Man on Fire

I'm a photo, movie, and music fan, haven't put out anything with this tag in a while, so here's a post on a popular movie that I see a connection too.

Man on Fire, staring Denzel Washington and Dakota Fanning is an intense movie about kidnapping and corruption in Mexico (originally in Italy). The movie is intense, violent, rated R for a reason. It is remarkable that Dakota being as young as she was could be exposed to such intensity. Christopher Walken stars as Denzel's friend, a different role from his usual bad guy, instead he helps set Denzel's background and add some humor. Marc Anthony plays the father of Dakota, married to Radha Mitchell, her mother. Mickey Rourke does a great job of playing the arrogant corrupt family lawyer. Rachel Ticotin as the helpful investigative reporter and Giancarlo Giannini as one of the few caring non-corrupt officials play their roles very well.

But the sub plot is how a child breaks through a man's cold heart, burned out from his intense work ethic and violent military career. When she is kidnapped, he erupts with a passion, a mission he truly cares about. To rid the system of its corruption. And that he does, showing no mercy to those who abused their trust.

If you get a chance, the double DVD version has an alternate ending suggested by Denzel. Still tragic, but some personal vengeance dispensed. Notice how the villains keep rationalizing with "I'm a professional" or "it's just business" or "I'm sorry", at one point Denzel gets sick of it and orders the villain to stop saying that.

Our judges and their "officers" (lawyer's, guardians, evaluators, social workers) are all "professionals" too and they say they are sorry that their large case load can't always deliver BIC, but then some work only three hours a day for full time pay, so what kind of sincerity is that? Lying bastards and bitches.

Certainly this storyline is intense, the heartbreak severe, kidnapping assisted by the corrupt system. Do you see a parallel? Oh technically you could say there is no comparison, but practically on an emotional level, right here in this United States; Is the breaking up of families, the relegation of NCPs to less than a parent, really so much better? Do we, us pompous ass American's, have any right to watch that movie and criticize Mexico as third world, when we American's do a very similar thing on a much grander scale? We are so blind to our own problems. And do our corrupt officials deserve any less punishment than their's? What have they done to deserve mercy?

Am I saying they should all be killed? No, that's a bit drastic. But I do firmly believe that they should pay for their crimes, hard time, like any other criminal and never hold an office of trust again in their lifetime. That would be justice. I pray for that day.

---

Some movie quotes:

• Dear God, I do not ask for health or wealth. People ask you so often that you can't have any left. Give me, God, what else you have. Give me what no-one else asks for. Amen.
• Creasy [pause] You're smiling.
• [about Creasy] I think he's been sick. He's all right now, but I think he's been very, very sick.
• Pita (Dakota): There are some good things in this world.
  Creasy: Oh yeah, like what?
  Pita: Like meeting me.
  
• [about Creasy] She showed him it was OK to live again.
  
  
• Forgiveness is between them and God. It's my job to arrange the meeting.
• A man can be an artist... in anything, food, whatever. It depends on how good he is at it. Creasey's (Denzel's) art is death. He's about to paint his masterpiece.
• He'll deliver more justice in a weekend than ten years of your courts and tribunals. Just stay out of his way,
  
• You know, I-I'm a professional.
  [Creasey (Denzel)]: That's what everybody keeps saying. "I'm just a professional". Everybody keeps saying that to me. "I'm just a professional", "I'm just a professional". I'm getting sick and tired of hearing that.
• I got all the time in the world. *You* don't, but I do.
• Last wish? I wish you had more time.
  
• Okay, my friend. It's off to the next life for you. I guarantee you, you won't be lonely.
• [Creasy is planning to go after Fuentes, a high-ranking corrupt police lieutenant]
  Mariana: He's better protected than the president of Mexico!
  Creasy (Denzel): He's gonna need it.
• 2.5 million, that's what Victor got, isn't it? 2.5 million to your lawyer [Mickey Rourke] that he put in an account in the Cayman Islands, but he won't get a chance to spend it. What happened to the other five Sam (Marc Anthony)? Huh? That's 2.5, 2.5. What is five from ten? That's five. What happened to the other five, Sam?
  
  
• Do you think God'll forgive us for what we've done? No.
  
• Revenge is a meal best served cold.

Thanksgiving

Time has worn me down. I am numb. I am tired. My mind looses track what I should be thankful for. It doesn't come easy. I think hard.

