Broken Bread

A letter to the New York City Office of Child Support Enforcement

2008-01-09T07:02:00.000-05:00

Human Resources Administration
Office of Child Support Enforcement
2 Washington Street
New York, NY 10004
Attn.: Frances Pardus-Abbadessa, Deputy Commissioner

Dear Ms. Pardus-Abbadessa:

This is in response to your condescending form letter to me dated December 24, 2007, in which you thank me for supporting my own child.

It never occurred to me, in my daughter's eleven years, not to support my child. In 2002 I was hauled into family court by a vindictive ex-spouse over a single bounced check and subjected to mistreatment and ridicule at the hands of an unscrupulous family court judge. Since then, my paycheck has been garnished every two weeks. There have been numerous errors, no corrections have been made, and no apologies have ever been offered. Last year, my ex wife helped herself to a "cost of living increase" and they are now taking out even more. Multiple attempts to recover the overpayments through administrative audits have been a complete failure and waste of time.

Your administration has come close to bankrupting me. At various periods of time you have forced me to buy groceries with credit cards, eat rice and beans at home while watching my daughter's mother take trips to Paris -- twice -- and even to become homeless for a brief period.

When I think of all the holidays you've ruined and all the things my child and I have gone without so that my daughter's mother can collect $359 every two weeks, tax-free, it makes my blood boil. Still, I had been reconciled with the idea of some third party playing fast and loose with my hard-earned money. I considered it a difficult lesson in good judgment, and have resolved never to have another child in the State of New York.

But that was before you had the chutzpah to write and thank me for all my hard work, commitment, and dedication. So now you're getting a good solid piece of my mind.

Of the real sacrifices I have made for my little girl and her care, you have no idea. They are off your radar screen and, I suspect, your understanding. They have to do with compassion, nurturing, patience, and giving of myself. You cannot put a price tag on these, Ms. Pardus-Abbadessa, and therefore I'm afraid you would consider them worthless. Yes, there is a relationship, and yes, my daughter loves me even though I cannot buy her much with the money I have left over after you people have taken your blood money. But she loves me all the same. Perhaps one day she will grow up to be a lawyer. If she does, I hope she plays a part in dismantling the OCSE and this whole corrupt, inhumane system.

Child support enforcement as it is currently practiced is illegal under the Tenth Amendment to the Constitution. Continuing to reach into the pockets of hard-working fathers in order to enrich single mothers, and to bankroll the machinery that makes it work, amounts to treason and a violation of international law. You may say you are only implementing a Federal mandate, and you would be technically right. But Nuremberg has taught us that obeying orders is not an excuse for human rights violations and illegal actions. Your actions, and those of your administration, amount to grave crimes against humanity. I pray every day that God will one day call you to task for the suffering you have created.

You ask if there is anything you can do to assist me. Get out of my family life now, and let me raise my child according to my own means and ability.

In case there's any doubt, I would prefer that you not insult me again by thanking me for doing what any responsible parent would do for their child. If you have any other sort of response, please be advised that it will be posted on my public blog, http://breadandwine.org. I have used this outlet to chronicle child support abuses, both in New York and in other states. You can read this entry on the site and post a comment there also, but either way, your response will be posted. Also note: While I won't mind a response in writing, I will consider any subsequent adverse change in my child support arrangement to be retaliatory in nature, and a further violation of my civil rights, and may take legal action as a result. All correspondence from your office, and all actions taken are, and will continue to be, part of a journalistic chronicle aimed at exposing your injustices and abuses to the clear light of day.

I will not call the customer service representatives, as they have never been very much help. They cannot add or subtract, which makes it difficult for them to assist in solving problems. They seem to serve no function other than to waste busy parents' time.

Yours in the hope of a better future for New York's families,

Jeffrey Zeth

Stop It Now

2007-06-26T19:16:00.000-04:00

To the Virginia Dept of Health:
When my daughter was born prematurely, I would place my thumb into her hand for her to squeeze as she lay in her isolette. When she recovered and came home from the hospital, I would hold and kiss her hand often. After she learned to walk, we could frequently be seen walking hand-in-hand down our street.

My daughter will turn eleven this summer. I see her two nights every week, every other weekend, and for two weeks in the summer. I have told her she doesn't have to hold my hand when we walk down the street, but she insists. At times I've wondered how it looks to other people to seea 10-year-old girl holding her father's hand, but this doesn't occupy my mind for very long. I'm more concerned about what feels right for her than about what other people think.

