Halloween Costumes - 2013

While this effort has already been picked up by the Toledo Free Press with both it's local Toledo-oriented entries as well as National suggestions,  I thought that it would be worthwhile however for those who might not understand the local  Glass City references to post only those costume ideas that had national implications here.  Besides, there always seems to be additions to this annual effort as the week of its  creation progresses (as a matter of fact, additions have already been made since this was originally posted.), and the TFP has both space and modification restrictions that must be respected.  If you check back later this week therefore, you're likely to discover additions to this entry that you missed earlier.  

Here is the link to the Toledo Free Press website effort that includes the Toledo specific entries as well as most of the national ones.

Halloween is almost upon us, though there's still plenty of time to choose a costume. For those of you who remain 'costume-challenged' for this all-important candy grab however, we here at “Just Blowing Smoke” have once again come up with our annual list of politically-oriented (and politically incorrect) suggestions that could make you the hit of your neighborhood, if not a viral source of public ridicule on Facebook and YouTube.
 

• Place some orange cones on your driveway and install a flimsy gate across the sidewalk leading to your front door with a broken lock and a newly painted 'Closed' sign hanging from it. Leave your porch light on however to encourage participants to push past these feeble barriers. When revelers ring the bell and say 'Trick or Treat', tell them they shouldn't be there but give them candy anyway. If asked about this apparently contradictory behavior, tell them you're the National Park Service.
• Take a big piece of plastic sheeting and paint a wavy blue line across it.  Wrap it around yourself and fasten it together; then make your neighborhood begging rounds.  When asked, tell them that you're a glass, and you think you're half-empty.  What do they think?
• Wear a nice suit and.Trick or Treat from door to door while weeping and mumbling logically contradictory statements on the state of the nation and laws that should be passed as if nobody is listening (they won't be). When asked, wipe a tear from your eye and stammer 'God bless America', before telling them you are Speaker of the House John Boehner. 
• Trick or Treat from door to door, carrying either a recently minted dog turd or freshly filled diaper to sniff right before the door is answered. When residents note your pinched, rather constipated expression and ask about your costume, tell them you are Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid and refuse to accept any candy they offer you.
• Wear a piece of poster board on your chest with the neatly printed words: “We are experiencing technical difficulties, please stand by ...” as you walk your neighborhood route. When asked, tell them that you are the 'Affordable Healthcare Website', take their candy, and apologize for not being able to give them anything in return; requesting that they try again later (after all, it's settled law) before moving on.
• Trick or Treat from door to door spouting the most wild, illogical, and even insane beliefs about the news at the top of your voice; making sure to periodically blame Republicans as the cause of the world's ills. When asked, tell them you're a show host for MSNBC.
• Trick or Treat the neighborhood and give the normal greeting when the door is answered. When homeowners attempt to speak however, interrupt their attempts to do so as foolish while disparagingly insisting that you know best about everything and insist that you are only taking their candy 'for the folks'. You will, of course, be masquerading as Fox News host Bill O'Reilly; and should be ashamed of yourself for providing him even that much attention.
• Wear whatever you want in while making your Trick or Treat rounds.  When asked who you're supposed to be and what you've done, tell them you're a member of the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW). When they explain that they don't know who that is, tell them that neither does anyone else, but that you're charged with cleaning up the poison gas in Syria and that you haven't actually done much of anything yet ... except for winning this year's Nobel Peace Prize.  
• Come to think of it, if you would like to Trick or Treat your neighborhood in a formal tuxedo with tails and can speak with a Norwegian or Swedish accent (I use the Swedish cook one from Sesame Street), you can go as a member of the Nobel Peace Prize Committee.  When they answer the door, give them one of the little blue ribbons you'll need to carry and explain that these days you're giving out the prize to damn near anyone whether they've ever done anything or not.  
• Wear something business casual and carry a clipboard full of computer printouts, along with your 'Trick or Treat' bag.  When homeowners answer the door, page through the list 'harrumphing', while telling them you're from the NSA and they shouldn't feel obligated to give you a special reward not to release the information they've gathered on you. 
• Kick a can from house to house on your Trick or Treat route and lethargically hold out your bag when the door is answered.  If questioned on your costume or your lousy attitude, tell homeowners you're a member of the new Congressional Budget Conference Committee and you're as optimistic of success in your coming Congressional efforts as you are of getting $20 bills from them for a 'Treat'.
• Drag out that old zombie costume from your 'Thriller' days but carry around a newspaper delivery bag instead of a Trick or Treat bag.  When those on your route ask about your costume, you might have to explain that it's the daily newspaper and not the carrier who's all but dead; but most will get the message. 
• If you want to really scare everyone however, you may dress however you'd like and carry a sign around your neck with the old Ronald Reagan quote about "the nine most terrifying words in the English language":  "We're from the government and were here to help."
• Wear a pair of jeans, flannel shirt, and cowboy hat; while also wearing President Obama masque on your 'Trick or Treat' rounds.  When asked, tell them that you are an out-of-work rodeo clown.  
• Walk your neighborhood in whatever you'd like and when the houses in the neighborhood answer their doors, mumble "Trick or Treat" in a disgruntled voice.  When asked about your attitude and costume (or lack of it), tell them that you are a non-essential federal employee, and were much happier when still at home watching "The View" on the shutdown's paid vacation.
  (By the way those of you actually capable of doing this should be ashamed ... not for enjoying the paid vacation, but of watching "The View".)
• Refuse to dress up, Trick or Treat, or decorate your house for Halloween; but buy a bunch of candy and leave your porch light on to encourage neighborhood participation in the festivities. When Trick or Treaters arrive, smile and engage them pleasantly, but refuse to give them any of the clearly visible candy you possess. When asked about this apparent contradiction, tell them you're a member of Congress and you're intention is to keep all the goodies for yourself.

