It's been a while since I had a chance to sit down and rant about anything in the news.  I've been a touch busy, what with the economy imploding, trying to keep my day job, and working in another country for a couple months.  But enough about me and my hiatus.  On to more important things.
 
Here's one I just read about today: "Prison Officer Sacked After Befriending Inmates on Facebook."
 
My friends and coworkers have commented to me that I rarely have anything good to say about anything, and that assessment is pretty accurate.  I usually say to them that I used to be an optimist, but then I started paying attention.  In this case, though, I actually have something positive to say.  My simultaneous first thoughts when I read the above headline were "GOOD!" and "Wait just a fucking minute...they get Facebook in prison?" 
Not that I give the tiniest of shits about Facebook personally, but I can't even get there from work, nor can I check my gmail account or view most message boards and forums.  Why the hell do convicted criminals have access to the Internet?

 
On the positive side (like I promised), it is refreshing to see someone held accountable for what can at its best only be described as an abomination of bad judgement.  If I had to make a list, and the title of this list was "Things You Shouldn't Have To Be Told", "Don't put the inmates you're guarding on your buddy list" is something I think would be a pretty good candidate for my list.  It seems somewhat of an inequality, however, that a prison guard who probably makes just over minimum wage can get fired for his bad judgement, but a corporate executive whose company has been run to the edge of bankruptcy and has received billions of dollars in "bailout" money can still get a million dollar bonus.  Something about that just doesn't seem quite right...
But back to the case at hand.  We've covered the "GOOD!" response to the above link, now more on the WTF.  As I write this it seems that the people leaving comments over on Daily Mail feel the same way I do.  Perhaps I'm just naive, but I was shocked to find out that people serving time in prison have access to the Internet.  If you read my rant entitled "The Bogeyman Uses Facebook" you know that there are people in government who think it would be a good idea for law enforcement agencies to be able to monitor personal accounts on sites such Facebook.  The justification given for this proposed invasion of your personal cyberspace is that these services may be used by bad people to do bad things.  For a moment let's ignore the fact that the whole point of prison is to punish commision of a crime by taking away freedom.  Let's also ignore the fact that there are plenty of hardworking non-criminals who can't afford the luxury of a computer and Internet access.  Does it not seem like a bad idea to allow felons access to the very services suspected of being used to plan and commit crimes?  I think I just found something else for the "Things you shouldn't have to be told" list.