I've written about child support before but I thought it deserved a revisit since I've recently learned a few new things about the system that makes me loathe it even more. I think the very idea of a State enforced child support system to be an outrageous abuse of power and intrusion by the state into people's private lives thereby making private life choices, matters of the State. Of course, whenever you talk about children to Americans, our minds open up in an unnatural way because culturally, it is seen as reprehensible to hold any position that could be painted in as detrimental to children. Fuck that! The child support system is immoral, unethical and should be illegal in spite of the fact that it supposedly ensures that some custodial parents have more income with which to raise their children.
First of all, if you decide to make a child with a dead beat who doesn't want to take care of it, that's not a problem that the State should be concerned with fixing. You should make better choices about who you make children with and you would if you didn't have the State providing a financial guarantee that if you make a bad choice, you'll be compensated for it. Historically, Americans weren't so quick to procreate because they knew that they could be stuck living with the consequences if their mate turned out to be a bad choice. There used to be so many hurdles a one had to jump before being deemed worthy of consideration for that level of intimacy. Americans used to date in search of a spouse and life partner as most others cultures do. Americans now date to find suitable sex partners with whom they might spend an extended period of time with before moving on to the next. Some do still marry for life but life is no longer considered "natural life" but rather, the time it takes to raise the children. Many modern marriages don't make it far passed the raising of the children.
Okay, so we all get the supposed logic behind the child support system which is that children are suffering because mothers and fathers aren't staying together to raise them and therefore the child has to live a lifestyle based on the income of the one parent who has custody rather than the two parents who made them. Personally, I think that's as it should be. If your relationship doesn't last and you want full primary custody, you should be fully and primarily financially responsible. If you don't want full financial responsibility then you should agree to joint custody. In fact, if the State is going to be involved with these matters, joint custody should be their default position unless the parents agree to something otherwise. The State also holds the position that many welfare parents receive welfare because the non-custodial parents of their children aren't contributing to the raising of the kids. Thus it supposedly decreases the burden on the State/tax payers if non-custodial parents are forced to be financially responsible for their children. That's bullshit!
The State still issues the same welfare it always has, child support or no child support. The only difference is that it forces the non-custodial parent to repay it. Explain to me how the fuck that's fair? Two people have a child, they are both supposedly responsible but only one has to repay the welfare the child receives. As a matter of fact, why does anyone have to repay the State for welfare, the government isn't pulling money out of thin air to pay the welfare rolls. That money comes out of our taxes - including the taxes of the person being forced to repay welfare. So if I paid the State the money to pay my child welfare, why do I have to pay the repay the State that same money? If I am repaying the State that money, why isn't coming back to me, the person who gave it to the State in the first place? It's an unethical money grab by the State is the bottom line.
Bye the way, there are some dead beat parents out there. So what? Why has being a dead beat parent become a crime? It's an over-reach of the authority of the State, an abuse of power and a waste of criminal justice resources to make criminals of people who simply aren't good parents. It is felonious to not pay child support these days. The State thinks it has the right to force people to be "financial parents" or incarcerate them for not doing so but at the same time, they allow parents to legally dump children at fire stations, hospitals and police departments if they no longer want to be parents and make no financial demands on those people - nor do they suffer any criminal or social stigma. A person can give up custody via adoption or surrendering their child voluntarily to the state without any financial or criminal liability. Why is it that the State sees such a difference with couples who simply don't work out? Why the heavy-handedness in these situations but not in any of the the others previously exampled?
Let's, for argument's sake, say that we all agree that there should be a State sponsored child support system. Okay, fine. Even if you believe that there should be one, do you think that the structure of this one is sound? Let's look at the current philosophy and structure. The philosophy of the current system is that the children of broken families should enjoy the same financial lifestyle that they would if the parents had stayed together since the separation can't be the child's responsibility. Secondly, the parents are intended to be equally responsible financially accept for in case where one parent earns substantially more than the other, in which case the financial responsibilities are respectively proportional. So a math formula is employed to determine what would be the financial contribution to the child's financial needs by each parents if the parents had stayed together and then the non-custodial parent is required to pay their portion of that to the custodial parent. So far it doesn't sound too malicious, does it?
