Mental Health Care, Not Political Blame

Loughner Was Stopped, Warned About Running Red Light Saturday Morning
What is this? Neighbors watch the media outside the Loughner home in Tucson. Neighbors watch the media outside the Loughner home in Tucson. "A wildlife officer pulled over the suspect in the Assassination attempt against an Arizona congresswoman less than three hours before the deadly attack," the Associated Press writes. "Jared Loughner ran a red light but was let off with a warning at 7:30 a.m. Saturday, the Arizona Game and Fish Department said. The officer took Loughner's driver's license an...

Loughner Was Stopped, Warned About Running Red Light Saturday Morning
What is this? Neighbors watch the media outside the Loughner home in Tucson. Neighbors watch the media outside the Loughner home in Tucson. "A wildlife officer pulled over the suspect in the Assassination attempt against an Arizona congresswoman less than three hours before the deadly attack," the Associated Press writes. "Jared Loughner ran a red light but was let off with a warning at 7:30 a.m. Saturday, the Arizona Game and Fish Department said. The officer took Loughner's driver's license an...

Change mental health laws, Gazette?
From the Charleston Gazette’s lead editorial today: Here’s a yes-or-no question: Should psychotic Jared Loughner have been allowed to carry a loaded, hidden, semiautomatic pistol with a clip holding 30-plus bullets? The deranged young Arizona man paid $500 for a Glock 9 mm and two clips on Nov. 30. He passed a federal Background Check because he had no felony record and his glaring Mental Illness — visible to most who encountered him — hadn’t been certified by a j...

Giffords District Unable to Meet Mental Health Needs
The Huffington Post reports: WASHINGTON — In the past year, Pima County, Ariz., where Democratic Rep. Gabrielle Giffords and 19 others were shot Saturday, has seen more than 45 percent of its Mental Health services recipients forced off the public rolls, a service advocate told The Huffington Post. The deep cuts in treatment were protested strongly at the time, with opponents warning that they would result in a spike in Suicide attempts, public disturbances, hospitalizations and brushes ...

Douglas LaBier: The Changing Face of Psychological Health
The aftermath of the Tucson shootings is likely to spawn new discussion about serious Mental Illness and it's legal implications. Coincidentally, the Mental Health establishment has been debating what to include or exclude as a mental and emotional disorder, for the forthcoming revision of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders. For example, one Controversy is whether to remove narcissism as a bonafide disorder. In contrast to discussion about mental disorders, I think we've...

Dupnik, on the Job
TUCSON — The police were sent to the home where Jared L. Loughner lived with his family on more than one occasion before the attack here on Saturday that left a congresswoman fighting for her life and six others dead, the Pima County Sheriff’s Department said on Tuesday. A spokesman, Jason Ogan, said the details of the calls were being reviewed by legal counsel and would be released as soon as the review was complete. He said he did not know what the calls were about — they cou...

Video: Shooter a nonpartisan nutcase, says friend
ABC’s Good Morning America tracked down a close high-school friend Jared Lee Loughner had to find out more about the motives behind the attack that left six dead and fourteen wounded in Tucson this weekend, including a Federal Judge and a 9-year-old girl who loved politics. Zach Osler explains that Loughner didn’t have a particular love or hate for politics, at least not in a partisan sense. Contrary to assumptions made by the media and the Pima County Sheriff, Osler says the shoot...

Descent into madness
Before After The New York Times: The account by Mr. Loughner’s friend, a rare extended interview with someone close to Mr. Loughner in recent years, added some details to the emerging portrait of the suspect and his family. “He was a nihilist and loves causing chaos, and that is probably why he did the shooting, along with the fact he was sick in the head,” said Zane Gutierrez, 21, who was living in a trailer outside Tucson and met Mr. Loughner sometimes to shoot at cans for target pract

Rush Limbaugh Blasts Critics Linking Talk Radio to Shootings...
Yahoo! Buzz Rush Limbaugh defended himself against suggestions that the heated Rhetoric sometimes found on political programs influenced the shootings in Arizona. Since the violent incident last weekend, a debate has erupted in the media about whether political Talk Shows influenced Jared Lee Loughner, the man accused of killing six people in Arizona and critically wounding Rep. Gabrielle Giffords. Talking about Loughner on his radio program, Limbaugh said, “We know he listened to heavy me...

