Capitalism is the Problem
Thanks for those pdf links i read some of the work on drug treatment that were in those and it's interesting to see that type of research being done by them.
I agree with Streetsmart. I also grew up poor, was the oldest of nine children, helped raised them and my absentee father and my mother whose mind was absent AND I worked at McDonald's...so I know, if I had wanted to become president it would have been a walk in the park for me with that kind of experience to fall back upon. Unfortunately, I didn't make use of the intelligence God gave me nor of the wonderful freedoms this country affords to us all. At a very early age I chose the wrong brand of ketchup to like with my "freedom fries" so my political career came to an end very early on in life. I am old now and I only say this as a warning to all of you who are still young...give up all your political aspirations immediately unless you are a Rhodes scholar who is wise enough to NOT know...what the definition of "is" is. Or you have a sugar daddy who will let you enjoy a hobby...of bankrupting companies.
The first poster said that capitalism is the problem and only the rich and well connected can be political leaders in this country. Is that really true? What about Bill Clinton and Jimmy Carter? From what I know about Bill Clinton he grew up somewhat poor, in a troubled home and his Father had serious issues. I figure if Bill Clinton can become President anyone can. President Bush shows that lots of money and powerful connections definately help, but you don't even have to be very smart to become president.
The second poster said that Karl Marx might have some good information for us to learn from and you might be right. We can learn from Karl Marx, but I don't know many people who would be willing to live under his suggestions, which bring an appearant lower standard of living for all and a much more restricted life.
Personally I believe in the power of free will and choice. I don't think Capitalism itself is the problem, I believe people are the problem. People choose to buy, invest in and consume things that are harmful to themselves and others. We don't need to get rid of Capitalism or become more Communist, we need to educate people to make better choices. The problem is that if we wait too long our system of government and economics might take on a life of its own that is so destructive that there will be no way to recover.
We don't really live in a capitalist country; that's just a lie they've been telling us since the New Deal. We live in a socialist country that leans towards capitalism. The New Deal took the fangs out of the capitalist monster that was destroying the country. There was a covenent between the corporations and the workers; overseen by the government.
But over the years, the wealthy and the corporations chipped away at the protections for the working and middle classes. Untill you have Bush-America.
I grew up in the 1970's, and you could drop out of GRADE SCHOOL and get a job that supported a house and a stay-home wife and family. Today, after Reagon's "Republican Revolution," with the same cast of characters in the Bush Administration, a person with a Phd can't get a job. In 1980 if you had a degree you could end up running a company. Today with a degree you'll be parking cars or flipping burgers.
Everytime I heard some blank-eyed Republican going on about how Bush is "saving america" I get the urge to beat the hell out of him.
GREAT EXAMPLES 
Research NOT Funded by Corporate PhRMA 
If the links don't work for these, go to http://psychrights.org/Research/Digest/Chronicity/NeurolepticResearch.htm
I like #9 the best, myself 
1. Leon Epstein, http://psychrights.org/Research/Digest/Chronicity/ataraxic.pdf
"An Approach to the Effect of Ataraxic Drugs on Hospital Release Rates," American Journal of Psychiatry, 119 (1962), 36-47.
• first large scale study of hospital release rates in the 1950s for schizophrenia patients treated with and without neuroleptics, and it concluded that "drug-treated patients tend to have longer periods of hospitalization." P44.
2. Nina Schooler, http://psychrights.org/Research/Digest/Chronicity/comunityadjustment.pdf
“One year after discharge: community adjustment of schizophrenic patients," American Journal of Psychiatry, 123 (1967), 986-995.
• NIMH study, one-year outcomes for 299 patients who had been treated either with neuroleptics or placebo upon their admission to a hospital.
• first long-term study conducted by the NIMH.
• researchers found that "patients who received placebo treatment in the drug study were less likely to be rehospitalized than those who received any of the three active phenothiazines (thioridazine (Mellaril), fluphenazine (Prolixin), chlorpromazine (Thorazine)." However, in spite of this finding, which the researchers wrote "was so unexpected," the NIMH investigators stated that they "were unprepared to recommend placebo as treatment of choice."
• NIMH researchers decided they wouldn't develop treatment guidelines based on their own research, which found that placebo patients did better than the drug-treated patients. SEE PAGE 991.
3. Robert Prien http://psychrights.org/Research/Digest/Chronicity/relapse.pdf
"Relapse in Chronic Schizophrenics Following Abrupt Withdrawal of Tranquillizing Medication," British Journal of Psychiatry, 115 (1968), 679-86.
• NIMH study -- relapse rates rose in direct relation to dosage--the higher the dosage patients were on before the drugs were withdrawn, the greater the relapse rates.
