(AP Photo/Steven Senne)

There are scoundrels in the world.  And then there are “Blue State” politicians who would steal from the poor to give to the rich, “anti-violence” grifters. Case in point: Seven states including California, Illinois and New York are stealing benefit money from the poor and disabled to fund dubious, unproven so-called “anti-violence” programs.

Frankly, in many of these states, “woke” soft-on-crime policies like “No Cash Bail,” defunding the police, gun control schemes and other misguided criminal justice “reforms” have given these deep blue states their rampant violent crime. If the statist do-gooders running these violence-ridden cesspools would simply hold criminals accountable and allow the little people the right to self-defense with firearms, the crime problem would solve itself in short order.

Governing.com has the very fetid details:

States Begin Tapping Medicaid Dollars to Combat Gun Violence

The subhead says it all:

So far, seven states have passed laws approving the use of Medicaid funds to pay for community-based programs intended to stop shootings. But unlocking the funds is complicated and it’s unclear how much money will actually be diverted.

Here’s the story:

To tackle America’s gun problem, a growing number of states are using Medicaid dollars to pay for community-based programs intended to stop shootings. The idea is to boost resources for violence prevention programs, which have been overwhelmed in some cities by a spike in violent crime since the start of the covid-19 pandemic.

An infusion of reliable federal funding, advocates say, could allow these nonprofits to expand their reach to more residents most at risk of being shot — or of shooting someone.

So far, California, Colorado, Connecticut, Illinois, Maryland, New York and Oregon have passed laws approving the use of Medicaid money for gun violence prevention, said Kyle Fischer, policy and advocacy director for The Health Alliance for Violence Intervention, which has lobbied for the federal and state Medicaid policy changes allowing this spending. More states are expected to follow.

“These are concrete things that we can do that avoid the debates around the Second Amendment,” Fischer said.

In a nation where we have no shortage of poor folks who need medical care, including homeless veterans who served their country honorably, only the morally bankrupt scumbags running Biden Administration behind the scenes would allow monies earmarked to help the poor and the disabled to be stolen to give to so-called “anti-violence” programs.  And when our dementia-like President needs to be rescued by the Easter Bunny, he clearly isn’t running the show.

Even Vox, hardly a bastion of conservative thought, has publicized the dubious records of these anti-violence programs not living up to the hype:

But studies on interrupters have been largely disappointing. Reviews of the evidence have found that the approach often produces no significant effect on shootings and murders, and some programs were even associated with more violence. While some studies have found positive effects, they are few and far between and suffer from methodological flaws. Taken together, the research is decidedly mixed — and offers little proof that the programs live up to their promise.

The research on interrupters “is mixed, incomplete, and very difficult to do,” Jeffrey Butts, a researcher at John Jay College of Criminal Justice who has studied violence interrupters, told me…

A 2015 review of the research, published in the Annual Reviews of Public Health, analyzed the results of interrupter programs across several American cities. None of the five studies included produced fully positive results, such as reductions in gun violence or murders. One program in Pittsburgh fared so poorly that it was linked to “an increase in rates of monthly aggravated assaults and gun assaults” in some neighborhoods.

There you have it. Pittburgh’s “anti-violence” program showed an increase in assaults.

Now that’s a ringing endorsement if there ever was such a thing. (PS: That’s sarcasm.)

 

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56 COMMENTS

  1. From one useless socialist project to another useless socialist project. Taxpayer wealth that the gov’t shouldn’t be stealing from the taxpayer.

    • neiowa,

      The biggest mistake Americans EVER made was ratifying the 16th Amendment. That one, MAJOR Bozo no-no put is in thrall to our “benevolent” government . . . unless and until we can get it repealed.

    • Dennis,

      Mark Twain taught us to ‘eschew surplusage’ in writing. You could have deleted the words “to fund ‘special projects’, and that would have conveyed the message, in fewer words (and arguably more accurately).

