Entry 67: Busy? in Much Ado About Nothing

Wow! Over the weekend my “Unread Bookmarks” jumped to 53 entries to catch up on! Likely not going to be able to do that at work, truth told. I have two cases to prep for evidence today: one where a woman spit on her man during an argument (I know) and one where the Defendant keeps screaming “How am I gonna pick up a failure to disburse at my own fucking home?” because she actively attempted to interrupt the police breaking up a fist fight in her front yard. Like… if there are people knocking each other around, and the police tell everyone to “go back to your homes” that doesn’t mean you get to stay there causing problems. That means you need to go back inside your home. But these are the cases to prepare today for immediate submission. Of course my day started immediately with finishing what I was doing Friday afternoon. Confirm that the police requested the warrant for the wrong person, confirm that police charged the wrong person, dismiss the case entirely.

Though, I suppose the very first thing I ran into today was more bullshit from the AnimeIowa Facebook discussion. It isn’t enough for MAGAts to put laughing emojis on Trans Kids legitimate concerns and questions. Now they are exposing their FULL Hatred. Genuinely an argument on “Why does ANYONE need Civil Rights?! Just giving people special treatment! That’s not equality.” This after I suggested to this person that he read up on Red Lining or the AIDS pandemic of the 1980s. Of course… suggesting that someone throwing a White Supremacy tantrum read some legitimate history is assuming too much to start with, but… deep sigh. I think it’s funny that a political movement that defines itself by “Owning the Libs” is also the party that routinely proves “nothing will ever be enough for them.” No amount of harming others will ever sate them. No amount of money will ever sate them. No amount of power will ever sate them. It is the perfect example of how the seven deadly sins consume permanently because whether it is gluttony or greed or lust or wrath or sloth or pride.... there is never ENOUGH to satisfy. OH, and for any MAGA who are surprised or frustrated with people in your life thinking “the wrong thing” about you? It is because we are legitimately encountering these kinds of assclowns in the real world. It is because even if YOU don’t think “Civil Rights are Anti-Cis/Straight/White”… we are encountering your fellow MAGA who not only believe it, but voice it, and are willing to commit crimes because of it. And to reflect what many of you were saying to the Muslims and Arabs in the 2000s? “If you don’t think the reputation is earned, maybe you should clean up your own house.”

Though, big frustrated and disgusted sigh. Kim Reynolds and the Iowa GOP constantly proving their “We refuse to address problems, but we want credit for looking like we’re addressing problems!” Truancy. BIG hammer down, “WE NEED TO BE PROSECUTING PARENTS WHO ARE NOT SENDING THEIR KIDS TO SCHOOL!” Okay, so tell me about this parent.... the one who sends her three kids to school in between working double shifts to try to afford housing and health care and food and everything else. Two of her kids get to school just fine; but the 13 year old says, “Fuck that! Nobody is going to force me!” Is this Mom supposed to consistently leave work, therefore getting fired, to make sure her 13 year old goes to school? Looking further into it (and this boils me up), if the child rolls into class around 10 a.m. every morning therefore missing the first two periods consistently.... why is this considered missing school?! He’s attending 70% of school. That’s more than half. AND YOU WANT ME TO PUT MOM IN JAIL FOR THIS SHIT?! Some possible suggestions, to the Iowa Legislature, on this issue:
(1) Do more to make childcare affordable. The average cost of childcare for ONE child in the state of Iowa is “around $10,000 per year.” Put that into Minimum Wage Terms: That is 1380 hours. JUST for child care for one kid. Considering 40 hours for 52 weeks equals 2,080 hours? That is 66% of your labor going to pay for CHILDCARE so that you can go to work. So, you don’t put them in child care areas and hope that your kids are responsible enough or behaved enough to go to school when they are supposed to absent supervision.
(2) Invest money into Public Education including additional funding for IEP, transportation, and Special Needs Children. Iowa is currently doing the opposite of that by funneling public funds into Private Charter Schools that are specifically and uniquely permitted to refuse to accept or educate children that need IEPs, special transportation assistance, or are considered Special Needs Children.
(3) Instead of making Truancy 1st Offense a 10 Day Jail term for the parent- make the “punishment” for Truancy 1st Offense mandatory DHS involvement. This does two separate things. First: If the matter is an issue regarding the child needing supervision or assistance, the DHS can provide it or can connect the children to services that may be needed. Second: If the matter is an issue of the parents abusing the children, DHS involvement is better equipped to investigate, determine, and take required steps to protect those children.
Instead, we’ll just keep writing more and more draconian laws regarding truancy whereby if a school requests it, we have to prosecute. Meanwhile, as the schools are requesting it, the Schools are telling parents that it is entirely the State’s fault and that the County Attorney’s Office are the “bad guys” threatening them with jail. Which… funny that. We wouldn’t have any of the information needed to prosecute if you didn’t send it to us with a little sticky note that says, “Please prosecute this parent.” BUT… blatantly lying to the parents shouldn’t make me question your veracity in any way, should it?

