Truth in Law and Media

As Published in the Brussels Journal

2006-02-04T11:37:00.000-08:00

First Offensive - The Gaia Wars: God, Allah, Freedom of Speech and the Law

2006-02-04T11:31:00.000-08:00

Few argue, even in the Islamic community among the more mentally stable, that Islamic Way has largely come to define itself in the worldwide public eye as hardly benevolent or socially proactive.

If anything, quite the opposite could be said about current humanity's application of the Koran to daily life. Some elements of the Islamic faith have deteriorated into a multi-national self-pity hysteria that constantly casts about looking for something, if anything, that they find offensive in the first person and worthy of abusive, hostile and violent conduct in return - all the better to quench an insatiable thirst for attention.

Within the United States, the Islamic community always co-existed nicely with just about any other denomination under the Sun. Theology is theology, your theology may be different than mine, but the ultimate goal of all theology is practical, daily application of social benevolence.

Unfortunately, in the hand of misguided local clergy, the overarching tenets of any faith can be warped on practical application.

The recent foibles of the Roman Catholic Church in America is but one example. Largely a 'gay' oriented community run rampant without restraint or fear of redress, the American Roman Catholic Church deteriorated throughout the 20th Century into a procedural organization that molested both male and female children. The Camden Diocese in New Jersey and the Philadelphia Archdiocese in Pennsylvania are two, quite sad examples of what transpired - dozens, if not hundreds, of children were sexually molested or assaulted, verbally and physically, in a variety of formats. Paul VI High School in Haddonfield, New Jersey, is one finite example - the male staff routinely propositioned and then harassed male students during the 1970s, often labeling those who failed to comply as 'gay' as a means of social intimidation and retribution.

These kind of incidents were so glaring and generic within the Roman Catholic Church, as Philadelphia District Attorney Lynne Abraham duly noted in a 2005 report on the culture, that it is difficult to not say that the Roman Catholic Church was officially sanctioning the conduct - hence becoming, arguably, an abusive homosexual-oriented organization from a Church structure point of view.

The observation of abusiveness is not without merit. But one should proceed cautiously because the abusiveness 'template' that underlay the American Roman Catholic Church's fixation with sexual assaults has little to do with sexual assault or the Roman Catholic Church.

Simply travel to the southern United States and sit-in on a fundamentalist 'Christian' organizational meeting. Roman Catholics are oft portrayed in manner that is truly cartoonish, filled with every sort of fault and flaw - precisely what fault and flaw no one can really seem to define - that you would expect any practicing Roman Catholic to have a serpent's tail and a forked tongue, carrying devilishly pronged scepters. And there is active solicitation by fundamentalist Church elders to indoctrinate their youth into generically viewing any Roman Catholic in such a manner. Flawed. Unworthy, except of going straight to hell of course.

What's really afoot is something more Sociopathic, a "you are not like me therefore I socially marginalize and exclude you" psychology. Experiences based upon skin color, regardless of the color, are predicated on the same discriminatory exclusion conduct. "I exclude you from the business world because you are black." The theme underpinned much of American business life prior to the 1965 Civil Rights Act and that discriminatory legacy continues to fundamentally shape the American business and legal landscapes to this day.

At this point, one must be attentive to the fact that elaborate 'rationales' are developed to legitimize the exclusion processes. You are not excluded based on skin color - a sleight of hand substitution takes place - you are now excluded because you are lazy, not very bright, have low morals and a poor work ethic, your skin color just becomes a convenient catch-all. Any casual reading of the Pro-Slavery argument of the 1700s and 1800s is apt in verifying the argument, including Thomas JeffersonÂs writings.

But, as hard as anyone may argue that the basic conduct was 'racist', it really had not much to do with skin color - it had everything to do with those in financial power excluding a dilution of that power. "Less money for you means more money for me" so the theme more realistically transpired.

You can actively see the same theme today, just as robust as in Thomas Jefferson's day, in excluding Social Security and Veteran's disability recipients from American Society - the Department of Labor does not count them in their employment statistics even if they no longer receive any benefits yet remain unemployed. Why? That's a fascinating question that can largely be answered thus: as a gratuity to American businesses, the federal and varying state Department of Labor structure their regulations so that disabled Veterans and injured workers need not ever be rehired in the American workforce, hence saving health care costs and bolstering insurance industry profits. A financial double-bang for American industry in return for a very small price in loss of human life.

In short, the disabled and previously injured are expendable. And labor statistics are fudged to conceal the matter gambling that America's media will be too lazy to inspect further. Generally, the gamble works.

So, we have a seamless transition - a portability of a behavioral template from religious grounds, to racial, to socio-economic. In all examples, the conduct is remarkably identical: 1. A desire to exclude and 2. Development of elaborate rationalizations to validate the lack of social benevolence.

It should shock no one that the same rationalizations used to validate slavery are oft used to validate exclusion of the previously injured from the workforce: they are, supposedly, really just lazy, of poor moral fiber and work ethic, and not very bright because - afterall - federal law bars discrimination against the disabled, hence the real core of the matter lies in some personal defect. To the letter, these tenets were the moral arguments in favor of Slavery.

So, how does any of this relate to the cartoonish characterizations of Muhammad?

Simply take the portable abusiveness template and slide it down the political ellipse. Is there any fundamental difference between how the American Roman Catholic Church handled its predatory homosexual, sexual, and pedophile issues and the modern radical Islamic communities approach to just about anything?

Instead of adopting a human benevolence point of view, the radical Islamic community adopts a "We do things because we can" modality of thought and act. Much like the Roman Catholic Church did with its dysfunctional sexual issues as Lynne Abraham so eloquently noted.

Which, from a social benevolence point of view, begs a question: when, and what, is fair commentary on anti-social conduct?

A picture of Muhammad with a bomb posing as his turban? Well, if the Islamic community finds the depiction unfortunate, it is certainly arguing against itself - the calmer, rational, socially benevolent segment versus the radical 'rationale manipulating' destructive segment that is out for 'revenge' in a series of self-fabricated insults?

Well, that is a dilemma. A quite intellectual one. Using the favored logic of the radical Islamic community, would the cartoon have ever appeared had not the radical Islamic community not favored destructive conducts?

And the media around the world do no service in limiting the debate. Perhaps the Islamic community is embarrassed by its more radical peers. Perhaps it should be. Much of the American Roman Catholic Church is embarrassed by their peers, if not their clergy, yet you do not see the lay community blowing up rectories and cutting off people's heads.

Why the difference? The American Roman Catholic Church, the lay community, reached a maturity long ago in deciphering that the procedural structures of any given institution are far different from any theological/philosophic tenet. And one should not casually be transposed or assigned to the other.

Camden County Prosecutor Vincent Sarubbi is an embarrassment to the Roman Catholic Church, the Camden Diocese, and the lay community because he refused to investigate the long history of abusive, quite illegal, conduct within the Roman Catholic Church in Camden County. Yet no one bombed the Camden County Prosecutor's Office.

The Islamic community, and any ardent proselytizing community, must realize that being 'ardent' and 'proselytizing' can translate into unrestricted, heavily rationalized 'abusiveness towards all, if not just anyone who is convenient, in a manner that is hardly 'socially benevolent'.

Jesus Christ, in one form or another, has been lampooned. So have conservative Rabbis.

Perhaps, in the pursuit of social benevolence, lampooning is not such a bad thing if it brings healthy perspective?

Whether all things community, Danish, American, or Islamic, the more intellectual elements of all three would answer that question in a decided affirmative.

And few would agree that anyone should exert 'law' into this debate to define its boundaries or scope, to impose restraint. Freedom of Speech exposes, it seldom conceals.

- Qi

The Political Ellipse footnote:

The political/theological/philosophical spectrum is more accurately represented - not as a straight line - but as an elongated ellipse. Hence, socially benevolent theological faiths can comfortably sit side by side even though taking divergent directions on 'procedural' issues. Essentially, two entities are tied to the same wooden post, facing opposite directions, but occupying the same fundamental ground.

One can comfortably tether conservative extremists with liberal extremists. Hence, odd pairings like Pat Robertson and Louis Farrakhan easily cross paths - either procedurally or substantively - in espousing their philosophies or how to implement them. Being 'pro' one segment of humanity often entails be 'anti' some other segment as anyone familiar with the American racial landscape can attest - skin color is no barrier to prejudice in any direction. The matter is no less so in theology. Or politics in general.

Pulling the Plug on Camden, New Jersey: The Racist Capital of the World?

2006-01-10T14:56:00.000-08:00

"Uncle Tom!" The epitaph pierced one's ears, a scream, not shouted. Welcome to "revitalization", welcome to Camden, New Jersey.

Voted the worst crime-ridden ghetto in the United States, I moved to 3rd and Cooper Streets in Camden as one of the news media's crowned "New Pioneers" in 2004. In January 2006, I pulled the plug on Camden, abandoning it to its racism and affluent suburban predators.

In the 1990s, Camden provided free bus tours of Camden neighborhoods to showcase property for real estate development. People from as far away as New York City were recruited. What Camden received in return was not New York City development wealth - but a Buena, New Jersey, slumlord.

Ted Laguna, a former minor league baseball player in the 1950s Milwaukee Braves organization, owns the Castle Apartments at the corner of Third and Cooper - a premier, by Camden standards, real estate rental property. The apartment building is located directly across the street from the Rutgers University campus, less than two blocks from the Rutgers-Camden Law School.

Laguna gleefully advertises that he "played with Hank Aaron on the Atlanta Braves" as part of his sales tactic. The gambit is the first of many frauds. In fact, Laguna never played with the Braves on the major league level according to the Atlanta Braves website. He did play for the Atlanta "Crackers" a minor league team of interesting racial epitaph that will become relevant shortly. He also played for minor league teams in Nebraska and Toledo, batting .194 in 46 games as a catcher in Nebraska.

From the outset, Laguna falsifies. That sociopathic tendency carries over into the legal realm as well. Laguna falsifies leases, enticing tenants to sign arguably illegal boilerplate documents and inspection reports that are deliberately crafted to be altered after they have been signed. In fact, Ted Laguna does alter those documents. And he will falsify any document or statement that he finds apt.

In return, the residents of the Castle Apartments get dubious quality. In one incident, Laguna allowed a broken sewer pipe to flood raw sewage onto his tenants for the better part of three months. Instead of paying to have the plumbing inspected, Laguna advised his maintenance staff to harass anyone taking a shower for being careless in spilling water on the floor.

In another incident, Laguna left a broken window - freely viewable from a common area balcony - unrepaired for nearly 15 months. Despite 10 degree temperatures, Laguna refused to fix the window.

Plumbing fixtures are so old and deteriorated that paint peels off bathtubs in large chunks. Urine stains floors. Holes in walls allow bugs and rodents free access - including flea infestations from the dog owned by Laguna's superintendent. Lice also exist.

And the matter is hardly within the control of the tenants. Laguna refuses to pay for anything more than once per week trash removal of an apartment building holding more than 20 units. And he provides only one trash dumpster. In 2004, and much of 2005, the dumpster overflowed an average of 27 days out of any given month - with trash and discarded food littering almost 50 feet in any direction.

Camden, for all its bus ride euphoria, inherited a slumlord.

Much can be speculated as to why any human being would act like Ted Laguna. Greed and racism would appear to be sensible theories.

Laguna refers to his Black male employees as "My Man" - much akin to the pre-Civil Rights nomenclature referring to Black slaves and menial employees.

And, in return for some of the most pathetic living conditions imaginable, one pays $600 per month for an efficiency apartment. In September 2005, Laguna more than likely failed a State of New Jersey Health Inspection - on the date of the inspection, all the conditions listed above were in existence, including the broken windows and trash overflowing onto the street. (The State of New Jersey refuses to publish the inspection report. Despite being a public record. In New Jersey, one of the most corrupt governmental organizations in modern times, anything can be directly or indirectly bought under the guise of 'law'. Including silence. And ignorance.)

Just two blocks away, the Victor Building has garnered the exclusive Camden residential revitalization attention, showcasing Dranoff Properties as a beacon in Camden's revival. The media overlooks that the Victor Building project is quite secluded on the fringe of Camden's waterfront. And that it is hardly exemplary of the type of investors that Camden is attracting. Ted Laguna - a financial predator by any reasonable conclusion - may be more normative.

And it would be within keeping with Camden being the crime capital of the United States - a multi-faceted slum whose economy is largely predicated, directly or indirectly, to a cocaine black market economy that utilizes Camden residents, particularly the Black community, as entertainment pawns.

Gone are the days of fiddle playing servants and token sports stars. In the 21st Century, and throughout much of the closing decades of the 20th Century, Camden remains a gateway to both the past and the future. And like a proverbial gateway, Camden can neither go forward or move backward - it is stuck in "cocaine" idle.

The predominate economy in Camden is feeding the drug habits of its wealthier, almost exclusively Caucasian, suburban neighbors.

All too glaring testimony of that fact occurred in the mid-1990s when the law journal of the Rutgers-Camden Law School would hold cocaine parties in a federal courthouse parking lot located at the corner of Fifth and Penn Streets - in broad daylight, less than one block from the Rutgers Police Department door.

And there is no shortage of ability to generically place the blame: when I went to vote in the November 2004 election, Camden's Black poll workers made it quite clear that neither the vote or presence of any member of the White community in Camden is appreciated. That resentment is palpable, the disgust self-evident.

The "Uncle Tom!" screaming incident noted above occured within one week of my arrival in Camden.

By default, unable to solve the voracious cocaine appetites of America suburbia, and unable to salve a deep-seeded racial antipathy by the Black community against America's White community for intentionally creating the cocaine economy - and relegating the Black community to any real estate unwanted by the White community, Camden continues to spiral out of control.

As everyone so glaringly witnessed, the historical tradition of real estate racial "red-lining" is alive and well: a change in century has not matured the White community's insatiable thirst for get-rich-quick financial scams, including those predicated along racial lines. The Camden County Democratic Party's championing of one such racial profiling real estate scam by the name of Cherokee won no friends among minorities in Camden. It was perceived by the minority community in Camden - along with many in the suburban White community - for what it was: unabashed financial-racial bigotry designed to uproot impoverished minorities in favor of a more affluent White community. And, notably, with White members of the Camden County Democratic Party reaping much fianncial benefit and first crack consideration for the newly "freed" real estate.

The local media has been relatively timid in addressing racial profiling and real estate corruption in nexus with the Camden County Democratic Party and the de facto New Jersey legal community that is, invariably, strewn throughout such scams around the state. Eloquent argument can be mounted that, on a de facto basis, the New Jersey Bar is an organized crime operation - all good efforts by honest members notwithstanding.

The advent of the contemporary Camden County Democratic Party and its efforts to "revitalize" the City of Camden are an apt point in the argument.

What the future holds is anyone's guess. But one suspects the City of Camden will see more Ted Lagunas and fundamentally bigoted real estate development plans like Cherokee before Camden ever sees the light of a positive future.

On January 5, 2006, I abandoned Camden. Or was Camden abandoned long ago into a racial, exploitive abyss? It is, at very least, an interesting question.

I, Journalista: Fashionistas by Any Other Name?

2006-01-09T13:27:00.000-08:00

Conformity in the journalistic dormitories is at a premium in the age of media consolidation - the only tell-tale sign of hope for a substantive Fourth Estate in 21st Century America is the advent of the Internet.

Come hither or nigh, public scrutiny is greater than ever. So is the dissemination of knowledge. No longer is ‘mass’ America dependent on ‘mass media’ as a solitary source of current event information.

Disgruntled workers to societal victims, free reign is now at hand to publish. While on first take, the ability to publish may seem indiscriminate - the Internet does contain as much error as accuracy - the sheer volume of Internet publication provides an automatic ‘check and balance’. In short, more than at any time in human history, the common people have access to a higher quality of information about their societies and about their governments.

All one need do is drop by a public library, or a tolerant university, and login to the Internet free of charge.

The fact has not gone unnoticed. Some attempt to cash in on the Internet phenomena is being made by newspapers like the New York Times and Philadelphia Inquirer. Whether rightly, or harmlessly, an attempt to guide readers into ‘pre-approved’ line of thought is becoming apparent in the online offerings of these news organizations.

The tendency is more glaring at the Philadelphia Inquirer, a smaller newspaper that is more cash-strapped than its wealthier cousin The New York Times. Money buys influence. Money can also free one from influence to a greater degree, and with more agility, than if impoverished. It is the latter phenomena that becomes noticeable with the smaller newspapers like the Philadelphia Inquirer.

While arguments can be mounted that any news organization slants its coverage of world events, some economic realities do apply.

When the Philadelphia Inquirer saw the Internet - that Gutenberg in every home - beginning to provide news content without the need for the Inquirer, it did the obvious thing. It started a website. And it started to contribute to that online news content. But, interestingly, it also started to guide readers to pre-approved webpages that more or less camouflaged “authors” employed directly by the Inquirer. Only in afterthought does the Inquirer mention, if it does at all, that the content on these webpages are written by Inquirer employees.

One thinks one is getting a broad expansion of the news found in the Inquirer - when all that you get is a manicured illusion reproducing the same philosophical news content, content that may or may not be balanced at any given moment.

While harmless in these early days of the Internet, the clear desire to garner a larger share of Internet information - to control what is being read - is apparent. Small, insignificant in the overall for the moment, the trend shows potential to grow.

Particularly disturbing is the promotion of ‘blogs’ - supposedly autonomously written web pages that are in fact in-house productions by the Philadelphia Inquirer. One is reading individual commentary, but with a Metropolis/1984 twist, one is really reading the corporate Inquirer. It is difficult, if not impossible, to distinguish between the two.

The phenomena has a bizarre, but all too real, parallel. Joseph Stalin infiltrated virtually every civic and military organization with ‘party spokesmen’ - for all intent and purpose, a civic official or military officer that looked like anyone else. Yet their sole purpose was to use that illusionary sleight of hand to infuse the Communist Party line into every aspect of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. People would think that it was a government official making decisions in the best interests of the local people. In fact, he was a pre-approved Moscow party line bullhorn whose only loyalty was to Moscow. And he or she would recommend what was in Moscow’s best interest, not the local people.

It is difficult to envision the news industry become anything like the Orwellian ‘Communist Party’ of the Stalin and post-Stalin eras. However, noticeable similarities do exist.

One of the more interesting is the employment of former lawyers as ‘experts’ on news or as news commentarians. While American society is desperately in need of apt legal commentary, all too often, what one gets is a Catherine Crier and Greta Van Susteren - stereotype driven, self-centered, and poorly educated, the Crier-Van Susteren ‘module’ of news reporting is disturbing. And ultimately hollow.

Catherine Crier has been known to conduct national broadcasts on social issues that she knows nothing about and clearly had done little research in an effort to do so. Such an incident took place concerning the federal John’s Law/Drunk Driving legislation in which friends can be held liable for the acts of an intoxicated person. Greta Van Susteren, and Nancy Grace, both fall into a slightly different ‘module’ of the news industry - not only do they know little about the topics discussed on their shows, as a guest on such shows, it becomes painfully clear that neither was much interested from the inception.

