Mental Illness Database?

[frankie_the_yankee]

How would you like to be in a courtroom where a bitterly contested divorce was being heard, complete with the most viscious child custody battle you could imagine, and everyone there was packing a streetsweeper?

Why are you suggesting that anyone who carries a firearm is going to go over the edge and use it?

Instead of answering my question WITH a question, (And a strawman question at that. I suggested nothing of the kind about "anyone".), why don't you just answer my question?

[jimlongley]

It has been argued that the right to drive is implicitly guaranteed by the Constitution, even if not explicitly, e.g.:

Argued, but not decided. You might as well say, and cite Sarah Brady, that it has been argued that the Constitution does not guarantee a right to bear arms.

This gets way too deeply into the living constitution concept for discourse on a forum, subtle nuances of language are inexpressible in text and responses suffer from time lag. Suffice it to say that I don't see having a driver's license as a Constitutional right even if I agree that locomotion may be one. The rights of others gets into the mix, as you acknowledged, and it's that mix of personal rights and the rights of others, combined with public, as opposed to private, roads, and settled issues that bless us with driver's licenses.

OTOH, if the government wants to build "public" ranges where we can shoot anytime we want to as long as we pass a test and get a license (to use the public ranges, not to possess or carry guns in general) then I will be happy to be first in line to get one of those licenses, but those ranges had better be ubiquitous and the license rules will have to apply to everyone that shoots there.

Still, there are better examples for discussion, in particular the very theme of this thread, the infringement of the 2A right on those who are deemed to be mentally incompetent; as well as convicted felons, the underaged, etc.[/qoute]

I can remember, a lot of years ago now, trying to argue that I had "civil rights" when I was under age, and I was told that those rights only applied to people of voting age. I accepted that concept at the time, but do not really consider it universal now, and was gratified when they moved the voting age to 18 although I was already well over 21. Until the last couple of decades the concept that felons, incompetents, and underage did not enjoy more than a limited subset of Constitutionally guaranteed rights was generally accepted. If you were a felon, you had pretty much voluntarily surrendered your rights, if you were incompetent then you lacked the capability to "enjoy" those rights (and family took care of you under most circumstances) and if you were underage you were kind of in training to avail yourself of those rights when you came of age. What a complicated world we have created by abandoning those simple concepts.

The old First Amendment thing about yelling "FIRE" in a crowded theater is an example. Most people would agree that you have no right to do so unless there is a fire, but I would argue that in today's society while it might not be acceptable to do so, you have every right to, as long as you accept the consequences.

And in that same vein, while "we" are proposing licensing gun owners in what I see as a vain attempt to protect everyone else, let's license journalists too. The past few years have shown many examples of irresponsible journalism causing harm to others and I think it's just common sense to ensure that we get the very best in journalism without allowing those who would abuse the privilege to spread untrue or discordant "news."

I know, reductio ad absurdam, but I had to fit it in somewhere.

It seems to me that we are dealing here with a simple matter of degree (a dangerous thing for sure) such that the definition of "competence", whether mental competence, maturity, and in the case of licensure requiring basic safety and skills training, operational
competence, is a basis for self-infringement (at least agreed to, or at best tolerated) by a majority of "the people".

Unconstitutional? It seems so. A bad thing? Unreasonable? Too steep a slippery slope? I'm undecided.

And like the frog in the pot thinking "Well another degree won't hurt." before too long we are way too far down the slope. One degree is too much.

I see no reason to allow such radical, often illogical groups hijack the term, and I certainly do not imply any support for such groups in my use of that term, but perhaps "logical" or "reasonable" would be better, given that logic and reason are testable and hence a better basis for concensus.

Too late! The Brady Bunch and the others already co-opted the term and I refuse to even consider it as anything more than a buzz word now. Who gets to say what "common sense" is?

It is IMO both logical and reasonable to presume that there are cases where restrictions on rights is justified. The problem, as always, is agreeing on what those restrictions might be, and how such restrictions might be most effectively managed, to the greatest benefit of the "the people".