MOTHER FUCKER!!
Iowa legislature has decided that Trump isn’t going fast enough on PROJECT 2025. After all of their Anti-Trans bullshit?
Today at 1:30 p.m. there will be a committee vote to pass the mRNA criminalization act. I’m not making this shit up. They will be passing a law out of committee that will make ALL mRNA vaccinations illegal and require jail time for any physicians who administer an mRNA vaccine of any kind. (SF360)
So… fuck medicine in general, right? I mean brain worm RFK wants to prohibit SSRIs and medications for “any chronic illness” because he can’t figure out the difference between chronic illness and addictive pills. So, let’s actively ban mRNA vaccines based on junk science that can’t stand up to scrutiny or peer review. “We don’t need experts, we need politicians” and this is the party of Small Government, Personal Accountability, and Facts Over Feelings? Are you fucking joking?! Sincerely… we’re coming to a point where I honestly can’t see myself working to “enforce the criminal code” of this state. If we’re going to make Theater a Felony and imprison doctors for healthcare? Burn this fucking state to the ground. I’ve been e-mailing representatives and state wide officials. “Do you have job openings? Is there a way I can get a job fighting for sanity in this State?

It’s… it’s becoming pretty apparent that I need to look at reinventing my life entirely. Which is terrifying but more than anything? I don’t know what to do! I can’t just pick up and go be a prosecutor in another state. It doesn’t work that way. I am now actively looking into Minnesota Bar Reciprocity. The County that contains Rochester Minnesota is looking for a County Attorney and an Assistant County Attorney. But other than that? If I can’t prosecute the law… I feel like I’m back in College looking at my options and suffocating. If not a Prosecutor.... a therapist or a pastor. And both of those would require significantly more schooling. And going from Juris Doctor to… what? going for a second Bachelor’s? Applying to a Masters Program which means I’d have to be working THIS job for these monsters while adding on top of that additional work? Honestly, it would just be.... easier and more in line with my values if I could just be a part of Government. Either lobbyist or Aid or… someone working to fight for actual change. Sitting here on the “I have no say in the laws but I have to enforce them” line is bullshit.

Meanwhile, my actual TRIAL cases for today?
Neighbors being violent with each other. Parents of a shared child being violent with one another. There is so much anger and violence and… it all makes sense. When the world is out of control people get frustrated. Humans revert to their animal instincts. “My world is spiraling, I will be violent with those that threaten what little sense of control I have.” Also known as “When fight or flight is active all of the time, fights happen more often.”

If I were a smarter person or a person with better time management or talent… I’d write the books in my head and be done with it.
All weekend I wanted to write a script based on “The starving man does not choose the food.” A series of vignettes where characters who, otherwise satisfied in life, were brought to ruin by the thing most missing in their life. Because what was missing, what they wanted so much, they simply accepted what came along. Whether it was power, or money, or sex, or love… anything other than food. Just show these sample lives of feeding into their own destruction chasing after what they starved for. And to beat the audience in the head at the end to just do a one page vignette. Someone giving some “controversial” dish like Herring or some such to a starving man and the man scarfing it up. And upon being confronted about it, something like “Wow, you ate that up! Do you actually like herring?” and the gaunt starving man saying simply, “The starving man does not choose the food.” Or to really drive it home, have them say it in a foreign language (whether Greek or Arabic or Ukrainian) and have the friend translate it. But that’s.... that’s me all over. I have ideas, I don’t have ability. Or even complete ideas. I have “Concepts of Ideas”… so, shit, at least I’m qualified to be President! Even writing SpecFiction right now would be.... or feel futile. We’re living in the Dystopian Novel. Our Speculative Fiction of the last two decades has been saying “Guys, you’re barreling into the abyss here. You might want to turn around.” But we kept saying, NO- we’re fine! And all the while, the White Power movement I had been telling people about for ten years grew strong enough to take over the Government.