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PHILADELPHIA - A city councilman who is the target of a federal investigation sought psychiatric care Thursday after being escorted down from City Hall's observation deck by the police commissioner. Commissioner Sylvester Johnson and Mayor John Street, who was the first to speak with Councilman Rick Mariano near the top of the towering building, would not characterize Mariano as suicidal. "I don't think he had an idea that all of this would result from it," Street said at a news conference following the incident that lasted about two hours. Johnson said Mariano checked himself into Pennsylvania Hospital. A dramatic emergency...

According to the results of a National Institutes of Health (NIH) study, reported in the December issue of the Archives of General Psychiatry (Volume 61), Mexican Americans and non-Hispanic Whites* born in the United States have a higher risk for developing psychiatric disorders than their foreign-born counterparts who have immigrated to the United States. The psychiatric disorders included alcohol and drug use disorders, major depression, dysthymia, mania, hypomania, panic disorder, social and specific phobia, and general anxiety disorder. Based on the 2001-2002 National Epidemiologic Survey on Alcohol and Related Conditions (NESARC), the analysis is the first to consider immigration status...

Concerning those forged memos: What did John Kerry know and when did he know it? There are a few seldom mentioned interesting facts that almost answer that question. The accumulation of "facts" do not speak well for John Kerry and his campaign workers at all. The first interesting tidbit was published in the Sept. 21 edition of the San Francisco Chronicle[1]. The lead paragraph tells the story: "Former Vice President Al Gore's presidential campaign heard but did not pursue allegations about George W. Bush's Air National Guard service, similar to the information in discredited documents aired by CBS News this...

The liberal media see their favored candidate heading towards the dumpsters. Instead of reporting why this is the case, the liberals in the media conspire to ramp up their attack on Bush and any real or perceived Republicans that happen to be handy. Last month they were writing hit-pieces on the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth. That is, the media coordinated an attack on the 254 Swifties and supported the two or three who still back Kerry. Even liberals get an opinion. The problem is, they should not publish that opinion as hard news, which they do. Because, the true...

As News Weekly goes to press, the NZ Labour Government has rushed legislation into Parliament which will effectively legislate for gay marriage, through what are called "civil unions". The bill was tabled in Parliament on June 21, and MPs were expected to vote on it on July 23 or July 24. The bill creates a new form of legal relationship - a registered civil union - that would apply to same-sex relationships and heterosexual couples. Running alongside the Civil Union Bill will be the Relationships (Statutory References) Bill that removes discrimination based on marital status. It amends over 1000 provisions...

Recent findings that gays can go straight radically alters the debate on gay marriage, says David van Gend. The Titanic of Gay Rights, leaving all in its wake, is about to founder on a large and immovable fact. My concern is not for the glamorous first-class passengers - the prominent doctors and judges - or for the Mardi Gras exhibitionists leering and lurching across the deck, but for the unknown homosexuals down in their lonely cabins feeling sick. These are the ones who want to stop the ship and get off. The homosexuals who do not want to be homosexual,...

At Ohio psychiatric centers, workers molested children, denied them food or gave them alcohol and drugs. Some kids suffered broken bones. Others lived in homes so dirty they urinated on the floor by their beds. Taxpayers shell out $160 to $1,000 a day for each mentally ill child who lives in these private treatment centers. But a Cincinnati Enquirer investigation reveals that kids don't always get the help they're promised. Some struggle just to survive. "You have kids secluded, restrained and injured over and over again," says Carolyn Knight, director of the Ohio Legal Rights Service, a state-funded agency that...

<p>Sekou Mims's son was 16 when he experienced a sudden psychotic breakdown. Over three months, the black teenager had a series of delusions - that white police were following him, that white strangers on a train were staring at him menacingly. He'd hyperventilate walking down the street. All his delusions revolved around racism.</p>

Homosexuality no longer a disorder in China By JOE McDONALD, Associated Press BEIJING (March 7, 2001 5:49 p.m. EST http://www.nandotimes.com) - China's psychiatric association is striking homosexuality from its list of mental illnesses in an updated diagnostic manual due out this year. The 8,000-member Chinese Psychiatric Association has concluded that homosexuality is not a perversion, said Dr. Chen Yanfang, the group's vice president. "Many homosexuals lead perfectly normal lives," he said Wednesday. The step adds to growing tolerance of gays and lesbians in China, where an underground culture of gay bars, Web sites and sports clubs is flourishing. Homosexuals...