Prior to one of my recent forays into a local court, I stood outside the court where a large pool of people stood waiting to see if they would be selected for Jury Duty. Most were not impressed with the idea, and were discussing amongst themselves ways to tell the court they could not serve, and finding every excuse in the book to "get out of jury duty". One in particular referenced the whole process as a bunch of "sh*t".
Well being the kind that always tried to teach our children nicer ways of addressing the fouling things in life, we would be inclined to reference what the dog drops as 'doody' as in its time to go clean all the dog doody out of the yard.
So the real question is do the american people have it right - is jury duty "jury doody"? or is this a duty we should be going well out of our comfort zone to embrace? After all the courts would rather just eliminate the jury process, and streamline everything to bench trials, and the thought of defendants going up before juries are often perceived as being worse than just dealing with a grandfatherly judge. So whats the problem?
The American justice system is built on the mandate of the United States Constitution - particularly Section 2 that where it states: "The Trial of all Crimes, except in Cases of impeachment, shall be by Jury; and such Trial shall be held in the State where the said Crimes shall have been committed; but when not committed within any State, the Trial shall be at such Place or Places as the Congress may by Law have directed."
Allowing the media to try people prior to a proper jury trial is a violation of the constitution unless it has been directed as such by Congress - but that is an argument for another days blog (maybe tomorrow).
My real issue for today is the importance of the Jury trial, and the necessity of the American people to take this obligation seriously, and respect it responsibly.
The reality is that the Jury is the essential objective component in the American system that holds every aspect of the process accountable on behalf of the accused.
There are significant problems with abandoning the jury concept regardless of the desired expeditious preferences of judges and the courts; the primary problem being the fact that the judges and the courts are a part of "the system".
Grandfatherly judges are almost exclusively the fiction of media. The real tragedy in such perception is the lure of expeditiousness over the fairness of a proper and constitutional jury trial. I don't care if they are more expensive and time consuming - they are more safe, just, and legally accurate, and no one should accept anything less for anything.
The problem is becoming complicated by the resistance of the American public to serve on juries, giving the courts the excuse they need to avoid jury trials at every opportunity.
Add to this the liberal left's preoccupation with running roughshod over the constitution, and democratic preferences for introducing legislation that violates the constitution without as much as a thought (let alone any serious consideration), it can't be long before the fools offer a proposal to make all trials bench trials eliminating the constituional right to a jury trial, and effectively eliminating the basis for the real rule of law.
You may have been called for jury duty yourself and tried to find a valid excuse to avoid the time loss, and who could blame you right? Well who are we going to blame in the end when the right to a jury trial disappears, and the system is left with free reign to sabotage your rights? A bench trial appeal?
If you don't yet fear the 'Just Us' system, you had better get your head out of the sand - these people are out to destroy us all. The system will only do what is best for the system - not you.
Every move that has not be challenged by individuals has removed more personal rights and freedoms, and added to this problem.
You need to appreciate the opportunity to serve, and counsel everyone around you that this right and obligation is really an opportunity that is well worth the effort.
Further, we should be demanding of our politicians legislation that encourages the jury trial approach by funding jury pay stipends more generously, and educating in the schools more effectively in this regard. The ignorance in the masses is killing the freedoms we have, and the rights to maintain these freedoms.
Without better education on things like this that truly matter, we leave the educators with the freedom to decide how to waste our kids time that is no longer needed to teach knowledge, and all they can come up with is more diversity and tolerance training or the perverts sex ed classes.
Big help all that stuff will be when were all locked up for finally waking up and speaking our minds against the system, and can't find a jury of our peers.
Wednesday, January 14, 2009
Saturday, January 10, 2009
"Patrolmen In Greed' - The PIGs Are On The Loose
Almost everyone I speak with - most of whom admittedly know my personal biases - have been commenting on the number of Police they are seeing everyday 'protecting our "SAFETY"' by stopping those of us evil traffic violators that speed, and/or violate some inane sign somewhere.
Safety is now deemed of vital importance to national safety by the American Society of Civil Engineers, who several years ago in an effort to promote highway and roadway construction projects introduced their version of "Safety Day". Apparently Elmer the Safety Elephant has long ago retired, and in this morbid black era of government interference, overindulgence and overreaching, they appropriately named their annual celebration each October 10 as "Fatalities Day". (See http://www.brakesonfatalities.org/)
Well I would never consider the civil engineering community the epicenter of social policy making wisdom. And I can hardly fault them for their attempt at developing an awareness campaign that gives lawmakers another good reason to spend money on Civil Engineers....
But it doesn't seem to be working that way.