Unless we can get a very strict ruling and exactly what is logical and how reasonable reasonable is, I even have an argument with them. All of those terms have interpretive implications too easily spun in meaning. I think it's perfectly reasonable for me to have jumped off cliffs, gone into cave, or scuba dived at night in contaminated freezing water. I have done it many times, and if you had observed me in the act you might even think so too, but I sure don't think a lot of the things I did, not just in my youth but in years as a member of a rescue squad, were necessarily logical.

The subjective terms are one of the places where we run into trouble, each of our definitions of logical and reasonable are going to be a little different from each others. Maybe it would only be a little difference in degree, but those degrees add up.

Well, er.. ahem.. in the context of this particular forum and thread,
that quip is a tad bit condescending.

But I do genuinely appreciate your comments and the time
you took to offer them.

I stand by the quip nonetheless.

Don't know why I can't get the quotes to work, they all look right, sorry.

[Geister]

Instead of answering my question WITH a question, (And a strawman question at that. I suggested nothing of the kind about "anyone".), why don't you just answer my question?

I'm not going to answer your questions when it's obvious that you are not using any logic whatsoever. For one thing I don't really have time.

You suggested that it is a good idea to ban guns from courthouses because of a unlikely scenario you gave. However, it wouldn't be too difficult for some nutcase like Cho to DISREGARD a gun ban, walk into a courthouse, and shoot many of the unarmed. That is a more likely scenario than a bunch of people carrying "streetsweepers" on a regular basis.

You should already know that gun bans DO NOT WORK.

[PatrickS]

It seems to me that we are dealing here with a simple matter of degree (a dangerous thing for sure) such that the definition of "competence", whether mental competence, maturity, and in the case of licensure requiring basic safety and skills training, operational
competence, is a basis for self-infringement (at least agreed to, or at best tolerated) by a majority of "the people".

Unconstitutional? It seems so. A bad thing? Unreasonable? Too steep a slippery slope? I'm undecided.

And like the frog in the pot thinking "Well another degree won't hurt." before too long we are way too far down the slope. One degree is too much.

I think that is the crux of the issue, namely if the
choice is between a lukewarm pot and the fire, is
there a means for the frog to retain control of
the stove

Most likley, there isn't.

[jimlongley]

Another point is that the constitution says we have a RKBA, not a RKB *CONCEALED* A. You don't think this little detail was left out by accident, do you?

Pistols of the time were a foot long, single-shot, inaccurate, and pretty much useless for anything other than dueling.

The RKBA also referred to swords. Whatever happened to that?

- Jim

I can't resolve the dichotomy you presented. If a pistol were inaccurate, how would it be useful for dueling?

Actually pistols were accurate enough, given the state of the art, with dueling pistols at the top of the heap. I have owned a couple of original pistols of the era and built a couple of other replicas, and except for the single shot and long reload, I wouldn't hesitate to compete with any of them in IDPA, they are certainly accurate enough for that level of competition.

Contemporary accounts refer to people carrying pistols concealed, and not all pistols of the era were as large as you state.

[jimlongley]

It seems to me that we are dealing here with a simple matter of degree (a dangerous thing for sure) such that the definition of "competence", whether mental competence, maturity, and in the case of licensure requiring basic safety and skills training, operational
competence, is a basis for self-infringement (at least agreed to, or at best tolerated) by a majority of "the people".

Unconstitutional? It seems so. A bad thing? Unreasonable? Too steep a slippery slope? I'm undecided.

And like the frog in the pot thinking "Well another degree won't hurt." before too long we are way too far down the slope. One degree is too much.

I think that is the crux of the issue, namely if the
choice is between a lukewarm pot and the fire, is
there a means for the frog to retain control of
the stove

Most likley, there isn't.

Ahh, but in our scenario, the frog either has a veto over raising the temperature, ie allowing or even encouraging the license to come into existence, or not even getting into the pot in the first place, ie not even considering the license to be valid restriction on a right.

Hopefully our legislative process is our control over the temperature of the pot.

[seamusTX]

I can't resolve the dichotomy you presented. If a pistol were inaccurate, how would it be useful for dueling?

My understanding is that they wanted a certain amount of chance, let God decide or something. I've read that most pistol duels ended with no injury or a minor injury. I've also read that some duellers missed intentionally, and sometimes they tried to miss and hit their opponent.

