Brits Banning Glass Pints

When I think of going to a pub for a pint of beer, I have a few specific ideas in mind:

• beer will be good
• beer will be served at the perfect temperature
• beer will have the perfect amount of carbonation from the tap
• beer will be served in a nice and heavy pint-sized glass

If I'm going to leave my home, travel to a pub and then spend as much on a single beer as I would on a six pack at the grocery store, I want that beer to be perfect. I suspect that an awful lot of pub-goers share these opinions, especially during a global recession in which it is getting increasingly more difficult to come up with recreational spending money.

According to the BBC story in the title link, Britain has decided that pint glasses made out of actual glass are too dangerous to be tolerated and are considering banning them from pubs. The plan is to replace the traditional glass with shatter-proof plastic. Here's why:

"Official figures show 5,500 people are attacked with glasses and bottles every year in England and Wales."

At first glance, 5,500 people being attacked does sound frightening. A closer look reveals that this number includes both bottles and glasses. Of those attacks committed with glass pints, no indication is given as to how many people were actually harmed. Thus, the relevant number could be a lot less than 5,500. It sounds like a nanny state government is just blowing everything out of proportion in order to get credit for "doing something". When you weigh these 5,500 attacks against the roughly 6,552,000,000 (six point six billion) pints served annually, you end up with less than 0.00008% of the pints actually being used in attacks.

This is why I loath and detest government bans against practically any object. Bans almost always start the same way. Somebody gets harmed by a person using a particular object in an unlawful manner and makes a fuss. Law makers and bureaucrats eager to earn their keep decide to "do something" and protect people from an alleged new public menace. The object that was used for an unlawful purpose suddenly becomes "bad" or "dangerous", without regard for its usefulness and without any responsibility being assigned to the attacker who used it in an unlawful manner. The next thing you know, a ban deprives society of a useful object and the thug grabs the next closest item and uses that as a weapon and the whole process starts over again.

For the most part bans are nothing more than knee-jerk reactions foisted onto simple-minded people who lack the reasoning skills to comprehend that they won't solve societal problems. If the goal is to disarm thugs in pubs, banning glass pints won't help. Bar stools, chairs, silverware, bottles, billiard balls, pool cues, darts, loose coins in a sock and countless other objects are just as dangerous. The only way to make pubs perfectly "safe" would be to turn them into padded cells where customers are stripped naked and chained to the wall while a medical team carefully administers alcohol-free beer through a tube.

To make matters worse, the pubs are already being hit hard by the recessions, as shown by these other BBC stories:
UK 'is losing 52 pubs each week'
Pubs are closing, but who cares?
Our pub's about to shut?!?

Here we are, in the middle of the decline of an industry, and these people want to make struggling businesses spend money to replace their glass inventory with a product that is likely to annoy their customers. All so that less than one ten thousandth of one percent of the pints served each year can no longer be misused by criminals who will undoubtedly pick up something else to wield as weapons.

Stop AB 962, The Bill That Could Kill

In the never ending war against liberty, California is considering passing a bill that would likely result in accidental shooting deaths and injuries. The bill would prevent handgun owners from practicing sufficiently to maintain their skills. If a gun owner is forced to use a firearm in self defense, society at large will be much safer if that person has recently been target shooting and is not fumbling around incompetently. Regular practice can mean the difference between the bad guy getting shot and a stray round striking property or an innocent bystander.

The bill would reduce safe practice by:

• Forbidding the sale or transfer of more than 50 rounds of handgun ammo per month to anyone who is not a licensed dealer
• Require ammo only be bought in person (i.e. banning mail order sales)
• Requiring vendors to keep a record of every ammo sale and report all sales to the state
• Require vendors to keep all ammo out of reach from customers so that buyers must seek assistance from staff before purchasing
• Require vendors to pay a licensing fee to the state (even if they already have a license to sell firearms)

Anti-gun people will probably think I’m crazy for opposing these restrictions, but take a moment to think it through before you decide. A leisurely one hour practice session with a hand gun for most people consumes about 200 rounds of ammunition, even when most of that hour is spent loading magazines, setting up targets, inspecting targets, collecting spent brass and other non-shooting tasks. A semi-automatic hand gun fires a round as quickly as the user can pull the trigger. In a regular slow fire practice session, a person will fire a shot every few seconds. Thus, a standard 10 round magazine will be emptied in about 30 seconds. 50 rounds of ammo during an unhurried practice session can be consumed in about 2.5 minutes of firing. If the shooter is practicing double taps, defensive shooting and quick reloads they might go through 50 rounds of ammo in less than half of that time (1min 15sec). Do you really think it a good idea for people with potentially lethal defense tools to be forbidden to practice with them for more than 1-2 minutes per month? What will happen when an unpracticed gun owner tries to defend themselves? Where will the bullets go if they they pull the trigger and miss the bad guy?

To make matters worse, the law doesn’t seem to distinguish between different types of hand guns. A typical concealed carry permit holder might be allowed to legally carry two or three different kinds of guns. For example, they might be permitted to carry a tiny gun that can be easily hidden under summer clothing, and a regular gun that can be concealed under normal clothing. Chances are good that those two guns will use different kinds of ammunition. If you are only allowed 50 rounds of ammo per month and need to practice with two different guns, you can practice with each gun half as much. That brings us down to maybe one minute of practice per month per gun, less time than you spend brushing your teeth before you go to bed each night.