  4. That’s what Democrats do – spend other people’s money on frivolous nonsense. That’s why we have so much welfare. We pay people to not work, then import workers from all over the world to support our lazy citizens. It’s only a slightly new twist that the Dems will steal money from our own retired workers and the disabled.

    • It’s a way of life in ILLANNOY. And lately the corpulent govner(and da mayor of Chiraq) has whined about Texas sending south of the border & who knows whut illegal aliens to Ill. Dims made Ill a “sanctuary” state. On the citizen’s dime. Do you suppose those illegals work for a bit less than minimum wage??? Meanwhile there’s been quite a pushback. From dims. They’ll likely still vote dim no matter whut🙄

      • Of course they will, however it will be a cash only deal and not taxed.
        I ain’t to smart but if my income depended on your taxes I’d make certain you were paying taxes.
        Oh wait, .givs income doesn’t depend on Americas taxes, it just borrows more money from Japan or China when it wants a raise.

      • Democrats say we have to have an endless supply of illegals to do our dirty work like good little peasants. They’re also needed to drive up the cost of housing, education, and healthcare, raise our GDP, and keep the federal pyramid scheme going for a few more years until the people who ruined our country are dead and gone.

  5. The “red communist” states. I refuse to call them blue states. Just because the New York Times did this “color change”, they started this back when obama was elected.

    “Real socialism hasn’t been tried yet”
    Real communism hasn’t been tried yet.”

    Well they certainly are trying in all these red communist states.

    California was once a solid republican state. Unfortunately the legal alien onslaught invasion changed that. It worked in california. So now the federal government is allowing hundreds of thousands to just come in here.

    The open borders crowd, libertarian and conservative, are never going to have a small size federal government.

    • So what was the former USSR doing from 1920 to 1990? If that was an experiment it certainly failed. Much like how China is facing economic and demographic collapse. Rev0lutionaries t
      do not make good managers or economists.

      • They know they’re the perfect ones who have “the secret formula” to make s0ci@lism work.

        • Last post put into moderation. Trying again as there was no profanity or overt p0lit-ics.

          While they have someone e-l-s-e-’s money to spend, or property to loot, errr, redistribute.

      • Southern,

        “That wasn’t REAL socialism/communism!”, amirite?? We just need to do it harder, and with more taxpayer money, and it will work. Just ask MajorLiar or dacian the demented.

  6. Same old same old. The more money in play, the more to skim, scam, squander, launder and pocket, buy votes of the free-shit addicted useful idiot, Government Plantation Dwellers.

      • possum,

        Do you REALLY think Debbie One-Note ever thinks further than the end of her nose???? That’s so cute!!

  10. The real reason is to divert taxpayer dollars to family and cronies, those high six figure salaries are quite a plumb for the well connected.

  11. quite a few of these fine young felons are getting caught on and off the job, some hired despite murder convictions.
    cwb for local to me examples.

  12. The fact is that NONE of these “programs” stop violence. There is NO WAY you can prevent a person who is either a criminal ors mentally ill from doing violent acts. The solution lies in proactive enforcement of the criminal law and reinstituting the State Mental Hospital system that the Leftists discarded in the ’70’s and ’80’s.

    • The purpose of such programs likely has nothing to do with stopping violence so much as moving funds around to the “right people” and making a “do something” checkbox for the talking points. Or you know a solid 1/3 of the spending we do in NY through various grants, programs, initiatives, and other forms of local aid packages.

    • At this point it just might be time for what Julie Haggerty suggested in Airplane.
      Sane Assalums.
      Put the well adjusted behind walls and let the nuts run loose.

  13. Wasn’t there a TTAG article a month or two ago saying violence interrupters were a proven tool to reduce violence?

    Everyone knows the spending is all Republicans fault. They so callously send their unwanted border jumpers to cities and state that claim to welcome them thereby forcing those cities and states to ignore their own local populations and instead house and feed the border jumpers.

    See, all Republicans fault. If they would just put up with the problems the Democrats caused there’d be no issue. Expecting Democrats to handle their own shit or change their own policies that hurt themselves is racist.

