Wednesday, January 26, 2005

School administrator was drug money launderer

Washington Post:

A high-ranking Prince George's County school administrator has been arrested in connection with a multimillion-dollar drug ring based in Virginia that distributed large amounts of cocaine and marijuana, law enforcement authorities said yesterday.

Unbelievable!

Hornsby hired [Pamela] Hoffler-Riddick in September 2003 to run one of the school district's five regions at an annual salary of $138,244.

And who said school teachers don't make a lot of money?

Hoffler-Riddick, 43, is accused of using proceeds from the drug ring to pay off loans for a car and two homes.

I guess $138K wasn't enough for her.

Hoffler-Riddick was born in 1961 in the South Bronx, the eldest of three daughters to a single mother who sometimes had to rely on public assistance.

To rephrase that in less politically correct terms, she's a black woman from the ghetto, born to a welfare mother. It's interesting that she made it to such a high paying job at the age of 41.

"She was a little rough around the edges. In Montgomery County, you have to use more diplomacy than an in-your-face style," said a former colleague who spoke on the condition of anonymity because of the charges in the indictment.

To rephrase once again in less politically correct terms, she still had a ghetto attitude about her.

One has to suspect that there's some sort of affirmative action going on here to explain her rise to such a high level position.

DRUG WAR COMMENT

By making a highly desired vice illegal, a black market is created where drug rings can make tens of millions of dollars. Such a huge amount of illicit money creates the potential to corrupt those who would have otherwise been law abiding citizens.

25 comments:

Norman Rose said...

i get it. you're trying to be ann coulter-- provocatively to the point of offensive? school teachers, by the way, do not make $138K. running a region makes that money. it's sad to see people's greed while serving the public but that is certainly not about where she came from (Colin Powell is also from the South Bronx) and whether or not she received public assistance (does that downgrade her moral fiber?).

having diplomacy is probably not her job description. a great many people rise to positions of power/ influence/ relatively high pay without being diplomatic. in fact, some people use their aggressiveness as an asset.

please, tell us more about this person so we know how you determined that affirmative action placed her in her job. as in, some evidence that she could not do her job.

mikeca said...

A few years ago the lead air traffic controller at San Francisco International Airport, who was making $120,000 year, was arrested and eventually pleaded guilty to a number of bank robberies totaling $40,000. He was white. (http://starbulletin.com/2001/08/10/news/story8.html)

Now what does this tell you about air traffic controllers?

What does this tell you about white people?

Ron Chusid said...

Some of the assumptions along the way (in Libertarian Girl's post) are questionable, but she is certainly correct in the underlying premise at the end: The war on drugs is a disaster.

Mexigogue said...

First of all if you were truly libertarian you should be defending her right to buy and sell drugs rather than calling her ghetto for being a capitalist.

Second of all, your implication that people from ghettos can only attain high positions through affirmative action is ignorant. Hell, there were former slaves after reconstruction who managed to send their children to universities and there was no affirmative action back then. Your racial presumptions are going to alienate people from the point of view you claim to support.

Chad said...

While I don't agree with everything, possibly even most, of what LG says I have to say I think calling her a rascist on the basis of this post may be a bit overboard. There is a difference in an attempt to be biting in a description and an actual hate of a group of people. That hatred is what defines racism and the demonstration of that hatred is what makes a rascist. That isn't to say the post wasn't insensitive bordering on the stupid. It also isnt to say it doesnt reflect some very negative stereotypes that LG should probably re-examine. But, from what I have read on this blog I would bet that LG is probably not a rascist just someone who made an inappropriate post.

John T. Kennedy said...

What's wrong with laundering drug money?

Mexigogue said...

Hate is not an essential element in whether or not a person or idea is racist. The idea that every black person with a good job must have gotten it through affirmative action is based on the underlying idea that black people are inherently not smart enough to qualify for good jobs based on merit. That idea does not have to be hateful in order to it to pass the litmust test of being racist.

guy in the UNLV jacket said...

I read her post a little different than the rest of you. I think she was pointing out the not so subtle racism that was coming from the writer. The writer without saying it was putting these images in your head and Librarian girl just highlighted them and brought them to the forefront......

