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Good thing the government is protecting me from the evil corporations
Posted on: August 17, 2011 - 7:42pm
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Good thing the government is protecting me from the evil corporations
Thank goodness.
Clearly that Lemonade stand didn't apply for the permit, because they didn't care and were only out for their own greedy profits.
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Yeah, this happens every year somewhere. You have to stop those evil little bastards. I'll bet they didn't even wear government certified latex-free gloves when they were making that lemonade. They probably didn't even have an OSHA approved kitchen to make it in. And I'm willing to bet they were evading sales and income taxes too.
When I was a kid I sold candy, lemonade, books, car washes, lawn service and anything else I could figure out to make a buck, that is how I figured out I could get someone else to do the work (my brother) and collect a profit for myself. I think it is refreshing when I see kids out there working instead of sitting on their fat asses playing video games, while we wonder why kids are so fat.
However, if we didn't have government scum walking around shutting these kids down, we would have ANARCHY! AND NO SEAT BELTS OR SPEED LIMITS! AND WE WOULD ALL DIE!!!!!!!
If, if a white man puts his arm around me voluntarily, that's brotherhood. But if you - if you hold a gun on him and make him embrace me and pretend to be friendly or brotherly toward me, then that's not brotherhood, that's hypocrisy.- Malcolm X
I'll give you credit BS. I half expected you to be quiet when these good Republican communities sent their cops out.
It is interesting that you talk about kids sitting on their asses when that was why you sent your brother out to do the work you contracted for.
"I do this real moron thing, and it's called thinking. And apparently I'm not a very good American because I like to form my own opinions."
— George Carlin
Your giving ANARCHY a bad name !
The law is the law and should be applied as such. Yes it is silly and the law should probably be changed to allow kids to do there thing but I will not fault anyone for applying the law. If you let them get away with it who else do you let get away with it, no it is better to just stick to the law and amend that where needed than to give individuals discresion where it could be abused. Although I am confused to why you would need a permit in the first place to have an informal business.
Whatever goes upon two legs is an enemy.
Whatever goes upon four legs, or has wings, is a friend.
No animal shall wear clothes.
No animal shall sleep in a bed.
No animal shall drink alcohol.
No animal shall kill any other animal.
All animals are equal.
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Tapey, I understand what you are saying but I see a problem. Who actually follows a law when they don't know that the law even exists? I will grant the whole “ignorance of law is not excuse” thing but that is for laws where ignorance need not apply, such as real crimes.
Consider all the people renting their lawns for parking. The video says that they are paying a fee to the county for that. But did everyone even know about that? If there was one person doing that who skipped the fee, was the county showing up and demanding to know if everyone on the block had all their paperwork in order?
Rather, I suspect that this was some minor official who picked an easy target and came in to make a very bureaucratic point.
Past that, what about people who really should know the law and decide to ignore it? Among other things, I happen to be licensed to prepare food for people with weak or no immune system at all. I cannot go to very many places where I do not see blatant health code violations.
If you do not work in that area, you would not know but I will give you one horror story.
One time I went to the deli at the supermarket to get a few different things. Now the large serving spoons that they use cost about a buck each, so it should not be that big of a deal to have enough on hand for what they are selling. In fact, it really should be standard that there is a spoon for every single product that needs a spoon.
So I order a pound of egg salad and there is no spoon there. The guy looks around and grabs a spoon from some other product. Guy does not even rinse it before dipping it in the egg salad. Now I want a pound of potato salad and no spoon there either. So he goes back to the egg salad and grabs that spoon, again without rinsing. I think that I got about four items that all needed a spoon to serve them and the same spoon traveled all over the deli.
Now, let's say that they had one bad product which wasn't even their fault. It came bad from the supplier. Well, this dickwad counter guy is going around infecting every product that they sell. When the health department gets reports of a hundred people with identical food poisoning, it will trace back to that store but everyone will have eaten different things.
