Tuesday, February 3, 2009

I'm a criminal!!

It figures that a company from the island that Great Britain used to exile its criminals would figure out how to make us all into criminals. Yes, Red Flex is an Australian company. This is no reflection on the people (other than Red Flex employees/criminals) of Australia. Turning otherwise decent citizens into criminals is the business of government and a sure way to make a buck in a world where people have been taught that they are incapable of self-discipline, mean, and stupid. Perhaps that's not our world, but as Adam Smith pointed out, taxation tends to make decent citizens into criminals too, and just about every country I can think of runs entirely on taxation. He did not point out that by claiming to spend the money on protecting people from nature and from each other, governments also encourage our own abilities to protect ourselves from nature and each other to atrophy. Do you lock your car and your doors at night?

I thought my beloved city of Riverside would have figured out that the red-light systems are causing more harm than good. In Fullerton, the Superior Court of California, Orange County deemed Fullerton's contract with another company to be illegal because it provides a financial incentive to the private company (NTS) to keep the number of citations high. According to theNewspaper.com, Riverside's contract with RedFlex contains a clause similar to the one that Fullerton had. So I went to trial. Here's the transcript:

Ok, right, they put on a criminal trial and there is no transcript. They also said that I couldn't have my trial unless I paid first. They also refused to let me have my trial in my own city as CVC 40502 says I can because "There's no traffic court in the county seat."

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