...said in the most Jack-Nicholson-in-The-Shining-esque voice I can muster.
Judge William Adams is the man on my mind tonight. Many may remember the name, but not remember exactly where you remember it from. Let me refresh your memory. (WARNING, NOT FOR THE FAINT OF HEART) Oh yeah. That guy.
The video, for people who didn't want to watch, depicts Judge Adams roughly hitting his 16 year old, disabled daughter, with a belt. While screaming profanities at her, and threatening to hit her in the face if she doesn't submit, all while she screams and cries and pleads for him to stop. Why? For breaking the 11th commandment, of course: Thou Shalt Not Install Games On Thy Family Computer.
But why dredge up this now, a year later? Because the verdict is finally in! For getting caught beating his daughter "into submission" Judge William Adams got a year of paid vacation (at about 150k a year, by the way) and a public "tsk tsk tsk."
But really, so what? Things like this happen every day. Hell, things much worse than this happen every day. What does it really matter? There are a couple of significant points that I feel need to be brought up here:
This man previously judged many cases that included alleged child abuse. While many people in this neck of the woods, myself included, are in favor spanking children, and even corporal punishment, most of the people I have encountered are not in agreement with this level of punishment. If the honorable judge treats his daughter like this, how does this affect his judgement on child abuse cases that parallel this? How can this man preside over anything related to the treatment of children with the public casting a very wary eye in his direction? Well, in short, he can't. And the even Texas Commission on Judicial Conduct knows that, so he doesn't get to preside over these types of cases anymore.
While this is interesting, what I really want to call to attention here is not Judge Adams' actions. Like I said, in the grand scheme of things, this was small potatoes: a guy got caught beating his daughter. What really struck me as funny were the actions and ruling of the Texas Commission on Judicial Conduct. You see, in the entire year that the judge was on paid suspension, the TCJC was hard at work for three days (August 15-17, 2012) reviewing the allegations against the judge. They interviewed several people including 15 local attorneys who regularly practiced in the judge's court. I'll do us all a favor and copy/paste the relevant parts:
On or about November 1, 2011, Judge Adams' adult daughter, Hillary Adams, released a videotape on the Internet.
The event depicted in the videotape occurred in 2004, when Hillary was 16 years old.
The videotape captured approximately seven and a half minutes of a scene occurring in the privacy of Hillary's bedroom, wherein her father, Judge Adams, struck Hillary forcefully at least seventeen times with a belt, yelled profanities at her, and threatened her with further physical harm.
Although surprised and disappointed by the scene captured on tape seven years ago, six of the attorneys interviewed by the Commission remained supportive of Judge Adams' return to the bench.
However, six attorneys believed that Judge Adams could no longer be effective in court because the conduct portrayed in the videotape created the public perception that the judge could not be fair and impartial in cases involving allegations of family violence, child abuse, or assault.
As further evidence of the perception that Judge Adams could no longer be fair and impartial, on March 12, 2012, Howard G. Baldwin, Jr., Commissioner for TDFPS, directed Richard Bianchi, the Aransas County Attorney, to "take action to prevent Judge Adams [from] hearing Child Protective Services cases."
Ok, so the facts have been established. Only 6 of the 15 people that work with the judge feel that he should come back to work. 6 go so far as to say that the judge can no longer work with children... which had been a significant portion of the judge's workload.
In the course of the Commission's investigation, ten witnesses, including at least eight of the attorneys who practiced regularly in Judge Adams' court, also described a pattern of incidents in which Judge Adams displayed anger and poor judicial demeanor toward certain attorneys appearing in his courtroom. Judge Adams often treated the nowformer Aransas County Attorney, Jim Anderson ("Anderson"), in an unprofessional and discourteous manner, and frequently exhibited angry, undignified, and demeaning conduct when interacting with Anderson in the
courtroom.
This part was interesting too. It came up that the judge was demeaning, unprofessional, and angry with some of the attorneys in his court... not the unbiased, impartial bastion of wisdom and law he is supposed to be. This is also against the rules...
Canon 3B(4) of the Texas Code of Judicial Conduct states, in pertinent part that, "A judge shall be patient, dignified and courteous to litigants, jurors, witnesses, lawyers and others with whom the judge deals in an official capacity, .. . "
Canon 4A of the Texas Code of Judicial Conduct states that, "A judge shall conduct all of the judge's extra-judicial activities so that they do not: (1) cast reasonable doubt on the judge's capacity to act impartially as a judge; or (2) interfere with the proper performance of judicial duties."