I find the latest advertisement from the Virginia Department of Health deeply offensive and hurtful. It is offensive to any man who has a nurturing relationship with a child, because it implies that any father who shows physical affection to his child should be labeled a potential sexual predator. It is hurtful because it twists an innocent gesture of affection between a father and child into something that would make most fathers turn pale. Fathers are not by definition pedophiles, but your ad asks viewers to think of all physical affection shown by fathers as an indication of sexual abuse.

Some find your ad ridiculous. I do not consider it funny or ridiculous. I am extremely uncomfortable with the climate of fear that sex abuse and domestic violence advocates are creating. You are creating a McCarthyist environment that may one day drive a permanent wedge between fathers and their children, and which will ultimately be damaging to men's relationships with ALL children. Sex abuse is a problem, but to imply that sex abuse by fathers is of epidemic proportions is both inaccurate and unhelpful.

Please stop smearing fathers. Stop It Now.

Jeffrey Zeth

Deadbroke dad sues Tennessee child support collections system

2007-06-25T07:06:00.000-04:00

It's a common scenario: a divorced dad running his own business gets into financial trouble, and gets hopelessly behind in his child support payments. The state collections apparatus goes after him with everything but guns. When his arrearages reach a certain point they hit him with criminal contempt charges. When he still doesn't pay, they throw him in jail. Even though the charges have now reached the status of a crime, no one ever reads him the Miranda warning or gives him other rights due to other criminals. He's sentenced to jail time.

This guy has the nerve to fight back. The convictions are overturned, but Bryan Cottingham doesn't stop there. He sues the child support pimps who turned his life into a living hell.

I don't know about you, but I think Cottingham should be a candidate for some type of men's rights award. He is a national hero and, if his suit is successful, it just might serve to discourage the predatory types of collection practices that have turned fathers into wage-slaves and second-class citizens.

Overheard in Brooklyn

2007-06-17T13:28:00.000-04:00

There were a few things I wanted to say in honor of Father's Day 2007, but I'll choose just this, in honor of those fathers who can't be with their kids this weekend.
Sometime around late May 2007, I'm waiting for a bus. At the stop with me is a 30-ish looking Latin man and a little girl. The girl is crying.
"I want to see you next weekend."
"You can't, sweetie. I'll be in the Dominican Republic."
"I want a daddy weekend."
"I'm going to the D/R. You don't want to come with me to the D/R, do you?"
She stops crying, looks him straight in the eye, and says "Yes". A full "yes", not "yeah", or "OK". Y-E-S.
There is a long pause. This is clearly not the answer he expected. But she's standing there in front of her dad, fully prepared, at least at that moment, to go with him to some strange place.
"Well, you can't," he says finally.
"WHY??" she says, her lower lip sticking out.
"Well, uh..."
Another long pause.
"Well, because, uh..."
She folds her arms in front of her in a strangely mature posture. She's got a shit detector like Hemingway, this one.
"Well, the mosquitoes are gonna bite," he says.
She considers this for a moment, arms folded. Then she starts crying again.

Louisiana legislature rejects child support bill

2007-05-28T10:21:00.000-04:00

Lawmakers in Louisiana just killed a bill that would have held parents responsible for child support until the age of 23, if the child is in college.

Ready the story.

I think this bill was a mistake. In fact, it didn't go far enough. Parents not living with their kids should be financially responsible for them until they reach the age of 35. After all, what if a child wants to go to graduate school after college? In fact, what if the whole "career" thing doesn't work out at all? Parents have a responsibility to their children. A parent's wages should be garnished if he doesn't pay voluntarily. If he doesn't like it, he should have thought twice about having a child in the first place.

Of course, mothers who don't want their newborn babies should still have the right to bring them to drop-in centers, never to see them again, no questions asked.

Oh, and abortion rights should be extended post-birth, at least until the child reaches the age of 18. We must all support a woman's right to choose, musn't we?

Sperm donor pays child support to lesbian couple

2007-05-11T19:51:00.000-04:00

A sperm donor who helped a lesbian couple conceive two children is liable for child support under a state appeals-court ruling that a legal expert believes might be the first of its kind.

A Superior Court panel last week ordered a Dauphin County judge to establish how much Carl L. Frampton Jr. would have to pay to the birth mother of an 8-year-old boy and 7-year-old girl.

Read the story

Woman indicted in alleged scheme to get child support

2007-05-02T22:07:00.000-04:00

ALBUQUERQUE — A grand jury has indicted a woman accused of pretending she'd had a child and bilking her former husband out of more than $26,000.
The Bernalillo County grand jury last week indicted Viola Trevino, 54, on 24 counts, including kidnapping, perjury, conspiracy to commit fraud and conspiracy to commit forgery.