TFP Column: They Know Where You Are

The problem with a tin foil hat is that periodically you have to take it out of the closet and see if it still fits.  Such might believe this to be such a case, with the subject I bring up in this weekend's TFP effort, "They Know Where You Are".  

On the other hand, how else would you look at the federal government providing funding to local law enforcement agencies to install cameras on their cars to take pictures of your license plates, while noting the time and location of your vehicle and store that information ... until they need it.  No crime, no warrant, no judges order; just a history of everywhere you've been every time one of these vehicles crosses your path.

I'd like to tell you more about the subject, but I need to peel back a corner of the foil on my window (not my head) and take a peek out there for the black helicopters that I can hear from my desk.  Before everyone becomes as paranoid as I sometimes get, maybe they should take a bit of time to read everything that's available in the largest Sunday circulation newspaper in Toledo, and Ohio's best newspaper for the last four years running, the Toledo Free Press.

 

Someone To Watch Over Me

(My recommendation is to enjoy the video while reading the post.  Trust me when I say that eventually it will all make sense.)

With  a unanimous vote of its City Council, Toledo becomes yet the latest in a growing number of cities to grow the number of cameras within its confines.  These were not the 11 red light cameras that I've written about before, to be added to 32 of their brethren in an effort once touted to promote traffic safety and not for the purpose of generating revenue. That ship sailed long ago after statistics showed that such cameras usually increase the number of rear end collisions in the intersections they're placed in and Toledo admitted that there was money to be made. But in cities like Toledo across the country that are starved for new sources of revenue in a tough economy, threatened by countless programs that they can't afford and buried under bloated union contracts for their safety workers, little more could be expected of elected officials who seldom consider the law of unintended consequences where their actions are concerned.

No, the vote this week was to purchase a different kind of cameras entirely; or more accurately, 150 of such cameras at a cost of $1.6 million.  In addition to the cameras, the city intends to use 4 members of a police department that many already claim is under-staffed to monitor them.  This program will be instituted (perhaps as a first step) in a technological effort for crime prevention and enforcement in the downtown and/or high crime areas of the Glass City.

Toledo is far from being alone in the installation of such cameras, and in fact might seem to have some way to go in order to compete with its 'Big Brothers' (George Orwell pun intended).  A  Wall Street Journal article from over two years ago points to an estimated 15,000 such cameras, in both public and private ownership, that are linked in Chicago to what the city calls "Operation Virtual Shield".  

New York City has a similar set up, though the last estimate on the number of cameras that I could find is probably woefully out-of date in a NYCLU report from 2006.  The maps contained in this report showing the locations of these cameras blanketing the city in various areas however, should be enough to frighten anyone (perhaps even more than the crime that they are supposed to monitor).  

London however has far and away taken the technological lead in city surveillance however, with estimates according to a British Channel 4 report from back in 2008 that there are 350-500,000 cameras under public or private ownership that are available to the local constabulary to monitor its citizens.

(Cities are notoriously recalcitrant in releasing the actual numbers of such cameras in use.  Go figure.  It seems rather strange not to do so however, if their intent is to, as they often tout, prevent crimes from occurring.) 

No ... make no mistake.  Regardless of the breast beating and dire warnings, this is not about crime prevention.  A camera can no more prevent a crime from happening than it can capture the perpetrator of that crime.  It can only take a picture (often rather poorly lighted and blurry) of the perpetrator in the act of committing it.  While these electronic sentinels may potentially contribute to reduced response times by police to such crimes, no statistics that I was able to uncover were able to document such an advantage.  And while they may make it somewhat easier to eventually track down the suspect and inevitably easier to convict them if they do, it will do nothing to protect citizens from either the crimes themselves or from the potential that the same crimes will be committed in the future.