Malkin: The worst sheriff in America
You must read Michelle's roundup of the history of the Pima County Sheriff's interaction with dangerous nutbag Loughner.There are many heroes who showed indomitable courage and grace under fire during this weekend’s horrific Tucson massacre. Blowhard Pima County Sheriff Clarence Dupnik was not one of them. ....As Sheriff Dupnik himself has now admitted, Loughner leveled death threats against others that were investigated by Law Enforcement – and then apparently shrugged off. Locals note that L..

Loughner Parents: Sorry About Those Murders (ignore that skull in the back yard??)
These parents have a LOT of explaining to do.    “Sorry” isn’t going to be enough. The family of Tucson shooting suspect Jared Loughner handed out a written statement to reporters standing in front of their home late Tuesday afternoon. This is a very difficult time for us. We ask the media to respect our Privacy. There are no words that can possibly express how we feel. We wish that there were, so we could make you feel better. We don’t understand why this ...

Sarah Palin Invokes Anti-Semitic Term Blood Libel in Reaction to Arizona Shootings
There has been extensive discussion about whether intensified hateful Rhetoric used in partisan debate may have incited accused Arizona shooter Jared Loughner to try to assassinate Rep. Gabrielle Giffords at her Congress on the Corner event Saturday, wounding 13 others and killing six.  Loughner himself has not yet explicitly expressed a motive, though Law Enforcement has uncovered evidence indicating an extreme political dislike for Giffords. Journalists such as Keith Olbermann and others ...

Neither Tucson Sheriff Or Campus Police Will Release Psycho Killers Records
Arizona Republic: Sheriff’s Department and community-college officials in Pima County are refusing to release a wide range of public documents about the man charged in Saturday’s shooting rampage that left six dead and more than a dozen wounded. The Pima County Sheriff’s Department and Pima Community College have declined to release documents that could shed light on run-ins they had with 22-year-old Jared Loughner in the months prior to the shooting. The Arizona Public Recor...

Sarah Palin's charge of 'blood libel' spurs outcry from Jewish leaders
Sarah Palin's remarks Wednesday in which she accused critics who would tie her political tone to the Arizona shootings of committing a "blood Libel" against her have prompted an instant and pronounced backlash from some in America's Jewish community. The term dates to the Middle Ages and refers to a prejudice that Jewish people used Christian blood in religious rituals. "Instead of dialing down the Rhetoric at this difficult moment, Sarah Palin chose to accuse others trying to sort out the mean...

A Missed Chance To Intervene In Tucson?
Jared Loughner could have been involuntarily admitted for evaluation under Arizona's progressive Mental Health laws long before he allegedly showed up at a Tucson Grocery Store Parking Lot with a semi-automatic pistol, Mental Health professionals say. Whether or not Loughner is mentally ill is unclear. But what is known is that friends, relatives and teachers watched as Loughner's behavior apparently became increasingly erratic, including outbursts in class, isolation and bizarre Internet postin...

Charles Krauthammer: 'The origins of Jared Loughner's delusions are clear: mental illness. What are the origins of Paul Krugman'
Pulitzer Prize-winning syndicated columnist, political commentator, and physician, Charles Krauthammer, so often a voice of sanity and reason (he is, after all, a Psychiatrist) ... says today exactly what's been needing to be said, in what Peter Wehner refers to as "a 'spectacularly good column' that concludes with a devastating knockout of the New York Times columnist Paul Krugman." Here are a few excerpts to pique your interest. The money quote is "The origins of [Jared] Loughner's delusions ...

Why Sarah Palin's 'blood libel' was a poor choice of words
Sarah Palin feels victimized by critics who accuse her of helping to create an angry political climate that led to the Tucson shootings, and she has a point. She chose a truly unfortunate way to make it, using the phrase "blood Libel." Here's the context, from Palin's eight-minute video statement on the shooting: "Especially within hours of a tragedy unfolding, Journalists and pundits should not manufacture a blood libel that serves only to incite the very hatred and violence they purport to con...

