Economics/Second Amendment/Taxes

Taxing firearms

Posted on by Kenneth Ballard / 0 Comment

Article: Don’t Ban Assault Weapons – Tax Them

I’ve said before (here and here) that subtle racism largely fuels the calls for greater financial burdens on firearm owners and buyers. Any financial barrier to the exercise of a right is no better than the poll taxes that were outlawed with the 24th Amendment.

So why are gun control advocates continually proposing additional financial burdens when the greatest effect they’ll have is on marginalized populations who need their Second Amendment rights the most? Again, because of an underlying racism they fail to see is there.

And that racism comes out in two ways: believing only well-off whites own firearms, and ignoring the fact most gun crime in the United States is committed by blacks. And that most gun crime is also committed by people illegally in possession of firearms, and who have zero interest in submitting to any additional laws.

In other words, like most gun control ideas out there, Saul Cornell’s idea of taxing “assault weapons” is racist and punishes the innocent.

Few Americans realize that guns and ammunition are already taxed to pay for conservation efforts. Gun owners have happily tolerated federal taxes for years to support this worthwhile public-policy goal.

A lot of people are completely ignorant about taxation, and Cornell appears to be no exception to this. There are various types of taxes levied against the United States economy.

The tax Cornell is referring to specifically is authorized by the Pittman-Robertson Act, officially known as the Federal Aid in Wildlife Restoration Act of 1937. And it’s an excise tax, meaning levied only at manufacture, and paid only by those in the business of manufacturing firearms and ammunition for sale. The funds from the tax are distributed to the States for conservation efforts. Hunting and fishing license fees serve the same purpose.

But Cornell isn’t proposing an excise tax on “assault weapons”. His article seems to be proposing ownership taxes in the same way we have property taxes on houses and vehicles.

Taxation sidesteps entirely the constitutional qualms some have over assault-weapons bans.

The Pittman-Robertson Act is constitutional only in the same way that sales taxes are constitutional. People who buy firearms and ammunition through retailers still pay the required sales taxes at the point of sale unless the purchase is online through an out-of-State retailer – with all applicable laws and regulations observed.

It also addresses the criticism often voiced that singling out assault weapons is irrational because it would leave hunting rifles that have many of the same features on the streets.

Yes it’ll address that criticism, but that isn’t a criticism lobbied against the assault weapon bans. The criticism lobbied is that it goes after a tiny minority in gun violence.

Assault weapons, in general parlance, are typically defined to include a typical, off-the-shelf AR-15. Indeed that, along with the AK variants also commonly-available and owned, seems to be the only firearm in mind when talking about “assault weapons”. According to the FBI Uniform Crime Report, consistently year-over-year, handguns account for the vast, vast majority of gun violence in the United States. Not rifles or shotguns, but handguns.

Yet no proposal by the gun control advocacy groups addresses this. Why is that? Racism.

Again the majority of gun crimes are committed by blacks, the majority of gun crime victims are also black, and the firearm used in those crimes is almost exclusively handguns. Yet consistently the greatest calls for gun control aren’t about addressing gun crime in the inner cities, but mass shootings that largely affect white kids – the vast majority of mass shooting victims in high-profile mass homicide events (such as Las Vegas) are white.

Moreover, gun bans do not address the problem posed by guns already in private possession. Rather than requiring an expensive buyback program, gun taxation would use a market-based strategy to reduce the number of guns in circulation by effectively raising the price of ownership.

And here we see that he isn’t proposing an additional excise tax, a tax at the point of manufacture. And I can show why he isn’t doing that.

First is the mention of firearms already in private possession. Meaning he’s proposing one of two things: property taxes on already-existing firearms, or additional point-of-sale or excise taxes on ammunition for “assault weapons”.

The latter won’t work, I’m pretty sure he knows it won’t work.

The AR-15 is chambered for one of several rounds: .22LR, .223 Remington, 5.56 NATO, or .300 Blackout. But none of those rounds is unique to the AR-15, and you can find other rifles – and handguns in the case of the .22LR – chambered for those rounds. So attempting to levy an additional excise or point-of-sale tax on those rounds as part of taxing “assault weapons” will end up affecting those who don’t own what is commonly called an “assault weapon”.

And there are carbine rifles that would fit the definition of “assault weapon” that don’t use the common rifle rounds. As an example are carbine rifles chambered for the 9x19mm Parabellum, also called the 9mm Luger or just “9mm”. So additional point-of-sale or excise taxes on the 9mm Luger will vastly affect pistol owners more than those who own the carbines.

Nor is this a “market-based strategy”. Taxation doesn’t work with a market, it works against a market. A market-based strategy would be a massive advertising campaign that convinces the millions of people who already own AR-15s to give them up or avoid acquiring more. Taxation circumvents the market in much the same way as an “assault weapon” ban.

Another advantage of using taxation instead of gun bans is that such a policy would provide an opportunity to reward the vast majority of American gun owners who already engage in safe gun practices. Tax policies could offer tax deductions for the purchase of gun safes or for the cost of safety courses. Weapons stored at federally licensed firing ranges or hunting lodges might incur no tax. But if you wanted the convenience of having such a weapon at home, you could be taxed for the privilege.

And now we see the underlying agenda. This isn’t about rewarding gun owners, this is about registration and creating a census on gun owners. By having a line-item deduction on tax forms for “safe gun practices”, this would be the start of a census on who owns guns.

This approach has the additional advantage of shifting the debate away from an argument over rights and moving it where it belongs—toward structuring a set of policies that protects gun owners’ rights and lowers the negative costs that gun ownership imposes on the rest of society.

Protects gun owner’s rights? No, this is about taxing rights in a fashion similar to how the Crown taxed paper, literally taxed paper, with the Stamp Act of 1765. You want a tax as a barrier to the exercise of rights to disincentives lawful citizens from exercising their rights while doing nothing to address those who actually are a problem.

Taxation offers another advantage: It might overcome some of the fear of gun confiscation.

Not even close. That you included tax deductions for “safe gun practices” means you don’t see how that could lead to confiscation. Again the deduction would be the start of creating a census of gun owners. You desperately want direct taxation on gun owners as back-door registration or census taking of gun owners. Don’t even try to say otherwise.

As such, it won’t assuage any fears of confiscation. If anything, it’ll enhance it.

One of the many dysfunctional aspects of our modern gun debate is that we have framed the issue exclusively in terms of rights. Thinking of gun ownership in this way is neither hardwired into our constitutional system nor rooted in founding-era practices.

Actually it very, very much is. Anyone familiar with the history of the militias during the American Revolution knows this. Which means Cornell isn’t familiar with that history.

The first militia act, which required those eligible to serve in the militia to purchase their own firearms, was in essence a tax.

By what definition? And such a law today would not be constitutional since the right to keep and bear arms also includes the right to decide to not keep and bear arms.

The problem was not that Americans did not own firearms—levels of gun ownership in America were much higher than in England—but that most Americans did not want military-style weapons. Such guns were relatively heavy, and not especially suited to shooting the critters that ate their crops or to hunting birds.

