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Thread: OT: Politics

  1. #631
    Quote Originally Posted by UV Halo View Post
    Thanks, and I'm sorry I missed or forgot about it.

    0. Yes, mental health services must be more readily available and easier to attain. The system really needs to take potential for violence or suicide much more seriously than it currently does (i.e. Tuesday "I'm suicidal", Wednesday: "I'm fine", and released).
    1. In "loopholes" do you mean what docwho goes into? If so, you can see my reply.
    2. I'm good.
    3. I agree with tax dollars spent on research however, I want it to be unbiased- It is possible, I just haven't seen much. One general theme I have a problem with is the inclusion of suicide (where there are no associated incidents of homicide or assault) in the metrics concerning violence with guns. I'm not saying the potential relationship between suicide and firearms should not be researched but, that should be kept strictly on addressing suicide and not used to bolster restrictions on the general population.
    the two biggest problems are the two zeros, and land squarly in republican hands.

    they made it illegal for unbiased government agencies to research gun violence.

    they are making it daily, harder for americans to receive mental healthcare. ie, when you are stripping millions of people of health insurance, you arn't helping the mental health of the country.

    this is purely a republican problem.
    social conservatism: the mortal fear that someone, somewhere, might be having fun.

  2. #632
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    "So you've done this before?"
    "Oh, hell no. But I think it's gonna work."

  3. #633
    Quote Originally Posted by Lurker27 View Post
    Thanks for this. Really interesting read.

  4. #634
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    I'm having first hand experience on the state of mental health care in North Carolina vs. where I grew up in South Carolina. A family member has needed care, and it's nearly impossible to get in North Carolina.

    Originally, to get the person into the system and start stabilizing care, we were required to enter the process through the Emergency Room of one of the local hospitals (a specific one, as only two hospitals in the City have mental health care facilities). Then, after being stabilized, the family member was discharged with no exit plan. My wife and I immediately scrambled to try to get coverage. Thankfully, BCBS has a program where you can have a "case manager" assist you with finding the exit care services required, but you have to choose to opt-in to their service. Initially, the way it was presented I was inclined to reject the service because they couldn't articulate what the benefit was (it turns out, the benefit is just having one extra person help with google searches and coordinating communication between medical practices - and that turned out to be a huge help!). Right now in NC, medical doctors are separated by a wall from therapists are separated by a wall from hospitals are separated by a wall from the large number of private mental health support companies that have popped up in the state. This is because the mental health industry here is largely deregulated and privatized. Our case manager setup bridges of communication between all the agencies we interact with and follows up with these institutions to make sure they are talking.

    Our family member first entered the emergency room in early January. We were able to have at least 1x a week treatment for this person within about two weeks of the emergency room visit. We're hoping to actually get into the recommended treatment program by mid next-week. If that happens on-time, it will have been 8 weeks between the first condition and the doctor-recommended recovery program. People in the various agencies we've been working with tell us that this is actually fast for NC, and a testament to the fact that my wife and I have given up a whole lot of working time to hammer on this each and every day. I tell everyone I talk to about this that the most frustrating part of the process for me is that there is so much you don't know, and no group in NC that takes on responsibility for seeing care is delivered. The hospital just dumps you out the door once you're stable. Doctors will prescribe medicine but not necessarily allow you to get it (in our case, we had to wait until the patient could return to a hospital setting to start receiving medicine). Therapists and social workers seem to abound in every agency but none seem to talk with each other or with the doctors. If I had known everything I know today back in the second week of January, I might have been able to get my family member into treatment 3 or 4 weeks ago - I just didn't know to start the paperwork process as early as required. And I didn't know this even though I was actively talking to the patient's doctors, nurses, social workers, and therapists on a daily basis.

    It's exhausting.

    Now, in South Carolina there is a department of mental health. And the social workers in that department are required to see through the patients from entry to the system until care is received. And they are the ones that handle communication between the groups and help you make medical decisions. If we just live fifteen minutes further south, my family member's wait time would have been a third of what it's been.

  5. #635
    Quote Originally Posted by Unfated33 View Post
    I'm having first hand experience on the state of mental health care in North Carolina vs. where I grew up in South Carolina. A family member has needed care, and it's nearly impossible to get in North Carolina.

    Originally, to get the person into the system and start stabilizing care, we were required to enter the process through the Emergency Room of one of the local hospitals (a specific one, as only two hospitals in the City have mental health care facilities). Then, after being stabilized, the family member was discharged with no exit plan. My wife and I immediately scrambled to try to get coverage. Thankfully, BCBS has a program where you can have a "case manager" assist you with finding the exit care services required, but you have to choose to opt-in to their service. Initially, the way it was presented I was inclined to reject the service because they couldn't articulate what the benefit was (it turns out, the benefit is just having one extra person help with google searches and coordinating communication between medical practices - and that turned out to be a huge help!). Right now in NC, medical doctors are separated by a wall from therapists are separated by a wall from hospitals are separated by a wall from the large number of private mental health support companies that have popped up in the state. This is because the mental health industry here is largely deregulated and privatized. Our case manager setup bridges of communication between all the agencies we interact with and follows up with these institutions to make sure they are talking.

