EvilMonkey

A. Garcia

DeAza

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ Sep 21, 2013 -> 10:40 AM) When the shooter bought his guns a week ago, he tried to buy an AR-15 style assault rifle but Virginia's state laws do not permit sales of those weapons to non-residents. He was unable to buy the rifle and was forced to purchase the shotgun used in the massacre instead. There's a decent chance people are alive today because of that law. The article implies that he tried to buy an AR-15 by saying that he test fired one, but no where in there does it have anyone saying he tried to buy one and was turned down. It claims he test fired and tried to buy it without revealing ANY source that that is what actually happened. If he DID try and buy it and was refused due to the law, hurrah! A law, already in place, was enforced and worked! edit Notice the correction now at the bottom of the story. Still doesn't say why they claim he tried to BUY an AR-15, but does say that the law doesn't ban it, just makes it slightly harder with additional forms of ID required.

QUOTE (greg775 @ Sep 20, 2013 -> 04:27 PM) Please read this column in the University of Kansas student newspaper about this poor kid who can't get coverage, finally has some sort of coverage, where he's at the mercy of the system to get treatment, which in his case is inadequate. We are barbaric in this country now. You read this and tell me what you think of our healthcare system. My god, we are NOT TAKING CARE OF OUR OWN PEOPLE. This kid can't get treatment. By Will Webber Sep. 19, 2013 0 Comments udkne.ws/15ExHLq I'm well aware at this point that the fiscally responsible thing for me to do is die. And I know now that when I was denied coverage by every health insurance company in the nation, it was for the benefit of the American taxpayers. I get sick a lot and it's really expensive to keep me alive. My name is Will and I was born with an immune deficiency. That means my body doesn't protect me from diseases. I was in and out of the hospital all through infancy, and my mom almost didn't graduate because she was taking care of me 24/7. Looking back, I'm really lucky just to be here. I could've died in the womb when my umbilical cord was wrapped around my neck, or possibly from any of my five bouts with pneumonia. But I'm here now and I can say with certainty that I would've been just another dead baby if I were born in a different decade. Nineteen years is a lot to be thankful for. I think all any of us ever wants is to go to bed each night with the knowledge that we'll wake up the next morning and everything will still be there. We want to look into our loved ones' eyes and be confident that they'll always feel the same way. We want to know that we'll be taken care of when everything collapses. That's all insurance is. And I had it, briefly. I had a treatment that worked for me. I didn't worry about going to the hospital again. I woke up in the morning and felt a little bit of control over my life, like I could get out of bed and take on the day. It's not like that now, since I lost my coverage. I set my alarm 30 minutes ahead of when I actually need to get out of bed so I have time to convince myself that it's worth it. It's not always an easy argument when the insurance companies send the message that I'm not worth keeping alive. They wouldn't cover me. And then they wouldn't cover my family if they were in any way linked to me. The only thing I'm allowed is student insurance, and even then, they refused to cover the weekly blood infusions that keep me functioning. I'm getting treated now, but it's on their terms. I honestly don't know what medicine is coursing through my IV from one week to the next. I don't know where I'll get it either – they can send me to a clinic or a hospital across town, regardless of where I am. They don't care when I get it – sometimes even a day's delay can shut my entire body down. I remember when the hospital was closed on the 4th of July, and I just sat on my blanket, praying for the fireworks to end so I could go home and pass out. I've lived the past year at the mercy of the insurance companies. They can do whatever they want with me, and I'll suffer the consequences, the bill and the side effects. I don't have control over any of it. I try to pretend I do, but I have constant reminders that I only wake up each morning because of modern medicine and the people who ration it. One of my lowest moments ended with me covered in tears and Cheerios – my limbs were trembling so severely that I couldn't grip my cereal bowl. That's not control. I wish just one time that my doctor would hesitate before telling me that I'll be like this forever. I wish that my parents never had to worry about outliving me. I wish I could talk about my future with my girlfriend without her voice wavering a little. I wish people would stop doing that little sympathetic double-nod when I tell them I'm gonna live to be 100, the same nod they give me when I say I want to be an anchor for CNN someday. But above all else, I wish people would stop thinking that an inconsequential amount of their tax dollars is in anyway more important than my life, or any other. I could die tomorrow and you might save a little bit on your premium. The taxes on your paycheck might round down a cent. But I don't plan on dying. I've made it this far largely because I'm 19 and my body is strong enough to take daily abuse, but mostly because I have the best support system in the world and my parents can spare thousands of dollars in medical expenses, time-consuming phone calls and arguments with insurance companies. But other people do the fiscally responsible thing and just die. The economy is in a bad place right now, but I think I'd rather be morally responsible instead. Will Webber is a journalism and political science major from Prairie Village. Read more from Will Webber. I think it is amazing that he was even born alive thanks to modern medicine. He should have been dead a long time ago but thru our medical system he is alive. He even stated it himself, born 20 years earlier or perhaps in a different place, he wouldn't be here at all. It says he lost his coverage. Do we know why?