As if this wasn’t bad enough, gun owners commonly own both a rifle and a handgun that fires the exact same type of ammunition. This simplifies ammunition purchases and lets them carry a single type of ammo when shooting. .22 rimfire, 9mm, .38 special, .357 magnum, .44 magnum and .44 special are a few examples of ammunition commonly used by both rifles and handguns. How can you prove to an ammo vendor what kind of gun you plan to fire their ammo through?

A single round of .45ACP ammunition costs about $0.30 if purchased in bulk (1000 rounds) over the internet. If purchased in a typical 50 round box at a local gun store, a single round will cost about $0.40, 25% more than by bulk. If we ban bulk purchases and tack on licensing fees and compliance costs, the price of ammo could go up by 50%. The cost of ammunition for a typical one hour 200 round practice session with a common .45ACP pistol would go from $60 to $90 (assuming they remembered to save up 4 months worth of ammo to allow for a one hour practice session). Such a large increase would significantly discourage practice.

Note that a similar Federal law was repealed in 1986 after the BATF testified that it was useless at preventing crime. The City of Pasadena passed a similar law, and repealed it two years later after realizing that they were generating a huge and costly database wasn't actually helping the police.

Please contact your state assemblyperson and the senators on the California appropriations committee to demand that they oppose this bill. Even if you hate guns you should oppose this bill because it will only serve to reduce the competency of law abiding gun owners without reducing gun ownership. No matter how you feel about guns, it is in your best interest that whoever squeezes a trigger on a firearm be well practiced, accurate and safe when they do it.

S.C.O.T.U.S. Affirms 2nd Amendment (sort of)

By now, nearly everyone has heard of the U.S. Supreme Court ruling that overturned the Washington D.C. ban on handguns. For the most part, it affirmed the 2nd Amendment, which is fantastic news for anyone who believes in the right to bear arms for self defense, checking government power, or both. It also affirmed that the 2nd Amendment bestows an individual right, and not merely a right for militias to bear arms.

For the most part, this ruling made me happy, but I'd like to caution firearms advocates not to celebrate too hard. There are several things that really should be considered about this ruling, lest complacency lead firearms owners to think that they can rest on their laurels.


Problem #1:
The fact that this issue was credible enough to make it all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court is a bad sign. The 2nd Amendment is very clear, and should not require a prolonged process of legal escalation for a gun ban to be thrown out. The very first judge who looked at this case should have thrown out the ban without much more than a few minutes consideration. What part of "shall not be infringed" did the lower courts not understand when this was first challenged?



Problem #2:
This was a 5 to 4 decision. That means that a single swing vote is all that stood between the highest legal authority in our nation declaring that the 2nd Amendment was null and void. It means that 4 justices, people that are considered the most experienced and powerful legal experts in the country, disagreed with the the decision to uphold the 2nd Amendment. Think about that for a moment. Our country is still dangerously close to invalidating a cornerstone of the U.S. constitution. What happens when this issue comes up again (it will), and on that day we have one additional anti-gun justice on the bench?


Problem #3:
This decision included enough wiggle room for other kinds of gun bans to successfully be passed. Here are some quotes from Justice Scalia:

"Nothing in our opinion should be taken to cast doubt on longstanding prohibitions on the possession of firearms by felons and the mentally ill, or laws forbidding the carrying of firearms in sensitive places such as schools and government buildings, or laws imposing conditions and qualifications on the commercial sale of arms."

Note that the 2nd Amendment's "shall not be infringed" wording says nothing about conditional limitations on the right to bear arms. Scalia's comments undermine this simple clarity by saying that it is indeed possible to establish quite a few limitations on firearms ownership, and if enough of these limitation are passed into law, owning, selling and transporting firearms could become so onerous as to create a de facto ban of them.



Don't get me wrong; I think today's ruling came out about as well as we could have expected, and gun owners are entitled to a little celebration. Nevertheless, I think it is important to keep this ruling in perspective and continue to actively support pro-gun organizations and vote against any politician who expresses a desire to further restrict the private ownership of firearms.

Dangerous Ruling for the Bad Guys

Recently a U.S. Court of Appeals overturned portions of a 1976 law that bans Washington D.C. city residents from possessing handguns in their homes. It also removed the requirement that long barreled firearms be stored with trigger locks or in a disassembled state. According to the judges, the Second Amendment protections

"are not limited to militia service, nor is an individual's enjoyment of the right contingent upon his or continued intermittent enrollment in the militia."

This fantastic news for several reasons:

• Residents of crime ridden Washington D.C. can now more easily own the means to defend themselves, and can store these vital safety tools in a more accessible manner
  
  
• If D.C. residents start using guns to defend themselves in their homes, we should see the usual drop in violent crime and home invasions that accompany gun friendly cities, and these improved crime statistics will make excellent fodder for pro-gun and pro-liberty activists.
  
  
• If anyone appeals this ruling at the U.S. Supreme court, there's a fair chance that we could reestablish a federal mandate that the 2nd Amendment is an individual right, which would in turn help people throughout the nation roll back the various gun bans they have been oppressed by.