As an experiment, when watching all three of these news commentarians, focus on their word selection. A profound invocation of “I” is strewn throughout their language - as if they have personally experienced every topic discussed, whether it is poverty, rape, or auto accidents resulting in murder charges. Ms. Van Susteren is prone to invoking “I’ve been around the block a few times” - in appropriate dismissing tone - to squirm her way out of difficult on-air discussions, usually when she realizes she knows too little about the topic at hand to fend for herself among the guests.

On several national and regional network television appearances, the in-residence network legal ‘expert’ turned to me just before going on camera and asked what he was supposed to be talking about. “All I know is that involved an accident.” Oh.

One ‘expert’ criminal lawyer on CN8 - whom, fascinatingly, no one in his local county courthouse in New Jersey can remember him ever trying a criminal case in his career - asked what he “should say” just seconds before air time. “I don’t want to make a fool of myself.” During a commercial break, the ‘expert’ repeated the gambit. “You will let me know if I get off line, won’t you?” (As not an entirely unrelated aside, it should be known that the supposed expert is known to be intimately involved with female staff members at local television stations.)

Experts beg for knowledge? The oxymoron would appear inherent.

Anything goes in the 21st Century media exploits - anything to compete with the free flow of information via the Internet.

Which is precisely why so many news organizations are banding together to kill Google’s news search engine. Grafted from free news organization websites around the world, Google’s webpage actually outperforms the Associated Press and The New York Times in breaking stories - at times. As the recent unfortunate mine tragedy in West Virginia noted well, Google outperformed much smaller news outlets like the Philadelphia Inquirer’s webpage hands down. The Inquirer was left standing in the informational dust with a hard-copy newspaper that blared a joyous headline that 12 miners had survived. In fact, all 12 were dead.

What the future holds is anyone’s guess, but it is clear that the traditional gatekeepers of information are mourning their loss of control over Americans - and licking their financial wounds as well. The Philadelphia Inquirer - and many of its brethren in the Knight-Ridder organization - are up for sale.

Look for increasingly desperate attempts by these news organizations to impinge on free access to information on the Internet in the pell-mell pursuit of profits.

Media Mania - Killer Lightning, the Internet and the Law

2006-01-02T12:12:00.000-08:00

As the 21st Century deepens hits hold on the American philosophical landscape, public knowledge about that landscape is broadening on an exponential basis.

Mainstream television and newspaper news organizations are increasingly finding themselves on the fringes of the traditional Fourth Estate - as profits of the New York Times and other news organizations dwindle. What is shoving them aside is a new mechanism for disseminating hard ‘news’. The Internet.

Anyone can ‘publish’ in light of 21st Century technology, all too often they do. A Gutenberg in every home.

The media’s inability to compete with the ‘new printing press’ - and its inability to escape manipulation by the very news ‘sources’ that it covers - is becoming increasingly glaring.

While profits have plummeted at the New York Times, wealth and inertia as one of America’s pre-eminent news outlets have allowed it to keep a journalistic edge, breaking news stories like the abuse of the Foreign Surveillance Act by President George W. Bush and the plights of Camden, New Jersey, the worst crime capital in the United States.

Other news organizations haven’t been so lucky. The erosion was first notable with the tendency of television stations to disaster-fy weather reports: simple thunderstorms morphed, seemingly overnight, into life threatening phenomena. Killer lightning and ‘dangerous’ storms are now a common clarion call.

More pragmatically, the erosion of news quality has expanded. Investigative reporting has largely disappeared. In fact, in-depth longterm reporting of key social issues has evaporated from most major city daily newspapers, entities traditionally entrusted with guarding the pubic welfare.

The Philadelphia Inquirer is a prime example, although it is hardly alone.

What one sees in reading the Inquirer is a growing phenomena nationwide: newspaper reporters are no longer 'reading' their own newspapers. More glaringly, they do not appear to be reading their individualistic news articles over a prolonged period of time. Hence, the news coverage is becoming increasingly disjointed and scattershot on overarching social issues.

The Philadelphia Inquirer’s inability to penetrate the Veterans Administration and Social Security Administration is an eloquent point - while dutifully documenting that thousands of veterans' widows are not collecting entitled payments, the Inquirer completely missed the much larger issue of how the Veterans Administration disseminates - or, more aptly, withholds - information from potential beneficiaries. It is a phenomena the that the General Accounting Office has commented upon in assessing the kindred Social Security Administration. And it is a widespread operational phenomena in the private financial sector. It is called “DK’ing”. Financial entities from insurance companies to stock brokerage firms ‘Do not Know’ any given client when it becomes apparent that the client is owed money. In much the same fashion, the Veterans Administration and Social Security Administration fail to publish or enforce their own programs to enhance salary budgets in a twisted stroke of financial nepotism.

While it may seem inconsequential, in the long term, the growing trend of reporters to not 'read' leads a news organization to have a decided inability to make connections. The political rise of George E. Norcross III as party chieftain of the Democratic Party in the southern portions of New Jersey is just one example.

While the New York Times has reported on the overall philosophical elements of political corruption in New Jersey, the Philadelphia Inquirer has largely remained quiet. Instead of focusing on large scale social issues involved with the Norcross empire, the Philadelphia Inquirer focuses on whatever attendant circumstances that happen to stumble into public view. And one should note the words ‘stumble into view’ well. Increasingly, the modern newspaper industry conducts no research. Instead, it takes a reactionary approach as the Inquirer’s forays with the Veterans Administration note.

When the Democratic Party in southern New Jersey decided to return to its 20th Century roots of racial discrimination by reverse redlining a large section of North Camden for redevelopment - by tossing out the current residents in favor of newer, more affluent ones - the Inquirer did report the procedural relocation. Yet it entirely missed the ‘redlining issue’ - a well-known financial ploy that is historically tied to real estate development schemes in urban areas. And tied to unabashed racism. And closely tied to political corruption as well. At the trickle down economic end of ‘red-lining’ one will usually find a smiling affiliate of the local political party - whether banker, lawyer, real estate mogul or insurance company.

The late 1800s/early 1900s creation of Harlem in New York City is but one example of the racial/financial/political exploitation of human beings based on race.

What is fascinating is that, concurrent with the North Camden redevelopment articles, the Inquirer was simultaneously reporting on the exploits of Mr. Norcross and his employer, Commerce Bank. Despite federal indictments, and subsequent convictions of Commerce executives on fraud charges, The Philadelphia Inquirer remained largely quiet on reporting any political corruption in southern New Jersey - even though Mr. Norcross heads the Democratic Party and even though Commerce Bank is headquartered in New Jersey.

While the New York Times documented payola scams involving lawyers and political officials in the Democratic Party of Middlesex County, virtually nothing has appeared of the same caliber in the Inquirer. Despite the death of a young woman after her evening commute home on a Delaware River Port Authority train - an organization dominated by the southern New Jersey Democratic Party - it took nearly four years for the Inquirer to question how the DRPA was spending ticket, tax and federal revenues.

Procedurally, the Inquirer has reported on the DRPA’s expenditures. Yet, virtually nowhere does any overall assessment of that spending appear. It was not until the waning days of 2005 - several years after Christine Eberle was dragged from the train station parking lot and strangled - did an apt-minded reporter by the name of Elisa Ung brave what has become all too uncommon in modern media reporting - she postulated a theory.

In quoting the Longshoremen’s Union, Ms. Ung hit common sense: perhaps the DRPA and the southern New Jersey Democratic Party are embezzling money in artful ways - instead of providing funding to dredge the ‘port’, what was the DRPA planning to do with that same $40 million dollars?

It was a philosophical question the Philadelphia Inquirer failed to ask concerning the death of Christine Eberle. What, precisely, did the DRPA and the Democratic Party under George E. Norcross III do with revenues instead of providing police protection at the train stations?

When three children suffocated to death in Camden, right in front of television cameras as police failed to examine a locked car trunk, the Philadelphia Inquirer again failed to examine the substantive chain of events. It did report the lack of proper police tactics. It did report that the police failed to properly examine the car. But it failed to ask what happened to the money to properly train the City of Camden’s police officers. And it failed to ask why Camden County, in supervisory control of the Camden Police via the Camden County Prosecutor’s Office, did not correct the lack of training.

In short, once again, where was tax money going? Afterall, millions of dollars had been set aside by the State of New Jersey to revitalize Camden. And to support Camden County via the Camden County Prosecutor’s Office - some of that funding in the form of federal grants. On these issues, the Inquirer remained philosophically silent.

To date, even in light of the murder of one of the Philadelphia Inquirer’s own employees due to the political spending decisions in southern New Jersey, the Inquirer has arguably turned its back on informing the public. (An Inquirer truck driver was murdered in the same parking lot from which Ms. Eberle was kidnapped yet, fascinatingly, no DRPA security existed thereafter at the location.)

As the recent payola scandals involving the media point out, it is fairly easy to “buy” news coverage. Whether favorable articles about the federal “No Child Left Behind Program” or news reporting in Iraq, the media has a seedy, on-going history of being on the take. Though profitable in a number of capacities, organized crime flourished in the late 1800s through the 1980s largely on the steam of media manipulations. No serious reporting on the social phenomena took place until the 1970s. And even then, despite open gunslinging, it took a lot of provocation to get newspapers like the Inquirer to tackle the matter seriously. (Al Capone's obituary in the New York Times is an eloquent point.)

When the duty to report the Mafia phenomena became undeniable, the news industry did report the philosophical elements rather well...in the long run. But one cannot forget, from a historical point of view, that it took nearly 100 years for the newspaper industry to do so.

The New York Times, in closing out 2005, printed a fascinating article detailing the New Jersey Bar’s de facto involvement in corruption in Monmouth County. And the de facto nexus of the New Jersey Bar with political corruption around the state. To date, in covering Mr. Norcross, the Philadelphia Inquirer has demurred on drawing similar connections in Camden County. It remains a provocative mystery in light of the deaths, more so in light of the Longshoremen’s Union commentary - a union that itself is no stranger to financial/political scandals. It would appear the union would have a wealth of historical expertise behind it's observations of Camden County, it's motivations via the DRPA, and the nexus with a Democratic Party largely dominated by members of the New Jersey Bar.

The lack of “substantive’ coverage is not going unnoticed among Camden County residents. What the future holds is anyone’s guess. But the rise of the Internet has engendered a broader definition of the Fourth Estate. Access to information is larger and more expansive than ever. And increasingly, old dog newspapers like the Philadelphia Inquirer are finding themselves marginalized and enslaved to revenue, marketing and advertisement realities.

The Philadelphia Inquirer, and many of its large city kindred, are now up for potential sale.

At some point a critical decision arises: When is reporting ‘news’ reporting nothing at all? When are reporters hired to facilitate an expensive, quite polished, delivery mechanism for ads?

Perhaps it is a question answerable by reflecting upon the newspaper industry’s television counterparts and their weather story phenomena: When is ‘killer lightning’ just a thunderstorm?

Gestalt: Understanding the ‘Manipulation of Law’ Cycle and Its Impact

2005-12-26T12:19:00.000-08:00

As America’s great experiment with Democracy proceeds past toddlerhood, growing pains are inevitable. It is incumbent upon all participants in a Democratic society to understand the ‘overall’ as opposed to any singular social issue - failing to do so will yield predictable, quite vivid, results.

In Camden County, New Jersey, the failure of that county’s residents to understand the overall impact of their governmental representatives has led to the deaths of four people - three of them children - and the rapes of three women. Seven lives sacrificed to the gods of political corruption and government largesse. (See note at the conclusion.)

Democracy, in this vulgar case, morphed into a spectacular failure that remains ongoing.

But, philosophically, the affair is predictable. It can happen anywhere. And it will happen again if the ‘gestalt’ of Democracy is not understood by society.

Lawyers, as you shall see, are not often the best people entrusted with educating the public. The interests of any given ‘client’ may not be the best interest of ‘society’. Although poorly understood even by the legal profession, law is nothing more than a careful balancing act. One maximizes the freedom and creativity of the individual while, at the same time, protecting society from the harms that freedom and creativity might create. And the converse is true. One maximizes the freedom and creativity of society while, at the same time, protecting the individual from the harms that freedom and creativity might create.

President George W. Bush’s frolic with the Foreign Surveillance Act Court is a succinct example. At a singular pen stroke, the individual was negated in favor of society.

It is an ultimate chicken and egg dilemma, one entity can be momentarily expendable in favor of the other. When and how one becomes expendable is an arbitrary ‘moment to moment’ thing left up, at any given moment, for individuals or society to decide - as President Bush’s foibles with the Foreign Surveillance Act play out. But singular pen strokes operate both ways - individuals can do much the same as President Bush (effectiveness is merely a haggling argument): The ability to sue.

But what happens when the froth and elation of ‘accomplishment’ and ‘success’ of these pen strokes wear off?

Unfortunately, the curse of any Democracy is that law becomes prone to manipulation. The Foreign Surveillance Act was designed to protect individuals from the excesses and harm of a government momentarily blinded by zealousness. The point should not be understated: Any law is prone to manipulation. Avarice, greed, even good intention, can morph into harmful impact - either to society or the individual, sometimes both as the racial Civil Rights struggle in America aptly demonstrates. The ‘Civil War’ began in 1861, and as many attuned citizens in America will tell you, some 145 years later the closing skirmishes are still very much being fought. Equal access to employment, despite skin color, is one such battleground. A recent case lost by the Philadelphia School Board illustrates that racial equality has nothing to do with any given skin color - four Caucasian purchasing agents successfully invoked the same exact equal opportunity laws traditionally used by minorities.

Not exactly a surprise, lawyers for the Philadelphia School Board referred to those employees as "crackers" in a public courthouse elevator after the verdict. So much for entrusting lawyers, at any given moment, to look out for the larger interests of society.

One must be careful to remember: the Civil War racial issue is not unique to America. The basic conflict is generic to Democracy as a whole and it has nothing to do with race. Adopting a ‘law’ is one thing. Enforcing it, squeezing social justice out of it in any pragmatic way, is quite another thing - usually attained long after the law initially was adopted as the cumulative Civil Rights Acts, spanning more than 100 years from the 1860s to the 1960s, eloquently suggests. Adopting law is easy - making socially benevolent use of it is quite another tumultuous thing, hence the Philadelphia School Board case. And the behavior of its legal counsel.

Two wonderfully contemporary examples are the Rehabilitation Act and the Americans with Disabilities Act - more than 3 decades after the former, and fifteen years after the latter, neither act substantively means anything if you are injured and looking for employment. Sadly, the United States Constitution does not guarantee any ‘right to work’ although, curiously, much of federal legislation, regulation - and even the two above Acts - are predicated on a ‘required’ duty to work. The ‘duty’ vs. ‘right’ to work sleight of hand is still not addressed in America - much to major financial impact and chagrin. If you are an injured veteran in America, one lives dangerously - if one lives at all. Homelessness is normative.

What happened to the intent of these laws? The same thing that happened after the initial Civil Rights Acts in the 1860s. Laws are illustrious goals of society. Once passed, and past, they often become illustrious templates for financial exploitation. Incentive shifts from achieving ‘social benevolence’ to ‘how can I make or save money off of this law’ - it is a basic tendency of human nature in any free market society. And lawyers tend to represent the wishes of their clients in their pursuit of money as long as no law bars the cause. Impact on ‘non-clients’ is not relevant. Hence, the lowest common denominators - which maximize the highest profits - are rabidly pursued under a basic human tendency towards ‘economy of effort’. Economy of effort is a innate biological phenomena, or foible, as social scientiest are learning and it plays itself out quite often in Democracies and free economies. Hence, law should - and often does - anticipate this weakness.

But, just as often, law does not.

Hence, fifteen years after the American’s with Disabilities Act passage, virtually nothing has changed for injured American workers. Eloquent arguments, statistically verifiable, can be mounted that previous injured American workers are more ‘pariahs’ in society today then they were when the ADA was passed in 1990 - exclusion from employment is massive with up to 85 percent never working again, swelling the demand on social services, and creating a tax demand cycle that defies lunacy.

Lost tax revenue from the previously injured is most likely in the billions annually. On just one individual in the State of New Jersey, the federal government has lost an excess of $250,000 in tax revenue - more balanced assessments place the figure closer to $500,000 since the federal government declared that individual ‘disabled’ in 1989.

Yet, virtually every attempt by that individual to work continues to be thwarted by the Federal government. The Treasury Department, on one hand, loses revenue while the Social Security Administration, on the other, quietly publishes that person’s medical history to any potential employer - and it does so to every former Social Security and Veteran’s Disability recipient. So much for ‘privacy’ or ‘privacy law’. The resulting non-employment is hardly a surprise in light of insurance realities.

So you can see the dilemma - that ‘philosophical’ balancing act inherent in any Democracy is a very real thing that plays itself out in very individualistic ways. In daily life, one often is blinded to the overall. In a Democracy, momentary blindness can have major impact.

The solution for any good individual living in a Democracy is to constantly remember ‘gestalt’ - the sum of the unique parts often creates a unified reality that looks nothing like the parts. A series of ‘beautiful’ paintings can be arranged imperfectly in a garish display that is the ultimate epitomy of ‘ugly’. And the reverse is quite true as a gentle browsing of Jackson Pollock’s artistry will atest. Simply remembering to pay attention in an on-going way, once the painting/law is finished, yields an on-going achievement of the original intent: Beauty/social benevolence. Which is exactly what Mr. Pollock did in painting - he paid attention to the foibles of his own process in an on-going way to create beauty - the end product was far greater than the messy parts.

Fail to pay attention in an on-going way and one achieves, generally, an ugly mess. Whether painting or Democracy, that reality is simple.

As always to the Citizens of Philadelphia, where Democracy in America was born, the presence and life of Robert Gorbi at the corner of 4th and Chestnut streets is an all too human example. Procedurally ‘disabled’ but substantively no less able to contribute to America, economically or otherwise, than any one else, Mr. Gorbi is homeless and unemployed.

Mr. Gorbi lives in the heart of America. And he is the very heart of Democracy... and the very heart of what happens when participants in Democracy fail to pay attention to law once it is adopted, to make sure ‘larger socially benevolent desire’ is applied on an individual basis. To protect the individual from the harms of society, to strike an ongoing balance. It is, afterall, the very heart and soul of what good law ‘is’.

Mr. Gorbi ‘is’. He lives less than 100 yards from Carpenters Hall where Democracy in America was first contemplated. Eloquently, he also is just one block away from where America decided to do so something about that contemplation. Life. Liberty. The Pursuit of Happiness. For all.