• I am thankful for the first 5 years with my son.
• I am thankful for the limited time I had with him in the next 4 years of separation and litigation.
• I am thankful I had the resources, strength, and endurance to fight for him to be in my life, even though it almost killed me. I do regret I have but one life to give to this terrible fight.
• I can only hope that my restricted access to my son will end sometime in the next 9 years.
• I hope with all my heart, for the best for my son for the next 9 years.
• I will be thankful when my son is grown and we can finally be reunited.
• I regret ever having gotten involved in this twisted notion of justice, it was never my desire to go to court.
  
• I am thankful I have a vehicle to speak up and warn potential victims.
• I am hopeful that one day, justice will prevail, my son and I will be free, and the people who feed off other's misery will receive their just punishment. Until then I remain conflicted on my thankfulness.

You can see how this mess has effected me over time, it wears you down, and that's the point...
Two years ago, my blessings easily came to mind.
And of course the wisdom of song writers can not be overlooked, in particular Don Henley's My Thanksgiving


Status: First Draft - Last Updated 11/28/08 11:30 PM

Happy F---king Birthday

Another year, another year older, and another dirty trick by my ex.

My ex has always had a sadistic sense of timing.

For one birthday she gave me a pair of web cams and said this is how you are going to see your son. But then she won't let him use it because Oprah said that web cams make child prostitutes. As if Oprah is technically competent to understand the Internet and protecting children on it. I actually have extensive experience in networking technology, advised the state government ISP, supported global networks, worked on computer security, and even set up the work from home network that my ex still uses.

She filed for divorce on April Fools day.

And now she decided that my restricted visitation is just too liberal and is taking me back to court to restrict it further. In the mean time, I haven't seen my son in two weeks and I didn't know when I'd see him again. She called today to say that she will meet me at a restaurant on my birthday and bring my son and let him see me there.

I miss my son terribly and will be happy to see him in one sense, but what mixed emotions, how stressful to know that when my meal is over, he'll go back with her and I won't know when I'll see him again.

Yeah, I'm gonna have a real Happy Fucking Birthday... Thanks to my ex.


Update

---

Well I waited a half hour for my ex and son to come. It was awkward, tense, and unnatural, hardly fun. But beggars and NCPs can't be choosers, after all we are the losers. (jqism) Nice pun, nice rhyme? I brought a set of inexpensive magic tricks, that my smart son quickly figured out to the amazement of my clueless ex. The one trick (coin switch) he figured out instantly. So at least that was a tension breaker for him as he practiced them while waiting for the food to arrive.

Less than an hour...

Earlier that day I asked my ex to withdraw her court request to alter visitation and go to a mediator instead. She was non-committal. I challenged her, "Didn't you learn anything in the last four years? Can't you see that the court's could give a shit about our son? Don't you see how much they've taken from him already?". She needs to think about it? What's to think about? Has she really thought about any of this, beyond her own selfish needs?

Divorced for 18 months and she's still fucking me royal.

Status: Second Draft - Last Updated 11/20/08 9 PM

The new face of our courts

So the election is over. BFD!

My judge, the Dis-Honarable [SIC] Judge A.J.R. has been officially promoted as Chief Probate Elect Judge, starting his new term 1/1/09, leaving the divorce court where he can only fuck divorcing couples to the Probate court where:

• He can fuck over everyone, we all die and go through probate
• He can make competency declarations
  (now that's kind of scary, he could declare me insane for speaking out against him, ala Soviet Union tactics).
• He has full authority over the court as the Chief Administrative Judge
• He also has wide reaching power to appoint boards to our park system, health care, etc.

This is a man who

• Worked three hours a day, effectively stealing $75,000 per year of public funds
• Allowed the lawyers to plunder the assets of divorcing couples and stealing the support and inheritance from children (BIC of course)
  
• Falsified public records to cover up his theft in office by entering "shadow" trial dates when in fact no trial took place
  

So how can you top that? Its hard, but they did.

• My judge was replaced by an incompetent part time civil (not divorce) magistrate who just started practicing family law recently (part time). No doubt she realized that the divorce industry is a recession proof growth industry.
  
• She was ranked as "Not Recommended" 0.0 of 4.0 by all four bar associations. That is hard to do as bar associations tend to protect "their own". It's also hard to achieve that unanimous rating from these ideologically diverse bar associations.
  
  
• The court continues to be led by the Dis-Honorable Chief Judge T.M.F. who also earned a 0.0 out of 4.0 rating because he refused to cooperate with the four bar associations in their mission to rate the judges.
  
• Being in this court since 1992 he probably feels a sense of entitlement to this position and feels he no longer needs to respond to the public. His sarcastic responses to our newspaper showed this contempt clearly. I believe he is entitled to be unemployed or in prison for his betrayal of the public trust and stonewalling of the State Supreme Court's investigation into the inefficiencies of his court.
• This man is so out of touch that he believes the biggest problem is litigant's exercising their constitutional right to self representation. He fully supports the status quo of judges' allowing the financial rape of the citizenry by greedy self centered lawyers, as well as the elitist view that litigant's are not c0mpetent to deal with the court.
  

