Voxie Sync Recording Index

Voxie Sync Recording Index

How To Establish Voice

1) SHOW DON'T TELL


2) I WRITE FOR MYSELF, MY FRIENDS AND MY PEERS, NOT MY PROFESSOR


3) SOUND LIKE I TALK


4) IF A SENTENCE SOUNDS TOO GOOD TO BE TRUE IT PROBABLY IS


5) RESEARCH


6) DON'T TRY TOO HARD


7) PRACTICE

Probate Court

It's known as Surrogate Court in New York State, but no matter where you are it's never a happy place. These courts deal with the distribution of someone's estate after they die.

Here's the process:

1) First you have to file a 10-page form. It's just about as fun to fill out as it looks. In the form you will encounter exciting terms as domicile and combined corporate verification, consent and designation. You do not just fill these sort of forms out, you will need to pay a lawyer to help you out. You will also need to pay a modest fee to apply for the form itself.

2) Once you have submitted the form, the probate court will go over it and verify that the all the information is correct. It's not as easy as just filing a form though. You'll need to appear before the probate court a couple of times and it will be a lengthy process.

3) Wills make this process a lot easier. If the deceased has left a will, the court will have to determine the validity of it and then distribute the assets once it is proved valid. If you haven't left a will then things get ugly. The money will first go to a spouse. If the spouse is deceased then it will go to the children of the deceased. If there are no children then it goes to brothers and sisters. This is where it gets ugly. Children will say that the no good spouse doesn't deserve it, brother will say the no good son shouldn't get a penny and so on and so forth.

Besides bickering family members, one of the biggest problems that can arise in Probate/Surrogate Court is the issue of intestacy. That's when someone dies with more debts than can cover there assets.

Lauren Pic

Legalized Racis........I Mean The Rockefeller Drug Laws

A set of laws enacted by one of the Tori Spellings of American politics, Nelson A. Rockefeller,
the Rockefeller Drug Laws have successfully taken non-violent criminals possessing moderate amounts of recreational drugs off the streets and jailed them for years.
In 1973, Rockefeller -- who sort of looks like a cleaned up version of Chicago Cubs broadcaster Harry Caray -- was in his final year as governor of New York State. Before he left, his administration enacted drug laws that were allegedly in place to help curtail drug related crime and take down drug kingpins, but somehow managed to accomplish the opposite.
At the time they were enacted, the laws made no distinction between marijuana, cocaine or heroin; selling two ounces or possessing four ounces of any of them would land one in jail for 15 years to life. Also, the law made no distinction between a first time offender and a career criminal. Pot was dropped from the equation in 1979.
In 79', the legislature also amended the law, raising the amount necessary to trigger the 15 to life penalty. But then, the mid 1980's came, and with it did the use of crack in the inner-cities. The government claimed they tried their best to curb crack use, but when PSAs from Pee-Wee Herman and Clint Eastwood didn't work, they had to take a different course of action.
In 1988 the amount of crack necessary to send one to jail for 15 plus years was reduced. If you were caught with 5 grams of crack, you would receive 5 years in prison. In order for the same penalty to be trigged with powdered cocaine, you would need 500 grams of the drug.
By 1997, the number of whites only made up 5.3% of the drug felon population while blacks and Latinos accounted for 94.2%. In 1996, blacks and Latinos made up only 23% of the states population but accounted for 85% of those indicted on felony drug charges.
Minority women were especially hit hard by these laws, as many children in inner cities were raised without mothers in the 1990's because of the Rockefeller Laws. In 1990, 61.2% of women jailed in New York State were convicted of drug offenses. Only 32.2% of men were incarcerated in the same year for on drug charges.
In 2004, the state legislature passed a small reform to the Rockefeller Laws, slightly reducing some sentencing and taking other small baby-steps in the right direction.
The real issue the state government continues to ignore is the effect that short, cost effective drug treatment has over imprisoning non-violent criminals.
A study by RAND's Drug Policy Research Center in 1997 concluded that effective drug treatment is 15 times more effective in curbing drug use than mandatory minimum sentencing. The same study showed that keeping an inmate in jail for one whole year costs $32,000 while the cost of an effective drug-free outpatient care program costs only $2,700 to $4,500 per person.
Think this doesn't effect SUNY students? Since 1989 -- ironically, the year after the necessary crack limits were lowered to jail offenders -- SUNY's annual funding from the state has dropped from $1.3 billion to $800 million. New York state now spends $1.7 billion annually on prisons, compared to the slightly less than $1 billion they spent in 1989.
Help rid our state of this outdated, costly and racist piece legislation that has ruined too many lives already.

