Family Court Exposed

There is no love deeper, more complete, and more vulnerable than the love that caring parents feel for their children. There is a bond so strong that it can be hard to tell exactly where the parent ends and the child begins, and the line is even harder to draw when our children are very young. Mothers have an additional bond from having carried their children inside of their bodies and having given birth to them, and more than half of mothers have experienced a deepened attachment through breast-feeding their babies. And mothers are, in the great majority of cases, their children’s primary caretakers, especially during their early years. All connections between caring, non-abusive parents and their children are so important as to be almost sacred, but there is usually a particular quality to the mother-child bond. That life-giving and sustaining connection deserves the full support and admiration of communities and nations.

And just as there is a special beauty and importance to relationships between mothers and their children, there is a special and extraordinary cruelty in the abusive man who attempts to break or weaken the mother-child bond, whether by turning children against their mother, by harming the children physically, sexually or psychologically, or by attempting to take custody of the children away from her.

Children need protection from their abusive parents. In the realm of custody litigation which involves abuse, the abusive parent tends to be the father while the protective parent is usually the mother, because most perpetrators of domestic violence and of child sexual abuse are male. We don’t know that much about what happens to protective fathers, since their cases are much less common, but we know that protective mothers frequently encounter a system that is insensitive, ignorant about the dynamics of abuse, and biased against women. In this context, mothers sometimes find themselves being forbidden by the court from protecting their children from a violent, cruel, or sexually abusive father. And this outcome is a tragic one, for children and for their mothers.

On behalf of the hundreds of people across the continent who are currently working for family court justice, I want to communicate to you our caring and solidarity with the challenging road you have ahead of you, as you fight to keep your children safe in body and soul. I want to let you know how critically important we believe that project to be, and how much your children need you to stand up for their rights and their well-being. You deserve admiration, not criticism, for the courageous risks you are taking on their behalf, and for your determination that all of you should have the opportunity to live in freedom and kindness.

Our society is currently giving mothers a powerful and crazy-making mixed message. First, it says to mothers, “If your children’s father is violent or abusive to you or to your children, you should leave him in order to keep your children from being exposed to his behavior.” But then, if the mother does leave, the society many times appears to do an abrupt about-face, and say, “Now that you are spilt up from your abusive partner, you must expose your children to him. Only now you must send them alone with him, without you even being around anymore to keep an eye on whether they are okay.”

Fathers & Families’ founder Dr. Ned Holstein appeared on the Samantha Clemens Show on Sporting News Radio AM 1510 The Zone in Boston on June 20.

Holstein asserted that equal treatment for fathers in family court is the most important solution to the problem of fatherlessness. It doesn’t cure the problem if the dad is truly irresponsible, but it’s the best place to start.

Holstein also criticized Obama’s new Father’s Day speech, saying “Dads don’t want to be chastised on Fathers Day–save it for another day.”

Holstein explained that “Responsible Fatherhood” programs Obama supports won’t be truly effective until fathers are treated fairly and equally in family court–a formerly irresponsible dad can be spiritually transformed but still locked out of this children’s lives.

One of the callers was a likeable dad who was refused shared physical custody, then suffered a move-away and Parental Alienation–a dad with a lot of pain, kids with pain who cannot be heard, and a court system that is empowering a mother to carry out her worst, vindictive impulses. The solution for the kids? Fairness and equality for fathers.

The Democrats met a week ago today, and as expected, failed to come up with candidates to run against County Executive Kathy Jimino and County Clerk Frank Merola.

We can’t say as we blame them. To run a viable, countywide race against two popular incumbents is an expensive, and likely losing endeavor. It’s too bad as it would have made this year all the more fun.

Now we’re stuck with two judicial races and while one is shaping up to be more exciting than most judge races, it only means it’ll be like watching two old people drink lemonade and play chess rather than checkers.

There is a three-way Democratic primary shaping up for family court and the party’s nominee, Richard Hanft, was nominated to fill the vacancy by the governor. He is, however, facing a primary from Troy attorney Beth Walsh and East Greenbush attorney Geri Pomerantz, who secured the Working Families Party endorsement.

Hanft still needs confirmation by the Senate, and who knows what they’re doing, but we’re fairly certain a Rensselaer County Family Court judge is not high on their agenda.

In the meantime, while that all shakes out, whoever wins the primary in September will run against Republican Arthur Dunn in the November’s general election.

In the other judicial race, Rensselaer County Court Judge Andrew Ceresia, who was nominated by the governor and confirmed by the Senate before it blew up, is running against Republican Charles Wilcox. Yawn.

Outside of the judge races, there is primary shaping up in at least one of the towns we are aware of. North Greenbush Democratic Party Chairman Dan Ashley is circulating petitions for the Legislature in the hopes of running a five-way primary for the four open slots in District 2 against the party’s picks of incumbents Keith Hammond, Kevin Harrington and Brian Zweig as well as newcomer Phillip Malone.

In Troy, we hear the two candidates for county Legislature looking for an eight-way primary, city Democratic Chairman Frank LaPosta and former Councilman Dan Doran, are said to be doing pretty well collecting petitions signatures even though they don’t have the party’s support.

The party picked incumbent Peter Grimm as well as newcomers Kathleen Cassidy, Mark Fleming, Edward Manny, Louis Rosamilia and Troy Councilman Peter Ryan.

The last one makes not too much sense since Ryan gave up a safe seat in District 3 that was a lock for the Democrats, only to jump into an eight way city-wide primary and then, should he survive that, a city-wide general election.

Mirch and the NYCLU

The New York Civil Liberties Union filed a lawsuit on behalf of the Sanctuary for Independent Media recently and named Department of Public Works Commissioner Bob Mirch both personally and as an employee of the city.

Thing is, we now know Mirch didn’t give the order to close down the Sanctuary the day after the controversial art exhibit “Virtual Jihadi” opened. That order came from higher up the food chain.

Actually, contrary to popular opinion, it’s not really Mirch’s style to just shut stuff down. We think he’d rather keep it open so he can stage protests, feign righteous indignation and get his face on TV and his name in the paper. It’s just too easy to just shut them down. And we don’t think he thinks it’s nearly as much fun.

The objective of the “Virtual Jihadi” video game/art exhibit, if you remember, is to kill Pres. George Bush. Offensive? Who knows. The only thing we know about “Art” is he runs a pretty cool bar on Fourth Street.

Legislature leaves

Today is the formally the last day of the state Legislature’s session but Gov. David Paterson said he will call the Senate back into a special session Tuesday and the next day and the next day and keep them in Albany indefinitely until they start doing their job.

It’s within his power to compel them to session but he can’t make them vote so the best-case scenario is the senators stay in Albany, they keep acting like a bunch of power hungry brats, it spills over into the Assembly and some legislators get voted out of office.