*This article was just sent to me and is a real candidate for Snappa
Joe painted the jail cells pink and made the inmates wear pink prison garb.

Maricopa County was spending approx. $18 million dollars a year on stray animals, like cats and dogs. Sheriff Joe offered to take the department over, and the County Supervisors said okay.

The animal shelters are now all staffed and operated by prisoners. They feed and care for the strays. Every animal in his care is taken out and walked twice daily. He now has pris oners who are experts in animal nutrition and behavior. They give great classes for anyone who’d like to adopt an animal. He has literally taken stray dogs off the street, given them to the care of prisoners, and had them place in dog shows.??

The best part? His budget for the entire department is now under $3 million. Teresa and I adopted a Weimaraner from a Maricopa County shelter two years ago. He was neutered, and current on all shots, in great health, and even had a microchip inserted the day we got him. Cost us $78.

The prisoners get the benefit of about $0.28 an hour for working, but most would work for free, just to be out of their cells for the day. Most of his budget is for utilities, building maintenance, etc. He pays the prisoners out of the fees collected for adopted animals.

I have long wondered when the rest of the country would take a look at the way he runs the jail system, and copy some of his ideas. He has a huge farm, donated to the county years ago, where inmates can work, and they grow most of their own fresh vegetables and food, doing all the work and harvesting by hand.

He has a pretty good sized hog farm, which provides meat, and fertilizer. It fertilizes the Christmas tree nursery, where prisoners work, and you can buy a living Christmas tree for $6 - $8 for the Holidays, and plant it later. We have six trees in our yard from the Prison.

Yup, he was reelected last year with 83% of the vote.
Now he’s in trouble with the ACLU again. He painted all his buses and vehicles with a mural, that has a special hotline phone number painted on it, where you can call and report suspected illegal aliens. Immigrations and Customs Enforcement wasn’t doing enough in his eyes, so he had 40 deputies trained specifically for enforcing immigration laws, started up his hotline, and bought 4 new buses just for hauling folks back to the border. He’s kind of a ‘Gi t-R Dun’ kind of S heriff.

TO THOSE OF YOU NOT FAMILIAR WITH JOE ARPAIO HE IS THE MARICOPA ARIZONA COUNTY SHERIFF, AND HE KEEPS GETTING ELECTED OVER AND OVER THIS IS ONE OF THE REASONS WHY:

Sheriff Joe Arpaio (In Arizona ) who created the ‘ Tent City Jail’:
He has jail meals down to 40 cents a serving and charges the inmates for them.

He stopped smoking and porno magazines in the jails. Took away their weights Cut off all but ‘G’ movies.

He started chain gangs so the inmates could do free work on county and city projects.

Then He Started Chain Gangs For Women So He Wouldn’t Get
Sued For Discrimination.

He took away cable TV Until he found out there was A Federal Court Order that Required Cable TV For Jails So He Hooked Up The Cable TV Again?.? Only Let In The Disney Channel And The Weather channel.

When asked why the weather channel He Replied, So They Will Know How Hot It’s Gonna Be While They Are Working
ON My Chain Gangs.

He Cut Off Coffee Since It Has Zero Nutritional Value.

When the inmates complained, he told them, ‘This Isn’t The Ritz/Carlton……

If You Don’t Like It, Don’t Come Back.’

More On The Arizona Sheriff:

With Temperatures Being Even Hotter Than Usual In Phoenix (116 Degrees Just Set A New Record), the Associated Press Reports:
About 2,000 Inmates Living In A Barbed-Wire-Surrounded Tent Encampment At The Maricopa County Jail Have Been Given Permission To Strip Down To Their Government-Issued
Pink Boxer Shorts.

On Wednesday, hundreds of men wearing boxers were either curled up on their bunk beds or chatted in the tents, which reached
138 Degrees Inside The Week Before.

Many Were Also Swathed In Wet, Pink Towels A s Sweat Collected On Their Chests And Dripped Down To Their PINK SOCKS.

‘It Feels Like We Are In A Furnace,’ Said James Zanzot, An Inmate Who Has Lived In The TENTS for 1 year. ‘It’s Inhumane.’

