Too Much

The news this week has been so heavy that finding one subject to cover in this post was almost impossible. There have been additional reports of how the search for Malaysia flight #370 has been further mishandled.

The Supreme Court continues its quest to disenfranchise the American people by allowing rich people the opportunity of giving as much money to political candidates as they wish. This is the follow-up ruling to the disastrous Citizens United.

DuPont heir Robert H. Richards IV was convicted of raping his three year old daughter but was spared prison because he “would not fare well in prison.” I never realized that faring well in prison was a determining factor if one is found guilty of a felony.

In Pennsylvania and Illinois, razor blades were found duct taped to playground equipment. A two year was hurt Monday afternoon suffering a minor cut to his hand.

This is just one week’s worth of news and I’m sure I missed something important but these are the four subjects that caught my attention. Allow me to offer some thoughts on each.

Since Malaysia #370 first went missing, the search has been mishandled. The airline officials seemed rather flippant in their communication to the families and the media about the steps being taken to find the flight. For two weeks, the families and friends of those passengers hoped their loved ones would be found. In this age of instant communication, it would be close to impossible for a plane to be out of contact two hours let alone two weeks and no one can find it or any indication of where it could be. Cars have On Star. ADT can turn off appliances and lock doors with the touch of an app. Seniors have Life Alert and even dogs have GPS but a jet plane disappears and it takes over two weeks to determine the plane was down. Adding insult to injury, families were notified by email that their loved ones were lost. Yet, it would have been time consuming to contact each family but given the hell those people went through, a personal call was the least they could have done.

The Supreme Court continues to prove that it has forgotten its original mandate in that it is the final interpreter of federal constitutional law. It’s become increasingly obvious that the court believes the Constitution and the rights guaranteed by it are reserved only for the rich and powerful, the rest of us be damned. The Citizens United decision is a travesty and should be repealed immediately. If corporations are people, I’d like to see Citibank, J P Morgan Chase and other corporations sit and wait at the doctors’ office or simply do something the rest of us do like use the washroom. It’s bad enough that we have to contend with corporation lobbyist’s stranglehold on our elected officials. We now have to contend with the rich being allowed to just outright purchase the people we rely on to work in our best interest.

This is the second time this year that a judge has allowed a rich person to avoid going to jail because the individual is not responsible or is unable to survive the prison system. Are prisoners being sentenced based on their survival skills? If so, there are a number of young people and women who have been unjustly sentenced and living lives of terror because they are not capable of surviving in jail. It’s obvious why Robert Richards was given probation for raping his daughter – he is a rich White man in America. Enough said.

There is a special place in hell for the perpetrators of this type of cruelty. Anyone who intentionally hurts a child should be tossed in a hole in the deepest, darkest part of the jail. This is not an April fool’s joke. This is not a harmless prank. This is the work of someone who doesn’t deserve to see daylight let alone share space on this planet with the rest of us. Every time I think people have gotten as low as they can go, someone comes along and makes me weep with the realization that I was dead wrong. Only divine intervention can save this soul.