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Yeah, that's pretty sound political logic right implied there. Law and order causes somebody a headache, so let's abolish the whole fucking thing. It doesn't have to be an argument in favor of completely doing away with law and order, just some portion of it. (Minarchism, free market, unrestricted capitalism, the various leftist anarchist ideologies) BOOM! You have a new power vacuum, waiting to create a status quo even worse than the one that existed previously.
I'm going to have side with Tapey on this. edit; this would also be one of the areas where Brian37 tends to be dead-on.
“A meritocratic society is one in which inequalities of wealth and social position solely reflect the unequal distribution of merit or skills amongst human beings, or are based upon factors beyond human control, for example luck or chance. Such a society is socially just because individuals are judged not by their gender, the colour of their skin or their religion, but according to their talents and willingness to work, or on what Martin Luther King called 'the content of their character'. By extension, social equality is unjust because it treats unequal individuals equally.” "Political Ideologies" by Andrew Heywood (2003)
And exactly what point do these permits serve? No one actually reviews these permits or inspects anything before issuing them. You simply show up, fill out an application that gets rubber stamped and pay your fee. The only useful thing the permits do is collect revenue. Which brings about the question, should the government charge a fee for you to simply start a business?
I don't think so. I think it is beneficial to make it as easy as possible for anyone to start a business. If someone is dirt poor and wants to start selling lemonade or sandwiches for cash, they ought to be able to without shelling out $300 before even purchasing the ingredients. All you are doing is preventing the poor from competing in the market place. Granted, $300 isn't a whole lot of cash that blocks a lot of people from the market place. But for these kids, $300 might as well have been $3000 or $30000. It is simply a micro example of what is a very real problem for many people who attempt to start businesses.
It isn't uncommon for fees and licenses to start a business to be in the thousands or in some cases tens of thousands, depending on your type of business, location and whether or not you will hire employees etc. Many businesses do simply operate out of ignorance without the proper permits and fees and most (if not all) operate without being ADA compliant. The sad truth is that an attorney or politician with a stick up their ass can make life hell for pretty much any company, even one that makes an honest attempt to do everything legally.
If anyone really wants to make sure they are doing everything legally and cover their ass, they should have a lawyer and a CPA and that creates a very real barrier to starting a business for many people, since attorneys and CPA's are expensive. All in the name of "protecting" the public, which as AIGS points out, they do a pretty crappy job of as violations happen everywhere.
If, if a white man puts his arm around me voluntarily, that's brotherhood. But if you - if you hold a gun on him and make him embrace me and pretend to be friendly or brotherly toward me, then that's not brotherhood, that's hypocrisy.- Malcolm X
So the government shouldn't be able to intervene if a business serves spoiled food or if an employee has hepatitis?
"I do this real moron thing, and it's called thinking. And apparently I'm not a very good American because I like to form my own opinions."
— George Carlin
What does that have to do with getting a permit? Either one could happen regardless of whether or not you have a permit and I never said a business shouldn't be liable for any harm caused through negligence.
If, if a white man puts his arm around me voluntarily, that's brotherhood. But if you - if you hold a gun on him and make him embrace me and pretend to be friendly or brotherly toward me, then that's not brotherhood, that's hypocrisy.- Malcolm X
I imagine the permits or required just so the government has a record of the business, so they know they need to tax you on something. Its always about tax.
Whatever goes upon two legs is an enemy.
Whatever goes upon four legs, or has wings, is a friend.
No animal shall wear clothes.
No animal shall sleep in a bed.
No animal shall drink alcohol.
No animal shall kill any other animal.
All animals are equal.
The county that issues the permit can have health inspectors visit to make sure you are following codes.
There are twists of time and space, of vision and reality, which only a dreamer can divine
H.P. Lovecraft
You don't want businesses to have to pay licensing fees - wouldn't that include food handling licenses?
"I do this real moron thing, and it's called thinking. And apparently I'm not a very good American because I like to form my own opinions."