Here's where it starts to fall apart: if the non-custodial parent loses their job, they are still responsible for paying child support. Remember, the system is supposedly structured so that the child enjoys the "same" financial lifestyle it would if the parents had stayed together and the fact is that if the parents had stayed together and one of them lost their job, the child's financial lifestyle would suffer as a result. The child, and the family as a whole for that matter, would probably miss some meals and perhaps even lose some utilities. Some families have to downsize the size of their homes, sell vehicles, give up extracurricular activities, etc. Why is the non-custodial parent racking up a financial debt when their financial circumstances change? Even worse, if fortune doesn't find the out of work parent fast enough, a warrant is issued for their arrest and they can be criminalized for their misfortune. That's not where it ends for the non-custodial parent you see, even in jail the child support bill still ensues. The non-custodial parent can be convicted of the crime of not paying child support, serve their time and still be held responsible. Isn't that double jeopardy?
Now here's some more insult to the injury of child support that's inflicted on the non-custodial parent. This, I only recently discovered myself, as I approached the end of the child support order against me. As you know, child support doesn't automatically end when the child is no longer a child at the age of eighteen if they attend college. In addition to being forced to pay for medical insurance for the child, the non-custodial parent has to pay child support for four additional years - until the child is eighteen - at a time when the custodial parent might have no financial burden at all, especially if the child attends school out of State. That's not the insult I was referring to however. What I was referring to is the fact that if the custodial parent evicts the child before the child no longer qualifies for child support, the non-custodial child still has to pay child support unless they pay the court to cancel the order (the custodial parent at no point has to pay anything to receive child support). If the custodial parent moves without notifying the non-custodial parent (which is a violation of the law and what happened in my case) the State will not stop the child support unless the non-custodial parent can track the custodial parent down and provide the State with the new address even though the State knows exactly where the person is because they have to have the current address to send the checks out.
So even if the custodial parent violates the State's child support law and has evicted the child and no longer has the right to receive child support, the State still refuses to assist the non-custodial parent. This is true even if the child moves in with the non-custodial parent thereby making them the custodial parent. The fact is that the system isn't established to help the child but rather to punish the non-custodial parent. Everything the State does is done to make it difficult on the non-custodial parent, even at the expense of the child.
The fact is that people have to pay a price for bad decisions and that's how we learn to not make them. That's reason one for there not to be a State sponsored child support system. Also, I have more faith in people. I don't believe the State needs to intervene in these matters. I think enough people have a conscience and therefore would be compelled by it to do the right thing if given the chance. There are also natural social pressures and stigmas that would be associated with being a dead beat parent if nature were allowed to take its course. Finally, it's obvious that the State is only involved in these matters for a money grab a chance for a little social engineering via the carrot and stick of child support.
What do you think? Is this a sensible, ethical and necessary system?
Showing posts with label Child Support. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Child Support. Show all posts
Wednesday, June 11, 2014
Sunday, April 26, 2009
Gripe of the Day: Laws that protect Me from, Me
While I am aware that our political system is corrupt, politicians are purchased & lobbyists are our actual law-makers, it disturbs me to realize that those lofty and grandiose documents such as the Constitution or the Bill of Rights, have lost the fight against capitalism. Once you commit to living the doctrines of capitalism, it's as if you swallow a pill that displaces your ability to sense when you have eaten your fill. In other words, you become greedy - "enough" will never be enough. It is because of the insatiable appetite that our politicians can't turn down a dollar - they'll sell the halls of Congress for the right price. There are many laws that pass through the halls of Congress that have the taint of all kinds of 'isms on them but it is the laws against the people's right to be wrong that get under my skin the most.
We are supposed to have the right, in this country, to do wrong or be bad people, especially when the wrong that is done, directly affects the offender only. We have a law enforcement structure in this country that's supposed to issue the consequences to those who offend others. The legal system is now being used to prosecute people for harming their selves. That's ridiculous!
