4.19.20
15,000 troops marched in the 70th Anniversary Parade in October 2019, Image Thomas Peters – Reuters.
4.19.20
15,000 troops marched in the 70th Anniversary Parade in October 2019, Image Thomas Peters – Reuters.
Arrogant NRA Keeps Lying about Mental Illness
Expert Offers Exciting Focus on the Genuine Problem
954 Words, 3 minute, 47 sec read
18 August 2018
This is a continuation of my post on ‘Anger Not Mental Illness’.
Something went awry since the post was about a paragraph long.
So if you read that post I am sure you were disappointed. I will delete it and start anew.
Pictured above is Spec. Ivan Lopez in his helicopter in the Sinai Peninsula during his service with the 295th Infantry of the Puerto Rico National Guard.
Spec. Lopez is suspected of fatally shooting three people before killing himself at the Fort Hood Army Base in Texas on April 2, 2014.
The accounts of what lead up to the shooting spree that killed the innocent people vary.
The Guardian January 23, 2015, reports that Specialist Lopez two parents had died shortly before the shootings.
The military relied heavily on personnel to ‘self-report’ on their conditions.
The self-reporting of personal issues did not work because Spec Lopez did report to his supervisors about his depression, although he was undergoing treatment for the depression.
Other factors may have played a part as well. Spec Lopez, in conversations, said he had injured himself in combat in Iraq.
There was no proof of that claim.
However, whatever system there was to monitor Spec Lopez it didn’t work.
He had an argument with his supervisor about the leave he was expecting and when it was denied ‘blew up’.
He traveled two blocks and killed three people including himself.
According to the Washington Post, he pulled out his private 45 caliber pistol, shot up the office of the 49th Transportation Battalion wounding two soldiers.
Before killing himself, he killed three people and wounded 12 others.
The question is:
Did his mental state, i.e. depression cause him to set off this horrible attack?
The NRA has been foisting this theory on people at every chance it can.
‘Mentally ill people are the mass murders.’
Psychologist Laura L. Hayes disagrees.
She states this “relatively weak connection between mental illness and mass shootings,” does not override another position.
She states that “the connection between the inability to manage anger and violence,” is a stronger motivation.”
We have to look back to the 1980s for answers.
The 1980s were a time of massive deinstitutionalization of the mentally ill.
She was working toward her degree in clinical psychology and was training at a psychiatric hospital in Washington D.C.
She relates “one small, diminutive, the elderly patient sometimes wandered the halls.”
“She had been committed to the hospital after she stabbed someone in a supermarket.”
She was what is sometimes referred to as a revolving-patient: She was schizophrenic and heard frightening voices in her head.
When she became psychotic enough, she would be hospitalized, stabilized on medication, and then released back to the community.
There she would go off her medication, become psychotic, be re-hospitalized, stabilized again on medication, released, etc.”
In 1955 deinstitutionalization began.In 1955 deinstitutionalization began.
It was the result of the introduction of the drug Thorazine. This was the first effective antipsychotic drug.
The abbreviated version is that in 1955 the total population was164 million people.
Of those 558,239 were hospitalized as mentally ill.
By 1994 the hospitalized population was 71,619. The true magnitude of the issue was that if the portion of the population in 1994 was equal to that of 1955, 885,010 people should have been hospitalized.
How many were hospitalized? 71,619.
Does that point to a problem?
Over three-fourths of the population should have been hospitalized in the same rules applied!
Back to our little, old lady, this is not intended as a pun or disparagement.
“She testified that she had become extremely upset in the grocery store before repeatedly stabbing the man in front of her in the checkout line.”
The hearing officer asked if she had been hearing voices at the time she stabbed the man. ‘Yes’, she replied, she had.
‘What were the voices telling you’ he inquired.
“She explained that the voices were telling her not to hurt the man, but he had gotten in the express checkout lane with more than 10 items, and that made her so mad that she couldn’t stop herself.”
This tale sounds a warning I think.
One that the NRA chose to ignore.
As we have seen so far in 2018
https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/mass-shootings-in-2018/ according to
the Gun Violence Archive which tracks the statistics there have been 154 mass shootings thru the deaths at the Capital Gazette.
While getting absolute confirmation of the numbers varies on the criteria used to calculate them, this massive number of deaths is not acceptable in a civil society.
This will not be a debate about guns or no guns.