— George Carlin
That's BS's point - he doesn't believe that people should need to buy permits (or follow codes, BS?).
"I do this real moron thing, and it's called thinking. And apparently I'm not a very good American because I like to form my own opinions."
— George Carlin
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Red Herring.
The government has the responsibility to fix serious problems. That does not mean that the problem is at the hands of the company that provides you with the food. However, when you get to the level of actual consumer interaction, we are looking at businesses which have all the paperwork in order but it is a huge pain in the ass for everyone.
A couple of years ago, the government recalled all the spinach in the entire country because a dozen people got sick. The issue turned out to be that some animal took a dump up stream from one farm but they never even figured out which farm it was. So for a couple of weeks, my favorite Italian restaurant could not serve steamed spinach.
Then there was the time that they recalled like 30 million pounds of ground beef. This was not an issue even for the supermarkets who sold the bad product to people who got sick.
All sources of protein suspected of coming from China are subject to quarantine at the port of entry without need for inspection because it is so nasty. Last year, a whole lot of people lost the family pet to kidney failure because of that mess. Not the fault of Ralston Purina.
I am not sure how lemonade could get tainted. Even if the lemons were grown in infected soil, the acidity would kill whatever germs there were. Even so, if something was wrong with the lemonade, the government should investigate and find out what the problem is. The problem is going to be upstream. Permit or not, bottled lemon juice, sugar and tap water are not the fault of the family who set up a lemonade stand.
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not a red herring if the position is that no business should pay permits and licensing fees.
"I do this real moron thing, and it's called thinking. And apparently I'm not a very good American because I like to form my own opinions."
— George Carlin
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Well, you can ask beyond for clarification if you want but I did not read his post as asserting that businesses should have carte blanch to do as they please.
Really, the government needs a certain amount of money to pay the people who regulate businesses. They should collect that money from registration fees. However, when they are so flush with cash that they can close down a lemonade stand, then something is clearly amiss.
Consider the role of OSHA. When it was created, businesses really were not all that excited to have new rules that they had to pay cash to be in compliance with. However, decades later, it turns out that OSHA really was a good idea because it saves companies quite a bit of money. It provides a more productive work force because people don't have to take as much time off for injuries that really were trivially preventable. Fewer worker die from stupid things and companies don't have to spend as much to train new workers because the retention rate is greatly improved.
@Beyond Saving: As a business owner, do you see much of an issue with OSHA?
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You have never taken the food handler's test, have you?
Part of the purpose behind the idea of a permit for selling food and drinks is that everyone who is handling the food understands how cross contamination can occur and how to prevent it. The rule in many counties is to have at least one person for each shift have a food handler's permit. This means they have paid a small fee (it was $5 10 years ago in the county where I worked for the health department) and they took and passed a test. The test made sure they understood time and temperature and cross contamination.
FYI - the most likely source of contamination for lemonade (and other cold drinks) is the ice. Ice is easily contaminated and there are a number of bacteria that seem to survive just fine in it. No, the lemonade is not always acid enough to prevent bacterial growth in the ice. That is why, if you are in a place where you are not sure about the safety of the food and drink, ask for a sealed bottle or can, not a glass with ice.
Also FYI - the exact rules and costs for permitting food establishments vary by county or by jurisdiction. Not by state, not by the feds. The state and federal gov't agencies only get involved for food manufacturers, commercial packers, farms, and livestock operations. The break down is by number of people that could be potentially made ill through improper food handling.
Also - JMNSHO, we would see fewer food borne illness outbreaks if the departments that do the inspecting were properly funded so as to have enough inspectors to catch and fine the bad actors. It is obvious to me that the potential for civil lawsuits do not worry the large companies enough to ensure their compliance with safe food handling practices.
And, the kid would most likely not have been hassled if there had been no complaints.
-- I feel so much better since I stopped trying to believe.
