Posts Tagged ‘regulation’

When you’ve got a guy like Senator John McCain who says “The battlefield is the United States of America,” it tells you that almost nothing is safe in the Land of the Free.

Whatever remains of civil liberties is going to feel the full brunt of the state’s boot heel.

They’re already regulating some of the most fundamental aspects of life, from how we are allowed to educate our children to what we can / cannot put in our bodies to the very nature of money.

Read more by Simon Black at SovereignMan.com

I have prepared this visual representation of the bureaucratic lifecycle:

Read more by Charles Hugh Smith at OfTwoMinds.com

According to a new survey, the average person breaks the law 260 times a year . . . or five times a week. Now, granted, they’re all really minor laws . . . but still, illegal is illegal. Here are the top 10 most common laws people break . . .

Read more at 973radionow.com

and also at dailymail.co.uk

Tuesday’s stunning decision by a Milwaukee County circuit court judge that Milwaukee’s taxicab ordinance is unconstitutional could provide some impetus to a plan touted by Ald. Bob Bauman.

Bauman, whose district includes the city’s downtown area, wants to increase the number of taxicab permits in the city, but it would also update vehicle standards and increase inspections. Bauman’s plan is expected to be discussed at 9 a.m. on Thursday at City Hall.

Bauman said Wednesday that Circuit Court Judge Jane Carroll’s decision “reinforces our need to move forward with some reforms.”

Read more by Don Walker of the Journal Sentinel

Because the mainstream media lobbied every bit as hard as Obama to win passage of ObamaCare, they are every bit as invested in doing whatever is necessary to see that it is perceived as a success. Unfortunately for Americans who expect truth from their media, this means the media are having to manufacture a false reality that says ObamaCare is, to steal a phrase, “doing fine.”

In order to manufacture this phony reality, the media must further sell their blackened soul by violating one of their most cherished principals: reporting on how government policy hits America’s weakest the hardest. It’s just a fact that the worst fallout of ObamaCare is already landing hard on the working class, who are losing work hours, jobs, and their insurance.

Read more by John Nolte at Breitbart.com

Rage over the waste and injustice of agents sent by the federal government to bang on doors of law-abiding citizens to ask probing, creepy questions is normally something that bubbles up only every 10 years. But ever since the federal government became a cancerous leviathan, the outrage is now an annual occurrence.

Read more by Charles Hurt at WashingtonTimes.com

Multiple rural county sheriffs from Utah testified Thursday about the abusive use of police power by Bureau of Land Management rangers or forest protection officers with the U.S. Forest Service.

They are asserting it is time to rein in the authority the agencies should have never been allowed to exercise.

Sheriffs from San Juan, Kane and Garfield counties spoke in favor of HB155, sponsored by Rep. Mike Noel, R-Kanab, which proposes to limit BLM rangers and forest protection officers from exercising police power over state and local laws unless someone’s safety is at risk or federal contracts are in place with local police agencies.

“You cannot use our (laws) to arrest our people and issue citations,” Noel said. “We don’t believe they ever had that authority. Our chief law enforcement officer is the locally elected sheriff who is accountable to the people every four years.”

Read more by Amy Joi O’Donoghue at DeseretNews.com

Why?

http://www.standardtime.com/

Study Shows Daylight Savings Time Change Increases Your Risk for Heart Attack

If you can get arrested for hunting or fishing without a license, but not for being in the country illegally … you might live in a country founded by geniuses but run by idiots.

If you have to get your parents’ permission to go on a field trip or take an aspirin in school, but not to get an abortion … you might live in a country founded by geniuses but run by idiots.

If the only school curriculum allowed to explain how we got here is evolution, but the government stops a $15 million construction project to keep a rare spider from evolving to extinction … you might live in a country founded by geniuses but run by idiots.

If you have to show identification to board an airplane, cash a check, buy liquor, or check out a library book, but not to vote who runs the government … you might live in a country founded by geniuses but run by idiots.

If the government wants to ban stable, law-abiding citizens from owning gun magazines with more than ten rounds, but gives 20 F-16 fighter jets to the crazy new leaders in Egypt … you might live in a country founded by geniuses but run by idiots.

If, in the largest city, you can buy two 16-ounce sodas, but not a 24-ounce soda because 24-ounces of a sugary drink might make you fat … you might live in a country founded by geniuses but run by idiots.

Read more at http://www.economicnoise.com/2013/02/27/founded-by-geniuses-and-run-by-idiots/

While I oppose most gun control proposals, there is one group of Americans I do believe should be disarmed: federal agents. The use of force by federal agents to enforce unjust and unconstitutional laws is one of the major, albeit overlooked, threats to liberty. Too often Americans are victimized by government force simply for engaging in commercial transactions disproved of by Congress and the federal bureaucracy.