So after 1/1/09 my judge has moved on and I have an opportunity to motion the court with a new judge assigned to the case. Local court rules assign the presiding trial judge to any post decree motions, which won't be possible since he has left that court for greener pastures. But who will I be assigned to, one of the recently elected 0.0 out of 4.0 rated judges or the other two that are proably equally poor.

Status: First Draft - Last Updated 11/14/08
Readers are reminded of terms and conditions not to contact the parties

Just filling in the bubbles

that is what many people's idea of voting is

Cynical opinion? NOPE! That's what the numbers say. So here are my observations from my county's vote results.

• Only 1.36% had the courage to vote outside the major parties for President
  
• 43% of those who voted for President voted for our corrupt unopposed divorce judges
• 99% of those voting for the corrupt divorce judges voted for the totally incompetent judge who was rated unqualified by four separate bar associations.
  
  
• 59% of presidential voters voted in contested judicial races
• 45% of presidential voters voted in unopposed judicial races
  
  
• 82% of presidential voters voted in contested county races
• 59% of presidential voters voted in unopposed county races
  
  
• 77 to 95% of presidential voters voted on state issues
  

More observations coming... or maybe not if I get too disgusted...

PFS (Pretty Fuckin Sad) !!!

Every one has the right to vote, but most don't understand the responsibility to be informed voters. (jqism)

Status: Final Draft - Couldn't bear to update this after the 12th

A temporary tangent

I've gone on a temporary hiatus, on a political tangent. Have no fear, regular domestic relations disaster posts will return here shortly after election day, although while the election winds its way through the courts I may still post some more political commentary.

For the record I think both Major Political Parties have serious flaws, if I appear to criticize the Democrats more its just that I'm trying to counter the media's blind love affair with them.

PS: This post will float to the top as I add new political posts...

PS: Well thankfully the election process is over, but have we learned anything?
Back to your regularly scheduled program, already in progress.

PPS: If you have a favorite Domestic Relations Disaster topic, let me know here by comment or by email and I'll see what I can do to address your interests.


Status: Last Updated 11/13/08 11 PM

The old man didn't do too bad

Considering the millstones he was carrying.

McCain had insurmountable odds...

He had the terrible legacy of Bush, branded and labeled with his mistakes just because he was of the same party. But of anyone in the Republican party, McCain was the least likely to toe the party line, it is so ironic that he was branded, white washed with the same broad brush of those in his party that he often disagreed with. This is the downside of party politics.

No one would have taken office without introducing major change. But McCain was branded as sam ole sam ole Bush. McCain was not a dim witted drug abusing draft dodger, why would anyone think he'd act like one? His opponent slung that shit at him and it stuck. Partly due to McCain's big mistake of not distancing himself from the leader of his party who isn't anything like him.

One thing won't change, we'll have an old man tripping over his words and saying dumb things, only it will be the VP instead of the President.

It is said that bad things come in three's. The first for McCain was the terrible Bush legacy. The second was a total economic meltdown at a critical point in the campaign, unprecedented in American politics. And even though this meltdown was a product of both parties, the shit stuck on McCain and slid off Obama. But still McCain pushed on.

And last, but not least, just as McCain was making progress, in the eleventh hour, VP Cheny, in the ultimate campaign sabotage endorses McCain. WTF was he thinking? Is Cheny so vain as to think there would be some benefit in a war monger lending his tarnished name to the untarnished war hero? Was this some type of campaign euthanasia?

Or was this a twisted plot to sacrifice McCain for the benefit of the future of the Republican party. There are those who say things are so fucked up that no one can fix them and who ever tries, which ever party wins this dubious honor, is doomed to failure and loss in the next election. Was Cheny trying to protect the Republican party from its demise by throwing McCain under the bus and allowing Obama to walk into its path? As Denis Miller said of one of the losers of the Republican primary, "the man should drop to his knees and thank God he was passed over for this challenging situation".

And despite all this adversity, and the 2 to 1 loss in electoral votes, McCain only lost in the popular vote by 52 to 47.

Say what you will about McCain, but he is no Bush, he is a trooper, and he deserved better. Hopefully these positive traits will be recognized, respected, and sought out by the new administration. To ignore a man of such tenacity, simply because of his party affiliation, would be a disservice to the country that needs all the help it can get.

Who's really disenfranchised?

