that social media overuse causes isolation and depression.
Meanwhile, hats off to the coach!
8
The US Army operated the Jefferson Proving Ground, immediately north of Madison, for five decades following WWII. 45,000 acres remain littered with unexploded ordnance, a depleted uranium firing range, and an active Air National Guard laser-guided bombing range in the center of the site. Contamination is worth considering, but so is the economic and social disruption that the base closure brought to this area some 20 years ago.
15
Pretty sure Madison gets its water from Ohio River. So check Cincinnati and Louisville.
1
This is what is happening in small town, white America. Its not just the boys: middle aged white men are killing themselves, getting addicted to alcohol and engaging in dangerous drug activity at alarming rates. The public health folks call these "diseases of despair". Over and over, I find these stories are told through the lens of the local football team - it would seem that football (and notably a kindly football coach) is all that's offered to these boys.
Frankly, these towns and the males that live there don't seem to have a way to move forward. They are focused on the past - the jobs they've lost, the societal privilege they used to have, the friends and colleagues who've moved away. Sadly, I'm not sure that there is anything to do about it.
65
Such "diseases of despair" are akin to the early death - due to the effects of alcohol - that showed up in middle aged Russian men when Russia broke apart and all the secure jobs once held went away, money given to the oligarchs. A real root cause of the despair shown in this article... lack of decent, union wage jobs and poverty leading to hopelessness.
6
Certainly, this is a sad story. I sympathize with folks in Madison. We need thoughtful, intelligent strategies and actions for dealing with these challenges.
Yet, these types of stories, now pretty common, are ironic. For decades, until relatively recently, young black people in the inner-cities struggled with drugs, crime, and despair. They were called "thugs" and "animals" by people like Trump (and many others in America). The society decided that the "solution" for their problems was jail. There was a "moral crisis" among black men (fathers), etc.
This story tells us that, in Jefferson County, the unemployment rate is around 4%, median household income is $51,500, and only 2 of every 10 children live in poverty. The statistics for the inner-cities were far, far worse. Yet when these (relatively) privileged and primarily white kids succumb to these temptations, the collective response is one of support rather than condemnation. Support is appropriate. But, clearly, we still have a long way to go in dealing with the egregious inequalities produced by our racial prejudice.
314
New Hampshire itself is a hotbed of trouble with addiction. This is a national scourge. You are right about some of the past facile and unfair conclusions about minority populations. Yet all groups are plagued with unacceptably high addiction or usage numbers, and it deserves a national approach and policy, not a piecemeal one.
15
The issue here is too much privilege, not too little. I feel bad for the kids, but the fault lies clearly with their parents.
Get a life, parents.
1
A great post and spot on. Where is the condemnation of their parents who would rather sit at home and eat chocolates and watch their "programs" than actually get off their keisters and raise their kids? Where are the absent father figures who need to step it up and work harder for their kids and just "be there" for them? Where's the questioning of the kids themselves? Their base morals, their entitlement, their love of violent video games, their lack of respect for authority? C'mon! These kids don't really even have the excuse of self created poverty! It seemed so easy to find a target for our collective pointed fingers just a few short years ago. Why is it so difficult now? Is it because they are white kids? Oh--okay.
2
Yet they cling to their guns and their bibles instead of education and health care.
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If the U.S. really wants to halt the opioid epidemic, let's see fewer stories of the tragic fallout and more, hard-hitting investigation of the root causes. Prescription medications are how most people become hooked, and there is too little focus on the how pharmaceutical companies and politicians complicit with them (in both parties, in all legislatures) enable the widespread availability of those "starter" drugs. Drug companies and the politicians they influence are only too happy to have media attention diverted to secondary matters: crackdowns on the heroin trade, better treatment centres, inspirational football coaches and the like. Yet, everything begins with the the drug company-political connections that determine FDA approvals, regulations and enforcement. Put the spotlight there. Follow the money.
115
Why do not only our youth, but people of all ages, have such a low frustration tolerance that they have to resort to mood altering drugs? The business sector is quite pleased to profit on this dilemma, and encouraged by the laissez-faire policies of this current unregulated economic system. The current "leader" wants to deregulate even more! Follow how little, government money is spent on health, education and welfare as we deregulate ourselves apart.