Here are a few things the government now governs that it shouldn't:
1 - Child Support
2 - Car Insurance
3 - Seat-belt/Helmet Laws
4 - Natural Resources
5 - Marriage
CHILD SUPPORT
Why is the government involving itself in the personal lives of people to such an extent that it's deciding how much money a child is worth? First off, it takes two people to make a child so if you want to penalize a father for having an unplanned child, where's the penalty for the mother who made the same decision? Are we saying that her penalty is that she's usually the person stuck with this undesired offspring? Are we saying that raising a child is a bad thing? But then, the system also ensures that the father is involved in the raising of the child so does that mean he's punished twice? For those of you who aren't familiar with financial concept of the child support system, allow me to explain. The system says that there are two parents and these two parents earn, collectively, whatever amount of money. Based on their formula, a particular percentage of that collective income would go towards the raising of the child. This figure supposedly accounts for average food, clothes, housing, etc., costs for the raising of a child who grows up in a household within a particular income bracket. The system then says, if the family breaks up, the child should continue to receive the same financial benefits it would have received if both parents were still together. Thus; the non-custodial parent has to pay their portion in the form of child support to the custodial parent. The justification for this system is that too many children are been born to people who don't want them and therefore, don't take care of them once they arrive so to protect society-at-large from having to pay the cost for these bastard children, the system was established to make the irresponsible pay for their own bastards.
Issue one with the system is it does nothing to discourage or eliminate what it perceives as a problem. In fact; the very existence of the system offers incentive for irresponsible women to get pregnant because it's a guaranteed pay-day. Child support is nothing but an attempt to replace welfare. This is made clear with issue two which is that the father or non-custodial parent is required to repay if full, any public assistance the mother might have received for the care of the child including food stamps. Now, if this was about equity, wouldn't both parents be held responsible for repaying an equal share. Then there is the criminalization of the father or non-custodial parent if that parent can't, for lack of a job, pay the child support. If you lose your job and get more than two or three months behind on paying child support, a warrant is issued for your arrest and you can be sentenced to jail time. Correct me if I'm wrong but, if you are married and you lose your job, doesn't the entire family suffer? I don't know of anyone who has to go on the lamb because they lost their job and now must fear the police kicking down the door because their kids can no longer eat steaks for dinner. If you pay child support, this is your unfortunate circumstance. This leads me to my final issue with the system which is that when the non-custodial parent is out of work and unable to pay support, they accrue a passed due amount. That's insane! If I lost my job and my family had to go from steaks to roman noodles, from the suburbs to the projects, there would be a problem if my child came up to me with a bill notifying my that I owe them for the steaks they didn't get to eat. Why the hell is their a bill accruing! When a family loses an income, the family has to change the standard of living they are accustomed to. Sometimes that means that there is only one income where there used to be two. Sometimes that means that there might not be an income at all. According to the system, if you lose your job, the child's standard of living shouldn't change simply because you're out of the house as opposed to in the house. The thing is, there is no just way to have a system that runs this aspect of people's lives. Get out of people's personal business!!!
CAR INSURANCE
Anyone who doesn't know that the mandatory insurance laws were written by the insurance industry lobbyist and passed by the politicians they bought, just isn't paying attention. These laws were fairly easy to pass because they generated income for municipals through traffic citations. The fact of the matter is that this is another case of the government attempting to regulate, legislate and adjudicate morality. I remember the 1980's and before, it was a time before these mandatory insurance laws, life wasn't as hard, people could stretch a dollar further, the working poor (who ofter get falsely counted as middle-classed) as well as the middle class, were more content. Most people, who could afford it, purchased insurance all on their own without government meddling. Insurance was far more affordable. I remember buying my first car when I was a teenager working a minimum wage job and paying bills at home - I could afford car insurance. I remember clearly the time the law took affect because almost overnight I could no longer afford insurance. The reality is that most people can't afford the new cost of insurance. Tons of crappy temporary auto insurance companies sprung up over night to provide ways for people to maintain their right to drive. They achieve this by issuing bogus insurance cards that everybody knows are only purchased to meet the requirement but doesn't provide any real protection for anyone. In other words, can can't make mandates on people's money, if they don't have it, without breeding more corruption. If you're going to pass a law on the citizens, you should first have a reasonable expectation that the citizens have the means to abide by the law. When you have a country filled with urban ghettos and semi-middle-classed people living pay check to pay check, how is it reasonable that they can afford to abide by a law that tells where to spend their money? The only expectation I have is that people are forced to become more and more corrupt themselves in order that they survive.