Not surprisingly, a Washington Post editorialist did not share my enthusiasm for this turn of events. Here's the opening sentence of their opinion piece (emphasis added by me):

a federal appeals court turned its back on nearly 70 years of Supreme Court precedent to give a new and dangerous meaning to the Second Amendment. If allowed to stand, this radical ruling will inevitably mean more people killed and wounded as keeping guns out of the city becomes harder. Moreover, if the legal principles used in the decision are applied nationally, every gun control law on the books would be imperiled.

It's really a shame how so many members of the media misinterpret the right to bear arms. The only danger in this ruling is to the criminals who used to be able to invade private homes at will without fear of being shot by homeowners. The criminals are the "more people [who will be] killed and wounded", and that's good news for the rest of us. The right to self defense is far more important than the government's right to govern, and every time a ban is lifted to empower self defense the media should celebrate rather than bellyache. When guns are banned violent crime goes up, as seen in Canada, Australia, the United Kingdom, Washington D.C. and New York. As gun bans are lifted and things like concealed carry are allowed, violent crime goes down, as seen in numerous states and cities.

I'm beginning to wonder if the reason media people favor gun control is because gun bans lead to juicy violent crime stories and eye-grabbing headlines that help to sell more copy and attract more viewers. If the world actually became safer, these people might have to actually look for something newsworthy rather than continue to inundate us with depressing crime stories.

TFS Magnum, The Freeholder, Musings of a Geek With a .45, QandO, Michelle Malkin, Stop the ACLU, Hot Air, and The Volokh Conspiracy have also covered this story.

AZ Minimum Wage Hike Causes Layoffs

The Federal government is likely to pass a law to increase the national minimum wage. This is a bad thing, as it will do the following:

• Harm the lower and middle class by increasing the cost of goods (paying an entry level worker/clerk more means you need to charge more for goods and services)
  
  
• Increase unemployment (if employers can't afford to pay more per hour, they will simply pay for less hours of labor, meaning that they can afford to employ less people)
  
  
• Increase crime (if people working near the minimum wage can no longer find work, they may find other ways to obtain money.)
  

The AZCentral.com story in the title link supports some of my predictions. Here are some quotes about what happened after Arizona increased their hourly minimum wage from $5.15 to $6.75:

Some Valley employers, especially those in the food industry, say payroll budgets have risen so much that they're cutting hours, instituting hiring freezes and laying off employees.

The Employment Policies Institute in Washington, which opposed the recent increases, cited 2003 data by Federal Reserve economists showing a 10 percent increase caused a 2 percent to 3 percent decrease in employment. . . . "After a wage hike, employers seek to take fewer chances on individuals with little education or experience," one institute researcher told lawmakers in 2004.

Tom Kelly, owner of Mary Coyle Ol' Fashion Ice Cream Parlor in Phoenix, . . . said, "The new law has impacted us quite a bit." It added about $2,000 per month in expenses. The store, which employs mostly teen workers, has cut back on hours and has not replaced a couple of workers who quit. Kelly raised the wages of workers who already made above minimum wage to ensure pay scales stayed even. As a result, "we have to be a lot more efficient" and must increase menu prices, he said.

The emphasis of the story is on how teenagers are most affected by layoffs caused by increases in the minimum wage. Increasing teenage unemployment is especially harmful to society. Gainfully employed teens learn about responsibility and self-reliance and channel their youthful energy into something positive. Society should encourage this. When I was a teen I knew some kids who planned their free time around how much money they had. If they had enough money for legitimate entertainment, such as a movie, they would behave themselves. If they were out of cash and bored, they would go vandalize something and act like delinquents. Increasing teenage frustration and boredom and making it harder for them to earn money will undoubtedly result in more petty crime.

Sen. Ted Stevens Clueless About Internet

The title link is to an .mp3 recording of comments made by U.S. Senator Ted Stevens. He is chairman of the Senate Committee on Commerce, Science and Transportation, and was a big reason why the so called "Net Neutrality" bill was shot down. This sound bite is part of his 11 minute speech against the Net Neutrality clause. Please click on the title link and listen to the 2.5 minute clip before reading further.

This is a typical example of how people in our government are regulating areas of our lives that they know absolutely nothing about.

Senator Stevens (recently famous for Alaska's $320 million dollar bridge to nowhere), was born over 80 years ago and lived nearly all of his life before the internet even became accessible to the average consumer. It would be very surprising if he knew much about the internet, and his rambling speech proves that he knows absolutely nothing about how it works. Nevertheless, he, and people like him, are deciding on what kinds of regulations should be placed on the internet. This will affect how much people pay to use the internet and what kind of content consumers are able to access. It could even effect what content providers survive.

I find this very frustrating. There is no shame in someone from his generation and cultural context not understanding the internet, but it is infuriating that someone who can't even grasp the fundamental concepts is a key player in regulating what has become the most vital communication system in the world. The internet delivers information and entertainment to and facilitates commerce for nearly a 1.5 BILLION people and should not be regulated by those who aren't even vaguely familiar with it.

Why can't these politicians get some help from their staffers, do some basic research and actually learn about an issue before they start making policy? Either their egos are so bloated that they don't realize the magnitude of their ignorance or they are utterly owned by lobbyists and corporations and just make up stuff to defend the positions they are paid to take. Why do voters even allow jerks like him to govern us? Is Ted Stevens really the best that Alaska has to offer as a senatorial candidate?