The facts that are available are simply stated.
Ms. Hayes, notes that “Violence is not a product of mental illness; violence is a product of anger”.
Some mass shootings occurred become some people had emotional problems.
It has become fashionable, i.e. The NRA, to blame mental illness for violent crimes.
“Violence is not a product of mental illness.”
“Nor is violence generally the action of ordinary, stable individuals who suddenly “Break” and commit crimes of passion.”
“Violent crimes are committed by violent people, who do not have the skills to manage their anger.”
Most homicides are committed by people with a history of violence.
Murderers are rarely ordinary, law-abiding citizens, and they are also rarely mentally ill.
“Violence is a product of compromised anger management skills.”
I thought I would throw this out there and let you follow the link to add to your insight in the conversation taking place.
Thanks for stopping.
Craig
July 1, 2018
I have favorite names for my ‘gardens’.
The names are a bit grandiose in relation to the actual ‘gardens’ but it helps me remember which is what and where. I assure you it is entirely on purpose to no purpose except to point an old mind in the right direction.
You have to remember that I am more than 68 years old and my memory is impaired. I am scheduled for a 4-hour session with a neuropsychologist next week.
That sounds a bit scary and it is. But maybe this doctor can find where I lost my memory. I don’t remember where I put it.
In the front of the house are the west side garden, the west front garden, the front center and the east front.
We may only get through two gardens in a post. We’ll have to see how much gabbing I do.
The west side garden is probably the best place to start since it has the fewest plants.
When we moved in more than 43 years ago there was a large chokecherry bush on a small hill. In order to plant a French White Lilac, we move the chokecherry bush to the west side of the house.
You can learn about Chokecherry Bushes here.
The major drawback to this location is that we can’t see the birds feeding on it.
It does well most of the time.
However, since an invasion of tent caterpillars a few years ago it has struggled. Tent caterpillars are a nuisance in town.
But in rural areas, they are outrageous and dangerous. Cars have slid into a ditch after striking a patch of caterpillars.
Forest Tent Caterpillars aka Army Worms in Minnesota
Just a glimpse of these crawling masses of Army worms is sufficient to bring back the odor of thousands (4 million can reside in one acre of a forest!) of these squished by car tires on rural roads.
They are nasty, ugly and bright green when squished.
People line the trunks of their expensive flowering trees to prevent these worms from climbing into the branches and devouring every last leaf.
Most of the time trees recover in the same season from being de-foliated. But there are times when the march of the Army worms is a contributing cause of trees dying.
I take this time to introduce you to one of my favorite image makers. Her name is Annie Spratt. Her images are found on Unsplash.com. You can download any image by thousands of professional photographers for FREE!
All the images are covered under Creative Commons License.
Rose images by Annie Spratt
In the west side garden, in addition to the chokecherry bush, we planted two Jens Munk roses in memory of Becky’s sister Sue. These Canadian Explorer roses have blossoms that may look frail but their canes are not in the least frail or fragile.
They have nipped a grandchild or two so they just stay out of that area of the yard now.
Ms. Munk looks after herself. Her thorns are almost a wicked as the rosa glauca (more on that rose later).
In the background of this garden are Iris. This is a picture of the bulbs we grew.
This is a link to many other varieties of Iris.
The next flower is a favorite of Becky’s. Lily of the Valley.
A Lily of the Valley short primer is here.
The fragrance of this Lily is intoxicating. This flower can be invasive depending on where you plant them.
One last concern with Lilies of the Valley is pets. These Ladies are poisonous to cats and dogs. If ingested you will see vomiting and diarrhea.
As with all plants it pays to do the research. I once heard weeds described as flowers that are just in the wrong place.
I have hewed to this theory. As undergarments to many of the roses, I planted dead nettle in many of the beds. It is invasive and I planted purple and silvery pink flowers.
Within a few years of planting, they had filled the ground under the roses and choked out many other weeds. Their luminescent foliage was a pleasant sight when not many other flowers were in bloom.
Dead nettle as ground cover
The next flower in this garden is Globe Thistle. I planted two of these and they rewarded us with large and robust plants.
This plant wraps around the corner of the house and shares some space with our Jackmani Clematis.
Our Viburnum ‘Snowball Bush’ was about 6 feet wide when we moved in. After fertilizing and cutting back to the ground several times it prospered and grew to about 15 feet wide.