• At the start of the study, 18 patients were on placebo, and only one got worse over the next six months (6%). Sixty-five patients were on 300 mg. of chlorpromazine at the start of the study, and 54% of these patients worsened after the drug was withdrawn. One hundred thirteen patients were on more than 300 mg. of chlorpromazine at the start of the study, and 66% of these patients got worse after drug withdrawal. SEE TABLE THREE, PAGE 684.
4. Robert Prien, http://psychrights.org/Research/Digest/Chronicity/discontinuation.pdf "Discontinuation of Chemotherapy for Chronic Schizophrenics," Hospital and Community Psychiatry, 22 (1971), 20-23.
• NIMH study--earlier finding that relapse rates rose in correlation with neuroleptic dosage was confirmed.
• Only 2 of 30 patients who were on placebo at the start of the study relapsed during the next 24 weeks (7%). Twenty-three percent of the 99 patients who were on under 300 mg. of chlorpromazine at the start of the study relapsed following drug withdrawal. Fifty-two percent of the 91 patients who were on 300 to 500 mg. of chlorpromazine at the start of the study relapsed following drug withdrawal, and sixty-five percent of the 81 patients who were on more than 500 mg. of chlorpromazine at the start of the study relapsed following drug withdrawal.
• The researchers concluded: "Relapse was found to be significantly related to the dose of the tranquilizing medication the patient was receiving before he was put on placebo--the higher the dose, the greater the probability of relapse." SEE PAGE 22, AND 23
5. J. Sanbourne Bockoven http://psychrights.org/Research/Digest/Chronicity/comparison2x5.pdf
"Comparison of Two Five-Year Follow-Up Studies: 1947 to 1952 and 1967 to 1972", American Journal of Psychiatry, 132 (1975), 796-801.
• Boston psychiatrists Sanbourne Bockoven and Harry Solomon compared relapse rates in the pre-drug era to those in the drug era, and found that patients in the pre-drug era had done better.
• Forty-five percent of the patients treated at Boston Psychopathic Hospital in 1947 had not relapsed in the five years following discharge, and 76% were successfully living in the community at the end of that follow-up period. In contrast, only 31% of patients treated in 1967 with drugs at a Boston community health center remained relapse-free for the next five years, and as a group they were much more "socially dependent"--on welfare, etc.--than those in the 1947 cohort.
• Other researchers who reviewed relapse rates for New York psychiatric hospitals in the 1940s and early 1950s reported similar findings: ~50% of discharged schizophrenia patients had remained continuously well through lengthy follow-up periods, which was markedly superior to outcomes with neuroleptics.
• See Nathaniel Lehrman, "A state hospital population five years after admission: a yardstick for evaluative comparison of follow-up studies," Psychiatric Quarterly, 34 (1960), 658-681; and H. L. Rachlin, "Follow-up study of 317 patients discharged from Hillside Hospital in 1950," J. Hillside Hospital, 5 (1956), 17-40.
6. William Carpenter Jr.,
http://psychrights.org/Research/Digest/Chronicity/treatacute.pdf
"The treatment of acute schizophrenia without drugs: an investigation of some current assumptions," American Journal of Psychiatry, 134 (1977), 14-20.
• NIMH study--49 schizophrenia patients, placed into an experimental hospital program that provided them with psychosocial support, were randomized into drug and non-drug cohorts.
• Only 35% of the non-medicated patients relapsed within a year after discharge, compared to 45% of those treated with medication. The medicated patients also suffered more from depression, blunted emotions, and retarded movements.
7. Maurice Rappaport, http://psychrights.org/Research/Digest/Chronicity/contraindicated.pdf
"Are there schizophrenics for whom drugs may be unnecessary or contraindicated?" International Pharmacopsychiatry, 13 (1978), 100-111.
• Maurice Rappaport and his colleagues at the University of California, San Francisco randomized 80 young male schizophrenics admitted to Agnews State Hospital to drug and non-drug groups.
• Only 27% of the drug-free patients relapsed in the three years following discharge, compared to 62% of the medicated group. Most notably, only two of 24 patients (8%) who weren't medicated in the hospital and continued to forgo such treatment after discharge subsequently relapsed. At the end of the study, this group of 24 drug-free patients was functioning at a dramatically higher level than drug-treated patients.
8. Susan Mathews, http://psychrights.org/Research/Digest/Chronicity/noneuroleptic.pdf
"A non-neuroleptic treatment for schizophrenia: analysis of the two-year post discharge risk of relapse," Schizophrenia Bulletin, 5 (1979), 322-332;
Loren Mosher, http://psychrights.org/Research/Digest/Chronicity/2yrsoteria.pdf
"Community residential treatment for schizophrenia: two year followup," Hospital and Community Psychiatry, 29 (1978), 715-723; Mosher, http://psychrights.org/Research/Digest/Chronicity/acutetreatment.pdf
The treatment of acute psychosis without neuroleptics: six-week psychopathology outcome data from the Soteria project," International Journal of Social Psychiatry, 41 (1995), 157-173; Mosher, "The Soteria project: twenty five years of swimming upriver," Complexity and Change, 9 (2000), 68-73.