    More busses. Give the sanctuaries all they want and more.

  14. Do these people really believe what they believe? When you talk to all the felons, thugs, mentally ill people and tell them it’s not nice to play with guns, and mess with innocent people, especially those evil AR/assault rifles as they call them, let me know what they say, and what happens. Give me a break!

    • The Second Amendment to the Constitution of The United States was written so that We The People have a right to assualt weapons.
      We have let .giv tell us what we can and cannot have.
      Enforced by the BATFE, who don’t mind shuting kids to enforce THE LAW.

  15. “These are concrete things that we can do that avoid the debates around the Second Amendment,” 

    huh?

    just stop trying to be tyrants and leave it alone instead of spending the, collectively for all of you, spending the $17.6 billion every year trying to take the right away from law abiding people in your states.

    • Thankfully TTAG is preparing us for the future.
      Now if TTAG can just figure out how to keep me from wrong think.
      .
      President Biden is the Greatest President America has or ever will have.
      President Biden is the Greatest President America has or ever will have.
      President Biden is the Greatest President America has or ever will have.
      ,,,, ,,,,, its working. Yay

      • My most recent post just completely disappeared like a CIA black OP. Never happened or existed.

        • And 2nd attempt also disappeared. Double-you, tea, eff is going on here. No profanity or p0litics were mentioned (except for a reference to the novel 1984).

        • Southern,

          Frankly, “whiskey, tango, foxtrot” is pretty obvious to any but the most casual observer. The Lyin’ Hawaiian came right out and said the quiet part out loud – he could have done so much for for America, if only we didn’t have that pesky Constitution in the way (which all THREE branches of government ignore, on the daily).

          They believe “they” are the smart ones, and “we” would all be better off if we just went home, shut up, and watched the boob tube. Any who were paying attention just saw Anthony Fauxi, the infamous COVID elf, admit that there was NO science behind the ‘social distancing’ rules, or the mask mandates.

          WUT????? Mr. “I AM science” admitted that he flat-out LIED to the American people??? Why, yes. Yes he did. But it was OK, because he was pursuing a higher goal – the ultimate subjugation of the American people to the “smart people in D.C.”. And only someone who has experience of those “smart people in D.C.” can truly realize how completely idiotic that premise is.

          But drones like Tony Fauxi, and Senile Joe, and Chuck Schemer (I could go on) are convinced that THEY are in charge . . . and they are too stupid to realize they ain’t in charge of jack diddly squat. Their strings are being pulled, but them being brainless marionettes, they don’t even know it.

          Trust me, you don’t even know that names of the people who really pull the strings. I do find it amusing as hell that absolute ciphers, like Xiao Bai-den, Tony the COVID Elf, et. al. THINK that they are in charge of their own bowel movements.

          Heinlein said it (through the mouth of one of his characters, of course), “The average slob is terrified of freedom.” Freedom requires two things that scare the bejesus out of most people, (i) accepting responsibility for your own actions and the outcome thereof, and (ii) being willing to accept the responsibility of actually doing your own thinking, and making your own decisions (see point #1). The average bloke would soil his drawers at the very idea.

        • Southern,

          As you know, I’ve been b*tching about the “moderation” policy on TTAG for ages. And EVERYTHING the editors and moderators say about their “policy” is a lie. It ISN’T an “algorithm”, it ISN’T ‘viewpoint neutral’, and it never was (at least since I’ve been here), but it is demonstrably getting worse.

          If the trend continues, I am sure there are other fora that would suit me. The ‘moderation’ policy is just one of the many things that suck about this site. Wasn’t here during the original owner’s regime (wish I had been), but it has been going downhill since I got here (and I suspect Dan’s leaving is another ‘sign of the Apocalypse’).

          They need me more than I need them. I am already in the process of researching other sites, and when I find one I like, TTAG is cordially invited to osculate my anal orifice.

  17. Always a “program” never a result; these “programs”, “stimulus” and “”investments” provide employment for sokialist-democrats and funds to launder as campaign contributions and nothing else.