Article V, § l-a(6)A of the Texas Constitution states, in pertinent part, that a judge may be disciplined for "willful or persistent violation of rules promulgated by the Supreme Court of Texas, incompetence in performing the duties of the office, willful violation of the Code of Judicial Conduct, or willful or persistent conduct that is clearly inconsistent with the proper performance of his duties or casts public discredit upon the judiciary or administration of justice."
Go on...
The Commission concludes based on the facts and evidence before it that Judge Adams' actions depicted in the 2004 videotape, once publicly released, cast reasonable doubt on his capacity to act impartially as a judge and interfered with the proper performance of his judicial duties, in willful and/or persistent violation of Canons 4A(l) and 4A(2) of the Texas Code of Judicial Conduct.
The Commission further concludes that Judge Adams' treatment of certain attorneys in his courtroom, particularly the now-former Aransas County Attorney, Jim Anderson, fell far below the minimum standards of patient, courteous and dignified courtroom demeanor expected of judicial officials, and constituted a willful and/or persistent violation of Canon 3B( 4) of the Texas Code of Judicial Conduct.
Now we are getting somewhere! Found in violation of judicial ethics!
Found that he was not impartial in his duties! This is going to be good!
Where is my popcorn?
In condemnation of the conduct described above that violated Article V, § 1-a(6)A of the Texas Constitution, and Canons 3B(4), 4A(l), and 4A(2) of the Texas Code of Judicial Conduct, it is the Commission's decision to issue a PUBLIC WARNING to the Honorable William Adams, Judge of the County Court at Law in Rockport, Aransas County, Texas...
(Source: http://www.scjc.state.tx.us/pdf/actions/FY2013-PUBSANC.pdf)
Wait, what? The commission found that he was biased, unprofessional, demeaning, unfit for his duties as a judge, and they let him go with a slap on the wrist and a year of paid vacation? On top of that he can return to his job immediately. Where do I sign up for this gig? More importantly, where do I get friends like his? How can this not look like anything but judges looking out for their own?
Well. It looks like justice will just have to prevail democratically. The judicial system in this state is designed such that the public will hold bad judges accountable for their actions through the election process. Maybe I shouldn't hold my breath, however; this Republican judge campaigns on his support of "conservative family values." And who doesn't want to vote for that?
Friday, November 30, 2012
Wednesday, November 14, 2012
Wait... What? A Comment On Another Blog.
So I got the chance to go snooping around on what some of my class mates were writing. It was fun, informative, and helped me see where other people in my classes stand. It also helped me see where I stand in relation to my peers. Apparently, I might be on a somewhat smallish island.
One of the blogs I read was called Don't Tread On Me. The particular article I read was entitled Say No To The UN! The basic argument was that inviting UN officials to participate in poll watching in would lead to the downfall of the freedom of US citizens. I think this is more than a little far fetched and extremely alarmist.
It begins with the assertion that it is against Texas Election Code to have UN officials watching the polling locations. While it is true that TEC states that only registered voters of that precinct are eligible for poll watching, it is also true that the Supremacy Clause of the US Constitution states that federal law, statutes, and treaties are the supreme law of the land. The UN's OSCE involvement in poll watching is part of the treaty (or commitment) by the US as a member of the UN that establishes this as within their conflict resolution scope. Therefore, as it has been accepted by the US Federal Government, the states must also abide by it. I would like to add that the UN poll watchers, the only actually actual non-partisan watchers, would be better suited to the job than Democrats or Republicans appointed to the position.
The next part of the blog states that Texas attempted to pass a voter ID law that was struck down in federal court, but implies that the federal government overstepped it's bounds in doing so:
Texas did what they thought best by trying to pass a vote ID law to prevent voter fraud but the law was shot down once again by the power of the Federal government.
The federal government was doing it's job. It was protecting the rights of its voters from unconstitutional legislation passed by the state of Texas. Voting is a right in the US for US citizens. The law that Texas was attempting to pass would be putting more barriers between voters and the voting booth. It was designed to block lower income voters by putting what is essentially a tax on voting by requiring certain people to purchase voter ID cards. All of this is of course, to help prevent voter fraud, which has been proven time and time again to be somewhere between .001% at the highest to .000004% at the lower end. Furthermore, most of the voter fraud that does actually happen is perpetuated using absentee ballots, which does not require a photo ID present.
The next part of the post, however, is my real problem. It is based on the slippery slope argument that if we are to let UN officials watch some of our polling places, the next logical step is full scale invasion.
