Scott Bradford: Off on a Tangent

Punishing the Good Samaritan (Updated)

Posted

I have the absolute highest respect for our public safety officials, including our police officers, when they aren’t abusing their power. In my experience, most people who choose a life of service in the military, police, or fire services are fine, dedicated professionals.

There are, however, plenty of exceptions. I’ve run into a couple ‘power trip’ cops now and then—yelling at citizens for no reason, lying in wait to catch people committing minor, inconsequential traffic violations, etc. Unfortunately, it would seem that one of Fairfax County’s finest thought it was an appropriate decision to yell at and ticket a man for stopping traffic on a major thoroughfare to keep people from plowing at 55 miles-per-hour into a group of geese that were crossing the road. The officer cited the Good Samaritan who likely helped save some geese and prevent accidents (geese are bigger and more damaging than they look) for, I kid you not, jaywalking. According to one police officer, Mr. Jozsef Vamosi should simply have called police instead of taking matters into his own hands.

Of course, by the time police likely would have arrived, the geese would have been dead and somebody’s car would have been seriously damaged. One can argue that Vamosi shouldn’t have risked his safety to stop traffic for a minute to permit the geese to cross safely, but he certainly committed no crime. Virginia law prohibits people from ‘carelessly or maliciously’ stopping traffic. Vamosi’s actions were not careless or malicious. Indeed, a police officer on the scene likely would have done the exact same thing Vamosi did.

People have the right to perform public safety tasks until officials arrive. You can fight a fire with your extinguisher until firefighters arrive; you can perform chest compressions on a cardiac arrest victim until EMTs arrive; and you can hold a burglar at gun-point—or stop traffic to prevent a possibly serious accident—until police arrive. Maybe you or I, as non-professionals, won’t always make the right decisions in these situations, but we cannot be faulted for making an honest attempt to do the right thing.

Updated 8/4/2009: Vamosi, assuming he stays out of trouble for six months, will have these ludicrous charges dropped. His day in court was yesterday.

Frivolous Lawsuit of the Day

Posted

I have seen plenty of frivolous lawsuits over the years, but our litigious society still hasn’t run out of new ways to waste courtroom time and taxpayer dollars. In this case, a woman in New York City is suing Monroe College for $70,000 because she can’t find a job and wants her tuition refunded.

According to the suit, the school’s career office failed to provide Trina Thompson with career advice and job placement. Of course, there are a few questions we don’t have the answers to: Did Thompson ask for career advice and leads? She might have. Did the school guarantee successful job placement? I can pretty much guarantee they didn’t.

Even if both Thompson and the school worked their butts off there’s no guarantee that Thompson would find a job within any particular length of time in a down economy. Furthermore, even if the school slacked completely they are under no legal obligation to find Thompson a job and (assuming the school is properly accredited) it’s pretty ludicrous for Thompson to claim she is entitled to a full refund of $70,000 in tuition for her degree. The degree has value, so even if the case had any merit (it doesn’t) she would only be entitled to a partial refund.

Of course, since the case has no merit whatsoever, Thompson is entitled to nothing (and should be made to reimburse all court costs, both to Monroe College and the taxpayers).

ADHD: A Symptom of Bad Schools?

Posted

As my grades slipped and my behavior worsened in 5th and 6th grades, I got to meet with a number of doctors and psychiatric professionals and was ultimately diagnosed with Attention Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) and prescribed methylphenidate—commonly known as Ritalin. For several years, the drug was part of my daily routine and it was, indeed, pretty effective. While on Ritalin, I had a much easier time focusing in school.

I stopped taking the drug by some time in 8th or 9th grade because I became frustrated with its side effects, particularly a feeling that it hampered my creativity and changed my personality. Eventually I was able to find a happy-medium somewhere between intent focus and freewheeling daydreams (and between A’s and D’s on my report cards). I was reminded of this chapter of my life when I read on CNN.com about a young girl who stopped taking the drug on her own initiative for basically the same reasons I did.

To this day, I believe that ADHD is over-diagnosed and Ritalin is over-prescribed even in legitimate cases of ADHD. I’m not the only one with this opinion. The vast majority of supposed ADHD cases—including, I believe, my own—are merely a manifestation of creativity and intelligence. Being easily bored in boring situations isn’t a disorder.

Read more . . .

Bathroom Chairpile

Posted

bathroom-chairpileWhile I was at the church for Eucharistic Adoration, I made a quick pit-stop before heading into the chapel. To my surprise, the men’s room was full of chairs . . . lots of them . . . stacked.

I am assuming that they were put there to be out of the way for Vacation Bible School, which is under-way this week, but I found it funny. One doesn’t expect tens of chairs to be stacked in the men’s room.

Of course, as you can see, there’s plenty of room so it’s actually pretty logical. After all, the adoration chapel next door used to be a storage room (I think) and may well have been where chairs used to be stacked when they needed to be out of the way. I’m not really sure though . . . I’m still new!

Friars Walkin’ 300 Miles

Posted

I read an interesting article on The Washington Post web site this morning about a group of Franciscan Friars who walked 300 miles across Virginia from Roanoke to Washington, DC. Complete with the requisite photo gallery, the article is an interesting look at their journey and some of the lives they touched along the way.

I’ve heard many stories along these lines since becoming Catholic, though mostly in Catholic-oriented media and informal conversations. The men and women who choose the religious life in the Catholic Church are set apart in their vows (including the vow of celibacy) and lifestyle, but also—most obvious to a casual observer—in dress. People within and without the Church often seem to gravitate to identifiable religious leaders like Priests, Friars, Nuns, and others in their times of need.

Nobody would ever approach me on the street with their troubles, nor would they know to approach a non-Catholic Christian pastor out for a stroll with his wife and children (as he is indistinguishable in that context from me or anybody else). A Catholic Priest, on the other hand, is usually in-uniform, rarely off-duty, and equally identifiable to everybody from his own parishioners to anonymous strangers. Thus, he has nearly constant opportunity for ministry if he chooses to make himself available. Indeed, the Friars’ journey was filled with stories of hope and service.

While these positives are the center of the story, and the most important part, it’s worth mentioning that these poor Friars were also subjected to some middle fingers and yelled obscenities while on their journey. Three cheers for basic common courtesy and ‘tolerance’!

Scott Bradford is a writer and technologist who has been putting his opinions online since 1995. He believes in three inviolable human rights: life, liberty, and property. He is a Catholic Christian who worships the trinitarian God described in the Nicene Creed. Scott is a husband, nerd, pet lover, and AMC/Jeep enthusiast with a B.S. degree in public administration from George Mason University.