In fact, the way I learned about "Fatalities Day" was through our state's websites where they are using the engineers attempts at statistic bundling to justify the ever growing need for more enforcement, more police, and more public abuse by people who are supposed to be "protecting" us. It appears that this kind of protection - like so many others - keeps breaking, and we keep ending up with more 'child support'.
In my home state of South Cackalacky, our states own statistics as maintained by the Department of Transportation (see http://www.roadmaptosafety.us/) have evaluated the cause of traffic deaths and traffic related injuries into the top 9 causes over the previous 5 years and have determined that more than 50% of the deaths and 25% of the injuries can be resolved through strategically placed guard rails, and similar such roadway improvements. In fact of the almost 20 recommendations made as to how to correct the first two death and injury types, only two involve police enforcement.
In fact, by cutting the budgets of 'enforcement' by less than 20%, almost every one of the other recommendations could be paid for and implemented as one time expenditures in less than 5 years, and maintained thereafter at a cost of less than half this amount ever after. Moreover the success rate of these improvements will far exceed 50% while the comparable expenditure on law enforcement is certain to yield a less than 5% improvement in safety.
In reality, we need less traffic police in every part of the union, more commitment to safe roads and infrastructure, and priorities that make real improvements. And yet the buffoons in every legislature in the country keep approving the budgets of these bloated law enforcement communities based on the medias preoccupation with crime, property damage, and interpersonal clashes as the top stories in every news and most reality shows. Any business mind knows that burning salary money over capital costs is the fastest way to destroy an enterprise - you add no value, and you may not get any value either.
Why can't the people wake up and recognize that the real enemy isn't your neighbor unless he drives a Police car? Next only to politicians that authorize this insanity, the power abuse by law enforcement at every level is now rampant, and costing you more than the average KGB agency ever got away with throughout the complete cold war era - and frankly with similar results.
In South Carolina, the new blue light special still includes you using your wallet, but is now available on every street corner whether or not there is a K-Mart, and more likely involves someone needing protection. But think twice - the protection is broken, and the final cost will always be yours.
Safety is now deemed of vital importance to national safety by the American Society of Civil Engineers, who several years ago in an effort to promote highway and roadway construction projects introduced their version of "Safety Day". Apparently Elmer the Safety Elephant has long ago retired, and in this morbid black era of government interference, overindulgence and overreaching, they appropriately named their annual celebration each October 10 as "Fatalities Day". (See http://www.brakesonfatalities.org/)
Well I would never consider the civil engineering community the epicenter of social policy making wisdom. And I can hardly fault them for their attempt at developing an awareness campaign that gives lawmakers another good reason to spend money on Civil Engineers....
But it doesn't seem to be working that way.
In fact, the way I learned about "Fatalities Day" was through our state's websites where they are using the engineers attempts at statistic bundling to justify the ever growing need for more enforcement, more police, and more public abuse by people who are supposed to be "protecting" us. It appears that this kind of protection - like so many others - keeps breaking, and we keep ending up with more 'child support'.
In my home state of South Cackalacky, our states own statistics as maintained by the Department of Transportation (see http://www.roadmaptosafety.us/) have evaluated the cause of traffic deaths and traffic related injuries into the top 9 causes over the previous 5 years and have determined that more than 50% of the deaths and 25% of the injuries can be resolved through strategically placed guard rails, and similar such roadway improvements. In fact of the almost 20 recommendations made as to how to correct the first two death and injury types, only two involve police enforcement.
In fact, by cutting the budgets of 'enforcement' by less than 20%, almost every one of the other recommendations could be paid for and implemented as one time expenditures in less than 5 years, and maintained thereafter at a cost of less than half this amount ever after. Moreover the success rate of these improvements will far exceed 50% while the comparable expenditure on law enforcement is certain to yield a less than 5% improvement in safety.
In reality, we need less traffic police in every part of the union, more commitment to safe roads and infrastructure, and priorities that make real improvements. And yet the buffoons in every legislature in the country keep approving the budgets of these bloated law enforcement communities based on the medias preoccupation with crime, property damage, and interpersonal clashes as the top stories in every news and most reality shows. Any business mind knows that burning salary money over capital costs is the fastest way to destroy an enterprise - you add no value, and you may not get any value either.
Why can't the people wake up and recognize that the real enemy isn't your neighbor unless he drives a Police car? Next only to politicians that authorize this insanity, the power abuse by law enforcement at every level is now rampant, and costing you more than the average KGB agency ever got away with throughout the complete cold war era - and frankly with similar results.
In South Carolina, the new blue light special still includes you using your wallet, but is now available on every street corner whether or not there is a K-Mart, and more likely involves someone needing protection. But think twice - the protection is broken, and the final cost will always be yours.