For example, the offices of Rawesome Foods in Venice, California, have been repeatedly raided by armed federal and state agents, and Rawesome’s founder, 65-year old James Stewart, has been imprisoned. What heinous crime justified this action? Rawesome sold unpasteurized (raw) milk and cheese to willing customers – in a state where raw milk is legal! You cannot even drink milk from a cow without a federal permit!

Read more by Ron Paul at the-free-foundation.org

When did we decide that we wanted a law that could make unlocking your smartphone a criminal offense? The answer is that we never really decided.

This is now the law of the land:

ADVISORY

BY DECREE OF THE LIBRARIAN OF CONGRESS

IT SHALL HENCEFORCE BE ORDERED THAT AMERICANS SHALL NOT UNLOCK THEIR OWN SMARTPHONES.

PENALTY: In some situations, first time offenders may be fined up to $500,000, imprisoned for five years, or both. For repeat offenders, the maximum penalty increases to a fine of $1,000,000, imprisonment for up to ten years, or both.*

That’s right, starting this weekend it is illegal to unlock new phones to make them available on other carriers.

Read more by Derek Khanna at theatlantic.com

As the Newton tragedy tidewaters slowly recede, shooters have seen ammunition in certain popular calibers dry to a trickle in all the usual places.  What you can get will cost you what you got and then some, but that doesn’t concern me that much because I reload (and you should too). But with handloading in mind and ammunition as well as gun control in the news, would there, could there, ever be a ban on reloading supplies, something that truly could leave many shooters with nothing more than gun case full of expensive paperweights?

Hey, is that a single stage, Lee Press in your truck?
No matter whether you’re a hunter, a run n’ gunner, a home defender or a plinker and no matter what gun you own or prefer, your weapon isn’t worth a solid baseball bat without ammunition. More and more shooters are realizing the importance of a consistent supply of ammunition turning to reloading their own ammunition, but could this spurred interest in the hobby mean lawmakers will target hand-presses next?

Read more by David LaPell at guns.com

–SNIP– THE CURRENT SYSTEM IS NOT A FREE MARKET

The current system is not a case of the free market failing the little guy and favoring the wealthy. Right now:

You cannot choose one medication over another, even beforehand, on the basis of cost;
You cannot choose one hospital over another based on the quality of management and nursing support;
You cannot choose your doctor based on hourly rate or volume of patients;
You cannot choose what procedures you want or need based on how much they cost from one hospital or doctor to the next.

This is insane.

–SNIP– THE SOLUTIONS ARE OUT THERE, BUT SPECIAL INTERESTS WANT A QUICK FIX

John Mackey is the co-founder and CEO of Whole Foods, a national grocery chain that specializes in organic, unprocessed foods and natural remedies. It is an immensely successful venture, with 340 stores worldwide and 73,000 full-time employees, all of which qualify for a custom health care plan the company has devised. In 2009, amidst the health care reform battle, Mackey wrote an op-ed in the Wall Street Journal that compiled the most important and understandable reform principles needed in health care, and presented them as an alternative. The current law take almost none of them into account, and simply changes who pays for it rather that moving the industry toward a real free market.

These solutions are not the be all-end all of reform, but they are the most fundamental change we could advocate that would take our current system and move it closer to one that is cheaper, more accessible, freer and more flexible to changing patient needs and scientific discoveries.

Read more by Ed Willing at FoundersIntent.org

This is all over the Web:

You know you live in a Country run by idiots if…

You can get arrested for expired tags on your car but not for being in the country illegally.

Your government believes that the best way to eradicate trillions of dollars of debt is to spend trillions more of our money.

A seven year old boy can be thrown out of school for calling his teacher “cute”, but hosting a sexual exploration or diversity class in grade school is perfectly acceptable.

The Supreme Court of the United States can rule that lower courts cannot display the 10 Commandments in their courtroom…while sitting in front of a display of the 10 Commandments.

Children are forcibly removed from parents who appropriately discipline them while children of “underprivileged” drug addicts are left to rot in filth infested cesspools of a ‘home’

Read more by Gary North at The Tea Party Economist

Illegally downloading a couple dozen songs can earn you a million-dollar fine. Setting some Robert Frost verses to music can make you a criminal. Software or hardware that could possibly be used to copy DVDs — illegal. And thanks to congressional action every couple of decades, Disney still holds a copyright over Mickey Mouse, whom Walt first created nearly a century ago.

The law and law enforcement around copyright has moved far beyond its purpose of promoting arts and sciences and has become a textbook case of collusion between big business and big government.

Read more by Timothy P. Carney at WashingtonExaminer.com