If participants really wanted to kill each other, they would use swords or rifles. (It's not an area that I have a lot of interest in.)

Contemporary accounts refer to people carrying pistols concealed, and not all pistols of the era were as large as you state.

I didn't know that. The few 18th-century pistols that I've seen were quite large.

In any case, the 2nd Amendment does not refer to concealed or open carry; and I'm convinced that the issue is irrelevant.

- Jim

[anygunanywhere]

In any case, the 2nd Amendment does not refer to concealed or open carry; and I'm convinced that the issue is irrelevant.

- Jim

I have read the same thing regarding the founding fathers and concealed carry. Most "gentlemen" at the time carried concealed.

Also, with regards to concealed carry, if you read much after the DC ruling, SCOTUS has held, if I read correctly, that restricting concealed carry does not violate the 2A.

I agree with you, Jim, in that I believe it is irrelevant since the 2A does not make a distinction.

Anygun

[jimlongley]

I can't resolve the dichotomy you presented. If a pistol were inaccurate, how would it be useful for dueling?

My understanding is that they wanted a certain amount of chance, let God decide or something. I've read that most pistol duels ended with no injury or a minor injury. I've also read that some duellers missed intentionally, and sometimes they tried to miss and hit their opponent.

If participants really wanted to kill each other, they would use swords or rifles. (It's not an area that I have a lot of interest in.)

Contemporary accounts refer to people carrying pistols concealed, and not all pistols of the era were as large as you state.

I didn't know that. The few 18th-century pistols that I've seen were quite large.

In any case, the 2nd Amendment does not refer to concealed or open carry; and I'm convinced that the issue is irrelevant.

- Jim

Actually, according to the rules extant at the time, the challenged person had the choice of weapons and swords were just as available, and often used, as guns. The point was not usually to kill, it was to draw blood, and in a sword duel if one duelist scored on the other it was considered cheating to continue.

That said, an inaccurate pistol would be a liability, not an advantage. If your objective was to merely score a hit and you killed you might be ostracized by society.

The dueling pistols I have seen, and the one I have shot, all were as accurate as the state of the art could make them in the day. Loads were worked up for them with as much care as that taken by today's benchrest shooters, rifling was carefully lapped after manufacture in order to achieve the smoothest and sharpest lands possible. Many of them used false muzzles for loading to prevent distortion of the projectile in the loading process. A false muzzle meets the rifling exactly at the real muzzle, and has a slightly tpering internal profile to allow engravement of the rifling in the false muzzle without having the projectile cant to one side or the other.

Even before the 18th century gunsmiths were working at reducing the size of all kinds of guns, admittedly problematic due to the inadequacies of black powder as a propellant as well as the inherent size of a flintlock action. I have seen, and I'm sure there are many pictures of, pistols small enough to fit in one hand from the era.

Also even my old CVA Kentucky pistol (flintlock) would have concealed almost as well as my 1911, merely being a little longer. One thing is that most people think of the old .70 caliber "horse pistol" as exemplary of the typical pistol of the day, and as a smoothbore with hand cast round balls (often not the roundest and with sprues merely cut or filed off) and patches of varying quality, it might be considered to be of questionable accuracy. The problem is that the old "horse pistol" was just the ottom end of the spectrum of handguns available in the era, the "Saturday Night Special" model of 1763 if you will.

My flintlock pistol was a .45 caliber, rifled, and would shoot every bit as accurately in my hands as any other handgun I have ever had, as long as I did my part.

But I do have to thank you for the idea. The next time I MD an IDPA match I may just introduce the shooters to a really strange gun.

[seamusTX]

Thanks for all the info. My false impressions are corrected.

- Jim

[frankie_the_yankee]

Instead of answering my question WITH a question, (And a strawman question at that. I suggested nothing of the kind about "anyone".), why don't you just answer my question?

I'm not going to answer your questions when it's obvious that you are not using any logic whatsoever. For one thing I don't really have time.