Libertarian Girl said...

Please, tell us more about this person so we know how you determined that affirmative action placed her in her job. as in, some evidence that she could not do her job.

Whenever I see a black person in a high position or at a top school, I usually assume they benefited from affirmative action because it's more likely than not. Only when affirmative action is eliminated would I stop assuming that.

Democrats get away with speculating that Bush appointed Condi Rice because she was black without getting called racist.

Evidence? If you read the article, you will she that she was was fired from her Montgomery County job, but then manages to find a better job.

What's wrong with laundering drug money?

I guess that she got caught.

guy in the UNLV jacket said...

Librarian girl that means that it is safe to assume that any woman I see working outside of the home is there because of afirmative action. I guess it is safe to assume that you got into college because of your gender got a job because the gumment need some women to meet some artificaial goal.....It is a proven fact that white women are the largest beneficaries of afirmative action.

DevP said...

"Whenever I see a black person in a high position or at a top school, I usually assume they benefited from affirmative action..."

What a sad and terrible world you must live in.

See, my parents taught to treat people as INDIVIDUALS, and lay down their individual successes and failures on their own choices.

Chad said...

The basic definition of racism is to believe that one race is superior to another simply because of racial difference. To me that requires a degree of hatred of that race. You may feel different doesnt change the basic jist of my original post.

What does change my feelings though is her follow on post. That is just downright ignorance and I withdraw my defense of her.

Mexigogue said...

Librarian girl, if a white person gets fired and goes on to get a better job are we safe to assume that THAT was through affirmative action??? That is a non sequitor. You have to step back and realize that correlation is not causation. Sometimes generalizations can be helpful in undertanding a concept, but if taken to access you can get some rather absurd results.

For the record I am a person of color who voted libertarian in the last election and I blog about libertarian concepts all the time. The difference between you and me is that when I say racist stuff I make it damned funny!

R said...

Yeah, it is.

Mexigogue said...

The law is not an end unto iself:
http://www.donotremove.net/mexigogue/archives/003298.html

Scott said...

There are a significant amount of Libertarians and people in general who think a morally unjust law is no law at all.

Thoreau comes to mind.

Imagine, perhaps, a law was established requiring you to shoot Jews on sight. Would you be morally obligated to follow it? Would you?

Personally, I think not.

I also drive over the speed limit without remorse.

Someone above mentioned correlation does not necessitate causation, which is true (technically untrue--correlation does imply causation, but not necessarily between the two variables in question, nor can it tell you which way the causation goes), but it does at least provide evidence for causation. Some people, most people, have beliefs based on such imperfect information. Libertarian Girl seems to be among their very numerous, and by no means prima facie unreasonable, ranks.

guy in the UNLV jacket said...

I personally only shoot little big Jews with good eyesight whol spend their money freely....

Libertarian Girl said...

See, my parents taught to treat people as INDIVIDUALS, and lay down their individual successes and failures on their own choices.

If society followed that advice then there wouldn't be any affirmative action.

Mexigogue said...

True Librarian girl. And I'm with you on that point. Affirmative action is damaging because it restricts freedom in hiring and it also hurts the credibility of skilled and talented people who would have gotten a job regardless but who always have to contend with the unspoken idea that they are there only by means of a government mandated quota.

Old Blind Dog said...

I also drive over the speed limit without remorse.I see idiots like you on a regular basis, plastered all over the landscape. You think that is libertarian? The speed limits are there to protect the rest of us from you. You are just as dangerous as someone that drives well under the posted speed. You certainly are not proving anything other than your innate stupidity.

Scott said...

>>I also drive over the speed limit without remorse.<<

"I see idiots like you on a regular basis, plastered all over the landscape. You think that is libertarian?"

It's tough to say. Doubtlessly some Libertarians don't mind the government building roads, and feel obligated to obey its rules. I am not one of them. Moreover, I'm not sure what being a Libertarian has to do with one's following or not following an unjust law, which is the point I was illustrating.

"The speed limits are there to protect the rest of us from you."