• During the 1970s, the head of schizophrenia studies at the NIMH, Loren Mosher, conducted an experiment that compared non-drug treatment to drug treatment, and he reported better outcomes for the non-drug patients.
• Mosher LR and Menn AZ. Soteria: An Alternative to Hospitalization for Schizophrenia. In JH Masserman (Ed), Current Psychiatric Therapies, (Vol. XIV). New York: Grune and Stratton, Inc., pp. 287 296, 1974. Menn AZ and Mosher LR.
• The Soteria Project. An Alternative to Hospitalization for Schizophrenics: Some Clinical Aspects. In J Jorstad and E Ugelstad (Eds), Schizophrenia 75. Oslo, Norway: Universitetsforlaget, pp. 347 372, 1976.
• Mosher LR and Menn AZ. Dinosaur or Astronaut? One Year Follow Up Data from the Soteria Project. In M Greenblatt and RD Budson (Eds), "A Symposium: Follow up of Community Care". American Journal of Psychiatry, 133:8, 919 920, 1976.
• Mosher LR and Menn AZ. Lowered Barriers in the Community: The Soteria Model. In LI Stein and MA Test (Eds), Alternatives to Mental Hospital Treatment. New York: Plenum Press, pp. 75 113, 1977.
9. (A) Pavel Muller and Philip Seeman, http://psychrights.org/Research/Digest/Chronicity/dopaminergic.pdf
"Dopaminergic Supersensitivity after Neuroleptics: Time-Course and Specificity", Psychopharmacology 60 (1978), 1-11.
(b) Guy Chouinard, http://psychrights.org/Research/Digest/Chronicity/nids.pdf
"Neuroleptic-induced supersensitivity psychosis," American Journal of Psychiatry, 135 (1978), 1409-1410; Chouinard, http://psychrights.org/Research/Digest/Chronicity/clinicalnis.pdf
"Neuroleptic-induced supersensitivity psychosis: clinical and pharmacologic characteristics," American Journal of Psychiatry, 137 (1980), 16-20.
• Canadian investigators identified the biological changes induced in the brain by neuroleptics that led to the higher relapse rates. Because the drugs dampen down dopamine activity, the brain tries to compensate by becoming "supersensitive" to dopamine. (The drugs trigger an increase in the density of dopamine receptors.) This perturbation in dopamine function makes the patients more biologically prone to psychosis and to worse relapses upon drug withdrawal. Chouinard concluded: "Neuroleptics can produce a dopamine supersensitivity that leads to both dyskinetic and psychotic symptoms. An implication is that the tendency toward psychotic relapse in a patient who has developed such a supersensitivity is determined by more than just the normal course of the illness . . . the need for continued neuroleptic treatment may itself be drug-induced."
10. George Gardos and Jonathan Cole, http://psychrights.org/Research/Digest/Chronicity/cureworse.pdf
"Maintenance Antipsychotic Therapy: Is the Cure Worse than the Disease." American Journal of Psychiatry, 133, January (1976), pager 32-36.
• After discussing the problems with neuroleptics, the authors conclude, "every chronic schizophrenic outpatient maintained on an antipsychotic medication should have the benefit of an adequate trial without drugs."
• Jonathan Cole (former head of the NIMH) stated in the conclusion: "An attempt should be made to determine the feasibility of drug discontinuance in every patient."
Also: Alaska Supreme Court Strikes Down Forced Psychiatric Drugging Procedures (June 30, 2006) http://psychrights.org/States/Alaska/CaseOne.htm
i agree, but also, No regular joe can run for office cause it cost so damb much to campainge, So only the super rich or somebody with strong corporate ties (pretty much the same thing) can become president. And of course when they get into office they have to pay off thier debts to every company that sponsored him. he'll do that buy passing legislator that favors those companies at the expense of the American people(i.e. Enron and the "Clear skies act"). That means the presidents concerns are automaticaly to help big name corp executives instead of the American people. THE RICH GET RICHER AND THE POOR GET POORER.
Issues, Issues, Issues
Name the problem. Name the issue. I bet we can trace the origins to the global focus on and domination of capital. Its seems to be the accepted fact that capital and its funcutions are an everpresent and nessesary baseline for the function of the world. To critisize capital is not to become a totalitarian. Totalitarianism is the destination of our current track. Karl Marx needs to be reconsidered. Unfortunately the atmosphere of intellectual and political dialog treats this exercise as either futile or wrongheaded. I challenge anyone to read the Manifesto of the Communist Party
and find the faults. Make effort to carefully examine and postulate the ramifications of what Marx calls the crisis of "Over-production." Think about what that means in regard to our issues. Lets get rid of band-aid attempts at solutions and treat the disease.