You suggested that it is a good idea to ban guns from courthouses because of a unlikely scenario you gave. However, it wouldn't be too difficult for some nutcase like Cho to DISREGARD a gun ban, walk into a courthouse, and shoot many of the unarmed. That is a more likely scenario than a bunch of people carrying "streetsweepers" on a regular basis.

You should already know that gun bans DO NOT WORK.

"I'm not going to answer your questions when it's obvious that you are not using any logic whatsoever. For one thing I don't really have time."

I have another theory. I think you're not going to answer my question ("How would you like to be in a courtroom where a bitterly contested divorce was being litigated, including a viscious child custody dispute, where everyone present was armed with Streetsweepers?") because YOU CAN'T answer in any way that makes sense without dumping one of your strongly held beliefs.

So instead, you dismiss it as "far-fetched", issue a (mild) personal attack (that I am not using any logic whatsoever), and claim that pressures of time prohibit you from answering.

And I'm the one with the logic problem?

I have another question. What do you think the chances are of getting fair justice from a judge presiding in a courtroom like that?

Or how about this one. Suppose carrying guns was freely allowed on airplanes. Do you think that one or two noble civic-minded people such as ourselves would be the only ones carrying, and that we could swiftly and heroically deal with any trouble that came up? Or is it possible that Osama might get the idea of having an Al Qaeda suicide squad of 10 or 12 people all buy tickets on the same plane and at the proper moment, they all get up, hose down the passenger cabin, shoot their way through the cockpit door, take control of the plane, and.........

Gee, execute a violent takeover of a commercial airliner in flight? How far-fetched is THAT?

My point is that ALL rights have limitations, including our cherished 2nd Amendment.

I think we can all agree that psychos, terrorists, drunks, dope addicts, and violent felons should not have guns and should not carry guns. At least I hope so. So the vast majority of us are willing to put up with esablishing our credentials, showing that we are "none of the above" in return for the ability to purchase and the license to carry guns.

If you think that what works in Vermont would work anywhere, you're dreaming. There are areas of a few blocks square in most of our major cities where you can find more human scum than you'll find in the WHOLE STATE of Vermont.

I **LIKE** it that I have a CHL to show a cop on a traffic stop. It tells him right away that I am not a criminal or a crazy. That makes things easier on everyone.

And I think there are places where limiting or prohibiting the carrying of guns is a benefit to everyone.

The trick is how to accomplish these things without trampling on the legitimate rights of citizens.

My own view, (just my opinion here) is that it is legitimate to ban guns in places that have true security, such as airplanes, courtrooms, The White House, etc. By true security I mean places defended by armed guards who man checkpoints where people are actually screened for weapons.

NOT any old place (like NASA, or AISD property, or a college campus or workplace) that posts some stupid sign or has a "no guns allowed" policy. Because as we all agree, only the good guys would honor such a sign or policy, leaving the psychos and criminals free to do their evil deeds.

If an entity is willing to create and maintain a "sterile" environment, I will hand over responsibility for my personal safety to them, as my part of the bargain. If they are not willing to do this, I believe they have no ethical or moral basis to insist I give it up while getting nothing but a sign or policy in return. And I will work to remove such irrational and unjust restrictions where and when I can.

If a zone is too large to be "sterilized", like a campus, a city, etc., then it is unjust for people to "wish" that it was, and expect me to act accordingly.

You will never get a court to rule that banning guns in a courtroom, The White House, or an aircraft is an infringement on 2nd Amendment rights. Sp how can a court allow such laws and rules to remain in place? "Compelling state interest", that's how. If you think that's wrong, I'd suggest that you either:

1) Run for president, and if you win, appoint as many like-minded judges as you possibly can.,

or,

2) Become a law professor, write some books and law review articles and try to pursuade large numbers of the legal community (where judges come from) that your thesis is correct.

Because THAT'S how we've gotten current thinking on constitutional law to begin to reject the "collective rights" model and begin to embrace the "individual rights" model that we have all believed in all along.

Remember, it was only 20 years ago (approx.) that the Chief Justice of the US Supreme Court, Warren Burger, said flat out that there was NO individual RKBA in the Constitution.

Look at how far we have come since then.

