On Wed, Jun 13, 2001 at 08:35:11PM -0400, Smitty wrote:
>
>
>
> >Date: Wed, 13 Jun 2001 15:39:41 -0400
> >
> >Subject: The new California.
> >
> >You won't believe this...
> >
> >http://www.nationalreview.com/comment/comment-weizner061201.shtml
>
> For the Children
>
> Legislature to ask Golden State docs to help curb violence.
>
> By Judith Weizner, a writer living in New York June 12, 2001 9:30 a.m.
>
> ncouraged by its recent success in securing the medical establishment's
> cooperation in reducing gun violence, the California State legislature is
> currently considering a bill that would require doctors to question their
> school-age patients about the prevalence of risky leisure-time behaviors in
> their homes.
>
> Rep. Barbara Medlar, sponsor of the Golden State Childhood Medical
> Practitioner Assistance Act (GSCMPAA), says the law would compel
> pediatricians to ascertain each patient's injury-probability index by means
> of a questionnaire to determine whether the youngsters engage in dangerous
> activities when they are not in school.
>
> "Childhood play injuries cost taxpayers and insurance companies
> $154,000,000,000 every year, and if we are to rein in health costs, we must
> get a grip on this problem," Ms. Medlar says. "But this isn't just about
> dollars and cents. Our government has a duty to protect its children."
>
> While some doctors are afraid the law's requirements would be burdensome,
> Ms. Medlar insists that isn't the case. "It will just mean a few more
> questions while they're asking the kids about their pets, online habits,
> friendships, sexual activities, their parents' eating, drinking and reading
> preferences, and the presence of guns in their homes," she said.
>
> Referring to the recently imposed schoolyard ban on tag, dodgeball,
> hide-and-seek, and hopscotch, Ms. Medlar added, "Very few parents realize
> how dangerous certain activities are because they have a benign image. We
> need to be sure kids aren't doing things at home that they're not allowed
> to do on the playground. If it's not safe at school, it's not safe at home."
>
> Citing a case in Almohada where a five-year-old was brought into the
> emergency room after inhaling a feather during a pillow fight, Ms. Medlar
> explained, "Many people actually encourage their children to take out their
> aggressions with pillows, but this case made it clear that fighting with
> pillows is unacceptable. If that child's doctor had known the family
> permitted pillow fighting, he could have had a conference with the parents
> to explain the potential danger and spared the child a terrible trauma -
> not to mention saving the cost of the ambulance and emergency room
> treatment."
>
> While there was some opposition initially to the idea of requiring doctors
> to delve into the details of their patients' family lives, resistance all
> but disappeared following passage of the Complicity in Child Abuse Act
> (CCAA), which made it possible for an adult to be charged with child abuse
> if he knew or could have known about the presence of firearms in a child's
> home yet failed to report it to the child's teacher.
>
> The first person charged under CCAA, Hector Flores, was a deliveryman for
> NotFauna.com. Two years ago, while carrying a heavy vase of flowers into
> the home of a paraplegic customer, he was squirted by one of the customer's
> kids with a water pistol. The customer apologized and Flores forgot about
> the matter, but subsequently, when the same child squirted a pizza-delivery
> man, who reported the incident, the ensuing investigation uncovered the
> previous assault on Flores. Flores was charged with child abuse for having
> failed to report the episode, which might have prevented the attack on the
> pizza deliverer. Convicted and sentenced to two years in a facility for
> child molesters, Flores appealed, arguing that the law referred only to
> actual firearms, not to purple water pistols. The court ruled that although
> the language of the statute read "firearms" and not "actual firearms," the
> prosecution had nevertheless acted reasonably in extending the state's
> school policy of zero tolerance to the home.
>
> After his release, Flores will be required to register as a child abuser
> wherever he lives while serving his 19 years' probation. The child will be
> returned to his family later this year when his parents have completed the
> state's Violence Begins in the Home crime-prevention program.
>
> Ms. Medlar says she has been very encouraged by the legislature's response
> to the GSCMPAA. "So often attempts to improve safeguards meet resistance
> from extremists who see everything government tries to accomplish as an
> infringement on their personal liberties. It is really high time that we
> stopped permitting these people to endanger our children."
>
> Although Ms. Medlar did not refer to it directly, she was undoubtedly
> thinking of the public-safety improvement program that was the backbone of
> her reelection campaign. The program suffered a setback last year when she
> was unable to convince the governor to sign the Hair Safety Act.
>
> Ms. Medlar had introduced legislation to eliminate hair as a causative
> factor in accidents following publication of a study in the Journal of the
> California Association of Public Health Medicine, which showed hair to be a
> significant contributing factor in as many as 43% percent of all injuries.
>
> The study, conducted over an 18-year period, followed 70 men and women as
> they went about their daily activities. During that period, 12 participants
> were hospitalized for hair-related traumas. One female subject is still
> recovering from serious injuries sustained in a high-speed accident that
> occurred when she sought to change lanes on a freeway and discounted the
> 'shadow' in her peripheral vision, thinking it was her own hair, when in
> reality it was a dark brown SUV attempting to pass her.
>
> When the study's results became the subject of a two-hour special on CNN,
> Ms. Medlar drafted a bill seeking to limit licensed drivers in California
> to hairstyles not exceeding two-and-a-half inches in length. The bill
> squeaked through the legislature, but the governor vetoed it, explaining
> that although he personally favored public safety, he doubted he would be
> reelected if he signed a law regulating hairstyles in California.
>
> Notwithstanding that minor setback, Ms. Medlar is optimistic that the
> Childhood Medical Practitioner Assistance Act will become law. "People are
> always complaining that medicine has become too impersonal," Ms. Medlar
> says. "And they're right. In an earlier time, doctors knew how their
> patients lived because they made house calls. This law will restore caring
> to the practice of medicine."
>
<no snippage, because you gotta read the above _again_>
People have laughed for decades about outrageous things that just
couldn't possibly ever happen in the United States. No, of course not,
we have this Constitution thing, and that Bill of Rights deal. 1984? No
way, not here.
Well, laugh while you can, monkey boy. Recently I've seen more and more
stories like this from California. America can't become a socialist
country? Just look at California; they're well on their way. And the
people of California are just looking the other way.
Maybe Orwell's book should have been titled: "2084".
Paul
This archive was generated by hypermail 2.1.3 : Fri Aug 01 2014 - 20:42:48 EDT