A Simple Indictment Against the City and County of Denver, Colorado.

Hmmmm ... Okay, soldiers, judges, police and government leaders all take an oath of office when they become a soldier, judge, etc. Those oaths include a statement that they will uphold the Constitution of the United States (even those that don't say they will uphold the laws of the United States or the State in which they serve and since the Constitution is the Supreme Law of the Land [U.S. Constitution, Article VI, Clause 2], it is included by indirect reference). Any government official who violates the Constitutional Rights of a citizen are therefore not only violating the law (since the Constitution is the Supreme Law of the Land), they are in violation of their oath of office.

Article VI, Clause 2 of the U.S. Constitution is commonly referred to as the '' Supremacy Clause'' and has been recognized as the authority under which State and local laws must comply with the U.S. Constitution and Federal law (as well as any international treaties to which the U.S. is party). So, here is my indictment of the City and County of Denver, Colorado.

Under the Fourteenth Amendment, it is stated that ...

No State shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States.

Yet the City and County of Denver has 1) repeatedly and violently interfered with otherwise peaceful protests against government policies and the corruption of our political system by acts of corporate bribery (in the form of ''political'' contributions), along with the devastation of corrupt economic practices by those same corporations and 2) in further oppression against those protests pasted bans on ''urban camping'' which forbid those protesters from even using a blanket to protect themselves from the elements while protesting.

In any corporation, employees violating corporate policy would be terminated on the spot. So explain to me why are we letting our officials (political and corporate) keep their jobs when they are so clearly in violation of our laws?

Are Landlords and Politicians Contributing to Homelessness?

The first great wave of homelessness inarguable occurred during the 1930s. Fueled by a combination of economic collapse and climatic disaster, millions abandoned their homes and lands in the American mid-west, fleeing to the west coast or east of the Mississippi. This mass migration overflowed communities already suffering the effects of economic collapse. Homeless shelters, operated much as they are today, were filled beyond acceptable limits. Families bunked refugee relatives commonly to twice their normal household capacity. Massive tent cities (dubbed Hoovervilles) sprang up in city parks and vacant lands in almost every city of the United States.

Fast forward to our modern society. We are at present suffering the second worst economic crisis in the past 100 years. Yet the survival tactics used in the 1930s are no longer there to catch the economic refugees of the United States. Homeless shelters have become the target of perpetual attack from neighboring residents and businesses, attempting to either shut them down as nuisances or to banish them to the most remote and inhospitable regions of the community. Landlords typically include clauses in apartment and house leases demanding to know exactly who is living in each residence and (frequently) proof that each adult residence qualifies financially to live in the residence (at a time when record numbers of citizens are out of work due to the economy). Politicians seem to be tripping over each other in their rush to ban outdoor camping from their communities to stem the potential of modern day Hoovervilles developing. Hand-in-hand with this are frequent raids of homeless encampments with police throwing personal belongings in trash dumpsters and in some cases slicing tents and sleeping bags, making them useless to the homeless.

Has our society truly become so cruel? Even attempts to protest these conditions have been met with animosity and violence from city officials and, sadly, the police departments charged with keeping citizens safe. Our cities are no longer safe, not because of crime rates or pollution (though those issues are still a problem) but because of the unconstitutional attacks executed under color of law. I leave these facts for you to ponder, along with a single question ...

... is this the America we want to leave to our children and grand-children?

Rebirth

First, allow me to apologize for letting this blog lay fallow for over three years. Though life has been interesting (as in the Chinese curse), it is no reason to have neglected my responsibilities for so long.

The primary things that have distracted me from my blogs for so long as been my work towards finally earning my Bachelor's degree in computer science, my entering the freelance writing industry, and my work on a number of soon-to-be-published manuscripts. Recent world events have, however, reawakened my view that our world needs a blog like this to start drawing together the various issues our world is facing.

Take for example the issues I have been dealing with during my academic endeavor.

Our school has a fairly strong reputation for excellence when it comes to the training of future medical, graphic design and business professionals. When it comes to our computer science program, however, there are a number of issues. Our school is marketed as a "hands-on" school, meaning students learn by doing realistic exercises that give them both knowledge and experience in their future occupations ... or at least it is supposed to.

Our school has issues in this field in a number of ways. The computers we have in-school are outdated by at least seven years, as is the network hardware. The computers used for Linux and server classes are totally inadequate for the task. Classes that mutually need what equipment is available are often scheduled for the same time slots, which limits the hands on experience for the students.

Turning to the laptops (which are supplied by the school), these do not have the software necessary for the students to complete their programming assignments, even though there is an academic version available for about $100 of both Microsoft Office and Microsoft Visual Studio. Mind you, this is a school that charges $65,000 - $75,000 for a Bachelor's degree program. Even considering the school is giving us laptops and lends us our textbooks instead of making us buy them, the lack of proper equipment and software is hard to overlook.

Which leads me to this ... we as activists and advocates are, in general, no better when we approach the general public or our political leaders. In recent weeks we have witnessed massive protests against corporate and governmental corruption across the United States (the "Occupy Wall Street" movement) that illustrates this.

While protesting the corruption, no one in the groups seemed to be able to say exactly what they were protesting or what could be done to address the issues. Without a clear understanding of what the problems are and some idea of what can be done to fix the issues, we are leaving our political leaders as helpless as my college has been leaving its computer science students. Instead of just complaining about problems, let's start focusing on solutions. If a given company is refusing to clean up its act, for example, why not buy controlling interest in the company and make the necessary changes ourselves?

Sure it will take capital, but consider this a moment. Any one of us may not have a million dollars, but with a few hundred thousand of us around the world, coming up with a few hundred dollars each would add up pretty quick. Don't know about the rest of you, but I'm in!