Extra Extra: The Outlook is Bleak, Bleak, Bleak

Photo by hinducow via the LAist Featured Photos pool on Flickr

• Over 300,000 troops returning from campaigns in Iraq and Afghanistan are suffering from some sort of mental illness, including PTSD. Over half admit they are not seeking medical treatment.
• "Trainwreck"? More like "how many college students can we fuck in the ass?" The answer is pretty much all of them: Sallie Mae, the largest student loan company in the United States, says the 2008 outlook for offering student loans is bleak at best.
• I don't know, move to Tucson? Home prices are dropping, yes, but as we know all too well, rent prices all over the Western U.S. are skyrocketing.
• Two women have been convicted of a terrible crime: they lured homeless men in off the street, housed them, took out insurance policies in their name, and then ran the men over in order to collect on 3.7 million dollars.
• X-Ray vision: coming to an airport near you. "Airports in New York and Los Angeles have become the latest equipped with body scanners that allow security screeners to peer beneath a passenger's clothing to detect concealed weapons."
• This is why drugs are bad, kids: a man has been sentenced to two years, four months in prison for cutting off his cat's head and tail. He believed a neighbor had put a spell on him.
• Puppy love, Valley lore: In the SFV, you can see people riding horseback in the streets, you can pick orange of a neighbor's tree and you can find true friendship between a dog and his good ole pal, a sheep.