Since then, we’ve been working on correcting some of the major problems with this house..plumbing and electrical.

One of the biggest problems was that the ground wire was electrically live on an entire string of outlets. I discovered this by accident when I touched both the end of the cable TV wire and the threaded “F” connector on a surge protector that was plugged in and got shocked.

I checked and sure enough the ground wire had 120V on it!

My first thought was an incorrect splice but we checked all of the junction boxes and everything looked fine.

Then we opened the breaker panel and I noticed that the ground wire for that circuit was touching the black insulated hot wire, and ended there. The ground wire had burned in half, apparently because the insulation on the hot wire had melted allowing the ground wire to make contact with it.

Interestingly…the other half of the ground wire was nowhere near where it had burned through so someone had been in this breaker box after this happened and moved the ground wire.

What caused this? Someone put two 14AWG wires on a 30-amp breaker. It should have been two 14AWG wires on two 15 amp breakers. There is room in the breaker box for it.

This allowed someone to overload the circuit, causing the hot wire to overheat, and then it shorted out against the ground wire and instead of the breaker tripping the ground wire just burned through.

What’s ironic about this is that one of the major reasons for doing away with fuses is that people could overload circuits by putting larger fuses in.

Now people are just putting larger breakers in and overloading circuits that way.

One, a Guatemalan named Elmer L. who said he was 16 when he started working on the plant’s killing floors, said he worked 17-hour shifts, six days a week. In an affidavit, he said he was constantly tired and did not have time to do anything but work and sleep. “I was very sad,” he said, “and I felt like I was a slave.”

At first, labor officials said the raid had disrupted federal and state investigations already under way at Agriprocessors Inc., the nation’s largest kosher plant. The raid has drawn criticism for what some see as harsh tactics against the immigrants, with little action taken against their employers.

But in the aftermath of the arrests, labor investigators have reaped a bounty of new evidence from the testimony of illegal immigrants, teenagers and adults, who were caught in the raid. In formal declarations, immigrants have described pervasive labor violations at the plant, testimony that could result in criminal charges for Agriprocessors executives, labor law experts said.

Out of work and facing deportation proceedings, many of the immigrants say they now have nothing to lose in speaking up about the conditions in the plant. They have told investigators that they were routinely put to work without safety training and were forced to work long shifts without overtime or rest time. Underage workers said their bosses knew how young they were.

Because of the dangers of the work, it is illegal in Iowa for a company to employ anyone under 18 on the floor of a meatpacking plant.

In a statement, Agriprocessors said it did not employ workers under 18 and would fire any underage worker found to have presented false documents to obtain work.

To investigate the child labor accusations, the federal Labor Department has joined with the Iowa Division of Labor Services in cooperation with the state attorney general’s office, officials for the three agencies said.

Sonia Parras Konrad, an immigration lawyer in private practice in Des Moines, is representing many of the young workers. She said she had so far identified 27 workers under 18 who were employed in the packing areas of the plant, most of them illegal immigrants from Guatemala, including some who were not arrested in the raid.

‘Goofy’ teenagers

“Some of these boys don’t even shave,” Parras Konrad said. “They’re goofy. They’re teenagers.”

At a meeting Saturday in Postville, three members of the House Hispanic Caucus — including its chairman, Rep. Luis V. Gutierrez, D-Ill. — heard seven immigrant minors describe working in the Agriprocessors plant.

Iowa labor officials said they rarely encounter child labor cases even though the state has many meatpacking plants.

“We don’t normally have many underage folks working in our state,” said Gail Sheridan-Lucht, a lawyer for the state labor department, who said she could not comment specifically on the Agriprocessors investigation.

Other investigations are also under way. The Equal Employment Opportunity Commission is examining accusations of sexual harassment of women at the plant. Lawyers for the immigrants are preparing a suit under the federal Fair Labor Standards Act for wage and hour violations.

Federal justice and immigration officials, speaking Thursday at a hearing in Washington of the House Judiciary immigration subcommittee, said their investigations were continuing. A federal grand jury in Cedar Rapids is hearing evidence about Agriprocessors.

A spokesman for Agriprocessors, Menachem Lubinsky, said the company could not comment on an active investigation.

“The company has two objectives in mind: to restore its production to meet the demands of the kosher food market and to be in full compliance with all local, state and federal laws,” Lubinsky said. Reports of labor violations at the plant “remain allegations only, that no agency has charged the company with,” he said.

Most of the young immigrants were hired at Agriprocessors after they presented false Social Security cards or other documents saying they were older than they were.

Agriprocessors executives said they had begun an overhaul of the company’s hiring and labor practices, starting with hiring a compliance officer, James G. Martin, a former U.S. attorney in Missouri.

He was only doing the the work Americans refuse to do. He was just giving back to the country that took care of him and allowed him to start a “business.” We all got the “business” from his escapades!

Man O’ Man. 7 mill in assetts and 1.5 mill in cash just sitting around the home? All from slinging yard bird?

Yea, right.

And people have accused ME of being a racist.

I wonder if Ike has been “enlightened”…

http://www.victimsofillegalaliens.com/index.php

Not a bad idea.

The comPost is especially whiny today. Poor Chirf Deane! Liberals REALLY hate it when conservative ideas and values prevail and solve problems.

Once again, an elected politician with a need to spend more money re-inventing the wheel. Bob and his cohorts want us to bend the rules helping a select group get around existing laws.

_ …..while also providing a legitimate way for the estimated 12 million undocumented workers to come out of the shadows and earn United States citizenship. These undocumented workers must pass a series of strict and critical benchmarks, such as paying fines, learning English, and waiting at the back of the citizenship line, behind those who have pursued legal means of attaining citizenship.

http://menendez.senate.gov/issues/brokensystem.cfm

Bob, we already have a legitimate system, when followed, it works. They just need to go home and start over.

Perhaps Bob could relocate south of the border and help them on that end.

ALERT/ALERT/ALERT - FREE FAX

You can find this fax by proceeding to
http://www.numbersusa.com/faxes?ID=10337

Sen. Robert Menendez of New Jersey has put a hold on the reauthorization of the E-Verify program. As you know, E-Verify allows employers to determine the legality of their potential new hire. This program is up for reauthorization and many anti-American worker congressmen have been trying to hold the bill up.

Sen. Menendez has placed a hold on the bill and refuses to release the hold until the Congress agrees to increase the number of work-based visas. It is absolutely appalling that a United States Senator would do this to American workers. Not only is he holding up a program that prevents illegal aliens from finding work (and thereby allowing Americans to fill jobs), he is holding it hostage for more skilled worker visas (which keep educated Americans out of a job).

Send your Democratic U.S. Senator as fax and urge him/her to keep Sen. Menendez in line. Remind him/her that this is probably not the message that the Democratic party wants to send heading into the November elections.

This was on another thread and I brought it over here. Has anyone heard about this?

The reason why Obama will not call out John on Juan, is because he supports amnesty as well. The difference is that with the Dems in control of both Congress and the WH, amnesty passes. With McCain in the WH, he faces the same issues as Bush does, the GOP in Congress is not going to support Amnesty.