The justification for the mandatory insurance laws was that the public has to pay the cost for people injured by uninsured drivers because the hospitals have to jack up the costs of care on everybody to cover the losses incurred from treating people without a means to pay. The mandatory insurance laws were supposed to insure that those costs were provided for and therefore, not transferred to the greater society. That is a bogus and over simplified argument. These laws have been in place for more than 20 years now - have health care costs been impacted at all by these laws? The answer is a resounding, no! That's because the whole premise was faulty. If they were truly interested in insuring that every motorist had insurance, they would have began by insuring that every motorist could actually afford insurance. Either they should have calculated the average cost of living in this country and juxtaposed that to the average income to arrive at a proper minimum wage or a proper price for insurance; or they should have provided an income level within the law that determines at what point the law kicks in. In other words, if you are one of the working poor, the law does not affect you but when/if this country provides you to opportunity to prosper and rise out of your plight, then you are held responsible for these additional costs. There are a million other approaches to mandating auto-insurance that are conceivably more fair but as we know, these laws weren't about public safety - they were a result of backroom deals.
SEAT-BELT/HELMET LAWS
Seat-belt and Helmet laws are an easy example of government intrusion on your freedom to move unrestricted. A seat belt law is as ridiculous as the suicide law. If I don't care to protect myself against the dangers in the world, I get what I get. That's the way it should be at least. The government seems to think that it is their business whether or not I protect myself against injury in a car accident. Their reasoning, once again, you guessed it: the cost of health care. Once again, this is a faulty argument and proof is in the pudding. The cost of health care has escalated in spite of these intrusive laws. What's the penalty for not wearing a seat-belt or helmet? They want money - of course! It always gets back to the dollar.
It bothers me that the government is able to pass so much crap on us using the same old wrong argument because enough people believe what they're saying is true, in spite of real evidence. It bothers me that so many people are so bothered by the idea of helping people less fortunate, that they'd rather surrender their freedoms. What happened to the breed of American that didn't depend on the government to fix everything they had a problem with? What happened to that breed of American that would have rolled up their sleeves and said, I'm not paying for other people's ignorance but point me in their direction so that I can help them to have what they need to live without being a burden on everybody else. Remember the "Little House on the Prairie" TV show? If a person's house was destroyed in a storm, the community came together and rebuilt it, they didn't depend on an insurance company to take care of it thereby jacking up the cost of everybody else' insurance. People didn't resort to those lengths until absolutely necessary. Contrary to what some people are brought up to believe about other people in our society, no one wants to be a burden on others. No one wants to not have everything they need to live happily. No one is content with misery. Again, another money-grab by politicians and corporations. At some point they are going to have to realize that the juice was drained from this fruit a long time ago. Their greed is so enormous that they've been settling for robbing you on paper - having no actual substance to back it. This recent economic collapse should have informed the politicians and the corporate leaders that they have eaten everything on the plate and are no longer eaten a meal, but the plate itself. In their blind lust for monetary gains, they realize nothing. They are pointing fingers everywhere but at the truth and the saddest thing about it all is that they might be truly convinced that they are right. Do you know that in the middle of this economic collapse, we had energy companies petitioning the government for rate hikes! That's just a total detachment from reality. The fields are barren, the field hands are starving and corporate America is demanding that the field hands provide more potatoes!
NATURAL RESOURCES
There used to be a time in this country when we were all free to dream, explore and experiment. It was this freedom that advanced this country time and time again. Most major advancements in this country were made by regular people with either a dream or vision and unobstructed freedom to explore and experiment to realize that dream. In the world today and in the political and legal environment of today, many of the accomplishments of the past would not be possible because our political and legal systems have been hi-jacked by corporate capitalists. These corporate capitalists are uninspired people who's only skill is generated income without working for it. One of the many disgusting things that these people have paid off our politicians to do for them, is restrict access to natural resources - the same resources that their scientists used to find the means for making their latest product. This is a way for them to lock down markets. In other words, if they discover an alloy somewhere that can be used to build a better battery, they have the government to restrict access to those resources so that no one else can explore or experiment with them. The issues are obvious. The justification for such restrictions are always something relative to national security. In other words; the government is protecting you from yourself. The next Einstein, Ford or Emerson might not ever come to be because only those who are part of the establishment, have access to the resources needed to explore and experiment with new ideas. The corporate capitalists have gone so far as to insure that there are even restrictions on growing your own food. In most parts of this country, you need local government approval to plant a fruit tree. Why would such laws exist? They exist to protect the income generating abilities of our corporate food suppliers. If you're growing your own food, what do you need them for? Paying for water used to be my biggest gripe when it comes to the controls placed on natural resources until they built a machine to sell air! Get a low tire on your vehicle and pull up to the local gas station, you have to pay to fill your tire with air! You have to pay to use a vacuum cleaner to clean your car! Both of these devices are nothing more than glorified high school science projects - they're not more than simple rotors packaged to look like something else. They cost almost nothing! I can build one of these things with scrap electronic devices I have laying around the house. I tell you, their appetite is insatiable.