    Our family member first entered the emergency room in early January. We were able to have at least 1x a week treatment for this person within about two weeks of the emergency room visit. We're hoping to actually get into the recommended treatment program by mid next-week. If that happens on-time, it will have been 8 weeks between the first condition and the doctor-recommended recovery program. People in the various agencies we've been working with tell us that this is actually fast for NC, and a testament to the fact that my wife and I have given up a whole lot of working time to hammer on this each and every day. I tell everyone I talk to about this that the most frustrating part of the process for me is that there is so much you don't know, and no group in NC that takes on responsibility for seeing care is delivered. The hospital just dumps you out the door once you're stable. Doctors will prescribe medicine but not necessarily allow you to get it (in our case, we had to wait until the patient could return to a hospital setting to start receiving medicine). Therapists and social workers seem to abound in every agency but none seem to talk with each other or with the doctors. If I had known everything I know today back in the second week of January, I might have been able to get my family member into treatment 3 or 4 weeks ago - I just didn't know to start the paperwork process as early as required. And I didn't know this even though I was actively talking to the patient's doctors, nurses, social workers, and therapists on a daily basis.

    It's exhausting.

    Now, in South Carolina there is a department of mental health. And the social workers in that department are required to see through the patients from entry to the system until care is received. And they are the ones that handle communication between the groups and help you make medical decisions. If we just live fifteen minutes further south, my family member's wait time would have been a third of what it's been.
    every barrier to mental health coverage that republicans put in place, betrays that they are not serious about blaming mental health for these problems.

    or rather, they are in so far as scapegoating for guns. blame anything other than the guns, and then do nothing to help those problems either.

    the onion isn't a joke, its actual republican policy: https://politics.theonion.com/this-s...ass-1819585076

    fine, you want to blame mental health, and not touch gun laws: sounds like the perfect justification for a fully health insurance covered society. so when do we get that passed?

    no really, it is that simple: this a purely republican problem. stop putting republicans in charge.
    social conservatism: the mortal fear that someone, somewhere, might be having fun.

  6. #636
    its even worse too, because not only are we making mental helath issues worse by making it tougher for people to access .... we are also passing laws explicitly forbidding police or law enforcement to actually do anything about someone who is mentally ill. yup, last year trump and THIS republican congress passed a law protecting mentally ill folk's right to bear arms. YUP.

    so never mind any warning signs ... still doesn't matter, even if you have every warning sign and you actually follow up on all of them. because no one can do anything about it anyway, at least until the person actually decides to shoot a child. you can't stop them from buying, you can't stop them from owning, you can't take them away ... provided they are not a felon. until they shoot there first kid ... law enforcement is totally powerless to stop the mentally ill from having anything you or i could own.

    no really guys, it is that simple .... republicans are fucking dipshits. it really is that simple. there is no nuance about it, nothing really to argue. there isn't a counter point here. there arn't two sides of reasonable people here.
    Last edited by cockerpunk; 03-02-2018 at 03:25 PM.
    social conservatism: the mortal fear that someone, somewhere, might be having fun.

  7. #637
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    I like how it is always the GOPs fault. Always. No exceptions. Your milk goes bad? GOPs fault.

    Never the individual, who is not an NRA member. Not the cops or FBI who historically did nothing. Like waiting outside for 4 minutes. Or the number of calls that went out to check on the kid for over 2 years. Or the fact that when seconds counted, the government failed to even enter the building, and it took a different police force to come to their aid. And your solution is to take protection away from the individual and make us rely on these do nothing screw ups in government?

    You know, it kinda deflates everything you say at any point after this, because you have one boogymen you blame for everything. That is not rational. It isn't anywhere close to right.

    I am sorry Gordon. Your are wrong, so totally wrong, and blaming the other guy is the wrong way to fix it, even if you were right. But you are not.

  8. #638
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    Quote Originally Posted by Unfated33 View Post
    Stifling of free speech actions - like mass-flagging an unrelated or innocuous post on Facebook, Youtube, etc. - really drives me crazy. I see it happening on both the left (guns, public speeches on campus) and the right (anti-secular, homosexual content), and I want both sides to stop. I find myself discouraging the left more because I associate more with the left than right, and I feel like I can better argue against the practice "in their language". I'm so frustrated about this.

    I've really enjoyed reading how the conversation has progressed between UV Halo, docwho, and cockerpunk. I think I generally agree with all of them. In addition, I'd like to see a few other things on top of that (even if I'd be mostly satisfied just with the position last posted by UV Halo):

    1. Regulate against high-capacity magazines in public. I don't really see where you need to be able to shoot more than a handful of shots before changing magazines. Could we agree to 5 shots? 10 shots? 15 shots?
    2. Voluntary buyback programs. Let people trade in pistols, shotguns, rifles, etc for cash or goods. If someone wants to get rid of a gun then have a mechanism for that - even if its something like requiring licensed dealers to buy the guns and the government reimburses.
    3. Police purchase. If we can't get sale of firearms regulated such as was discussed above, I'd like to see police and federal agencies actively remove weapons by purchasing them in the same formats as current buyers. This would be an active step to remove guns from the marketplace.
    4. I don't know what this item looks like exactly, but what can we do on ammunition? Should the .223 or .300 blackout be available to civilians? If we leave the .30-06 available as a rifle ammunition, will we start seeing high capacity .30-06 rifles? I would think no, but... From my hunting experience, all we ever used was 12 and 20 gauge shotgun and .30-06 rifles. The handguns were .22, .357, and .44. Why does more than this need to be available to civilians?

