Posted on 10/22/2012 10:07:51 AM PDT by 92nina
The nanny-staters have been busy this week finding every way they can attack your freedom.
Grant aimed at creating a force of peeping-toms: If you live in Massachusetts and Connecticut, watch out! The Department of Transportation has announced a grant for expanding these states’ ability to spy on drivers to make sure they are not texting while driving. Besides the obvious invasion of privacy, this money is wasted on preventing a behavior that is not linked to a marked increase in traffic fatalities. “The irony here is that the statistics really don’t bear out the ideas that these things are really as deadly as the federal government keeps telling us,” say a senior fellow of the Cato Institute. The government is spending thousands on creating a force of peeping-toms that will do nothing but peer into your car and pull you over if you do not behave the way they desire.
A ban on “hazardous” and “messy” snacks: No more Cheetos for kids at the LBJ Middle School in New Mexico. Another school has joined the crusade against allowing parents to dictate what snacks their kids can eat in schools. The school sent a letter home stating that this snack should be left home due to what the schools claims as “poor nutrition,” a cause of the spread of germs and a mess. The teacher who initiated the ban claimed it is a “health hazard” and a mess. One wonders what the next snack to be placed on the “messy” and “hazardous” list will be.
Purposed ban on people trying to make a living: St. Petersburg, Florida has decided to place many people out of a job for misguided safety concerns. The city is considering a ban on “sign spinners,” or people who are paid to stand on the road and advertise for companies. Council members claim that the safety of these sigh holders is there concern. However, one business owner says he knows of not a single incident where a sign spinner is harmed from being out near the street. Furthermore, one spinner, who was recently homeless, will end up back on the street if this ban is passed: “If they do that than if puts me right back where I came from.”
Another city to ban smoking outdoors: Despite overwhelming opposition from members of the community, Hopkinsville, Kentucky has banned all smoking in the city. Even worse this ban forces businesses to act as the soldiers for the mayor’s war on freedom. This is the most recent victory for the anti-smoking zealots, making Hopkinsville the seventh city in Kentucky to ban smoking city-wide.
Stay off your own lawn: In Irondale, Alabama, families will be banned from parking in their own front yards. In a 3-2 vote during a town meeting, the council banned parking in the front yard, with a $50 dollar fine for violating. In a show of arrogance, one council member said that if people actually opposed this, more would have shown up to the meeting that was announced 2 days prior and was held at 4 pm on a work day. Opponents rightly criticize this ban for it will disproportionately harm low-income and large families who need, in many cases, to park in their own yards.
There’s a difference between texting being safe and it being dangerous enough not only to be illegal but for the state to pay people to look for it. There are a million car activities that increase the likelihood of crashes yet aren’t necessarily illegal, from conversing with your carmates to fumbling with the radio/cs’s to eating to leaning over for whatever reason. Is texting like these, or is it more like drunk driving? I don’t know. One thing I do know is we are irrational when it comes to new technology, and the antitexting movement might be a mania.
If you trust texters more than drunks you are an idiot and don’t deserve to be listened to on the issue.
Worst ban we ran into when our kids were in gradeschool occurred when a nosey teacher discovered we always sent the kids in with fresh made french croissants ~ with chocholate chips, and sometimes with pate chaude.
The Vietnamese French bakery just down the street was on the right schedule.
The teacher told my spouse that such buns ~ SHE CALLED THEM BUNS ~ were not allowed because they were too flakey, and that she should come up with something other than Chinese food for morning snack!
I don't believe we complied. Now about life's lesson, when our youngest was visiting the Louvre several years back with a college group he found a kiosk based bread and cheese store in the vicinity and ate these fantastic lunches of fresh croissant with 2 or 3 kinds of cheese just now cut off a block by the proprietor. When too busy looking through the galleries he'd knock off a bowl of artichoke hearts ~ one of life's nicer surprises.
But buns? We never served just buns!
I cringe anymore when I see the word "drunks". Through years and years of activism MADD has gotten every state to lower the BAC level for "drunk" to .08. That's 3 beers for a 200 pound man and 1 beer for a 98 pound woman. Give me that over texters anyday.
MADD is now shooting for .05 BAC. That would mean that no woman under about 130 pounds would legally be able to have a single beer, drink or glass of wine. Not one.
>>If you trust texters more than drunks you are an idiot and don’t deserve to be listened to on the issue.