Wow, you really need to read on the history of firearms in the United States.

Until the 20th century, the weapons owned and kept by private individuals were much the same weapons, if not the exact same weapons, kept by the military. The only notable exceptions on that mark are field artillery units (e.g. cannons and Gatling guns). Even private merchant vessels had cannons to defend against pirates, with the need for merchant vessels to be armed lessening as piracy lessened.

It was not until the 20th century when there started to be any kind of distinction of “military-style weapons” with the development and increased commonality of full-auto firearms in military combat. The first truly full-auto firearm, known as the Maxim gun, wasn’t developed until 1885, well after the Civil War. The first full-auto rifle was the Cei-Rigotti, introduced in 1900, but never adopted by any military.

The first commercially-successful full-auto firearm was the Browning Automatic Rifle, which saw use in the First World War. Like the Gatling gun, though, the Browning Automatic Rifle and Maxim gun are considered field artillery, not infantry artillery. The Nazis would actually develop the first full-auto infantry rifle.

But throughout the history of the United States, the rifles and muskets commonly used by the military were much the same, if not the exact same, as the rifles and muskets owned by civilians. It wasn’t until the development of fully-automatic weapons that there started to be separation in that.

And that separation applied only to rifles. That separation never applied to pistols.

There is no pistol used by the military that was never in civilian hands. Some pistols were developed first for the military, but they eventually made it to civilian ownership. The two most common pistols in the United States for much of the 20th century are the M1911 (or just “1911”) and the Beretta M9 (called the Beretta 92 in civilian markets). After the introduction of the M1911, the military stopped carrying revolvers. Today Glock reigns as the most commonly-owned civilian and law-enforcement pistol, though it was never adopted by the United States Armed Forces as a sidearm.

And the Second Amendment is the reason for that continued parity between civilian and military arms. The Second Amendment, in a nutshell, basically enshrines the ability for the people to defend themselves. Even if they need to defend themselves against their own government.

Your attempt to rewrite the history of firearms and the Second Amendment is shameful in the kindest terms.

Taxation offers a more flexible set of tools to achieve a goal all Americans seek: lowering the costs of gun violence to Americans.

Taxing rights is not constitutional. And that is what Cornell is seeking to do: tax people who exercise their Second Amendment rights. Again, this is like the South enacting poll taxes to discourage and prevent blacks from exercising the vote.

The problem is Cornell doesn’t really fully spell out what his tax policy would be. What, specifically, would be taxed and how? His article provides a couple implications that he’d want property taxes on firearms and, likely, ammunition, given his statement about taxation being a strategy, not “market-based” as he asserts, “to reduce the number of guns in circulation by effectively raising the price of ownership.”

The only way to reduce the number of firearms already in private possession is to confiscate them. Increasing the price of ammunition won’t do that – people didn’t just sell their firearms during the 2013 ammo scares and shortages following Sandy Hook. And taxation carries with it two tools for enforcement: liens and incarceration. In other words, those who don’t pay the tax could have their firearms seized and/or be incarcerated.

That statement alone means he isn’t proposing an excise tax like the one provided by the Pittman-Robertson Act. He’s proposing property taxes, with the registration to go with it for enforcement of those taxes, and the confiscation and (likely) incarceration that comes with noncompliance. Completely in contradiction to his assertion that taxation would allay fears of confiscation.

This is why I say there is racism underlying any gun control proposal. Any new anti-gun policies are most likely to be enforced against blacks. And the fact gun control proponents refuse to acknowledge that reality is quite telling. Since it shows that they seem to have only white gun owners in mind in making these proposals, since they not only know that whites are more law-abiding, but also more likely to just surrender to the new laws.

While blacks are just going to get locked up.

Debt/Politics

Student loans and lender risk

Posted on by Kenneth Ballard / 0 Comment

Bankruptcy tends to make lenders more cautious when it comes to making loans. The prospect of borrowers going into default and declaring bankruptcy makes lenders nervous since bankruptcy, or at least Chapter 7, means they walk away with pennies compared to the outstanding debt.

With student loans we see what happens when that risk doesn’t exist. Government guarantees plus the protection of student loans from bankruptcy discharge means that lenders have much lower risk lending to just anyone, regardless of their credit history. And regardless of their major.

With all of the talk on how to alleviate the current student debt “crisis”, the one change that I’m sure both sides could agree upon is merely ending the bankruptcy protection on student loans. Make them able to be discharged in bankruptcy and lenders will start feeling the pinch.

But you’ll also see student lending dry up as they pull back on their lending to reduce their risk of loss. I wouldn’t really call that a bad thing.

Second Amendment

State gun laws and pediatric firearm-related mortality

Posted on by Kenneth Ballard / 0 Comment

Recently the American Academy of Pediatrics published a study concluding that “States with laws requiring universal background checks for firearm purchases in effect for ≥ 5 years had lower pediatric firearm-related mortality rates”. The study has a few flaws. Let’s start with the opening sentence of the abstract: “Firearms are the second leading cause of pediatric death in the United States.”

And how do the authors make that claim? By defining as “children” everyone 21 and younger.

For their study, they used data from WISQARS for 2011 to 2015, giving a total of 21,241 firearm-related deaths. Now what happens if you limit the age range to just those under 18 years-old? The total drops by over 68% to 6,658.

Now let’s limit to just homicides. The number drops to 3,640, just 17.1% of the original total.

So why just limit to homicides? There’s no reason to believe universal background check laws or other gun laws would stop teen suicide by firearm or unintentional homicides.

To keep things simple I’ll also use the Brady Campaign’s scorecards for 2013, since I’ve used that in the past when comparing gun laws against various violence statistics. I don’t need to go any more granular to prove my point. And I’ll also be using the CDC WISQARS data for 2011 to 2015 for victims of firearm violence age 17 and lower.

The range for firearm homicide rates among teens and children ranges from 0.29 (Massachusetts) to 2.75 (Louisiana) per 100,000. The median is 0.99 and the average is 1.03. Five of the six States with universal background checks in 2013 had more than 10 homicides. Here is the breakdown of their rates:

  • New York: 0.54
  • Colorado: 0.65
  • California: 1.00
  • Delaware: 1.08
  • Connecticut: 1.1

That New York doesn’t have the lowest firearm homicide rate tells you that universal background checks aren’t the panacea they’re made out to be. Here are some highlights from running the data on States without universal background checks:

  • Under 10 homicides: 9
  • Homicide rate lower than New York: 15
  • Homicide rate lower than California: 28
  • Homicide rate lower than Connecticut: 33

Given that breakdown, it’s clear that universal background check laws can’t even correlate with lower homicide rates, let alone be causal. You won’t get lower firearm homicide rates among youth by passing universal background check laws. There are other factors at play.

And if you’re going to start out a study by including adults in your definition of “children”, then I really need to question the peer reviewers who allowed that study to be published. Since doing such is beyond disingenuous, and the only reason the 18 to 21 age range was included, along with including suicides and unintentional homicides into the mix, is to inflate the numbers.

* * * * *

So just for completeness sake, let’s look at suicides as well.