Nearly 50 Percent Of Mental Health Services Recipients In Giffords' County Were Dropped In 2010
Source: Huffington Post Nearly 50 Percent Of Mental Health Services Recipients In Giffords' County Were Dropped In 2010 WASHINGTON -- In the past year, Pima County, Ariz., where Democratic Rep. Gabrielle Giffords and 19 others were shot Saturday, has seen more than 45 percent of its mental health services recipients forced off the public rolls, a service advocate told The Huffington Post. The deep cuts in treatment were protested strongly at the time, with opponents warning that they would resul...

Lawmaker calls for briefing on mental health danger signs
A leading lawmaker on Mental Health issues is calling for a Bipartisan debate on how to keep lawmakers and their staff and families safe in the wake of Saturday's deadly shooting in Tucson. Rep. Grace Napolitano (D-Calif.), co-chair of the Congressional Mental Health Caucus along with Rep. Tim Murphy (R-Penn.), wants the group to hold a briefing focusing on the behaviors and threats that raise red flags. "Police agencies already do that," Napolitano told The Hill. "I want to make sure some of ...

Weekly Pulse: Giffords Shooting Reveals Flaws in U.S. Mental Health Services
Rep. Gabrielle Giffords (D-AZ) was shot in the head at a constituent outreach event in a Supermarket Parking Lot in Tucson on Saturday. In all, the gunman shot 18 people, killing 6, including a Federal Judge and a 9-year-old girl. Jamelle Bouie of TAPPED urges President Obama to take up the issue of Mental Health care in his upcoming Speech on the Mass Shooting. Several people who knew the alleged shooter came forward with stories of bizarre behavior and run-ins with Campus Police at his commu...

GOP Stresses Need For Mental Health Services, Despite Pushing For Repeal Of Aid
GOP Stresses Need For Mental Health Services, Despite Pushing For Repeal Of Aid Following Saturday’s tragic shooting in Tucson, Arizona, some Republicans have argued that 22-year old assassin Jared Lee Loughner was more affected by his Mental Illness than the nation’s lax Gun Control laws or Washington’s divisive and often times violent political Rhetoric. “What will solve this problem is removing the politics from it and getting after the crux of this problem and that...

The Political Consequences of Violence
I believe that The New Yorker’s George Packer has mistaken the meaning of a line in my column this week. He writes: Douthat wrote, in the spirit of phony equivalence, “If overheated Rhetoric and martial imagery really led inexorably to Murder, then both parties would belong in the dock,” but also this: “the Attempted Murder of a Democratic congresswoman is a potential gift to Liberalism.” In other words, everyone goes over the line now and then, no one actually want...

Loughner's Father Chased Alleged Shooter Into Desert On Saturday
In the hours before Jared Lee Loughner allegedly tried to assassinate Rep. Gabrielle Giffords (D-AZ) and killed six others, his father chased him into the desert as he carried a mysterious black bag in his hand, the Associated Press reported. Police also said that at 7:30 a.m. that same morning, Loughner was stopped by a wildlife officer after he ran a red light but was let off with a warning, according to the AP. The officer, the Arizona Game and Fish Department said, looked at Loughner's dri...

Heroes of Tucson
It is an instinct that is inherent in the animal kingdom and was present on January 8, 2011 when Jared Loughner opened fire with a Glocker gun spraying bullets at a crowd of people in Tucson. The heroes are mainly everyday Americans like Patricia Maisch a 61 year old that heeded the call to capture the magazine before Loughner reloaded his gun. She grabbed it and actually tackled him to the ground and Bill Badger jumped in and sat on him to stop him from shooting again. It as at this moment that...

Friend claims that Jared Loughner didnt watch television or listen to talk radio
  Shortly after Jared Loughner shot and killed six people while wounding dozens of others in Arizona the media went on a witch-hunt to see where they could lay the blame for Loughner’s actions. Personally, I would have blamed Jared Loughner and I suppose the media would have also if they weren’t being driven by their agenda.   It didn’t take long for the media to find their target and set their sights on Sarah Palin, Glenn Beck, conservative t...