You Have to Be Nuts to See a Shrink
by Larry Pratt
Many Americans recently lamented the six-month anniversary of ObamaCare, a law that is guaranteed to result in tremendous violations of our gun rights.
How do we know that? We know because of what the feds have already been doing with legislation that George Bush signed two years ago.
With the passage of the Veterans Disarmament Act in 2008, Congress granted the Veterans Administration (VA) the authority to computerize the medical records of veterans and ship them to the FBI. Any diagnosis that could be interpreted as "might be a danger to self or others" results in the vet being denied his right to keep and bear arms. People with concealed carry permits are denied renewals. Customers at gun stores are turned down.
In one recent case, a GOA member visited a VA hospital for a couple of days and soon after returning home, state authorities knocked on the door and confiscated his guns.
There is a campaign at the VA to come in and get the "treatment you deserve." TV ads to this effect have been run. Obama has announced new regulations to make it easier for war vets to get help.
WARNING: With help like this you don't need enemies.
There are three questions that you should not answer yes to:
1.       Have you felt stressed?
2.       Have you felt threatened?
3.       Do you feel like doing harm to someone?
Regarding the first question, how stupid is that? Who does not feel stress? Do they think we should live in a cocoon? As to the second question, who doesn't feel threatened – by the pack of socialists that have taken over our country and are working to steal everything we have? And number three – who does not want to harm the juggernaut bearing down on us? Looks like with those questions all of us could be disarmed.
An Arkansas veteran, Wayne Irelan, returned from Iraq with a Purple Heart and Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. Moreover, he recently learned that no good deed goes unpunished when he was stripped of his right to keep and bear arms. It started when his wife took over the family's finances in 2009. The VA began paying Sgt. Irelan a small stipend. All of this to say that the Veterans Administration used this as a basis to define him as mentally incompetent – the very words in an unconstitutional federal gun control law that trigger one's loss of Second Amendment freedoms.
Irelan was notified by the Arkansas State Police that his concealed carry permit was revoked a few days after he attempted to get a gun out of pawn. A few days later still, the BATFE told Irelan that he was not allowed to have any guns and that he would go to jail if they ever found any in his house.
In summary, better than going to the VA, if at all possible, go to a private psychiatrist – or better yet, a pastor or some other person skilled at counseling – and keep yourself off the government books. If ObamaCare is not repealed, ALL doctors will be forced to make their records available to government drones pawing through our private records. Then you will have to find a non-medical counselor if you want to keep your guns.
Senator-to-be John Boozman of Arkansas wants to repeal this abomination. Until then, warn all the vets you know about the risk they run if they deal with a VA psychiatrist.
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Larry Pratt is the Executive Director of Gun Owners of America, a national gun lobby with over 300,000 members. GOA is located at 8001 Forbes Place, Springfield, VA 22151 and at www.gunowners.org on the web. The phone number is (703)321-8585.
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