For 2011 to 2015, age 17 and below, there were 2,494 suicides by firearm. It’s really the only age group where firearm homicides outnumber suicides. The suicide rate per 100,000 ranges from too low to calculate effectively (6 States) to 2.86 (Montana).

Among States with universal background checks, two have a rate too low to effectively calculate: Delaware and Rhode Island. Colorado tops out the other four at 1.31 per 100,000, while California, New York, and Connecticut come in at 0.24, 0.25, and 0.28, respectively.

That is why they included suicides in their tallies and didn’t provide a breakdown. It skews the numbers toward the States with universal background checks.

By not providing this breakdown between suicides and homicides, they make it seem like universal background checks reduce overall firearm death rates, and that isn’t true. While it might help with suicides, it does nothing for homicides as I’ve shown. This is why gun rights advocates continually emphasize breaking homicides out from suicides.

Teen suicide is a problem unto itself. Between 2011 and 2015, 6,291 teens and youth committed suicide, of which about 2 in 5 committed suicide by firearm. Meaning more teens killed themselves by some other means than by firearm. Meaning teens will use some other method if they can’t get ahold of a firearm as the numbers readily show.

But I guess the authors of the above study want to act like laws will somehow curtail that.

Photography

“Got home” routine for photography

Posted on by Kenneth Ballard / 0 Comment

For about a year I’ve been a photography hobbyist. Every photographer, whether you’re a professional or hobbyist, must have a “got home” or “back at the office” routine. So I’ll detail mine here. If you’re trying to establish a “got home” routine, or you don’t have one, you can use this as a guide.

Every weekend for the last several months, weather permitting, I’ve been going to a local park for a nature photo walk. For reference, I use a Nikon D7200. And this is the routine I typically follow when I get home.

Nikon D7200. Image copyright Nikon, Inc., and used with "fair use" for commentary.

1. Copy off the pictures – two copies

I make two copies of all pictures on the card. My system has 4TB secondary HDD storage. All the files get copied there first. Each session has a separate folder.

Once they’re copied, I immediately copy them to my NAS – networked attached storage. If you don’t have a NAS, and even if you do, you can instead (or also) back these up immediately to any cloud storage you have – Google Drive, OneDrive, etc. The point is to have at least two copies of the original files: one you’ll cull and edit on your workstation to make your final photos, and the backup(s).

2. Check the batteries

Do this while the files are copying off to your system, or the NAS or cloud storage. I said this in a comment to a YouTube video by UK photographer James Popsys:

While you’re backing up the photos off your card(s), check your batteries with your camera to determine which ones are still good or decent (50% or more) and which ones need to be charged. Integrate it into your “got home” routine. On site or in the field, segregating the dead from good batteries can save you a little bit of time – that way you’re not wasting about 30s because you grabbed a dead one. But, again, checking and charging your batteries should be part of what you do when you get home. Do it while you’re backing up your card(s).

If you have a separate battery grip for your camera that doesn’t plug directly into the battery compartment, use this as a chance to rotate the batteries as well if they aren’t low enough you feel the need to charge them. I always make sure the battery with the higher charge is the one the camera is configured to use first.

I use the Vello BG-N11 with my D7200, and I love it! It’s a fraction of the price (only about 70 USD as of this writing) of the Nikon MB-D15. Several brands make battery grips for the D7200, but the Vello has very positive reviews at B&H, and is the only off-brand battery grip for the D7200 that B&H sells.

3. Format the cards

Once the photos are copied off, I put the card back into the camera and format both cards. I do this immediately so I don’t have to worry later about whether I got everything off the cards. Since I format the card immediately afterward, I know I got everything.

4. Review and cull the photos – Nikon ViewNX-i

This step I actually only recently started using, and I’m glad I did as it’s been a significant efficiency boost to my workflow.

Nikon ViewNX-i (with Capture NX-D) is Nikon’s RAW viewing and editing software. (Obviously use the proper software for your camera.) It comes in very handy for culling through the initial set of RAW files from the camera since it just reads files straight off the file system. I can quickly look through the files and delete any that are out of focus or missed focus. I also normally take multiple exposures of a scene, sometimes with differing settings, so this allows me to easily determine the best of those sets.

Lightroom CC is very slow in this regard, since you need to import them first, for one. And deleting a file locally means it must also delete it from the cloud, which… isn’t quick, even with my gigabit Internet connection.

I used to use ViewNX-i to bulk-rotate all of the images as well prior to import into Lightroom, but ViewNX-i no longer saves those settings to the RAW file directly. Lightroom can bulk rotate images – you need to be in one of the grid views to do so – so it isn’t much of a pain having to do that twice. But I still use ViewNX-i to review and cull the files before importing, with its bulk rotate coming in handy for that. In case you’re wondering, I’ve had issues with in-camera auto-rotate in the past on my D40 and D3200, so I just don’t bother with it.

I don’t determine all of the keepers in this step, only the ones that absolutely are not keepers – missed focus, out of focus, unintentional shutter presses, etc. I also don’t typically try to do this all at once unless I’m working with a small initial set.

5. Adobe Lightroom

Once I’ve culled through the set, I import that set into Adobe Lightroom. Since I’m now working with a much, much smaller set compared to the initial set, the time for import is negligible compared to how long it would’ve taken to import everything from the card. And bulk rotating the files is the first thing I do after importing them into a new album for the shoot.

Concluding…

So that’s my “got home” routine in a nutshell. It’s working out well for me so far, and if I ever change it for whatever reason, I’ll hopefully remember to come back and update this article with the specifics.

Copyright 2019 by Kenneth Ballard. All rights reserved.

Abortion

This isn’t about abortion!

Posted on by Kenneth Ballard / 0 Comment

Let’s establish the scene. Here’s the cast:

  • MJ – woman who is 5 months pregnant
  • EJ – woman who is presumably-lawfully armed

Somewhere in Alabama. MJ starts some kind of altercation with EJ. Somehow the altercation escalates and EJ pulls a gun, shooting MJ in the stomach, ultimately resulting in a miscarriage. A grand jury hears evidence and returns an indictment against MJ for manslaughter in the loss of the pregnancy.

Pro-choice advocates become outraged. One is quoted as saying this:

The state of Alabama has proven yet again that the moment a person becomes pregnant their sole responsibility is to produce a live, healthy baby and that it considers any action a pregnant person takes that might impede in that live birth to be a criminal act.

Except this has nothing to do with abortion. This isn’t any indication that women will be subjugated under the new anti-abortion laws, as many have readily alleged. A lot of pro-choice States have laws wherein it is counted as a homicide if a woman loses a pregnancy during the commission of a crime.

This isn’t about abortion in the least. But they want to paint his situation as such given the recent laws passed in Alabama all-but banning abortion.

MJ is Marshae Jones, a 27 year-old black woman who was 5 months pregnant at the time of the altercation. EJ is Ebony Jemison, 23 years old and, I’ll presume, also black. The incident occurred on December 4, 2018, so this wasn’t recent. Meaning it preceded the new abortion laws, so the new abortion laws cannot, under ex post facto, be applied to this.

