Is it possible, in America, that government will not allow citizens to make a living describing national landmarks without holding a license from the state? A license, literally, to speak about our democratic heritage. Not a business license — no, a second license from government — by which government claims to permit a person to…
Laws/Regulations
Government Spending, Law, Laws/Regulations
Wisconsin: State Journal: Shame those who hide state contracts
by JOHN ADAMS •
The Government Accountability Board deserves credit for trying to put some teeth into the law that requires state agencies to post online the details of any contracts that involve more than $10,000 in state money…. Problem is, that website [to post details] has been mostly blank, as agencies have routinely ignored the requirement for online…
Laws/Regulations
Reason.tv‘s Nanny of the Month (Aug 2010): Police Chief Busts Guy Who Keeps Drunks Off the Street
by JOHN ADAMS •
Beautiful Whitewater, City, Laws/Regulations
Beautiful Whitewater
by JOHN ADAMS •
During the week, each morning, I’ve posted photos of wildflowers near a parking lot on our college campus. There are two reasons for posting them. Those photos appeared Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday. First, the flowers make beautiful photographs, however poor the photographer. Seen as they are, they’re lovely. Look back over the photos from…
Laws/Regulations
Wisconsin State prison head lives in Illinois – JSOnline
by JOHN ADAMS •
Exemptions: The state employee in charge of responding at a moment’s notice to riots and other disturbances in Wisconsin prisons recently moved to Illinois, more than 90 miles away from his office in Madison. The employee also received an exemption to state policy requiring him to keep his specially equipped emergency response vehicle at his…
Laws/Regulations, Libertarians, Liberty
When (Canadian) Bureaucrats Attack
by JOHN ADAMS •
Kevin Libin, of the Canadian National Post has a story about how Canadian officials are bullying a libertarian family of immigrants to Canada from what was Soviet-occupied Poland. They left a dictatorship, but they’ve run into the soft, oppressively bureaucratic culture of modern-day Canada. (Sadly, something like his story might easily happen in countless places…
Laws/Regulations
OSHA fines Wis. company again, this time for $375K – BusinessWeek
by JOHN ADAMS •
Laws/Regulations
How Is Smoking Pot Like Beating an Old Lady? – Reason Magazine
by JOHN ADAMS •
It’s like beating an old lady in the way it’s prosecuted and the sentences handed down for possession. The Associated Press reports that “[Udonis] Haslem was charged with possessing more than 20 grams of marijuana, a third-degree felony which could bring maximum punishments of a $5,000 fine and a five-year prison sentence.” Twenty grams is…
Laws/Regulations, Liberty
Institute for Justice: Free the Monks and Free Enterprise
by JOHN ADAMS •
We have become so regulated, and government has become so much a tool of particular businesses over others, that in Louisiana monks of Saint Joseph Abbey cannot even build and sell caskets for those who would prefer a simple casket. Fortunately, the Institute for Justice is prepared to defend the right of a monastery to…
Laws/Regulations, Taxes/Taxation
Applying So-Called Sin Taxes Sensibly
by JOHN ADAMS •
In a recent column at Bloomberg, Amity Shlaes writes that not all sin taxes, taxes on supposedly harmful behaviors, are applied to best revenue-generating effect. Shlaes is author of the excellent The Forgotten Man: A New History of the Great Depression. She finds that Franklin Roosevelt understood the best way to implement a ‘sin’ tax…
Laws/Regulations
Apology in Oregon After County Inspectors Shut Down Child’s Lemonade Stand
by JOHN ADAMS •
It was right for the county’s executive to apologize afterward, but telling that two county inspectors lacked the normal understanding to refrain from shutting the stand down. Here they are: Petty, small-minded, and contemptous of the culture in which they live. Alternatively, they don’t have the capacity required for exercise of simple authority. Apology in…
Laws/Regulations
Author David Gumpert on Raw Milk Consumption
by JOHN ADAMS •
I’ve posted occasionally about raw milk, and the inability of adult consumers to drink natural, unpasteurized milk even in a dairy state like Wisconsin. There’s a story at the Walworth County Gazette‘s online edition about an interview with David Gumpert, who’s written about raw milk. See, Author: More research needed on health risks of raw…