For those of you not familiar with the "Net Neutrality Issue", here's a quick summary:

AT&T and other Network Infrastructure owners have expressed a desire to charge additional money from web sites and services that you visit/use in exchange for not blocking your access to access them. For example, your ISP could tell someone like YouTube.com or Google.com to pay them extra money if they want to ensure that you and other users of that ISP/phone lines are able to view their content without undue slowness.

This is admittedly a biased oversimplification of the issue, but since most people who visit this site are fairly tech savvy, I don't want to spend too much time explaining all of the details of Network Neutrality in this post. If you'd like more information, try this Wikipedia link.

SF Gun Ban Overturned

Although this really isn't much of a surprise, the new San Francisco law banning the possession and sale of handguns has been overturned by a judge after an NRA backed lawsuit. Here's a quote from the foxreno.com news story:

In siding with the gun owners, San Francisco County Superior Court Judge James Warren said a local government cannot ban weapons because the California Legislature allows their sale and possession.

"My clients are thrilled that the court recognized that law-abiding firearms owners who choose to own a gun to defend themselves or their families are part of the solution and not part of the problem," NRA attorney Chuck Michel said. "Hopefully, the city will recognize that gun owners can contribute to the effort to fight the criminal misuse of firearms, a goal that we all share."

The ordinance targeted only city residents, meaning nonresidents in the city or even tourists were not banned from possessing or selling guns here. Warren's decision was not unexpected. In 1982, a California appeals court nullified an almost identical San Francisco gun ban largely on grounds that the city cannot enact an ordinance that conflicts with state law.

While I am always glad to see self defense rights upheld in court, part of me was curious as to how bad crime would have gotten in San Francisco. Had this law been allowed to stand, pro-self defense people would have had another example of how gun control leads to increased violent crime. Nevertheless, I am glad that it was overturned as I'm sure that there are many people in San Francisco (albeit not the voting majority) who disagreed with this law and would have either been turned into criminals or rendered defenseless had it been allowed to take effect.

Pay Phone Ban to Fight Crime in Boston?!?

From the Boston Globe's Bostom.com news section:

Saying that pay phones attract drug dealers and prostitutes, city agencies are pushing for an amendment to the zoning code meant to restrict installation of coin-operated phones.

''What happens is [drug dealers] hang out there, the buyers come, make the deals," said Sal LaMattina, chairman of the East Boston Neighborhood Response Team. ''For some people that live in the neighborhood, they get a little nervous to walk by. They see the drug dealing that's going on.

This is stupid. If the pay phones attract criminals, this should make things it easier for the police. Rather than stop installing phones, they should just periodically drive by the phones and arrest the prostitutes, drug dealers and other criminals they claim hang out at the phones.

Why do authorities always attack problems from the wrong angle and end up punishing the innocent without deterring crime? I can understand not installing pay phones if the phone companies can't make a profit from them, but if there is someone willing to pay to install and maintain the phones, why block it? Who knows when someone will need to dial 911 and stop a crime or call an ambulance? (For those who say cell phones replace this functionality, keep in mind that land lines are a much better choice for 911 emergency calls as most agencies still can't accurately pinpoint where the cell call came from.)

Revisiting Employer vs Employee Rights

Whenever I post an article proposing that employers should not be able tell employees how to live while they are out of the office, I invariably get a comment along the lines of:
"Employers should be able to offer employment on their own terms, and if the employees don't like it they can quit."

My recent post "2 Women Fired for Having Nicotine in Blood", was no exception to this rule. In the post I complained about Weyco terminating employees who smoked while "off the clock", and how they enforced this rule via mandatory blood tests. Fellow LLP member, The Unrepentant Individual, disagreed with me in his post. Here’s a quote:

How about, why don’t you let the owner of Weyco decide who he does and does not want to employ, based upon the criteria he determines. This isn’t government here, nobody is forcing these employees to work for Weyco. He has in no way infringed upon their “rights”, because the only right here is the right of contract.

If we take this logic to the farthest extreme, the so called “right of contract” would trump basic human rights. What if Weyco decided to fire all employees who have not been surgically sterilized in order to make sure that childcare issues never impacted productivity? What if all staff were required to vote only for political candidates that favored Weyco’s industry? How about requiring them to maintain a small shrine to a certain god both in their work area and in their homes? If the "right of contract" is all that matters, such abominations would be considered acceptable.

If these examples are too extreme, consider the inverse of the smoking issue: If it's ok for the employer to forbid nicotine in the employees' blood, wouldn't that imply that it's also ok for Weyco to require that the employees always have nicotine in their blood? Most people are non-smokers, and thus probably find it easy to side with anyone who forbids smoking. What if the tables were turned? Would people still side with the employer if he fired non-smokers instead and only kept the smokers?

I believe employers pay employees for the successful completion of units of work, whatever that work may be. As long as staff correctly produce the required units of work and do not otherwise disrupt business, they should be left alone. I don’t mind if an employer bans smoking in the office, or if they fire individual smokers because their frequent smoke breaks make them unproductive. I do, however, object if the employer fires people just because they have a legal and non-impairing substance in their blood.

