Selective Justice?

Just to start, I still like this one, "Move over Pinocchio.  Here comes Hillary Clinton."

I haven't followed this very closely, but two Michigan lawmakers who had an affair, tried to cover it up, and then lied about it are being charged with six felonies.  Hmmm......

So let me get this straight.  A President of the US can engage in sexual activities, try to cover it up, and then lie (looking straight into the camera in front of the American people) about it, but then was caught in the affair and the lie(s) and nothing happens to him, nothing of substance?  Oh, there was the sideshow of an impeachment and trial, but who thought that was going to lead anywhere?  The man not only kept his position, but now makes millions of dollars giving speeches and appears as a respected elder statesman for his party.  After all, "it was his personal life, none of anyone else's business."  I disagree.  The morality of the President of the United States is our business, but that's another point.

Why are these state lawmakers being charged with felonies?  Wasn't their affair their "personal lives, none of our business?"  Why is this different?

The state attorney-general, who is behind the charges, claims the citizens are skeptical of government and this will help to restore faith in it.  Yeah, right.  This guy is running around charging people with lying about an affair (Gee, I wonder if any other people who were accused of affairs every lied about them, even under oath?) to get people to believe in government again.  We should ask the people of Flint how this is working, that is, restoring faith in government.  Where are even the preliminary charges of the misconduct up there?  Oh, yeah, I forgot.  Congress in investigating.  Now that restores my faith.  I know it's probably early in the investigation, still......

In the same news broadcast, I heard some local government official, an elected one, is being charged with multiple counts of soliciting a prostitute.  I am morally opposed to prostitution, I guess.  But why is it or soliciting it a crime?  Where are the feminists?  Aren't women supposed to be able to do with their bodies what they wish?  Who is hurt by this?  Families and other loved ones, maybe.  Then why  don't we criminalize alcoholism and drug use, gambling addiction, and other things that also are deleterious to families?  Again, I'm not a proponent of prostitution, but it seems we have things out of whack.

BTW, what is a "whack?"

One way of restoring our faith in government might well be to fix the federal tax system.  Using the short form, 1040A, two pages, there are more than 80 pages of instructions.  To handle the two lines dealing with Social Security benefits, one must wade through 30+ pages of instructions.  Try doing any of the "worksheets."  It's add this amount and then add that amount.  After a few more instructions, it's turn around and subtract this same amount and subtract that same amount.  What can be the reason, well any good reason, for such a complex system?  I think we know the answer to that one.

I've always wondered, even back when I was a kid, how novelists come up with their ideas.  I heard a former CIA guy some years ago on the radio.  He noted that many of the ideas in the espionage and adventure novels aren't made up, that they are based on very real episodes.  Hmmm......  That would, I suppose, explain some things.  But, at the same, time, some of these horror novels, with the bad guys perpetrating the most terrible of crimes, where do those authors come up with those?  Are these novelists psychos?  How do they even imagine such things?  Do they, too, cull their ideas from reality, from real life?  That's more frightening than their novels, isn't it?  Still, I marvel at many of them.

I see some Ivy League school students are complaining about the stress of homework--reading, assignments, and other class work.  They can't sleep or eat.  They have stomach issues.  Maybe even some of them are losing hair.  It seems, with all of the social protesting they are doing to right the world, the academics are too much.  Yep, students are finding their studies to be too stressful, negatively affecting them.  I guess deans are even making personal phone calls to see how students are holding up, how they are coping, how they are feeling.  Well, that's nice.  But there's a simple, very simple solution.  It involves a choice.  (Oh, no, another stressful matter!)  Students who are so overwhelmed their mental and physical health are affected can either quit school and tend to those very important social protests or they can hold off on the protests and devote their time to being students/their studies.  Apparently they can't handle both.  So, make a choice.  No doubt many professors will cave in and lighten their students' work loads.  After all, if colleges give academic credit for "life experiences......"