At what point will you stop optimizing for the number of dead children? Why not keep them in a padded room with some electrical impulses to stimulate their muscles as needed, while feeding them a perfect blend of nutrients for exact caloric intake.
Edit: lol this doesn't even break the site rules... it's a legitimate question. Fuck you dang.
I think you and I agree, but it's an interesting question.
Neglect laws in the US are incredibly vague.
Driving a vehicle for some unnecessary reason like to take a child to a water park for fun could be construed as abuse/neglect, as it unnecessarily exposes the child to danger.
Our neglect, and child reporting laws, badly need overhauled because common sense it totally removed. People have been arrested for as little as letting the kid walk or be at the park independently. Things need reworded to make it clear it isn't neglectful unless the child is facing certain and imminent serious injury or death, or something along those lines.
Am parent, can confirm. Trust that we are making the best decisions we can make for our children. People quick to criticize parents are often lacking key context and important details specific to that familial situation. Judge not lest ye, and such.
It's nice San Francisco has such compassion for violent criminals and mentally ill homeless that their dreams can truly flourish there. Perhaps there is merit to the idea that stabbers need their own utopia too. Not many places you can get high on smack, shit on the public side walk, stab a CEO, and then walk around with impunity to live your dream again the next day.
One of my last memories in SF was around 4th and King where I watched a man steal from Walgreens, grab a person's handbag and run past a police officer and down the street.
The officer didn't do anything and shrugged when the Walgreens employees were asking for his help.
edit: by the way, this was around afternoon/lunch time in broad daylight.
Foot chases are being forbidden in some jurisdictions because it causes a higher risk of harm, such as a suspect running into traffic and causing a crash.
That, and some DAs have built their career on lowering felonies to misdemeanors and directing people to "alternative" or "restorative" justice, meaning sending them to community service rather than prison.
What's the point of chasing a robber who probably took less than $1k and will be released without charges anyway?
The problem is one of perception and human nature. You will eventually reduce your economy because of an outflow of business and human capital out of where this is happening. It’s how food deserts in America happen. No one wants to be in places where they are physically threatened.
Edit - especially when they can’t defend themselves. I don’t like proliferation of guns. But condoning this is specifically making a case for concealed carry, stand your ground laws and increased risk of life.
> What's the point of chasing a robber who probably took less than $1k and will be released without charges anyway?
What is the point of the government continuing to employ police, when they refuse to do their jobs as a protest against government decisions on justice policy?
> What is the point of the government continuing to employ police, when they refuse to do their jobs as a protest against government decisions on justice policy?
Realistically, none. If the DAS won't prosecute and the state won't imprison, then there's no point other than optics. Of course, sensible people want to keep existing police in the hopes the DAs and states will change their policies. But if there's no hope of that, then yes, it would make financial sense to eliminate police and let the cities descend further into anarchy. At least then, some revolutionary instinct may awaken in the general populace and they can institute new, competent governance, as is their right.
Why is police choosing not to make arrests (at high physical risk to all involved) in cases where the DA has announced intent to not prosecute “not doing their job”?
The public demands that police only focus on the worst offenders, everyone demands that use of force is eliminated, and the DA announced intent not to press charges for victimless crimes like property theft.
How would it be appropriate for police to take action in that scenario? If that chase ends in a tackle and the thief is harmed, and the government would have just let the dude go, how is that in any way consistent with the government’s interest?
Responding to clear direction from political leadership and the public is not “protest”, if anything failing to do so would be.
> Why is police choosing not to make arrests (at high physical risk to all involved) in cases where the DA has announced intent to not prosecute “not doing their job”
The specific claim made upthread was that this was justified by DAs pursuing alternative/restorative justice. Not arresting because they don’t like DAs doing that instead of seeking prison is very much not doing their job.
Similarly, not arresting because they don’t like DAs charging misdemeanors rather than felonies.
Not arresting in specific circumstances where DA has indicated no action of any kind will be taken, if done consistently, is reasonable; but even here, police are very inconsistent, and will frequently arrest nonviolent protestors (and engage in viewpoint discrimination as to which protestors get this treatment) – for possibly legitimate offenses, sure – in circumstances that they know will not be prosecuted, while using the lack of prosecution as an excuse not to arrest for equally legitimate offensea of other kinds. This is, itself, a form of political lobbying while on th4 clock as civil servants.
The worst of the worst list is especially interesting, though the numbers for at least three arrests are more indicative.
Whatever it is we're doing, it's not working. The people who lose in this case are the victims.
As for differential treatment, it's not too hard to see arrests of protesters who start becoming aggressive with officers as a means of nipping something worse in the bud.
Compare that with the upthread example where a guy was running after having stolen something. The threat of violence was over, there wasn't a risk of escalation unless the officer ran after him.
I think the real challenge you’re running into is that the line between enforcement-worthy and not enforcement-worthy crime is in the eye of the beholder. But the DA saying _x_ is no longer a felony would seemingly be a clear signal about how police should be prioritizing their work.
The DA is a political actor too and could be pressuring cops to funnel people to their restorative Justice programs if they wanted to.
Police don't get to choose the method of justice. That's up to the judge, and depends on what the DA's orders are regarding what charges are actually filed (i.e. felonies won't qualify, so drop charges to a misdemeanor).
Arrest gives them legal authority to search the person of the accused and find evidence of other crime. Perhaps they will find something that leads to a felony and authorization to hold. For instance, you probably wouldn't want to release someone who was heavily intoxicated in public while in possession of a deadly weapon.
To be clear, I'm not saying I'm thrilled about prosecuting people for many of the crimes for which the contraband would constitute, but the advantages of arresting the perp even if they'll immediately be released is obvious.
