Lessons From Dennie

The former Speaker of the House of Representatives, Dennis Hastert, agreed the other day to plead guilty to federal charges stemming from his payment of over $3.5 million in "hush money" to a young man Hastert used to coach back in the 1960s. The charge involves him failing to file proper federal financial disclosures on payments he made WITH HIS OWN MONEY. Apparently, that is a crime; worse for Hastert, when asked about it, he lied to the feds...a big no no (just ask Bill Clinton and Martha Stewart). But what's really troubling about this case is that someone in the federal prosecutor's office "leaked the info" that Hastert was paying hush money to a former high school wrestler. Innuendo piled on innuendo and before you knew it, the word was out that Hastert was hiding a sex crime from his days as a high school coach.

Whether or not he did commit a sex crime (and the Illinois police have already said there cannot be any prosecution for it) the Hastert case raises troubling question about people leaking info and the resulting effect. And yes, the point of this is to the troller (anonymous) who apparently likes to hide behind his/her purported anonymity and write things about me that he/she proclaims are "facts."

Everyone's life has dark moments and failures/errors--including anonymous. And here’s something anonymous should remember: there is no such thing as anonymity in the world. Answers to blogs leave traces and I can figure out who reads and who doesn't. And I wonder, knowing that if "anonymous" would be so forward and confrontational knowing they are just one more blog post from their life's foibles being exposed.

See, people love to hide behind the curtain and say things as "fact." But here's a real fact: the truth always comes out and when you leave telltale signs (such as use of the expressions "POS" or logging on to the blog, you make yourself known).

Am I a thief--yes. Not proud of it, but that's what I did. Does my crime justify prison time? You bet. I told the sentencing judge that. But that doesn't mean the system isn't rigged, nor does it mean that what is going on inside DOC at a cost of $1.23 billion this year is smart or efficient for the taxpayers of this state. Nor does it answer the question, "is this how a moral and just society should act"?

Dennis Hastert may have broken some obscure federal finance law (a law we all should be concerned about) but does that mean his entire life should be played out in front of the world?

During Jesus' ministry on earth there was only one group he ever condemned, one group he ever challenged--it was the Pharisees, those self-important, legalistic purveyors of "truth" who couldn't see their own failings yet were quick to pass judgment and condemn all those around them.

So anonymous, keep reading--you increase my readership and my exposure; but be ready to see your own life flashed across the small screen. I wonder how reading your worst moments will feel? Me... I know what I am and who I am and where I've come from. Now who's the POS?

Cheaters and Nincompoops

They promoted the "chief of security" to assistant warden the other day; it figures. This guy has been here less than two years and the compound is more poorly run than ever. There has been a massive turnover of long-term staff; may new officers stay just a few months and then leave; drug use is rampant; the attitude of the general offender population worse than ever; so why not promote this guy? It makes sense if you see how money...and lives...are mismanaged in here.

Of course, why wouldn't you promote a guy like this to assistant warden when the general inmate population is how it is? Just a week ago there was a small "cheating scandal" in one college class. Two guys way too close to each other (isn't funny when a 30 something sex offender finds his soul mate in a 19 year old sex offender?) decided to cut corners on a take home math test. Like so many other scams run in here, however, these two Einstein’s wrote down the exact same wrong answers (the only two in the class to miss those questions!) and turned their papers in "together." Yeah, being arrested and convicted and sent to prison doesn't say much about your intellect--I know it first hand.

The compound is awash in "rats"--guys who will sell out anyone for a kind word from the investigators even though that won't do anything for their sentence; there are degenerate gamblers who spend what little they have every week chasing one of a dozen parlay tickets only to lose and then--with huge debts owed to usurious "scoreboxes" --"check in" (they go to the hole and then get moved to either the other side of the compound or to another level 2 facility); you get drug users crying all day about their pills - the med unit won't give them heavy enough psychotropic drugs (and why do they give out so many pharmacologic scripts to a population overwhelmed with drug use and abuse? why indeed!).

Re-entry is a failure. You can't convince guys to "live clean" when they have no education, no job skills, no hope. So instead they create some silly "word of the day" classes with names like "thinking for a change" and "ready to work" even though their entire time locked up has been just the opposite. And the people who run all that, they get more responsibility even as they waste more money and get the same--or worse--outcomes.

So am I surprised our illustrious "big hat" the chief of security with no significant higher education got promoted--no. It happens all the time.

In here life truly is lived "through the looking glass." The more incompetent you are, the more disrespectful you are as a CO, the quicker you'll move ahead. And the offenders... they keep getting dumber and younger; and the cycle goes on.

Will it ever change? Maybe. It’s beginning to in other places in the country. The states and the Federal government are starting to see that costs outweigh the results...and that is the only sensible thing in all of this.