"tipping" the scales of justice

A North Carolina waitress named Judy Proffitt has been arrested and charged with seven counts of "obtaining property by false pretenses" for altering the tip amounts on her checks at the restaurant where she worked.

Maybe she was trying to finance a new pair of glasses

It was a clever plan, but one that can only go on for so long before someone notices. Seriously, Judy, there are much safer ways to turn a Proffitt! Oh thank you, thank you, I'm here aaaaaaaaaall week.

am i the only one who sees a huge problem with this?

Michael Jackson's memorial service will be taking place tomorrow at Los Angeles' Staples Center, and promises to be a massive spectacle. Streets will be blocked off, a basketball arena will be filled to capacity, and tickets to the service are being scalped for tens of thousands of dollars (in a depressed economy, no less). It will be a circus the likes of which the world has never seen. And if that's how the Jacksons want to honor the King of Pop, that's up to them. I have no problem with that.

I do have a problem, however, with the way this memorial service is being paid for: not by the Jackson family, or by Michael's estate, or by his plethora of obscenely wealthy friends, but by the City of Los Angeles.

In case you glossed over that, let me repeat it: A private citizen's memorial service is being paid for, 100%, by taxpayer dollars. Millions of them.

If you live in LA, this should piss you off big time. This kind of squandering is not only incredibly irresponsible, it's practically criminal. Heck, it almost makes San Diego look pretty good by comparison.

mrs. watson-parker was unavailable for comment

Well, I got on the boat pretty late, and chances are you did too. Did you know that a website has been set up for citizens to suggest and vote on policies for Obama's incoming administration? Apparently the Top 10 ideas, as determined by voting, will be presented to Obama and the 111th Congress for full consideration. That doesn't mean the Top 10 ideas will automatically be enacted, naturally (and once you see some of the top votes, you'll be glad that's the case), but Obama does seem pretty keen on involving the electorate in shaping his administration, so I wouldn't discount the contest as a waste of time, either.

While I'm wholeheartedly against the use of "voter guides", I do think it's a valuable exercise to discuss the issues on the table. I'd love to write about each of the ten initiatives I voted for (and some of the ones I didn't), but I simply don't have the time for that today. I will, however, tackle one of the issues. I'm writing about this one because it is, at the time of this writing, in first place among all the dozens of initiatives on the website, so it's obviously important to a lot of people. And obviously, since I voted for it, it's important to me too.

Ideas for Change: Legalize the Medicinal and Recreational Use of Marijuana.

Before I go any further, let me just say that using any recreational drugs, including marijuana, is stupid, and I do not endorse drug use or abuse in any way. Having said that, though, I do endorse the idea that adults should have the right to make their own personal health decisions, and the federal government has no right whatsoever to dictate what can and cannot be consumed by an individual, provided it doesn't harm anyone besides the moron doing it. The government acknowledges that we should be allowed to destroy our bodies and minds with tobacco and alcohol, yet doing the same with cannabis is prohibited. It simply doesn't make sense.

But restoring individual rights isn't the only benefit to decriminalizing the reefer; it would also make a pretty decent dent in the federal defecit, and right now we need whatever dents we can get. Think about it: We currently have pigovian taxes on tobacco, alcohol, and other harmful taxable items, ostensibly to discourage use and help pay for any damage they cause. Marijuana would certainly be a candidate for such a tax, so why not legalize it for the sake of the much-needed tax revenue it would generate? Even greater than the money it would bring in, is the money it would save. How much cash are we pouring into police, FBI, DEA, state and federal courts, county jails, state and federal prisons, probation and parole departments, et cetera, et cetera, ad nauseam, in order to combat marijuana? Now imagine not spending all those millions every year.

Decriminalizing pot would drastically reduce crime, too – particularly organized crime. If marijuana could be grown openly on American farms, the drug cartels would lose much of their power. This would result in a drop in violent crime, which would not only save lives, but law enforcement and emergency services resources as well (and again, the tax dollars that support such services). Now I'm not so naive as to think that the cartels wouldn't bounce back, finding other drugs to subsidize their losses... which is why I also advocate legalizing many other illicit drugs, thereby taking away pretty much all of their power... but we're talking about a marijuana initiative, so I won't spend any more time talking about other drugs. Perhaps I'll delve further into it in a future post.

But wait, this isn't Denmark! I don't want to be running into long-haired stoners every time I turn a corner, or share the highways with reefer-headed space cadets! Hey, neither do I, and don't worry, that won't happen. There are already laws in place in all 50 states (correct me if I'm wrong) against public intoxication, DUI, and DWI, and it'll remain just as illegal to swagger around stoned as it is to stumble around drunk. Let's not throw the baby our common sense out with the bathwater ridiculous and unconstitutional federal laws.

So that's my rationale behind voting to legalize marijuana for medicinal and recreational use. It may be controversial, but I stand by it. Washington, Adams, Jefferson, and Franklin would stand by it too.

somehow, this seemed perfectly reasonable to them

Good news for all of you procrastinators, lazy slobs, and irresponsible schmucks: your failure to do things right just may pay off for you!