The fight was allegedly about the MJ’s baby’s father. MJ started the fight, and escalated it to the point where EJ felt it necessary to produce the firearm. Quoting Lt Danny Reid of the Pleasant Grove, AL, police:

The investigation showed that it was Jones who initiated and pressed the fight, which ultimately caused Jemison to defend herself and unfortunately caused the death of the baby.

Again what is lost here is the fact that MJ started the fight. That means she is ultimately responsible for its outcome. That EJ produced the firearm means we can reasonably infer that MJ produced some kind of weapon as well, or gave reasonable indication she was about to produce a weapon. In response to a perceived threat, EJ produced her firearm and shot MJ, ultimately ending the altercation, and unfortunately ending MJ’s baby’s life as well.

Including any deaths that occurred. But in my attempt to explain this to various individuals online, I kept getting the sense that they felt EJ was in the wrong because she produced the firearm.

So far I’ve yet to see it, but it wouldn’t surprise me if someone would try to parallel this with the Trayvon Martin and Michael Brown shootings, with the exception being an unarmed, pregnant woman is being charged with manslaughter. Because it’s the same mentality at play: whoever produces a gun is always in the wrong.

Again this case has nothing to do with abortion. It isn’t even about gun laws. But the recent Alabama abortion laws being on everyone’s minds, many have attempted to frame this in that light. So much so that Amanda Reyes, Executive Director of the Yellowhammer Fund, said this:

Today, Marshae Jones is being charged with manslaughter for being pregnant and getting shot while engaging in an altercation with a person who had a gun. Tomorrow, it will be another black woman, maybe for having a drink while pregnant. And after that, another, for not obtaining adequate prenatal care.

And there is nothing about the incident and indictment that supports such a disgusting reduction.

MJ started the altercation. MJ escalated the incident to the point where EJ felt threatened. EJ produced a firearm and shot MJ. MJ lost her baby. MJ is therefore responsible for that. And under the laws of close to every other State in the US, she would still be held responsible unless EJ’s actions could be shown to have been an unreasonable response to how the altercation escalated.

Again this isn’t about Alabama’s new abortion laws, since they don’t apply here.

End of story.

Source: “Alabama woman loses unborn child after being shot, gets arrested; shooter goes free“, AL.com

Ethics/Law/Working

Leaving on short notice

Posted on by Kenneth Ballard / 0 Comment

There are a lot of decisions made in the heat of the moment that many likely come to regret. In Michigan today there’s a store manager likely regretting some of what she said in the heat of a moment, and I’m hoping the employee berated by said manager is also regretting it.

The headline is pretty straightforward: Manager fired over heartless text messages to worker with child on life support. And it’s a classic case of not all relevant facts being available. Now this case I realize is from July 2018, but the details of the case aren’t moot with regard to discussion. There are still lessons that can be learned, both on the manager and employee side.

Here’s the long and short of the situation. Crystal Fisher had to rush her son to the hospital on Thursday June 28 with a 104°F (40°C) fever and low blood oxygen. Initially Crystal’s daughter called into her employer, “Can you have somebody cover mom for [Friday], my brother’s really sick, they’re going to have to ventilate him?” The manager replied that Crystal needed to be the one calling in.

After the son was transported to the University of Michigan and put on life support, Crystal texted her manager in an exchange that went viral after she posted it to Facebook. The parent corporation caught wind of the exchange, fired the manager, and told Crystal to take as much time off as she needed.

Now given only the facts made available, one could reasonably presume the manager was heartless, cruel, a bitch, etc. But I fear that would be reaching conclusions not completely warranted. Time to play devil’s advocate here.

“Until further notice” = Leave of absence

Any kind of “until further notice” request is a leave of absence. You don’t request that over text message. Not in a phone call either. You can give a “head’s up” to it by text, e-mail, or phone, but that is not a request unto itself and is not binding.

Virtually every employer subject to the Family and Medical Leave Act (and a lot of those that may not be) has a procedure for requesting leave, regardless of whether the leave is subject to Federal law. With paperwork detailing the estimated time of the leave and why it’s being taken. Even if the leave isn’t protected by law, meaning the employer isn’t required by law to hold your job, this should protect you from any claims to the contrary and a “no-call, no-show” termination.

These policies also involve human resources (HR), meaning your direct manager or the store manager (in the case of retail and food service) is not the only person with whom you will be speaking. The HR manager will know the company’s specific procedures and what the law requires with your specific circumstance.

So Crystal certainly did not do everything right in this circumstance. Understandable given the specifics of the case. Let’s outline a few guidelines that I’ve at least followed in the time I’ve been working – last 20 years minus a few years for college.

Guidelines for calling off work

If you’re going to be out for one or two shifts or days, then you can call in, providing a reasonable idea of what’s going on, and giving them a reasonable estimate on when you’re going to be back. For example, contracting influenza (“the flu”) and expecting to be out for two or three days since that always happens when you catch it. And keeping your manager (and team) in the loop if it appears you’ll need more time out.

Caught food poisoning where you ate the night before? Call or write in – or have a family member do it if you’re too busy… reminding yourself of what you ate. And again, keep your employer in the loop on when you expect to be back to work. The last time I had a bout of food poisoning, I spent the next several days after I was done… recalling what caused it trying to regain my strength. It took well over 6 months to be able to eat at IHOP again, and my wife and I still don’t eat there with the same regularity as prior to that incident.

You’ve just been told your son or daughter is on life support? You get the attending physician to put that in writing so you can send a family member or friend to your place of employment with the details. And you show up as well once things have stabilized to get everything in writing.

The fact this all occurred the day before her scheduled shift means she had adequate opportunity to do just that. She had options beyond a text message exchange. But it sounds like she wasn’t all that versed on employment law, so couldn’t directly assert her rights. And she let her emotions get ahead of her reasoning skills.

With that out of the way, let’s turn to the manager.

The manager’s response

It was perfectly reasonable for the manager to demand Crystal call in, especially since this wasn’t the day of her shift. You cannot resolve scheduling concerns via text message. But that’s about the only thing about the exchange that is reasonable.

When an employee contacts a manager about a family medical event, the manager is largely not allowed to question that without… some demonstrable reason (“probable cause”) to believe the person may not be telling the truth. Federal law largely doesn’t allow for that. And they most certainly are not allowed to become combative with the employee, regardless of whether the employee escalated it.

That said, I’m willing to grant the manager some benefit of doubt here with why she became combative.

In that I wonder about Crystal’s history with the store and/or the manager in question. Was this a kind of “last straw” situation? There are numerous reasons the manager responded the way she did, so I’m willing to grant the benefit of doubt. And it’s possible she was just being a bitch without any rhyme or reason, but I’m hesitant to believe such since I don’t know either person.

In short, there are plenty of unknowns here.

But what is clear is the manager may have broken Federal law by becoming combative, hence her termination. The text message should have, at minimum, been interpreted as advanced notice of an intent to take protected leave. Legally speaking, then, the only reasonable response is pointing out the company’s policy regarding leave and stating she needs to follow that policy. But the manager’s response was likely heat of the moment, making me wonder about Crystal’s history with the store and/or this manager in particular, or what the manager had endured at around the time of the text exchange. It appears the manager also easily let her emotions get ahead of her reasoning skills.