My view is not what people would think. I propose that the blind ambition to ensure voters are not disenfranchised has gone overboard in fact disenfranchised the responsible voter.

Should everyone vote?

Do I blaspheme? How dare I take the elitist view that maybe some should not vote? But think about this with an open mind. Should the uninformed be voting and disenfranchising those who took the time to take their civic duty seriously and are informed voters? Do you think that maybe the forefather's envisioned that people would be informed before voting, rather than voting for the candidate who attracted the coolest celebrities to perform free concerts?

Aggressive Voter Registration

ACORN

ACORN isn't responsible

Really, WTF. Then who is, you, me, God, no one? Look ACORN hires workers, gives them instructions, then incentitives to violate voter registration laws. Do we need to debate this? ACORN is responsbile for their workers, for their insentive to violate laws, and for the actions that occur violating laws. The individual workers are also respobible for their violaion of the law. Their collective actions disenfranchise responsible voters and represent a crime against the people and the government, nearly akin to treason.

I'll hold off on their execution at dawn, but I don't hesitate for a second to see them all jailed, fined, and made to clean up the fraudulent registration mess they made.

Registration Fraud isn't Voter Fraud

Oh please, can the bullshit. Shit is shit and it stinks and fraud is fraud and its a crime. Splitting hairs and semantics makes no difference. It's a technical academic argument of no practical value.

Voter Fraud often begins in Registration Fraud.
Registration Fraud often leads to Voter Fraud.
Both are bad, neither should be tolerated.
PERIOD, FUCKIN PERIOD, END OF ARGUMENT.

Partisan Board of Elections

Our corrupt state has had both Republican and now Democratic Partisan Board of Elections, to the determent of the people. As our Sunday paper editorialized, there is no place for politics in the election process. It should have only one goal, fairness and the upholding of the letter and spirit of the law.

Making voting too easy

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No ID required

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Media Manipulation

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Its all about money

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Early Voting

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Electoral States

The Electoral State process marginalizes individual voters rights. It even creates bell weather and irrelevant states. How should a voter feel if they live in a guaranteed red/blue state verses a schizophrenic bell weather state like I live in, where our red/blue sections are constantly vying for control.

h3

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Status: Rough Draft - Last Updated 11/04/08

Big surprise!

I already knew how I felt about the divorce judges in my county, they all need to be unemployed. But today I looked up judicial rankings for the other judges so I could make an informed vote. We are lucky enough (out of necessity) that our good ole boy judge network is so corrupt that a coalition was formed to inform the voters about the judges credentials. Four different groups and new newspapers rate all elected judges and put their ratings online.

It is imperfect as the bar and the power circles have some impact on the judicial ratings, but they do rate some judges as "adequate (1)" or "Not recommended (0)". And it beats the bias ads.

So while I was reviewing the various judges, I came across the divorce judges. The chief administrative divorce judge has been stone walling the State Supreme Court investigation into "the worst divorce court in the State". So it came as little surprise that he also refused to cooperate with all six rating agencies, earning himself a rating of 0.0 out of 4.0.

The second divorce judge up for election did cooperate and received a "Not recommended (0)" rating from all agencies, for a rating of 0.0 out of 4.0.

My divorce judge is a political power broker with the famous brand name and was able to get a 3.0 out of 4.0, and as for judicial skills that may be fine. But when you factor in corruption, theft in office ($75,000/year), and ruining people's lives I think he too deserves a rating of 0.0. Imagine how bad the other two were to get that. My judge is not running for re-election, but rather for a promotion to Chief Probate judge where he can wreck havoc on the lives of married and divorced alike.

So I did not vote for any of these three, NO! But that doesn't matter, they have already won. They, like many other judges in our one party county, won the Democratic Primary and were running unopposed. This election is a meaningless formality as the unqualified will wrongfully take their place in our corrupt government and pass judgment on us.

Too bad our local judges can't be handled like presidential judicial or cabinet nominees. If the legislature (or in our case the judicial rating agencies) believe all candidates are unqualified, they simply refuse to allow them to take office and another candidate must be submitted. Crazy idea? Or is having 0.0 out of 4.0 candidates getting into office even more crazy? I think the latter is crazy. No judge is better than an incompetent one.

What of my judge's 3.0 rating, should he be allowed to get in? Well as soon as he is promoted out of the Divorce Court (Jan 2009) and can no longer control my case, I will be writing letters to every judicial rating agency and suggesting that the judge's ethics be considered along with their judicial skill. The best judicial skill means nothing when ethics are absent.

