There a story on the front page with a link to Think Progress about a Republican Congressional Candidate shooting Target practice with a silhouette image of Representative Debbie Wasserman Schultz. Here is the link
The Associated Press reports today that the South Florida-based Southeast Broward Republican Club held an event earlier this week at a gun range where targets included silhouettes of Muslim stereotypes and of Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz (D-FL). Among those who attended the event was real estate CEO Robert Lowry, who is vying to replace Wasserman Schultz in 2010:
I've been reading the thread on Daily Kos discussing this with great interest. I've mentioned this in a previous diary, but I suffer from mental illness including a form of schizo-effective, obsessive compulsive disorder, and Asperger's syndrome (which isn't technically a mental illness but is still a part of my diagnosis).
Why do I bring this up? Because I truly believe a LOT of the right wing in this country have completely lost their minds. As someone who suffers from mental illness, I actually sympatize with a lot of these people. I know, considering the garbage they've pulled, and the threats upon Democrats and the President of the United States himself, I probably shouldn't, but I've been in the same boat myself, and as a progressive who has walked in a sick person's shoes, I can sympathize whether other liberals can agree with me or not.
I found the front page diary on Kos interesting because a LOT of people were suggesting throwing these people in prison for "sedition" or "treason" which was rightly pointed out as a violation of their civil rights. But these people are clearly a threat to others and we can't do nothing. I have suggestion.
Couldn't we have some of the people responsible for the most egregious of death threats hospitalized for their own and other's safety? Now, I hated the hospital and wouldn't wish that on my worst enemy but sometimes people are so in need of help there is nowhere else to turn. And to be absolutely honest, being surrounded by so-many low-functioning people for so long was a wake-up call to myself to start getting my act together and work on my problems.
I would imagine throwing these people in prison would convinced them they've been martyred and are taking one for a righeous call. But hospitalizing them would send a different message. It would tell them that their rhetoric is so extreme and outside of acceptable discourse that it isn't normal behavior or something that should be engaged in. Because it isn't and maybe being surrounded with other's with similar paranoia's and symptoms would make them realize how completely messed up their behavior is.
That's my thought on the subject. I'm no expert, but this seem like a good idea to me.
UPDATE: Diary title changed. Aside from the fact that's it's snazzier and might get more people to see this it reflects the diary's subject better.
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Hating Republicans is easy. What if we went about trying to help them?
but there is nothing that will convince these people that they are wrong in any way.
I wasn't exactly a Republican in my youth but I was VERY conservative. It wasn't until I met some very loving and kind people in my teens and twenties that I realized what a bankrupt philosophy it was. Maybe we can't change everybody's minds. But it could be a start.
Wasserman Schultz angry at target practice "joke"
Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz just responded to reports that a Broward County Republican who plans to challenge her next year fired live rounds at a target that had her initials "DWS" scrawled on it.
Her statement:
"There is nothing light or funny about pretending to shoot someone. At a time in our country when people are bringing guns to Town Hall Meetings and a preacher is calling for the death of our President, I find this type of action serious and disturbing. Tonight I am going to have to talk to my young children about why someone is pretending to shoot their mother. Trivializing violent behavior is the kind of extreme view that has no place in American politics."
I haven't always been entirely happy with her politics but this response was fantastic and she didn't deserve what happened to her. Thank you for posting this!
for getting your act together (or at least attempting to); as one with mental illness in my own family, I know how much a struggle it can be on all involved.
It's been a struggle but I have some caring people in my life who have helped me move on. I still have nightmares but other than that I'm doing MUCH better.
of help will change them in any way.
They have dug their heels in and will NEVER admit
to being wrong about anything.
They just don't get it, doubt they ever will.
But it could help SOME of them. That might be worth the effort. And it's also a perfectly legal way to keep an eye on people who while being dangerous, haven't carried out their threats yet.
It sounds like you have a mission in life.
May goodness and luck lead you on your path.
Just surviving. I'm pretty happy where I am right now.
no prison, a mental hospital would be adequate. then they would lose their gun rights/privilages.
Not only their gun priveleges but the State could keep an eye on them when they are at their most dangerous. It's a perfectly legal way to make sure that dangerous people don't hurt anyone.
that keeps me very level. I took years to get the right diagnosis. I do think we need better mental health care in this country and I agree with you that many of the crazies we're seeing are in fact delusional with real psychiatric problems. I have a few family members that are untreated bipolars and they buy into the crazy conspiracy shit that is shoveled at them.