Joe Arpaio, the tough-guy sheriff who created the tent city and long ago started making his prisoners wear pink, and eat bologna sandwiches, is not one bit sympathetic. He said Wednesday that he told all of the inmates: ‘It’s 120 Degrees In Iraq And Our Soldiers Are Living In Tents Too, And They Have To Wear Full Battle Gear,
But They Didn’t Commit Any Crimes,So Shut Your Mouths!’

Way To Go, Sheriff!

Maybe if all prisons were like this one there would be a lot less crime and/or repeat offenders. Criminals should be punished for their crimes - not live in luxury until it’s time for their parole, only to go out and commit another crime so they ca n get back in to live on taxpayers money and enjoy things taxpayers can’t afford to have for themselves.

As an Australian I was affected deeply by the horrific Victorian fires which killed more than 180 lives on Saturday 7th of February 2009 and destroyed over 1000 homes.

My partner Lisa was so concerned for me as I told her of stories of Wildfires I had fought many years ago in my youth.

No one can understand how powerful a widlfire is unless you have witnessed one yourself.

Back in the 80’s, I worked for the Australian National Railways and part of our job was to put out summer track fires started by passing freight trains. When a train uses it’s brakes, it will spew out sparks. In most cases these sparks land on bare ground and do not pose a risk. However, sometimes these spark will fly out from the trains brake pads and light small fires along the tracks.

Most of the track fires were very small. But as a track maintenance crew, we were called out and usually put out the fires with a couple of hours. These fires were at anytime day or night. The only bonus to us, was that we were paid for a minimum of 4 hours, whether we were out there for an hour or 10 hours.

I worked between Hallet in South Australias mid north and Peterborough.

In the summer of 1981 we were called out to fight a fire 5 kilometres east of Peterborough. The day was extremely hot and our crew had spent most of the day under a colvert. It was a bad day for fires and we had hoped that this day would be clear of fires and track buckles.

Around 3pm our Track boss had rang us on the railway phone line and told us of a small track fire near Peterbrough and that he wanted us to get the truck and fire tank and pumps and go have a look. I remember we were all pissed off because we had just completed a very hot day (46c on track) and all we wanted to do was go home and have a cold beer.

At the time I was a truck driver/fettler so my job was to get the truck and water tanks. We were on the road to Peterbrough by 3.15pm and arrived at the fire by 3.45pm.

The small track fire had grown from a small blaze on Railway property to a large grass fire on the property of farmer Giles. I remember seeing him trying his best to keep the fire from going through another fence.

My Ganger (foreman) told four of our crew to grab the fire hoses and get in the back of the truck. He then told me to drive the truck along the upwind side of the fire so that the flames wouldn’t burn back on us.

The heat was unreal and the roar of the flames was deafening. I had fought many small fires in my young life, but this one was the “Bigun”.

It was a very hot day, gusting winds and we had very limited water. The only water we had was what ever was in our water tank. I would gues around 2000 litres and we had 4 fire hoses feeding from it.

I suppose within 30 minutes the fire had got away from us and we needed help and a message was passed onto the Country Fire Service and we had to hold on till they arrived.

I remember seeing farmer Giles trying to cut some fences to let his stock out and the fire was within metres of him. I yelled out, or maybe my Ganger yelled out for everyone to get off the truck. I drove like the devil towards farmer Giles. My intent was to shield him from the flames. If I could put the truck between him and the fire, maybe he could cut the fence?

That was the plan, but in the end the fire was way too hot for me to get the truck between him and the fire, so I kept blowing the truck horn to try and get him out of the way, so that I could use the truck to bring the fence down.

I can still see him, trying to cut the fence. Putting himself in front of the fire, desperately trying to save his livelyhood and the lives of many hundreds of sheep and kangaroos.

Farmer Giles did get out of the way and I did drive through his fence and the stock did get out. But we were running very low in water, so out came the fire bags. These are heavy heshion bags we use to stamp out the small flames on the wings of a fire. We were not going to put this fire out, but we needed to stop it getting any wider.

