What Does White County, Georgia, Have Against Teenage Girls?

by JASmius



As Constitutionalists, we believe that non-external matters should be handled by State and local governments as close as possible to the governed.

This story illustrates that even the best government system is far from perfect:

Shannon Hamilton had to deal with the one thing no parent should ever have to experience. His beloved daughter, Cecily, died when the truck she was riding in careened off of a bridge in White County, Georgia…

One month later, according to Rare, the safety barricades were still absent from the Gene Nix Road bridge. Shannon Hamilton voiced his frustration to local news station NBC 11:

“I think to not have something in place immediately by the end of the day, or a week ago, two weeks ago, or the day after this happened, I think that’s disgusting. I think that’s disrespectful and I think that’s reckless disregard,” Hamilton said.

Instead of being heralded as a local hero, however, he was arrested and charged…

Hamilton’s son, Kale, posted the video of the arrest (shown below) to his Facebook page…

“It’s sad. It’s sad that the community of the grieving parents have to make things happen, while the county public roads department can’t do [expletive],” he said as his father was being taken away by police.

The can-do American spirit - and, dare I say it, practical communitarianism - at its best, and government designed and intended to squash both at its very worst.  Here is a local community deciding to to itself what its local government refused to do in order to prevent any more needless tragedies from happening, and the local government cracks down on that community by making an example of Mr. Hamilton because this independent community spiritedness was infringing upon their power.

The county "manager," Mike Melton, claims that the White County was "considering" repairs to the bridge in question, and that Mr. Hamilton should have been patient and waited for them.  But as the latter pointed out, was it too much to ask to put up some kind of temporary barrier or protective devices until those repairs and upgrades could be implemented?  Sure doesn't seem so to me.

I have a daughter.  I see what she's accomplishing and all the things she will accomplish.  And I know that the reason she's had the chance to do so is because she wasn't cut down seven years ago in a pointless, needless automobile accident.  So suffice it to say, I can identify with Mr. Hamilton's sentiments and motivations in not wanting any other parents to have to endure the horror and loss and grief that he has.

And for that he faces criminal charges and perhaps jail time.

Something's seriously, seriously wrong with this picture.

Exit question: Does nobody in White County government have a daughter or daughters of their own?  Or is empathy only permissible when it's politically correct?