- Qi

Note: A young woman was kidnapped and murdered on PATCO property owned, in part, by agencies operated by Camden County and its political parties. Instead of providing funding for security, the money went elsewhere. In 2005, three children suffocated to death in a car while police officers, under supervision of the Camden County Prosecutor's Office, stood around outside the car in which the children were trapped. No one bothered to look in the trunk. Money to properly train the police officers was spent elsewhere. And three women were raped on or adjacent to Rutgers University property in Camden when both Rutgers Police and Camden County officials knew that the 911 system covering Rutgers University did not operate properly - the system tranferred calls to Philadelphia and Delaware County in Pennsylvania, and often provoked a 25 to 45 minute lag times in response. The ineffectiveness of the 911 system was so well known that street criminals were more than likely aware of its shortcomings, hence, broad daylight rapes in the heart of Camden City's business district.

It Is Clear: Nothing Less Than A Disability Constitutional Amendment Will Do

2005-11-19T13:38:00.000-08:00

In light of Congressman John Murtha's eloquent detailing of how the United States government treats its war veterans, nothing short of a Constitutional Amendment will break the back of such inhumanity.

All the more so, no difference exists between the Veteran's Disability system and the Social Security Disability program. Both debauch human life in pell-mell pursuit of finances while satiating private employers who fear health insurance costs and their attendant circumstance insurance companies.

Human beings - regardless of civic service - are being sent home without support, without social services, without the requisite laws to protect themselves, and without the ability to participate in the national economy in meaningful ways in order to support themselves independently. If you are a transexual, the Rutgers Small Business Development Center will help you. But if you are disabled or collected Social Security Disability, the lights are out, you need not apply.

One might as well dump all our returning injured veterans, as well as all Americans injured during their employment years, on the corner of 4th and Chestnut streets in Philadelphia. At least there, they can keep a homeless man by the name of Mr. Robert Gorbi - a Vietnam Veteran who lives on that street corner - good company.

What the federal government, as well as varying states like the State of New Jersey, do to America's injured is nauseating and pathetic. And there is no civilization, now or at any other time in humanity's history, that would disagree.

Every single disability/employment law in America is legal sleight of hand that leaves America's injured homeless, impoverished, or in such tattered condition that life is hardly worthwhile.

Until the Americans with Disabilities Act and the Rehabilitation Act are codified into an United States Constitutional Amendment, this country can not stand beyond reproach...nor can it stand in full dignity of 'Life, Liberty and The Pursuit of Happiness' let alone 'We the People'.

If this country can not care for its war veterans in a proper, dignified matter that fulfills life rather than detracting from it, then perhaps it has no business entertaining global responsibility for the well-being of humanity. If you can not do it at home, you have no reasonable expectation of others acting with humanity elsewhere.

*******

The text of Rep. John Murtha as published by the New York Times and the Federal News Service:

REP. MURTHA: I just spoke to the Democratic Caucus and told them my feelings about the war. And I started out by saying the war in Iraq is not going as advertised. It's a flawed policy wrapped in illusion. The American public is way ahead of the members of Congress.

The United States and coalition troops have done all they can in Iraq. But it's time for a change in direction. Our military is suffering. The future of our country is at risk. We cannot continue on the present course. It is evident that continued military action in Iraq is not in the best interest of the United States of America, the Iraqi people or the Persian Gulf Region.

General Casey said, in a September 2005 hearing, the perception of occupation in Iraq is a major driving force behind the insurgency. General Abizaid said, on the same date, reducing the size of visibility of the coalition forces in Iraq is a part of our counterinsurgency strategy.

For two and a half years, I've been concerned about U.S. policy and the plan in Iraq. I've addressed my concerns with the administration and the Pentagon, and I've spoken out in public about my concerns. The main reason for going to war has been discredited.

A few days before the start of the war, I was in Kuwait.

The military drew a line -- a red line around Baghdad, and they said when U.S. forces cross that line, they will be attacked by the Iraqis with weapons of mass destruction. And I believed it, and they believed it. But the U.S. forces -- the commander said, they were prepared. They said they had well-trained forces with the appropriate protective gear.

Now, let me tell you we've spent more money on intelligence than any -- than all the countries in the world put together and more on intelligence than most countries' GDP. And when they said it's a world intelligence failure, it's a U.S. intelligence failure. It's a U.S. failure, and it's a failure in the way the intelligence was used.

I've been visiting our wounded troops at Bethesda and Walter Reed, as some of you know, almost every week since the beginning of the war. And what demoralizes them is not the criticism; what demoralizes them is going to war with not enough troops and equipment to make the transition to peace. The devastation caused by IEDs is what they're concerned about, being deployed to Iraq when their homes have been ravaged by hurricanes -- and you've seen these stories about some of the people's whose homes were destroyed, and they were deployed to Iraq after it -- being on their second or third deployment, leaving their families behind without a network of support.

The threat by terrorism is real, but we have other threats that cannot be ignored. We must prepare to face all these threats. The future of our military is at risk. Our military and their families are stretched thin. Many say the Army's broken. Some of our troops are on their third deployment. Recruitment is down even as the military's lowered its standards. They expect to take 20 percent Category 4, which is the lowest category, which they said they'd never take, but they've been forced to do that, to try to meet a reduced quota. Defense budgets are being cut. Personnel costs are skyrocketing, particularly in health care. Choices will have to be made, and we cannot allow promises we have made to our military families in terms of service benefits, in terms of their health care, to be negotiated away. Procurement programs that ensure our military dominance cannot be negotiated away.

We must be prepared. The war in Iraq has caused huge shortfalls in our bases at home. I've been to three bases in the United States, and each one of them were short of things they need to train the people going to Iraq. Much of our ground equipment is worn out. And I've told the COs -- (inaudible) -- you better get in the business of rehabilitating equipment because we're not going to be able to buy any new equipment because the money's not going to be there.

George Washington said to be prepared for war is one of the most effective means of preserving peace. We don't want somebody to miscalculate down the road. It takes us 18 years to put a weapon system in the arsenal. And I don't know what the threat is, nobody knows what the threat is, but we better make sure we have what's necessary to preserve our peace. We must rebuild our Army.

Our deficit is growing out of control. The director of the Congressional Budget Office recently admitted to being terrified about the deficit in the coming decades. In other words, where's the money going to come from for defense?

I voted against every tax cut -- every tax cut I voted against. My wife says, "You shouldn't say that." I believe that when we voted for these tax cuts, you can't have a war, you can't have a tragedy like we had, the hurricanes, and then not have a huge deficit, which is going to increase interest rates and could cause real problems. This is the first prolonged war we've ever fought with three years of tax cuts without full mobilization of American industry and without a draft. On the college campuses they always ask me about a draft: You're for a draft. I say yeah, there's only two of us voted for it, so you don't have to worry too much about it.

The burden of this war has not been shared equally. The military and their families are shouldering the burden. Our military has been fighting this war in Iraq for over two and a half years. Our military has accomplished its mission and done its duty.

Our military captured Saddam Hussein, captured or killed his closest associates. But the war continues to intensify. Deaths and injuries are growing, and over 2,079 in confirmed American deaths, over 15,500 have been seriously injured -- half of them returned to duty, and it's estimated over 50,000 will suffer from what I call battle fatigue. And there have been reports that at least 30,000 Iraqi civilians have been killed.

I just recently visited Anbar province in Iraq in order to assess the conditions on the ground. And last May -- last May -- we put in the emergency supplemental spending bill -- Moran amendment -- which was accepted in conference, which required the secretary of Defense to submit a quarterly report about the -- and accurately measure the stability and security in Iraq. Now -- we've now received two reports. So I've just come back from Iraq, and I looked at the next report. I'm disturbed by the findings in the key indicator areas.

Oil production and energy production are below prewar level. You remember they said that was going to pay for the war, and it's proved to (be) below prewar level. Our reconstruction efforts have been crippled by security situations. Only $9 billion of $18 billion appropriated for reconstruction has been spent. And I said on the floor of the House, when they passed the $87 billion, the $18 billion was the most important part of it because you got to get people back to work, you got to get electricity, you got to get water! Unemployment is 60 percent. Now, they tell you in the United States it's less than that, so it may be 40 percent. But in Iraq, they told me it's 60 percent when I was there. Clean water is scarce, and they only spent $500 million of the $2.2 billion appropriated for water projects.

And most importantly -- this is the most important point -- incidents have increased from 150 to a week to over 700 in the last year. Instead of attacks going down over a time when addition of more troops -- when we had addition of more troops, attacks have grown dramatically. Since the revelation of Abu Ghraib, American casualties have doubled. You look at the timeline. You'll see one per day average before Abu Ghraib. After Abu Ghraib, you'll see two a day -- two killed per day because of the dramatic impact that Abu Ghraib had on what we were doing in -- and the department -- the State Department reported in 2004, right before they quit putting the reports out, that -- they indicated a sharp increase in global terrorism.

I said over a year ago now, the military and the administration agrees now that Iraq cannot be won militarily.

I said two years ago, the key to progress in Iraq is Iraqitize, internationalize and energize.

Now, we have a packet for you where I sent a letter to the president in September, and I got an answer back from assistant secretary of Defense five months later. I believe the same today. They don't want input. They only want to criticize. They -- Bush One was the opposite; Bush One might not like the criticism and constructive suggestions, but he listened to what we had to say.

I believe that and I have concluded the presence of U.S. troops in Iraq is impeding this progress. Our troops have become the primary target of the insurgency. They are united against U.S. forces, and we have become a catalyst for violence. U.S. troops are the common enemy of the Sunnis, the Saddamists and the foreign jihadists. And let me tell you, they haven't captured any in this latest activity, so this idea that they're coming in from outside, we still think there's only 7 percent.

I believe with the U.S. troop redeployment the Iraqi security forces will be incentivized to take control. A poll recently conducted -- this is a British poll reported in The Washington Times -- over 80 percent of Iraqis are strongly opposed to the presence of coalition forces, and about 45 percent of Iraqi population believe attacks against American troops are justified. I believe we need to turn Iraq over to the Iraqis. I believe before the Iraqi elections, scheduled for mid-December, the Iraqi people and the emerging government must be put on notice. The United States will immediately redeploy -- immediately redeploy. No schedule which can be changed, nothing that's controlled by the Iraqis, this is an immediate redeployment of our American forces because they have become the target.

All of Iraq must know that Iraq is free -- free from a United States occupation, and I believe this will send a signal to the Sunnis to join the political process. My experience in a guerrilla war says that until you find out where they are, until the public is willing to tell you where the insurgent is, you're not going to win this war, and Vietnam was the same way. If you have an operation -- a military operation and you tell the Sunnis because the families are in jeopardy, they -- or you tell the Iraqis, then they are going to tell the insurgents, because they're worried about their families.

My plan calls for immediate redeployment of U.S. troops consistent with the safety of U.S. forces, to create a quick reaction force in the region, to create an over-the-horizon presence of Marines, and to diplomatically pursue security and stability in Iraq.

Now let me personalize this thing for you. I go out to the hospitals every week. One of my first visits, two young women. One was 22 or 23, had two children, lost her husband. One was 19. And they both went out to the hospitals to tell the people out there how happy they were -- or how happy they should be to be alive. In other words, they were reaching out because they felt their husbands had done their duty, but they wanted to tell them that they were so fortunate, even though they were wounded, to be alive.

I have a young fellow in my district who was blinded and he lost his foot. They did everything they could for him at Walter Reed, then they sent him home. His father was in jail. He had nobody at home. Imagine this. A young kid that age, 22, 23 years old, goes home to nobody. VA did everything they could do to help him. He was reaching out.

So they sent him -- to make sure that he was a blind, they sent him to Johns Hopkins. Johns Hopkins started sending bills. Then the collection agency started sending bills. Well, when I found out about it, you could imagine they stopped the collection agency and Walter Reed finally paid the bill. But imagine, a young person being blinded, without a foot, and he's getting bills from a collection agency.

I saw a young soldier who lost two legs and an arm, and his dad was pushing him around.

I go to the mental ward; you know what they say to me? They got battle fatigue. You know what they say? "We don't get nothing. We get nothing. We're just as bruised, just as injured as everybody else, but we don't even get a Purple Heart. We get nothing. We get shunted aside. We get looked at as if there's something wrong with us."

Saw a young woman from Notre Dame. Basketball player, right- handed, lost her right hand. You know what she's worried about? She's worried about her husband because he lost weight worrying about her. These are great people. These soldiers and people who are serving, they're marvelous people.

I saw a Seabee lying there with three children. His mother and his wife were there. He was paralyzed from the neck down. There were 18 of them killed in this one mortar attack. And they were all crying because they knew what it would be like in the future.

I saw a Marine rubbing his boy's hand. He was a Marine in Vietnam, and his son had just come back from Iraq. And he said he wanted his brother to come home. That's what the father said, because the kid couldn't speak. He was in a coma.

He kept rubbing his hand.

He didn't want to come home. I told him the Marine Corps would get him home.

I had one other kid, lost both his hands. Blinded. I was praising him, saying how proud we were of him and how much we appreciate his service to the country. "Anything I can do for you?" His mother said get me a -- "Get him a Purple Heart." I said, "What do you mean, get him a Purple Heart?"

He had been wounded in taking care of bomblets, these bomblets that they drop that they have to dismantle. He had been wounded and lost both his hands. The kid behind him was killed.

His mother said, "Because they're friendly bomblets, they wouldn't give him a Purple Heart."

I met with the commandant. I said, "If you don't give him a Purple Heart, I'll give him one of mine." And they gave him a Purple Heart.

Let me tell you something. We're charged -- Congress is charged with sending our sons and daughters into battle, and it's our responsibility, our obligation to speak out for them. That's why I'm speaking out.

Our military's done everything that has been asked of them. U.S. cannot accomplish anything further in Iraq militarily; it's time to bring the troops home.

Yes, ma'am?

Q Congressman, Republicans say that Democrats are calling for withdrawal, are advocating a cut-and-run strategy. What do you say to that criticism?

REP. MURTHA: It's time to bring them home. They've done everything they can do. The military's done everything they can do. This war has been so mishandled from the very start. Not only was the intelligence bad, the way they disbanded the troops, there's all kinds of mistakes that have been made. They don't deserve to continue to suffer. They're the targets. They have become the enemy! Eighty percent of the Iraqis want us out of there. The public wants us out of there.

Yes, ma'am?

Q Democrats have called for an exit strategy in the past, but Republicans have said that it's a non-starter. Is there anything -- do you think that the climate has changed in Congress that would give your legislation a chance?

REP. MURTHA: I don't know whether the climate's changed or not. But I know one thing: It's the right thing to do. And setting an exit strategy with some kind of event-driven plan doesn't work because they always find an excuse not to get them out. There's times you just got to -- you got to change your mind about this thing, you got to change your direction.

There's times when you just got to say what's the right thing to do? The right thing to do -- our troops are the enemy, they're the targets. When I went to Anbar province, General Huck said to me, you know, the thing that's so discouraging, we got all this armor and everything, and the snipers are shooting right below the helmets. They're blowing the turrets off tanks, no matter how much armor that we put out there. We're the targets. We're uniting the enemy against us! And there's terrorism all over the world that there wasn't before we went into Iraq.

Yes, sir?

Q Mr. Murtha, you say -- your first point about bringing them home consistent with the safety of U.S. forces. You know about these matters; what is your sense as to how long that would be?

REP. MURTHA: Well, I think they can get them out of there in six months. I think that we could do it -- you know, you have to do it in a very consistent way. But I think six months would be a reasonable time to get them out of there.

Q And could you tell us also --

REP. MURTHA: See, one of the -- let me add something else. Let's say you wanted to go the other way, you wanted to put 500,000 troops over there. Now, we can't even meet the goals of 512,000; we're going to be 10,000 short in recruitment right now. Unless you have a draft, there's no way that you can have more troops. And where are most of the attacks coming? On the roads, on the roads to logistics. General Huck said every convoy is attacked. I had a young Marine that -- I went to a young group that just came back, and he said he'd been hit five times. Now, he wasn't wounded five times, but his vehicle was hit five times, and people all around him were killed.

And -- but what was the question?

Q My other question. What do you mean exactly by a Quick Reaction Force in the region?

REP. MURTHA: Yeah. Well, the Marines in Okinawa -- you remember in Somalia, we came back from Somalia and then we went back in. It only took us a couple of days to take care of the Iraqi army, and now we're not talking about an army. What I'm talking about is a terrorist camp that may affect our national security or the security in the region, we could go back in. But not a civil war or something like that, I mean, you know, that's up to the Iraqis to settle that. So I think the Marine force could be in there momentarily, within a couple of days, within 48 hours they could be in there. And if the Kuwaitis would agree and they wanted to put a force in Kuwait, that would be a good place to have them. They could go right down the road.

Yes, ma'am?

Q Mr. Murtha, what about the goal of having an oasis of democracy in the Middle East and the idea that leaving now would leave a breeding ground for terrorists right in the middle of the least stable parts of the --

REP. MURTHA: Let's talk about terrorism. What the State Department said; there's more terrorism now than there ever was, and it's because of what? Is it because of our policy? I would say it's a big part. We have become the enemy there. We have united them against us. So when they say that they want democracy, what was the first goal? The first goal was to get rid of weapons of mass destruction. The second goal was to get rid of Saddam Hussein. Well, they did that. And the third was to -- well, I guess the third was destroy the enemy and then get rid of Saddam Hussein. We've done our job militarily. It's time for us to get out.

Q You said that you had spoken with the caucus earlier today. What was their reaction, and are they willing to stand with you on this, specifically the leader?

REP. MURTHA: Well, you'll have to -- you'll have to talk to them about that. I got a standing ovation. But you'll have to talk to them. (Laughter.)

Q The president and the vice president are both saying it is now irresponsible for Democrats to criticize the war and to criticize the intelligence going into the war because everybody was looking at the same intelligence.

REP. MURTHA: I like guys who've never been there to criticize us who've been there. I like that. I like guys who got five deferments and never been there, and send people to war, and then don't like to hear suggestions about what need(s) to be done. I resent the fact on Veterans Day he criticized Democrats for criticizing them.

This is a flawed policy wrapped in illusion! The American public knows it. And lashing out at critics doesn't help a bit. You got to change the policy. That's what's going to help with the American people. We need to change direction. The troops -- what hurts the troops are the things that I listed before.

Yes, ma'am?

Q How did you come to this decision now? Obviously it's something you've been thinking a lot about, but could you just talk us through a little bit --

REP. MURTHA: Yeah.

Q -- how you got here?

REP. MURTHA: I'll tell you, I supported -- I led the fight to go to war in '91. I was one of the few people that believed that Bush -- Bush One was absolutely right about not going into Iraq. You know why he didn't go into Iraq? He said I don't want to rebuild it, and I don't want to occupy it. That's why he didn't go to Iraq -- into Iraq after the '91 war.

I supported Reagan all through the Central American thing.

This was a decision that came because the troops and the target -- they become the target, and the lack of progress that I see. When I go over there I see commanders that are discouraged; even though they say what they're supposed to say, you can tell the difference.

And when I come back here and look at what's called the criteria for success -- and the incidents have increased, even though we've increased the number of troops -- when the unemployment is 60 percent, and we're the target, and our kids are being killed because of that, it's time to redeploy them from Iraq.