Don’t appeal to the court of public opinion

Crystal’s appeal through Facebook, though, was beyond improper.

She may not have initially thought the exchange would go viral, but it was predictable, almost inevitable because she didn’t have any privacy controls enabled on the post. This shows Crystal was willing to shame her employer rather than follow proper protocols. A decision made in the heat of the moment, for sure, but a grave mistake nonetheless.

Crystal largely should consider herself lucky she was not fired as well. But this whole ordeal doesn’t shine well on her either. The viral attention and publicity the situation garnered is likely the only reason she wasn’t terminated. Doing anything that shines a negative light on your employer is grounds for termination. And this… certainly qualifies.

Given how this has played out, Crystal is better off walking away from the store when all is said and done. Her Facebook profile isn’t showing any employer information, so there is no way to know if she’s still employed by that store.

Again I have a feeling there is more to this than we’re being told, in particular with how the manager responded when Crystal texted in. But that’s almost always the case in situations like this.

* * * * *

So now that we’ve gotten that out of the way, how should the situation have been handled? Again this presumes there isn’t any kind of negative history between employer and employee – repeatedly calling in last minute, misuse of paid time off or sick time, etc.

Again, the text message is only a “head’s up”, not a request for leave in and of itself. You can’t just say “I won’t be available to work until further notice,” or something similar, and leave it at that. No employer will accept that. You need to specifically say you will be requesting leave and follow the company’s processes regarding leave. In Crystal’s case, it should’ve been something like this: “My son has just been admitted to UMich and is on life support. I will be in as soon as possible to discuss a leave of absence.”

Virtually every employer has some kind of leave policy and a procedure for requesting leave. And that leave policy is typically worded to allow for unexpected, exigent circumstances. But the point of calling it a “leave of absence” or just “leave” is also to specifically invoke the Family and Medical Leave Act of 1993 (FMLA) [29 USC § 2601] and the protections it affords, provided you’re eligible. I’ve said before that you need to use the statutory language when invoking statutory rights so there is no misinterpretation of what you’re doing. And there’s a big difference between saying you are requesting leave versus saying you “won’t be able to make it to work until further notice”. The latter leaves a lot of room for interpretation.

But then there’s the matter of posting the conversation to Facebook. That alone is enough to warrant termination.

In short, if you have a beef with your employer, do not post that to social media. Most anything negative you say about your employer publicly will warrant termination, and Federal and State-level employment laws won’t protect you. And publicly posting a conversation you had with your manager will also warrant termination, since that is considered a breach of confidentiality and fiduciary duties.

A person who puts in for FMLA leave can still be terminated before, during, or after the leave. Timing might provide the illusion of retaliation. If the employer can demonstrate the circumstances around the termination minus the leave or leave request would still result in termination, the employer is in the clear. So has ruled United States District and Circuit Courts several times over. FMLA will not delay or prevent termination.

And Crystal’s actions would, absent the need for family medical leave, lead to her termination. Again, post anything negative about your employer online, or publicly reveal a conversation you had with your manager, and that is grounds for termination.

Any details about your specific employer’s leave policy or your rights under the Family and Medical Leave Act (FLMA) are best addressed by your employer’s HR department.

Fifth Amendment/Law Enforcement/Police/Religion

Religious police

Posted on by Kenneth Ballard / 0 Comment

Let’s talk about that new law recently signed by the Alabama governor. The bill amends Alabama Code § 16-22-1. Here is the original text of that section:

(a) The president or chief executive officer of any state college or university, the president or chief executive officer of the Alabama Institute for Deaf and Blind, the Presidents of Talladega College, Concordia College, Samford University, Birmingham-Southern College, Miles College, Stillman College, Tuskegee University, Spring Hill College, Faulkner University, and Selma University may appoint and employ one or more suitable persons to act as police officers to keep off intruders and prevent trespass upon and damage to the property of the college or university or of the institute. These persons shall be charged with all the duties and invested with all the powers of police officers.

(b) Any person appointed to act as a police officer, pursuant to subsection (a), while on duty, shall carry and be trained in the proper use of a nonlethal weapon. For the purposes of this subsection, a nonlethal weapon is a weapon that is explicitly designed and primarily employed to immediately incapacitate the targeted person while minimizing fatalities and permanent injury. A nonlethal weapon is intended to have a reversible effect on the targeted person.

(c) A person appointed as a police officer pursuant to subsection (a) shall be certified through the Alabama Peace Officers’ Standards and Training Commission.

(d) This section is cumulative.

And under § 16-22-2 of the Alabama Code, any person appointed as an officer under the above section shall have police powers only on the property of the institute that employs them.

The law the Governor recently signed amends subsection (a) of the above statute to include two additional institutions: Briarwood Presbyterian Church and its school (elementary grades are taught at the main church building), and Madison Academy.

Of the eleven (11) institutes listed in (a) above, three (3) are Christian institutes and three (2) are affiliated/associated with a religious institution. Concordia College was one of them, but they ceased operations at the end of the 2017-2018 academic year. And aside from the Alabama Institute for the Deaf and Blind, the rest are historically black colleges and universities.

These are the remaining four (4) religious institutions:

Absolutely there are immediate First Amendment implications to the State authorizing religious education institutes to have their own police force. Since it gives the appearance of the government showing favor to those institutions.

Except appearances can be deceiving. And this has been getting blown well out of proportion.

I’ve discussed the Establishment Clause in detail already, and my prior article will guide my reasoning here. By allowing Briarwood Presbyterian Church and Madison Academy to have their own police forces, has the State of Alabama made a law that has regard for the foundations and principles of religion, specifically the Christian religion?

No.

Indeed with the recent Supreme Court decision in Trinity Lutheran Church v. Comer, 582 US ___ (2017), applying reasoning from Associated General Contractors of America v. Jacksonville, 508 US 656 (1993), Alabama may actually more violate the First Amendment by allowing only secular institutions to have their own police under § 16-22-1. And the same could be said if Alabama had been authorizing religious education institutions only to have their own police under § 16-22-1, and never allowing any secular institutions.

But since this is a matter of legislation, not policy, there is no recourse when an organization is denied. It’d be a different story if it was the Alabama Department of Justice authorizing and certifying those police forces. In which case they’d absolutely be bound by the aforementioned Supreme Court precedent.

But too many people wildly misinterpret the First Amendment in so, so many ways, as I show in my article regarding the response to the Trinity decision.

Contrary to many assertions, Alabama did not establish any kind of religious police. As those police forces are authorized by Alabama law to enforce Alabama law on the property of said institutions, they are also limited by the Constitutions of the State of Alabama and the United States, including the Bill of Rights – the First, Fourth, Fifth, and Sixth Amendments specifically. And as already noted, those police only have jurisdiction on the properties of the institutions that hire them.

