December 21, 2012

How The NRA Stifled Gun Violence Research

Spencer: For Hire ?@OakFoSho

#NRA kills research into the effects of gun laws by lobbying to cut funding for such studies http://bit.ly/UWz67e #p2 #tcot #Newtown

http://thinkprogress.org/justice/2012/12/20/1366561/how-the-nra-stifled-gun-violence-research/?mobile=nc

The tragic massacre at an elementary school in Newtown, CT on Friday reignited the debate over the solution to America’s gun problem. President Obama announced that Vice President Joe Biden would lead a task force to examine the available evidence and make recommendations for new policies to prevent the next shooting. But thanks to a concerted, 20-year effort by the National Rifle Association, the available evidence is severely lacking.

While pushing a radical agenda to arm as many people in as many places as possible, the NRA has also maintained a side campaign to quash research into the effects of gun laws. The group successfully lobbied to cut off almost all funding for such studies. The Center for Disease Control, once the main patron of gun violence research, was stripped of funds for firearms research. The agency has not conducted any studies on the matter since 1996. As a result, the debate that arises after each shooting has very little evidence to consider.

Scientists and researchers who want to study why American gun homicides are so much higher than all other developed nations are now dependent on just a few private foundations still willing to brave the wrath of the gun lobby. The NRA has continued its intimidation campaign even as gun violence research becomes virtually nonexistent:

The amount of money available today for studying the impact of firearms is a fraction of what it was in the mid-1990s, and the number of scientists toiling in the field has dwindled to just a handful as a result, researchers say.

(Slightly more at the link.)

December 21, 2012

Common Dreams: The Ultimate Logic of a Society Built on Mass Murder

http://www.commondreams.org/view/2012/12/21-6

As a native-born American, I grew up watching cowboy and Indian shoot-em-ups in which the highlight of the movie was when the white guys in the circled wagon train shot the Indians off their horses until all the red men were dead, and very silent. Indians didn’t do a lot of screaming in pain when they were shot; they just expired. Same thing with buck-toothed Japanese, line after line of them, charging into U.S. machine guns, falling instantly silent and dead. It was somehow quite clean, almost antiseptic, these cinematic rituals of death, all staged for the broadest popular consumption to demonstrate the inevitability – and cosmic justice – of ultimate white victory over the darker races.

This was mother’s milk to the white American nation – which is why Richard Pryor and kids like me rooted for the Indians. Mass murder is at the core of the American national religion, which is a celebration of a genocidal march across a continent filled with other, doomed human beings. America’s contribution to European culture was to invite “all the nations of Europe” to come to these shores and become fellow “white” citizens, whose status was defined by the enforced inferiority of Blacks and the remnants of the Indians. Ritual burnings of Blacks were organized as great public festivals, attended by thousands, staged in order to affirm whites’ collective right to commit murder. This monopoly on violence was what made them white Americans.

U.S. foreign policy reflects the nation’s origins and ghastly evolution into a globe-strutting mob, that empowers itself to kill at will. A million dead Filipinos at the turn of the 20th century; aerial bombing of Haitian villages less than a generation later; the totally unwarranted nuclear annihilation of two cities at the very end of World War Two; two million dead Koreans shortly thereafter; three million dead Vietnamese in the next decade,; and, since 1996, six million Congolese – all, and many, many more, slaughtered in the name of U.S. civilizational superiority – the ghastly opiate of the white American masses.

(Much more at the link.)

December 21, 2012

List of countries by firearm-related death rate

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_firearm-related_death_rate

December 21, 2012

New NRA webpage: "The National School Shield."

Michael ?@_cypherpunks_

New NRA webpage: "The National School Shield."
http://nraschoolshield.com/ (h/t @AlexJamesFitz)


RT ?@RT_com

BREAKING: "The only thing that stops a bad guy with a gun is a good guy with a gun" - NRA CEO Wayne LaPierre http://on.rt.com/5xdi8z

"More guns"

December 21, 2012

"Battle for the Rockaways"

Occupy Wall Street ?@OccupyWallSt

Disaster capitalism is attacking thousands of families in Far Rockaway. "Battle for the Rockaways", by @Gottesdiener
http://ow.ly/ghd5K
Retweeted by StrikeDebt

December 21, 2012

The Real Life and Death Consequences of Cuts to Mental Health Funding

Sarah Reese Jones ?@srjones66

The Real Life and Death Consequences of Cuts to Mental Health Funding http://www.politicususa.com/consequences-cuts-mental-health-funding.html … via @politicususa #P2 #P2b #topprog #ctl

http://www.politicususa.com/consequences-cuts-mental-health-funding.html

Discussion about mental illness and its treatment remains a challenge in our society. If we are going to take meaningful action to prevent another incident like Sandy Hook, we need a frank discussion about our broken mental health system.

We also need to dispel the stigmatization of mental illness. Some people with mental illness are at greater risk of being violent – more so without treatment. While there is an increased risk that people with some mental illnesses will be violent; mental illness is not synonymous with violence.

