- cross-posted to:
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- cross-posted to:
- [email protected]
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A small, inexpensive item might have averted some of these deaths. Fentanyl testing strips can be used to check for the presence of the synthetic opioid. With an appearance similar to an at-home COVID-19 test, the strips are dipped in water in which a small amount of the drug has been dissolved. A line indicates if fentanyl is present.
But such testing strips are illegal in Texas. They’re considered paraphernalia, and possessing one is a Class C misdemeanor. While the Texas House passed a bill that would have legalized them in 2023, the Senate declined to vote on it.
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In 2023, the Legislature passed a law allowing prosecutors to bring murder charges in fentanyl overdose cases. Critics say this discourages people from reporting emergencies, and research shows such laws harm public health. Some who overdosed in Austin last April had shared drugs, putting survivors at risk of being charged. In 2021, the Legislature passed a good samaritan law ostensibly meant to protect people who call 911 to report an overdose. The law created a defense for people arrested for low-level possession, but it has so many caveats—you can only use it once in your life, it doesn’t apply if you’ve been convicted of a drug-related felony, you can’t use it if you’ve reported another overdose in the last 18 months—that you’d need a flow chart to understand it. Critics say the statute’s of little use.
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Tired of being ruled by smooth-brained, knuckle dragging politicians, yet? Who get kickbacks from special interest groups for enacting these kinds of laws that never work?
So so tired, but there is absolutely no way to change this system, and not willing leave Texas.
There is a way to change it, but it’s only going to happen if we can get enough of the Republican voters to realize they’re just pawns being used by billionaires, like the rest of us.
It will only happen when they start looking up and realize the American Dream was stolen from them decades ago.
I’m not sure if Texas is a democracy; that kind of strategy might work in some other states.
But I think part of the problem in Texas is many here like to pretend it’s a democracy, that votes matter; that participation makes things whole.
It isn’t and it can’t until enough people care, like you said, and they understand democracy has two parts, not just one. People must vote and the vote counts must be public and understood by the people. No computer voting managed by private software companies.