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ Sep 19, 2013 -> 04:34 PM) Wait, since when do you oppose razor wire and dogs patrolling every inch of the border? I wouldn't make those dogs walk the line out in that heat. I don't even want it all fenced. but would like SOME of it fenced, And patrolled. And enforced. But that is a different argument.

QUOTE (lostfan @ Sep 18, 2013 -> 09:28 PM) You know what? I think this is actually the best we can do. This is what we've collectively decided we want and that we're okay with it. We've repeatedly rejected even the smallest, most token attempts to do anything about it in all the previous incidents, we'll have the same exact arguments and decide we won't do anything about this either. There WILL be another event like this and these are NOT rare events, even if we like to pretend they are sometimes. This is how it's going to be. Garbage in, garbage out. It is what it is. You accept that guilty people may go free so as to have the system best equipped to keep innocent people from jail. You accept porous borders to not have razor wire and dogs patrolling every inch of border. You accept alcohol related deaths so as not to ban a substance that doesn't cause most people to die or kill someone. So yes, you accept that occasionally a crazy-ass person will get a gun to not infringe on the rights of the millions more that don't go crazy. They also get knives, bats bombs and poison as well.

QUOTE (Y2HH @ Sep 18, 2013 -> 01:45 PM) I have absolutely no issues with this. Now, let's see them do it. What they'll do instead, is add such a tax (Chicago sure as hell made it expensive to own a gun here legally), and ZERO of it will go to mental health facilities. They'll spend it on some pet project, I'm sure. Maybe they'll build a new park next to millennium park for 100 million dollars, instead. Oh, wait, already doing that. Kinda like lottery money going to the schools. They may take all the money and put it towards the issue, but they will then take away money that they were already paying from other sources.

QUOTE (HickoryHuskers @ Sep 18, 2013 -> 01:32 PM) How about this? Federal excise tax on all gun purchases, with the money going directly to mental health care?? How about we tax all these endowments sitting out there untaxed, like the Ford Foundation and stuff.

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ Sep 18, 2013 -> 01:07 PM) Like I said. You're fine with saying how terrible it is that mental health services aren't getting the funding they need, but it's someone else's problem. Mental Health Services are at the bottom of the totem pole. They have no advocates. When you guys talk about cutting waste, this is what gets cut. This is what you mean by waste. No, this is what spineless, crooked politicians mean by waste. I am sure that most citizens of either political spectrum would find different things to call waste and cut.

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ Sep 18, 2013 -> 01:06 PM) Oh, and here's actual numbers. "In 2005, a total of $135 billion was spent on behavioral health services in the United States." Medicaid is the largest block of that, and it doesn't count prison expenses. The US is currently spending about $50 billion a year on total foreign aid, economic and military. However, more than $15 billion of that is going to countries we recently invaded. There ya go! $50 billion in new funding!

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ Sep 18, 2013 -> 01:02 PM) I see. So no more guns for Israel? I did say all of it. Can SELL them all they like.

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ Sep 18, 2013 -> 12:58 PM) Are you willing to pay a substantial tax increase to do so? No, but I am prepared to sacrifice some foreign aid to help pay for it. Like, all of it.

Someone in the Navy should be in big trouble for this. http://www.foxnews.com/us/2013/09/18/navy-...intcmp=trending Warning signs were there. Authorities were notified, yet nothing was done. Blame the shooter, blame the people who didn't act when they had information. WHY they didn't act only they know. But their negligence in acting cost lives.

QUOTE (Soxbadger @ Sep 18, 2013 -> 12:49 PM) Why would I not be suggesting a graduated tax when that is the only tax system the US has ever used? Last I checked I lived in the US. But lets be honest, this line of argument by you and Y2hh is just proving my point. You dont really want to fix the problem, you just want to place the blame somewhere else. The 90% number is hyperbole, if anyone actually wanted to solve the problem they could easily say: "Well 90% is to high, but maybe an extra 5% in taxes would be a good idea if it meant everyone go healthcare". I just made a statement that I knew would get a predictable response from people, and then I could prove my point that people dont really want to help other people if it means theyll have to pay money. (Edit) And honestly, you and y2hh are just predictably missing the point. Solutions sometimes require sacrifice. Im willing to sacrifice for the betterment of others. Which is why I said "I". Im not expecting that everyone would give up 90% of their wages, it was hyperbole to call people on the red herring. Everyone just wants to blame someone else. Why not step up to the plate and propose your own solutions? You dont want gun laws, you dont want more money spent on mental health...? I don't thinik anyone here said to not spend more on mental health. Nice try.

