[Tom Servo]

You know what I'd like to see? Laws and/or executive orders giving more money and support to our mental hospitals, rehab centers, and outpatient facilities. I'd like to see rehab and mental health counseling treated the same as other medical issues by insurance carriers and employers.

In other words, I'd like to have the conversation on mental health we were promised before they derailed it with futile and divisive attempts at gun regulation.

We treat mental illness by stigmatizing it, punishing it, or doping it. It's a very 18th-century way of going about things, and it does us no credit as a modern society.

The thing is, this wouldn't be a nasty knock-down drag-out fight in the legislature, and it wouldn't be hard to make these changes. We don't need to violate HIPAA or deny rights to people; we need to encourage them to get treatment before things get bad.

Would it prevent every Cho/Holmes/Lanza? Probably not. But I'll take a page from the antis' playbook and suggest that it's worth doing if it saves a few lives.