Taxes

Tax credits do not make adoption more affordable

Posted on by Kenneth Ballard / 0 Comment

Several United States Senators recently introduced the “Adoption Tax Credit Refundability Act”, which aims to make the entirety of a family’s adoption expenses refundable via a tax credit. Now why is this relevant?

The maximum amount you can claim for an adoption tax credit, in addition to any other tax credits, is limited to your tax liability. The remainder, however, can be carried forward for up to five (5) years. See IRS Topic No. 607 for details. By changing the tax credit so it is refundable, you can claim all adoption expenses in the calendar year in which they occurred.

Absolutely this is a good thing. I applaud this bill and hope it goes through, as it’ll make the tax credit easier to claim.

But let’s not lie to ourselves about it either.

There is an oft-repeated notion that tax credits and deductions make something more affordable. And Senator Blunt’s press release perpetuates that fallacy with its headline: “Blunt, Casey, Inhofe Introduce Bill to Make Adoption More Affordable for Families”. And also with this statement from the press release’s first paragram: “Making the tax credit fully refundable will ensure that more families can benefit from this critical support.”

Again this perpetuates the oft-repeated fallacy that tax credits (and deductions) aid affordability. They don’t. On Facebook I made this analogy: “This is about like a friend saying they’ll help you buy a car by reimbursing part of what you paid up front several months later.” And back in 2013 I wrote an article about several tax breaks in which I pointed out the catch-22:

Taxes are always going to be a financial catch-22, because reducing your tax burden almost always requires you taking on a major expense or reducing your take-home pay – i.e. the only realistic and legal means of reducing your tax burden involves you giving up money.

Adopting or giving birth to a child comes with plenty of tax benefits. You can adjust your W-4 withholding following the adoption or birth, reducing how much money comes out of your paycheck for Federal and State taxes. You may even be able to adjust your Federal W-4 withholding to declare yourself exempt from Federal income taxes (as opposed to FICA taxes) for the rest of the calendar year, depending on how much you had to pay out. I wonder how many who adopt actually consider doing this. Make sure to read through the IRS publications and do the math with your paystubs before you actually do this, though, to make sure you can actually do that.

Plus you get to claim the child as a dependent for the whole year even if the adoption was only finalized in December. Marriage works the same way, something that worked very well to mine and my wife’s advantage (read: big tax refund!) when we married in December 2011.

But the tax benefits only occur after you’ve shelled out who-knows-how-much money to adopt the child, meaning they do not and cannot make the process more affordable. Again, it is analogous to a friend or family member saying they’ll help you out by reimbursing part of your out-of-pocket expenses after you’ve already incurred them.

If our representatives really wanted to make adoption more affordable, they would find ways of addressing the up-front cost rather than acting like a tax credit you can only get after the adoption is finalized is somehow making it more affordable.

Which one way to make it more affordable is allowing the IRS to loan money to taxpayers to cover qualifying adoption expenses that can be repaid with the fully-refundable adoption tax credit. That addresses the up-front cost while still providing for the offset in tax liability the credit already provides. The taxpayer gets all of the benefit of the tax credit without having to wait months or even a year or more (depending on when the adoption is finalized) to claim the tax credit and receive the commensurate tax refund.

Movies/Politics

Forrest Gump

Posted on by Kenneth Ballard / 0 Comment

Over at the New York Post, Sara Stewart penned an article about the classic movie Forrest Gump that shows she did not understand the movie. She basically went into watching it with a very clouded lens, and interpreted it completely from a modern, SJW-ish context. And she must also be completely unaware the movie is based on a book of the same name.

Let’s get into this. I pulled quotes from the movie from an online script publication.

For starters, its protagonist is the worst. Not because he’s mentally challenged in some never-defined way (although this type of role is one of the most cloying members of the Oscar Bait family), but because he’s a relentless narcissist.

I’m guessing you’ve never been around many, if any, people with autism.

In the book it’s made clear that Forrest is an “idiot savant”, meaning he’s also likely autistic. And one feature of autism is narcissism. So much so that narcissistic personality disorder and autism can actually be confused for each other.

My brother is autistic (Asperger’s specifically). And back over 20 years ago I worked in fast food with a man who was also on the spectrum – and he didn’t need to tell me for me to see it. And some characteristics of how an autist’s brain functions could be seen as “annoying” to others, such as engaging in seemingly pointless conversation. Or in the case of Forrest Gump, broadcasting his life story from a bench at a bus stop to anyone who would listen.

His first victim, a black woman who is very clearly not interested, keeps attempting to bury herself in her magazine while Forrest tries to remember his first pair of shoes. Out loud.

The poor lady’s side-eye is all the more understandable when he tells her the origins of his name: His ancestor is Nathan Bedford Forrest, Confederate army general and a founder of — I’m not making this up — the Ku Klux Klan. “The Forrest part was to remind me that, well, sometimes we all do things that don’t make no sense.”

No shit you’re not making that up. At the same time, I need to question the quality of your history education. Nathan Bedford Forrest (right) was a real man, a Lt. General in the Confederate Army. But he wasn’t one of the KKK’s founders. The first KKK was a small, fledgling group that he came upon one night and decided to join.

He would later become its first real leader (“Grand Wizard”), giving people the impression he founded the organization. That’s one detail where the movie fumbles.

Yes, Forrest Gump’s mother (Oscar winner Sally Field, no less) explains away the KKK by saying everybody just does random stuff sometimes. She might as well have said there were good people on both sides.

And of course, no discussion of white supremacy would be complete without a dig at the President.

Gump’s mother said the name was to remind him that “sometimes we all do things that don’t make no sense”. That’s not dismissive of the Klan, nor does it mean “everybody just does random stuff sometimes”. It speaks to the senseless acts of violence the Klan would become known for under Forrest’s leadership for the short time he led the group.

Though the violence against blacks in the South didn’t start with the Klan and didn’t stop when the Klan was successfully suppressed by Federal law enforcement in 1871, the Klan gave a name to which people could readily attach and associate the senseless acts of violence against blacks.

After its suppression, members of the Klan and sympathizers formed similar paramilitary groups under different names in the South. You can read about the Klan’s history on its Wikipedia page.

Forrest’s mama also gives him weirdly misleading advice. “Vacation is when you go somewhere and don’t ever come back,” she tells him at one point. Again, what?

That isn’t advice. And you completely forgot the context of that quote. Given the rest of your article, I’m starting to question whether you actually watched the movie.

Here’s the context. Earlier in the movie, Forrest’s mother is sitting in the principal’s office when the principal asks “Is there a Mr. Gump, Mrs. Gump?” In other words, where is his father? And she replies “He’s on vacation.”

When she’s reading Forrest a book at the end of the night, Forrest asks “What’s vacation mean?”, indicating that he’d overheard them. Needing to give some kind of answer, she says “Vacation’s when you go somewhere, and you don’t ever come back.”

But your misrepresentation of the movie doesn’t end there.

But Hal Ashby’s movie [“Being There”] was a brutal political and cultural satire; Zemeckis’ is an all-out, red, white and blue celebration of ignorance, making the argument that there’s more virtue to be found in following orders, being generally incurious and spouting aphorisms than in being politically active or ambitious in any way or, God forbid, adventurous (especially sexually).