Read the story

The equal parenting bike trek

2007-05-01T09:25:00.000-04:00

A reader sends word about an upcoming event:

"I am trying to spread the word about the following:

Click Here...

....and I hope that other members of the male-friendly web community will do likewise. This event - The Equal Parenting Bike Trek - could make a serious propaganda splash. And that is what politics is all about. Publicity is what we sorely need, and this is a chance to hit feminism hard in a strategic area where it will be felt throughout the entire organism.

The event will take place in the USA, but since our politics is international in scope, the eye of the world ought to be upon it..."

More here...

Thirty-two college students

2007-04-18T09:46:00.000-04:00

I'm growing weary of documenting the slaughter of our children and young adults. Until now, though, most of the deadliest school shootings have been committed by people who were able to articulate rational complaints, however misguided. Harris and Klebold knew what they were doing, and did it to redress perceived wrongs and injustices. There was a whole string of school shootings in the late 1990s -- almost all of them committed by kids who knew what they were doing, were able to state why, and at times even sent out warning signs. If you want to go back even further, there was Marc Lepine, the Canadian psychopath enraged at women who were admitted to engineering school. Their crime was having the guts to step out of the barefoot-pregnant-in-the-kitchen role and dare to try making careers for themselves.

However, by now it appears that the Virginia Tech shooter had schizophrenia. His targets were chosen 100% at random, and he never articulated any clear complaints against anyone. This may make it more difficult to give the tragedy some meaning: the Canadian engineering students, for example, were symbols of women's progress; the Columbine tragedy started a whole debate about the effects of bullying in high schools. The deaths were horrific and shocking, but led people to ask tough questions about what changes could be made to make our schools safer, and about our responsibility, as adults, to all children and young adults.

Cho Seung-Hui had a history of psychiatric problems. He was 23 years old, around the age when people with schizophrenia first begin to get symptoms. His creative writing teacher expressed concern over a play he wrote. He was apparently hospitalized in 2005, and it's unclear whether he ever followed up with treatment after his discharge (probably not). We can't really blame the perpetrator for a mental illness that shredded his perception and judgment just as thoroughly as cancer rips apart the immune system.

Of course all the gun nuts will say that this would never have happened if everyone in the school was armed to the teeth, and the gun control nuts will argue that we need to make guns much harder to get. Charles M. Madigan, in my opinion, gets the balance exactly right. Without greater attention to mental health issues, it's hard to see what could possibly be done to prevent this sort of tragedy in the future. An increased awareness of emotional literacy in the classroom, and maybe training educators on how to detect psychosis would probably help a lot. We can't make every writing teacher or computer science professor a mental health clinician, of course. But the symptoms of psychosis are not that difficult to detect, and by now it's clear that our shooter's social isolation and preoccupation with violence sent up red flags to anyone around him who cared to look. It should not have taken a shooting rampage to get people to pay attention to someone who was holding his own academically but who clearly needed help in just about every other area of his life.

Our hearts go out to the victims' families in this horrible disaster.

A timeline of recent worldwide school shootings

Attorney General in Michigan charged with racketeering

2007-04-16T10:43:00.000-04:00

Michigan's attorney general Mike Cox has been hit with racketeering charges stemming from a mishandled child support enforcement case. Robert R. Parker, Jr., a father and former child support obligor, claims he was alienated from his daughter from the time she was two years old. He was covered under a state law exempting parents wrongfully denied visitation from making child support payments, but the State went after him anyway, defrauding him of more than $15,000.

Also named in the suit is Gennesse County's former Friend of the Court, Jennie E. Barkey.

Read the story.

Charges dropped against Duke University athletes

2007-04-13T13:58:00.000-04:00

THE prosecutor who charged three Duke University lacrosse players with raping a stripper has apologised to the athletes, a day after North Carolina's Attorney-General branded him a "rogue" and dropped the case.

Read the story.

Regular readers familiar with this case might have noticed that I have not taken a stand on its racial aspects. In fact, Broken Bread has focused mostly on the specious nature of the allegations, on credibility problems that surfaced almost at the very beginning, and on the impact these would have on legitimate victims of rape. The fact that the case pitted a group of elite, white college kids against one poor African-American local gave the story more attention than it really deserved. The situation created the perfect environment for a lot of pompous grandstanding, but at the end of the day the accuser's story just did not hold together. I saw it as an example of the climate of distrust and political correctness which cause the media to condemn a person as guilty until he can prove himself innocent. I also saw it as an example of an unscrupulous prosecutor willing to sacrifice lives at the altar of his personal ambition.

