Mental Health and Prison ovepopulation

This will likely be a pretty short rant, unless I run off on a tangent, which has about a 50/50 probability whenever I begin a conversation. I read a few weeks ago that SC is not going to accept some funds that are generally directed to Mental Health for care and treatment. I don't remember the precise numbers that would be lost by the State Mental Health Commission. When you are spending about 50% of what is needed, any cuts are simply suicide/homicide, we just don't know who the victims are yet. As I have said before, I suffer from depression, anxiety/panic disorder, and obsessive personality disorder. I take meds to help control the symptoms, but I have medical insurance and a wife and family who most don't have for the  support that is absolutely necessary. There are a lot of people out there who suffer from one or all of my problems and receive no treatment or care outside of their school setting and none when they dropout. With no treatment, I don't think I would survive very long and certainly not alone. There are so many folks on the streets who are taking drugs to make the noises go away, committing petty crimes to come up with the money and then they get locked up. All they needed was a combination of probably two drugs that a medicare copay would be less that $25/mo. How much does it cost to incarcerate and is the person we let go because of overcrowding much more of a menace to society.

OK, I knew I would find a tangent and it really fits nicely. If we were to legalize medical marijuana and all other amounts that would be considered for personal use. Our police would have time to police real crime. If I get really out on a limb, do the same with all street drugs. If the product is taxed to both growers and users, imagine how much crime fighting dollars we could use to educate people of the dangers and keep them out of jails that we don't have and creating job opportunities for 12 yr. olds to make $40,000 a year as a drug mule after they drop out of school? Our government spent $15B fighting the drug war last year and arrested somewhere in the neighborhood of 1.7 million people. What we really did was waste a big chunk of $15B and create 1 Million new job opportunities for 12 year olds. We currently incarcerate or parole some 7.5 Million people or about 3.1% of our population. While taking these personal users out of our court system, we could tax transactions - 6-8% on each end when gross dollar exchanges run into the 100's of Billions would certainly help our deficit issue. I know, our congress would find another way to waste it because they somehow think that is their money.

I hope your main takeaway is that mental health, or the lack thereof, needs more than polite attention. About 25% of us suffer from some mental disease and we need to become comfortable discussing the problem face to face and publicly. You know or work with someone who is clinically depressed, bipolar, anxiety challenged, etc...Find a way to help them one-on-one and just lend a non-judgmental ear of support.