MARRIAGE
I really would like for someone to tell me why it is necessary for the government, local or federal, to recognize marriage of any sort. Marriage is a personal commitment and contract between two people and if they are religious, it is also a matter of their faith. What business is it of the government, if you are married or not? As far as taxes go, you don't have to declare that you have committed to spend the rest of your life with someone for the government to collect taxes. All the government needs to know is whether or not you live together, have assets in common, are caring for a child, etc. None of that information requires a marriage certificate to ascertain. I have heard no justification for marriage laws but it is obvious that they generate income for the state. The only time it becomes necessary to prove marriage, is when one of the parties to the marriage is incapacitated and the other needs to make decisions on their behalf and again, this doesn't require government intervention. All that is really needed is that when a person decides that someone else should have such authority under such circumstances, they sign something establishing that authority, whether they're married or not. In other words, if two people make a personal commitment to each other to be with each other forever, they should have a way to establish all of the rights and privileges that are currently only afforded to people with marriage certificates. Then again, you have to pay the government for marriage and divorce so again, it's back to the dollar. Anywho, I'm vented.
We are supposed to have the right, in this country, to do wrong or be bad people, especially when the wrong that is done, directly affects the offender only. We have a law enforcement structure in this country that's supposed to issue the consequences to those who offend others. The legal system is now being used to prosecute people for harming their selves. That's ridiculous!
Here are a few things the government now governs that it shouldn't:
1 - Child Support
2 - Car Insurance
3 - Seat-belt/Helmet Laws
4 - Natural Resources
5 - Marriage
CHILD SUPPORT
Why is the government involving itself in the personal lives of people to such an extent that it's deciding how much money a child is worth? First off, it takes two people to make a child so if you want to penalize a father for having an unplanned child, where's the penalty for the mother who made the same decision? Are we saying that her penalty is that she's usually the person stuck with this undesired offspring? Are we saying that raising a child is a bad thing? But then, the system also ensures that the father is involved in the raising of the child so does that mean he's punished twice? For those of you who aren't familiar with financial concept of the child support system, allow me to explain. The system says that there are two parents and these two parents earn, collectively, whatever amount of money. Based on their formula, a particular percentage of that collective income would go towards the raising of the child. This figure supposedly accounts for average food, clothes, housing, etc., costs for the raising of a child who grows up in a household within a particular income bracket. The system then says, if the family breaks up, the child should continue to receive the same financial benefits it would have received if both parents were still together. Thus; the non-custodial parent has to pay their portion in the form of child support to the custodial parent. The justification for this system is that too many children are been born to people who don't want them and therefore, don't take care of them once they arrive so to protect society-at-large from having to pay the cost for these bastard children, the system was established to make the irresponsible pay for their own bastards.
