Friend in CT who worked in mental health

[ErikJ]

This guy is an old Republican long-hair hippie type who I do business with. (Never understood conservative long-hairs.)

I asked him about the shooting which is 50 miles from him and he blamed the current mental health system. He said he worked on a mental health institution 35 years ago in CT for 5 years where the patients actually worked doing things to keep their minds occupied, gardening, cleaning etc.

CT had 20,000 people in the mental health institiuions like this. Now they only have 300 people. The problem was that activists claimed they werent making minimum wage and so the whole thing fell apart and home care became the standard, probably thanks to the Reagan cutbacks. I told him they have drugs now so they dont need the institutions that much and he said, "yeah, if they take them."