The Country Fire Service people came out with their trucks and within an hour had the fire under control.

We continued putting out spotfires for about 2 hours, until the CFS told us that the fire was out.

Because this fire started on Railway land we were not allowed to leave the fire until the fire was totlaly out. It was still very windy and hot and the Ganger was concerned the fire may start again, so we stayed until nightfall, when the conditions cooled off and the wind stopped.

I arrived home around 11pm and the first thing my wife told me was I stank of grass smoke. She was trying to be funny, trying to console me. She also noticed that all the hair on my right side of my head was singed and the skin on my right arm was surface burnt. To be honest I hadn’t noticed. But i certainly did after she mentioned it. But we lived 250 kilometres from Adelaide and at least 40 kilometres from the nearest Dr, so I just had to put up with it.

It wasn’t until the next day in the work shed that I realised how dangerous the fire had been. All down the righthand side of the truck the red paint had been burnt. It wasn’t burnt off, it was discoloured. Sort of a mustard colour.

My Ganger, Mike told me I had to go get something done for my burnt arm. So I did!

My fire wasn’t anything like the one in Victoria and no one died in my fire except for a couple of field mice. But I can truly understand how the fire fighters feel while trying to save life a property. You do things that are super human. And they do it for free. True heros.

I was watching A Current Affair tonight, waiting for a story about the rollout of Taser Guns to the grunts out on patrol with our Police force. Seems ACA thought it was a good enough story, the presenter volunteered to be shot with a loaded Taser Gub, delivering 50,000 volts of electricity via 2 barbed prongs.

Not sure what the presenters name was, Chris Kenny I think, but the man deserves a bloody medal!

Seems the boys in blue have been waiting for months for the results of a preliminary report on the vesability of implementing Taser Guns into the protective arsenal now being utilized by South Australian Police. And them(Police Bigwigs) where delaying the implementation for some bullshit reason.

Anyway, the reporter was shot under strict control with a Taser and hit the ground as if he had been king hit in a pub brawl. It didn’t last long, maybe 5 second before he started to come round. I’m not sure why he volunteered, but thereis no way I will ever volunteered.

But, I would much prefer to get shot with a Taser, than being shot with a 357 Magnum handgun. At least with the Taser I will get up and be none the worse for it. Get shot with a handgun and the chance of ever getting up is pretty slime and if you do, it will take months of extreme pain before you will be well enough to get on with your life.

Give them the Tasers! Let them shoot as many bad guys as they want. As long as one hormone pumped up cop doesn’t lash out and use it on some poor bastard that dared to mouth off at them while under the influence of booze.

Ican see that we do need to monitor how the Tasers are used but I still would prefer the Taser over a handgun. If you have been such a diskhead that a cop felt he or she needed to us it on you, then you deserved all you got. If I was acting in a threatening way and the person I was playing up to feared for their lives, they deserve to protect themselves the best way they can. If that means shooting me with a Taser, go for it. But I had better hope that the cops who have to bring me down have Taser’s and not a loaded handgun.

I wish some of these bloody do-gooders saying that Tasers, and tools like these should not be used by the Police, would go out and do a shift with the Police. See how they would handle some blonde chick screaming blue murder as 2 cvops trying to arrest her drug dealer boyfriend. Would they just sit back an watch the same blonde smash a full bottle of Vodka over your partners head? Or would they want to pull their batton or piston? Or would they feel less threatened if they had a Taser, knowing that putting the blonde chick down in the longterm would be less traumatic and would solve a dangerous situation? The answer would be if they were even close to being human, would be to use the Taser and would happy knowing that the blonde chick was no longer a threat and was very much alive because fatal force was not needed.

I would prefer to be shot with a Taser and I hope that the SA Police get the guns they need. What do you think?

How can the finance fuckups of one country effect the financial wellbeing of all the other nations of the world?

I have to admit that I don’t own a house, have enormous amounts of money invested and basically this financial crisis we are now in has very little effect. Add to that, I am an Australian with a fairly safe financial base, with all our large banks making billion dollar profits.