So, now that the story's over, perhaps the Duke University athletes will be able to live normal lives. Maybe in a few years they'll be able to look back on these days as a time when they did a lot of growing up quickly.

...and Yours Truly needs a vacation after his vacation

2007-04-10T11:26:00.000-04:00

Well, I'm back from Italy, exhausted after having spent eight consecutive days waking up my daughter at daybreak so that these people could show us three cities. I'm feeling about as relaxed as Jim Carrey on crack, and am ready for another eight days, this time in the Caribbean, sans child. I know it was a lot to do and to see, and probably should have done my homework to know what type of tour I was getting into, but let's just say that anyone who thinks of an escorted vacation with days that routinely begin before 7:00 a.m. as "family-friendly" doesn't understand the meaning of the term.

Still, the sight of Samantha's jaw dropping upon her entry into the Sistine Chapel almost made it worth it. Almost, but not quite. It's Tuesday, I've got another four days of work ahead of me, I'm jet-lagged, and I've blown tons of money in a country that was too expensive and had little to offer other than history, as important as that history is. My parents, dyed-in-the-wool Italophiles, used the phrase "your heritage" with me a lot, understandably expecting me to be proud of it. But I suppose that if I'm related in any way to Michaelangelo I'm also related in some way to Mussolini. Who will be the closer relation? Well, I ain't gonna be carving no damn block of marble anytime soon.

I don't mean to knock Italy -- if art history, the Catholic religion, and cities built on swamps are your thing, go ahead and go. As for me, next time you'll find me someplace below the equator, sipping a rum punch with some gorgeous woman, unrelated to me, who probably won't add to my knowledge of the Italian Renaissance.

She sure does need a vacation

2007-03-28T10:00:00.000-04:00

Cynthia Brown is a genius. Cynthia Brown is going to revolutionize social services in the state of Ohio. And it all started with Cynthia Brown simply ordering pizza. When it arrived, Cynthia Brown looked at the box and thought something like, "They can put coupons on the box, why not pictures of child support obligors?" Her husband responded with, "You need a vacation."

I'll say. Maybe she even needs to find another line of work. She brought no new information to the table, and could not make any substantive response to Glenn's arguments. All she did was threaten people with embarrassment and grandstand. Folks, I hate to say it, but this is one occasion where the nasty, ugly phrase "dumb blonde" just might actually apply. With her punitive attitude, she might make a good corrections officer. Her wintertime tan would probably help her fit in as a ski instructor at some posh Vermont ski resort. But a civil servant? Honey, you can't be serious.

Cynthia Brown, as they say over there in Ohio: you are as dumb as a pile of rocks.

Pizza party

2007-03-26T14:32:00.000-04:00

Imagine a beautiful sunny summer day in a Cincinnati playground. Clustered around a picnic table draped with balloons and ribbons is a group of excited children. It's someone's birthday and, as often happens at these events, pizza is being served.

But at this party, the pizza boxes look different. They're decorated, not with drawings of smiling, moustachioed Italian pizza-makers slinging dough, but with photos of grownups. Men, mostly.

"Happy birthday, Bella! Gosh, this guy looks a lot like your dad."

"That's gotta be your dad, Bella. I'd know his chin anywhere!"

Everyone at the table is talking at once. One of the moms comes over to have a look, examines the pic carefully, and addresses Bella's mom.

"Gosh, Valerie. I didn't know Bill paid child support."

Valerie is steaming. She's looking at the picture now with a strange mixture of pity and rage. Seeing the picture carries her away from the moment. She's remembering all the dashed dreams, the love lost, the family they once were. She clenches her teeth.

"He doesn't."

Utah child support: alarms and activism

2007-03-18T10:51:00.000-04:00

Protesters are picketing the Utah governor's office today, urging him to veto child support legislation that recently passed the state house by a narrow margin.

Read the story.

I cannot believe that this bill is anything but a cheap way for politicians to gain political brownie points with the special interests and the fed. The main argument is that the child support tables have not been adjusted for 14 years, and that they need to be "updated" to reflect inflation. But child support amounts (in Utah, as in New York) are already linked to income: as a man's income rises, so will his child support. Something similar occurred with me in 2006, when my daughter's mother pocketed an additional $70 a month out of my income, though in fact my income only rose a fraction of that. But in Utah, dads paying child support can expect to see increases, over time, of up to 50%, with those having one child hit the hardest.

There are three ways I could make ends meet if my child support went up 35-50%:

1. My daughter's bedroom, which is used only by her when she comes to stay, would be given over to a roommate.

2. I would cancel my Internet and phone service, shut the electricity off, and default on my student loans. (Heat is included with my rent and would not be affected.)