Q Mr. Murtha, based on your meeting this morning, I assume you have Ms. Pelosi's endorsement of this --

REP. MURTHA: You have to talk to her. You know, I was very careful not to say this was a caucus position. I -- a lot of people suggested it should be, but I was very careful about this. This is my own position, my own conclusion that I've reached.

My long years in the Marine Corps, my long years in defense, in reading -- I'm frustrated because in the first war President Bush -- we made some suggestions to him. What did he do? He collected $60 billion -- and I was chairman of the committee at the time -- $60 billion from all the world in order to fight the war. We paid about $60 billion. There were coalition troops, a legitimate coalition.

And I remember calling General Scowcroft, saying, "Get these things moving! Get this war over with! There's 250,000 troops out there." He said, "We will not move until we got whatever Schwarzkopf wants."

And that's what they did. And they followed the U.N. resolution to a T. He didn't want a resolution, you remember. This was a very controversial thing, the '91 thing. People forget how controversial it was. And it only passed the Senate by two votes. And -- but he listened to us. He had a meeting every week and listened to what we had to say. And sometimes he took the advice. Sometimes he didn't.

This outfit doesn't want to hear any suggestions. It's frustrating, and the troops are paying the price for it. Yes, ma'am?

Q Sir, so you're effectively saying that this war should end, beginning as soon as possible, and that all these troops can be brought home within six months. So that's your hope.

REP. MURTHA: It's what -- I say they could be brought back. I'm saying within the safety of the troops -- but I project it could be six months.

Q Six months to start or six months to have them all back?

REP. MURTHA: I think in six months you could have them all back.

Q Also, on a related subject, what's your plan for the Defense conference coming and the anti-torture and --

REP. MURTHA: Well, we thought it was going to be today, but it doesn't look like it.

Q But do you intend to fight to keep the anti-torture language that the Senate passed in the bill?

REP. MURTHA: Absolutely.

Q (Off mike) --

REP. MURTHA: I think you'll see a big vote. Republicans -- many Republicans come to me -- nobody's for torture, you know. And for us to send the signal to the world that we're for torture -- I mean, this is what caused a major part of the change in minds in Iraq and the United States, is Abu Ghraib. And some of those are my constituents that were at Abu Ghraib.

One young fellow, who was the ringleader, at least they said he was a ringleader, this guy was under a court order not to be allowed to see his family because he abused his family. He couldn't carry a gun in the United States, yet they put him in charge of this group that got out of hand. He told them, and they still -- they were so short-handed. No supervision. No training.

You need strict -- Captain Fishback came to see me five, six months ago. He said, "We don't know what to do. We don't know what the guidelines are. I'd ask a lawyer and he'd say one thing; I'd ask the commanding officer, he'd say something else. Were you guys complicit in this? Were you guys in Congress part of this? Did you wink and say, Yeah, go ahead and torture these people.`?" He said, "They're not following the Geneva Convention."

We need to clarify exactly what the standards are. We need to make sure that the world knows we do not treat prisoners inhumanely or detainees inhumanely. We can't -- Fishback said, I'd rather die than lower the moral standards of the United States. He said that in the letter to John McCain. And I believe that. I believe this is the thing that we have going for us in this country.

Q Do you believe that any House Republicans support your position on the torture amendment?

REP. MURTHA: I do.

Q (Off mike) -- keep it in?

REP. MURTHA: I do. He's not going to veto that bill over torture, I'll tell you that, not a defense bill, when we got troops in the war.

Q Mr. Murtha, could you respond directly to what Mr. Bush and Mr. Rumsfeld say, that saying that we're going to get out in six months is giving the insurgents exactly what they want in Iraq; they just can outlast us?

REP. MURTHA: I can only tell you this: Incidents have increased, and there's no economic progress. And we have become the enemy. And 80 percent of the Iraqis want us out of there. Saying it -- you know, the president said it's tough to win a war. You know, it's tough to wage a war. That's where the fallacy's been. To WAGE this war is where the problem's been.

Yes, ma'am?

Q Do you have any co-sponsors or congressmen --

REP. MURTHA: I didn't ask for any. I'm not sure that -- I think I'll just sponsor it myself. I feel very strongly about this thing, and I'm not sure whether I'll ask for co-sponsors.

Yes, ma'am?

Q What's your political strategy, though, going forward? Because you would have to convince some Republicans to get on your side, and there doesn't seem to be any that are wiling to go out on a limb on this and buck the leadership. Do you have private conversations with any Republicans who have conveyed to you quietly, "I'm behind this"?

REP. MURTHA: I have not yet, because obviously, anything I said before this time would have leaked out.

You folks are so hard-working, so dedicated, so -- have such an ability to get words out of people that I knew better than to say anything.

Q Do you have a political strategy now moving forward to try to get more support on this? REP. MURTHA: Well, I'm just -- I'm just starting to think about that.

Q Will you introduce your bill today?

REP. MURTHA: Yeah.

STAFF: Okay, folks, one more question.

Q Have you had any discussions with anyone in the administration prior to coming out with this, the idea that you were coming all the way around to having troops come back immediately? Have you had any discussions prior to coming out --

REP. MURTHA: My experience goes back to the letter I sent to them as the former chairman, as the ranking member of the Defense Subcommittee. Five months later, I get a letter from the assistant secretary. So I didn't have much chance to speak to the administration about it. And I don't -- I don't know -- I know it wouldn't have made any difference. I mean, what they're saying is rhetoric. It's easy to sit in these air-conditioned offices and talk about what the troops are doing, send the troops to war.

Let me tell you, these young folks are under intense activity over there, I mean much more intense than Vietnam. You never know when it's going to happen.

One young commanding officer -- I just met with him the other day, went out to the hospital to see him; he's from Johnstown. He actually was a commanding officer unit in Johnstown. Three days before he's supposed to go home, he walked up to this IED and it blew up and blew him apart. Luckily, he had the glasses on that we have provided for them and it didn't blind him, or he'd have been blinded.

And I remember one young fellow -- and this is the last story I'll tell -- is -- he had pock marks all over his face, shrapnel all in his face, all over his body, arms, everyplace. But he wasn't blinded. And I was so pleased because he had glasses on that we had made sure he'd got, and I patted him on the hand and the vibration was so severe, he almost screamed. And he turned his arm over and it was split the whole way up and his nerves were showing.

It's -- it's -- we've got to address -- and these are long-term problems. This is not something you just put them out of the hospital. You've got long-term problems with these guys and the intensity that they have been through.

Thank you very -- Q Senators Warner and Stevens just talked with reporters on the other side of the Capitol, and they said that they had yet to meet a single soldier in Iraq or at the hospitals here who thought it was time to pull out of Iraq --

REP. MURTHA: Is that right?

Q -- and that --

REP. MURTHA: What do you think they're going to tell you? We're here to talk for them. We're here to measure the success. The soldiers aren't going to tell you that. I told you what the soldiers say. They're proud of their service. They're looking at their friends.

You folks are so hard-working, so dedicated, so -- have such an ability to get words out of people that I knew better than to say anything.

Q Do you have a political strategy now moving forward to try to get more support on this?

REP. MURTHA: Well, I'm just -- I'm just starting to think about that.

Q Will you introduce your bill today?

REP. MURTHA: Yeah.

STAFF: Okay, folks, one more question.

Q Have you had any discussions with anyone in the administration prior to coming out with this, the idea that you were coming all the way around to having troops come back immediately? Have you had any discussions prior to coming out --

REP. MURTHA: My experience goes back to the letter I sent to them as the former chairman, as the ranking member of the Defense Subcommittee. Five months later, I get a letter from the assistant secretary. So I didn't have much chance to speak to the administration about it. And I don't -- I don't know -- I know it wouldn't have made any difference. I mean, what they're saying is rhetoric. It's easy to sit in these air-conditioned offices and talk about what the troops are doing, send the troops to war.

Let me tell you, these young folks are under intense activity over there, I mean much more intense than Vietnam. You never know when it's going to happen.

One young commanding officer -- I just met with him the other day, went out to the hospital to see him; he's from Johnstown. He actually was a commanding officer unit in Johnstown. Three days before he's supposed to go home, he walked up to this IED and it blew up and blew him apart. Luckily, he had the glasses on that we have provided for them and it didn't blind him, or he'd have been blinded.

And I remember one young fellow -- and this is the last story I'll tell -- is -- he had pock marks all over his face, shrapnel all in his face, all over his body, arms, everyplace. But he wasn't blinded. And I was so pleased because he had glasses on that we had made sure he'd got, and I patted him on the hand and the vibration was so severe, he almost screamed. And he turned his arm over and it was split the whole way up and his nerves were showing.

It's -- it's -- we've got to address -- and these are long-term problems. This is not something you just put them out of the hospital. You've got long-term problems with these guys and the intensity that they have been through.

Thank you very --

Q Senators Warner and Stevens just talked with reporters on the other side of the Capitol, and they said that they had yet to meet a single soldier in Iraq or at the hospitals here who thought it was time to pull out of Iraq --

REP. MURTHA: Is that right?

Q -- and that --

REP. MURTHA: What do you think they're going to tell you? We're here to talk for them. We're here to measure the success. The soldiers aren't going to tell you that. I told you what the soldiers say. They're proud of their service. They're looking at their friends. We are here -- we have an obligation to speak for them.

Thank you very much.

.... END

The Money Prince and The Moral Pauper: Why Congressman Robert Andrews Wants Jon Corzine's Senate Seat

2005-11-12T14:10:00.000-08:00

"We've gone from a being a beacon of opportunity to being a symbol of arrogance," says Congressman Robert Andrews.

Of course, Mr. Andrews would know best in his Congressional stewardship over southern New Jersey - a quiet natural disaster if there ever was one.

While Mr. Andrews' comments were quite correctly directed at President Bush’s ineptitude and fortitude for dishonesty, no less can be said of Congressman Andrews: what does southern New Jersey get for its federal tax dollars?

One of the best ways to measure Mr. Andrews is the local rail service, PATCO, in the Congressman’s district and the Delaware River Port Authority that manages that train service.

PATCO is a multi-faceted abyss of financial dishonesty that has killed at least one life - Christine Eberle - and arguably swindled millions of dollars. New Jersey residents faithfully pay to ride the train but they do not get much in return. For over 40 years, the service has been left to deteriorate to such an extent that - even in light of recent improvements - PATCO is unarguably one of the shabbiest train services of its kind.

Elderly women are left stranded on platforms by the trains that do not stop at the ‘Board Here’ locations. Elderly men have train doors slammed on them even though the train operator is standing less than 20 feet away watching the man attempting to board.

The disabled routinely must 'run' down the platforms in what can only be described as a macabre scene as the trains routinely fail to stop properly...or anywhere near the passenger seating areas on the platform.

In Camden, overdosed drug addicts from a methadone clinic are left comatose on the City Hall station platform. When informed of the medical emergency, PATCO train operators do nothing. They simply close the doors and pull away.

DRPA police harass individuals who complain about these antics. In a September incident, a DRPA police officer chased a man down Market Street in Camden - with his hand on his gun - for doing nothing more than criticizing the police officer for filing a knowingly false police report. A week earlier, the same individual had been hit by a PATCO train while attempting to board it in Philadelphia. In order to cover up the incident, and protect his employer, the DRPA police officer falsified the victim’s statement on the police report in order to render the incident impossible to investigate. (The technique is a notorious tactic within the railroad industry.)

Brand new escalators do not work a substantial amount of time. Most of the stations are not handicap accessible decades after federal law mandated such accessibility. And where elevators do exist, they are poorly sized to accommodate wheelchairs, neglected in routine cleaning, and in fetid condition. Puddles of human urine are not uncommon.

While improvements have been made, they are woefully minor and cosmetic. Which describes the bulk of Robert Andrews tenure in the United States Congress. Has he done any good? Well, of course. It’s hard not to when you are a Congressman. But is any of that work socially beneficial to his overall constituency? Hardly.

When asked to investigate disability discrimination in employment within his own district, Mr. Andrews would not return telephone calls or electronic mail. It is a common response from the Congressman’s staff. But that is not entirely surprising. In 2001, members of Congressman Andrews' staff attempted to embroil a disabled Camden County resident in an embezzlement scam that involved - fascinatingly - both the Legislative Aide for Mr. Andrews and the DRPA.

The disabled person was asked to participate in an office kiting real estate scheme at 527 Cooper Street in Camden. The scam involved renting the same office over and over to unsuspecting lawyers. Notably, the office was rented to Pennsylvania attorneys wishing to establish bona fide offices in New Jersey - an office that they really had no need for other than to comply with New Jersey rules of court. Essentially, it was an empty room. Except the same empty room was rented repetitively. The empty law office that could. Until a mysterious employee of the Delaware River Port Authority stumbled along.

That employee was a lawyer. Just like Congressman Robert Andrews.

While working for DRPA/PATCO, the lawyer set up shop at 527 Cooper Street. In actuality, he was practicing law while working down the street at the official DRPA headquarters - except he was no lawyer for the DRPA. He was a patronage employee with close ties to Mr. Andrews’ Legislative Aide, David Mayer. And the lawyer did - in his own words - “nothing” from 9 to 5 while on the taxpayer clock. “I don’t know what my job title is,” the lawyer said about his DRPA employ. “I don’t have one.” A brief self-conscious pause ensued followed by “I guess.”

So, to whittle away the hours, the DRPA employee ran his law practice instead on the taxpayer dime. To comply with Ethics laws, the lawyer could not use the DRPA offices as his address. So he created an office at 527 Cooper Street - the same office rented to numerous unsuspecting individuals, all unaware of each other, all at the same time.

When the disabled individual caught wind of the scam, Congressman Andrews' staff did an interesting thing. “David Mayer wants to see your resume. He’s the Legislative Aide for Rob Andrews.” Oh. Mr. Mayer did not want to see the resume before the scam had been exposed, only after the disabled individual refused to participate.

It was unclear at the time whether Mr. Mayer was actively the Legislative Aide for Congressman Andrews - the House.gov website for Congressman Andrews did list Mr. Mayer as the Legislative Aide even after the 2001 office rental scam. However, other websites are less clear as to whether Mr. Mayer was both Clerk of Camden County and Congressman Andrews' Legislative Aide when the office scam was foisted. Either way, there is no dispute that Mr. Mayer is an Assemblyman in the State of New Jersey Legislature.

What remains interesting about the resume request is that it was delivered by the same DRPA employee who substantively did nothing from 9 to 5 at the DRPA. Just days after the request for the resume, a warning followed once the resume had been forwarded. And it concerned not exposing the office rental scam. “I wouldn’t make too much out of this if I were you,” the DRPA employee said, not once, but over and over.

In short, the DRPA employee was strong-arming the disabled individual with promises from Congressman Andrews' staff - current or former - for employment while simultaneously demanding that the disabled individual participate in the office renting scam at 527 Cooper Street in Camden. The disabled individual had thought his refusal was final, only to have the matter resurrected after forwarding the resume.

When the disabled individual picked up the phone and called David Mayer at the Camden County Clerk's Office, Mr. Mayer refused to accept the telephone calls or return them. Which is odd. A county government official refuses to return telephone calls from a Camden County resident - especially when the Camden County resident had never called before? Nor indicated what the matter was about? Nor did any member of Congressman Andrew’s staff return the call?

No. And they would never do so again. Such is the retribution for not participating in Congressional antics.

Apparently, Mr. Mayer did not want to confirm his involvement in the 527 Cooper Street scam. Mr. Mayer certainly did not want to deny his involvement - the disabled Camden County resident did offer that opportunity. Afterall, that is precisely why the telephone calls were placed.

The DRPA is a federally funded agency operating in Congressman Robert Andrews' district. PATCO is a train service that garners a high volume of cash, virtually all of it within Congressman Andrews' district. Some of that money appears to disappear willy-nilly into the private pockets of patronage benefactors for the Camden County Democratic Party. Afterall, the DRPA bought a boat - now rotting in the Delaware River - that was supposed to be turned into an educational facility. Unfortunately, the funds went elsewhere. Where, exactly, no one seems to be asking. But it is safe to say that the pockets were personal benefactors of the Democratic Party and its membership. At the very least, the DRPA employee who foisted the office rental scam is a personal benefactor of the Democratic Party - and, viola, David Mayer’s political career. The DRPA employee has donated to Mr. Mayer’s campaigns.

Sadly, the matter is no different than federally funded employers during World War II when they refused to hire Jewish workers. Or Black workers. But, under certain circumstances, they would exploit them. The matter was so distended in an indentical manner to the Andrews/Mayer/office rental scam that even Dr. Seuss, Theodor Geisel, lampooned the practice in editorial cartoons proclaiming "No Negros Need Apply" and "No Jews Need Apply" to war production factories.

While being disabled, or a former Veterans/Social Security disability recipient, is not exactly like being Black or Jewish in 1930s America (more aptly, the South), it certainly is not far from the mark. And one need not live anywhere other than Camden County, New Jersey, to feel the sting.

By elegant analogy, the DRPA illustrates how Congressman Robert Andrews and his emeritus staff choose to operate. Can we expect any different in the Senate?

Probably not. As you can see, Congressman Robert Andrews wants to enlarge his territory. But is that to represent or to swindle?

- Qi

Terrell Owens: A Legal Opera of Media-Sized Portions

2005-11-09T11:03:00.000-08:00

“So what have you done for your client other than getting him kicked off the team?” Beautiful words uttered, in a rare display of perception and understanding of law, by a television reporter.

For the past six months, Terrell Owens has been playing one of the oldest legal games in the book. Crucial to that game has been manipulating Philadelphia’s media. To a large extent, it has worked - and it is continuing to work.

Many people dismiss Terrell Owens as a soap opera. Few realize how correct they are in ways they never stop to think about.

Under the auspices of Drew Rosenhaus, Mr. Owens adopted classic legal strategy in how to get out of an unwanted personal performance contract. In short, you do everything to honor your obligations under the contract...but you do so in a way that is insufferable to the other side yet still not violating any terms or provisions of the contract itself.

If the personal performance contract says nothing about standing on your head nude while reading War and Peace, well so be it. If it isn’t in the contract, and it is not covered by default laws that fill in the gaps of such situations, then, well....Tolstoy!

Mr. Owens has been doing the Tolstoy.

It is familiar practice among personal performers who have reached the upper echelon of their professions. Essentially, ‘quality’ runs the legal table: who else are you going to get of my caliber? It is a performer’s market. When opera houses demanded more user friendly ambiance from opera legend Luciano Pavarotti, he would simply doff his scarf and blow away in the winds of all things contract law. There may be a contract but that doesn’t mean I have to technically honor it, substantively I do, but will it be worth it in the long run?

There, in a nutshell (perhaps literally), is the bedrock key to understanding Terrell Owens. Is it real dementia or just good legal “personal performance contract” tactics?

Courthouses are stacked to rafters with dusty examples of how to torpedo a contract. It’s done all the time. And few legal theorists would disagree that Drew Rosenhaus’ earnest outburst for the media was not much more than a carefully scripted and well-oiled theatrical show validating the legal maneuver.