Anyone else who shares my location, or has this problem in another area and wants to join my effort or share my ideas, please email me. Our rating agencies have very clear definitions of their standards and I have very strong evidence of how my judge has violated these standards. Even if you live elsewhere, my case may serve as a good example of the activism needed.

Why bother? I've been fucked, and getting corrupt judges unemployed won't undo that. That is an irresponsible attitude I will not take. It is lazy silent inaction that acts as a co-conspirator to corruption.

Speak up, or shut up and don't complain (jqism).

So how did I vote? Any candidate with 3.0 and less did not get my vote, even if they were unopposed and that included all three divorce judges and a few others too. Wouldn't it be wonderful if others did that too? It might be humiliating and at least send a strong message if an unopposed incompetent was sent to office with less than 10% of the vote. Stay tuned, I'll be looking for the final vote counts.

And what of the other unopposed, did I just leave them blank, since they are getting in anyway? No, if they had a rating close to 4.0 and I believed they were a good candidate, they got my vote.

You still have a choice with only one candidate! Vote for them if they are qualified or leave them blank if they are not. To fill them all in, because they are the only choice, or to leave them all blank because they will be shooed in, are both irresponsible and derilection of your civic duty.

Who's vote will you cast?

Will it be your own? Or will it be so influenced by other factors that it won't be your own?

Will you buy the media hype, don't throw away your vote, vote for the winner they tell you to? Is voting your mind, even at the risk of your candidate loosing, a waste? Or is voting for the media chosen winner you have reservations about a betrayal of your civic responsibility?

Did you know something about all the candidates and issues you voted on? Did you get info from multiple sources or a biased source? Did you vote for unopposed candidates to fill in the blanks or because they were worthy of your vote?

Did you get discouraged and stay home? Why bother? Maybe your state isn't a bellweather state. Maybe your local board of elections is ruled by partisan politics and is rigged or corrupted (by ACORN).

The purpose of voting is to express your choice, win or lose, popular or not. The only right vote is your own. Not voting, for any reason, or voting for who the media tells you to, or by gender or race, or anything that you don't truly believe in, is wrong.

Do the right thing!

They called me stupid

As I complained about how the divorce system was treating me, I was told mater of factly, "Well you're stupid!" And by inference they were calling my parents and their whole generation stupid too.

See I was brought up old school - work hard, save, invest, and your efforts will be rewarded.

And for nearly 30 years of my adult life that served me well. Until big government, the big brother that was never born into my family reared its ugly head and got more involved in my life than anyone has a right too.

That's when greedy lawyers with the assistance of a corrupt judge taught me a lesson my parents never did. They stole my hard earned money, my son, my family, my job, possibly my career, everything I had worked so hard for 30 years to build. They have stolen every meaningful part of my life for their own personal enrichment or out of callous disregard for other's personal rights.

Big Government is not the answer to your problems it IS your problem, if not now, someday soon!
Big Government is always bad for civil liberties and democracy.
Power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely.

What was my stupid mistake? Saving, investing and owning. See if I just spent, rented, and owned nothing, then I would not be a target. I would have empty pockets instead of deep pockets and would not been a target of the divorce industry's lustful desire.

As we move toward our great socialist experiment, where hard work is considered stupid and penalized (as mine was) we will pay dearly for our collective stupidity of believing our forefathers were stupid!

We will move from a ladder of classes where people can hope, dream, and work their way up, to a new class structure as follows:

• The Super Rich (and powerful)
  
• The Government
  
• Government dependents gaming the system (the Great Welfare/Socialist masses)
  
• Old school middle class who will be crushed and beaten for their "stupidity"
  

There will be a large chasm between each of these classes. You won't climb a ladder you will attempt to jump and if you miss you will fall into the bottomless abyss that separates them. Most people will be content to sink into reality TV and the welfare masses to escape the miserable reality of their lives living as slaves waiting for their masters in the government to give them their next handout (or beating).


Which class will you belong to? How "stupid" are you?


Status: First Draft - Last Updated 11/03/08

She changed her tune...

• 
  

"I would bring a life time of experience to the White House, McCain would bring a life time of experience to the White House, Obama would bring a speech from 2002."

-- Hillary Clinton

Of course Hillary changed her tune and her official response to this message being replayed recently is "Why aren't they quoting my current support for Obama."

Well my dear Hillary there are 20 million reasons why!

See when you said this, you were speaking from your gut, back before you lost the primary. But when you lost you had $20 million in campaign debt. OUCH!!! The day after Obama won, you and Bill were pissed!!! But even when you were passed over for VP, your mood lightened and that's because Obama bought your endorsement in return for paying off your debt. You swallowed your pride very well, but then that's a lot of grease you had to help you swallow it.