"We are entitled to our own opinions. We're not entitled to our own facts"- Al Franken
"If death isn't sweet oblivion, I will be severely disappointed" - Ruth M.
What about 'Paracon', which is a theory concerning government policys,put forth by Michael Albert from Z Magazine, I forgot to put a link to this, sorry.
Signature ? How ?
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OK, how do we get there from my being certified to make food for people with late stage HIV?
Sure, things can go wrong with ice but if you use city water, you should be reasonably safe there.
Also, I partially agree with you about the inspectors not being able to do their jobs. One of the problems that we have around here (and I tend to think probably all over the USA) is the “adult singles” groups. Basically widow(er)s and divorcées open their houses to other old people who want to find new fuck buddies. The organizers charge an admission cost sufficient to pay for all the food and booze which is consumed along with enough profit to cover administration costs and keep a bit of cash for themselves.
I have been told by health inspectors that they wish they could go after those people because they know that there are occasional problems that get people sick. However, detecting the groups and tracking them is nearly impossible so they can only react to whatever comes from that.
Getting back to my point about upstream contamination, another large disease vector is neighborhood parties. One person brings bad hamburger meat to a barbeque and lots of people get sick. Is that the fault of the person who bought the bad meat or is it the fault of the slaughter house that cut up the cow and let bovine e-coli get in the meat?
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You asked about lemonade and how hard it must be to contaminate. Cross contamination - did the kid wash his hands when he last took a dump? Did he handle your ice bare handed afterwards? Does he even know to wash his hands with soap? Some families, don't, if you didn't know.
Definitely. If you go to a potluck, skip the potato salad or any other salad with mayonnaise, store bought or home made. Deviled eggs, too. Sealed soda cans or bottles. Try to get the food that is at appropriate temperature and don't go back for seconds (or thirds) two hours after the food has been put out.
For the bad meat question - how many people got sick and where? If it is just at that one party, then the cook/supplier didn't keep the meat cold enough or didn't cook it to high enough temperatures. If it is most parties who bought meat from the same store, it is the slaughter house/grocery store.
And e coli is e coli. Bovine is no different from the stuff you have in your own gut. Yes, you have e coli in your gut, we all do. It is part of the flora and fauna that digest your meals. It is only a problem if you are immune compromised (HIV or immuno-suppressant drugs eg), or if you get an overgrowth. Which you can get from meat that is contaminated excessively. If you check the FDA standards, you will see that a little e coli (or rat hair, or insect parts...) is allowed in processed food. The amount is based on the least amount to sicken the fewest people yet not seriously compromise profits by having too high of standards.
See, BS, they really are thinking of the company's bottom line. The standards are based on experimental evidence over years of dealing with processed foods and people hospitalized for food borne illnesses.
-- I feel so much better since I stopped trying to believe.
"We are entitled to our own opinions. We're not entitled to our own facts"- Al Franken
"If death isn't sweet oblivion, I will be severely disappointed" - Ruth M.
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Cj: while it is true that parents probably don't know health codes and certainly cannot police the kiddies to that level, that is not the case with an official swooping down to shut down a lemonade stand.
Back before I had my certification, I was doing a charity fund raiser and so I did not know where the problem was. Well, we were in a public park on a Saturday morning when an off duty health inspector dropped by.
We had the proper permit for what we were doing but we had still made a mistake. We had a large bowl of bagels which, instead of being wrapped in plastic were just out for people to sort through. They had been bought fresh from the bakery that morning but still, you don't know where people's hands have been.
As far as the potluck thing, yah, I would not bring egg salad or eat anyone else's. But I was not going in the direction of violations of FATTOM or HACCP. Se my earlier post about the nasty supermarket deli for a HACCP violation. Rather, I was addressing that despite every possible control, food poisoning can and does happen.
If you bring a box of frozen hamburgers to a cookout and the next day, the government recalls ten million pounds of ground beef, well I hope you did not get the bad stuff. The thing is that you do not have any control over the matter.
