LOST - Are they trying to Boil the sea?

POSTED BY: SheWolf
UPDATED: Saturday, August 21, 2004 13:33
VIEWED: 9750
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DANFAN

Thursday, August 19, 2004 6:25 PM

I'm not sure yet who I support in the upcoming election. But, wow… that's quite a list of allegations. Perhaps you read some of this in newspapers and TV. If you are like most of us, you got a lot of your information from the internet.

Regardless what your information source, as I read your list, I found myself wondering if you had researched each of these items to their source, or if you had relied upon other people’s articles about these topics. This is a very real problem when dealing with any information outlet… there’s no authority reviewing everything out there for accuracy. So it’s easy to read an article or opinion piece put out by some group with an axe to grind. And who knows if that author researched their topic to the source or if they were simply relying upon someone else’s opinion piece, who was relying upon someone else’s article, ad infinitum…

Chasing each of the allegations you expressed to their source could take days. I decided to choose one that that I had never heard of before and see what I could find. I chose one that looked very disturbing to me (given that I am a father of two sons):

“or what about the Bush administration signing a bill to test public school children for pychological problems and then medicate them .... seeing as how they are working with the pharmacitcal companies..they've found the perfect way to make money off the American people in the most disgusting and diabolical way”

My initial search turned up a zillion articles written by various organizations with agendas (both for and against). But I didn’t want to formulate an opinion based upon someone else’s opinion based upon someone else’s opinion. So I kept digging and finally turned up the Report to the President from the President’s New Freedom Commission on Mental Health.

http://www.mentalhealthcommission.gov/reports/FinalReport/FullReport-0
5.htm

When I searched it for screening, this is what I got:

1) It references a model program that screens schoolchildren with parental consent.

2) Is supports providing screening services for youth, adults and elderly people in stressful environments (criminal justice system, hospitals, nursing homes, etc.).

Note that there is no explicit mention that such screening would be mandatory (in fact the model program referenced explicitly requires parental consent). Also note that there is no mention in this report as to how to deal with any mental health issues uncovered. There’s certainly no “medication preference” flavor to it.

Finally, note that there is no mention of a “bill” in that report. In researching for bills, I came across HR3063 “Children's Mental Health Screening and Prevention Act of 2003.” See:

http://www.theorator.com/bills108/hr3063.html

Is this the bill that you refer to? It offers grants to orgnizations to set up programs to perform mental health screenings of children. However, it appears to be targeted at providing referrals to health care providers to develop treatment plans for mental health problems that are found, and collecting statistics regarding the prevalence and types of mental health issues in children. It certainly doesn’t mandate participation in the screening. And again, it doesn’t mandate pharmaceutical solutions. The bill seems "solution agnostic." It seems to be more focussed on finding mental illness than in promoting a particular treatement plan.

Even more interesting, the bill was introduced by a democrat (Rosa DeLauro) with a number of co-sponsors. I didn’t look at all of them, but the first co-sponsor was Mr. Waxman (another democrat). The remaining co-sponsors could be a mix of dems and repubs… I stopped looking so I can't say one way or the other. Let’s assume that it is supported by such a mix.

Where does that leave us? One could debate the value, legality, or ethics of the locations/situations where the report from the president’s commission recommended mental health evaluations be performed (criminal and juvenile justice programs, hospitals, etc.). There are interesting arg

RATNUT12

Thursday, August 19, 2004 9:08 PM

RE: DANFAN

That was the most refreshing post I've read in years

PIRATEJENNY

Friday, August 20, 2004 12:10 AM

I rarely pay any attention to anything thats on the t.v..if your looking for real information and truth your not going to find it on t.v our media is as much a propaganda tool ...everything I've said about Bush is true

the medical stuff comes from a london medical journal..I also read alot..everything I've said can be backed up researched and checked out...most of the info is already known

also if you really want to find out whats going on, a good way to do it ..is check to out all the sources espeically foreign..

Quote:
Regardless what your information source, as I read your list, I found myself wondering if you had researched each of these items to their source, or if you had relied upon other people’s articles about these topics. This is a very real problem when dealing with any information outlet… there’s no authority reviewing everything out there for accuracy. So it’s easy to read an article or opinion piece put out by some group with an axe to grind. And who knows if that author researched their topic to the source or if they were simply relying upon someone else’s opinion piece, who was relying upon someone else’s article, ad infinitum…

the internet is a tool...and you have to be able to tell the chaf from the wheat..I don't mind advice..but it seems your using the internet alot more then I am for your information so maybe its your own advice you ought to be taking

also, I don't mind getting up on my soap box from time to time..everybody should do it its good for the soul... the iformation is out there...people are going to believe what they want to believe..its all pretty much a lost cause so I don't have anything to gain..nor am I intrested in spinning any truths to my own bias..I don't care what the truth is I'm only intrested in knowing it whatever it maybe...

ARAWAEN

Friday, August 20, 2004 4:50 AM

I personally think a lot of Clinton's economic success was the fact that big business was booming under the questionable accouting practices that have recently got them into so much trouble. They weren't new practices when a few of them got caught, in fact I think most big corps were doing it, just not all were going bankrupt on top of it.