Mr. Rosenhaus said many things besides “Next question.” Overall, he said Terrell Owens performed his side of the contract. And that it was the Eagles who are barring full performance. Hence, the Eagles breached the contract and Mr. Owens should be allowed to play elsewhere.

When David Henry, as astute reporter for WPVI television (notably not a sports reporter), asked Mr. Rosenhaus what, if anything, he had done other than working to have Mr. Owens kicked off the Eagles, Terrell Owens could not contain himself - it took a full six months for someone in the media to understand precisely what was going on. (Video is temporarily available at http://nbc10.feedroom.com/iframeset.jsp?ord=495615 courtesy of the NBC10.com website.)

David Henry hit the reality nail on the legal head. Mr. Owen’s sheepishly smiled long and uncontrollably as the ABC television reporter stood off camera in a quiet demeanor that mimicked an intellectual equivalent of a WWF Smackdown headlock. In return, Mr. Owen’s demeanor reflected a silent blushy answer to “Who’s your daddy?” replete with wink. Or was that more “Aww, gee kids, you caught me”?

The underpinning legal psychology follows:

The Owens/Rosenhaus gambit is simple, clean and concise. Mr. Owens was willing to give up some money in order to gain more money later down the road. Which he probably will get, in the overall, despite many skeptics. He may lose previously agreed to signing bonuses but, even there, a simple reality exists from a legal maneuvering point of view: you can control the future, not the past.

Mr. Owens is willing to sacrifice his personal and professional reputation, temporarily, to achieve getting kicked off the team - knowing full well that the sooner that he is kicked off, the sooner the Eagles will let him out of his contract (one way or another), and the sooner it will be that Mr. Owens will be playing elsewhere. And the sooner that his obvious talents will overwhelm any tarnish to his reputation.

Afterall, the New York Times has reported that Luciano Pavarotti was figuratively banned from some opera houses much the same.

Did Mr. Owens, in good faith, honor the terms of his contract? Unless there is some language addressing behavior, the answer is yes. He showed up. He performed. He may not have done it well - off the field - but his performance did not sink to the overall level of not acting in good faith. Afterall, he scored a number of touchdowns, no?

And if he wants to criticize the Eagles, or quarterback Donovan McNabb, well, the First Amendment of the Constitution says he can...unless he agreed in the contract that he would not. Most likely, he didn’t.

For a little temporary perception that Mr. Owens is a nutcase, and he may very well be, larger benefits loom. Mr. Owens will probably get a contract that he likes elsewhere. His ‘personal performance’ is not different than what Luciano Pavarotti’s acumen was to opera. And being barred from some opera houses was no loss to Mr. Pavarotti - his overall performance quality was much larger and more outlasting than any momentary foible involving an opera house.

The same legal strategy - and ‘trust’ that quality trumps all - is motivating Mr. Owens and Mr. Rosenhaus. If history is any indication, the tactic will be successful.
.
Mr. Owens may not get a long term contract with another team but, it is clear, Mr. Owens does not like long term situations anyway...so that’s hardly a loss to Mr. Owens. Familiarity breeds contempt, Mr. Owens has a large gullet to harbor contempt as his antics demonstrate. And it certainly will not be a loss to the new team - for minimal exposure risk, they get to reap much talent. Afterall, it’s most likely only a one-year deal.

Hence, Mr. Owens will pick up where he left off before the Eagles. And, like Pavarotti after being banned by an opera house, Mr. Owens will be very handsomely compensated for his efforts notwithstanding.

As for the effect on all things opera house, also known as the Philadelphia Eagles, well....like Pavarotti, the house will stand, but the opera star will sing elsewhere.

Look for Terrell Owens in a Dallas Cowboys uniform shortly.

Afterall, he may have exhausted War and Peace...but Anna Karenina yet lives.

Rutgers University: The University of Al Capone?

2005-11-03T11:44:00.000-08:00

As glaring as the headline may seem, Rutgers University - The State University of New Jersey - is a leading discrimination institution in America. It often pursues discriminatory policies to defraud federal money via student loans.

Rutgers University actively exploits minority groups. And it does so for financial profit.

Discrimination, whether racial, age, gender or disability, is a pure act of financial greed. Americans were raised to discriminate against Blacks, not because anything was innately inferior about Blacks, but because isolating the Black community was financially lucrative. No one disputes - not even Thomas Jefferson - that slavery was a sure-fire ‘Get Rich Quick’ scheme that would make modern purveyors of such gambits (the tape selling seminar industries of Tony Robbins and Dave Del Dotto) blush. For minimal effort, one reaped enormous cash flow.

Rutgers University is a modern financial legacy of America’s slave trade. As noted in the “Lying is the Same as Telling the Truth” article, New Jersey did oppose the Thirteenth Amendment ending slavery. Only when slavery’s demise was a foregone reality did New Jersey belatedly ‘join the gang’ and race to approve the amendment.

The wait-and-see approach was no financial accident.

It should not be overlooked that New Jersey probably would have never approved the Thirteenth Amendment unless it was ratified by others first - the ‘wait-and-see’ business mentality is designed to maximize all avenues of financial exploitation. The tactic operates under the rationale of 'not foreclosing means of income unnecessarily' - regardless of whether those means are immoral, amoral, or in opposition to fundamental elements of justice and fairness. If it is not illegal, even arguably, then do it - especially if it involves money.

While New Jersey banned slavery, it has never abandoned the basic business models that inspired, supported, and ultimately prolonged slavery into the mammoth culture that it became. What underpinned slavery, philosophically from a business point of view, is still what underpins New Jersey’s business culture to this very day.

It is helpful to remember, and there are many less than sincere incentives desiring that it be forgotten, that slavery was not a primarily race-based institution for most of its existence in the United States. Whites were just as subject to enslavement as Blacks. One can parse between indentured servitude and slavery but, pragmatically, they were identical business practices as time bore out. Only between the end of the Revolution and the Civil War did slavery take on a profound racial orientation.

While slavery, legally, may be gone, all the ‘shadow’ aspects of slavery - its causes, its financial theories and philosophies, remain intact and very much a part of New Jersey law.

For instance, few dispute that New Jersey slants its laws to favor the rich and the corporate. The favoritism plays out in interesting ways. Employers can falsify weekly salaries to hurt employees, true or false? In New Jersey, it is quite true. New Jersey allows employers to falsify salary records if you work less than one full week - for any reason - during the course of your employment. Employers can claim that a ‘portion of a week’ is a full week as long as the salary paid is slightly more than $100. By doing so, New Jersey allows accounting sleight of hand to reduce Unemployment benefit obligations by employers. Your salary was actually $750, your employer will report - at least for that week - it was much less.

It gets worse should you be injured during your employment years. New Jersey allows employers to threaten you with employment termination if you fail to apply for Social Security Disabiity benefits. Employers are also allowed to threaten to fire you if you fail to appeal any denial of disability benefits by Social Security. Nice guys. But sadly, it gets even more Draconian. They can fire you, not just threaten you, in New Jersey if you fail to play the Social Security application game. The game is codified under New Jersey’s insurance indemnification laws. A careful review of your employer's healthcare contract - particularly the fine print legalese - will often reveal the game.

Should you be injured longer than one year, New Jersey allows you to be fired outright - including termination of all your health insurance benefits. You can continue the benefits but only under conditions that New Jersey ensures as unrealistic and financially silly.

The ‘exploitation’ business philosophy of New Jersey permeates its higher learning institutions as well.

If you attend Rutgers University, chances are high that New Jersey will play the same economic exploitation games that gave rise to slavery, the unemployment insurance laws and the injured employee laws.

Why? Because it is financially lucrative in a guaranteed way. The federal government pays most tuitions through student loans. Once the cash is safely in hand, a university is free to do whatever it desires as long as it does not get caught.

For every disabled student admitted to Rutgers, many dependent on federal student loans to pay tuition and living expenses, Rutgers provides virtually no disability-employment services - it certainly provides far less in services than to the non-disabled, particularly in career placement. (Rutgers does sponsor disability related programs with Merck and IBM but the programs are largely concealed and quite limited in scope. In fact, Rutgers has refused to divulge any statistics concerning those employment placement efforts for the disabled.)

In one example, Rutgers received nearly $50,000 from the federal government for a student attending the Rutgers University campus in Camden. What did it give the student in return?

Well, the student was allowed to attend classes and take examinations but that’s about it. A professor by the name of Gary Sambol, a former deputy Attorney General for New Jersey, complained that the students handwriting was so poor that “I want you to go see the Dean of Students, you are never going to pass a course in law school.” The incident happened less than three weeks into the first year of law classes.

The Dean of Students, Elaine G. Dushoff, response was classic and historically apt in light of New Jersey’s past. The Dean denied any request by the student to type examinations, denied a request to submit medical records, and denied any ability to appeal her decision. A rationale was provided, it is noteworthy. “We have to separate the students for our employers somehow.” As she requested the newly enrolled student to leave her office, Dean Dushoff made a more pragmatic application of the business philosophy just espoused. “If I ever catch you typing any examinations, I will personally see to it that you fail every one that you type.”

While the matter clearly falls into the ‘he said/she said’ category, institutional psychiatrists and psychologists would hardly be surprised by Ms. Dushoff’s conduct - particularly those studying discrimination behaviors.

What is fascinating about Ms. Dushoff’s conduct (she was subsequently allowed to resign her position) was her willingness to hit the nail on the head: the discriminatory behavior was entirely economically based. Those perceived as ‘disabled’ are to be identified and isolated, most particularly highlighted, so that businesses can act appropriately - notably not hire them due to the increased health care costs which are invariably associated with the previously injured.

Sadly, Dean Dushoff’s behavior was just the beginning. Like a starter pistol at a track meet, the denial of the examination accommodation was like a shot signaling the beginning of three years of legal charades that culminated in a dramatic, eloquent and fascinating way.

Over the next three years, the student was targeted by the administrative staff. Non-disabled students were given preferential treatment in course enrollments even though, by university policies concerning tenure, the disabled student should have been afforded seating priority - not due to disability but simply because of being an upperclassman.

In an infamous cheating scandal at the Rutgers School of Law during the Spring of 1995, students were allowed to cheat in preparation for Professor Sherry Colb’s Evidence class examination. Students were afforded extra preparation time even though it violated the Rutgers University Honor Code and Student Handbook guidelines. Needless to say, a Social Security Disability recipient was excluded from the extra preparation time. Every student allowed to alter their examination schedule was not disabled. One student was barred from altering their schedule. That student was the Social Security Disability recipient.

Notably, it was the same dean, Elaine G. Dushoff, who supervised the events. The dean went on to bar the same Social Security Disablity recipient from taking a related examination, then changed her mind with less than one hour in the examination period, and demanded that the Social Security Disability recipient take the test or fail. The student refused. A failing grade was assigned to the Social Security Disability recipient. It was subsequently erased and the Social Security Disability recipient was allowed to take the examination properly and fairly.

The incident may have contributed to the resignation of the Dean of Students during the following academic year.

But the matter was hardly over. When the Social Security Disability recipient applied to the New Jersey Bar, Rutgers University did not forget that the student had exposed its de facto policies of discrimination. Or the examination cheating. And it exacted retribution.

Rutgers University sent a negative letter of recommendation to the New Jersey Board of Bar Examiners recommending that bar applicant 00777-1997 not be admitted to the bar. Why?

Well, no one has ever seen the negative recommendation letter other than Rutgers University or the Board of Bar Examiners, not even the now former Social Security Disability recipient. A member of Board of Bar Examiners character and fitness committee did read the letter over the telephone to the bar applicant. What it stated is a plausible reason why it still is being concealed by the New Jersey Supreme Court which oversees the Board of Bar Examiners.

The letter said, nothing more or less, than Rutgers objected to how the student ‘handled’ the 1995 cheating scandal. No particulars were given, no explanations. And for good reason - to give any particulars or explanations would entail either outright lying to the New Jersey Supreme Court or so hideously misrepresenting actual events through legal ‘spin’ that it risked exposing a larger truth: Rutgers University actively seeks to exclude the disabled, and former Social Security Disability recipients, from enrollment and post-enrollment services on a meaningful basis. And post-graduation benefits as well.

The attempt to block the disabled individual from becoming a member of the New Jersey Bar failed. But Rutgers persisted whenever the opportunity arose.

In 2003, the same individual tried out for the alumni rowing team at the Rutgers-Camden campus. Despite being praised by the rowing coach - in fact, the rowing coach could not believe the alumnus had never rowed before - the director of the Rutgers Alumni Association for the Camden campus, Charles Mannella, began harassing the alumnus. How the harassment took place is interesting - accusations. Not just accusations but accusations of irresponsible conduct, a deja vu to the negative recommendation gambit.

What did Mr. Mannella accuse the alumnus of doing? Nothing more or less than failing to attain required rowing team workouts. In fact, the alumnus had attended every meeting and workout. Mr. Mannella persisted. In short order, the alumnus ceased being invited to any rowing team meetings, events and functions. The situation was so attenuated that the newly hired rowing coach felt intimidated to intervene when advised of Mr. Mannella’s conduct.

Why did Mr. Manella and Ms. Dushoff engage in their conducts? They could simply be cast aside as less then exemplary human beings. But that does not address the financial motivation - afterall, Dean Dushoff was the one who unilaterally offered the “We have to separate the students for our employers somehow” rationale.

A clarifying answer can be found in a 1996 incident at the same Rutgers Law School. A young, healthy pregnant woman refused to take a pregnancy leave of absence. She only wanted to be excused from one week of classes after the child birth. Her demeanor unleashed a torrent of abusive conduct by the Rutgers administrative personnel unlikely ever to be forgotten.

No less than two deans, including the same Elaine G. Dushoff, pronounced the young woman - according to the young woman - this way: “You must not be a very good mother if you don’t want to take a pregnancy leave.” The second dean was a male administrative dean within the law school.

In short, Rutgers University was attempting to kick a young woman off their campus - extend her length of studies at some financial burden thereby delaying her ultimate employment post-graduation - for no other reason than she was pregnant? It may be hard to believe...until one remembers the Dushoff espousement. It’s all about money - that separation for the benefit of employers ‘economic’ thing.

Keeping the young woman enrolled while pregnant meant Rutgers was incurring an insurance risk that she would stumble, fall, or otherwise be injured on campus. Nothing out of the normal about that, any student can file an insurance claim for stumbling and falling. But she was pregnant: that’s two claims for the price of one. And the likelihood that costs would be higher for pre-natal injury to a child is obvious, Rutgers would be on the hook for substantial costs. Hence, a simple economic policy: get rid of her.

Take that psychology and apply it to Charles Mannella and the Rutgers Alumni Association: a ‘no disabled or former injured need apply’ policy now makes perfect sense. Instead of separating ‘students for our employers’, Rutgers separates students and alumni for their insurance companies - regardless of the Americans with Disabilities Act and the federal Rehabilitation Act. If Rutgers can do so on before-the-fact basis for potential employers - a sort of ‘Psst, you guys don’t want to hire this person over here because they have prior injuries’ policy - so much the better to engrandise yourself with your chief means of income, your endowment and alumni donations.

Rutgers University would much rather take the risk of being sued - discrimination cases are difficult to prove, particularly when nothing is committed to writing as Dean Dushoff’s conduct elegantly demonstrated. And you can write Student Handbooks in such a way that any remedial address of the behavior is impossible in a timely way. (The Rutgers Law School student handbook from 1993 through 1997 remains a remarkably evasive document, it imposed no ethical conduct standards on the University.)

As you will see in future articles, the ‘Rutgers template’ on how to sabotage economic rehabilitation efforts by America’s disabled is no idle past practice. The philosophy is a living, portable thing.

While slavery is no longer available to validate the economic policies, that does not mean the overall business model that led to slavery - and supported slavery - is defunct.

New Jersey opposed the banning of slavery. It is historical fact. And it opposed the banning of slavery at a time and age quite late in humanity’s moral and philosophical evolution on the topic. More than one million people had just died on America's battlefields to end slavery when New Jersey inarguably voted to continue it - it is a damningly eloquent point underscoring New Jersey's economic motivations indiscriminate of damage to human life.

One hundred and forty years later, as future articles about MaGee Rehabilitation Hospital in Philadelphia will detail, slavery may be gone - but the people who created it, supervised it to fruition, and then tenaciously opposed its banning did survive the experience. And they spread their learned business acumens into the new, non-slavery financial world. Like a ripple spreading across a financial pond, the effects of that business mentality are still playing themselves out in 21st Century New Jersey.

Tracing the post-slavery business acumen is a fascinating journey into the modern legal system, a system that can be claimed to be corrupt and prone to manipulation. Why it may be corrupt and manipulated is a larger topic. Both topics will be explored at this website.

As for the title of this article, it was not a trite ploy to garner attention: it is current United States Attorney General for New Jersey Christopher Christie who said contemporary New Jersey is the most corrupt governmental entity since Al Capone’s Chicago. In that light, Rutgers University may be the State University of New Jersey in more ways than one would like to think.

- Qi

Speaking Engagements are Available Upon Request

2005-11-02T17:08:00.000-08:00

Legal corruption in America is nothing new. Fresh perspective adds much to understanding Democratic society and how it can go astray.

If you would like a brief but interesting presentation on corruption within the legal profession - and how it can permeate American society - please leave a comment with an email contact. Single speaker, panel discussion, and debate formats are welcomed.

A Supreme Law in New Jersey: Lying is the Same as Telling the Truth as Long as You Don’t Get Caught

2005-11-01T10:23:00.000-08:00

Without doubt, ‘Lying is the Same as Telling the Truth’ is a legal axiom above all others: thinking like a lawyer is, in New Jersey, often nothing more than thinking like a creative, financially successful liar.

Those in the legal academic realm insulate themselves from that bitter vintage reality, and those in the Judiciary do much the same - appealing to their intellectual isolations, if not clinging to them like a child attempting to climb a greased pole - in pell-mell self-reassurance that their philosophies have separated them from the great unwashed, money-hungry masses. What reels them back in, eventually, is a harsh reality. Most of America’s court cases are fabricated: the evidence is falsified and witnesses lie so dexterously that it is breathtaking to behold.

At the very least, it is a rare case with two honest opposing parties, every rarer, two honest attorneys representing the opposing sides - a recent rash of railroad crossing/auto accident cases demonstrates what can go wrong.

The railroad industry lied, it presented witnesses - supposedly independent - that lied when stating that railroad equipment was not defective during numerous personal injury lawsuits filed around the country. Based almost exclusively on that falsified evidence, the cases were dismissed or otherwise tossed out of court as meritless even though a substantial number of people had been killed and injured at the hands of the railroad companies. It is a repetitive scene, played over and over like a scratched recording, in virtually every courthouse in America.

Anything can be falsified, testimony and evidence. Often, it is done so under the close supervision of America’s law firms which provide much coaching on the topic.