Even so, this whole angle seems to me to be off topic. What we are dealing with here is not risky food. Rather, we are looking at a situation where a petty bureaucrat swooped in to shut down something that clearly did not violate HACCP or FATTOM and only because the paperwork was not in order.
Do you care to address the civil liberties question which is clearly at hand?
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Curious is the health inspector going to come into my home and make sure I cook properly? Are they going around during Halloween to "protect the children"?
All these stupid laws do is stop kids from having fun. Can't take karate or gymnastics anymore, they might get hurt. Can't go jogging, they might get hurt, and then wonder why kids are so fat and lazy. WE HAVE TO PROTECT THE CHILDREN!
Are the kids suppose to pay special filtering fees for the ice? I mean come on.
Not to mention, they aren't paying min wage and don't have unions.
I doubt the kid would have been busted if there hadn't been some busy body neighbor calling in to complain. Contrary to popular opinion, health inspectors would much rather keep tabs on restaurants, grocery stores, fairs, and other populous venues where real outbreaks could get started. They are really very busy and respond to complaints because if they don't, the county/city commissioners get all over their case. (Been there, seen it happen.)
Let's review - it is the law in that jurisdiction (county, city or both). Someone complained to the health department. The health inspector must apply the law as evenly as possible to everyone or hear yet more complaints - as routed through his/her bosses, the commissioners. From the video, no one is going to be homeless because of the fine, in fact, it looks like one or both of the parents are perfectly capable of appealing the fine to the commissioners/board of health/health officer. Should they have to go through all of that? Everyone else does, why should they be an exception?
Is it right? Fair? Change the law.
-- I feel so much better since I stopped trying to believe.
"We are entitled to our own opinions. We're not entitled to our own facts"- Al Franken
"If death isn't sweet oblivion, I will be severely disappointed" - Ruth M.
The health inspector does not give a rat's ass about your personal kitchen as long as you aren't trying to run a catering service out of it. And no, feeding the neighbor children when they zoom through with your children, is not a catering service. I was once known as "the apple mom" and every kid in our neighborhood would stop by for an apple whenever they had an urge for same. I always kept the small apples around for snacks.
Again, Halloween no one pays for the treats they pick up. The laws are usually very clear about money changing hands before anyone from the health department gets involved. If you have a potluck and 85% of the attendees get Hepatitis A from the potato salad, the health department will be interested until they learn it was Aunt Mary's and not Costco's potato salad. If it is Costco's, they will then see if it was the store or if it was improper handling after the salad was purchased. You know, the bacteria and viruses that cause you to puke all day do not have return envelopes so it isn't easy to tell where they came from. Costco would like to be sure it was not their unsafe practices, but yours, and so they will be very eager to cooperate with any investigation.
If it was Aunt Mary's potato salad, the health department will just shrug and offer some pamphlets on safe food handling or refer you to the local Cooperative Extension office. If you have one in your area.
There are laws about kids participating in gymnastics, kung fu and jogging? I can see if you were making your kid run 60 miles a day, you might be up for child abuse, but really? Where do you live? If parents choose to restrict their children's activities, it is none of my business. If this means their children are overweight, what - are we supposed to make laws requiring that children exercise? And where are the civil liberties in that?
How important is it to you to not be ill? When I worked in an office building, there was a small lunch counter inside. And one of the food servers had Hepatitis A - and had no symptoms. She didn't realize she had it. Happens sometimes, sort of like Typhoid Mary. She managed to give it to over 20 people, a couple of whom had to go to the emergency room. Nasty health inspectors came in and made everyone get tested. Then they required she be treated and stay at home until the course of treatment was completed. You know, no one objected - not her boss, not her, not anyone who got sick. And this was just in the last 5 years, not some time in the distant past.
That is the problem with public health laws - they work too well and people forget what it is like to try to survive without them.
-- I feel so much better since I stopped trying to believe.