The stigma that goes with mental illness makes it more difficult to seek treatment. Stigma means facing discrimination in the work place and in social situations. In the case of mental illness, stigma is reflected in the absence of coverage for mental health treatment in many health care insurance policies. Other policies fail to provide sufficient coverage.

Then we wonder why people who have mental illness may be reluctant to acknowledge their illness and get treatment. We wonder why some parents don’t seek help for children who have mental illness. In some cases it may be a matter of choice. In many cases, it is a matter of lacking the resources.

(More at the link. And if you're not already a fan of politicusUSA, you need to be.)

December 21, 2012

Protest the NRA Press Conference Tomorrow, Friday, December 21, 2012 at 10AM ET

Occupy Wall Street ?@OccupyWallStNYC

From @InterOcc: Protest the NRA Press Conference Tomorrow, Friday, December 21, 2012 at 10AM ET

http://interoccupy.net/blog/credo-occupy-the-nra-and-others-to-deliver-200000-signatures-to-nra-during-its-press-conference-tomorrow-friday-december-21-2012/


Protest the NRA Press Conference as CREDO Delivers 200,000 signatures to the NRA and pick up a free “Stop the NRA” sign

View Facebook Event Here:

https://www.facebook.com/events/450178351703627/

Pershing Park, across from Willard InterContinental Hotel, 1401 Pennsylvania Avenue NW, Washington, DC 20004

On Monday, hundreds of us rallied at the NRA office chanting “Shame on the NRA.” More than 200,000 CREDO Action members from across the country have asked the National Rifle Association to “stand down” and stop blocking sensible gun control laws.

Show up and protest the NRA as CREDO delivers their petition signatures? You can also pick up a free “Stop the NRA” or “Another _____ Against Assault Weapons” sign.

On Friday, the day the NRA plans to break its silence on the Sandy Hook Elementary School massacre, we will deliver petition signatures at their press conference along with a strong message: We will not stop until the NRA stands down.

Info for the NRA Press Conference:

National Rifle Association * 11250 Waples Mill Road * Fairfax, VA 22030

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE FOR MORE INFORMATION
December 20, 2012 NRA Public Affairs (703) 267-3820

MEDIA ADVISORY

For Planning Purposes

Fairfax, Va. – The National Rifle Association (NRA) will be holding a press event on Friday, December 21, 2012.

The details of the event are as follows:

Friday, December 21, 2012
Start time: 10:45 a.m.
Willard Hotel
1401 Pennsylvania Avenue Northwest
Washington, DC 20004

Please follow signs to location.

Media pre-set must be completed by 10:00 a.m.

Media registration will end at 10:45 a.m. No one will be allowed into the press conference without proper media identification.

Media must preregister to attend this press event. Please RSVP to nrapressrsvp@nrahq.org

Satellite information is as follows:

Galaxy 16 k19 lower
14371.0 V
12071.0 H
HD MPEG 2
DVBS
Symbol rate 13.235
QPSK
Fec 3/4

December 21, 2012

The Mental Illness Rights Movement

starts right here and right now.

I am dual diagnosis. I dislike guns and violence although I'll huff and puff to attempt to keep them away from me. I am not a danger to myself and others (although you'll certainly hear about it from me if you're a danger to others).

People more eloquent than myself, including mental health workers, have been posting here in regards to the tragedy in Newtown, on behalf of the mentally ill due to ill-considered and -conceived comments and suggestions regarding the "mentally ill" en mass or even "just the violent ones". A care worker posted that the paranoid schizophrenic is the only type who is violent (perhaps as a rule, I don't know). There are many, many "types" and degrees of mental illness, some of which come and go due to situations, some of which may be tamed or negated through medication, and some which incapacitate us to varying degrees. Most folks have no concept of the suffering and stigmatism which is involved even for the most mildly affected.

It's time everyone learned. If you feel so driven, please identify yourself and even share your story or even just a shout-out in support so that people may "get" that we are first and foremost, people. Another world is possible!

December 21, 2012

Petition to unlock this very on-topic, timely thread:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/10022042134

Well we've done it again, run off another good DUer with persistent, hurtful bullshit.

(This discussion thread was locked as off-topic by DURHAM D (a host of the General Discussion forum).

Denninmi's off. Gone because of the attacks on the mentally ill, the smears, and the efforts of DUers to paint mentally ill people as Adam Lanza clones.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/1018261322#post36

I'm embarrassed for us. I'll say it again, the mentally ill are far FAR more typically the victims of violence than the perpetrators.



Damn shame.

December 20, 2012

Cops gone wild - Occupy Honolulu being raided (and raided again) despite winning court reprieve

Occupy NZ ?@OccupyNZ

Cops gone wild - Occupy Honolulu being raided (and raided again) despite winning court reprieve until March.
http://fb.me/1ogtmeYQy