Today's nanny state report.
King County, near Seattle, passes a law that "appears to be the first of its kind in the state."
People who hope to beat the summer heat by swimming, floating or boating on rivers in King County must wear a life vest or face an $86 fine.
A divided County Council on Monday passed a personal flotation device ordinance by a five to four vote. Opponents said it was an intrusive move by "big government."
"This Council sometimes thinks it's everybody's mom," said Councilwoman Kathy Lambert, who voted "no."
OK, make that "mommy state." President Obama's food police, meanwhile, are messing with one of our favorite cereal sellers:
Tony the Tiger, some NASCAR drivers and cookie-selling Girl Scouts will be out of a job unless grocery manufacturers agree to reinvent a vast array of their products to satisfy the Obama administration's food police.
Either retool the recipes to contain certain levels of sugar, sodium and fats, or no more advertising and marketing to tots and teenagers, say several federal regulatory agencies.
The same goes for restaurants.
It's not just the usual suspected foods that are being targeted, such a thin mint cookies sold by scouts or M&Ms and Snickers, which sponsor cars in the Sprint Cup, but pretty much everything on a restaurant menu.
At some point, the wretched excesses become so commonplace and expected that parody is no longer possible. I t
Comments
We're there now Leo, and as I pointed out years ago (when you all laughed and scoffed) that smoking was just the tip of the iceberg.
Anybody else remember when a few of us were warning you that food was next?
I told you so.
Tim:
(raises hand)...I DO!
...and was also one of those "fear-mongering whackos"...that happened to be CORRECT (again)!
Who knew?
let's get rid of seatbelt laws next.
Andrew J Says:
June 23rd, 2011 at 9:13 pm
let
Except your way of natural selection will cost me, the responsible swimmer and driver, more in insurance and health care costs for those who don't know how to swim but don't use life jackets or drive without seatbelts and then go through the windshield as a result.
AJ
Andrew, That argument is a red herring but even it weren't, why would that matter to you? You've already planted yourself squarely in the national healthcare camp right? You think paying for EVERYONES healthcare is a good idea remember?
because we pay for everybody's health care, in one way or another, with insurance for everybody or not. And if that means govt. has to require you with a law not to do a header through your windshield because of the societal costs involved, so be it.
AJ
Tim, we're paying for everyone's healthcare NOW. When someone can't pay their bill, they don't find John Beresford Tipton paying the bill for them. They end up filing bankruptcy.
And it doesn't just drive up the hospital costs and the doctor costs that everyone else pays. When they file bankruptcy, the light company, the gas company, the cable company, the phone company, and everybody else they owe money to ends up getting screwed. You end up paying more for everything, when people go around without adequate health insurance.
If we require that everybody carry health insurance, we eliminate the cost of the lawyers making a living out of bankruptcy cases, the cost of collection agents, and the cost of repetitive billing by the hospitals, doctors, labs, etc.
What would be even better would be single-payer health care financing, so we could eliminate the commissions paid to insurance sales agents, and the salaries paid to adjusters who are trying to shift costs onto other insurers' policies. Medicare has very low administrative costs, as a percentage of the benefits paid out.
That's not to say that it couldn't be better. The VA negotiates for best prices; why can't medicare? But individual responsibility is an important conservative principle, and continuing to allow people to slough off their responsibility is a really dumb idea.
I agree with Harl; you want personal responsibility, make everyone wear a seatbelt, either voluntarily or through govt. coercion, and make everyone have minimal coverage to tend to their most pressing health needs. there's nothing wrong with curbing irresponsibility for the millions of us who are responsible.
AJ