Subject: Re: Will powerful women give up their trad

From: [email-masked] (aaron.l.hoffmeyer)
Date: Mon, 8 Mar 1993 04:29:36 GMT

In article <[email-masked]> [email-masked] (Kenn Barry) writes:
>In article <[email-masked]> [email-masked] (aaron.l.hoffmeyer) writes:
>>[Aaron's classy prose deleted for reasons of space]

>>Why does Bill Clinton believe that all you need to raise children is a
>>Mom and a wallet?  Is that your position too?

The most glaring thing I note, off the bat, is the "casting aside" of
my "classy prose."  It was a long string of questions that I hoped you
might at least think about.  I really don't care what your position
is--besides, I am able to comprehend and understand what you are
saying.  What I'm saying to you is that children have MORE than just
rights to money.  They have rights to be able to have a relationship
with both of their biological parents.

[Classy prose re-inserted at the end of this post.]

[Some of Kenn's classy prose deleted for reasons of space]

>	And here are some bad reasons:
>
>	1) My ex is a bitch.
>	2) My ex screwed me over.
>	3) Family law is unfair to men.
>	4) My ex won't allow me to visit the kids.
>	5) She coulda had an abortion.
>
>	Am I getting through, yet? Anyone see a pattern?
>
>	When you boys get ready to discuss child support in terms of the
                 ^^^^
Classy.

>children's needs and the children's rights, then we can talk about
>what's wrong with the current system. Until then, you lack a moral
>foundation for your position.

Ahem, we have a God in our midst.  Really Kenn.  Please, let me tell
you a couple of anecdotes that should illustrate how easily one can
determine what is morally correct:

The first case involves a couple I met last month.  This is their
problem:  This couple has been married for 10 years.  A couple of years
before they married and months before they met, this man had an affair
with another woman.  Then he and that other women separated.  Shortly
thereafter, this man noticed that this woman was pregnant.  He asked if
the child was his, because, if it was, he wanted to be a father to the
child.  He was assured that it wasn't.  But he still wasn't sure.  So,
this mother made a written statement that said that he wasn't the
father--she didn't want him around so she gave him what she thought
were his walking papers.  Shortly thereafter, the mother went on AFDC.
AFDC wanted to know who the father was.  She said she didn't know.
This mother never got a job and she stayed on AFDC for 12 years.
During that time she signed eight statements asserting either that she
didn't know who the father was, or naming the wrong father.  Finally,
about three months ago, AFDC told this woman that either she name the
real father of her child or AFDC would stop.  She named the real
father--the father to whom she'd given a written note 12 years earlier
stating the child wasn't his.  This man was called in for blood tests.
He presented his signed statement.  No matter.  The blood tests say
with a 90% certainty he is the father--not good enough by state law.
DNA tests are ordered.  The results:  99.9% certainty he is the
father.  So, what about this father?  He has three children from his
present marriage and a nice family and good home.  He was always
willing to support a child that was his, but he also wanted to have a
relationship with that child.  Why do I know that?  Because this father
is now trying to get custody of his child by this woman, a woman who
has not worked one day in 12 years to support that child.  The state,
though, is very intent on recouping the AFDC money its shelled out
during that time.  Does this man, who doesn't even know his child,
whose child doesn't even know him, have a snowball's chance in hell of
getting custody?  Will his subsequent children suffer from a decrease
in their standard of living to make up for 12 years of unpaid support?
How moral is this little tale of woe and who is REALLY at fault here?
What does your morally superior mind say about cases like this?

The second case involves a nationally prominent volleyball and
basketball player.  Her name is Natalie Williams.  Natalie is an
impressively gifted athlete, leading UCLA to two national championships
and a runner-up in the last three years in volleyball.  She is also the
nation's leading rebounder and one of the top scorers in girls' college
basketball.  Natalie is the daughter of a white mother and black
father, who met while in college in Utah.  At the time of the
pregnancy, the father was ordered to sign a document that stated that
he could not see his daughter until she became an adult--a no-contact
order.  Why?  Well, because he was a black man who got a white woman
pregnant in Utah, that's why.  Nate Williams became a professional
basketball player after getting an early release from college and
played in the NBA for something like six seasons.  He abided by the
court order and did not see his daughter.  This same court order
absolved him from child support responsibilities.  When Natalie was 12,
her Mom decided she did want the child support.  Nate was ordered to
pay $8,000 in back child support and to make regular payments.  He
did.  When she was 16, Natalie decided she wanted to meet her father.
It was arranged.  When she met him, she was frightened.  Standing
before her was a 6'5" black man possessing more than his fair share of
muscle mass.  She subsequently found out he wasn't anyone to be
frightened of, but it took years.  When she played hoops with him
one-on-one, she said, all she saw was this big hand blocking her
shots.  Did Nate Williams get a raw deal?  Did Natalie Williams get a
raw deal?  Did Natalie have the right to know her father a long time
before she realized it and insisted on it when she was 16-year-old?