Another text-and-drive person heard from! BTW, the person who texts and drives is the idiot. I was being a little bit facetious, but subtlety is lost on people with two-digit IQs, isn’t it?
Rereading the article, I do agree that the author should cite the source for the claim that texting isn’t a high accident factor. Interestingly, here in Virginia, texting is a secondary offence when driving.
Found that Cato-Text quote in this article
http://www.politico.com/news/stories/1012/82605_Page2.html
Grant aims to help police tag texting drivers in the act
I am quite self-reliant. My MAIN trust is in God.
You are correct in that we have far too many laws, some of which are ridiculous. This does not mean that ALL laws are ridiculous. I trust in God, my good (and defensive) driving skills and I LIKE a law against texting...because it WILL reduce my chances of having to deal with an inattentive idiot behind the wheel.
That does NOT make me a socialist....not by a long shot.
You said: “You people are against freedom .” (sic)
NO, we are for common sense. Your generalization is illogical.
You people have no idea what this struggle is about.
This is a struggle between collectivism and individual freedom.
On the one had you have the government and on the other an individual . Is it a wonder we have 2 parties? and other countries do too.
The socialists statists always come up with some “perfect” sounding justification to take more of our freedoms. Do you not see their goal? It is to make us slaves , to empower the government.
It is their ( the statists/socialists) goal to tilt the balance even more to the government. what chance do we have if a city hall , an IRS decides to target us? an individual is small already and you want to empower government and government idiots more? every week there are more laws and regulations at all levels of government and you don't see this as a problem yet texters are? See the government and the media ( the democrats) pit us against other Americans be it the rich ( their original threat) then it's textters or whatever , there will be another manufactured threat next week etc.
Let's take the example of crime ok? I can as a thinking individual can use the freeedom remaining in the free market to make myself safe by buying guns, fences, security alarms , carrying a gun etc. as our freedom goes as they will take our guns then how will we protect ourselves ?
So let's take the great threat of texters: ok what if I drive more carefully or less or get a safer car , or learn about defensive driving ? no you would have the government protect you from texters and that would give you a FALSE sense of security ( as the many who didn't carry a gun and got tortured raped and murdered by criminals did) and you wouldn't drive more carefully . look this is just of the top of my head and I'm sure you will ridicule me for grammer etc. but I am very busy and writing fast.
You people have no idea what this struggle is about.
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I beg to differ. I know VERY well against whom we struggle.
Ephesians 6:12 “For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the powers, against the world forces of this darkness, against the spiritual forces of wickedness in the heavenly places.”
So let’s take the great threat of texters: ok what if I drive more carefully or less or get a safer car , or learn about defensive driving ? no you would have the government protect you from texters and that would give you a FALSE sense of security
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You are making quite a few false assumptions.
I DO drive both carefully and defensively. I do NOT depend on Government for my personal safety from a person who texts while driving. I have NO false sense of security. I have excellent auto insurance and a safe car. I am a realist. I DO, however, want a law in place that punishes one who texts while driving....because that person puts all of our lives in greater jeopardy.
I also like the law that requires a driver’s license. :-)
When we allow government to get the foot in the door then they take the whole thing. We are already past the tipping point (or close to it ) to tyranny and socialism.
Obama has added 11,000 pages of government regulations, 13,000 new pages of government regulations in Obamacare alone that will be implemented next year. At all levels of government they are writing laws and adding regulations on us chocking businesses and destroying our freedom. The only power government has is to crack down on “law breakers” you are empowering government for a media created threat. The media create a million threats (everything from fast food to big sodas , even gasoline is destroying the planet they say. So now did you know that cars will have to soon meet ridiculous mileage standards,at a NATIONAl level they have even banned 100 watt incandescent light bulbs and are pushing these curly bulbs that have mercury in them (the insanity of government). I'm not even sure but I think that all incandescent bulbs will be banned soon. where will it end ? this is why they passed 2700 pages of laws of Obamacare . If we give up on texters or whatever your fav threat is then it makes it easier for them to pass something you don't agree with like Obamacare. They even force us and car companies to put in seat belts yet all the sheep comply . you agree with that seatbelt too?
The individual is small and powerless against the government . so is a private business. but you are for empowering this government even more? This is a fight between individualism vs collectivism .you cannot be for empowering government without being a collectivists( socialist). They even put that film maker in jail for making that innocence of Muslims movie. the IRS can crack down on anyone one and even more so with Obamacare.
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