Disfunctional Florida
Authorities released information that a Florida resident, Ms. Latreasa L. Goodman, called 911 emergency dispatchers three times after she paid for a 10-piece McNugget but did not receive the product because the McDonald's where she made the purchase claimed to be out of McNuggets. Ms. Goodman then became upset when the McDonald's employees refused to give her a refund claiming that all sales were final. (They had her money; the goal, and they weren't about to give it up for nuthin'.) Although the McDonald's offered Ms. Goodman substitute food, Goodman became irate which prompted her three calls to 911. The police have cited Ms. Goodman for abusing the emergency call system.
(And the Republicans are always around claiming that they care about people... yuh, right.)
The real problem here is that there is no place for Florida residents to turn for consumer protection. This is not the first story we have heard of frustrated people calling 911, if for no other reason than to let off steam. If Florida were being run properly, there would be offices to handle people's complaints, frustrations and upsets. But Florida is run by Republicans and Republicans are only interested in getting your money away from you as seen when the restaurant refused to give her a refund. I've had the same thing happen to me with Dominoes' Pizza, more recently Pizza Hut, and also our local Taco Bell. In the situation with my local Taco Bell, I ordered a soft taco supreme, and a Fruitista. There were no strawberries in the Fruitista, and no tomatoes or sour cream on the taco supreme, yet,
this store saw fit to take my money, full price, with not so much as the bat of an eye. Can we all say 'rip-off" and "consumer screw-over"? This, and the example of Ms. Goodman are only the tip of the ice berg. These instances are going on all over the place because these are the results of TERRIBLE AND DYSFUNCTIONAL REPUBLICAN POLICY. I have stopped going to all of these restaurants. I refuse to be ripped off and screwed over time and time again. If President Obama want's people spending money, then he needs to have a chat with the big box people about their less than ethical modus operandi. I'm better off eating at home.
When I moved to Florida four years ago, the only recourse a consumer had was to file a complaint. I was told at that time I would have to pay a ten dollar fee to file a consumer complaint which "may or may not be reviewed." (What the heck did THAT mean? If I pay ten dollars to have my complaint reviewed then why would it not?) I was also told that the chances of any action being taken were next to none. I asked why that was but the woman wouldn't give me any reason and just got surly. Since then I have come to understand how come: because George W. Bush had stated in his inaugural speech that if there was ever a complaint or conflict between consumers and businesses, he was going to come down on the side of business and this became Republican party policy carried out by Republican administrators nationwide.
Another problem is that Florida keeps its consumer complaint department up under the Department of Agriculture. (Have you ever heard of anything so stupid?) When I lived in New York, California, Hawaii, wherever, all a consumer ever had to do was contact the District Attorney's office. Ah, but this is dysfunctional Florida. Only criminal complaints are handled by the DA's office and Floridians still have to line up after the citrus with the Department of Agriculture to try and get some kind of justice.
It is also noteworthy that in dysfunctional Florida the person who heads up the consumer complaint department is the same person who heads up the Department of Agriculture. This public servant is not a lawyer and his only qualifications for handling legal complaints is that he used to be a deputy sheriff once upon a time. But Charlie Crist has claimed that he stands by all of this (mediocrity and lack of qualifications) and so the consumer is left frustrated and once again "on your own" under a dysfunctional Republican system of bureaucratic government that serves only to confound and confuse but never take care of We the People even though these said same bureaucrats think nothing of filching the public's pockets for their salaries. We have now come to understand that this pointed abuse of We the People was a goal of the Bush administration and Florida fell in behind party lines when it comes to dishing out surly abuse.
Instead of citing Ms. Goodman, this situation should serve as a heads-up to the dysfunctionality going on in the twenty-first century in states that have arteries clogged with Bush Republicans who wish the worst for the American people. It won't be until we get officials in office who are there to oversee good operating standards and not the usual obstructionism that so heavily marks and taints Republican thinking, administrations and administrators. Yes, I know President Obama stands behind and supports Charlie Crist, but then again, President Obama doesn't live in dysfunctional Florida, either...
Under Bush and the Republicans, the whole Florida legal system has become bastardized with hand picked law students who become party lawyers that only serve the party political agenda and not the People. We have judges who have been on the bench for thirty years or more who hold the rigid, punitive, plantations obstructionism in place coupled with a state's government that insists on being unresponsive to the needs of the people by not providing access to efficient courts/offices/
The kind of thinking that goes on at the state level and trickles down through out all of the various operating systems in Florida are provincial, antiquated, and throughly dysfunctional when not outright corrupt. (I had an ambulance show up at my house when I had called the fire department. The ambulance driver heard the fire dept., call while out cruising around and showed up on his own, unasked, uninvited and then had the rocks to bill me fifty dollars for it; oh, yes, this man turned out to be the *supervisor* for the ambulance company, a *for-profit* sub-contractor to the county and state. Obviously his job is get the money, get the money. Same goes for Crist who is more interested in developing gambling casinos for profit than taking care of the people for all of his hand-patting claims to compassionate humanitarianism. The fruits of his policies are bitter, indeed.
While We the People get to pay the salaries for all of this bureaucracy, the laws have been reconfigured to bar We the People from access to the courts. The lawyers spend all of their time telling clients what rights they DON'T have (and if you object, the lawyers get surly,) and consumers must take the hit, get screwed for the money, and are left with the clear understanding that McDonald's, Pizza Hut, Dominoes' Pizza or Taco Bell's interests mean more to the likes of Charlie Crist than EVER do the people of the state of Florida. (I have had my money stolen by three of the above companies with sub-prime products without any satisfaction. For all of his personal troubles, Eliot Spitzer (DA-NY) always took care of the people and any time I ever had a consumer complaint, it was taken care of with LIGHTENING speed. But then again, Eliot Spitzer is a Democrat and we don't get "your on your own, just give us your money" from the Democrats, only from dysfunctional Republican politics and practices. (Thi is a primary reason why I do not support State's Rights and do support a good, strong and healthy Federal government, regulation, and tons of oversight. State's Right's is just another form of caging to divide, conquer and destroy America and the values of right reasoning.)
Florida needs a really good over-hauling from stem to stern. But as long as the do-nothing Republicans are running the place, I don't hold out much hope of Florida being anything but a dysfunctional dynosaur in the twenty-first century. Instead of citing Ms. Goodman, they should thank her for pointing out the need for fundamental demolition and reconstructiion in a state that should be paradise.
Komodo
Nothing changes if nothing changes
You'll never get the truth from a pack of lies
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