Vet. Adm. putting veterans with PTSD and physical injuries denied firearms list

[tennmike]

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/1...n_2230786.html

WASHINGTON -- Should veterans deemed too mentally incompetent to handle their own financial affairs be prevented from buying a gun?

The issue, for a time last week, threatened to become the biggest sticking point in a $631 billion defense bill for reshaping a military that is disengaging from a decade of warfare.

Sen. Tom Coburn, R-Okla., sought to amend the bill to stop the Veterans Affairs Department from putting the names of veterans deemed too mentally incompetent to handle their finances into the National Instant Criminal Background Check System, which prohibits them from buying or owning firearms.

Sen. Charles Schumer, D-N.Y., objected, saying the measure would make it easier for veterans with mental illness to own a gun, endangering themselves and others.

"I love our veterans, I vote for them all the time. They defend us," Schumer said. "If you are a veteran or not and you have been judged to be mentally infirm, you should not have a gun."

Currently, the VA appoints fiduciaries, often family members, to manage the pensions and disability benefits of veterans who are declared incompetent. When that happens, the department automatically enters the veteran's name in the Criminal Background Check System.

This from a so called Congress so incompetent that they have spent us over 16 trillion dollars in debt. Who is incompetent to handle financial affairs?

http://gopthedailydose.com/2013/02/2...ns-gun-rights/

The letter states that the Department of Veterans Affairs has “received” information about the veteran that “because of your disabilities you may need help in handling your Department of Affairs (VA) benefits.”

However, it provides no details other that the information was “a report from Portland VA Medical Center.”

“The evidence indicates that you are not able to handle your VA benefit payments because of a physical or mental condition,” the letter warns. “We propose to rate you incompetent for VA purposes. This means we must decide if you are able to handle your VA benefit payments. We will base our decision on all the evidence we already have including any other evidence you sent to us.”

Completion of the incompetency determination means that a “fiduciary” would be appointed to manage the veteran’s payments.

The VA also warns: “A determination of incompetency will prohibit you from purchasing, possessing, receiving, or transporting a firearm or ammunition. If you knowingly violate any of these prohibitions, you may be fined, imprisoned, or both.”


Bureaucrats deciding who is and is not mentally incompetent. No hearing with actual medical exam by people capable of making such a determination? Just some clueless government prefect making the determination? This country is on a rocket sled to hell!

I apologize for the lack of several MSM sources; I can't provide sources from them if they refuse to report on it.

[Buford]

This is a tough argument. How can you let someone have a gun when they are deemed incompetent?

Should veterans deemed too mentally incompetent to handle their own financial affairs be prevented from buying a gun?

[Teach]

This is a tough argument. How can you let someone have a gun when they are deemed incompetent?

I deem you incompetent- - - - -send me all your guns for safekeeping. I promise I'll take good care of them. I'm at least as qualified to make that decision as some Washington bureraucrat, probably more so since I've observed how unstable you are from years of forum posts!

Jerry

[horselips]

Given the ease with which one may lose his civil rights, anybody seeking treatment for a mental health issue ought to have his head examined.

[NN]

I deem you incompetent- - - - -send me all your guns for safekeeping. I promise I'll take good care of them. I'm at least as qualified to make that decision as some Washington bureraucrat, probably more so since I've observed how unstable you are from years of forum posts!

Jerry

Forum post, what about his voting record?

[alphasigmookie]

This is all a very tricky situation with no easy answers. There is a serious push to improve the background check system to prevent crazy people from being able to buy guns. The goal is a good one, but the implementation is full of traps. Who gets to determine who is too crazy or dangerous to have a gun, especially if the person has never committed a serious crime (which would disqualify them anyway). Is there a process in place to challenge and reverse a ruling if someone makes a mistake? How do you ensure that people who need mental health services can seek them without fear of their rights being taken away? What about the fact that in most of the mass shooting cases there are big red flags about the shooter prior to the incident, but there's currently no way to account for these kinds of things.

The clear lines that are easy to draw are felony convictions, people who have had restraining orders issued against them, and people who have been involuntarily committed to a mental institution or deemed incompetent or otherwise in a court of law. Unfortunately that leaves out a lot of people who have not (or at least not been caught) but will commit a crime or are bat guano crazy but no one has officially diagnosed as legal purchasers. I lean on the side of lax rules to minimize trampling of liberty even if it makes it easier for criminals and crazy people getting guns, but given that it seems a lot of people are going to demand that something be done, what can be done that will be at all effective while minimizing the effect on law abiding gun owners?

PS BTW the article you linked to seems to indicate that the current practice is to place vets who have been deemed incompetent on the denied persons list, the change appears to be an attempt to stop this practice.

[Buford]

Forum post, what about his voting record?

What's you talking about Willis?

[NN]

What's you talking about Willis?

A+13 voted for obama twice.