There have always been paranoid people running around, but when did we start electing so many people who are, as they say, “lightly tethered to reality”?
Case in point: a few days ago, Talking Points Memo reported on a fiasco in Idaho, where a routine bill to bring the state into compliance with federal rules governing child support collections–needed in order to avoid losing $46 million dollars in federal money–failed because conservative legislators said it would have subjected the state to Sharia law.
State Sen. Sheryl Nuxoll, a Republican from the small northern community of Cottonwood, raised the objection during the House Judiciary and Rules Committee hearing. She testified that the federal law Idaho was adjusting to incorporated provisions of an international agreement regarding cross-border recovery of child-support payments, the Hague Convention on International Recovery of Child Support and Family Maintenance.
None of the nearly 80 countries involved in the treaty — which the U.S. entered in 2007 — are under Sharia law. But Nuxoll and other skeptics said their concerns were valid because some nations in treaty informally recognize such courts. They added that the provisions of the deal wouldn’t leave Idaho with the authority to challenge another nation’s judgment, particularly if it were under hard-line Islamic law.
Idaho uses federal programs to process in-state and out-of-state child support payments, and compliance with the federal rules is required in order to continue doing so. Without access to the federal tools, parents who are owed child-support payments will have no way to get those payments.
Apparently, Senator Nuxoll and her “black helicopter” colleagues consider hungry children a small price to pay for averting the imminent threat of a “Sharia law” which they couldn’t define if their lives depended on it.
Just shoot me now.
Why is it that these states think they live on some sort of island unable to communicate to other states about their processes for collecting child support for these children? Good grief, the stupid it burns.
I’m going to go read the Harper’s May edition which I know the professor and I share a common regard to. Happy hump day readers.
Problems collecting child support here in Indiana rests on a ridiculous quirk in the law which prevents many custodial parents from using the court ordered support payment against the non-paying parent. For some reason; non-payment of court ordered child support is considered a separate legal issue when the parent/payer does not comply. A separate case must be PAID FOR to file before courts take legal action – if they bother to do so. The custodial parent often does not have the money to pay for refiling because the child support is not being paid. It is the same in divorce cases; court orders are ignored and a separate case must be filed to seek compliance. What good is a court order in these cases…is it the same situation in Idaho and other states? Seeking compliance across state lines adds to the problem. Many of these men, and it is primarily men, will pay just enough to stay within the legal time frame to prevent additional court cases. This still shorts the mothers – and the CHILDREN – of needed income for their support. It is not a religious problem – it is a legal problem long ignored.
Could it be possible that someone that lives either out of state or out of the country that has a huge income currently pays (or owes) substantial child support and has found that a donation to her campaign is a small price to pay that could save “him” from paying hundreds of thousands or even millions of dollars in the future?
I worry how we can ever recover from this level of crazy
Certain, if not all, states have reciprocal child support collection systems. Call your family court or county clerk for more information.
Ex-wives are notorious for assuming that Child Support includes support for themselves and for their boyfriends. It doesn’t. Child support is not alimony, so quit whining, get a grip girls and get a job to earn your share of the total family income.
Charles; maybe you have an ex-wife who expected enough child support to support herself and a boyfriend. The amounts set by courts rarely covers what that support is to be used for to support the children – food, clothing, housing, education, medical bills, participation in extra curricular activities which are also important. Only the wealthy get large court ordered amounts. The $15 per week per child I got years ago didn’t pay for anything. I worked full time in local government; the “ex” decided to go through the court rather than pay in cash, this took 4 months and I qualified for food stamps during that time…and ONLY during that time. I stopped them by returning them to the local food stamp office in person. There are always, and will always be, those who have the “gimme” mind set, but they are the minority. Why do you think there are hundreds of thousands of mothers working – married and unmarried? There is no such thing as “extra income” these days except for the 1-2% who own this country. Whatever is in the minds of any of these women is beside the point – the fathers were ordered by courts to pay child support and they refuse to do so. The fact that laws; local, national and international, are ignored IS the point, not the fear of some imagined religious interference in a state that is home to a vast number of residents who are anti-government on all levels…and all other states.
There seems to be no real way to know what women do with child support. I do know women who use the support to pay for themselves and their boyfriends. Sometimes the children never know that their father is sending support for them and they become hostile to him because they feel that they are neglected. Some women are honorable but many are not. Is there a real solution to that problem since most of the children live with the mother and believe her when she says there is no money for things they want and need because “dad” isn’t paying, so it isn’t that the fathers always refuse to pay. It is that often the children are not given true information.
We’ll probably never know if the mind of the legislator from Idaho was purchased or merely dysfunctional but clearly it plays to the holy war paranoia that we’ve been inflicted with ever since we started bombing Islam.
My wife told me this weekend that at the church she attended the minister got a very rare round of applause for his sermon on how Christianity is being attacked.
Now every Muslim is a terrorist and every Christian a victim.
Funny, people here have no problem dressing weirdly at huge cost as ordered by fashion mavens but are scared to death of what other cultures do.
Republicans seem largely unable to distinguish between culture and law. They want to legislate culture in order to bring more voters in line with their politics.
Their politics being based on increasing poverty in every way possible. Like they believe that being wealthy is a decision open to all.
The Gospels say that Christians should expect to be persecuted for doing good things. The ancient Romans thought the Christians were crazy because they did good things for people and expected nothing in return. “Christians” should also expect to be ridiculed when they actually do genuinely crazy things which alienate people, so when that happens they should not count that as persecution so much as they should consequences for being stupid. That’s karma.
Speaking of Sharia law, is there some reader who can explain it or define it?
Stuart – the truly terrible and mean spirited people that refer to themselves as Christians are not really Christians at all. They choose to ignore the teachings of Jesus. Instead, they attempt to force feed their interpretations of the Old Testament as the rules and laws that we must all live by. They are small-minded and ignorant.
My daughter’s ex was ordered to pay child support by an Indiana court. He rarely does and he is often unemployed, I think by choice. The court order has little impact and is apparently difficult to enforce. My daughter works, takes care of her child, makes sure she is enrolled in extracurricular activities, at her own expense, i.e. she has little left to fund her retirement.
It is strange how a male can become nothing more than a deadbeat sperm donor when the work and expense of raising his offspring start to get serious. Having said that, my granddaughter is much better off without him around.
Stuart; Nancy knows something you don’t!
I have no disagreement with Nancy. Read our stuff a little more closely.
I am reacting to the “crazy” and “paranoid” mindset. These were the lyrics for what I can recall of a Mother-Daughter skit at Ohio University, Athens, 1960, “buddy weekend.” WE are schizoid and neurotic, plagued with episodes psychotic, fraught with phobias quite fatal, traumatized in days prenatal, paranoid, unrealistic, maladjusted, narcissistic.. . .[dance] So this Mothers’ Day we appreciate your being here to Advocate. . . Born sick, maybe?