What it will do however is remind everyone in the Glass City, and others around world that no matter where they are, someone is probably watching.  We're told that if we're not doing anything wrong, we have nothing to worry about, but we were told the same thing when TSA told us that making us safer would only prove a minor inconvenience.  We were told the same when the Patriot Act was passed to aid the good guys in catching the bad ones.

No, the answer here is as simple as it is subtle.  We have nothing to worry about as long as we aren't concerned about a level of government's ability to monitor its citizens without the protection of a legally issued warrant.  We have nothing to worry about as long as we are willing to give up our liberty and rights of privacy to achieve a purported level of safety on a public street. (Can anyone else remember what Benjamin Franklin said about liberty and safety?)  We have nothing to worry about as long as we blindly believe in the altruism of government officials and law enforcement agencies, that such surveillance will not become over time a not-so-subtle form of behavior modification.  We have nothing to worry about unless we're afraid to live with a bunker mentality where everyone is watching over their own shoulders to see who else is watching.

While I chose to entertain you with a rather eclectic Sting rendition of a classic George and Ira Gershwin tune from 1926, it doesn't require me to slip on my tin foil hat to tell you that I'm anything but comforted in knowing that no matter where I am, soon there will undoubtedly be "Someone to Watch Over Me".

 

Silly Bits I

I was getting some grief over the title of some of the previous entries to this blog (Stabilizing the MCP).  Evidently there were some that thought that instead of writing about miscellaneous crap, I was writing like crap instead. (Personally, I was surprised that anyone could distinguish the difference.)  But as Gene Autry once said: "How come you know me so well, when I'm just a stranger to myself."  Nevertheless, from this day forward such posts will henceforth be known as “Silly Bits” in homage to the Monty Python “Ministry of Silly Walks” skit.  (I won’t bore those of you not interested with the entire piece, but for those who would like to travel down memory lane, or have never seen it before, you will find it here.)  Now for the other silly bits:

The National Right to Work Foundation and the National Federation of Independent Business, along with other business groups have filed suit over the recess appointments made by President Obama to the National Labor Relations Board and the newly formed Consumer Financial Protection Bureau.  It appears that this President didn’t like the tactics used by the ‘Democratically Controlled’ Senate to ostensibly stay in session in spite of the fact that he was a part of the very same tactics being used to prevent his predecessor from making recess appointments when he was in the Senate. 

Having gotten a paper from the Department of Justice saying that he was within his rights to do so (The President’s lawyers agreed with him, imagine that!), the appointments were made in what many are calling a violation of the separation of powers in the Constitution. Speaking on the Senate floor on Tuesday, Republican Senator Rand Paul of KY announced that he was joining the suit.  Now while this might appear to be little more than two male children squaring off in childish comparison of linear measurement, let me say that there are two important things to take note of here.  The first is that this is a serious question of executive authority in this country, and the decision here will be far-reaching no matter which way it goes.  The second is that having long believed that emasculation was a requirement for the national legislature, it could be considered even more startling that a member of Congress in fact has the equipment required for such a comparison (though the fact that it’s Rand Paul goes a long way to explaining it).  

Indiana became the 23^rd state (and first in the Rust Belt) to become a ‘Right to Work’ state.  Similar efforts are under way in Michigan and Ohio, both traditional strongholds of the union movement, as they are in New Hampshire and Montana.  None of these laws prohibit Unions from forming and representing workers; but their passage means that Unions may no longer demand that workers join such a Union nor must they pay dues to the Union in order to work at that profession.  With the Super Bowl coming up in Indianapolis this Sunday, the timing of this bills signing means that the potential for gamesmanship is as likely outside of the field as inside it.  Union representatives have called passage of such laws ‘the beginning of the race to the bottom’ (in spite of the fact that almost half of the nation now has them).  No one knows whether they are right, but regardless of the answer to the question the race is unquestionably on; and those states who will compete in the coming economy had better decide whether they will run in it, or merely stand by in the pits (that's an Indy 500 reference).

For the first time that I can remember, a municipal government representative in the nation has admitted that the placement of red-light cameras were for revenue and not driver safety.  (I guess he’s seen the same statistics that I have and couldn’t say otherwise with a straight face.) As I pointed out in a column for the Toledo Free Press on Tuesday, Toledo’s Finance Director Patrick Mclean said that they wanted to install the new cameras in order to generate $320,000 that the city would use for youth recreation programs that the city could not otherwise likely fund. 

Setting aside the ramifications of any government finally admitting that these red light robo-cops have become a next generation tax collector in a ‘scofflaw tax’, there’s that pesky bit of how these laws are enforced.  You see in these cases, the presumption of innocence central to American justice is tossed out the window.  The evidence that a car you own committed the offense is enough to convict you whether it can be proved that you were driving it or not.  The only alternative to a guilty plea is to rat out whoever else might have been driving; an alternative that seems as unpalatable as paying the $130 fine.