If we take any isolated case and let the employer do as they please, the employees can indeed vote with their feet. If enough employees quit, the employer will go out of business. This system won’t work, however, if all employers offer equally miserable terms and workers have nowhere else to go (look at the beginnings of the industrial age). Just because an employee agrees to be exploited doesn’t make it right to exploit the employee. If that were the case, it would be ok for pedophiles to engage in sex with children as long as the victims don’t know enough to object. While I object to minimum wage laws and don’t like undue restrictions on employers, I do draw the line at letting employers intrude upon the personal lives of employees.

British Swordmaker Fights Sword Ban

According to Scotsman.com, a British sword smith is about to meet with members of Parliament in an attempt to persuade them against banning swords.

Mr Macdonald, 33, a former fencing instructor who now makes and sells swords, fears any new laws could also affect those who use them for perfectly legitimate reasons.

He is concerned that Highland dancers, fencers, collectors, antiques dealers, battle re-enactment groups, theatre companies and thousands of heritage enthusiasts could lose out if they become illegal.

Unfortunately, weapons banners probably won't really care who their law hurts as they are not likely to acknowledge that there are indeed "legitimate reasons" for owning weapons. Just look at UK and Australian firearms as proof of this unfortunate point.

And he argues banning the sale of swords will do very little to reduce the number of knife crimes in the country. Mr Macdonald claims that only approximately 1% of all knife-related crimes each year involves [sic] the use of a sword.

This poor guy keeps using logic to make his case, something that politicians around the world tend to disdain. Look how California banned .50 BMG rifles when they have yet to be used for crime. While I completely agree with his argument, I think this sword-crafter would fare better if he gathered enough funds to buy an MSP or enough voters to threaten their seat. Nevertheless, I wish him luck in his battle as he is definitely backing a worthy cause. If they outlaw swords, they will be banning an important part of their heritage for absolutely no practical reason.

For those of you who have never seen a finely crafted sword and don’t understand what all the fuss is about, take the time to view one in person. Visit a museum or upscale sword shop (i.e. a place that sells $1000+ weapons and not just junky wall-hangers). Swords can be incredible works of art, as well as elegant and effective weapons. They are an important part of most cultural histories. Swords have been created to commemorate noteworthy events, carried as symbols of rank/class, and wielded to create and defend nations. Banning them would be akin to banning family crests, or forbidding the creation and possession of sculptures.

Alaska Passes Law Limiting Gun Control

According to the Washington Post article in the title link:

UNEAU, Alaska -- Starting Wednesday, handgun owners won't need permits to carry concealed weapons in the seven Alaska cities where they're still required. There also will be no more restrictions on keeping a firearm in a vehicle.

A new state anti-gun control law that goes into effect will essentially bar municipalities from passing gun laws that are more restrictive than state law.

As if this news wasn't pleasant enough already, the article goes on to mention that Alaska is the 44th state to implement this type of law. I didn't realize that so many other states already had such measures in place. This is great!

When I travel to my favorite outdoor shooting range, the one hour drive takes me through more than a dozen different cities and two counties. Theoretically, that makes me subject to about 15 different sets of firearms laws before I even get to my shooting destination. Hunters, competitive shooters and others often travel much longer distances with their firearms. Laws like this new one in Alaska make it possible for firearms owners to obey the law as they will now have a practical way to figure out what laws they will be subjected to while traveling throughout the state.

UPDATE:
I just noticed TFS Magnum has an interesting take on the left-wing hysteria over this issue.

Bush vs Posse Comitatus

Whenever a crisis looms in this country, government officials look for an efficient way out, often without regard to civil liberties and privacy. A classic example of this is responding to 9/11 with the so called Patriot Act.

In the aftermath of hurricanes Katrina and Rita, and with the imminent threat of a potentially deadly avian flu epidemic, the President is considering a solution that would further0 erode our liberty. In short, he wants to be able to use U.S. Armed forces to assume domestic police functions in the event of a "national emergency". This is contrary to the very foundations of our country.

One of the compelling reasons our nation came into existence was that the colonists who lived here resented British soldiers being sent here to enforce the laws of the British law. Here's a quote from the title article:

In the tumultuous years preceding the American Revolution the British military was sent to the colonies to enforce British control. In the Declaration of Independence, Jefferson expressly cited the use of the British military in America as one of the colonists' central grievances: “He [the king] has kept among us, in times of peace, standing militaries without the consent of our legislatures. He has affected to render the military independent of and superior to the civil power."

Consider the differences between local police and Federal military forces:
Local policemen are answerable to your local government, are members of your local community, and enforce local laws that you probably had a chance to vote on. If you are wronged by a police officer, you can file a complaint, go through a locally controlled process or court and seek to redress your grievance in a timely manner. Local District Attorneys, Judges, Mayors and other people have a vested interest in keeping police personnel under control as they need your votes to get reelected every few years.

Federal soldiers acting to enforce martial law, however, will come from all over the nation and are unlikely have a special fondness for your community. Not only will they be unlikely to know your local laws, they will be free to disregard them. If they wrong you, your only available course of legal action is to hopefully find a Federal court that will listen to your complaint long after the emergency is over and the forces are withdrawn. If a national emergency is declared, the Federal forces that come to you will probably have far greater powers than your local police. For example, if martial law were declared, it is conceivable that the military could commandeer your private property and punish lawbreakers with imprisonment or death without the usual process of a civilian trial.