But, I still have to ask why the yanks allowed their financial institutions to steal money from them.

I have always had the belief that people investing in homes and realestate, with the hope to make unbelieveable profits in a very short time deserve to be in the position they are in now. These fucking leeches have taken an immoral ground that, as long as they make a small fortune short term, who gives a shit if the new owners need to take on a mortgage they really can’t afford. I suppose they can justify their greed by claiming that, these strugglers should have done their research.

I believe in karma. Do something bad to someone, something bad will happen to you

Also, how immoral can the financial institutions be. These fucking pricks sold loans they know would never be paid back. How could a battler l;oan 200k, pay at a reduced rate in the hope that the banks will be understandable when the full rate had to be back. Sure there was a lot of ignorance on the borrowers side, but the banks were sitting in their high branches like vultures just waiting to pick off the people who had to forclose.

Banks, don’t lose money. They sell a loan and if the loan defaults, they sell the defaulted loans to some more vultures. Don’t ever think that Banks lose money. It’s a fucking lie when they say, they have made a loss.

And, whats with the multi-million dollars incomes of the CEO’s and Directors. 4 million, 12 million and ever 28 million dollars yearly incomes are the norm these days, even if the institution makes a loss.

I think that all Banks large an small should be Government regulated to assure that there will be some transperancy in how these banks operate. How can an CEO justify sacking 200 tellers, claiming they are trimming the fat, when infact they have just had a 3 million dollar pay rise?

It sucks and I for one would not support any move to financially support these thieves. Any Bank that can be proven to have participated in risky Bank practices and then scream massive losses should be gaoled.

Stick them behind bars and liquidate all their assets and give their loved ones an income eqaul to and no larger than the dole.

Well that’s what I think.

I have been watching with great interest the rise, then rise, then rise of petrol in Australia, with the current price of diesel is hovering around $1.87 per litre. Good thing I don’t own a truck or Turbo diesel 4WD.

I have abasic understanding of how the price of crude oil is set and I also understand that demand for oil is greater than supply. But what I dont understand is, why OPEC dosn’t increase production and release more oil?

Is it because the greedy oil barrons want even higher prices for their oil? Is it because they have shareholders that want even better Dividends? Or is it really, that the reserves of crude oil are low and OPEC has the ration it? I’m a bit sceptical and beleive that BIG BUSINESS is taking us all for a ride and shareholder dividends and Million Dollar CEO paydays are the reason I am paying $1.62 a litre for ULP.

I have no answers to the fuel price problem except to say, “Screw the rest of the World”! Lets find our own oil, refine it and sell it at a price we can all afford in our own country. If we have any left to trade with, then and only then we export it.

From what I can see, as the Corporations and BIG BUSINESS gets richer and richer in our growing economy, the poorer are getting screwed on fuel and food prices so that profits and enormous incomes are increasing. The price of fuel and food only effects the poor. The rich, earning $150,000 plus per year are not going to worry about fuel prices or that the price of prime steaks are going up in price.

Publishers Note: I get emails form this website and I found this article interesting. So interesting I wanted to add it to Snappa.

Written by Citizens Electoral Council Research Team

Prime Minister John Howard has presented legislation to the Parliament, authorising the Federal Government to seize control of all of the water of the Murray-Darling Basin from the states, and to put it under a new Federal agency with dictatorial powers. Just before Victorian Premier Steve Bracks and his Water Minister John Thwaites suddenly resigned on Friday, July 27, Bracks charged that Howard’s actual intent was to privatise all of the Basin’s water. Caught, Howard bellowed that Bracks was “desperate, stupid, inaccurate and just totally wrong.”

It is Howard who is desperate. The global financial system is now crashing down, and the financial oligarchy which owns Howard is attempting to grab control over such vital assets as raw materials, food, and water, so as to maintain their political power when their paper, and even their banks vaporise. Howard’s legislation will give his owners control over the Basin’s water for which they will charge whatever they want, and, by bankrupting most of the farmers there, in Australia’s food bowl—as this legislation assuredly will—will make us dependent on multinational agribusiness for our food.