The Lying/Truth axiom underpins everything in law, at least everything in the pragmatic application of law as Justice Learned Hand so eloquently gasped in exasperation: if you want justice, if you want fairness in life, you better not rely on the law to give it to you. We, as a society, better rely on the better angels of our human natures. Otherwise, all one is left with is the cold, often indiscriminate - often easily manipulated - realities of imperfect, man-made law that seldom suits any given situation without some degree of tailoring, often a lot of degree of tailoring. Whether the law ever sees that tailoring is up to the judge and, often, it does not see it. (A lot of lawyers come from socially and financially isolated backgrounds, accordingly, their ability to grasp socially benevolent issues tends to be limited. Hence, America’s laws are often ill-fitting suits.)

If you don’t believe me about Justice Learned Hand, simply visit the Constitution Center in Philadelphia. His quotation is the last exhibit on your way out the door. The fact that it is the ultimate philosophical display on the exhibit floor is apt - it forms an elegant backdrop to explore how the Constitution stumbles from humble words on parchment into human reality. And the Constitution can do a lot of stumbling as American society proceeds from dawn to dusk.

Congressman Robert Andrews and the State of New Jersey provide an eloquent demonstration of Justice Hand’s warning. Congressman Andrews is a lawyer. The State of New Jersey is a state dominated heavily by lawyers. If law is a seamless web - a trite adage recited by legal scholars unfamiliar with the daily workings of law - then, hoisting with their own petard, the ‘Lying is the Same as Telling the Truth’ axiom will permeate not just the courtroom, but virtually everything lawyers touch.

Sadly, it does tend to do so.

Attached is a copy of Congressman Robert Andrews constituent services webpage that appeared on the House.gov website, a tax dollar supported internet venue, up until early 2005. The site appeared as presented for no less than two years.

The website, inarguably, is a violation of state and federal privacy laws and it was subsequently taken down and reconstructed.

In return for a Social Security Number, Congressman Robert Andrews traded representation in the House of Representatives. If you provided your Social Security Number, Congressman Andrews would consent to reply to your inquiries. Maybe. What is not in dispute is that representation in the United States Congress was held provisional, you would be represented only if you divulged your Social Security Number.

What is attached to one’s Social Security Number is fascinating. Not just your name and age, but your birthplace, place of residence, telephone number, mother’s maiden name, bank accounts, checking and retirement accounts. It’s all there and varying private companies, legally, use your Social Security Number to track you as an individual. For instance, your bank accounts.

If you don’t believe me, consult your nearest competent private detective agency. Within 15 minutes or so, the detective can have the keys to your Social Security Number kingdom...and your wallet as well. And, if lecherous, within hours that detective can start making wire transfers from your accounts without your knowledge or consent.

But it does not stop there. Your insurance ‘claim history’ is tracked by the insurance industry via your Social Security Number. Every policy, medical claim, doctor visit. It’s all attached to your Social Security Number.

And Social Security Numbers are bought, bartered and sold within the insurance industry in processes known as ‘brokering’ and ‘underwriting’. Hence, a Social Security Number is an all-purpose substitute for the more ‘flesh-bound’ you. Your body is you, your Social Security Number is your alter-ego in a more electronically transfer-friendly format. And there, legally, the distinction ends. The number is ‘you’ without the flesh and blood restrictions. Legally.

The fact that insurance companies buy and sell human beings via Social Security Numbers - regardless of whether they actually insure the people being bought and sold - is not a matter of dispute. Merely applying for insurance, or for that matter, applying for employment, often means that your Social Security Number will be electronically traded to determine the amount of ‘risk’ involved in insuring you and the potential ‘premium’ to be charged. If the premium isn’t worth the cost, the insurance company declines to insure you. And then the process repeats itself. In short, you are ‘auctioned’ in hopes an insurance company will bid on you and buy your risk and, hence, write an insurance policy to cover you.

If the matter occurs in the employment screening process, which is precisely why potential employers ask for your Social Security Number, whether you are hired often hinges on the brokering process - if it even gets that far. The employment reality is simple and hardboiled: an unfavorable insurance response, you will not get hired.

Which brings us back full circle to Congressman Robert Andrews: what, precisely, was he doing with all the indiscriminately collected Social Security Numbers of anyone who contacted him via the House.gov website?

Anyone can speculate. Philadelphia Inquirer reporter Frank Kummer stated he did call Congressman Robert Andrews on that issue. The response is illuminating. Instead of divulging specifics, according to Mr. Kummer, Congressman Andrews evaded. With a citation that the House Counsel had reviewed the website and found it legally correct, according to Mr. Kummer, Congressman Andrews dismissed the inquiry as meaningless: Social Security Numbers are needed to answer questions if someone has an issue requiring a Social Security Number.

The logic is fascinatingly circular. Social Security Numbers are necessary if someone has an issue requiring a Social Security Number. Which is an entirely different issue from: Are Social Security Numbers needed to get a ‘response’ from a member of Congress? It is the latter question that Congressman Andrews desperately tried to avoid, hoping the Philadelphia Inquirer would not understand the difference. And it is an interesting question. For the reality of the matter, and the philosophical reality underpinning all federal privacy law, is that a Social Security Number never should be divulged unless absolutely necessary - even to governments or governmental representatives.

Congressman Robert Andrews played logic games with the Philadelphia Inquirer hoping the power of his office, the tenure of his position in Congress, and the ‘seamless’ nature of ‘needing Social Security Numbers in case a Social Security Number is needed’ would go unnoticed.

The fact that Congressman Robert Andrews collected Social Security Numbers via his misuse of the House.gov website is not disputed. The fact that Congressman Robert Andrews collected Social Security Numbers indiscriminately of his need to have them is not disputable either. And the fact that it is likely Congressman Robert Andrews collected a massive amount of Social Security Numbers is not open to much debate as anyone wishing to contact the Congressman via the House.gov website was required to provide such a number.

Anyone can speculate on motivations but an interesting reality and juxtaposition exists. Congressman Robert Andrews is a member of the Democratic Party. Widely acclaimed as the leader of the Democratic Party in Congressman Andrews’ district is George Norcross III, an executive within the Commerce Bank umbrella of financial organizations. One of those organizations is Commerce Insurance, it is arguably headed by Mr. Norcross.

At this point, the legal issues of ‘constructive possession’ and ‘agency’ arise. When is a Congressman acting on behalf of his constituent and when is a Congressman acting on behalf of his party bosses?

A succinct practical answer does exist: who knows? And, despite all the machinations of law and scholarly analysis, you cannot know and never will know. It’s that Learned Hand thing again. All the laws in the world cannot undo or dissuade the hearts of men and women, particularly less than socially benevolent or greedy hearts. Law can redress the matter after the fact, but that’s a different story with debatable effect and affect.

No one can dispute that all those collected Social Security Numbers, of constituents located in Commerce Insurance’s core marketing area, would not be lucrative financially to Commerce Bank. As noted earlier, such numbers are bought, sold and otherwise bartered within the insurance industry. Even if no direct use was made of the information attached to Social Security Numbers, the numbers themselves can be traded for cash to other insurance companies wishing to do business in Congressman Andrews’ district.

Commerce Bank and Commerce Insurance would be hardly alone in doing such a thing in New Jersey. In fact, the State of New Jersey does the exact same thing: it gives away your Social Security Number and driver’s license number to private corporations. It certainly gives away your private medical history if you suffered injuries in an automobile accident. And New Jersey gives away that information knowing full well that it will be published on the Internet. ChoicePoint Asset Company of Atlanta, Georgia, resells the medical histories to anyone who would like a copy - including potential employers - in a CLUE insurance risk report. Simply visit ChoicePoint.com and you will find the CLUE report listed in their services - it is located under ‘Consumer Solutions’ and submenu “Insurance Reports’.

Notably, the ChoicePoint website contains a sample CLUE Personal Auto report in which the State of New Jersey figures prominently (albeit not nearly so prominently as the alternative sample report that ChoicePoint now hides from public view, you are about to see why). In the automobile insurance CLUE report, an entry appears listing "Payments by Claim Type”.

What ChoicePoint is hiding from public view, and it is included in CLUE reports, is that your medical history is reported - your personal injuries and the amount paid to provide your medical care. On page 4 of the actual CLUE report, your medical history will be divulged in an explanation. The amount of your medical expenses will be noted under “ME”. Any medical payments will be noted under “MP”. And any bodily injury claims will be noted as “BI”. Of course, there is always the handy “OT” entry - the ubiquitous ‘other’ category that can give potential employers a more well-rounded idea that you may be a medical risk.

Like Congressman Andrews, ChoicePoint Asset Company changed its website in the past year to hide the full nature of the CLUE reports from public view.

Whether the State of New Jersey engages in this ‘trading’ of medical histories for profit remains to be seen as the State of New Jersey abides by a closed-lip policy when inquiries are made about its use of Social Security Numbers in general - the Office of Disability Assessment in Trenton is one example.

But there is no doubt that New Jersey engages in the Social Security Number trade, replete with medical histories, with private corporations. It is a fascinating historical anomaly that New Jersey opposed the adoption of the Thirteenth Amendment banning slavery in 1865. Ultimately, New Jersey did ratify the amendment, belatedly, when the matter was a foregone reality. One hundred and forty years later, is it really a surprise to find New Jersey trading human beings by surrogate via Social Security Numbers and medical histories?

What does ChoicePoint do with the CLUE reports? Virtually anyone can buy them, notably potential employers. There is no law against a potential employer from doing so. Even if there were, one must remember the first legal axiom and Justice Learned Hand: even if there was such a law, who’s going to police it? And how will they do so? One can come up with answers to the dilemma. But, just as assuredly, one will find oneself inspecting the last wall as one leaves the Constitution Center with some introspection.

The significance of the ChoicePoint CLUE report should not be understated - it is an elegant lifting of the hem allowing a seamy view of insurance industry practices, like brokering, that are not held open to public view.

From the ChoicePoint CLUE report, it is a very short walk to the hiring officers at America’s corporations, even America’s law firms. For it is not an uncommon refrain, as abhorrent as it may seem on first blush, to hear a legal entity ask a prospective recruit: “So, what’s it like to be in a car accident.” Or, “Do you limp?” followed by a request for the employment candidate to walk around the law firm. And that’s if there is not total admonition altogether: “You better get that fixed, no one in the legal profession is going to hire you.” All the examples involved a former Social Security Disability recipient. In the last example, the legal entity subsequently denied that the potential recruit ever submitted an application - despite the interview, despite the fact that the application was hand-delivered - in order to take advantage of the first legal axiom, in order to escape redress.

Two of the legal entities are State of New Jersey agencies - the Camden County Prosecutor’s Office and Burlington County Prosecutor’s Office. One first assistant prosecutor, James Lynch, and one unit director, Deborah Siegrist, made the ‘car accident’ and ‘you better get that fixed’ statements. Surprised? In light of the CLUE report and Congressman Robert Andrews, it is hard to be so.

The full clarity of these legal charades comes into focus with Walmart and an internal Board of Directors memorandum concerning health care costs and how to keep such costs low. Page 14 of that report is attached adjacent to this essay.

“A healthier workforce will lead to lower health insurance costs, lower
absenteeism through fewer sick days, and higher productivity. It will be far easier
to attract and retain a healthier workforce than it will be to change behavior in an
existing one. These moves would also dissuade unhealthy people from coming
to work at Wal-Mart. Even a modest shift in Wal-Mart’s ability to attract and
retain a healthier workforce could result in significant savings: $220 million to
$670 million in FY2011. The key tasks in implementing this fourth bold step,
once the team has developed a more complete list of actions, are to create a
clear set of metrics to measure success, to run pilots in several stores to
understand each idea’s effectiveness, and then roll out the most successful ones.”

In short, ‘no previously injured need apply’ - a more clear espousement of ‘complete list of actions’. At the very least, you may apply but the ‘clear set of metrics to measure success’ will not include you. You may legally be invited in America but you are neither welcomed nor wanted. And state and national employment statistics concerning former Social Security Disability recipients, Veteran’s Disability recipients, and the disabled in general, aptly testify to this reality: over two-third live below the federal poverty line.

And do not look to the Judiciary of New Jersey for any common sense salvations. When a Social Security Disability recipient, and former auto accident victim, applied to the New Jersey Bar as a means of economic rehabilitation, the Judiciary responded swiftly and, in light of the above, aptly: "Do you mean to tell me you had absolutely no employment during all this time?"

The Supreme Court of the State of New Jersey, in 1997, went on to delay the disabled individual's admission for 5 months, refused to publish that he had passed the bar examination, and ultimately left his bar application sitting in a file cabinet. The period of non-employment complained about by the Judiciary was the exact period of time that the person was learning to walk again after suffering massive leg injuries. The bar admission number of the disabled person is 00777-1997.

So, you can see, all the federal and state laws, like Humpty Dumpty and all the King’s Men, cannot put integrity and social benevolence back together again. They certainly cannot do so in light of pell-mell corporate pursuit for profits and its attendant circumstance ‘corrosive’ and ‘coercive’ impact on the legal community. As the proposed Walmart policy indicates, it is financially lucrative to hire only ‘healthy’ workers. Previously injured Americans are not, by any definition, healthy. They may be modestly so but only within the realities of their pre-existing injuries.

As any good insurance underwriter, or any insurance defense lawyer, will tell you: pre-existing injury means increased risk that insurance costs later on will be higher.

State governments face a Hobbesian dilemma: corporations are, legally, people too. Do you favor corporations over individuals or individuals over corporations? All too often the question is answered by which constituent donates the most money to the state through tax dollars. Usually, that is the corporate ‘individual’. And hence, legally, preferential treatment is accorded to corporate individuals in crafting State of New Jersey’s laws. (For instance, a little more than $100 dollars in paid salary counts as ‘a full work week’ in New Jersey for unemployment insurance purposes. So you work one day in New Jersey, your employer is allowed to claim that you worked a full week and pro-rate your weekly salary accordingly. So, instead of receiving 60 percent of $500 as unemployment benefits, often New Jersey residents receive substantially less.)

And the same quirk of favoritism applies to the formerly injured in New Jersey that is Machiavellian. To put it simply, good luck in finding and retaining employment. Chances are, in New Jersey, you will not do either if you are a former Social Security Disability recipient. The ChoicePoint CLUE report shows you how it is done.

Law as a seamless, benevolent thing is a fallacy as so eloquently noted, philosophically, by Justice Learned Hand.

Pragmatically, as noted by the conduct of Congressman Robert Andrews, the State of New Jersey in nexus with ChoicePoint, and the corporate realities espoused in the Walmart internal memorandum, even in light of the Supreme Court of New Jersey conduct regarding one of its own, a blind reliance by society - without diligent regular checkups - on the fault and flaw of man-made law unveils a more harsh reality. If it were a football score, it would be: Manipulation of the Law, 72, Socially Benevolent and Balanced Intent of the Law, 0.

As much as there is the Americans with Disabilities Act and the federal Rehabilitation Act, there is a Walmart, an insurance industry and a Congressman Rob Andrews to craft ‘Sleight of Hand’ as the House.gov website demonstrates - corporate greed wins, individuals lose, law not withstanding.

Lying and manipulation of the law is the same as telling the truth, legally...as long as you don’t get caught...in the State of New Jersey.

- Qi

2005-11-01T09:12:00.000-08:00

Congressman Robert Andrews website appearing at the House.gov web address. Your tax dollars at work...but only if you provide a Social Security Number?

An internal Walmart memorandum to the Board of Directors published as well by the New York Times in full. Page 14 outlines the future hiring policies of Walmart.

Read at Your Own Peril: An Overview of Legal Corruption by Analogy

2005-10-30T14:10:00.000-08:00

The fact that legal corruption exists is not a disputed thing - Aristophanes of ancient Greece lampooned legal corruption in Athens almost 2,500 years ago in his classic "The Birds".

Why legal corruption exists is a subject of debate. But it should not escape any experienced eye - young or old - that there are four, not three, branches to any effective government: the executive, legislative and judicial. The fourth branch is the independent 'media' whether it is organized or simply errant commentary.

Often, the organized media refuses to take up that yoke. One gets a proliferation of Bill O'Reillys, Catherine Criers and Nancy Graces...one seldom gets Edward R. Murrows, much less thoughtful, mindful commentary and inspection.

As the 21st Century turns farther into the future, it is not a useless thing to observe that the 'media' of today is not much different - in any substantive aspect - than the media in 1800. The technology upon which that media plays itself has evolved but the substantive issues of what is conveyed remain strikingly identical. James Callendar to Nancy Grace, all is but a twist of time and name? It is, at the very least, an interesting road in history to inspect.

Parts of that road are priceless: Edward R. Murrow made a speech in 1958 that defies time and circumstances. Although emersed within his times, the tenets harken to all ages of the human endeavor old and new. Mr. Murrow easily could have been standing on a street corner in ancient Athens as much as sitting in a cafe in contemporary Philadelphia, one is merely haggling over the technological means of media, not the substance nor the foibles.

As always, read at your own peril but...please, read thoughtfully and mindfully. It is but a short walk from journalistic corruption to legal corruption for the templates are much the same.

- Qi

******

EDWARD R. MURROW
RTNDA Convention
Chicago
October 25, 1958

This just might do nobody any good. At the end of this discourse a few people may accuse this reporter of fouling his own comfortable nest, and your organization may be accused of having given hospitality to heretical and even dangerous thoughts. But the elaborate structure of networks, advertising agencies and sponsors will not be shaken or altered. It is my desire, if not my duty, to try to talk to you journeymen with some candor about what is happening to radio and television.

I have no technical advice or counsel to offer those of you who labor in this vineyard that produces words and pictures. You will forgive me for not telling you that instruments with which you work are miraculous, that your responsibility is unprecedented or that your aspirations are frequently frustrated. It is not necessary to remind you that the fact that your voice is amplified to the degree where it reaches from one end of the country to the other does not confer upon you greater wisdom or understanding than you possessed when your voice reached only from one end of the bar to the other. All of these things you know.

You should also know at the outset that, in the manner of witnesses before Congressional committees, I appear here voluntarily-by invitation-that I am an employee of the Columbia Broadcasting System, that I am neither an officer nor a director of that corporation and that these remarks are of a "do-it-yourself" nature. If what I have to say is responsible, then I alone am responsible for the saying of it. Seeking neither approbation from my employers, nor new sponsors, nor acclaim from the critics of radio and television, I cannot well be disappointed. Believing that potentially the commercial system of broadcasting as practiced in this country is the best and freest yet devised, I have decided to express my concern about what I believe to be happening to radio and television. These instruments have been good to me beyond my due. There exists in mind no reasonable grounds for personal complaint. I have no feud, either with my employers, any sponsors, or with the professional critics of radio and television. But I am seized with an abiding fear regarding what these two instruments are doing to our society, our culture and our heritage.