"We are entitled to our own opinions. We're not entitled to our own facts"- Al Franken
"If death isn't sweet oblivion, I will be severely disappointed" - Ruth M.
I think if you buy lemonade from a child on the street it's caveat emptor but the person who fined them was probably there trying to catch people letting their property for parking without a permit.
There are twists of time and space, of vision and reality, which only a dreamer can divine
H.P. Lovecraft
Exactly, the people charging for parking paid their $300 each for a permit. The kids parents should have done the same.
When I was a kid, my dad was very involved with the Boy Scouts. They did a lot of this kind of stuff - exhibitions, vendor stands, car washes, etc. And my best recollection is the necessary permissions and permits were in place - and the parents researched the local laws to be sure all was proper - before the stand was set up.
-- I feel so much better since I stopped trying to believe.
"We are entitled to our own opinions. We're not entitled to our own facts"- Al Franken
"If death isn't sweet oblivion, I will be severely disappointed" - Ruth M.
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That is a good point Gauche.
Where I am going is more to the point of mens rea. Nobody (apart from that cult leader back in the 80's) has ever intentionally inflicted food poisoning on people and even that attempt did not work out so well.
There are standards for food service and none of them are violated by running a lemonade stand. So there is really no call to kill the venture regardless of the idea that it might have a non zero risk to the public.
Locally, we have a huge festival at the end of every summer. I think it is in two weeks but I will have to check. Anyway, a couple of years ago, one of the food vendors served bad chicken to several thousand people. Again, not the fault of the company.
Because the whole thing is county wide, there were several health departments involved and eventually they tracked it back to the real source of the problem. However, here we are not even talking about anyone getting sick. The whole point of the video was that the family had not put out cash up front for permission from the government to run a standard kid thing that never has caused a problem in 200 years.
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Please review the video. Apparently this is a yearly event. Everyone else has paid a $300 permit fee for making money from people parking on their front lawns. There is probably an inspector who goes up and down the street checking everyone's permit. The kids were first fined for not having an operating permit. Then the inspector most likely told the health inspector about it and the fine was increased.
The parents have the option of appealing the fine. They had the responsibility of checking with local laws before setting their kids up. I know that county I worked for had laws to exempt things like lemonade stands. It was the parent's responsibility to check. And as the reporter noticed, they had coolers and coolers full of lemonade - it wasn't just one or two kids trying to be entrepreneurs, they had a lot of help from their parents. Most places I know, if you set up that kind of operation at the county fair, you are inspected. Even if it is only sodas and/or cookies.
If it was truly for charity - and we don't have anyone's word for that except one parent and one kid - there might have been an option for waiving the fees and/or health requirements. Again, the parents should have checked.
What your children need to learn, is we all live here together. We all follow the rules or we suffer the consequences. I don't care if it is health permits, operating permits, following the speed limit, paying taxes owed, or getting home in time for your curfew. You break the law (rules), you deal with the consequences.
-- I feel so much better since I stopped trying to believe.
"We are entitled to our own opinions. We're not entitled to our own facts"- Al Franken
"If death isn't sweet oblivion, I will be severely disappointed" - Ruth M.
What about Anarchism Lite?
*cough*
“A meritocratic society is one in which inequalities of wealth and social position solely reflect the unequal distribution of merit or skills amongst human beings, or are based upon factors beyond human control, for example luck or chance. Such a society is socially just because individuals are judged not by their gender, the colour of their skin or their religion, but according to their talents and willingness to work, or on what Martin Luther King called 'the content of their character'. By extension, social equality is unjust because it treats unequal individuals equally.” "Political Ideologies" by Andrew Heywood (2003)
My point was that whether or not you have health/safety inspectors etc is completely unrelated to what you charge for permits. You can still have inspectors even if you don't charge $300 for a vendors permit. You can still have all the same regulations. Permit does not equal inspectors, and arguing about inspectors and if we should have more, less etc. is completely irrelevant to the question of whether or not we should have permits required and whether or not they should cost potentially prohibitive amounts. Simply having your business registered with your state revenue department is sufficient enough for the government to determine the appropriate businesses to send the appropriate inspectors to.