3
Nobody is forcing anybody to take prescription medications, especially ones that aren't their own. This same group of people is all about "personal responsibility" so maybe it's time for them to start taking some.
6
Thank you, it seems I've been quoting Deepthroat's famous directive almost daily as of late: Follow the money.
4
I grew up in small town Arlington, Virginia in the late 1940s, early 50s. My mother was at home for my first 8 years, My teachers were wives of successful business and government workers who went to great colleges and worked for low "supplemental" wages. Because the government was growing, we weren't loosing our best and brightest--there were plenty of good jobs in my home town. Everything we knew about drugs, we learned fro "Reefer Madness."
What a contrast to the situation in many small towns like Madison, where each year most of the best and brightest, the communities potential leaders, go off to college and become part of the talent pool for large cities. Where many mothers and fathers work two jobs and have very little energy for helping with homework, other skills and emotional support. And where addicting, prescription, legal drugs are readily available, because we don't want regulatory "government on the backs of business." And money and profits are the new national religion that governs government policy, so everything else, including our children is secondary.
Compare that to
16
RobertAllen - "Addicting, prescription, legal drugs are readily available, because we don't want regulatory government on the backs of business." Amen. Take a look at the new head of HHS, Alex Azar. He was an executive at Eli Lilly during the time it was pushing its lethal "blockbuster" Zyprexa. Others from Lilly have gone on to run the state ( such as Mitch Daniels, Governor and now head of Purdue University). We never prosecute these individuals, we promote them.
2
These articles frustrate me. I'd like more detail on how a guy like Zach Morrison gets started on drugs, or the player that dropped out and ended up passed out in his car.
Given that the core issue driving suicides seems to be drug use, what is the actual moment, the choice, the path, the friends, the connection(s), the family situation, that lead these kids (or anyone) to start doing hard drugs?
These articles always talk about the aftermath, that's the easy part, the no brainer, the tear-jerker. Drugs ravage a community 12.0. Yet they never talk about the lead up. Who's offering them drugs? In what situations? Parties? Downtime after school? Hanging out in groups of friends? With a best friend? Teammates? Parents? Relatives? What times? What places? At school? At home? Parks?
Seems like scrutinizing these patterns and researching this kind of data is the only way to learn how to reduce the influx of new addicts, and stop the epidemic. Not to be hard-hearted, but for people already hooked, odds aren't good. They will battle addiction for life. Yes, we can't give up on them, and need more treatment facilities, innovate with better ways of people getting off drugs. But we seem completely in the dark and ignore the other side of the epidemic equation--reducing the infection rate, stopping new cases from cropping up.
I'd really like to hear the stories and data of how people get hooked, and see programs that focus on disrupting these patterns and pathways.
141
How people get hooked? They're bored, and when they take drugs it feels good and passes the time. Either that, or the drugs plug a longstanding emotional hole.
I grew-up in a town of similar size, where there's nothing to do but play sport and tinker with your car. If I still lived there, I'd probably be despondent enough to use drugs.
9
Yes! More investigation into the real root causes and the mechanisms at work.
I hope the editors pick up on your suggestions. We've already had a lot of the aftermath articles.
3
I checked. There is a library in Madison, IN. It looks very nice. No reason to be bored.
5
It seems as if the Madisons ot the U.S., some with Norman Rockwell Main Streets, are standing still while the rest of society is moving forward. But that's an illusion. To stand still is to fall behind. Madison holds no bright future for its youngsters, and the kids know it.
The political classes, while publicly waving the flag and standing up for the 2nd Amendment, and while privately pocketing big money from Big Pharma, has thrown these towns to the wolves.
This country needs another revolution.
47
I thought Trump was the revolution? That he was going to save places like Madison and make them great again?
Also, not sure why you dragged "big pharma" into this?
4
Without "big pharma" there would have been no oxycodone and other opiates (i.e. heroin knockoffs...) and their easy availability...
1
Despair is contagious; recall Malcolm Gladwell's The Tipping Point. Even more so for young people whose grown-ups are absent; who haven't acquired the experience, coping skills and mature judgment that form resiliency; who can readily obtain drugs; and who routinely see their community bond at funerals for their peers, dead from overdose or suicide.