I think with good mental health care (it's currently below par) we could reduce the right's numbers considerably.
If these people actually learned how to DEAL with things that anger and frighten them instead of throwing tantrums and using violence we'd all be better off.
people hear voices or have visions that feel absolutely real. I heard chatter that just bugged me from age 12 and so I got into the habit of having the tv on when I studied because the voices liked the tv and I could concentrate on my homework. I had a breakdown after my dad died suddenly and the voices for the first time became very violent and my wrists started talking to me and wanted me to cut them open. It seemed so real. I still can't work (I'm an illustrator) without the tv on. I don't hear voices anymore but it's such a habit.
These delusions they're having are real to them.
All of this stuff FEELS real to them so it's very important that we educate instead of dismissing it out of hand. Well, maybe mocking IS a great tool against the right but if they ever are hospitalized that is most certainly not the way to go.
in mental health care. I live in the midwest where we are severely underserved. We only have one psychiatrist in town and a regional counseling center that had a traveling psychiatrist who quit because it was too hard on his family. So now they just have a psychiatric nurse to handle people who need meds. They are pretty good, but my insurance doesn't cover those appointments so I just go to my GP now that I'm maintaining.
Our mental health care system is even worse than regular health care and while your idea of people getting help is noble, I just don't know where the help will come from. It needs a serious overhaul.
But I also suggested the idea for the practicality of being able to keep a close eye on the dangerous ones.
I am appalled at the state of mental health care in this country and the fact that it was so bad was one of the reasons I turned my life around and promised myself never to get hospitalized again. It could actually be a good deterrent.
me to death. When my wrists were telling me to cut them open, I called my therapist who is also a friend and she told me that if I could hold on without going to the hospital, that would be best because our hospital just straps you down and pumps you full of drugs. Be strapped down is a big fear.
The worst is the full-body strap. I only had that happen once and they took it off after minute of me screaming in agony but it was a horrible sensation of not be able to move.
It's good when therapists say stuff like this to their patients because even though most of being hospitalized isn't as bad as that, it CAN happen and is a good deterrent for going back there.
Our hospital just isn't set up to deal with mental health issues and the priority for them would be to keep me from killing myself.
I am always open about my condition because there's just too much shame attached to mental illness. Is diabetes shameful? No. We need a voice to get equality in care. The public face shouldn't be the raving homeless people that are seen wandering around cities. It should be those of us who are medicated and leading normal lives.
The stigma against mental illness, even among liberals is HUGE. I cannot adequetely describe the amount of disparaging remarks I've seen on this site against the mentally ill (usually in the guise of comparing Republican leaders to crazy people). I'm ashamed to say that on days that I've been especially angered by the latest stunt the GOP has pulled that I have even recced some of those comments even though I of all people should know better.
They don't want to get better, it is wiring. The lowest common denominator is the easiest.
Guardian, 2003.
A study funded by the US government has concluded that conservatism can be explained psychologically as a set of neuroses rooted in "fear and aggression, dogmatism and the intolerance of ambiguity".
As if that was not enough to get Republican blood boiling, the report's four authors linked Hitler, Mussolini, Ronald Reagan and the rightwing talkshow host, Rush Limbaugh, arguing they all suffered from the same affliction.
Don't want to get better. It's only until they realize it's the only way they can leave and rejoin society is when they start to take their problems seriously.
It's a major problem with mental illness.
Some like Haldol I don't blame people for not wanting to take, but they've developed recent anti-psychotics without all of the lethargic side effects. I'm currently on Geodon and I'm not really having any problems.
No side lethargic side effects and lets me sleep all night. I love it.
It doesn't have the weight side effects of some of the other meds and that's a good thing to because I'm already overweight and trying to get thinner. THAT is a struggle but I hope I can do it.
However, but niether, I think, would be possible outright I think, without inviting the specter of persecution and political prisoner.
First, we would need a trial on competence, and then one for siezing their person, and placing them under care. No matter how mightily we would try to say "YOU NEED HELP." they would see a different thing...
Hospitalization I think would only add a further "Do you SEE what they do when they think we're getting to close to the truth? They don't lock us up, they hospitalize us to be REPROGRAMMED TO LOVE FEARLESS LEADER."
They would never see help,or care, they would see persecution and politicized medicine.
But if they are dangerous they NEED to to be locked up for their own safety as well as the public's. I'm just saying that hospitalization is a perfectly legal way to do so before any real violence happens again.