And I never said anything about having no inspections or no regulations. Those are words that others on this site have routinely thrown in my mouth. I just don't think people should be shut out of competing in the marketplace because of some dumb ass permit. Where do you draw the line? And the purpose of these laws isn't to protect people, the purpose is to limit and control the businesses that can operate in a given industry. Maybe with food you can make a compelling argument that permits are needed on some level to track and prevent food borne disease. But a permit to let people park in YOUR fucking lawn? A permit to set up a vending stand in YOUR yard? A permit for a fucking garage sale in YOUR garage? A permit to put up a fucking sign in YOUR window? A license to give drunk people free rides home in YOUR car? A license to cut peoples hair? A license to be an interior designer? How the hell do those do anything to protect people?
If, if a white man puts his arm around me voluntarily, that's brotherhood. But if you - if you hold a gun on him and make him embrace me and pretend to be friendly or brotherly toward me, then that's not brotherhood, that's hypocrisy.- Malcolm X
Why is the website acting wonky?
Really cj, we should just "follow the rules"?
If we followed the rules, women wouldn't be allowed to vote, and blacks would be at the back of the bus. Hey, those were the rules, and to break them we deserve to be punished.
If I wanted to open a business, I would have to hire a small army of lawyers to make sure I was following regulations.
Should the parents have hired a lawyer to check the local lemonade laws? So on top of the $300 permit, they would have to pay hundreds more in legal fees. It would have been better to take that money and just given it to the charity. It's like the government got more than the charity. This is extortion. Nothing less.
If we just "followed the rules" nothing would change.
Irrelevant examples. If you want change -actual change, not watered-down political campaign change- most people start through completely legal means, and when those utterly fail beyond any tangible possibility of getting the change one wants, then the next logical step becomes breaking laws to get the progress society truthfully wants. When that fails as well, the only solution is an armed revolution.
Neither justifiable crime or bloody revolutions are ever the first choice, for reasons that should be damned well obvious to most. Also, I'm sure everyone thinks that some law or another is unfair and unnecessary, while the overwhelming majority (say, 95+%) of the population would rather it stay in force.
“A meritocratic society is one in which inequalities of wealth and social position solely reflect the unequal distribution of merit or skills amongst human beings, or are based upon factors beyond human control, for example luck or chance. Such a society is socially just because individuals are judged not by their gender, the colour of their skin or their religion, but according to their talents and willingness to work, or on what Martin Luther King called 'the content of their character'. By extension, social equality is unjust because it treats unequal individuals equally.” "Political Ideologies" by Andrew Heywood (2003)
I imagine there are very few laws that 95% of people want in force. This particular one certainly doesn't have support of 95% of people.
Edit: Actually, I could be all for a system where all laws required the approval of 95% of the population. You would probably end up with a country very much like what I advocate, virtually no laws, just the important ones like laws against murder and theft.
If, if a white man puts his arm around me voluntarily, that's brotherhood. But if you - if you hold a gun on him and make him embrace me and pretend to be friendly or brotherly toward me, then that's not brotherhood, that's hypocrisy.- Malcolm X
Funny, that. In my mind, the laws 95% of the constituency are behind are all the laws I find agreeable anyhow. Interesting the striking similarities in both hypothetical situations.
I suppose such is the fallacy of such an extreme selection bias based entirely around one person in each case: ourselves.
“A meritocratic society is one in which inequalities of wealth and social position solely reflect the unequal distribution of merit or skills amongst human beings, or are based upon factors beyond human control, for example luck or chance. Such a society is socially just because individuals are judged not by their gender, the colour of their skin or their religion, but according to their talents and willingness to work, or on what Martin Luther King called 'the content of their character'. By extension, social equality is unjust because it treats unequal individuals equally.” "Political Ideologies" by Andrew Heywood (2003)
My preference would be a country where all laws expire after five years and have to be remade if they are still valid. Then Congress would have to spend a fair amount of time figuring out what priorities remain on the table.