The recent DC Circuit ruling is HUGE. Chances are good that in the near future, the idiotic and wrong-headed collective right model will be dumped on the legal ash heap right alongside"separate but equal", where it belongs. Keeping and bearing arms will finally be established in law as a genuine RIGHT, secured for generations to come.

But if we aren't willing to accept some limits to that right, (psychos, violent felons, terrorists, drunks, dope addicts, sterile areas, etc.), we could overplay our hand and lose everything.

How do you think the Supreme Court would rule on a 2A case, if it thought that upholding the individual rights position would result in divorce court cases being decided in rooms full of people carrying Streetsweepers?

[Commander]

NEWSFLASH..NEWSFLASH ....NEWSFLASH

Are you sitting down?


The state of Texas has a central DATABASE already which track people who have been diagnosed or perscribed drugs for a mental issue. It is called WEBCARE. didn't cities have separate ones which can be accessed. dallas
' is called Northstar. doctors can access it for search of patients and perscriptions. police can enter names based on arrest.

in church now. but 'daughter' works for harris county just filled me in. be back....service starting

I've never heard of WEBCARE or Northstar. These systems are not accessed through TLETS (Texas Law Enforcement Telecommunications System). TLETS is the system that connects all Texas Law Enforcement agencies together and provides connections to TCIC, and NCIC. If these databases are not part of the TLETS system, then access to those systems is not available to law enforcement. Unless some local agency somewhere has access via another interface system.

Never having heard of them in my 32 years of Police Communications experience, I can only speculate what agency is responsible for them. From how you describe "Northstar" I'd speculate that could be a Dallas County system - accessible to agencies connected to the Dallas County main frame, but not agencies statewide. WEBCARE? Maybe Texas Department of Health Services.

[Charles L. Cotton]

finally back in TX, here goes.

I find it rather silly that there are those wanting to propose a mental patient database after ONE mass incident.

like I posted earlier, there is a mental health database in TX which is called WEBCARE. Any patient who seeks mental care and is DIAGNOSED as mentally ill or perscribed a drug for mental sickness is automatically enter into the states database for tracking purposes. my daughter works for Harris County Mental Health and Retardation Authority as a mental health clinician. according to law and doctors hypocritical oath, they have to maintain records of this info. she says it does not come up on background checks. also LE have a state form that is filled out on mental case arrest which is automatically entered into states database. it is also reported by medical insurance plan to database when doctor files a claim on your policy during a visit.

so I think the argument some have made about a database is mute because it has been going on for years. where is the abuse?

I'm going to try to find some information on this. I'm at a loss to see how this database is legal, both under Texas law and federal law.

Chas.

[Charles L. Cotton]

finally back in TX, here goes.

I find it rather silly that there are those wanting to propose a mental patient database after ONE mass incident.

like I posted earlier, there is a mental health database in TX which is called WEBCARE. Any patient who seeks mental care and is DIAGNOSED as mentally ill or perscribed a drug for mental sickness is automatically enter into the states database for tracking purposes. my daughter works for Harris County Mental Health and Retardation Authority as a mental health clinician. according to law and doctors hypocritical oath, they have to maintain records of this info. she says it does not come up on background checks. also LE have a state form that is filled out on mental case arrest which is automatically entered into states database. it is also reported by medical insurance plan to database when doctor files a claim on your policy during a visit.

so I think the argument some have made about a database is mute because it has been going on for years. where is the abuse?

I'm going to try to find some information on this. I'm at a loss to see how this database is legal, both under Texas law and federal law.

Chas.

This doesn't look like a database of everyone prescribed medication for a mental disorder, but I'll keep looking as time permits.

http://www.dshs.state.tx.us/cmbhs/default.shtm

Neither does this: http://www.dshs.state.tx.us/mhprograms/ ... epage.shtm

[Lucky45]

This doesn't look like a database of everyone prescribed medication for a mental disorder, but I'll keep looking as time permits.

http://www.dshs.state.tx.us/cmbhs/default.shtm

Neither does this: http://www.dshs.state.tx.us/mhprograms/ ... epage.shtm

That was a typo. I was at church service and typing on cellphone so couldn't edit too good. But I have clarified it since then. Only certain types of drugs, NOT ALL, gets you on the database.