And finally, from the land that brought you the promising beginning (allegedly) of Arab Spring, we have news today that riots broke out once again in Egypt.  This time however, the goals of those taking to the streets seem not so lofty, nor can the cause be deemed worthy of praise.  Apparently this violence broke out as part of a long rivalry between fans of local football (soccer) teams Port Said and Cairo.  When Port Said won the match 3-1, fans of the Cairo team stormed the field.  According to the latest counts released, 73 are known dead and over 200 injured so far in the riots that ensued.

Now I don’t know about you, but I've personally found soccer matches to be so boring that I might consider storming the field at the end of the game myself, but only in protest of the lack of entertainment provided for the ticket price charged.  I do know however, that the next time I hear about football fans turning out into the streets after an Ohio State – Michigan game, turning over a couple of cars and setting a few dumpsters on fire, my reply is going to be:  “That’s nice…” 

TFP Column: Red Light Cameras Are All Wet

For years we heard from the city that it installed red light cameras at intersections in Toledo not to make money, but to promote public safety.  While statistics gathered in other cities said otherwise and questions continued to surface about the ‘presumption of guilt' that was used in processing these offenses, the Glass City’s leaders insisted that this was not in fact a “red light scofflaw tax”.

In a stunning reversal the city’s Finance Director, Patrick Mclean this week declared just the opposite, talking about adding to the city’s electronic intersection guardians as a way to supplement funds for youth recreation programs like the city’s pools.  It seemed therefore appropriate that the topic of this week’s effort for the Toledo Free Press would be “Red Light Cameras Are All Wet”.

In it, I give some of the safety statistics now abandoned, as well as the city's ‘robbing Peter to pay Paul’ concept of financial planning a bit of airing out.  I even manage to do so before City Council takes its vote on it this afternoon.

Being as early in the week as it is, there will be much more going on in the Glass City this week however.  Issues that will best be covered in both the TFP mid-week Star edition, as well as this weekend’s edition of Toledo’s largest Sunday circulation and Ohio’s best weekly newspaper (3 years in a row), the Toledo Free Press.

Smile, You're On Govt. Camera

Just as we in Toledo are signing a petition to eliminate "Red Light" Cameras from our city intersections, our local State Representative Peter Ujvagi is sponsoring a bill to place similar cameras on construction sites to watch for speeders. 

Now the goal of the cameras, according to Rep. Ujvagi, is safety; but according to an editorial in The Blade on Sunday, only about 30 deaths per year occur due to passing motorists in construction zones across the country. A far greater percentage of such deaths occur with job related accidents. Likewise in the injuries related to passing motorists in such zones, the only numbers cited point to approximately 22% of them being related to traffic. So while the safety of highway workers should be of concern to all of us, and following traffic laws on our highways (especially in construction zones) should likewise be something we are all aware of, why the sudden fuss about putting up these cameras? 

Well for those of you not yet experiencing this recent technology (an ever-shrinking number), Both Red light and speeding cameras are designed to capture the license plate number of the offending car. The citations filed however are civil ones, carrying no points against the offending car owner but a great deal of annual revenue to the budget of the local government handing them out. Yes, I said car owner. You see the system is not designed to capture the offender, but the offender's vehicle instead. And since this is a civil and not criminal prosecution, the concepts of "innocent until proven guilty", "the right to be confronted by one's accuser", and "the right to a trial by a jury" are all set aside without that pesky little Bill of Rights of the Constitution getting in the way. 

Not set aside however, is the fine of up to $250 imposed for such a violation and the impact that such fines could make on diminishing government budgets. The state now it seems, learning from cities across the country that such laws and the installation of such cameras will be held up by the courts, would like to extend its reach into the potential new revenue stream. 

But what the heck, let's not stop there. Perhaps next we could look for speed cameras in our school zones for the safety of children or jaywalking cameras at intersections, ostensibly mounted to protect citizens at crosswalks. They too could be used to offset shortfalls in local and state budget. Maybe we could even mount cameras inside of bars to monitor the compliance with local smoking regulations (in Toledo, we would probably make the bar owner pay for the cameras as well).  

I know that all of this may sound a little far-fetched, but if Rep. Ujvagi gets his way, we will move one step further down the slippery slope of increasing government surveillance and a decreasing value to the Constitution that limits the control of our government over our everyday lives. It hasn't happened yet, but some day sooner that we expect, we may be able to paraphrase a line from an the old TV show produced by Alan Funt,  

"Sometime when you least expect it, a notice may come in the mail to you that says Smile, you're on government camera".