Divorce and the Second Amendment

 

 

All the current discussions of violence control and the Second Amendment, reminds me of a divorce case I mediated years ago where the Husband asserted his Second Amendment rights.  The dispute concerned a parenting plan for the children.  The Mother had lost a brother in a gun accident. The Father owned guns and asserted his Second Amendment right to guns when the children were with him.  The Mother did not want their children to have parenting time with their Father if there were guns in his home. The Father had stored the guns in a locked “gun locker” but the Mother was not satisfied. If I recall the case was resolved when the Father agreed to not have the guns in his home when he was parenting the children in his home. 
As always, you can post any comment about this blog or Divorce Mediation, or just Mediation by following the directions at the right in the green column or at the bottom of this website. Learn more about mediation at http://www.center-divorce-mediation.com/ CDM (269) 2/8/13



Checkbooks, Marriage, and Divorce

The classic joke is “What is the biggest cause of divorce?  Marriage!”  However, in my experience as a mediator more divorces are caused by fights over finances than fights over infidelity.  With this in mind an article by Rachel Louise Ensign entitled “I Do – Now Hands of My Checkbook” in The Wall Street Journal Sunday section of the Arizona Daily Star caught my eye.  See the entire article at http://tiny.cc/cdm0125 I have always been interested in how married couples handle their finances.  Some couples have all joint accounts. We do and have handled the entry problem by having two check books for one account. It resolves the problem of one checkbook and one spouse constantly forgetting to enter items.  Many couples have separate accounts and divide up who pays what bills.  Ensign cites a statistic that 31% of individuals who are married have separate checking accounts.  She also some parental wisdom which states that the secret to a happy marriage is separate checkbooks.    Ensign suggests some things for couples to consider.

1.   How are you going to split shared expenses?

2.   What do your portfolios look like together?

3.   What about assets such as property and businesses?

4.   What would happen if one of you died?

5.   Do you need a postnup?

Of course with the more and more people using credit cards and debit cards this may not be as important anymore or maybe there are just new problems!

As always, you can post any comment about this blog or Divorce Mediation, or just Mediation by following the directions at the right in the green column or at the bottom of this website. Learn more about mediation at http://www.center-divorce-mediation.com/ CDM (267) 1/25/13

 



War of the Roses



I recently was in another person’s vehicle when they were listening to KRQ 93.7 in Tucson, Arizona.  The station had a segment called War of the Roses.  I first thought of the English dynastic wars fought between the houses of Lancaster and York for the throne of England. Then I thought of the 1981 movie starring Michael Douglas, Kathleen Turner, and Danny DeVito.  A radio segment was new to me.   More about my thoughts about the program but first a little about War of the Roses on radio.  I checked it out on Wikipedia and found the following:

“The War of the Roses is the name of a radio broadcast radio skit, which is a registered service mark owned by the Capstar Radio Operating Company.

This bit is fake and acted out, either using a script or ad-libbed. This is done due to FCC rules that require broadcasters to notify people that they intend to tape them for broadcast.

The general format of the skit is that the host of a radio show calls man with an offer of free roses then asks the man where he would like to have them delivered. However, the girlfriend or significant other is in fact silently listening to the call the entire time, having previously been contacted by the host.

During the phone call, the host asks the suspect questions that will hopefully reveal the identity of the subject of their affair, and other questions that may help understand the nature of it. For example, the host will typically ask the suspect for one or two sentences to be used as an optional "personal message" to be included with the gift, before asking for the name of the desired recipient. Once the suspect gives up the name and reveals the secret relationship, the spouse or significant other is free to jump in and chastise the guilty party over the phone.

Often, suspects are confused and bewildered when confronted on the phone, because they are unaware that they've been taken in by a ruse, and often believe their significant other is really at home listening on an extension. Suspects who believe this continue with the prize dialogue with the radio station host and continue to embarrass themselves, unaware that the entire call is a prank.

Other suspects turn out to not be cheating at all, and end up sending the roses - and the embarrassment along with them - to their significant other who initiated the call.”

I was amazed that the people went along with and did not just hang up.  Also that the man who just sent flowers to someone other than his wife minimized the new relationship by saying it was nothing and usually wanted to get back with his Wife and dump the girl friend.  Only once so far did I hear a man dump his Wife for the girl friend.  I would have been interested when they called for man and asked who she wanted to send tickets to the Super Bowl to.  Not sure if the results would be different.  I also wondered why the men behaved that way they did and if there was a correlation between a Wife who will call in and the nature of her relationship with her husband.  Was a Wife who was calling in more “shrewish” and did her behavior drive the Husband away from her.  I guess we will need more research to answer these questions.

As always, you can post any comment about this blog or Divorce Mediation, or just Mediation by following the directions at the right in the green column or at the bottom of this website. Learn more about mediation at http://www.center-divorce-mediation.com/ CDM (266) 1/18/13

Marriage Penalty

 

The passage of the “Fiscal Cliff Act” or its real name American Taxpayer Relief Act of 2012 has reminded me of the tax marriage penalty.  This has not been discussed much.