QUOTE (Soxbadger @ Sep 18, 2013 -> 12:37 PM) Do you even understand how graduated tax works? The only part you pay 90% is the amount that is higher than that bracket. The top tax bracket now is $400k. Meaning that only dollars made over 400k would be taxed at 90%. http://www.forbes.com/sites/moneybuilder/2...marginal-rates/ But I know you actually do understand that, you are just trying to create a strawman argument suggesting that I was saying a "flat tax", which I never did. Does this type of argument ever work? You never mentioned graduated 90% taxes or just on the top bracket, you just said " Ill sign up for that right now, everyone in the US gets healthcare, no matter what, even if I have to pay 90% taxes." Changing goal posts now?

QUOTE (Jake @ Sep 18, 2013 -> 11:21 AM) 22% of Americans claim they personally own a gun, according to Pew Research in 2010. 37% say someone in their household owns a gun. Both numbers have been trending downwards for about 50 years and I recall hearing 18% in the past year -- can't find the cite for that though. In the 1960s, gun owners were over half the population. Now it is a relatively small group of people, smaller than the 26% of Americans that have diagnosable mental illnesses (diagnosable implies that it is severe enough to be worth diagnosing, as we now understand many mental illnesses to occur on a spectrum). How many of that 26% are shopaholics, ADHD or some other similar 'disorder' that gets treatment nowadays but is not the same as crazy person hearing voices in their head?

QUOTE (Tex @ Sep 18, 2013 -> 09:40 AM) He was walking the streets because if we locked up everyone that fit his profile we would be locking up hundreds or thousands of people who would not shoot up a workplace, or commit those crimes. Hindsight is 20/20, predicting who will, and who will not, break those laws, is not. He didn't have to be locked up, but he should have been prevented from (legally) obtaining a firearm due to his mental condition. But the appropriate people failed to do their jobs and make that happen. So it was a failure of a system, not related to guns.

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ Sep 18, 2013 -> 09:02 AM) You wrote this entire post without adding the phrase "and could buy as many guns as he wanted". because judges/police/navy didn't do what they should have done and had this man entered into the system, where the laws, already in place, would have prevented him from buying a gun as well as having security clearance. More laws wouldn't have done anything. using the ones in place could have.

QUOTE (greg775 @ Sep 17, 2013 -> 11:14 PM) Why do U.S. citizens continue to pull this s*** and take out strangers? What possessed that guy to go onto a Naval facility and kill 12 people? He was standing and shooting from up top into a cafeteria or something with a shotgun? What are we going to do about random violence? It's bad enough terrorists want to kill us? But we are killing our own people in a lot of cases. Why didn't this guy just kill himself if he was so angry/troubled at the U.S.? So many innocent people are getting murdered in our country. And that's not to mention all the deaths of people in Chicago the past few years. WTF? I'm outraged and saddened ... again. Glory, fame, revenge, all could be the answer. I for one would love it if the media never ever announced the names of the people who do this s***. I am sure that many of them get off on the idea that people will be talking about them after they are gone. Take that away. Also, this guy should have never been allowed to purchase the gun he used. There are laws in place to prevent that. One of his previous arrests was a felony, which should have put him on the list of ineligible buyers. But apparently some DA somewhere never prosecuted it or plea bargained it down and he never got the felony rap. It would have also made him ineligible for security clearance he used to get onto that base. Then there is the Navy that knew he was bats*** crazy yet never reported him unfit for duty, which would have also rendered him unable to get a gun. What good are laws if they are not followed?

Gordon

Head to the bathroom.

A. Garcia (hope he is playing!)

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ Sep 12, 2013 -> 02:14 PM) I know this will be a thread hijack, but all of the best research suggests this is a terrible thing and produces vastly more troubled youth. Because we all know that time outs are so much more effective. And by more effective I mean not.

QUOTE (pettie4sox @ Sep 12, 2013 -> 02:12 PM) Tex, I agree with this sentiment. When I was younger, I got my ass whooped when I did wrong. My parents actually cared for me and explained that my actions would have consequences. Some of these troubled youth do not have the luxury of caring parents. Most children, are simply a product of their environment. That's why when I stated earlier that criminal behavior is a product of multiple entities coming together. Why aren't you in jail then! And all your contemporaries! Hell, I got whooped too. Not often, but often enough you never wanted it again. Somehow I managed to avoid jail for most of my life. it was just back then, if some adult said you were breaking windows or something, your parents believed THEM, and you got in trouble. Now, you can get caught on video and parents will insist that their kid is an angel and that it never happened.

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ Sep 12, 2013 -> 01:45 PM) Are you of the opinion that punishment for crime in the African American community is not harsh enough? Sounded like what he is saying is that they are excused way too much when younger that it leads to overkill when older.