Presumably. But that in no way means that the speed limits are the safest limits, or are properly set. The government could of course protect the rest of you all even more by limiting the speed limits to 10 mph. They of course don't, because they view the costs of such a move as outweighing the benefits. I simply don't assume the government has properly determined the precise point where the costs equal the benefits; I question their calculus, whereas you seem to blindly (as per your name) accept it.

"You are just as dangerous as someone that drives well under the posted speed."

If I am "just as dangerous as someone who drives well under the posted speed" why should I slow down? I imagine you were trying to say something else in support of your point--regardless, you have no idea what kind of driver I am, how well my car performs at high speeds, what kind of roads I frequent, etc.

Old Blind Dog said...

>>"The speed limits are there to protect the rest of us from you."

Presumably. But that in no way means that the speed limits are the safest limits, or are properly set.
[..]
I simply don't assume the government has properly determined the precise point where the costs equal the benefits; I question their calculus, whereas you seem to blindly (as per your name) accept it.

--
Which only illustrates that you are arrogant. How, in your all knowing wisdom, were you able to determine that the government is just trying to jerk you around by posting a speed limit?
--

>>"You are just as dangerous as someone that drives well under the posted speed."

If I am "just as dangerous as someone who drives well under the posted speed" why should I slow down? I imagine you were trying to say something else in support of your point

--
Yeah, running over someone is just as dangerous as being an obstacle to those obeying the law. Or, have you never learned that most systems flow smoothly when everyone co-operates?
--

>>--regardless, you have no idea what kind of driver I am, how well my car performs at high speeds, what kind of roads I frequent, etc.

--
Which has absolutely nothing to do with the issue. You want to play with your car, put it on a track. Besides, with an attitude like that you are likely nowhere near the driver you imagine yourself to be.

Old Blind Dog said...

LG, sorry for hijacking the thread. I'm done.

Scott said...

"The speed limits are there to protect the rest of us from you."

>>Presumably. But that in no way means that the speed limits are the safest limits, or are properly set.
[..]
I simply don't assume the government has properly determined the precise point where the costs equal the benefits; I question their calculus, whereas you seem to blindly (as per your name) accept it.<<

“Which only illustrates that you are arrogant.”

Perhaps, but not necessarily. It may simply demonstrate that I think I know my own taste for risk and the benefits of that risk better than some disinterested third party. I find that a safe assumption; it’s the assumption upon which much of modern economics is based.

“How, in your all knowing wisdom, were you able to determine that the government is just trying to jerk you around by posting a speed limit?”

I make no claims to omniscience, nor do I much respect others’ claims that the government possesses that omniscience I lack. Nor did I ever say the government is “just trying to jerk” me around.

“Yeah, running over someone is just as dangerous as being an obstacle to those obeying the law. Or, have you never learned that most systems flow smoothly when everyone co-operates?”

You are comparing me to some slow driver of some unspecified dangerousness without knowing my level of dangerousness. Even if you are using “you” to not indicate me, but rather some other anonymous driver, you are still comparing two different things—being an obstacle to others and running someone over—with no justification as to why the two are equivalently dangerous. There are possible ways of proving such things: accidents caused, tendency to be in a deadly collision, etc. But you have merely asserted.

Furthermore, the speed limit is just that. There is nothing illegal per se about driving under it, even significantly under it.

I have heard that latter bit about cooperation leading to smooth flowing systems though, from a speech by Lenin or Stalin, I believe.

>>--regardless, you have no idea what kind of driver I am, how well my car performs at high speeds, what kind of roads I frequent, etc.

“Which has absolutely nothing to do with the issue.”

Nor did your statement to which I was responding. Your statement was nevertheless made from a position of ignorance; if you don’t want me to point out such fallacies, do not post them.

“Besides, with an attitude like that you are likely nowhere near the driver you imagine yourself to be.”

Or you can continue to post them if you like.

English Professor said...

"Whenever I see a black person in a high position or at a top school, I usually assume they benefited from affirmative action because it's more likely than not. Only when affirmative action is eliminated would I stop assuming that."
Is that racist enough for you, Charles?

I can't imagine why anyone reads this. That's it, Jeremy--I'm not following any more of your links over here. There are too many intelligent and interesting conversations taking place with bloggers to waste time here. No offense intended to those who do respond to her--I'm sure you are trying to help. But I'm done.