A caveat, in the wet spring early summer the flowers will rust quickly just as white lilacs do.
I never researched in depth until now the difference between the Snowball Bush Viburnum and the Snowball Bush Hydrangea.
I would casually look up the Viburnum and then Hydrangea at different times. I would wonder why our Snowball Bush didn’t have the full shape that Annabelle Hydrangea has.
Next post we will look at Turkestan Burning Bush and a BIG chunk of Bluestone.
Thanks for stopping by.
Craig
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A king surveying his domain |
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Ancient Rock Builders |
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Sunset on the Big Lake |
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Born to Run |
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Downtown Duluth at Dusk |
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He went that away |
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Laker just passed thru the Duluth Ship Canal |
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Laker just passing thru the Duluth Ship Canal |
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Packing for the Road Trip this weekend |
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Sunset after the Storm |
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Sunset on the Lake |
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MN Noreaster.com |
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Laker in the Sea Fog |
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What did you do on New Year’s Eve? |
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Peace and Quiet Can you hear the fish swimming? |
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Bridal Gazabo at Duluth Rose Garden |
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Springtime on the rivers of the North Shore |
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Sunrise on the Lakewalk |
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The City Steam Plant Dukes in and out of the Sea Smoke |
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Bentleyville in its Finest |
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Bentleyville at Christmas |
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Wrapped up Snug and Warm for the Winter |
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Split Rock Lighthouse in Spring Thaw |
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Presque Isle December 31st, 2017 |
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St Clair maneuvering in Sea Smoke |
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St Clair Maneuvering in Port of Duluth |
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Full Moon in Canal Park |
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Moonlit Aerial Lift Bridge |
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Canal Park |
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A Summer Evening on the Lake |
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At the Cabin |
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Amity Creek |
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Seven Bridges Road |
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A Night of Nostagia |
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Music on the Bayfront |
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Isn’t Driftwood Fascinating? |
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Stunning View of the Waterfront |
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Early Morning Best Morning |
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Breaking at the Boardwalk |
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Palisade Head with Rick out for a Stroll |
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Canoes? Must be Northeast Minnesota |
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Under On the Boardwalk |
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Who wants Duck? |
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Wedding Gazebo up with the Crocus |
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Must be Minnesota |
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Wedding Gazebo in the Rose Garden |
Post dated: December 26, 2017
I read his tweets very early this morning and was almost physically repulsed (of course I’m also fighting some kind of bug).
Rather than trying to channel Mr. Dangerfield, who needs his peace and quiet I think, I am going to run down a list of questions that somebody may want to show a friend that still supports Trump. Remember I have forsaken all communication with anyone that still supports him after he has been in office for a year.
These questions are in no particular order. Most of them are taken from a Facebook Rant sometime last week. I am getting worried that Facebook buddies are next on my list of things to break free from. There very astute questions and observations that throw me into such quandary that I cannot escape from.
> Would you agree that Trump has seized control of a republic that does not know that it is in deep trouble? Never in the history of this country has one man, with the jubilation of what was once a respected national party, despoiled the principles, the land and the minds of a nation now wallowing in his spit?
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My Mood this day#! |
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Bob Canning #58962 via Unsplash! |
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Jaanus Jagomagi #365720
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“Hundreds of miles away in Reading PA, Lisa (she didn’t want me to use her last name) sat on her back porch and told me she had lived the American Dream. Lisa owned a home with a small pool and an abundance of plants thanks to her $22 an hour job at a paper factory nearby.” But she was glad her daughter went to college and works in an office. ‘I didn’t want her to work as hard as I did physically, Lisa is an optimistic 55-year-old, told me before the election. “Its difficult working odd shifts and 12 hour days in steel tip shoes’. Lisa was laid off at the end of last year when the Neenah Paper Factory shut for good. She wasn’t sure she’d ever be able to earn $22 an hour again. It was the second time in her life that Lisa had toiled for more than a decade in a factory only to lose her job when it closed.”
I have read that schoolmasters in India are pleased that their students can’t get the H-1B Visas anymore. It means rather than teach their student s to aspire for highly educated jobs and then leave for the United States. They will be able to keep them at home and shortly beat the Americans or play ‘Whack a Mole”.
Hey, we’ve got this nailed. WINNER! WINNER! WINNER! Am I the dealmaker? You bet boss, you are making deals with the devil.
Thanks for stopping.
Craig