The marriage penalty refers to the higher taxes required from some married couples, where spouses are making approximately the same taxable income, filing one tax return  than for the same two people filing two separate tax returns if they were unmarried. It works to the couple’s advantage when there is a large difference in their incomes. The source of this increase in taxes has its roots in the progressive tax-rate structure in income-tax laws where the combined income of the parties puts them in a higher tax bracket. This law probably discourages some people from getting married. Going back to the “fiscal cliff act,”  it increased marginal income and capital gains tax rates relative to their 2012 levels for annual income over $400,000 ($450,000 for couples) and  phased-out of certain tax deductions and credits for those with incomes over $250,000 ($300,000 for couples).  Note the items in parentheses.  If I understand the act properly a married couple’s tax rate increases when their combined income is in excess of $450,000.  If the same two people were not married it would increase when their combined income was over $800,000. Once again this encourages people not to get married. 
As always, you can post any comment about this blog or Divorce Mediation, or just Mediation by following the directions at the right in the green column or at the bottom of this website. Learn more about mediation at http://www.center-divorce-mediation.com/ CDM (265) 1/11/13



Marriage Rules

When driving, I enjoy listening to what use to be books on tape and now is books on CD’s.  I actually listened to all of Moby Dick but usually listen to fiction and mysteries in particular.  I read nonfiction. It was not unheard for me to sit in a parked car so I could hear the end of a book! Occasionally, I listen to something else.  In particular, I like to listen to books which will make me a better mediator. Recently, I listened to “Marriage Rules: A Manual for the Married and the Coupled Up” by Harriet Lerner, Ph.D.   She is a scholar on the psychology of women and family relationships.  In Marriage Rules gives us just over 100 rules that cover all the hot spots in long-term relationships. Marriage Rules offers new solutions to age-old problems ("He won't talk"/"She doesn't want sex") as well as modern ones (your partner's relationship to technology.) She also suggests how to:

• Calm things down and warm them up• Talk straight and fight fair• Listen well as a spiritual practice• Connect with a distant partner• Survive the unique challenges of children, stepchildren and difficult- laws• Follow a 12-step program to overcome defensiveness• Know how and when to draw the line• Take back your marriage when things fall apart

Marriage Rules suggested many ideas which will help me when mediating and in particular help resolve impasses.

As always, you can post any comment about this blog or Divorce Mediation, or just Mediation by following the directions at the right in the green column or at the bottom of this website. Learn more about mediation at http://www.center-divorce-mediation.com/ CDM (264) 12/28/12

 

 

Seder Preidah: Ritural of Release

 

I recently spoke with my good friend, Rabbi Sandy Seltzer. Rabbi Seltzer has mediated divorces with his wife, Rita Pollak, family law attorney, trainer, teacher and mediator and  Past-President of the International Academy of Collaborative Professionals.   We were discussing Jewish divorce and he told me about the “Seder Preidah: Ritual of Release.”  I had never heard of it.  When I asked him for more information, he told me he would lend me a book he wrote entitled, “When There Is No Alternative – A Spiritual Guide for Jewish Couples Contemplating Divorce.”  It is the best book I have read about Jewish Divorce. The book discusses much more than Seder Preidah and I highly recommend it.

Seder Preidah is Reform Judaism answer for dealing with some of the problems of divorce.   As Rabbi Seltzer says in part, “In a radical departure from classical Reform’s attitude toward divorce as a purely civil matter, the CCAR in 1988 introduced a “Ritual of Release or Seder Preidah for Divorcing Couples.  Its intent has been to foster a spiritual setting for the termination of a marriage, thereby hopefully lessening it adversarial potential as well as providing a religious context for the expression of grief and loss.  It is not meant to be a Reform version of the get.”

As I get older, I understand even more the need for ritual.  I often told my clients that as painful as going to court when the divorce is granted, it is important because even that legal ritual provides them with more closure and helps them move on.

As always, you can post any comment about this blog or Divorce Mediation, or just Mediation by following the directions at the right in the green column or at the bottom of this website. Learn more about mediation at http://www.center-divorce-mediation.com/ CDM (263) 12/21/12

 



Have Gun – Will Mediate

 

One of my all-time favorite TV shows was Have Gun - Will Travel.  I have purchased and watched the CD’s of the show and am now listening to the radio show version on my iPhone.  What I have come to realize is that Paladin was often a mediator.  Perhaps this was part of the shows attraction to me.  He did not call himself a mediator but in episode 23, in the first season one  entitled ” Bitter Wine”, Paladin is hired to mediate a dispute between an Italian vintner and an Irish oilman. I like the way he was a problem solver.  There was always the threat and sometime the use of the gun but he always tried to resolve problems without the use of force.

As always, you can post any comment about this blog or Divorce Mediation, or just Mediation by following the directions at the right in the green column or at the bottom of this website. Learn more about mediation at http://www.center-divorce-mediation.com/ CDM (262) 12/14/12