Take these 88 University students in England who failed to submit their housing papers on time. When they found themselves without dorms (the logical consequence), the school was gracious enough to accommodate them anyway, and found a place for them to stay. Pretty nice of them, huh? But there's a fine line between nice and asinine, and since I'm writing about it here, I think we all know which side of the line they chose.

Nice would be making some grad student dorms, or other similar accommodations, available for the self-displaced students; really nice would be bringing in some modular housing, and perhaps charging them for the added expense (and even that would be a little much, I think). But the school catapulted straight over the nice-line and landed square in the heart of asinine country when they decided to put them up in a 5-star luxury hotel, complete with gourmet food, bubbling jacuzzis, and more high-end hookers than you can shake a stick at. And with rooms going for £50-£120 per day, we're looking at a £700-£1680 bill per room for the two weeks it took for the university to find more appropriate housing. So that means, assuming that students were paired two-per-room, that the final bill was somewhere between £30,800-£73,920 (or $53,548-$128,515 US dollars), not including meals. And the really nice part for the students? They paid the same rate for this Home Alone 2-style adventure as their dorm-dwelling counterparts, with the school generously picking up the difference.

So slackers and half-wits, take heart! If you tend to fail at life, rejoice! For Leicester University has set a bold precedent, and you can now fail no more. Forgot to go to class all semester? No problem, they'll probably give you an A out of pity. Did you shite on the department head's shoes? Don't worry, they'll make you Dean. The more epic your fail, the greater your win! How can you possibly go wrong?

[Related story.]

"searing gas pain land?"

There's a lot of talk about gas prices lately, and it seems everyone's got an opinion on the best way to manage the situation. The topic came up at a family dinner last night.

My aunt and uncle support the plan endorsed by John McCain and Hillary Clinton to temporarily remove the federal tax on gasoline for the summer, which sounds great on paper, but wouldn't really do anything to help American consumers.

My grandpa is in favor of increased domestic production, which means expanded offshore drilling, and possibly poking into Alaska. This is, of course, a touchy area. More offshore drilling may indeed help lower prices, but will it be worth the cost? Maybe. I have no idea how much it costs to build those big drills under the sea and pipe it to the mainland, so I can't really comment on whether or not it's a viable option.* As far as Alaska goes, let's just say there's a good reason it's gone largely untapped for three decades, despite the best efforts of the drilling interests.

My brother opposes increased domestic production on the grounds that oil companies will find a way to screw us all no matter what, so we may as well not waste taxpayer money on new drilling facilities and pipelines. Instead, he wants a federal cap on the price of gas at the pump. This sounds pretty good, especially if you believe that prices are artificially high (which I do, but not to the extent that Matt does), but there are always problems when the government starts interfering in private enterprise. Not only does it run counter to the ideals upon which our economy, and indeed our government, are based, but this kind of protectionism can actually bring about terrible consequences, which is no good.

The fact is, gas prices are high because demand is high. Yeah, oil executives are swimming around in giant money bins like Scrooge McDuck these days, which is an indication that they are indeed giant assholes who don't mind ruining the economy and forcing me to work two jobs and still have to downsize to a smaller apartment, so they can light their Cubans with hundred dollar bills while drinking their highballs and sleeping with Playboy models down at Hef's place... but... where was I going with this? Oh yeah; they're charging a lot more than they need to for gas, but that only accounts for part of the high price. The fact is, there's a civil war going on in Iraq that's brought instability to the OPEC region; there's an industrial revolution taking place in China and India, which has dramatically increased demand for oil; and China has introduced a ridiculously inexpensive car within the past year, which means literally millions of folks in the region who have historically been unable to buy cars, now have cars. All of these factors are likely influencing the price of oil far more than executive greed is.

If we really want to bring the price of gas down, we need to bring the demand down. Way down. This means adopting more sensible driving habits, traveling less, conserving electricity at home and in industry (yeah, how do you think power plants generate their power?), and if you're financially able to do so, getting more efficient automobiles. And of course it goes without saying, carpool and use mass transit if those are available to you.

There are also some policy choices our elected representatives can take, such as standardizing gasoline formulas, investing more in alternative energy, subsidizing mass transit to make it more accessible**, and, dare I say it, raising taxes on gasoline.

So there you have it -- Caleb's answer to America's energy woes. Now if only I were a member of the Senate, I could propose a bill that would see the floor for six minutes before being shot down by special interest puppets :-P

* The topic of offshore drilling is more complex than meets the eye. Of course we have to consider the cost of infrastructure and all that good stuff, but we also need to consider the benefits of more American jobs created, localized shipping (which creates a smaller carbon footprint, as well as reduces oil demand, which goes hand-in-hand with the whole point of the project anyway), and the impact on the local economy.

** For all I know, mass transit such as Amtrak is already subsidized, and I'm just not aware of it. If that's the case, it needs to be subsidized a heck of a lot more, in order to make it a more economical option for John Q. Public, who currently sees no monetary incentive for taking the train versus driving.