3. I would stop paying into my 401K, and either rely on Samantha to take care of me when I'm old, or work until I drop dead.

None of these options is ideal, but the biggest bang for my buck, and the most forward-looking, would be Option #1. At my age, having a roommate would not be my idea of fun, but I'd put up with one if it meant staying in my apartment with the lights on.

Call Governor Huntsman at 801-538-1000, or e-mail him and tell him not to force dads to make choices like this. Tell him he should veto this legislation NOW.

There she goes again

2007-03-15T12:10:00.000-04:00

My daughter's mother is a piece of work. She gets pissed when I haul out the dirty laundry in public, but she has a seemingly inexhaustible supply of dirty linen. It's rather unfair of me, I know, but she's aware that I usually only blog about her negative behavior, so if she really wanted me to stop, all she'd have to do is not give me anything to write about. Last year, when she noticed that I posted an e-mail of hers on this site, she stopped corresponding with me via e-mail altogether. One would think that she might have seen my posting of her exact words, unchanged except for legal names, as an attempt to be balanced and to present her side of the problem we were having -- which is actually what it was intended to be. Instead she wrote one last e-mail indicating that she'd no longer be communicating with me via e-mail. This does not seem logical -- after all, I can and do blog about conversations we've had and things she's done, without e-mail.

As an example, take practically every arrangement we've been making for trips to Europe. She took Samantha to London last month, I'm taking her to Italy this month. But she refused to split the cost of the passport renewal, saying I should pay for the whole thing, on the grounds that she paid for the last one (kids' passports are usually good only for 5 years). It didn't seem to make any difference to her that I didn't take Samantha out of the country for five years, and so didn't need a passport for her. It also didn't seem to matter that all this traveling was funded at least partly with child support her mother was collecting from me. Jesus Christ, where does this woman get off?

She gave me the information on the outgoing flight to London, but not for the return flight, and included no phone number for the hotel. She had me get a notarized affidavit granting her my permission to take Samantha on the trip, but said she didn't have time to do the same thing for me. For urgent messages, she gave me a number for a phone that doesn't even function outside the U.S. Now she's saying she wants not only a complete flight itinerary, but contact information for the hotels at every leg of the trip, and she's refusing to give me Samantha's passport -- which I paid for -- until this information is provided.

What a sorry-ass, pathetic, miserable little control freak.

A friend of mine has pointed out that, since I am now divorced, I should be grateful that I'm not dealing with this crap on a day-to-day basis. He has a point. Children learn from their parents, and in my last days in that household, Samantha was beginning to imitate her mother's shameful, disrespectful, controlling behavior. Can you imagine what kind of relationship I'd have today with my child if I'd stayed married?

Word problems for children with deadbroke dads

2007-03-08T10:46:00.000-05:00

My daughter is taking the State-Wide Math Test this week. She's learning addition from her money-hungry mother, and subtraction from her deadbroke father, but, in honor of us both, here's a few word problems I wish they'd add to the test:

Daddy has $10 left until payday. Payday is five days away. How much money can Daddy spend per day?

A can of black beans costs $1.50. A bag of rice costs $2. Two cans of black beans and a bag of rice will cook five meals. If Daddy eats two meals a day, how much will he spend on food over the next five days?

Mommy likes to get manicures and go out to dinner. Each manicure costs $15. Each dinner out costs $50. She collects $400 every two weeks in child support. The babysitter charges $15 an hour, and Mommy hires the babysitter to watch you while she goes to dinner and gets her nails done. Each dinner out takes about two hours; each manicure takes about one hour. If Mommy gets her nails done once a week, and goes out to dinner three times a week, how much will she have left to spend on you?

A trip to Paris for a week costs about $2,000. If Mommy were to pay for the trip using the child support checks in Problem #3, how long would she need to save in order to have enough to take a two-week vacation to Paris?

What I would say to Britney

2007-02-23T09:51:00.000-05:00

I haven't blogged at all about the tidal wave of famous people in drug rehab, but I've held my tongue for long enough about Britney Spears. I was angry with her for shaving that head of hair, but figured even beautiful women get to do stupid things when drunk. There's no reason to heap scorn on a celebrity just because she's successful and pretty, and at any rate, yakking about her problems isn't going to help either her or the thousands of other, lesser-known people with the same problems who need help too. Not only that, but as a father I feel some solidarity with Jamie Spears, who probably never wanted this scandal made public and must want to kill the paparazzi, who are making everything extra horrible. I'm not a Britney fan to begin with, and even though I'm a sucker for a pretty face, I'm also a substance abuse counselor who has seen a lot. She didn't seem that different in many ways from other celebrities with substance abuse problems, and for a while I was hoping that she would just get the help she needed and disappear for a little while.