I agree. Some of our neighbors and fellow citizens have been made mind-sick.
I say with no sarcasm or snark, that the last thing we need is some of these folks, sick as they are, concerned and half mad with the lies and falsehoods fed to them, fresh from fox news, armed and in the streets.
I know, though, that no matter how much we tried to help, it would feed the paranoia, and I fear further exacerbate any violence under the banner of "freeing themselves from the TRUE madness."
It's the gentleman with the illness that insists "I'm not crazy, it's all of YOU that's crazy" on a FAR GRANDER scale.
I hate to say this, but I think the biggest reason they'd complain is because of the stigma attached to mental illness. Being in a psychiatric hospital will not only make them FEEL marginalized but BE marginalized. That would probably be a different feeling for them after hearing all of the dittoheads on talk radio confirming all of their worst and most terrifying false suspicions to have their opinions dismissed by a good deal of their friends.
gods, one would hope that logic like that would prevail.
I should know better than ANYONE the doors being thought of as crazy closes for you, but these people are actually trying to hurt people and destroy the country so I have to temper my empathy with a "serves them right" feeling. I mean, I WANT people to understand mental illness isn't the fault of the sufferer but they may not be able to make that leap until they see themselves or people they care about having to go through the process of dealing with it.
If that sounds terrible I apologize and is somewhat of a mixed message from my diary but I think the soluation has SEVERAL benefits and not all of them overlap in benevelance.
not a little bit, tbh.
I just have to wonder what the more extreme of the ill on that side of things will resort to in the face of "martyrs" of their cause.
What kind of escalation could it start, and what kind of reaction could we expect from them. I'm just trying to think a few steps ahead, and consider the steps it would take and the public exposition is would require to tame those fears both prior to and in the process of helping some of our more 'on the edge' neighbors.
Because I don't think this should be implemented until we have looked at all sides of the issues and it's consequences.
Honestly, I knew some friggin' scary people in the hospital. One of them was my roommate. One night I was in the lounge with a bunch of the other clients and his face showed up in a "most wanted" manhunt on television. He apparantly escaped that day and held a knife to his grandmother's throat. They caught him again pretty quickly but people slipping through the cracks is a valid concern. It was surreal seeing your roommate on TV as a wanted criminal. I have never felt more unsafe in my life.
most State Laws. Not Imminent is a most successful defense.
A person most of us might agree needs to be removed from society for the good of both can argue "I was just letting off steam. Of course I wouldn't actually do that." Another argument is that you can't punish speech or even thoughts. The appropriate response is that it is not punishment; is is protecting society. It goes on and on.
I get asked "are you suicidal now. I tell each one "No, the answer will always be no, because if I am and admit I am, you will try to prevent it and I wouldn't want that.
As a Lawyer and as a Guardian ad Litem, I had to argue for what the person wanted and in some cases was justified in wanting, freedom. But I remember one case where the person was florid and where the sister told me (in confidence out of her fear) how he had wacked her on the back of her head with a log when she was lighting the fire). He did not want to be locked up and he really wanted to testify. So after making all the arguments on his behalf, and seeing that they looked to be effective, I yielded to his demand, and put him on the stand. Where his talking quickly convinced the judge that he was, at the least, unable to control himself.
For stuff that wasn't an imminent threat. I've been hospitalized more than once out of spite from someone who worked in my group home or a doctor in the emergency room. It's not as strict a guideline as you are saying.
...because I know that some of the wingers Are on or beyond the edge of reality, and need help.
However, to attempt to institute of policy of involuntary hospitalization of people because their political precepts differ from those of the majority would be unconstitutional, and rightly so. It has been done before, in the USSR under Stalin.
Because political aspirations are Forward looking or Predictive, (However rooted in the past their precepts may be!) and predicting the future is not and cannot be certain. Facts can be, but until an action has created a Factual result, a determination of intent or motive, or even the probability of such action will be speculative. (See: "Schrödinger's cat").
We rightly condemned thePreemptive War against Iraq, in part because that Governmental action was based on speculation about the intent, motives and possibility of a Future attack against the US rather than an established fact...like an actual attempted attack. We cannot then advocate preemptive detention against an individual citizen of the US without a factual determination that a crime or harm has been done, without becoming hypocrites.
This is a good point. I just know that I was personally helped by being hospitalized and I was thinking it could do the same for some of the most dangerous Republicans.