    Unrelated to anything in this thread (I think), but I see a lot of people on Facebook default to the argument that their high capacity semi-automatic weapon will help them defend from Tyranny. This sounds a lot like "we want to overthrow a liberal government" - because a stable democracy is the best weapon against tyranny. I grant you that we teeter away from a stable democracy like we've had in the past, but the same group pushing the most to destabilize is the one that wants high capacity semi-automatic weapons to defend themselves. That just confuses me.
    I totally agree about the free speech actions and I agree that I've seen it happening on both sides, the gun one is just impacting me more directly.

    Now, I would like to address your last subject before the others. I'm sure that there are plenty of ass-hats who get all fearful when democrats come into office (I do have problems with some of them though [i.e. Dianne Feinstein]). But, the idea of guns as a means of protecting liberty generally extends beyond party lines, it's been a portion of our population for many years and has flipped parties, like many other topic areas. All that being said, when we get to restricting capabilities of rifles and/pistols, we're going beyond just restricting what bad guys can or can't get, we're restricting everybody. As for whether or not semi-auto rifles could contribute to the overthrow of a tyrannical government, they certainly could. Most military (and revolutionary) forces don't use 'the fun switch' on their select fire systems except in specific situations. It requires too much weight (jn ammo), costs too much (in terms of ammo and rifle wear), and accuracy tends to go to crap. Semi-Auto isn't that far away in capability to full-auto in firearms any more than it is in paintball. I think military historians would agree that semi-auto is much more valuable than full auto for a military.

    1. Regulating magazines is one of those restrict everyone types of things above. Also, since they are a changeable, consumable item, I don't know if restrictions would fix things (i.e. the San Bernadino shooters had several high cap mags that were not legal in California). And finally, if nobody is armed to respond, there is no risk in changing magazines.
    2. Totally on board.
    3. Trying to get police to out-purchase the buying public seems like a losing proposition, just in terms of buying power, meanwhile the manufacturers see profits grow.
    4. Restrict everyone thing and, I doubt it would work. Several rounds have come to market just to get around a ban in europe (i.e. .222) Funny that you mention .300BLK That's a huge debate right now in the gun community if that really brings anything to the table that other rounds don't already provide. One area where that particular round is getting a lot of traction is suppressed hog hunting.

    Edit: Also, I'm not addressing the right to use of arms in self defense.
    Last edited by UV Halo; 03-02-2018 at 11:14 PM.

  9. #639
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    Quote Originally Posted by pbjosh View Post
    I like how it is always the GOPs fault. Always. No exceptions. Your milk goes bad? GOPs fault.

    Never the individual, who is not an NRA member. Not the cops or FBI who historically did nothing. Like waiting outside for 4 minutes. Or the number of calls that went out to check on the kid for over 2 years. Or the fact that when seconds counted, the government failed to even enter the building, and it took a different police force to come to their aid. And your solution is to take protection away from the individual and make us rely on these do nothing screw ups in government?

    You know, it kinda deflates everything you say at any point after this, because you have one boogymen you blame for everything. That is not rational. It isn't anywhere close to right.

    I am sorry Gordon. Your are wrong, so totally wrong, and blaming the other guy is the wrong way to fix it, even if you were right. But you are not.
    I don't think Cockerpunk has any beef with holding those responsible for the failures that have occurred in this particular incident. However, he's talking to the larger, over-arching problem which the Republicans have acknowledged but have done nothing about and when they start cutting the availability, they are making the problem worse. They may not be trying to make the problem worse but, they are.

  10. #640
    Quote Originally Posted by pbjosh View Post
    I like how it is always the GOPs fault. Always. No exceptions. Your milk goes bad? GOPs fault.

    Never the individual, who is not an NRA member. Not the cops or FBI who historically did nothing. Like waiting outside for 4 minutes. Or the number of calls that went out to check on the kid for over 2 years. Or the fact that when seconds counted, the government failed to even enter the building, and it took a different police force to come to their aid. And your solution is to take protection away from the individual and make us rely on these do nothing screw ups in government?

    You know, it kinda deflates everything you say at any point after this, because you have one boogymen you blame for everything. That is not rational. It isn't anywhere close to right.

    I am sorry Gordon. Your are wrong, so totally wrong, and blaming the other guy is the wrong way to fix it, even if you were right. But you are not.
    Josh how do you explain why every other countries that regulate guns has lower homicide rates/less gun related crimes? How do you explain why gun-related deaths/shootings went down after more controls were placed on gun ownership - namely Switzerland and Australia? I'm honestly curious because what limited data points we have seem to suggest that reducing the number of guns and limiting ownership leads to a safer country.

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