Topeka, Kansas

Owing to budget cuts, we will no longer prosecute you for beating your wife.  

Whoa! Put down that belt and put away that rolling pin.  The city ordinance against domestic battery is merely under consideration.  District Attorney Chad Taylor is warning his office will not be able to afford to prosecute misdemeanors in Topeka, including domestic battery, if the city cuts the D.A. budget for 2012 by the proposed ten percent ($347,765, from its 2011 amount of $3,477,651).

In an apparently Orwellian wrinkle of logic, another Chad, City Councilman Chad Manspeaker (what's in a name?) argued many don’t understand that repealing the anti-domestic battery ordinance would help domestic battery victims in Topeka by forcing District Attorney Chad Taylor to prosecute their attackers.  I must have missed something.  Under Taylor's proposal, misdemeanor cases would get knocked down to municipal court level (like Judge Wapner), which has far less legal reach.  Topeka city manager says the Topeka Municipal Court isn't prepared to handled these cases either.

So...that's the face of tax cuts and small government!
http://www.inthe00s.com/smile/02/buck.gif

And in related news...the Topeka city council has announced that I-70 running through downtown will from now on be known as the Ike Turner Expressway.  :P