The big ones like murder and rape should not have much problem going through but the minor laws that do need to be discusses regularly would take so much time to deal with that there would have to be a huge effort to decide what even comes up for debate vs. what is simply allowed to expire without comment.
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What a drama queen.
Look, you don't want to follow the laws and rules, whatever. There will be fines, and then you may really want a lawyer.
There is this handy place you can look up the relevant laws, rules, permits required, etc. It is called the internet. And if you search on your city's website you can find all the pertinent requirements for whatever you wish to do. And if you don't understand the words on the page, you can call the number listed for a real person to assist you. City of Portland Oregon has the special events permits and rules all on one web page.
http://www.portlandonline.com/omf/index.cfm?c=29561
And every time I have had a question, the person on the phone was pleasant and helpful. If they aren't when you call, I am sorry, but I have no control over them or you. Next time you have to call a nasty bureaucrat, try starting in a pleasant tone with, "Hello, I have a problem with <this issue>, and I was wondering if you could help."
Civil disobedience --
The entire purpose of civil disobedience is to disobey the law with the intent of having the consequences of your disobedience as widely spread by the news media as possible. You do not evade your consequences, you accept your fines or jail time, but you make sure everybody and their cousin hears about how badly you are treated. With the desire to ultimately change the law through the public pressure on the law makers.
I have a hard time believing this person was trying to change any law, it seemed to me she was evading the law. Whether or not she was deliberately ignorant, I refuse to speculate about. I still contend she gave a poor example to the children.
As for whether or not anyone should have to pay for a permit, that is not my choice, my law, or my community. Obviously, someone thought it made sense. It is my experience that if you investigate just where these laws come from, it is usually some neighbor complaining about the person who started the rodeo, their elected official either agreed or was pressured into agreeing, and tah-dah! New law.
There are ways to change the law. This one most likely won't work.
-- I feel so much better since I stopped trying to believe.
"We are entitled to our own opinions. We're not entitled to our own facts"- Al Franken
"If death isn't sweet oblivion, I will be severely disappointed" - Ruth M.
http://www.forbes.com/sites/erikkain/2011/08/25/massachusetts-state-police-shutdown-twelve-year-olds-green-tea-stand/
Christopher Carr’s twelve-year-old stepson had set up a smoothie and green-tea stand near their house when they moved back to the States after the earthquake in Japan. After they’d set up shop, Christopher took his daughter back inside to get some lunch, leaving his son to manage things at the stand.
After my daughter finished eating and as we approached the end of our street where the drink stand was, I could see from afar that the sign was pulled up and put away, the cooler was shut with everything which we had so carefully arranged on the tray table put away, and my stepson was huddled up and sitting on the rail, staring out between his knees at the ocean.
“What happened?” I asked when I got down there. I wondered if he had gotten discouraged that no one was buying his drinks or maybe that no one could understand his accent. Or maybe he was just lonely down there by himself.
“The police told me to pack up and go home,” he said. Or, more accurately I discovered after making a few phone calls, the town police swung by and wished him good luck, and then afterwards, “someone in brown” came by and made my stepson stop selling drinks at the end of our street, because this required a permit, and my stepson did not have a permit to sell drinks.
After hearing a little more from my stepson and talking to the town police, I discovered that it was the Massachusetts State Police that broke up our lemonade stand. After attempting several times to contact the State Police, I reached only answering machines. Apparently, having someone on call on weekends is not in the Massachusetts State Police’s budget (but breaking up lemonade stands is somehow cost-effective).
If, if a white man puts his arm around me voluntarily, that's brotherhood. But if you - if you hold a gun on him and make him embrace me and pretend to be friendly or brotherly toward me, then that's not brotherhood, that's hypocrisy.- Malcolm X