Patric Morrison's program does beautiful work to immunize his "little brothers." Visiting from college, Madison football alum Curry Morgan shows the kids that the coach is on to something: it's possible, if scary, to survive.
40
It is sad that these young men only receive some sort of emotional support through playing a game that may endanger their long-term health. There must be a better way to reach them.
77
Trump and Christie were going to solve this problem. When was the last time that you saw any reporting that they have done anything ? This is their base . Madison is in Jeferson county and went 2 to1 for trump and todays NYT shows that trumps base remains at 40%.
What has happened to our electorate ?
107
The story of the self delusional America of 2018. The story of an American town that’s in despair because it deludes itself into the belief that the American dream to which they feel entitled has been stolen by the immigrant dreamers. This was the story of a town that has everything but deludes itself into thinking it has nothing and drowns it’s despair in pills and blames everyone sinking so low in its inebriation that it votes for Donald Trump because surely he will save them. It’s a story of incredible sadness.
175
How do you know what the problems are in this town? With such a low unemployment rate I don't think anyone is "blaming" immigrants. How can you take a story like this and bend it to fit your political views? It is interesting how many progressives understand exactly what other people are thinking (not saying) and then give their usual response to every social problem faced by others: "If only they could be more like us, all of their problems would go away. After all, we know what's best for everyone".
15
Not everyone here voted for Trump.
I don't understand how you determined that "the American dream was stolen from them by immigrant dreamers." Where is that anywhere in the article?
10
The issue is young people with depression, deciding to take their own lives rather than continue on.
Think about the actuality of their reality: they look ahead at the coming years, months, weeks, days, hours, minutes, and they would rather feel nothing than continue on. They would rather take drugs than continue fearing the next step. They would rather take their lives than continue fearing the next step.
Whether that fear is because of actual or perceived social standing that maybe’s going away, or if they’re worry life will never be as good as it was for their parents, or if they worry the environment is rotting away, one day to be inhabitable, with people possibly fighting just to have a clean breath of air, or whether it’s clinical depression, an imbalance of chemicals that could be treated with proper care, it’s not really for you to decide, in Honolulu.
It’s not for me to decide.
It’s something we should maybe try to help with. And helping can be as simple as hearing, rather than imposing pre-conceived political opinions on a tragic act of self-inflicted violence that ripples throughout communities, families, individuals, tearing them apart in the the most psychologically isolated of ways.
Maybe, just maybe, we should listen instead calling someone delusional or entitled, calling someone these words even from a distance of 4,385 miles when they are already feeling so down they’re thinking the darkest of thoughts.
Maybe we could be the light.
Maybe.
16
Teaching school isn't just about your subject content. I did it for 31 years. You will always think of your students as your " kids." And even today I hear from my "kids." Job references, proof a paper they've written, sometimes they call just to ask my advice.
Most of you "civilians" will never understand the job.
That said, the job is changing. Politicians, parents want us to be all for a starting salary of less than $30,000....and until you've been cussed, hit, broken up a fight between two 200lb students, consoled kids whose best friend overdosed over the weekend, don't tell me how easy of a job teaching might be....
And by the way, I am a hunter, I own guns, but carry a gun in the classroom? That's one of the nuttiest thing I've ever heard...Have they not thought about how many things could go wrong?
373
It is unconscionable to abandon these communities to the twin specters of narcotics and suicide. Counseling and Treatment options must by made publicly available. These heartland areas supply our nation with young mind and bodies, and we overlook them at our peril. The rot starts from the center this time.
13
This is certainly a cry for help. I tend to think these tragedies are symptoms. Our small towns have suffered over the past 50 years. Thank you for giving voice to the survivors. They need help. I believe that change will require an election- but we can all recheck what we can and are able to do for each other. Please follow up with reports on approaches that work and what we all might do to restore our national fabric. More voices need to be heard. These deaths and situation, like Parkland, call to us all.
30
Is this what happens when the American dream goes away? Or rather after it gets destroyed. What stood out for me was the line about parents working two jobs. Destroyed by capitalism?
