Donkephant

American Community Survey?

donkephant — Fri, 29 Oct 2010 04:05:43 +0000

Several days ago, I received a letter in the mail from the Census Bureau. In it, I was informed that I would be receiving something called the American Community Survey. I was also informed that my response was mandatory and enforceable by law. I’ve never heard of it, but, today, the “survey” came in the mail. OH. MY. GOD.

I can understand why they make it very plain and clear that it’s enabled by law and that you can be fined and/or imprisoned for failure to fill it out. And even more so if you decide to fill it out with false information. You see, at some point, some legislation was passed that slipped in some wording into the USCode that deals with the census. (Title 13, Chapter 5) Basically, that verbiage gives the Department of Commerce the legal right to “survey” the people on a regular basis between censuses in order to gather further statistics.

Also, it would seem that they’ve found a place for most of the questions that disappeared from the “long form census” when it was replaced with the new, friendlier census form. And a few more.

After reading a few of these questions, I have no intention of answering the survey. Some of them are fairly normal. How many people live at this residence? Ages? Sexes? But then they get downright invasive. Questions like how much I spent on utilities. Or if I carpool. Of if I have problems bathing or dressing. Questions that they have no right to ask. I don’t care who passed the law, I have no intention of answering those questions. How much do I pay for my mortgage? Nope.

No how. No way.

From what I can tell from a somewhat cursory bit of internet research, not only does the DOC not enforce the fines, they don’t have the authority to.

There’s plenty of other stuff, both extremist conspiracy theory stuff and more reasonable stuff, that looks at this horribly invasion of privacy. Even some arguments that it could constitute unreasonable search. I’m no lawyer, so most of that is gibberish to me.

How about you? Have you seen one of these things? Filled one out? Refused to fill one out?

When You’re Holding a Hammer

donkephant — Wed, 06 Oct 2010 14:50:19 +0000

Everything looks like a nail.

I’m not much for country songs, but this one seems to be pretty good.

Thank You, Rep. Barton

donkephant — Fri, 18 Jun 2010 20:15:18 +0000

Thank you, Rep. Barton for saying what many of us are feeling and want to say, but don’t have the platform. You apology was deserved and I (and others) think you were right when you characterized what happened as a shakedown. That’s exactly what it was. Chicago-style gangster politics at it’s worst. Completely un-constitutional and certainly illegal.

Perhaps the fund should have been created (I have no good reason why it shouldn’t have been.), but the way it was gone about was wrong. Just a bit more of the mob styling of the Presidents political bent. Sad that we have to endure another 2 years of this. Let’s hope that by November they become a little bit more bearable.

Jamestown Council Extending Tax

donkephant — Fri, 26 Mar 2010 20:17:53 +0000

The Jamestown, ND city council is scheduled to vote to extend the 1% economic development sales tax and change the use at their April 5, 2010 meeting. The tax, originally scheduled to end in 2012 enacts a 1% sales tax, the proceeds of which are supposed to be used for economic development and infrastructure improvements for economic development. The city council would like to extend it’s end date to 2018 as well as divert 50% of the funds to infrastructure maintenance such as sewer replacement.

All of those changes are fine. IF the citizens of Jamestown, ND get to vote to approve them. The original ordinance was placed on the ballot and voted on by the citizens, so it should follow that the citizens should be allowed to vote on any changes to the ordinance. Am I wrong? Am I missing something here?

Unfortunately, the city of Jamestown doesn’t have any of their ordinances or election results online, so I can’t do any research that way. I guess I’ll have to go down to the city hall and see if I can find anything out in the catacombs. Welcome to the 21st century folks, it’s time to digitize your records. Especially the ones that are supposed to be publicly available.

Also, you can bet I’ll be recording in detail the election results from now on. If for no other reason than for my own research ability.

Reid Votes No on Healthcare Again

donkephant — Fri, 26 Mar 2010 16:12:30 +0000

I almost missed this. Last December, when the vote was taken for the healthcare blunder, Sen. Harry Reid of Nevada “mistakenly” called out “No” when asked how he voted. He immediately caught himself and changed his vote to “Yes”. Well, fool me once…

Reid casts wrong vote on health care for second time.

Way to go. This is the Senator who is the Majority Leader! And you Nevada folks? What were you thinking when you voted this guy into office? Or did the dementia set in after the election? He can’t even get a vote right, but you trust him to represent you and your state?