The Posse Comitatus Act of 1878 is what protects us from this sort of Federal oppression. Part of it reads:

Whoever, except in cases and under circumstances expressly authorized by the Constitution or Act of Congress, willfully uses any part of the Army or the Air Force as a posse comitatus or otherwise to execute the laws shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than two years, or both.

In plain English, this means that using Federal Troops to enforce the law is a criminal act, except for in a few very specific cases. It makes it very difficult for the Federal Government, the President of the United States, and high ranking military officers to impose their will on a community without due process. It's one of the key differences that makes us empowered citizens rather than the subjects of a whimsical regime.

If an emergency does occur, each state's governor already has the power to use National Guard troops to deal with it. Furthermore, the President already has the power to declare a state of emergency and use Federal troops to perform non-law enforcement tasks, such as provide technical assistance, transportation, labor, etc. The President also has the power to use Federal troops to quell insurrections. These existing powers should be sufficient to deal with any domestic emergency. There is no reason to alter the Posse Comitatus act and make it easier to use our military against citizens of this nation.

Here's something else to think about:
Currently, all of our armed forces consist of volunteers. The draft is not active at this time. Men and women voluntarily enlist to protect our nation with the expectation that if they have to use force against someone, it will probably be against a foreign enemy. Imagine, for instance, if a city experiences a deadly viral outbreak. A state of emergency is declared, and Federal troops are ordered to seal off the city to prevent it from spreading across the nation. Anyone who tries to leave that area is to be imprisoned or shot. (Think of the movie Outbreak as a rough scenario.) As horrible as this would be for the city in question, it would be equally odious to the Federal troops ordered to carry out the task. Such a thing could cause people to stop volunteering to serve in our military. If that ever happened, we would likely see a return of the draft, an abomination akin to slavery. Perhaps this is why the Pentagon and Secretary of Defense Rumsfeld are reported to be obstructing efforts to change the Posse Comitatus Act.

Changing the Posse Comitatus Act to grant broader powers to the Federal government would be a grievous attack on our freedom and would redefine the very concept of liberty for citizens of this nation. I encourage you to write the President and urge him to abandon this folly.

Here are a few more articles on this issue if you would like more details.

Senate Moves to Include Cold Medicine in the War On Drugs

According to the article in the title link, it's going to get a little harder to buy cold medicine. Here are some excerpts:

The bill would require stores to sell Sudafed, Nyquil and other medicines only from behind the pharmacy counter.

...

Consumers would have to show a photo ID, sign a log, and be limited to 7.5 grams — or about 250 30-milligram pills — in a 30-day period. Computer tracking would prevent customers from exceeding the limit at other stores, according to the bipartisan bill.

...

The Senate voted by unanimous consent to add the anti-meth measure to the massive Commerce, Justice and Science appropriations bill, which is expected to pass the Senate next week.

This is yet another example of the government passing new laws to combat criminal acts that are already forbidden by law. Say goodbye to stocking up on cold and allergy medicines to take advantage of sale prices. Remember those quick trips to the drug store in the middle of the night to grab some Nyquil so you can finally fall asleep? Now you'll have to find a clerk to go to the pharmacy counter, find your medicine and give you paperwork to fill out. If your store's pharmacy counter closes before the rest of the store, you might even have to wait until the next day. I suspect conveniences stores and other low volume sellers might quit selling these medicines rather than worry about complying with selling procedures.

Who will enforce this? Will there be people tasked with going into stores and issuing citations if the cold medicine isn't secured? Will there be sting operations in which cops try to buy medicine without ID or without signing for it so they can bust the store if they don't follow the procedure? Will there be a system to verify that the buyer has valid ID and isn't a meth cooker using fake ID? It is infuriating that our tax dollars are going to be used to make it more difficult to buy common cold and allergy medicine than it is to buy alcohol, tobacco and pornography.

This is so typical. Someone commits a crime with a gun, so they pass laws to make it harder for everyone to buy guns. Vandals illegally spray paint on a wall, and people pass laws requiring that stores keep spray cans under lock and key. Drug pushers commit the crime of stealing cold medicine, another crime of making illegal drugs and a third crime of selling illegal drugs, and rather than concentrate on busting them, they make it harder for sick people to buy medicine. According to this logic, toilet paper and shaving cream should become controlled substances in order to prevent childhood pranks.

Australia Bans Something Else

So far Australia has banned guns, swords and laser pointers and more for "public safety" reasons. Now, in their never-ending quest to impose morality through bans, they have decided to ban a video game:

SYDNEY, Australia (AP) -- Australian officials effectively banned the computer game "Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas" and ordered it removed from stores Friday because it contains hidden sex scenes that can be viewed with a special Internet download.

Somehow I don't think this ban will be any more successful in improving their society than have been the plethora of other bans. For one thing, people who want the game can just download it off of the internet. When will they learn? Bans are especially silly when they apply to information and digital content as they do little to block access to the materials while simultaneously arousing curiosity.

Morality is not something that can be legislated. It is taught by parents, reinforced (or undermined) by societal views and is ultimately outside of government control. Banning things such as pornography, drugs and prostitution does nothing but make it more profitable for peddlers, more desirable for miscreants and more expensive for tax payers and law enforcement. Who will police the stores to make sure it isn't sold? Who will make sure that the people who already have the game won't copy it and sell it or give it to their friends? Will they create a giant tax funded firewall around the country to block downloads of this game from the internet? Will they search travelers to make sure they aren't smuggling in copies? Will they check all incoming mail? This is just silly.