Thursday, January 8, 2009
A Media Running Roughshod On Our Constitution? Imagine That!
And so it was that I was minding my business on my way into work this morning when I heard a news story generated by the complaint of a city official against the Mayor.
The story was effectively a rehashing of the complaint, followed by the reporters attempts to verify the story without success. And it dawned on me - this mayor has not yet been convicted.
So I began to think on this story, and how I would feel if I was that Mayor - being tried in the media - the court of public opinion. I thought for a moment about Illinois Governor Rod Blagojevich - also a media favorite that has not yet been convicted, and I realized how much the media without challenge is trying public officials (and less) with their stories intended for sensationalism, political sabotage, and every other sort of malignment for the sake of filling airspace and entertaining the public.
The Cayce and Caylee Anthony story in Florida has been the CNN Headline News default story every evening for months now, and yet as of today, Ms. Anthony has not yet faced a jury or told her side of the story. This should not yet be a story.
We all know that media bias is ruining jury selection processes all over America, and that premature ejaculation of stories is the media norm that is making it effectively impossible to have fair trials - and yet this is a blatant violation of the concept of "Innocent until proven Guilty".
The reality is that the role of a court is almost irrelevant, or at least of nominal priority when a media tries an individual in public before the constitutionally protected right to a full trial has been given the chance to run its course.
The more I have thought about it this morning, the more it is clear that unless the public rises up to demand compliance with constitutional rights, the concept of "innocent until proven guilty" is irrelevant when the media (and government reporting offices) already begin reporting charges and suspicions before justice has had a chance to be proven.
In reality the concept of "Innocent Until Proven Guilty" is only being given lip service any longer. In practice, media and government agencies are reporting suspicions, scurrilous allegations, unproven charges, and fraudulently manufactured details every day in a growing environment of sensationalism, irresponsibility and non-accountability - entirely spearheaded by the media.
And given that the courts can't handle or do an effective job of holding other courts accountable, or frankly begin to grasp, let alone manage the concept of justice, we can only appeal to higher authorities if we expect this matter to ever be dealt with properly.
It is time to demand more of our media. Call in - as I did this morning - and demand that such stories are removed immediately. Write letters. Hold politicians and government agencies accountable and demand more at every level.
Once we have given up the right to be presumed innocent, there is no saving anyone anymore!
The story was effectively a rehashing of the complaint, followed by the reporters attempts to verify the story without success. And it dawned on me - this mayor has not yet been convicted.
So I began to think on this story, and how I would feel if I was that Mayor - being tried in the media - the court of public opinion. I thought for a moment about Illinois Governor Rod Blagojevich - also a media favorite that has not yet been convicted, and I realized how much the media without challenge is trying public officials (and less) with their stories intended for sensationalism, political sabotage, and every other sort of malignment for the sake of filling airspace and entertaining the public.
The Cayce and Caylee Anthony story in Florida has been the CNN Headline News default story every evening for months now, and yet as of today, Ms. Anthony has not yet faced a jury or told her side of the story. This should not yet be a story.
We all know that media bias is ruining jury selection processes all over America, and that premature ejaculation of stories is the media norm that is making it effectively impossible to have fair trials - and yet this is a blatant violation of the concept of "Innocent until proven Guilty".
The reality is that the role of a court is almost irrelevant, or at least of nominal priority when a media tries an individual in public before the constitutionally protected right to a full trial has been given the chance to run its course.
The more I have thought about it this morning, the more it is clear that unless the public rises up to demand compliance with constitutional rights, the concept of "innocent until proven guilty" is irrelevant when the media (and government reporting offices) already begin reporting charges and suspicions before justice has had a chance to be proven.
In reality the concept of "Innocent Until Proven Guilty" is only being given lip service any longer. In practice, media and government agencies are reporting suspicions, scurrilous allegations, unproven charges, and fraudulently manufactured details every day in a growing environment of sensationalism, irresponsibility and non-accountability - entirely spearheaded by the media.
And don't count on the media to hold themselves accountable - they would have to limit themselves - all while letting their competition have the upper hand. Have you heard of the media reporting effectively on its own lack of accountability to the public or the law? Me neither.
And given that the courts can't handle or do an effective job of holding other courts accountable, or frankly begin to grasp, let alone manage the concept of justice, we can only appeal to higher authorities if we expect this matter to ever be dealt with properly.
It is time to demand more of our media. Call in - as I did this morning - and demand that such stories are removed immediately. Write letters. Hold politicians and government agencies accountable and demand more at every level.
Once we have given up the right to be presumed innocent, there is no saving anyone anymore!
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