Wow… talk about a very inaccurate derivation of the entire movie.

Because let’s talk about Forrest’s ostensible love interest, Jenny (Robin Wright, another great performer saddled with a misogynist dud of a role). The childhood friends are “like peas and carrots” (does anyone over the age of 5 actually like this culinary combo?), but once they’re adults, she goes on to try her hand at being a singer and a Vietnam War protester, both of which she’s punished for. The former sees her playing naked at a strip club, the latter, having a pinko boyfriend who hits her.

And you’re drastically overlooking one key aspect of Jenny’s life that in part explains the direction she goes. Again, did you actually watch the movie?

Jenny had an abusive and controlling father. And she often sought refuge in Forrest’s home at night so she could sleep peacefully. Sure she ends up bouncing between assholes in her teenage and adult years and not having that great of a life. In large part because she didn’t have that great of a start.

For all of Forrest’s faults, and being in a fatherless household, he at least had a somewhat stable upbringing. Jenny, most certainly, did not.

Later in life, she becomes… experimental. LSD. Cocaine. One scene shows her sniffing some lines of coke and then, after looking at herself in a mirror, stepping out onto a balcony and nearly falling over to the busy street below.

She eventually comes crawling back to her hometown in Alabama, and when Forrest takes her in, she has pity sex with him after being told he’s “not a smart man, but I know what love is.”

Re-watch this scene and feel all the icky chills as Jenny rather unenthusiastically strips off her nightgown to sleep with a man whose emotional intelligence still appears to be around age 10.

She doesn’t exactly come crawling back to where they grew up. Jenny returned to Alabama as part of wanting to clean up her life. She’d hit rock bottom, nearly committing suicide while in a cocaine-induced high, and wanted to, basically, start over. Throughout her life, Forrest was more-or-less a known stable point. During her youth, she could rely on Forrest as a retreat from her father, so she knew she would be able to rely on him as a starting-over point.

It’s during that stay that Forrest works up the courage to propose marriage to her. His mother is gone, his father was completely absent from his life, provided he was even alive. Aside from Lt Dan, Jenny was the only living connection he really had. And it’s during that proposal that Forrest says that line: “I’m not a smart man, but I know what love is.”

I wouldn’t exactly call it “pity sex” either. And given the nightgown Jenny was wearing and how she took it off, I’d like to see you try to do that “enthusiastically”.

For good measure, she gets pregnant, doesn’t tell Forrest about it until their son (a tiny Haley Joel Osment) is several years old and then conveniently dies of AIDS.

Conveniently dies of AIDS? That’s a rather… cold and incomplete way of describing it. For one, THEY GOT MARRIED! A bit of time passes between when Forrest meets his son and Jenny dies. They appeared to live a somewhat happy life, about as normal as possible, until she succumbed to her illness.

At the same time, Jenny didn’t tell Forrest she was pregnant to protect him, not even wanting to seek out child support from him, even though that would have more than guaranteed a very comfortable living given Forrest’s wealth. And we see that Jenny made the right decision given how Forrest reacts upon learning he’s a father. That scene, along with the night Forrest proposed to Jenny, also showed that Forrest understood his mental limitations in asking whether his son is smart, or like him.

The film’s treatment of race, following Forrest’s name origin, isn’t any better. In one of many brushes with history, Forrest is there when Alabama Gov. George Wallace rails against integrating schools. When a redneck hisses at Forrest that they want to let “coons” into their schools, his initial response is, “When raccoons try to get onto our back porch, Mama just chases ’em off with a broom.” Hilarious!

Okay this reduction pisses me off royally. Here’s the full scene in question:

Forrest asked one of the students standing nearby what was going on. He misinterpreted what was said, “Coons are tryin’ to get into school,” as raccoons trying to get into the school building. Raccoons are commonly called “coons” in rural areas, still are even today, and they’re known for trying to get into houses and farm buildings.

He also couldn’t at first see what was going on, so until the student clarified he was referring to the black students, “Not raccoons, you idiot, n*****s,” he didn’t know what the student was referring to. And likely still didn’t even after that given what happens next: when one of the black students drops a book, Forrest runs up to pick up the book and hands it back to the student.

Talk about a blatant misrepresentation of that scene, Sara! It sounds like you’re trying to treat Forrest as a white supremacist or old-fashioned southern racist when the movie clearly shows he was not.

At the same time, the movie’s treatment of race went on how race was largely treated in the United States during the depicted eras. Something you seem to casually forget. Again, what was the quality of your history education?

He blithely goes through his war buddy Bubba’s family history of slavery with a montage of black women serving shrimp to white men. And when he strikes it rich with his shrimping business — which was entirely the late Bubba’s idea — he pats himself on the back for giving Bubba’s family a cut of the proceeds.

And he started the business – the Bubba-Gump Shrimp Co. – to honor Bubba’s memory! You know, the friend who DIED IN HIS ARMS! The friend he would’ve started the business with had he lived! The friend to whom he made a promise to start that business!

And it was in Bubba’s memory that he decided to send to Bubba’s family a very large amount of money, “Bubba’s share” of the company, enough that Bubba’s mom “didn’t have to work in nobody’s kitchen no more”. A scene, by the way, in which Bubba’s mom, a black woman, was being served shrimp by a white servant!

Seriously your attempts to paint the movie as racist are falling very, very flat.

He’s  less concerned with politics: When reporters ask him if he’s running for world peace, or the environment or any other cause, he shrugs it off: “I just felt like running.”

He has an IQ of 70! Why would you expect someone with an IQ of 70 to be concerned with politics to any degree? And yes, he got up and started running for the hell of it. Just jumped off the bench on his front porch and started running. And kept running. And running. And running.

Yes, just for the hell of it.

Sometimes we all do things that don’t make no sense. That actually describes a lot of what Forrest does, hence why he continually has to field being called “dumb or just plain stupid”.

Anyone, really, who sets foot in the political protest arena is a loser, from Jenny’s abusive boyfriend to the bloviating Black Panthers they meet, to the amputee veteran Lt. Dan (Gary Sinise, yet another fine actor doing his best), who’s portrayed as a hot mess until he stops being so gosh-darned angry about the war that put him in a wheelchair. Once he makes “his peace with God,” he turns up with new titanium legs, a partner and a big smile. See, everything’s better if you just go along and don’t complain so much!

Setting aside that you included Jenny’s abusive boyfriends in that list, let’s go over the other two. First, the Black Panthers are barely shown in the movie. One scene from what I can find. I also do not recall there being any indication they were portrayed inaccurately. Though they definitely accurately portrayed what Vietnam protesters called those in the military when Wesley calls Forrest a “baby killer”.

Now let’s talk about Lt Dan.

First of all, he’s not “angry about the war that put him in a wheelchair.” He’s angry that he didn’t die in Vietnam like he was “supposed to”:

You cheated me. I had a destiny. I was supposed to die in the field! With honor! That was my destiny! And you cheated me out of it! You understand what I’m saying, Gump? This wasn’t supposed to happen. Not to me. I had a destiny. I was Lieutenant Dan Tyler.