Supreme Court Justice Souter Reaps What He Sowed

The title link is to the web site of Freestar Media LLC, a company that is protesting one of the Supreme Court's many recent abominable rulings. Justice David Souter was one of the scoundrels who voted to allow government to seize private property via eminent domain and give it to another private party in the guise of "public good". Here are some quotes from a press release written by Logan Clements, Executive Producer for Freestar Media LLC:

Justice Souter's vote in the "Kelo vs. City of New London" decision allows city governments to take land from one private owner and give it to another if the government will generate greater tax revenue or other economic benefits when the land is developed by the new owner.

On Monday June 27, Logan Darrow Clements, faxed a request to Chip Meany the code enforcement officer of the Towne of Weare, New Hampshire seeking to start the application process to build a hotel on 34 Cilley Hill Road. This is the present location of Mr. Souter's home.

Clements, CEO of Freestar Media, LLC, points out that the City of Weare will certainly gain greater tax revenue and economic benefits with a hotel on 34 Cilley Hill Road than allowing Mr. Souter to own the land.

The proposed development, called "The Lost Liberty Hotel" will feature the "Just Desserts Café" and include a museum, open to the public, featuring a permanent exhibit on the loss of freedom in America. Instead of a Gideon's Bible each guest will receive a free copy of Ayn Rand's novel "Atlas Shrugged."

...

"This is not a prank" said Clements, "The Towne of Weare has five people on the Board of Selectmen. If three of them vote to use the power of eminent domain to take this land from Mr. Souter we can begin our hotel development."

So far this story is being treated seriously by the media, and has been covered by the Associated Press, The Washington Post, Worldnet Daily, Boston.com News and other noteworthies. Let's hope Freestar Media succeeds with this endeavor. All five of the Supreme Court Justices who supported this decision should have to spend the remainder of their lives fighting to keep their homes out of the clutches of private developers under the guise of "public good".

Special thanks to "Rob" for pointing this story out to me in his comments on my previous post.

More Contempt for the U.S. Supreme Court




I'm a little late to cover this, but I'm so angry about it I'm going to do it anyway. For those few people who haven't heard, the U.S. Supreme Court has once again decided to erode the principals that this nation was founded on. According to the CNN.com article in the title link:

The Supreme Court on Thursday ruled that local governments may seize people's homes and businesses -- even against their will -- for private economic development.

Just to make sure everyone is clear on this:
Cities, counties, states and other governments can now literally seize a person's home via eminent domain and give it to someone else.

In California, for instance, Proposition 13 severely limits increases in property taxes for homeowners. Each year, the property taxes on a home cannot increase by more the 2% unless the home is sold to a new owner. An elderly couple that bought a house for $60,000 in 1940 can't be driven out of their home by property taxes just because it is now worth $500,000. Under the Supreme Court's Kelo v. New London decision, local government could simply seize the house and sell/give it to a developer who in turn sells it to someone else at a tidy profit. Since the house was sold, taxes would then be reassessed based on the $500,000 current value and the city/county/state suddenly would see a big increase in tax revenue. Never mind the fact that the house used to be the legal and private property of someone else! The developers get a profit, the government gets more taxes and the original property owner gets screwed.

It used to be a given that governments could only use eminent domain if the seized property was going to directly be used for the public good, such as for building a new highway. The idea behind this is to give the government a chance to forcibly evict people from their home in extreme cases where the land is desperately needed for a project that will have tremendous public benefit and where the homeowner does not want to sell or cooperate with the project. This court decision just threw that idea out the window and onto the manure pile. Now, something as trivial as increased tax revenue could be used to invoke eminent domain. All a developer needs to do now is bribe his favorite politician and *POOF*, the land that they want is seized and handed over to them.

Francis Poretto a.k.a. "The Curmudgeon" has responded with a sentiment that is being echoed throughout the blogosphere:

...your Curmudgeon has decided to announce his intentions:

• He will resist with force any attempt to expropriate him, up to and including the cost of his own life.
• He will regard the lives of all persons complicit in an attempt to expropriate him as forfeit, and will take them without consideration or restraint.
• He will assist any neighbor in similar resistance, without regard for the consequences.
• He will use his personal resources to accumulate similar pledges, properly formed and geographically circumscribed, from like-minded persons, and will propagate them constructively, to the best of his ability.

It's "our lives, our fortunes, and our sacred honor" time, friends.

Come and take it, statist bastards. Just try.

For those of you sitting there in silent rage wondering what you can do about this, write your congressman. Remember, according to Article III, Section 2 of the U.S. Constitution, the U.S. Supreme Court must function "under such Regulations as the Congress shall make". In theory Congress could overrule this decision with a 2/3 vote.

For more coverage of this issue, check out Michelle Malkin's two posts featuring numerous quotes and links to various blogs and online articles.

Illinois Will Require Background Checks for Stun Guns

This is ridiculous! The governor of Illinois just signed a bill into law that will require people to go through the same sort of checks to buy a non-lethal stun gun as they do real firearms.

Gov. Rod Blagojevich signed legislation Friday approving the restrictions, which go into effect Jan 1. In addition to submitting to a criminal background check and waiting period, stun gun owners in Illinois will be required to have a state firearm owners identification card.

