Monday, November 10, 2008

Nurture vs. Jail, and Rappelling the Financial Wall

Across America, I’ll bet voters approved very few tax increases. Here in Conservative Central, we decided not to approve an entire one percent increase to build yet another jail.

Some of the one percent would have gone to worthy programs, such as scraping pigeon poop off the General William Jackson Palmer statue in the middle of Platte and Nevada avenues, but for two consecutive years 50 percent of that money would have been spent on building and maintaining another jail.

Colorado Springs voters decided, perhaps two years ago, not to build another jail. Still, the county cheated on us and built one anyway, on the sly, behind our backs, using COPs. No, not police, certificates of participation.* I did not participate, nor did a lot of other constituents.

If parents would nurture, educate, and hold their children accountable for their actions, we wouldn’t need to incarcerate as many deviants.

If judges acted judiciously, which is akin to saying, “if drug addicts wouldn’t take drugs,” fewer people would live free, off our tax dollars, like judges do. [Auntie knows there are three good judges out there. The criminal in the following story isn’t one of them.]

I know a judge who sent someone to jail knowing the person was innocent. For this example, we’ll call the judge Loser Larry. Larry was fully aware that an opposing party contrived a story out of vengeance. Larry knew, because he was a party to the conspiracy and played along with the setup scheme of two attorneys, Kimmie and Lizzie.

Loser Larry conspired with them in his chambers without the pro se victim present. His action was illegal. Then, through his course of action, Larry denied due process. This is the Readers’ Digest version, but in Colorado’s Fourth Judicial District, travesty against victims is not unusual.

But if the county’s leaders really want more motel space for judges to fill, maybe our voting against the one percent tax will discipline judges a mite. Disciplining a judge in Colorado is like trying to control crazed groupies at a Stones concert, yet both parties smoke pot.

Some of us can sleep better knowing our taxes have temporarily stabilized, while others are losing their jobs.

Why do people have to lose their jobs? Were their positions superfluous? If they were, why did the positions exist?

If the people are necessary, why can’t employers simply reduce pay? Follow the airlines’ lead: “You want to keep your jobs? Take a pay cut.”

In 1996 I quit my job to more actively parent my daughter. If anything in my life was unessential to living and breathing, I eliminated it. Bare bones, babycakes.

Remaining only as a memory were massages, lunches out, subscriptions, call waiting, and my excessive gift giving. I now work from home, earn $34,000 less a year than I used to, drive less (4,000 miles per year), pollute less, waste little to no time. Plus I have time to take a daily hike.

Abundance comes through peace of mind (except during financially freaky times), continued healthy gourmet meals, more socialization, and playing music with our group.

Even in poverty, thank God for a simple life.

copyright © 2008 by Auntie Eartha. All rights reserved.

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http://auntieeartha.blogspot.com/2008/11/nurture-vs-jail-and-rappelling.html

* certificate of participation: Financing in which an individual buys a share of the lease revenues of an agreement made by a municipal or governmental entity, rather than the bond being secured by those revenues.

2 comments:

  1. Like voting on tax increase in Colorado, we can also vote to replace judges. Funny how no matter how bad a judge is, retention is virtually automatic. No wonder our legal system is somewhat screwed up.

    The tax may have failed for numerous reasons. Building a new jail was only one of the reasons. Another was the tax was permanent, while the need for financing the jail would have been satisfied in the first couple years. The amount of tax was also too high and given the poor economy, it was not an opportune time to ask already strapped taxpayers to pony up even more.

    The wastefulness of public monies is a big issue. They regularly plead poverty for things such as road maintenance, while at the same time building massive overpass projects that are nice to have but not completely necessary. There is also a substantial inventory of unoccupied industrial buildings that could be remodeled into jail space at far less cost. Of course they don't consider such things because they want a new jail with all the trimmings.

    Permanent taxes meant to solve temporary problems should never be approved. After the temporary problem is solved, government just grows to use all the extra funds.

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  2. When people vote yes on the judges, it's because they have not endured the court system and lack intelligence. Even friends of judges should have the sense to put them out of their misery.

    I agree wholeheartedly about using already existing structures for newfound "needs." By continually expanding, we are not appreciating what we have.

    My philosophy: Look in the garage before you spend money. And don't let people parent new children unless they can thoroughly be there for their child.

    As you have!

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