Frustrated Inc.

The title of my blog for tonight happens to be the same as a popular song. I quote it, not because I particularly like that song, or could even tell you who sang it, but because it seems of late that has been the way things go.

I was looking back on my blog and read my entry on "Fuzzy Math" from back in February. To prevent your (obviously) overwhelming desire to go back and read it, I was venting on the apparent lack of math skills of one certain contracting officer I was being forced to deal with on a contract for work. Alas, that contract is still being mulled about and has not been awarded. I identified the need for that project about 3.5 years ago. I applied for funding for it about 3 years ago. I got the money about 2.5 years ago. I started working on the contract then. After the elongated pre-contracting junk we had to do, we got the solicitation out on the street in June 2008. It was awarded in September 2008. Then one of the losers (and I use that term as nicely as I can) protested the award. Then our Fuzzy Math guy got involved and it went all to crap.

Protests usually get resolved in about 2-3 weeks. October 8th was the 1 year mark of the protest. It still is not resolved. Sadly, I still have to work with this goomba to get this thing on contract. I have quit holding my breath long ago. The future working with him is not so bright (just as he himself is - not so bright).

Then I have been trying to keep up on the "comedy of errors" with my brother and his kids. I would say comedy of errors, if there was anything funny about it, but there isn't. His experience with his now ex-wife has been a model case as to why our system is so broken. At one point, his ex hit him with her car. That's right - you didn't read that wrong. She watched him walk in front of her van, turned the wheels into him, and punched it. It screwed up his knee. He had surgery to fix it about 3 months ago. The cops were there when it happened. Know what they did? They arrested my brother and charged him with domestic abuse!

You may call me jaded because he is my brother. But that is exactly what happened. He had to be bailed out or would have spent the night in jail. The cops took the kids and give them back to her. Not bad, huh? Hit your ex-husband (on purpose), they haul him off to jail, then give you back the kids. Not bad. No charges against her. Nothing.

Then, after months of working through the courts, my brother gets custody of the kids. She comes down and takes them without my brother knowing it. Isn't that technically kidnapping? On top of that, she is driving on a suspended license. She holes up in her apartment. The police intervene. Get the kids back to my brother, and what do they do to her? That's right. Nothing. I guess we should be glad they didn't arrest my brother and give the kids back to her.

Then I hear a story of my neighbor who is going through a divorce. They caught the guy going into his ex-wife's house looking for his kid's hat. They threw the book at him. He narrowly avoided jail time, and got like 2 years probation. His ex-wife even went and testified that she didn't want him to go to jail and they still nailed him. What's the real crime here? The same as my brother - he is a man, not a woman.

In Utah, apparently you can do anything you want in these situations if you are a woman. You can assault your ex-husband and they will arrest and charge him - her recourse? Nothing. You can kidnap your kids in direct violation of a court order, abuse them physically,verbally, and emotionally. DCFS has a case file a mile long on it. You can hold them hostage in your apartment against their will and what is your recourse? Nothing.

Amazing. Frustrating and amazing.

What is wrong with our justice system? I realize that men are the majority of the problem in most of these cases. But if it's 99% of the time the man's at fault, what about the 1% when it's the woman? Do those ends justify the means? And the real victims here are the kids. They are being neglected, abused, and traumatized. But she can do no wrong in the eyes of the law.

Ahh, there are so many frustrations. I could go on with more, but I would sound like I am whining. This post really is kind of a drag, but what can I say? I had to say it.