One reason people buy stun guns instead of real guns is because they prefer not to carry around a deadly weapon. Another BIG reason is so that they can avoid the hassle of the paperwork, background check and waiting period. The concept behind waiting periods with firearms is to theoretically prevent a person from buying a gun while in the throes of rage, and then immediately using it to kill the person they are mad at. The anti-gun crowd feels that this "cooling off" period will save lives (though this hasn't been proven). It is absurd to take this concept and apply it to a non-lethal defense tool. People don't buy stun guns to commit murders; they buy them for self defense either because they are scared or because they want to be prepared.

Lately the news media has been gleefully reporting the horrors of stun guns and tasers. Every time a person is injured or killed by a stun gun, there are stories about how dangerous and deadly these devices are. I believe this is just a current media fad, and is akin to the bursts of "shark attack" stories and other unusual deaths that the media focuses on for a few weeks before moving on to a new type of tragedy. Keep in mind that these stun guns are everywhere. Tens of thousands of police, military and civilian personnel carry these devices yet very few deaths and injuries are reported.

ANYTHING can be used to inflict death. Hammers, rocks, cars, gasoline, etc., can be used to kill both intentionally and accidentally. Stun guns fall in this same category: they are not intended to kill or even harm, and if used correctly they rarely result in death or injury.

States do not have the moral right to sit in judgment of their citizens and decide who is entitled to defend themselves from rapists, muggers and the like. It is unfortunate that they often end up with the legal right to do this in spite of morality.

Fighting Illegal Immigration with Trespassing Charges

New Ipswich Police Chief W. Garrett Chamberlain charged Ramirez with criminal trespassing -- a violation comparable to a traffic ticket -- on April 15 after immigration officials refused to take him into custody.

...

"What I'm trying to do is find a manner in which we can get the federal government to step up to the plate and start helping out here," Chamberlain said. "It's basically a situation here where right now if you make it past the border patrol, you're free and clear. There's no interior enforcement for illegal immigration in the United States. What I'm hoping to do is find a way that if the feds aren't going to help us out, then local enforcement can take care of it."

This isn't going to go away. Tens of thousands of volunteers have signed up for future Minutemen- like projects all over the U.S. One way or another, the Federal Government will be forced to do it's job and enforce our immigration laws.

Judges Reverses Ruling for Pregnant 13 Year Old

But the same judge reversed the order late on Monday, after LG underwent a psychological evaluation.

"Legally speaking, it's not a difficult decision to make. Morally speaking, it's very difficult," the judge said.

"But I'm not here to make the moral decision. I'm here to make the legal decisions," Judge Ronald Alvarez said, according to the South Florida Sun-Sentinel newspaper.

I withdraw my earlier comment that this was an abuse of judicial power. While it is possible that public outrage lead to this reversal, I prefer to give the judge the benefit of the doubt. I was under the impression that the previous ruling delaying the procedure until she underwent a psychological evaluation meant that for all practical purposes she would not be given permission to do a she wished. Quite often, judges and legislators impose hurdles to deny people a particular course of action and I mistakenly thought that was happening in this situation. (Example: It became legal to arm pilots, providing they received training and passed tests, even though such training and testing wasn't readily available for quite some time.) I may have jumped to the wrong conclusion in this case, as she promptly received an evaluation and was authorized to proceed with the abortion if that is still her intent.

Florida Forcing 13yr Old Girl to Have Baby

I generally avoid the topic of abortion on this site and frankly I wish our government would do the same. There is a vast number of things that I feel should be left up to the morals and discretion of the people that are most deeply affected. Here are few of those types of things:

• Assisted euthanasia
• Abortion
  
• Consumption/use of potentially harmful/carcinogenic substances
• Using/Not using safety gear such as helmets and seat belts

I don't like it when government gets involved with these issues, as to me it is not the government's job to protect people from the consequences of their own decisions. Abortion is the diciest of these issues, because it pits a mother's rights to control her body against the rights of an unborn being, which may or may not actually have rights depending on how you define the earliest stages of life. In this specific case, however, the issue is clear cut:

A pregnant 13-year-old girl in Florida has been told she cannot have an abortion because she lacks the maturity to make such a decision.

...

The judge's ruling comes in spite of Florida state law which specifically does not require a minor to seek parental consent before an abortion.

This is an abuse of judicial power. I can understand it when people who think that life starts with conception and who equate abortion to murder try and find ways to prevent abortion. I find it repulsive, however, that a judge would ignore existing state law and force a 13 year old little girl to have a baby she does not want only on the grounds that "she lacks the maturity to make such a decision." Is going through 9 months of pregnancy and having the responsibility of raising a new human being something that requires less maturity? Keep in mind that this injunction was issued shortly before she was to have the abortion, which means she went through all of the emotional turmoil, made up her mind and thought she had a plan and then "POOF!" the judge took away her choice. According to the article, this girl is already under the care of the state, and isn't exactly part of a normal family that can help her raise a child while she herself finishes growing up.

If the state wants to have laws against abortion, or require minors to have parental consent before abortion, the people of that state can try to vote these laws into existence. In this case, Florida does not have such prohibitions, unless you are a little girl that happens to stumble across the wrong judge.

Thank you Rob, for commenting on this issue in the "Teen Girl Captures Mugger" post.