Do we really want to start relying on the UN to protect the citizens of Texas? You give some people a little power and that is not enough. Watch out Texans, if the UN poll watchers show up in your neck-of-the woods the next time they come they will be dressed in blue military uniforms with guns and besides losing your voting integrity you will be losing your right to be free.
Whoa there, Wolverine. This is one of the most extreme cases of the slippery slope argument that I have encountered. It is pure fiction. There is no evidence that anything remotely like this has or will happen in the US, and if the author has evidence of such, he should probably cite it. It seems to me that this type of extreme rhetoric is not based on factual evidence, but is an intended to create a fearful response in the attempt to persuade others to agree with them, and should be called out as such.
In conclusion, I find that this argument falls flat because there is no factual evidence presented to support the author's claims. All of the assertions are based on extreme rhetoric and I think that if the author wants to help people see their point of view, a couple of facts, cited evidence, or better presented arguments would go a long way.
One of the blogs I read was called Don't Tread On Me. The particular article I read was entitled Say No To The UN! The basic argument was that inviting UN officials to participate in poll watching in would lead to the downfall of the freedom of US citizens. I think this is more than a little far fetched and extremely alarmist.
It begins with the assertion that it is against Texas Election Code to have UN officials watching the polling locations. While it is true that TEC states that only registered voters of that precinct are eligible for poll watching, it is also true that the Supremacy Clause of the US Constitution states that federal law, statutes, and treaties are the supreme law of the land. The UN's OSCE involvement in poll watching is part of the treaty (or commitment) by the US as a member of the UN that establishes this as within their conflict resolution scope. Therefore, as it has been accepted by the US Federal Government, the states must also abide by it. I would like to add that the UN poll watchers, the only actually actual non-partisan watchers, would be better suited to the job than Democrats or Republicans appointed to the position.
The next part of the blog states that Texas attempted to pass a voter ID law that was struck down in federal court, but implies that the federal government overstepped it's bounds in doing so:
Texas did what they thought best by trying to pass a vote ID law to prevent voter fraud but the law was shot down once again by the power of the Federal government.
The federal government was doing it's job. It was protecting the rights of its voters from unconstitutional legislation passed by the state of Texas. Voting is a right in the US for US citizens. The law that Texas was attempting to pass would be putting more barriers between voters and the voting booth. It was designed to block lower income voters by putting what is essentially a tax on voting by requiring certain people to purchase voter ID cards. All of this is of course, to help prevent voter fraud, which has been proven time and time again to be somewhere between .001% at the highest to .000004% at the lower end. Furthermore, most of the voter fraud that does actually happen is perpetuated using absentee ballots, which does not require a photo ID present.
The next part of the post, however, is my real problem. It is based on the slippery slope argument that if we are to let UN officials watch some of our polling places, the next logical step is full scale invasion.
Do we really want to start relying on the UN to protect the citizens of Texas? You give some people a little power and that is not enough. Watch out Texans, if the UN poll watchers show up in your neck-of-the woods the next time they come they will be dressed in blue military uniforms with guns and besides losing your voting integrity you will be losing your right to be free.
Whoa there, Wolverine. This is one of the most extreme cases of the slippery slope argument that I have encountered. It is pure fiction. There is no evidence that anything remotely like this has or will happen in the US, and if the author has evidence of such, he should probably cite it. It seems to me that this type of extreme rhetoric is not based on factual evidence, but is an intended to create a fearful response in the attempt to persuade others to agree with them, and should be called out as such.
In conclusion, I find that this argument falls flat because there is no factual evidence presented to support the author's claims. All of the assertions are based on extreme rhetoric and I think that if the author wants to help people see their point of view, a couple of facts, cited evidence, or better presented arguments would go a long way.
Friday, November 2, 2012
Prop 1 vs Austin
I’m sure everyone in this town has heard of the Central Texas Health Ratification Proposition 1 by now. Every time I turn on the radio, I hear something about it. With audio and visual assault for and against the proposition, what are we to make of it?
The first response I heard, and the response I seem to be hearing more often than not is something akin to “No more taxes!” or “The liberals want to steal my money!” or some other Texas-style-no-taxes-ever! or I-got-mine-already-so-screw-the-rest-of-you! crowing. Quit frankly, I find this disappointing. When I first heard about this, I thought, “finally, we can get some decent health care in Austin!” Improved medical care is a good thing. Medical schools are not only good, but necessary for the advancement of medicine and the training of good physicians. This seems like a no brainer to me.