Compound Interest In My Own Words (Round 2)

Moneychimp.com

I finally gave in to the second website that comes when you Google "compound interest." I'm terrible with numbers. I tried searching through all the others that came up, desperately trying to come with a definition and an understanding of what compound interest is.

So I gave up.

I tried my hardest to avoid using one of the 1,500 online compound interest calculators, but I couldn't. Turns out that I was just overthinking. I kept convincing myself that there was this crazy concept I wasn't getting, a missing equation I couldn't possibly understand or maybe I just wasn't carrying the one over to the next column.

According to Moneychimp.com, if you invest $1000 over three years with four percent interest that compounds annually you end up with $1,124.

After several hours of excruciating financial breakdowns, calculators and pie charts I realized that you only need to know 5th grade math to execute this equation and I decide to break it down.

The first year, you invest $1000. 4% of $1000 is $40. Your total over the first year is $1,040.

The second year your money is invested, you take the $1,040 you earned the first year, and add 4% of that. 4% of $1,040 is $41.60. Add $1,040 and $41.60 together and you get $1,081.60, your total for the first two years.

The third year your money is invested you start with that $1,081.60 and, once again, add 4% of that to the total. 4% of $1,081.60 is $43.26. Add that $43.26 to the $1,081.60 and you get.....

....$1,124.86!!!

So easy a moneychimp can do it.

How an Idea Becomes a Law

How an idea becomes a law in New York State is a lengthy process, so let me somehow try to sum it up in a few paragraphs. Lets say there's a large group of concerned citizens out there who want, I don't know.......free ice cream on Mondays.
First you a need a whole lot of people who would want free ice cream on Mondays and they'd need to have a pretty good reason for it.

So, let's pretend that a recent research study conducted by the State Health Department shows that the more people eat ice cream, the happier they are. You and a couple hundred, maybe thousand, of your fellow supporters argue that since there is scientific proof that ice cream makes everyone happier, there should be free ice cream on Mondays for everyone. You argue that, if everyone who works or goes to school receives free ice cream every Monday then they're less likely to be upset about going back to work or school after every weekend is over, thus increasing work place productivity and grades.
You and your fellow supporters contact your local senator. You write or email a report to this local senator that's several pages thick, arguing why New York State would be a more productive if everyone simply received free ice cream on Mondays. After some deep thought, and recognizing the lack of campaign contributions from the local ice cream workers' unions, your senator is convinced this is a good idea for a law. The senator now turns your idea into a bill, the "Free Ice Cream on Mondays Act of 2008."
Your senator now proposes the "Free Ice Cream on Mondays Act of 2008," before the State Legislature. Once everyone in the legislature familiarizes themselves with the proposal, it is sent to what's called an "appropriate committee." The committee weighs the pros, cons, costs and overall effect the "Free Ice Cream on Mondays Act of 2008," will have if enacted. A public hearing is also called in most cases so the politicians can gather information on what the public thinks of the bill. Oddly enough, in an election year what the public thinks about a bill may be more important to the politicians than what they actually think about the bill.
Now the appropriate committee has agreed on the actual written format of the "Free Ice Cream on Mondays Act of 2008." The bill is presented to the rest of the State Senate and then to the State Assembly. You and your friends may as well get comfortable, because in New York State the process of having the majority of either side of either branch come to a consensus may take quite a long time............
.......18 months later and the "Free Ice Cream on Mondays Act of 2008" has been passed!!! Now the only obstacle is Governor Patterson, who has 10 days to veto the bill. Having a sweet tooth himself, Governor Patterson decides not to veto it, despite numerous threats from the executives of Haggan-Das, Ben and Jerry's, Cold Stone Creamery and the local chapter of the United Waffle-Cone Manufacturers of America. Free ice cream for everyone!