Issue one with the system is it does nothing to discourage or eliminate what it perceives as a problem. In fact; the very existence of the system offers incentive for irresponsible women to get pregnant because it's a guaranteed pay-day. Child support is nothing but an attempt to replace welfare. This is made clear with issue two which is that the father or non-custodial parent is required to repay if full, any public assistance the mother might have received for the care of the child including food stamps. Now, if this was about equity, wouldn't both parents be held responsible for repaying an equal share. Then there is the criminalization of the father or non-custodial parent if that parent can't, for lack of a job, pay the child support. If you lose your job and get more than two or three months behind on paying child support, a warrant is issued for your arrest and you can be sentenced to jail time. Correct me if I'm wrong but, if you are married and you lose your job, doesn't the entire family suffer? I don't know of anyone who has to go on the lamb because they lost their job and now must fear the police kicking down the door because their kids can no longer eat steaks for dinner. If you pay child support, this is your unfortunate circumstance. This leads me to my final issue with the system which is that when the non-custodial parent is out of work and unable to pay support, they accrue a passed due amount. That's insane! If I lost my job and my family had to go from steaks to roman noodles, from the suburbs to the projects, there would be a problem if my child came up to me with a bill notifying my that I owe them for the steaks they didn't get to eat. Why the hell is their a bill accruing! When a family loses an income, the family has to change the standard of living they are accustomed to. Sometimes that means that there is only one income where there used to be two. Sometimes that means that there might not be an income at all. According to the system, if you lose your job, the child's standard of living shouldn't change simply because you're out of the house as opposed to in the house. The thing is, there is no just way to have a system that runs this aspect of people's lives. Get out of people's personal business!!!
CAR INSURANCE
Anyone who doesn't know that the mandatory insurance laws were written by the insurance industry lobbyist and passed by the politicians they bought, just isn't paying attention. These laws were fairly easy to pass because they generated income for municipals through traffic citations. The fact of the matter is that this is another case of the government attempting to regulate, legislate and adjudicate morality. I remember the 1980's and before, it was a time before these mandatory insurance laws, life wasn't as hard, people could stretch a dollar further, the working poor (who ofter get falsely counted as middle-classed) as well as the middle class, were more content. Most people, who could afford it, purchased insurance all on their own without government meddling. Insurance was far more affordable. I remember buying my first car when I was a teenager working a minimum wage job and paying bills at home - I could afford car insurance. I remember clearly the time the law took affect because almost overnight I could no longer afford insurance. The reality is that most people can't afford the new cost of insurance. Tons of crappy temporary auto insurance companies sprung up over night to provide ways for people to maintain their right to drive. They achieve this by issuing bogus insurance cards that everybody knows are only purchased to meet the requirement but doesn't provide any real protection for anyone. In other words, can can't make mandates on people's money, if they don't have it, without breeding more corruption. If you're going to pass a law on the citizens, you should first have a reasonable expectation that the citizens have the means to abide by the law. When you have a country filled with urban ghettos and semi-middle-classed people living pay check to pay check, how is it reasonable that they can afford to abide by a law that tells where to spend their money? The only expectation I have is that people are forced to become more and more corrupt themselves in order that they survive.
The justification for the mandatory insurance laws was that the public has to pay the cost for people injured by uninsured drivers because the hospitals have to jack up the costs of care on everybody to cover the losses incurred from treating people without a means to pay. The mandatory insurance laws were supposed to insure that those costs were provided for and therefore, not transferred to the greater society. That is a bogus and over simplified argument. These laws have been in place for more than 20 years now - have health care costs been impacted at all by these laws? The answer is a resounding, no! That's because the whole premise was faulty. If they were truly interested in insuring that every motorist had insurance, they would have began by insuring that every motorist could actually afford insurance. Either they should have calculated the average cost of living in this country and juxtaposed that to the average income to arrive at a proper minimum wage or a proper price for insurance; or they should have provided an income level within the law that determines at what point the law kicks in. In other words, if you are one of the working poor, the law does not affect you but when/if this country provides you to opportunity to prosper and rise out of your plight, then you are held responsible for these additional costs. There are a million other approaches to mandating auto-insurance that are conceivably more fair but as we know, these laws weren't about public safety - they were a result of backroom deals.
SEAT-BELT/HELMET LAWS
Seat-belt and Helmet laws are an easy example of government intrusion on your freedom to move unrestricted. A seat belt law is as ridiculous as the suicide law. If I don't care to protect myself against the dangers in the world, I get what I get. That's the way it should be at least. The government seems to think that it is their business whether or not I protect myself against injury in a car accident. Their reasoning, once again, you guessed it: the cost of health care. Once again, this is a faulty argument and proof is in the pudding. The cost of health care has escalated in spite of these intrusive laws. What's the penalty for not wearing a seat-belt or helmet? They want money - of course! It always gets back to the dollar.