Kenn, US Government statistics assert that 66% of all child support
that is not paid is due to financial hardship.  If I lost my job right
now, within 90 days I would owe my ex-wife, not my children, $5000.
How would I pay that off when I get a job?  What if the next job
doesn't pay as much as this one?  What if it takes me six-months to get
back on my feet?  Then I would owe $10,000.  But the state will not
consider changing my child support payments for exactly that amount of
time, six months.  During that time I would jump to the top of their
deadbeat dad list, too, because of my financial hardship.  It would
literally take years to make up that much if a difference.  The entire
time the state would, for propagandistic record-keeping purposes,
consider me a deadbeat.

Again, over 90% of joint custody obligors pay all their child support
on time and in full.  44% of obligors who DO NOT GET TO SEE THEIR KIDS
pay on time and in full.  Every one of these financial obligors is
legally accountable for every dime of the child support the state tells
them they owe the obligee (legally, the children are NOT listed as the
obligee).  How many of these obligees are legally accountable for their
state determined obligation to the children?  According to the state of
Ohio, my child support obligation to my children is $13,462.80 plus my
share of the Guardian Ad Litem/private investigator/psychological
evaluation bill.  But my ex's obligation is $3797.20.   I'm legally
accountable for providing that $13,462.80 plus my share of the GAL bill.
Is she legally accountable for her $3797.20?  Is she even accountable
for spending the $13,462.80 on my children?

Is your moral throne really that high?  Is it possible that maybe there
is a another, possibly even better, solution to this problem, besides
your draconian child support enforcement moral high ground approach?
one that empowers children and both parents and creates new role models
for post-divorce or unmarried parents of children?  one that says, "Hey,
this is your child, these are your parents, take care of one another and
have a good life."

Aaron L. Hoffmeyer
[email-masked] 

Oh, would you also please answer these questions?

Do children have the right to a relaxed, secure relationship with both
parents without feeling a need to manipulate one parent against the
other?  

Do children have the right to have the issue of custody truly and
honestly decided without sexual prejudice or bias (permitting a
continuing parent-child relationship through joint custody, equal to
that prior to a divorce) with the best interests of the child and BOTH
parents as the only considerations?

Do children have the right to continuing care, guidance and support
from BOTH parents, and the freedom to express love for both without
guilt?

Do children have the right to be free from physical AND MENTAL abuse
and pressure from both parents and from JUDICIAL abuse by the state?

Do children have the right to know and be able to visit regularly with
grandparents, aunts, uncles, cousins and other relatives on both sides
of the family?

Do children have the right to be free from having any social class
forced upon them by the state courts which order and decree single
parent custody, denying one parent an equal legal and personal
relationship with the child and producing a family model which has NOT
been proven to be either psychologically healthy or constitutionally
sound?

If you don't believe these are also the rights of children, then you
have serious problems.  If you do believe these are rights of children,
then where is the law that guarantees these rights?  

Where is the law that ensures that custodial parents pay their share of
CS?

Where is the law that empowers both parents with joint custody after a
divorce by default?

Where is the law that enforces the child's right to access to BOTH
parents and BOTH families?

Why is your concern and the state and federal government's concern
primarily with money?  

Have you ever stopped to think that some very rich people can be very
crappy parents?  that money can't solve all problems?  that love and a
nurturing relationship with both parents might be just as important,
probably much MORE important than whether or not the child has $250
tennis shoes or a $350 mountain bike or $250 roller blades?  Does it
strike you that over 90% of all children of joint custody parents
receive all court-ordered financial support in full and on time, yet
only 44% of support from non-custodial parents who never see their
children is paid?

Why does Bill Clinton believe that all you need to raise children is a
Mom and a wallet?