Our history will be what we make it. And if there are any historians about fifty or a hundred years from now, and there should be preserved the kinescopes for one week of all three networks, they will there find recorded in black and white, or color, evidence of decadence, escapism and insulation from the realities of the world in which we live. I invite your attention to the television schedules of all networks between the hours of 8 and 11 p.m., Eastern Time. Here you will find only fleeting and spasmodic reference to the fact that this nation is in mortal danger. There are, it is true, occasional informative programs presented in that intellectual ghetto on Sunday afternoons. But during the daily peak viewing periods, television in the main insulates us from the realities of the world in which we live. If this state of affairs continues, we may alter an advertising slogan to read: LOOK NOW, PAY LATER.

For surely we shall pay for using this most powerful instrument of communication to insulate the citizenry from the hard and demanding realities which must be faced if we are to survive. I mean the word survive literally. If there were to be a competition in indifference, or perhaps in insulation from reality, then Nero and his fiddle, Chamberlain and his umbrella, could not find a place on an early afternoon sustaining show. If Hollywood were to run out of Indians, the program schedules would be mangled beyond all recognition. Then some courageous soul with a small budget might be able to do a documentary telling what, in fact, we have done--and are still doing--to the Indians in this country. But that would be unpleasant. And we must at all costs shield the sensitive citizens from anything that is unpleasant.

I am entirely persuaded that the American public is more reasonable, restrained and more mature than most of our industry's program planners believe. Their fear of controversy is not warranted by the evidence. I have reason to know, as do many of you, that when the evidence on a controversial subject is fairly and calmly presented, the public recognizes it for what it is--an effort to illuminate rather than to agitate.

Several years ago, when we undertook to do a program on Egypt and Israel, well-meaning, experienced and intelligent friends shook their heads and said, "This you cannot do--you will be handed your head. It is an emotion-packed controversy, and there is no room for reason in it." We did the program. Zionists, anti-Zionists, the friends of the Middle East, Egyptian and Israeli officials said, with a faint tone of surprise, "It was a fair count. The information was there. We have no complaints."

Our experience was similar with two half-hour programs dealing with cigarette smoking and lung cancer. Both the medical profession and the tobacco industry cooperated in a rather wary fashion. But in the end of the day they were both reasonably content. The subject of radioactive fall-out and the banning of nuclear tests was, and is, highly controversial. But according to what little evidence there is, viewers were prepared to listen to both sides with reason and restraint. This is not said to claim any special or unusual competence in the presentation of controversial subjects, but rather to indicate that timidity in these areas is not warranted by the evidence.

Recently, network spokesmen have been disposed to complain that the professional critics of television have been "rather beastly." There have been hints that somehow competition for the advertising dollar has caused the critics of print to gang up on television and radio. This reporter has no desire to defend the critics. They have space in which to do that on their own behalf. But it remains a fact that the newspapers and magazines are the only instruments of mass communication which remain free from sustained and regular critical comment. If the network spokesmen are so anguished about what appears in print, let them come forth and engage in a little sustained and regular comment regarding newspapers and magazines. It is an ancient and sad fact that most people in network television, and radio, have an exaggerated regard for what appears in print. And there have been cases where executives have refused to make even private comment or on a program for which they were responsible until they heard'd the reviews in print. This is hardly an exhibition confidence.

The oldest excuse of the networks for their timidity is their youth. Their spokesmen say, "We are young; we have not developed the traditions nor acquired the experience of the older media." If they but knew it, they are building those traditions, creating those precedents everyday. Each time they yield to a voice from Washington or any political pressure, each time they eliminate something that might offend some section of the community, they are creating their own body of precedent and tradition. They are, in fact, not content to be "half safe."

Nowhere is this better illustrated than by the fact that the chairman of the Federal Communications Commission publicly prods broadcasters to engage in their legal right to editorialize. Of course, to undertake an editorial policy, overt and clearly labeled, and obviously unsponsored, requires a station or a network to be responsible. Most stations today probably do not have the manpower to assume this responsibility, but the manpower could be recruited. Editorials would not be profitable; if they had a cutting edge, they might even offend. It is much easier, much less troublesome, to use the money-making machine of television and radio merely as a conduit through which to channel anything that is not libelous, obscene or defamatory. In that way one has the illusion of power without responsibility.

So far as radio--that most satisfying and rewarding instrument--is concerned, the diagnosis of its difficulties is rather easy. And obviously I speak only of news and information. In order to progress, it need only go backward. To the time when singing commercials were not allowed on news reports, when there was no middle commercial in a 15-minute news report, when radio was rather proud, alert and fast. I recently asked a network official, "Why this great rash of five-minute news reports (including three commercials) on weekends?" He replied, "Because that seems to be the only thing we can sell."

In this kind of complex and confusing world, you can't tell very much about the why of the news in broadcasts where only three minutes is available for news. The only man who could do that was Elmer Davis, and his kind aren't about any more. If radio news is to be regarded as a commodity, only acceptable when saleable, then I don't care what you call it--I say it isn't news.

My memory also goes back to the time when the fear of a slight reduction in business did not result in an immediate cutback in bodies in the news and public affairs department, at a time when network profits had just reached an all-time high. We would all agree, I think, that whether on a station or a network, the stapling machine is a poor substitute for a newsroom typewriter.

One of the minor tragedies of television news and information is that the networks will not even defend their vital interests. When my employer, CBS, through a combination of enterprise and good luck, did an interview with Nikita Khrushchev, the President uttered a few ill-chosen, uninformed words on the subject, and the network practically apologized. This produced a rarity. Many newspapers defended the CBS right to produce the program and commended it for initiative. But the other networks remained silent.

Likewise, when John Foster Dulles, by personal decree, banned American journalists from going to Communist China, and subsequently offered contradictory explanations, for his fiat the networks entered only a mild protest. Then they apparently forgot the unpleasantness. Can it be that this national industry is content to serve the public interest only with the trickle of news that comes out of Hong Kong, to leave its viewers in ignorance of the cataclysmic changes that are occurring in a nation of six hundred million people? I have no illusions about the difficulties reporting from a dictatorship, but our British and French allies have been better served--in their public interest--with some very useful information from their reporters in Communist China.

One of the basic troubles with radio and television news is that both instruments have grown up as an incompatible combination of show business, advertising and news. Each of the three is a rather bizarre and demanding profession. And when you get all three under one roof, the dust never settles. The top management of the networks with a few notable exceptions, has been trained in advertising, research, sales or show business. But by the nature of the coporate structure, they also make the final and crucial decisions having to do with news and public affairs. Frequently they have neither the time nor the competence to do this. It is not easy for the same small group of men to decide whether to buy a new station for millions of dollars, build a new building, alter the rate card, buy a new Western, sell a soap opera, decide what defensive line to take in connection with the latest Congressional inquiry, how much money to spend on promoting a new program, what additions or deletions should be made in the existing covey or clutch of vice-presidents, and at the same time-- frequently on the same long day--to give mature, thoughtful consideration to the manifold problems that confront those who are charged with the responsibility for news and public affairs.

Sometimes there is a clash between the public interest and the corporate interest. A telephone call or a letter from the proper quarter in Washington is treated rather more seriously than a communication from an irate but not politically potent viewer. It is tempting enough to give away a little air time for frequently irresponsible and unwarranted utterances in an effort to temper the wind of criticism.

Upon occasion, economics and editorial judgment are in conflict. And there is no law which says that dollars will be defeated by duty. Not so long ago the President of the United States delivered a television address to the nation. He was discoursing on the possibility or probability of war between this nation and the Soviet Union and Communist China--a reasonably compelling subject. Two networks CBS and NBC, delayed that broadcast for an hour and fifteen minutes. If this decision was dictated by anything other than financial reasons, the networks didn't deign to explain those reasons. That hour-and-fifteen-minute delay, by the way, is about twice the time required for an ICBM to travel from the Soviet Union to major targets in the United States. It is difficult to believe that this decision was made by men who love, respect and understand news.

So far, I have been dealing largely with the deficit side of the ledger, and the items could be expanded. But I have said, and I believe, that potentially we have in this country a free enterprise system of radio and television which is superior to any other. But to achieve its promise, it must be both free and enterprising. There is no suggestion here that networks or individual stations should operate as philanthropies. But I can find nothing in the Bill of Rights or the Communications Act which says that they must increase their net profits each year, lest the Republic collapse. I do not suggest that news and information should be subsidized by foundations or private subscriptions. I am aware that the networks have expended, and are expending, very considerable sums of money on public affairs programs from which they cannot hope to receive any financial reward. I have had the privilege at CBS of presiding over a considerable number of such programs. I testify, and am able to stand here and say, that I have never had a program turned down by my superiors because of the money it would cost.

But we all know that you cannot reach the potential maximum audience in marginal time with a sustaining program. This is so because so many stations on the network--any network--will decline to carry it. Every licensee who applies for a grant to operate in the public interest, convenience and necessity makes certain promises as to what he will do in terms of program content. Many recipients of licenses have, in blunt language, welshed on those promises. The money-making machine somehow blunts their memories. The only remedy for this is closer inspection and punitive action by the F.C.C. But in the view of many this would come perilously close to supervision of program content by a federal agency.

So it seems that we cannot rely on philanthropic support or foundation subsidies; we cannot follow the "sustaining route"--the networks cannot pay all the freight--and the F.C.C. cannot or will not discipline those who abuse the facilities that belong to the public. What, then, is the answer? Do we merely stay in our comfortable nests, concluding that the obligation of these instruments has been discharged when we work at the job of informing the public for a minimum of time? Or do we believe that the preservation of the Republic is a seven-day-a-week job, demanding more awareness, better skills and more perseverance than we have yet contemplated.

I am frightened by the imbalance, the constant striving to reach the largest possible audience for everything; by the absence of a sustained study of the state of the nation. Heywood Broun once said, "No body politic is healthy until it begins to itch." I would like television to produce some itching pills rather than this endless outpouring of tranquilizers. It can be done. Maybe it won't be, but it could. Let us not shoot the wrong piano player. Do not be deluded into believing that the titular heads of the networks control what appears on their networks. They all have better taste. All are responsible to stockholders, and in my experience all are honorable men. But they must schedule what they can sell in the public market.

And this brings us to the nub of the question. In one sense it rather revolves around the phrase heard frequently along Madison Avenue: The Corporate Image. I am not precisely sure what this phrase means, but I would imagine that it reflects a desire on the part of the corporations who pay the advertising bills to have the public image, or believe that they are not merely bodies with no souls, panting in pursuit of elusive dollars. They would like us to believe that they can distinguish between the public good and the private or corporate gain. So the question is this: Are the big corporations who pay the freight for radio and television programs wise to use that time exclusively for the sale of goods and services? Is it in their own interest and that of the stockholders so to do? The sponsor of an hour's television program is not buying merely the six minutes devoted to commercial message. He is determining, within broad limits, the sum total of the impact of the entire hour. If he always, invariably, reaches for the largest possible audience, then this process of insulation, of escape from reality, will continue to be massively financed, and its apologist will continue to make winsome speeches about giving the public what it wants, or "letting the public decide."

I refuse to believe that the presidents and chairmen of the boards of these big corporations want their corporate image to consist exclusively of a solemn voice in an echo chamber, or a pretty girl opening the door of a refrigerator, or a horse that talks. They want something better, and on occasion some of them have demonstrated it. But most of the men whose legal and moral responsibility it is to spend the stockholders' money for advertising are removed from the realities of the mass media by five, six, or a dozen contraceptive layers of vice-presidents, public relations counsel and advertising agencies. Their business is to sell goods, and the competition is pretty tough.

But this nation is now in competition with malignant forces of evil who are using every instrument at their command to empty the minds of their subjects and fill those minds with slogans, determination and faith in the future. If we go on as we are, we are protecting the mind of the American public from any real contact with the menacing world that squeezes in upon us. We are engaged in a great experiment to discover whether a free public opinion can devise and direct methods of managing the affairs of the nation. We may fail. But we are handicapping ourselves needlessly.

Let us have a little competition. Not only in selling soap, cigarettes and automobiles, but in informing a troubled, apprehensive but receptive public. Why should not each of the 20 or 30 big corporations which dominate radio and television decide that they will give up one or two of their regularly scheduled programs each year, turn the time over to the networks and say in effect: "This is a tiny tithe, just a little bit of our profits. On this particular night we aren't going to try to sell cigarettes or automobiles; this is merely a gesture to indicate our belief in the importance of ideas." The networks should, and I think would, pay for the cost of producing the program. The advertiser, the sponsor, would get name credit but would have nothing to do with the content of the program. Would this blemish the corporate image? Would the stockholders object? I think not. For if the premise upon which our pluralistic society rests, which as I understand it is that if the people are given sufficient undiluted information, they will then somehow, even after long, sober second thoughts, reach the right decision--if that premise is wrong, then not only the corporate image but the corporations are done for.

There used to be an old phrase in this country, employed when someone talked too much. It was: "Go hire a hall." Under this proposal the sponsor would have hired the hall; he has bought the time; the local station operator, no matter how indifferent, is going to carry the program-he has to. Then it's up to the networks to fill the hall. I am not here talking about editorializing but about straightaway exposition as direct, unadorned and impartial as falliable human beings can make it. Just once in a while let us exalt the importance of ideas and information. Let us dream to the extent of saying that on a given Sunday night the time normally occupied by Ed Sullivan is given over to a clinical survey of the state of American education, and a week or two later the time normally used by Steve Allen is devoted to a thoroughgoing study of American policy in the Middle East. Would the corporate image of their respective sponsors be damaged? Would the stockholders rise up in their wrath and complain? Would anything happen other than that a few million people would have received a little illumination on subjects that may well determine the future of this country, and therefore the future of the corporations? This method would also provide real competition between the networks as to which could outdo the others in the palatable presentation of information. It would provide an outlet for the young men of skill, and there are some even of dedication, who would like to do something other than devise methods of insulating while selling.

There may be other and simpler methods of utilizing these instruments of radio and television in the interests of a free society. But I know of none that could be so easily accomplished inside the framework of the existing commercial system. I don't know how you would measure the success or failure of a given program. And it would be hard to prove the magnitude of the benefit accruing to the corporation which gave up one night of a variety or quiz show in order that the network might marshal its skills to do a thorough-going job on the present status of NATO, or plans for controlling nuclear tests. But I would reckon that the president, and indeed the majority of shareholders of the corporation who sponsored such a venture, would feel just a little bit better about the corporation and the country.

It may be that the present system, with no modifications and no experiments, can survive. Perhaps the money-making machine has some kind of built-in perpetual motion, but I do not think so. To a very considerable extent the media of mass communications in a given country reflect the political, economic and social climate in which they flourish. That is the reason ours differ from the British and French, or the Russian and Chinese. We are currently wealthy, fat, comfortable and complacent. We have currently a built-in allergy to unpleasant or disturbing information. Our mass media reflect this. But unless we get up off our fat surpluses and recognize that television in the main is being used to distract, delude, amuse and insulate us, then television and those who finance it, those who look at it and those who work at it, may see a totally different picture too late.

I do not advocate that we turn television into a 27-inch wailing wall, where longhairs constantly moan about the state of our culture and our defense. But I would just like to see it reflect occasionally the hard, unyielding realities of the world in which we live. I would like to see it done inside the existing framework, and I would like to see the doing of it redound to the credit of those who finance and program it. Measure the results by Nielsen, Trendex or Silex-it doesn't matter. The main thing is to try. The responsibility can be easily placed, in spite of all the mouthings about giving the public what it wants. It rests on big business, and on big television, and it rests at the top. Responsibility is not something that can be assigned or delegated. And it promises its own reward: good business and good television.

Perhaps no one will do anything about it. I have ventured to outline it against a background of criticism that may have been too harsh only because I could think of nothing better. Someone once said--I think it was Max Eastman--that "that publisher serves his advertiser best who best serves his readers." I cannot believe that radio and television, or the corporation that finance the programs, are serving well or truly their viewers or listeners, or themselves.

I began by saying that our history will be what we make it. If we go on as we are, then history will take its revenge, and retribution will not limp in catching up with us.

We are to a large extent an imitative society. If one or two or three corporations would undertake to devote just a small traction of their advertising appropriation along the lines that I have suggested, the procedure would grow by contagion; the economic burden would be bearable, and there might ensue a most exciting adventure--exposure to ideas and the bringing of reality into the homes of the nation.

To those who say people wouldn't look; they wouldn't be interested; they're too complacent, indifferent and insulated, I can only reply: There is, in one reporter's opinion, considerable evidence against that contention. But even if they are right, what have they got to lose? Because if they are right, and this instrument is good for nothing but to entertain, amuse and insulate, then the tube is flickering now and we will soon see that the whole struggle is lost.

This instrument can teach, it can illuminate; yes, and it can even inspire. But it can do so only to the extent that humans are determined to use it to those ends. Otherwise it is merely wires and lights in a box. There is a great and perhaps decisive battle to be fought against ignorance, intolerance and indifference. This weapon of television could be useful.

Stonewall Jackson, who knew something about the use of weapons, is reported to have said, "When war comes, you must draw the sword and throw away the scabbard." The trouble with television is that it is rusting in the scabbard during a battle for survival.

Memoriam: A Lincoln-Parks Axiom - The Incredible Ordinariness of Greatness and Genius

2005-10-26T12:20:00.000-07:00

Despite all the literary machinations of Doris Kearns Goodwin, Abraham Lincoln was not a genius: at least not in a sense that he was much different than anyone else.

Nor was Rosa Parks. To develop a sense that Ms. Parks was great - or, more aptly, greater - than anyone else is simply a betrayal of the beauty of what Rosa Parks did. Rosa Parks sought equality and normalcy. And she took no act other than ordinary to achieve it.

As we race pell-mell into the future, it is an eloquent and often repeated foible by our historians to create fleeting, newspaper tabloid headlines out of our own pasts, out of our own parents, in the form of gigantic books. The genius of Ben Franklin, the monolith of Thomas Jefferson.

The World War II generation was not the greatest generation. And if you could poll them all, living and dead, few would disagree that they did anything other than ordinary acts.

In reflecting upon Abraham Lincoln, remember well that he was a tall, gangly, often unsure human being much like anyone else. Some of his decisions were good ones, others were not. He had fault and flaw. And he was no more suited to the times in which he lived than you or I assigned now to our collective fate.

It is a lesson worth remembering: for to remember Rosa Parks and Abraham Lincoln, much less the people of World War II, as something beyond ordinary, beyond the capabilities of daily human life, is to devalue what they did. In the glaring, often harrowing moment of choosing to act or not to act, when choosing to speak or not to speak, when choosing to object or not to object, they acted. They spoke. They did object, albeit within the simplicities of who and what they were and in the times and places in history assigned to them.

It is, in a grand and noble sense albeit quite pedestrian as well, the fate of us all. If we think of Rosa Parks as great and Abraham Lincoln as a genius, then we must think no less of ourselves being as much in potential and capability.

- Qi

A Personal Note on Corruption in New Jersey

2005-10-10T18:57:00.000-07:00

New Jersey is corrupt - the state government, the political parties and the legal institution. Fighting corruption is expensive in myriad ways. Through this website, the legal corruption in New Jersey and elsewhere will be highlighted. Read at your own peril but, please, read thoughtfully and mindfully.