See the full story at the Citizens Electoral Council Research Team website

This letter was sent to me a couple of days ago from a visitor to snappa.com.au who gave me permission to publish his thoughts. He will remain anon but his views are very similar to those of many blue collar workers in our community.

I was recently issued a standard government form outlining our new intended workplace agreement, listing the government web site, for further details.

From the forwarded material, it struck me as un-fair that salaried earnings over $75,000 pa are excluded from a fairness test, and I asked via the governments web link, to explain this disparity, and outline any other rights are excluded based on a level of salary.

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I don’t know about you, but I am an avid watcher of Big Brother on Channel 10 and I recon this years group are the best so far.

Now I am expecting to cop and ear full from a lot of your, but look at the characters in the last 4. Four people with as a diverse lives you wouldn’t find anywere. Each with their unique personalities adding to the attraction of watching the show.

• Aliesha is a bubbly, busty country blonde with an infectious smile and a personality that would light up a city. No doubt she would like to pursue a longer relationship with Billy except for his aloofness and non committal attitude. If she was my daughter I would be so proud and if I was 30 years younger ………….mmmmmmmm.
• Billy is a born leader. He is respected in the house with a air of honour and adventure that allows him to make tough decisions but suffers later when he realises his manner of arogance has hurt someone. The Star task showed what this man is made of. Billy is avery loyal person and having him as afriend would be an honour.
• Zak is as camp as any poof can be, but don’t ya just love him. I am slightly homophobic, but this bloke is so happy with himself and out there, you have to think this bloke has what it takes to win Big Brother and he has worked his way into the hearts of everyone I know. He has done the poof movement a great service. Hail to Zak.
• Travis will win big brother! He is the picture of an aussie bloke with compassion, respect and loyalty all built into a tanned hulk of a man, not afraid to lay his feelings on the line. Even with his “bloody, “bloody, “bloody, “bloody, really starting to piss me off, I will still vote him as the Winner of the 2007 Big Brother.

All in all I have enjoyed this years show and have watched it since the Bum Dance and I suppose I will keep watching it. Mr Howard, keep ya hands of Big bros.

June 2008

Wow its hard to beleive its been 12 months since I wrote the above post. I havnt really got into it this year. Apart from Travis, Nobbi and Bianca it been pretty boring

I was watching an SBS program last night, which was a forum about Work Place Agreements introduced by the Howard Government. It sickened me to see some business representatives standing on thier ivory towers sprooking propaganda on how good the Australian work force has it now.

One representative of the Chamber of Commerce said “most workers now have more money in their pay packets, since the introduction of a new work place system last year”. Nearly every academic in the forum laughed and said “lies! the average hourly income has actually come down by 3 to 4%”. And most of these academics had studies and surveys commissioned by the Government to back them up.

Now, I am a business owner and I wouldn’t for a second put any of my employees and a AWPA which took all their entitlements away. Wages and conditions have been fought hard for by my father and his work mates. Going months at a time striking to get a fair days pay. My people can expect me to think of them first when making a profit. But the big end of town does not have those sorts of thoughts.

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Anzac Day, 2007 and my family wanted Pizza for dinner. I had noticed on the voucher that a surcharge of 10% of the total cost of my pizzas would have to be paid. It was a public holiday and paying an extra 10% was a fair thing to pay. The guys and gals working today, deserved the extra pay, so I was quite willing to pay Pizza Huts Public holiday surcharge.

I ordered 3 $4.95 Large pizzas from my local Pizza Hut (Christies Beach, South Australia), I had ordered them online and my wife and I had gone down to pick them up 20 minutes later. It was quite busy and while waiting I asked Lisa(my wife) “do you think these young people get a penalty rate today?”. “I don’t think so, not since the new Industrial Relations laws introduced came in” she replied.  “Well, then why are we paying a surcharge”? I responded. She went on to say she wasn’t sure, but thought it was a ripoff, if the staff didn’t get the extra money, seeing the surcharge was charged.

Mmmmmmm, I might ask the guy at the counter, do you get more money today?

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