83
Mr. Wright,
Capitalism has produced more wealth for more people than any other system in history.
Socialism (state ownership of the means of production) has caused more poverty and death than any system--think Stalin, Pol Pot, Mao, and lately, Chavez/Maduro Venezuela.
Having said that, unregulated Capitalism, and Capitalism without a decent social safety net, results in Oligarchy, another evil.
The problem with our current U.S. politics is an awful polarization that often precludes rational discussion.
16
The thing is, for nearly 4 decades, all we've had is unregulated capitalism without a decent social safety net. So, de facto, that's what capitalism is now. I'm not trying to start another internet argument between strangers, but the capitalism of Econ textbooks in college is a fairy tale, as relevant as the Grimm Brothers, or probably less so. The capitalism of the real world is Nestle admitting last week it uses slaves in Thailand, and children on cocoa plantations getting maimed for not harvesting enough, and the billion dollar CEO bonuses of the crash/bailout of '08, and the plastic manufacturers' trade associations lobbying and even suing cities to prevent plastic bag and bottle bans, while we all stand by and watch plastic destroy the Earth. It's most especially US companies closing factories and reopening them in developing countries with few labor or environmental laws, all for higher profits, to the doom of American communities. THIS IS WHAT CAPITALISM IS IN 2018. Not Adam Smith, Not Ayn Rand, Not Grover Norquist, Not Cinderella or Snow White.
45
Are you counting the people form Madison in those statistics David G.? I've heard that figure before but doubt that it takes into consideration all the damages that capitalism has cost this planet. Indeed we're just seeing the costs of the post-capitalistic wave has had on the planet. More to come-climate change is the clear game changer in your idol worship of capitalism. By the way your examples are not socialism but rather communism. Modern socialist countries lead the world in quality of life indicators for their citizens. I don't condemn all capitalist economics but it takes more that a social safety net to control it. Heavy regulations are necessary to prevent environmental and worker exploitation along with public control over natural resource extraction.
14
i'm confused. This article seems to indicate the redeeming values of football. Yet The Times has frequently run articles tying it to suicide and drug addiction.
I don't understand how playing football will reduce the incidence of things that it causes. It would be almost like saying that if they smoked cigarettes they might not be using other drugs so despite the harm it would do them, it would be better to allow them to do so.
18
It isn’t the playing of football that saves some students; it is the very caring adult who coached them who does. Such support can come from band leaders, art teachers, guidance counselors, and yes, all teachers who are on the front lines of child care.
63
You missed the message. It's not about football. It's about mentoring. It's about people caring enough to go out of their way to help.
I would much rather football was NOT the way to reach the young people at risk. I don't like the sport because of the damage it does to people's bodies. But if that is the most effective place to reach those people, at this time, then so be it.
I hope our society moves beyond its fascination with football. But we're not there yet.
12
If this town is so poor, why are they funding a football team?
Chilling. This is real life in so many communities throughout the country. Thank you for the article.
59
Mike Pence will solve this.
39
Pence will pray on this. They're won't actually be a plan with responsible people, nor will there be any money.
119
Pence is like Marx and Lenin, he wants the state to "wither away", he's given up the American dream for one more stupid ideology. Trump and his Russian money launders are the new New class, thanks a heap.
18
Trump and his cohorts are simply the enemies of the people, treacherous scoundrels.
I'm still left wondering what the connection between the drugs and suicide is. What a heart-rending despair is must be.
9
You said it yourself; despair.
9
Marcel Widzisz - Many prescription drugs, of various classes, can cause behavior change in the person taking them - including suicide and homicide. One source, detailing such incidents, is SSRI Stories - (SSRI antidepressants).
2
What kind of life is being modelled in common-place America? It is a culture fueled by an unbridled commerce free for all that is hardly inclusive of those not born on second base. Even those "privileged" enough to maybe score an early run, are more interested in being the winner, not how they play the game. The current "leader' of the country is a shameful epitome of this and a sad elegy to an empire in decline.
48
Thank you for writing such a thoughtful article!
14
thank you for this.
8
I'm confused when people add politics to this. Here we have an all to rare story about a decent man. Let's be happy before we have to start reading about Washington again.
3