A former Social Security Disability recipient, the author attended law school as a rehabilitative means of obtaining productive employment. Sadly, corruption in New Jersey is proving to be the true 'handicap'. If you would like to make a financial contribution to this blog, please leave a posting expressing your desire and an email contact.

2005-10-10T09:04:00.000-07:00

A rare look into the world of legal corruption: A pay to play demand letter sent to a former Social Security Disability recipient.

All Things Commerce: Legal Corruption and You

2005-10-10T08:33:00.000-07:00

Commerce Bank is a rapidly growing financial phenomena in the Philadelphia area. With two senior executives heading off to Federal prison, Commerce Bank is now - officially - corrupt.

There's nothing new with the flimsy fact that a bank is corrupt, lots of banks are corrupt. More aptly, the question is whether the 'corruption' is inside the safe harbor of law or elsewhere.

Commerce Bank is an interesting example to study. Infiltrated by the Democratic Party within the southern New Jersey region, Commerce Bank features prominently in the daily working life of the regions legal realm. The de facto head of the Democratic Party in southern New Jersey, George Norcross III, is a senior executive within the Commerce Bank umbrella of financial organizations. And the media - newspapers such as the Philadelphia Inquirer - claim that it is Mr. Norcross who pulls the governmental power strings in southern New Jersey, not the voters.

The observation has some apt qualities: the Democratic Party is overwhelming in control throughout most of the suburban Philadelphia area in New Jersey. That political power extends into the daily governmental realm. Who is chosen to fill employment positions in the local towns is largely dictated by whether you supported the Democratic Party. And, if you fail to do so, you can - and often do - end up being fired or never hired in the first place. A recent spat in Palmyra, New Jersey, erupted when the Mayor of Palmyra objected to Democratic Party demands - claimed to be from Mr. Norcross - that local town appointments be fired. The claim has been extensively reported in local newspapers such as the Courier-Post and the Philadelphia Inquirer

What is fascinating - and one should not undervalue the nexus - is who was to be fired: an attorney.

Political corruption is a known entity of long standing. Tammany Hall in New York, for example. And it is well understood that political corruption "means" governmental corruption: when you control the politics, you control who runs the governmental services and how they operate.

But seldom does one see, hear, or speak of "legal corruption" - even though it is long accepted, few talk about it.

Legal corruption takes many forms. Often, as illustrated in the Mayor of Palmyra episode, it boils down to a 'pay to play' ambiance. One must 'pay' in one form or another to practice law in New Jersey. And, often, that 'pay' encompasses a variety of venues - not only is it political pay to play, it is often 'legal' as well.

The above photographic document is an actual letter mailed to an attorney in October 1998. It appears as mailed. No signature was attached. The impression then, and it remains so now, is that the document - from a legal point of view - was calculated to escape redress.

The letter was verified by Matthew Spence, now an assistant prosecutor with the Camden County Prosecutor's Office, in August 1999 during a parking lot encounter at Fifth and Penn Streets in Camden. Mr. Spence unilaterally raised the issue of the letter, vouched that he authored the letter, and appeared emotional and disapproving that no compliance took place: that a one-third salary kickback was not paid.

In addition, two meetings took place with Peter Garcia - then Counsel to the Public Defender - in which Mr. Garcia asked numerous questions, all appearing to express disapproval that the salary kickback was not paid. Mr. Garcia would go on to become the Public Defender of New Jersey.

What followed was fascinating. In well-worn employment law strategy designed to coverup corruption, a program director began fabricating falsified memorandum in retaliation for failing to pay the kickback. Each letter was designed artfully to place the non-complying attorney in a false light. In interesting symmetry, at one point, the fabrications escalated to a demand that the attorney sign forms - printed on official Office of the Public Defender letterhead - redacting his own salary.

If not a voluntary kickback, a coerced kickback? One could not send a more clear signal that employment was on the line. And, subsequently, when the attorney failed to sign the salary redaction papers, his services were "no longer necessary" in September 1999 - just one month after the encounter with Mr. Spence.

Although it may be coincidence, the following nexus has been commented upon: at the exact same time Mr. Spence was rewarded by the State of New Jersey with employment at the Camden County Prosecutor's Office, the former disability recipient who failed to pay a kickback was fired by the State of New Jersey. At the very least, his services were no longer necessary.

Was the fact that the attorney was a former Social Security Disability recipient, and therefore highly unlikely to secure employment in any sense, a factor: was he targeted by the legal profession of New Jersey for extortion?

It is a fascinating question. Particularly in light that the State of New Jersey publishes the complete medical histories of any citizen who had the misfortune of being injured and covered by the New Jersey Joint Underwriter's Association. It is a matter of public record. And it is published on the Internet for any prospective employer to view.

Throughout the affair, in fact from the very beginning in 1998 up to as recently as 2002, the Camden County regional director for the Office of the Public Defender was identified as a guiding force in setting up and shepherding the pay to play schemes.

The system operated as the letter demonstrates. The only variant is that it seldom was committed to paper. Normatively, it operated by telephone. A telephone call would be placed to a local attorney advising that attorney of an opening within the Office of the Public Defender. That attorney then would advise a targeted individual: do you want the job?

Another variant that became self-evident was that kickbacks may not have been direct. Being a 'pool' attorney for the Office of the Public Defender can be a lucrative thing. Pool attorneys are private lawyers who handle the excess caseload experienced by the Public Defender. While the hourly rate is not high, the volume of cases can keep new, or experienced, attorneys financially healthy. In return for kickbacks, it would be easily foreseeable to be given preferential treatment in the assignment of cases by the regional director. The ease of foreseeability is demonstrated in the letter, a rare document of not insignificant proportions - the boldness in that it was ever written, the contents, and the ease in which it is expressed hint at a far larger culture that does not stumble into print often.

Sadly, in New Jersey, pool attorney cases are not assigned by rotational lottery as is the practice in adjacent Pennsylvania. In New Jersey, cases are parceled out by regional directors who act as overlords in each of New Jersey's respective counties. Who gets cases is largely a matter of discretion. And who gets cases can be largely a matter of corruption - payment of kickbacks - as the letter demonstrates. It is worthy to note that the recipient of the kickback demand letter was barred from receiving pool attorney cases from 2001 up to 2004. When the attorney inquired about the non-assignment of cases, the Camden County regional director's name would invariably be mentioned.

The same regional director was identified when the Intensive Supervision Program position became available in August 1998. Upon termination in September 1999, the same regional director's name was mentioned by Joel Harris who was the acting Public Defender at the time: Mr. Harris stated he would "consult" with that regional director to decide the future of the non-paying attorney within the Office of the Public Defender. An interesting nexus: No pool cases were assigned to the kickback demand letter recipient until both Mr. Harris and Mr. Garcia had left their positions.

So, what does all this mean? In the academic world, it is known as "publish or perish." In the legal world, especially New Jersey, it is known as pay or perish. Fail to honor the kickback demands and one may never work for a governmental organization in New Jersey again. And, if you happen to be a former Social Security disability recipient, well...honesty and predicament don't mix, not in New Jersey anyway.

Complain? That's a fascinating idea but please review the contents of the embezzlement letter. Note the paragraph structure, the first sentence is solitary and no mistake. It is first for a reason. The letter is designed to exploit the Ethics Committee of New Jersey and manipulate New Jersey's ethics rules in order to coerce payment.

In New Jersey, lawyers are required to keep their files for 7 years. Now, reread the letter. There were no files. Nothing was included in the letter. No files are identified by name. Approximately 7 months after the embezzlement letter, a regional director wrote a companion demand to the same attorney. The contents of the demand letter should hardly surprise you: please return all files assigned by the Office of the Public Defender. In fact, there were no files assigned by the Office of the Public Defender that had not been returned. And surprise, surprise: the letter was written by the same regional director shepherding the pay to play kickbacks.

One attorney says 'here are your files' when none exist. Another attorney says 'where are my files' when none exist. What's transpiring is not rocket science. In civil law, the burden of proof is remarkably shallow. One merely needs a preponderance of evidence to win. And preponderance of evidence often trickles down to a "me and my gang" legal strategy i.e. my gang is bigger than yours, I win. One side shows up in court with more people and more statements. Absent any concrete proofs, under preponderance of the evidence, the bigger side wins. Invariably, the judges cite legal logic that boils down into laymen terms of "So many seemingly credible people could not be wrong."

Two people claiming files exist legally outweighs one person who says they do not. It was easy to see where the embezzlement demand letter was heading: straight to the Ethics Committee door. And it was easy to see who would lose. And that person would lose for very simple reasons, all one had to do is use Office of the Public Defender letterhead to manufacture cases that were 'assigned' and never returned. Essentially, all that the regional director had to do was pull out a sheet of paper and begin falsifying. Case over. In some legal realms, the tactic is known as the Morton Thiokol maneuver after an interesting employment law situation designed to coerce silence, and then non-employment, of an engineer who warned that SpaceShuttle Challenger would explode. The strategy can best be summed: In order to mitigate liability, destroy credibility, preferably before one gets to court.

So the choice was simple and Hobbesian, if not Machiavellian: pay or be fired. New Jersey and You: Perfect Together.

The attorney chose honesty and was fired. With rare exception, he has not worked since - mostly due to the substantive denial of pool attorney cases and the publication of his medical history by the State of New Jersey on the Internet. (Procedurally, two pool attorney cases were assigned, but not until 2004, and both were fringe cases that did not reflect a more normative assignment ratio. Essentially, they appeared to be assigned solely for the future purpose of denying that pool cases were withheld. They knew the seven year window on any ethics violations for not keeping 'files' was closing. A year before it did, they rushed out two minor cases. Fascinating, no?)

So, as the autumnal days of the United States Department of Justice's investigation into Commerce Bank wane into the future, it is helpful to remember that the indictments and convictions are but a small part of an overarching culture in which not only governmental positions are exploited but the lives of innocent human beings.

Christopher Christie, an attorney general for the United States Department of Justice's regional office in New Jersey, is quoted in newspapers as calling the State of New Jersey the most corrupt entity since Al Capone's Chicago. In light of the Commerce convictions, and what Commerce was attempting to do, and that Commerce Bank is based in New Jersey, you decide.

The template plays itself out in remarkably simple ways, no?

If nothing else, you can dismiss this as a letter over the transom of Democracy from the sea of reality.

- Qi

Cinekyd: The Sociopathic Empire of Prosecution In America

2004-07-28T07:06:00.000-07:00

What happened to Robert J. Clark, Jr. is hardly exceptional. Mr. Clark, like so many others in lesser profile cases, became a sacrificial pawn in building and maintaining a legal empire: The Sociopathic Empire of Prosecution in America.

Mr. Clark, with nary a shred of evidence - perchance nary half a shred - was accused in 2003 of sexually molesting any number of aspiring boys in Montgomery County, Pennsylvania, at his private educational film studio. Remember the word 'accused', it will become a clarifying ray of light for you: for anyone can be accused of anything, truth often lies elsewhere.

And sometimes it lies in economic profit motive. For instance, most lawyers - certainly most lawyers holding political appointments or elected offices, such as a 'prosecutor' - are members of political parties. And for good reason. If you wish to succeed in life, working together is far more financially worthwhile than going it alone. It's simple business sense.

Pleasing the political party, much like pleasing your shareholders - or your spouse - pays dividends...like bigger and better, certainly more lucrative, situations in the future.

So being a prosecutor is a position coveted by many lawyers, mostly for financial reasons. In the pell-mell pursuit for money and career riches, certain things can be expendable. Be perceived as a criminal, merely be 'convenient' to be perceived as a criminal, and you can find yourself facing an indictment that is largely, if not wholly, fabricated. Many are fabricated and, shhhh, quietly dismissed with no hastily arranged 'news conference' to call the public's attention to the dismissal - a somewhat differing situation to the original arrest or indictment.

  Why? If you are a local prosecutor or district attorney with aspiration for more wealth or a better political future, you must think like a prosecutor: prosecutors get paid to convict criminals. The more high-profile the case, the more likely people will notice. The logic is not complicated. 'People' can be defined in two opportunistic ways: 1. Potential voters at the next election or 2. Party officials who seasonally dole out largesse - money. But you really hit the jackpot, you roll both categories into one effort, when you go for definition number 3: The Media.

  At this point, two economic worlds collide in a happy kiss of career-oriented bliss. The media make money by selling advertisements. Advertisers spend more money on media that have more readers/viewers, so much the better to increase their odds of selling their wares. And prosecutors do much the same.

  High profile cases are much like marketing strategies for the aspiring prosecutor to market his 'wares' to party bosses and the electorate. You maximize your future career effort by spending more time where it will have the biggest impact, just as advertisers wisely prefer television over radio. Now, innocent Americans happen along and stumble - for whatever reason - into a nice 'fit' for the equation. As did Mr. Clark.

Putting your hand on the bottom of a child, much less the bottom of a child on videotape, does not look good particularly when you sanitize all context. Or be a Black person talking to a White woman in a mostly White neighborhood in Camden County, New Jersey, as happened in one 1997 case. You may be indicted, in the above case, the man was indicted. Or be a convict on parole living in a high-drug sale area of Camden, New Jersey, with a girlfriend who just lost the local drug dealer's 'stash' - even though you had no idea she was involved in the local rackets.

All of the above are real cases with virtually no more criminal evidence beyond these brief descriptions. Plausibility gets more attenuated with each example but, at least, you are seeing the continuum. You better see the continuum, aspiring prosecutors do. And they manipulate your perception accordingly.

  What makes Mr. Clark's plight so eloquent is the clean nature of the example. He is, by all accounts, an upstanding citizen substantively and procedurally. But even that could not, and did not, save him from falling prey as an 'image building utensil' whether artfully intended or by default. Afterall, the camera crews were on the scene simultaneous to any search warrants and that did not happen by accident - television crews are not easy to bait but, given a ratings motive, anything is possible. (Please see the July 25, 2004, edition of the Philadelphia Inquirer.)

   In the dying days of Lee Solomon's administration as Camden County Prosecutor, the clarion call among his staffers was "We have got to get the numbers up!" Statistical numbers? A euphemism for so many Mr. Clark's? Sad to say, inarguably, the answer at any given moment is 'yes'.

   Prosecutor's offices validate their budgets, hence their salaries, by demonstrating what a good job they do - by churning out statistical numbers, by churning out criminal cases. It is not just 'convictions'that generate the lucrative statistics but actual cases in which charges are filed. All too often, the matter sinks to a low common denominator as well - churning you as a citizen for profit.

   For instance, what can be politically gleaned from a high profile sex abuse case? Or, better yet, a high profile child sex abuse case? Do you see the marketing difference between the two? One is offensive, the other offensive to virtually all. Which is more a 'ratings motive' for institutional media concepts like 'action news' or 'eyewitness news'?

  The same 'marketing/ratings' logic holds true for the aspiring prosecutor as it does the evening news hounds. You reach more influential political party members, you reach more voters in general, by making sure your work is featured in the high profile media. And it doesn't matter whether the allegations are true or not, as so nobly demonstrated by Mr. Clark and his supposed 'victims', it just matters that someone can be 'accused'. The former is a substantive reality, the latter is a procedural reality. Both television and prosecutors love high-profile procedural realities because they make each other look good - the television station attracts more viewers with 'breaking news' while the prosecutor attracts more favorable opinions as in "he really protects our society."

   But does he? That's an interesting question on which Mr. Clark most assuredly would have a fascinating observation. Or a fair amount of the Black community for that matter. Or anyone who stumbles into that prosecutorial Nirvana of 'convenience' - you just happen to be there and eligible under the alleged fact pattern. For instance, your spouse is murdered. As the surviving spouse, you are always 'Suspect Number One' until proven otherwise - facts notwithstanding as many who have gone through the ordeal will tell you. Economy of effort plays itself out in many less than flattering ways in society.

Criminal charges are not brought because crimes took place. Criminal charges are brought, as Bruce Castor duly noted, because crimes are 'perceived' to have taken place. A world of difference exists between the two. And, inarguably, one is more 'convenient' to claim than the other.   The matter can be philosophically summed as the 'Camdenization' of our law. The comparison is apt.

Camden, New Jersey, became one of the worst ghettos in North America, not by accident, but for largely economic reasons. It is called 'red-lining'. Real estate brokers, bankers and mortgage companies found it more profitable to segregate by ethnicity - by drawing red lines around groups to be economically isolated. The red-lining concept is portable and valuable in understanding our prosecutorial systems. For instance, a business can save a substantial amount of marketing money by 'red-lining' customers who can't afford what you wish to sell. And it works in reverse, you red-line those who can. One has a choice in which method is most 'convenient'.

Within the walls of the prosecutorial empire, certain types of cases have long been 'red-lined' in a positive, career enhancing way as long as you are not the one accused: sex crimes, particularly, sex crimes involving children. They garner lots of media attention, lots of camera time, lots of quotable space in the newspapers. As the Montgomery County District Attorney's office so aptly demonstrated (as reported by the Philadelphia Inquirer), all one need do is make a few telephone calls - you need not actually 'investigate' anything - and, viola, off to the steps of the Courthouse you go, media dutifully in tow, to inform the county residents what a great job you are doing on their behalf by protecting them - and, more particularly, their current and future children - from such ghastly betrayals of confidence and public trust.

The example is hardly isolated. In the last year alone, at least two such cases - albeit much lower in profile - staggered through the Camden County Hall of Justice before finally being dismissed as unsubstantiated, some were plainly silly.

Ghastly betrayals of confidence and public trust, it is an interesting choice of subjects. All in the pell-mell pursuit of image building? Ramping up the electorate for your next political foray? Anyone can make claims, proving them is another thing. But what cannot be denied is what appeared in the same media shortly after Mr. Clark's ordeal began in the Fall of 2002, coming to fruition in the Summer of 2003 with formal charges: the head of the same prosecutor's office was running for political office, in fact, Attorney General of Pennsylvania. Ah....

And, if you are perceived as soft on crime, as the same media documented earlier this year as the primary election neared, what better way to bolster your prosecutorial credentials to lead, not just Montgomery County, but the entire State of Pennsylvania than with a high-profile case involving, gasp, children?

Sociopathic behavior is defined, largely, as using others for your own self-centered purposes while attempting to win as much social support for your actions as possible. Although the sociopathic conclusion is applicable, I think Mr. Clark would agree that he befell the "Camdenization of the Law" with more clarity. In the pell-mell pursuit to get statistics up, and wooing public image much the same, Mr. Clark's life was opportunistically red-lined into one of the worst ghettos humanly imaginable...replete with a visit to jail.

Now, almost a year later, the media finally starts to ask questions as so contritely demonstrated by the July 25, 2004, Philadelphia Inquirer. Oh, well, yes, of course....the primary election is over. And, needless to say, the television stations aren't asking anything, it wouldn't garner more viewers to admit that you can't trust what you see on television.

Is any of this coincidence? You decide.

- Qi