What does prop 1 give us? In a nutshell,
1) Prop 1 will open up a medical school at UT that will educate and train doctors in Austin. While doctors are in no way obligated to stay in the same area that they completed their residency in they tend to do just that. This means more access to doctors for everyone in Austin. More specialists. More GPs. Quicker turnaround times. Less waiting. Better, more personalized care.
2) It will allow the establishment for clinics for the uninsured to receive health care. (I think I just heard someone crow in outrage.) How dare I suggest their money go to some migrant worker, or illegal!? Everyone worth their salt in Austin can afford health insurance (but somehow can’t afford a negligible tax raise). Right? Wrong. Texas is the most uninsured state in the union. According to the stats, 1 in every 3 people you know is likely uninsured. And every single one of them will need health care sometime. Right now, their course of action is to wait until they are in an emergency situation to receive medical treatment at an emergency facility. The rates for emergency medicine is astronomically higher than preventative, scheduled treatment. When they can’t pay, the hospital doesn’t just write that off. They pass it off on those who can pay. Ever wonder why those staples in your leg cost $84 dollars a piece? Or why that gauze was $9 per dressing? Now you know! And the insurance company wont just eat those inflated prices either. All of us who can afford insurance now have jacked up premiums to help the insurance companies recoup their expenses. So the net effect of having clinics for the uninsured? Less unpaid medical bills for hospitals. Less markup on your medical care. Lower premiums. Yes, this is a non fictional version of trickle down economics.
3) It would create 15,000 new jobs in Austin. How? Well, with more doctors practicing we will need more supporting staff, for starters. We will encourage a boom in Austin’s medical tech economy. Not to mention clinic workers and all of their supporting staff. The projected increase is about 2 billion dollars of economic activity. Lowering unemployment in Austin. This seems pretty self explanatory.
4) It would enable us to receive 129 million a year in matching federal funds. This is a biggie. This is, in essence, money injected straight into the medical field in Austin that the people of Austin don’t even have to pay for. In fact, Austinites only have to pay 10% of the entire bill. Seton, UT, US government fund matching, and a few others will be footing 90% of the bill. That is a hell of an ROI if you ask me.
5) This one is obvious, but I feel that it needs to be said. DECENT HEALTH CARE IN AUSTIN. Being a person, in a world, I have a grandmother. I remember when my grandmother had heart issues, we wanted to get her the best care we could afford. So we took her to Scott and White. In Temple. I can’t tell you how backwards it felt that we were leaving the educated center of Texas, in order to go to Temple, Texas. There were better people in Dallas, but my grandmother refused to have us drive her that far. Gas alone was much more than 9 dollars a trip. A trip we made sometimes up to 6 times a month. On top of that, I can’t imagine a car trip to and from Dallas or Houston with a loved one puking from a wonderfully potent combination of car sickness and chemotherapy.
But what will be giving up? $9.00 a month. Yes, that’s it. To fund this, Austin (and the surrounding area) residents who own property would have to pay an additional 9.00 a month average of increased property taxes. (Austin, I would like to add, has by far the lowest property tax of all 5 of the largest cities in Texas.) This isn’t a tax leveled against lower income residents or students who can’t afford to own their own homes. No, this tax increase would be on people who are generally well enough to do that they own on average a $214,000 home in Austin. While I am definitely not saying that everyone who owns a house in Austin is well to do, I am saying that people have the cash flow to pay for a mortgage can spare 9 dollars a month. They might have to skip two blended venti carmel macchiatos to hit this goal, but I have faith in them. I can hit 9 dollars at Chipotle if I’m feeling frisky and opt for a heaping scoop of guacamole on forearm sized burrito. I would be ok (and probably better off just by) giving up a loaded burrito every month in order to be granted to better local health care.
I won’t tell anyone how to vote. That isn’t my place, but personally I would rather be shorted $9.00 a month while having ample medical staff around me when I need it. In my opinion, that extra $9.00 a month is going to be poor compensation when we are forced into driving our loved ones or ourselves to Houston, Dallas, or San Antonio in order to receive proper medical treatment. But, really, how can prop 1 compete with two super sonic bacon double cheeseburgers pried from our starving mouths every single month?