And yes, he spent the next several years basically wallowing in self-pity over his disability. But he discovers new purpose in life when he joins Forrest as the first mate on his shrimp trawler. Though he did display bouts of temporary insanity even then, such as when they were going through the hurricane. The hurricane that would wipe out virtually all of their competition and allow them to make “more money than Davy Crocket”.

But to look at Lt Dan’s progression in life, to the point where he gets “new legs”, and say “everything’s better if you just go along and don’t complain so much”… How did you deduce that from the movie?

Lt Dan’s disability paralleled Forrest’s disability with the leg braces in many ways. Like Forrest eventually ran himself out of the braces and away from his adversaries – something he had to do a lot – Dan eventually overcame his own adversities, namely the chasm of self-pity he flung himself into after his medical discharge.

Rather than “living off the government tit”, he started making something of himself as Forrest’s business partner, to the point where both of them “don’t have to worry about money no more.” He easily could’ve lived and died a bitter, broken veteran. Instead he turned himself around and lived a prosperous life after becoming Forrest’s business partner.

Now does that sound like someone who just stayed in line?

The movie even makes a case for the virtues of bullying: Being chased both as a child and a teen by awful classmates makes Forrest a terrific runner, and eventually gets him a football scholarship to college. It’s a perfect illustration of the retro belief that being bullied builds character.

Yes having to run from bullies made him a good runner. But to say that means his bullying got him onto the college football team is… even Elastigirl couldn’t stretch that far!

You’re also overlooking one key detail: “Bear” Bryant was the only reason he was able to turn running away from bullies into a ticket to college. He was conveniently sitting in the stands when he runs into the football stadium to escape bullies chasing him in a truck.

It was pure chance. He got lucky. Indeed luck defines a lot of his fortunes in life.

And finally, oy, the sayings. “Stupid is as stupid does” does not, at its core, really mean anything. “That’s all I have to say about that” is kind of rich coming from a guy nobody asked in the first place.

The first quote, “stupid is as stupid does”, was Forrest’s retort to people calling him stupid. Which happened a lot. And on the second, again, you’re rather dismissive of a guy with a mental disability.

But the “Gump” quote that’s best known, the one about life, is especially vapid. Every box of chocolates comes with a guide — so you only “never know what you’re going to get” if you don’t learn how to read.

Ever bought a box of hand-selected chocolates from a chocolatier, or received one as a gift?

For me, I last purchased a box of chocolates from a chocolatier over 10 years ago at Chocolaterie Stam in West Des Moines, Iowa, at Valley West Mall. The chocolates we selected were put in a plain box. No labels for anything as to what any of the chocolates were, though we did get a reference card with them so we could tell what we had as we went through them. But the chocolates weren’t neatly arranged with labels on the lid showing what was where.

Mass produced boxes of chocolates didn’t really become commonplace until the 1950s, about the same time that a lot of things once considered luxuries started becoming commonplace in society. Forrest’s mother coined the phrase that Forrest repeated through the movie. She would’ve lived through the 1920s. When you typically bought a box of chocolates from a chocolatier, hand selecting what you wanted, not a mass produced box of chocolates at a grocer.

So no, you didn’t know what you were getting when you received a box of chocolates in that era.

* * * * *

Now there is plenty about Forrest Gump that warrants criticism. But Sara didn’t criticize the movie. She completely, and I believe willfully and knowingly misrepresented the movie and everything that happens therein. As I’ve shown above, the movie is not how she portrays it.

I’ll leave you with this from the original book, which also sums up the movie pretty well, too:

I may be a idiot, but most of the time, anyway, I tried to do the right thing– an dreams is jus dreams, ain’t they? So whatever else has happened, I am figgerin this: I can always look back an say, at least I ain’t led no hum-drum life.

You know what I mean?

And this little gem from Gump & Co., the sequel to the original book:

So I tole him a little bit about my checkered career, an after he listened for a while, Tom Hanks says, “Well, Mr. Gump, you are sure a curious feller. Sounds like somebody ought to make a movie of your life’s story.”

Product and service reviews

State Line Chrysler Dodge Jeep Ram in Kansas City, MO

Posted on by Kenneth Ballard / 0 Comment

Recently I had routine service on my Jeep Compass at the dealer where I purchased it – State Line Chrysler Dodge Jeep Ram in Kansas City, Missouri. It didn’t exactly go well. I sent this e-mail to them via their contact page.

Good day,

This morning I was in to have my 2018 Jeep Compass Latitude serviced. Oil change, tire rotation, and cabin air filter replacement. I was there for around 2-1/2 hours. Checking in at around 8:30am, and not leaving till 11am. For an oil change, tire rotation, and cabin air filter change… When checking in I was told it “shouldn’t be long”.

After I’d been there for well over an hour, nearly an hour and a half, one of the desk attendants told me they didn’t have the cabin air filter in stock, so had to acquire one from someplace nearby. Okay, fine. Except they should have told me as soon as they realized they didn’t have the air filter. After that update… almost nothing. I walked out into the service area at one point and overheard them talking about the Compass and how it should be done soon.

Needless to say, I was growing more impatient and angry as time passed.

Then came the actual check out at about 10:45am, paying for the cabin air filter service, and being told that my vehicle should be brought up front “shortly”. Only to be waiting *another* almost 15 minutes before [REDACTED] *finally* brought my vehicle out and I could actually leave. Another customer in the waiting area saw me check out and commented she thought I was done, and I could only respond with “so did I”. She actually left almost immediately after that exchange as they’d actually brought her vehicle out as she was checking out. Meanwhile mine had yet to be brought forward so I could leave.

To summarize, despite not being short-staffed, I was still there for nearly 2-1/2 hours for routine maintenance that was delayed due to not having the cabin air filter in stock, and not being told about that till, I presume, after they acquired one from someone else in town. And, making matters worse, I was still waiting for my vehicle to be finished and brought forward for nearly 15 minutes after I’d paid and, presumed at that point, would be able to actually leave.

This isn’t the first time I’ve had service take an inordinate amount of time. But the previous time that occurred, I was told up front they were unexpectedly short-staffed. And they comped me on the tire rotation for the inconvenience. This time, I was told they had plenty of staff, yet what should’ve been simple, routine service still took an amount of time that was, in the kindest terms, unacceptable.

Now I do want to point out that this was likely unusual. Typically when I have my vehicle serviced, I drop it off on a weekday morning and have my wife drive me back home, and I work from home during the day – one of the perks of my current employment. And then I pick it up some time in the afternoon. I typically avoid Saturdays since everyone brings their vehicle in on Saturday.

And a thought I had after sending this e-mail, regarding being told they didn’t have the air filter in stock, I should’ve been given the opportunity to not have the filter changed rather than waiting for them to get one, and then the inordinate amount of time I had to wait on top of that.

But given the numerous shortfalls of this service encounter, and the fact customers who checked in after me were leaving before me, I just had to write in about it.

As of this article going live, I have not received any kind of response.