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June 18, 2006
Discrimination is permitted only in politics
Not surprisingly, the expert quoted in the last post (one James Alan Fox), is a gun control advocate. Elsewhere, when he was specifically asked whether or not armed citizens might help prevent criminal rampages, he ducked the question: Yazoo City, Mississippi: As Chief Medical Examiner/Investigator for Yazoo County, Mississippi I have investigated a work place homicide and know the child and family of the Pearl, Mississippi school shootings. The shooting I investigated was the result of 2 men in love with the same woman. The victim saw the shooter coming outside of the workplace and crawled under a vehicle, where he was shot. Even though it may not be politically correct, I believe that citizens carrying handguns could help prevent this as well as other crimes. What are your thoughts?Let's take a look at the professor's logical analysis. In the purest sense he is right. If an attacker is literally suicidal, the mere threat of counter-attack will not deter him. But isn't a citizen armed with a gun more than a threat? By its nature, can't a gun be used to do more than threaten? A gun can deter an attacker in three ways: it might function as a mere threat, which means the attack is stopped. It might stop the attacker by wounding him. Finally, it might kill him. In all three cases, the attacker has been successfully deterred. While it may be that truly suicidal attackers will not deterred by the mere display of a gun, how can anyone (much less a distinguished professor) maintain that wounding or killing will not act as a deterrent? In the same interview, Dr. Fox discusses the problems caused by mental illness in the workplace, although he does not discuss the role of the ADA -- which prohibits discrimination because of mental illness. What about the man accused of knifing people in the subway -- a guy who imagines that everyone is watching him? Would you hire him? If you were a landlord, would you rent to him? Stop laughing. If you didn't, you might be guilty of discrimination. Not only are they no longer allowed to consider the tenants' sources of income, California landlords may not reject applicants for being palpably (even frighteningly) insane. The following comes from a checklist for landlords titled "Six Tips to Avoid Discrimination" written by a Berkeley landlord: The fact that a landlord does not discriminate is no protection against being charged with discrimination and forced to spend a huge amount of time and money defending himself. In the end, even if the landlord is completely innocent, he may lose anyway. Although there is no way to completely protect yourself from being charged with discrimination, there are a number of thing you can do to greatly reduce your risk.Which means that if a hallucinating, penniless psychotic comes in off the street and demands you rent him the apartment, you may not discriminate against him for being broke and insane. Not even if he is panhandling for a living and catching invisible fish with an invisible net. (I knew a Berkeley street person who used to do just that.) Well, maybe you could give as a reason for not renting to him that you don't want a tenant who catches invisible fish, because if he left them lying around, after three days the stench of the imaginary fish would be overpowering to the imagination . . . Seriously, though, common sense is gone. In the name of abolishing discrimination. Everything now constitutes discrimination. The inmates are literally running the asylum. My advice? Pray if you believe in God, and buy a gun whether you believe in God or not. (Little wonder the Democrats still can't be assured of winning elections, despite huge dissatisfaction with Republicans.) posted by Eric on 06.18.06 at 06:48 PM |
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Im on a role with the stories today!
I owned (still own but not live there) a duplex where I rented the upstairs out and lived in the bottom. I had one tenant that I allowed in against my gut feeling, and what a nightmare that was.
Young girl, 19 years old. Said she worked in a bar, which I confirmed via phone call but failed to ask what her position was. Turned out she was stripper that also dealt XTC, which she immediately began dealing out of my own house!
After three weeks of all manner of undesireables entering and leaving at all hours, parties with fights, high kids on my roof, overnight guests staying when the tenant wasnt there, Id had enough.
I didnt want to go through the months-long eviction process and if I called the cops and had them take her, Id have had my apartment tied up and unrentable for months there too. Fortunately the girl was both inexperienced and stupid.
I offered her a week to leave voluntarily, told her Id give her deposit back, refund her for that months rent and NOT report her to the "Landlord Eviction Roster" where ALL the landlords in the country look at potential renters. I told her if she gets on that list, shell NEVER get an apartment again in her life.
After the cost repairs, carpet cleaning, trash removal and getting rid of the flea infestation, I wrote her a refund check for $28. I felt like I had barely dodged a really BIG bullet on that deal!