All that you’ve said is clear Abe obvious and the logic of the post-90s sustained reduction in crime we saw for decades.
The challenge is that holding people accountable for misdemeanor crime, using stops as pretexts for deeper investigation, and aggressive enforcement of nuisance laws all contribute to disproportionately bad outcomes for underprivileged people. That consequence is more directly obvious than the consequences of not going effective police work, which is why our society collectively made the choices it did over the last few years.
My attitude changed a lot more once I had a kid. I was never a big tax fan, but once you have a kid and realize
1) You pay the daycare
2) You pay the birth
3) You pay the food
4) You pay the healthcare
....
basically the list goes on, and all along society tells you to get fucked. Society isn't there unless maybe you let your kid walk alone to the park so they can have the slightest shred of confidence and then they arrest you for "neglect." It's not "we're a society we'll work together" -- no its "on your own you dumb fucker, by the way dont abort or you'll be in jail for murder." As soon as you raise the kid, suddenly society says "Look we need to take 30% of the kids stuff, including for retirement of everyone else" no matter that society straight up told you to get fucked for the costs of raising the child up to become someone who can pay the taxes.
It's that way with everything in the US. We pour money straight into Israel and get nothing in return. Blow up brown kids with drones only to have the world hate us.
Taxes are theft. I'd rather live with McScrooge evilCo that requires a toll every time I enter the road than this fucking dystopia where my tax money goes to blowing up innocent people around the world and the world's highest prison rate.
People eligible for EITC rarely are handling stacks of 1099 and business transactions.
We're talking about single mom with a couple part time jobs with a W-2 territory.
The idea their taxes should have mistakes more than average seems a bit far-fetched to me.
That said maybe it is cheaper and easier just to eliminate the EITC/taxes/filing for people earning under X. It seems like a waste to even bother with people making under 20 or 30 grand.
The idea their taxes should have mistakes more than average seems a bit far-fetched to me.
I used to file my return electronically, a lot of my forms were downloaded electronically so I didn't even have to type in most data. Now I use an accountant (who I assume uses even better software than I do).
What part of "single mom with a couple part time jobs" makes you think that she's perfect at transcribing data and calculating values?
What makes you think she’s any worse at cutting and pasting than a non single mom?
Standard deduction EITC does not involve many calculations even if someone uses the paper form and does it all manually. But most people are using the free tax services made for low income filers.
>What makes you think she’s any worse at cutting and pasting than a non single mom?
I don't - I think she's worse and manually copy and writing down the numbers than automated software or a professional accountant.
Cut and paste? Why do you think that she has a computer and her employer gave her access to an electronic portal where she can download her W-2's? My niece is that single-mom with 2 jobs (actually it was 4 jobs, not all at the same time). Last time I helped her with taxes, one of her w-2's was handwritten from her employer.
>EITC does not involve many calculations
But why force her to do any calculations or transcription of numbers at all when the IRS already has them?
Compared to married moms? Maybe not. Compared to accountants, paid tax preparers, or e-filing software that imports the tax forms? Then most likely yes.
Your thesis is the taxes aren't worse, it's that you think the poors are too dumb to go to freetaxusa or something where basically all they have to do is copy and paste the data from their W2?
EITC is not a some kind of a deduction though. EITC is a significant source of government welfare as it pays more than the taxes you paid at certain levels of income. And the reason it's a part of tax code instead of a direct handout is that illegal aliens would not be eligible otherwise, I suspect.
Coffee machines usually don't phone home and the good La Marzocco machines are worth as much as a new car. It's quite a liquid market. Furthermore parting them out is highly profitable as the replacement parts from the dealer operates almost like a mob, with some brands requiring replacement parts to be ordered or replaced through certified repairmen.
Didn't the legislature try to introduce a bill to prevent using the new agents/funding against lower earners, and it flopped? So it turns out all along no one actually wants to keep anyone accountable to such "promises."
Statement of Purpose: To prevent the use of additional Internal Revenue Service Funds from being used for audits of taxpayers with taxable incomes below $400,000 in order to protect low- and middle-income earning American taxpayers from an onslaught of audits from an army of new Internal Revenue Service auditors funded by an unprecedented, nearly $80.000.000.000, infusion of new funds.
Vote Result: Amendment Rejected
> legislature try to introduce a bill to prevent using the new agents/funding against lower earners
Money is fungible. This was a messaging bill. If they were serious, they'd create an independently-funded agency within the IRS with the sole mandate of going after high earners.
If the bill was a message, so was the response. "Fuck you, we'd rather not be hindered by such promises."
-----------------------------------
RE: below [due to timeout]
>The original bill already passed.
factcheck: false. Original bill passed almost 12 hours later on the same day[0] [1]. The (above) amendment was voted on in the early morning, with the unamended increase passing in the afternoon.
>Congress has more important things to do.
factcheck: false. All 100 senators voted on the floor for a full vote on the amendment. None found they had something more important to do that would cause them not to cast a vote.
>The executive has stated its position.
factcheck: True. Either congress ignored the position, or they followed the privately endorsed position rather than the publicly endorsed one.
[0] https://www.senate.gov/legislative/LIS/roll_call_votes/vote1172/vote_117_2_00325.htm
[1] https://www.senate.gov/legislative/LIS/roll_call_votes/vote1172/vote_117_2_00296.htm
Then more money will have to be printed. So we get a raise, but the raise still doesn't match the hurdle rate, while demand remains the same. That's some dystopian fucked up shit there.
Edit: lol this doesn't even break the site rules... it's a legitimate question. Fuck you dang.