Then word came out that the reason she signed out of Promises Treatment Center was because the regimen was "too tough".

Oh. My. God. Take a look at Promises' Malibu location.

Too tough? Honey, you can't be serious. I've worked in managed care in the fields of mental health and substance abuse for nearly ten years. I've managed many cases in southern California, including patients in treatment at Promises. As a counselor I'm not intimately familiar with any of the facilities in this region, have never worked in or visited one, and would need to be careful about what I said in public about them even if I had. However, let's just say that treatment at these facilities is, well, about as far from "tough" as you can get. By any description, baby.

A tough treatment facility is one that probably doesn't have a web site. It's a state or city-run place like the Manhattan ATC or Kings County which does adequate treatment with very few resources, or it's a greed-driven Medicaid mill, of which there are many (all will remain nameless). "Tough" is being thrown into groups with hardcore criminals and psychopaths and having to talk about your feelings. "Tough" is being kept up all night by a roommate who's brought cocaine with him into the facility, who then threatens you if you say anything to staff. "Tough" is getting a "scholarship" to remain in treatment after your insurance runs out, then coming back from group one afternoon to find your bed out in the hallway and your place in the bedroom taken by a paying patient (A "scholarship" doesn't guarantee comfort, or even a bedroom.)

Party girl, it doesn't matter how demanding the schedule is. I don't care if they make you read from the Big Book all day, every day. It doesn't even matter if they make you get up at 5am. If it happens in a place by the ocean, with horseback riding, yoga, gardens and fountains, it ain't tough. It ain't even close. And don't tell your counselor you're doing treatment to get custody of your sons. Your kids didn't seem to mean a whole heck of a lot to you while you were using.

Talk a little, if you want, about the pressures of being a pop star. But don't forget that people have gotten clean with far fewer resources and in much less comfort than you. You're not really that different from any other substance abuse patient and, like everyone else, custody of your kids is NOT guaranteed just because you show your pretty face at a rehab that could just as well be a five-star resort. Start with gratitude, sweetie -- just a little will go a long way. Get real with yourself, and whenever you think about signing out, remember what brought you in to begin with.

The news that she's back in treatment again makes me think that someone, either a human being or her higher power, has managed to make her see that conditions at Malibu maybe aren't so tough. Maybe finally the treatment team there has something to work with -- in between horseback riding and yoga sessions, of course.

MRAs, meet Steven Guess

2007-02-22T15:26:00.000-05:00

Men's News Daily has published a so-called analysis of the men's movement, by Steven Guess, based on "several weeks of interaction with [men's movement activists] on an almost daily basis." His conclusion? That divorced men are blaming a nebulous, undefined bogeyman for problems we've caused ourselves.

Read the article.

Steven Guess appears to have learned a remarkable amount about us after such a short time, but for the time being, I'll ignore his sweeping statements. These have the quality of a young man who is a little too sure of himself in the wrong places, but too unsure of himself in the right ones. Steven is more qualified than he thinks he is to speak on this subject, but in future he'd better back up his opinions with facts gained from someplace other than the halls of academia. If he is going to talk academically, he should cite research studies and not theories or ideologies.

My reply to his article can be found as a comment on Mens News Daily, but I'll post it here too:

Mr. Guess,
Middle-aged? I stand guilty as charged.

However, I am not a conservative. I might have become slightly more so over the years, and in my hometown of New York City might be considered a bit to the right of most people. But I think the world is a better place with abortion rights, birth control, and with people in the GLBT community out of the closet. I also don't believe the women's rights movement should be totally dismissed, because it did do a lot of good, once upon a time.

You disqualify yourself too easily. You say you haven't done an exhaustive study. That you've never been married and are not a parent. That you're lacking clinical expertise. That doesn't mean you don't have a right to an opinion on these subjects. But it does mean you have a responsibility to inform yourself by getting to know as many people as you can who do fit these criteria. And, just maybe, to do something close to an exhaustive study. Otherwise, many will say, with some justification, that you don't know what you're talking about.

To all appearances, you haven't done your homework, because you seem to think that the real world is in the halls of academia and not in the reality that people live every day. It's the other way 'round. I've never been inside a women's studies classroom, but I've felt the effects of intolerant policies and laws that are the direct result of extreme feminism. Yes, there are MRA's who don't like anything feminists have done, and the more extreme of them give the rest of us a bad name. But, before you dismiss us out of hand, you need to take the time to investigate the reality of those of us who have lived in the world. That's where you'll find the effects of feminist extremism -- not in a classroom.