  19. Actually, they are stealing tax dollars intended for ‘ALL’ citizens. Paid by those citizens. To feed, house, cloth and provide healthcare. For millions of illegal aliens.

  20. [the government] steal[s] from the poor to give to the rich
    Also see…
    -illegal immigration
    -legal immigration
    -Bidenflation
    -Exporting industry
    -Every modern “crisis”
    -The Puppet & Co’s completely unnecessary multi-trillion $ spending planS with imminent inflation, which they lied about, abetted by the federal reserve!
    -unnecessary provoking, extending, and funding of foreign wars

  21. To condemn these programs which are still new is the height of hypocrisy from the Far Right. Some programs in California previously funded privately have been a success.”

    “While the pandemic has receded, gun violence has surged in some cities. Gun ownership is at a historic high in the United States, which is estimated to have more guns than people. Programs that worked a few years ago in places like Oakland, Calif. — which had won acclaim for slashing its gun violence — can’t keep up.

    Gun violence also brings a hefty price tag. Studies from the Government Accountability Office and Harvard Medical School have shown that the cost of caring for gunshot survivors ranges from $1 billion in initial treatments to $2.5 billion over 12 months. And it’s not only gunshot victims who need medical help.

    “The patients that we see, there’s a lot of grief. Parents losing their children, grandparents losing their grandchildren. That impacts people’s health tremendously,” said Noha Aboelata, founding CEO of Roots Community Health Center in Oakland. “Entire neighborhoods have ongoing stress and trauma.”
    https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2023/12/12/gun-violence-is-plague-could-medicaid-help/

    • dacian, the DUNDERHEAD. Oh, please. These “new programs” are nothing but repackaged same old sh*t. Again, you use a disreputable source to back your “claim.” You have no shame at all.
      Your studies, as usual, start out with predetermined conclusions(confusions) and then go about proving said “conclusions” with cherry picked stats. “Gun shot survivors?” They are 99.99999% of the time survivors of criminal attacks by criminals who should have been never in possession of a firearm.
      Like everyone else, I feel for people who have lost loved ones for various causes gun shots included. Their care is of course important. But I fine your again, using antigun advocates to back up your opinion with their opinion. Kind of like the blind leading the blind.

  22. To condemn these programs which are still new is the height of hypocrisy from the Far Right. Some programs in California previously funded privately have been a success.”

    “While the pandemic has receded, gun violence has surged in some cities. Gun ownership is at a historic high in the United States, which is estimated to have more guns than people. Programs that worked a few years ago in places like Oakland, Calif. — which had won acclaim for slashing its gun violence — can’t keep up.

    Gun violence also brings a hefty price tag. Studies from the Government Accountability Office and Harvard Medical School have shown that the cost of caring for gunshot survivors ranges from $1 billion in initial treatments to $2.5 billion over 12 months. And it’s not only gunshot victims who need medical help.

    “The patients that we see, there’s a lot of grief. Parents losing their children, grandparents losing their grandchildren. That impacts people’s health tremendously,” said Noha Aboelata, founding CEO of Roots Community Health Center in Oakland. “Entire neighborhoods have ongoing stress and trauma.” bb
    https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2023/12/12/gun-violence-is-plague-could-medicaid-help/

    • dacian, the DUNDERHEAD. Actually condemning these stupid programs is using your head for something other than a hat rack. Can you point to one single life that was saved by your hoplophobic ideas?
      And for some reason you still cling to the idea that a gun can be violent? Pray tell, how so? Last I heard a gun is still an inanimate object? Can you tell me how an inanimate object can be “violent”?
      Your quotes are grandstanding and ludicrous. You hoplophobes claim that because people own guns that parents and grandparents will be losing their children? (Psst! the Washington Post as your source? JBOL!)
      Wouldn’t it be better to deal with the real problem? Criminals and the mentally ill? Or is that too simplistic for you? they say insanity is doing the same thing over and over, expecting a different result. Actually, it’s not just insane but down right stupid.

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