The first response I heard, and the response I seem to be hearing more often than not is something akin to “No more taxes!” or “The liberals want to steal my money!” or some other Texas-style-no-taxes-ever! or I-got-mine-already-so-screw-the-rest-of-you! crowing. Quit frankly, I find this disappointing. When I first heard about this, I thought, “finally, we can get some decent health care in Austin!” Improved medical care is a good thing. Medical schools are not only good, but necessary for the advancement of medicine and the training of good physicians. This seems like a no brainer to me.
What does prop 1 give us? In a nutshell,
1) Prop 1 will open up a medical school at UT that will educate and train doctors in Austin. While doctors are in no way obligated to stay in the same area that they completed their residency in they tend to do just that. This means more access to doctors for everyone in Austin. More specialists. More GPs. Quicker turnaround times. Less waiting. Better, more personalized care.
2) It will allow the establishment for clinics for the uninsured to receive health care. (I think I just heard someone crow in outrage.) How dare I suggest their money go to some migrant worker, or illegal!? Everyone worth their salt in Austin can afford health insurance (but somehow can’t afford a negligible tax raise). Right? Wrong. Texas is the most uninsured state in the union. According to the stats, 1 in every 3 people you know is likely uninsured. And every single one of them will need health care sometime. Right now, their course of action is to wait until they are in an emergency situation to receive medical treatment at an emergency facility. The rates for emergency medicine is astronomically higher than preventative, scheduled treatment. When they can’t pay, the hospital doesn’t just write that off. They pass it off on those who can pay. Ever wonder why those staples in your leg cost $84 dollars a piece? Or why that gauze was $9 per dressing? Now you know! And the insurance company wont just eat those inflated prices either. All of us who can afford insurance now have jacked up premiums to help the insurance companies recoup their expenses. So the net effect of having clinics for the uninsured? Less unpaid medical bills for hospitals. Less markup on your medical care. Lower premiums. Yes, this is a non fictional version of trickle down economics.
3) It would create 15,000 new jobs in Austin. How? Well, with more doctors practicing we will need more supporting staff, for starters. We will encourage a boom in Austin’s medical tech economy. Not to mention clinic workers and all of their supporting staff. The projected increase is about 2 billion dollars of economic activity. Lowering unemployment in Austin. This seems pretty self explanatory.
4) It would enable us to receive 129 million a year in matching federal funds. This is a biggie. This is, in essence, money injected straight into the medical field in Austin that the people of Austin don’t even have to pay for. In fact, Austinites only have to pay 10% of the entire bill. Seton, UT, US government fund matching, and a few others will be footing 90% of the bill. That is a hell of an ROI if you ask me.
5) This one is obvious, but I feel that it needs to be said. DECENT HEALTH CARE IN AUSTIN. Being a person, in a world, I have a grandmother. I remember when my grandmother had heart issues, we wanted to get her the best care we could afford. So we took her to Scott and White. In Temple. I can’t tell you how backwards it felt that we were leaving the educated center of Texas, in order to go to Temple, Texas. There were better people in Dallas, but my grandmother refused to have us drive her that far. Gas alone was much more than 9 dollars a trip. A trip we made sometimes up to 6 times a month. On top of that, I can’t imagine a car trip to and from Dallas or Houston with a loved one puking from a wonderfully potent combination of car sickness and chemotherapy.
But what will be giving up? $9.00 a month. Yes, that’s it. To fund this, Austin (and the surrounding area) residents who own property would have to pay an additional 9.00 a month average of increased property taxes. (Austin, I would like to add, has by far the lowest property tax of all 5 of the largest cities in Texas.) This isn’t a tax leveled against lower income residents or students who can’t afford to own their own homes. No, this tax increase would be on people who are generally well enough to do that they own on average a $214,000 home in Austin. While I am definitely not saying that everyone who owns a house in Austin is well to do, I am saying that people have the cash flow to pay for a mortgage can spare 9 dollars a month. They might have to skip two blended venti carmel macchiatos to hit this goal, but I have faith in them. I can hit 9 dollars at Chipotle if I’m feeling frisky and opt for a heaping scoop of guacamole on forearm sized burrito. I would be ok (and probably better off just by) giving up a loaded burrito every month in order to be granted to better local health care.
I won’t tell anyone how to vote. That isn’t my place, but personally I would rather be shorted $9.00 a month while having ample medical staff around me when I need it. In my opinion, that extra $9.00 a month is going to be poor compensation when we are forced into driving our loved ones or ourselves to Houston, Dallas, or San Antonio in order to receive proper medical treatment. But, really, how can prop 1 compete with two super sonic bacon double cheeseburgers pried from our starving mouths every single month?
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