I have clinical expertise as a mental health clinician. I'm here to tell you that the professional organization that is supposed to represent me is controlled by feminists, and I don't even think that the leaders of this organization would seriously take issue with this statement. They have duped the public with a snow-job and a smoke-and-mirrors operation that is now coming home to roost. Believe it or not, women are as much the victims as the rest of us. Women are brought up with enormous expectations -- of society, of their partners, of their careers, and of institutions such as family courts, to whom they turn when those closest to them fail in their unrealistic demands. If you visit any other part of the world, you'll observe that women just about anywhere else are happier than those in the U.S.

You made a big splash and generated a lot of controversy, but don't worry. When you're ready to address the subject in a serious way, we'll be here ready to tell you our stories.

Guerilla gourmet

2007-02-07T12:29:00.000-05:00

If necessity is the mother of invention, she must be a non-custodial parent.

My daughter's class is doing a unit on inventions this semester, and all the kids have to design and invent something. I got this idea too late to suggest it to her, but have come up with something that makes our lives easier during the cold weather. In order for you to understand its use, I have to explain the visitation arrangement I have with Samantha's mother: in addition to every other weekend, I see her for two hours on Monday and Wednesday nights. That's not really enough time to go outside her mother's neighborhood. In warm weather we eat sandwiches in a park or playground, but when it's cold we hunker down in a Starbuck's to sip hot chocolate and do homework. At those times, supper is either a cold chicken cutlet, a peanut-butter-and-jelly sandwich, or cold pasta with pesto. The folks at the Starbuck's either don't notice or don't care that Samantha eats food from outside the establishment. This is good because I can't afford (thanks to her mother gouging me) to take her out to eat twice a week, even at someplace cheap. But now, with the wind-chill in the single digits, cold food just won't cut it. Samantha, the dearheart that she is, would probably eat it without complaining, but I want something hot for her.

The Starbucks doesn't have a microwave. So lately I've been bringing pre-cooked pasta, heating it up in a food container using boiling water from behind the counter, draining it over the trash can, and tossing it over pesto.

So, if you happen to have a child who eats pasta but don't have anywhere to heat it, here's how you can. All you need is the pasta, a little of your child's favorite pasta sauce (tomato, pesto, or alfredo), a fork, some modified food containers, and a cooperative Starbucks barista:

1. Get two round, plastic containers, identical in size and shape, so that one can be nested inside the other.

2. Using a small knife-blade, cut holes in the bottom of one container. Save the lid. This is your portable collander.

3. Wrap a child-size portion of her favorite sauce in a bit of saran wrap or a small, empty spice-jar. Pack some leftover pasta in the container without the holes and cover.

4. When you get to Starbucks, ask for a cup of hot water in addition to your latte or kid's hot chocolate. Pour some hot water over the pre-cooked pasta -- just enough so that each piece is completely covered -- and let stand for a couple of seconds.

5. Standing over the Starbucks trash can, empty the contents into the container with the holes. Allow water to drain into the trash. Mix the sauce in and stir well. Serve immediately.

Publicity stunt bombs

2007-02-01T09:29:00.000-05:00

I was beginning to despair of not having anything to write about this week. My ex has been on pretty good behavior, the world situation is desperate as usual, and there haven't been any child support horror stories to rival the Gary-Gowins case (though the heated debate among readers on the Atlanta Journal-Constitution site is still going on).

Then a bunch of idiots working for the Cartoon Network gave everyone in Boston the the fright of their lives.

What kind of morons would think that placing devices on bridges and tunnels with blinking lights that depict a cartoon character making an obscene gesture would be funny?

Probably the same morons who thought that a show about a talking milkshake, meatball, and fries would be good entertainment.

Holy crap, where do these guys get their drugs?

Mind-Find-Bind...and Entrap

2007-01-29T11:04:00.000-05:00

Well, I'm sure Dr. Phil wouldn't consider this match.com story a success. I'll bet fertility clinics are not amused either.

"He considered himself just a sperm donor. But now he's a dad who has to pay.
Michael Wilford -- a Chicago businessman who said he simply provided semen to a girlfriend whose biological clock was ticking -- has agreed to provide financial support to the twin girls he fathered after their mother demanded it."

Read the article.