It bothers me that the government is able to pass so much crap on us using the same old wrong argument because enough people believe what they're saying is true, in spite of real evidence. It bothers me that so many people are so bothered by the idea of helping people less fortunate, that they'd rather surrender their freedoms. What happened to the breed of American that didn't depend on the government to fix everything they had a problem with? What happened to that breed of American that would have rolled up their sleeves and said, I'm not paying for other people's ignorance but point me in their direction so that I can help them to have what they need to live without being a burden on everybody else. Remember the "Little House on the Prairie" TV show? If a person's house was destroyed in a storm, the community came together and rebuilt it, they didn't depend on an insurance company to take care of it thereby jacking up the cost of everybody else' insurance. People didn't resort to those lengths until absolutely necessary. Contrary to what some people are brought up to believe about other people in our society, no one wants to be a burden on others. No one wants to not have everything they need to live happily. No one is content with misery. Again, another money-grab by politicians and corporations. At some point they are going to have to realize that the juice was drained from this fruit a long time ago. Their greed is so enormous that they've been settling for robbing you on paper - having no actual substance to back it. This recent economic collapse should have informed the politicians and the corporate leaders that they have eaten everything on the plate and are no longer eaten a meal, but the plate itself. In their blind lust for monetary gains, they realize nothing. They are pointing fingers everywhere but at the truth and the saddest thing about it all is that they might be truly convinced that they are right. Do you know that in the middle of this economic collapse, we had energy companies petitioning the government for rate hikes! That's just a total detachment from reality. The fields are barren, the field hands are starving and corporate America is demanding that the field hands provide more potatoes!
NATURAL RESOURCES
There used to be a time in this country when we were all free to dream, explore and experiment. It was this freedom that advanced this country time and time again. Most major advancements in this country were made by regular people with either a dream or vision and unobstructed freedom to explore and experiment to realize that dream. In the world today and in the political and legal environment of today, many of the accomplishments of the past would not be possible because our political and legal systems have been hi-jacked by corporate capitalists. These corporate capitalists are uninspired people who's only skill is generated income without working for it. One of the many disgusting things that these people have paid off our politicians to do for them, is restrict access to natural resources - the same resources that their scientists used to find the means for making their latest product. This is a way for them to lock down markets. In other words, if they discover an alloy somewhere that can be used to build a better battery, they have the government to restrict access to those resources so that no one else can explore or experiment with them. The issues are obvious. The justification for such restrictions are always something relative to national security. In other words; the government is protecting you from yourself. The next Einstein, Ford or Emerson might not ever come to be because only those who are part of the establishment, have access to the resources needed to explore and experiment with new ideas. The corporate capitalists have gone so far as to insure that there are even restrictions on growing your own food. In most parts of this country, you need local government approval to plant a fruit tree. Why would such laws exist? They exist to protect the income generating abilities of our corporate food suppliers. If you're growing your own food, what do you need them for? Paying for water used to be my biggest gripe when it comes to the controls placed on natural resources until they built a machine to sell air! Get a low tire on your vehicle and pull up to the local gas station, you have to pay to fill your tire with air! You have to pay to use a vacuum cleaner to clean your car! Both of these devices are nothing more than glorified high school science projects - they're not more than simple rotors packaged to look like something else. They cost almost nothing! I can build one of these things with scrap electronic devices I have laying around the house. I tell you, their appetite is insatiable.
MARRIAGE
I really would like for someone to tell me why it is necessary for the government, local or federal, to recognize marriage of any sort. Marriage is a personal commitment and contract between two people and if they are religious, it is also a matter of their faith. What business is it of the government, if you are married or not? As far as taxes go, you don't have to declare that you have committed to spend the rest of your life with someone for the government to collect taxes. All the government needs to know is whether or not you live together, have assets in common, are caring for a child, etc. None of that information requires a marriage certificate to ascertain. I have heard no justification for marriage laws but it is obvious that they generate income for the state. The only time it becomes necessary to prove marriage, is when one of the parties to the marriage is incapacitated and the other needs to make decisions on their behalf and again, this doesn't require government intervention. All that is really needed is that when a person decides that someone else should have such authority under such circumstances, they sign something establishing that authority, whether they're married or not. In other words, if two people make a personal commitment to each other to be with each other forever, they should have a way to establish all of the rights and privileges that are currently only afforded to people with marriage certificates. Then again, you have to pay the government for marriage and divorce so again, it's back to the dollar. Anywho, I'm vented.
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