Couple this with the tech stock overinflation and most of the boom is accounted for.

The gap between the rich and poor continued to increase unabated through Clinton's two terms, with little to no improvement for the middle and lower classes.

Arawaen

Um, I'm lost. Uh, I'm Angry. And I'm Armed.

PIRATEJENNY

Friday, August 20, 2004 7:45 AM

Quote:
Originally posted by Arawaen:
I personally think a lot of Clinton's economic success was the fact that big business was booming under the questionable accouting practices that have recently got them into so much trouble. They weren't new practices when a few of them got caught, in fact I think most big corps were doing it, just not all were going bankrupt on top of it.

Couple this with the tech stock overinflation and most of the boom is accounted for.

The gap between the rich and poor continued to increase unabated through Clinton's two terms, with little to no improvement for the middle and lower classes.

Arawaen

B]

I'm going to put it in as simplest terms as I know how...because it doesn't take a brainiac to see the writting on the wall its real simple

4 years of Bush sr..econmy= bad
8 years while we had Clinton in office the econmy...= pretty damn good....
4 years of Bush jr..econmy= bad

how hard is that!!

apparently it does make some diffrence who is in office

I'm not here to sing anyones praises..but I do believe in giving credit when and where its due and the ecomny during Bill Clintons reign was pretty damn good his record speaks for itsself and who are you or anybody to try to take away from that..if you weren't one of those people who flourished during the Clinton economy..then I'm sorry for you..but millions of people did ..I was one of those people and I saw plenty of people around me flourish ..it was good times for everyone and if someone wasn't getting a peice of the pie its because they weren't trying because the opportunity was there

you can't tell me that things weren't better..becuse it was...

We had a surplus, something they said could not be done..More people were going to college.. more high tech higher paying jobs were being created..we got welfare reform..the middle class got and poor got tax breaks, intrest rates were lower then they had ever been.. more people were able to buy their own homes during the 8 years of Clinton econmics then they had been since the 1940's and 1950's the middle class grew

thats just a fact..you can hem and haw about this or that..but it doesn't add up..do the math because its not that complicated

PIRATEJENNY

Friday, August 20, 2004 8:25 AM

SGTGUMP

Friday, August 20, 2004 10:20 AM

Quote:

4 years of Bush sr..econmy= bad
8 years while we had Clinton in office the econmy...= pretty damn good....
4 years of Bush jr..econmy= bad

Can anyone tell me 3 ways that any president can influence our economy?

ARAWAEN

Friday, August 20, 2004 1:55 PM

It is not really a good economy if the money is being made by underhanded accounting that tricks people into investing. (The bubble will burst eventually).

It is not really a good economy if it is based upon the overvaluation of certain types of products. (Again the bubble will burst eventually).

Clinton didn't start these problems, but he didn't try to stop them while he was in either.

I am opposed to Bush so I am not being partisan.

Yes the economy seemed strong and growing, but it appears that it wasn't growing on true merits but corporate chicanery.

I am not saying the economy was really bad under Clinton, just not so glowing as we might want to think.

If you want to oversimplify and dwell in partisan land be my guest. I am not your conservative-pundit opponent and bantering with you does nothing for me.

Arwaen

Um, I'm lost. Uh, I'm Angry. And I'm Armed.

ARAWAEN

Friday, August 20, 2004 2:05 PM

Apparantly everytime he opens his mouth, he can affect the stock market. If they didn't like what he said, stocks go down. If they liked what he said, stocks go up.

He is part of the equation that makes up economic policies: including taxes, budgets, and spending.

He is a major factor in whether we go to war (haven't heard of our troops being deployed against the President's wishes). This can have a huge impact on the economy depending upon the size and duration of the conflict.

There isn't a lot the President can do all by himself when the rest of government is opposed to him, we do have checks and balances in our system (they may not be perfect, but do prevent tyrrany by one man).

Arawaen

Um, I'm lost. Uh, I'm Angry. And I'm Armed.

DANFAN

Friday, August 20, 2004 2:29 PM

Aircraft carriers at flank speed don't turn on a dime. It takes miles to do that. I've always suspected that the economy of a nation as large as the US is a lot like that aircraft carrier. The sitting president inherits a lot of momentum in the economy from the administration, congress, and events that went before.

That's not to say that he doesn't begin having an impact right away... but I don't think the economy is fully "his" until his second term (if he gets one). Again, this is a theory... I've not done any research to prove it. It seems sensible to me though... in my experience, large systems of any kind have that sort of momentum.

Also, with regard to the economic slump that we are still struggling to recover from... at least one significant contributor was that never in our nation's history was more economic power (money) lost in a single day as we lost on 9/11. One of the main economic centers in the world was totally destroyed. An entire multi-billion dollar industry (composed of many corporations) was stopped dead in its tracks in the space of a couple of hours. And kept that way for a significant time racking up debt. Of course, the bail-outs, the military expenditures, and a number of other economic policies that followed contributed their part.

One way to achieve an immediate course change in an aircraft carrier at flank speed is to run it smack into a continent. That technique comes at a high price.

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