"It's not about money, it's about honor"

2007-01-23T11:31:00.000-05:00

Eliot Spitzer's Reign of Terror against the business community probably won't get any better now that he's governor. But it is refreshing, in a state where so many businesses have been bullied into settling out of court, to see someone finally standing up to the campaign of intimidation coming from Albany.

Richard Grasso has conducted himself with incredible restraint and integrity all the way through the smear campaign being waged against him. His only crime, from what I can tell, is to bring out envy among nasty, small-minded people who started out with far more than he has and who have achieved a lot less. It's easy to forget, if you listen to his interview on Bloomberg, that this is a man who completed nothing more than high school, who started off at the Exchange on the trading floor in his teenage years, and who quickly worked his way up the ranks. It is jealousy, plain and simple, that has fueled this witch hunt. The $140 million compensation package might be excessive -- personally, I think no individual has any business making more than a million or so dollars a year under any circumstances. But it is not illegal. And if the NYSE board thinks Grasso earned that money, well, it's just possible that he did.

Another thing you'll notice about the Bloomberg interview is that Grasso will not say anything bad about Spitzer, no matter how much they try to bait him. He also won't talk directly about settling. But most moving part of the interview is a statement he made that reflects his role as a father:

"This is really about honor, and your name, and how your kids perceive what you did in your life, [and] how my grandkids will."

Funny, stupid, foolish girl

2007-01-21T04:34:00.000-05:00

OK, let's assume for the moment that Diana Gowins is not a golddigger. Let's take her at her word and say she wants to be a full-time, stay-at-home mom. After all, if she really were at home with the kids, it would be very important to "have [her] at their side," as she puts it.

So why is she going on cruises without them? Why is she withdrawing money out of the college fund and getting tummy tucks and designer clothes? Why is she spending some of that money on a child not related to Willie Gary?

Before she spends any more of Daddy Moneybags' loot, Diana Gowins needs to make up her mind who she really is. She can either be a single, stay-at-home mom who will provide the kids with all they'll ever need -- and more -- and not have to worry about her own basic needs; or she can be a single mom of modest means who leaves the kids with a babysitter or with family at every opportunity, and who works to support herself and the kids. She cannot live a lifestyle of the rich and famous on some other's guy's dime. She cannot be both a stay-at-home mom and a player.

What do you call a woman of such complex character who wants to live both the single life and the family life? Well, folks, if we were talking about a man, we'd call him a hypocrite.

But what makes this hypocrite look ridiculous more than anything is the conspicuous nature of her consumption. If she hadn't worn money on her sleeve and made it obvious she was spending it on herself, I wonder if a judge would have been all that sympathetic towards Gary (who is one of the richest men in Atlanta, by all accounts). If she'd kept the spending just a bit more moderate -- kept the college savings accounts open, bought a few designer outfits for herself every once in a while, and gone out on the town only on special occasions, the spending might have gone unnoticed. Then she might have looked more like my ex, who was collecting reasonable amounts from me (in comparison at least -- they were crippling to me) and who at least had the good sense to take our daughter on vacation with her when she went.

But Diana Gowins spent too much and too ostentatiously. She borrowed money from friends, to be paid back when the next support check rolled in. She even tried to apply for welfare.

For a woman, Diana Gowins has some pair of balls. But, alas, she is, in addition to being greedy and hypocritical, not very sophisticated or smart. I, for one, don't even hate her. She is a prime example of a shallow, morally bankrupt woman whose greed and materialism have gotten the better of her. A golddigger by any definition, and a stupid one.

More from the "Blood from a Stone" Department

2007-01-18T09:38:00.000-05:00

Glenn Sacks is an articulate, moderate voice in a realm that can often be distorted by angry hyperbole. (Ultra-feminists don't really like him, but that's OK.) His article in the American Chronicle addresses child support -- one of my favorite subjects, and one which I've written about many times before. Sacks' article focuses on Texas, but also looks at several other states' recent policies of publicly embarrassing men who fall behind on child support -- as if posting their names and photos, and arresting them if they're found, is going to net them the tens of thousands these men owe.

Delaware is now the latest state to jump on this bandwagon. There are fewer details on the men, but the formula is the same: a collection of mug-shots of hapless-looking men, most of whom look like they're just leaving the house to shape up on the corner, with amounts next to their names in the tens of thousands. Also provided are physical descriptions, the number of children for each of them, and the county in Delaware where they reside. Unlike Andrew Spano's Westchester County initiative, Delaware is being very careful about labeling these guys "deadbeat parents", not fathers. But this month's list is completely male, and it will be interesting to see if Delaware even recovers enough funds to cover the costs of printing and distributing the poster. I kind of doubt they will.