>Should we just start to insitutionalize the homeless that are beyond any help?
>That is one debate topic that might be worth talking about. Since California
>is the poverty capital of the nation.

Well, I don't know about all the homeless, but a lot of them do have mental
illnesses and would probably get better care in an institution vs. the
streets.

The US (and other parts of the developed world) started having a "homeless
problem" when the government decided to stop instituionalizing the mentally
ill.  Conditions in the institutions were not great but, rather than fix
them, they closed them down.  IMHO, they did it partially to save money and
partially to make the liberals, who thought institionalizing the mentally ill
was inhumane, happy.

There is a book called "The Psychopath's Test" that goes into some detail
about the well-meaning hippy-types who thought the criminally insane could
be rehabilitated in less institutional-type settings (think group homes run
by hippy therapists).  Their "commited murder again" rates were not too
good.

Also IMHO, the number of national-headline-grabbing violent acts would go
way down if we went back to institutionalizing some of these folks before
they actually commit a mass-murder/suicide rather than wondering why after
the fact.

Mike

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 * SLMR 2.1a * Wrinkles only go where smiles have been - Jimmy Buffett