Don't Worry About the Government
I see the states, across this big nationI hate the City of Minneapolis. More specifically, I hate the City of Minneapolis police/traffic/towing/impound Nazis.
I see the laws made in Washington, D.C.
I think of the ones I consider my favorites
I think of the people that are working for me
My hatred for the City of Minneapolis Nazis started about 15 years ago. At the time, I owned an old beat up pickup truck that didn't get driven very often, in addition to a car that I drove daily. One day I came home from work and noticed that the truck was not in the parking lot where I had left it. I wasn't too concerned - I just figured a friend had borrowed it or had played a joke on me and moved it. After it was gone a few days and nobody I knew would admit to having touched it, I reported it stolen.
Three days later, The City called me to say that my truck had been parked illegally and impounded. If I wanted it back, I owed The City for the towing fee and two days of storage. Evidently the fact that I had reported it stolen before they towed it did not matter - I had to pay The City to get my stolen truck back. AND, since the thief had dumped it in a tow-away zone, I also had to pay the parking ticket.
Gee, thanks Minneapolis.
Monday afternoon, I came home to find my car missing. Since I am a big fat procrastinator on such things, and have been taking the bus to Machinery, Inc. every day and not driving my car much anyway, I let my car's registration expire. Yep, I'm an idiot. So I figured that it probably got towed. But why hadn't The City given me a ticket first? Isn't it a little drastic to impound a car for expired tags before at least issuing a ticket first? Evidently not, in the mind of The City. I even wrote The City a futile email just to voice my discontent:
I don't expect anyone to care about this comment, but I want to say that I think the City of Minneapolis is out of line for towing my car for expired tags.Surprisingly enough, I got a reply 20 minutes later:
I wholeheartedly admit fault for letting my tags expire, but to tow my car without giving me a ticket or some kind of warning first is ridiculous. Why is the City so harsh?
Sincerely,
steve
Dear Steve,
We appreciate you e-mail. I apologize that you vehicle was towed. The reason why the vehicle was towed away without a ticket is because you were given a great length of time to renew the tabs and they were not renewed. The DMV gives an additional 30 days after the tabs expire to renew. The city gives you additional time on top of the 30days to renew the tabs. The warning in this case was not have the tab renewed when they expire. I apologize again for what happened to you vehicle. If you choose to dispute the ticket you can contact the violations bureau at 612-348-2040.If you want to view the city ordinances on this issue you can go to our web site at (www.ci.minneapolis.mn.us/cityhall/laws/ordinances/) and look under title 18
If there is anything else we can help you with please contact us. Thank you for emailing the City of Minneapolis.
L Anderson
Minneapolis 311
Office: (612)673-3000
Email: minneapolis311@ci.minneapolis.mn.us
I'm not sure I understand L's explanation, but hey... at least someone in the Nazi organization cares enough to reply to my email. I was tempted to reply with a comparison and contrast of the English usage of the words "you" and "your", but decided against it.
Anyway, today I called in sick to Machinery, Inc. and wasted the entire damn day at the DMV and The City impound lot (which, coincidentally looks a little bit like a concentration camp for cars). $174 for the tow and impound.
Here's the best part: when they towed the car, I got a $112 ticket for expired registration, too.
Fuck you, City of Minneapolis.
posted by steve at 10:01 PM
2 Comments:
That's it, some fire in your belly! It's been missing from your recent posts. That said, by using the Nazi analogy, you are violating Godwin's Law. I know, you're going to say "Fuck the law, especially Godwin's Law!". But before you do, read this from Wikipedia ("Fuck Wikipedia!"):
"Godwin's Law (also Godwin's Rule of Nazi Analogies) is a mainstay of Internet culture, an adage formulated by Mike Godwin in 1990. It is particularly concerned with logical fallacies such as reductio ad Hitlerum, wherein an idea is unduly dismissed or rejected on ground of it being associated with persons generally considered "evil". The law states: As an online discussion grows longer, the probability of a comparison involving Nazis or Hitler approaches one. Godwin's Law does not dispute whether, in a particular instance, a reference or comparison to Hitler or the Nazis might be apt. It is precisely because such a reference or comparison may sometimes be appropriate, Godwin argues in his book, Cyber Rights: Defending Free Speech in the Digital Age, that hyperbolic overuse of the Hitler/Nazi comparison should be avoided, as it robs the valid comparisons of their impact. Although in one of its early forms Godwin's Law referred specifically to Usenet newsgroup discussions, the law is now applied to any threaded online discussion: electronic mailing lists, message boards, chat rooms, and more recently blog comment threads and Wikipedia discussion pages."
I hear this more and more these days, from the left, and from the right (Bush does it a lot) - anytime someone has a difference of opinion, an argument can be won by calling the opposition "racists" "fascists" and of course, "Nazis". It's like saying "I win, I'm right, because I'm calling you a Nazi, end of discussion." Also, the constant use of the word "Nazi" really diminishes the historical context of what a "Nazi" is. Nowaday, "Nazi" is used to describe anyone who is in opposition. It's a terrible overuse of the word.
Oh, and fuck Minneapolis. It's time you left that hick town and moved back to Venice. Here you can drive around with expired tags, and nobody cares. And you can live a block from the beach...
Yikes. Towing seems way over the top! I am impressed that someone from the city actually replied to your message, although I am not sure that I understand it either.
Post a Comment
<< Home