Lowering the Bar

Droopy-Pants Law Fails in Louisiana; Similar Measure Gutted in Florida

On April 22, a bill that would have ended the scourge of droopy pants throughout Louisiana failed in the state senate.  This was lamented by the bill's sponsor, Sen. Derrick Shepherd (D-New Orleans), who said the state should take a stand against low pants and other clothing felonies.  "The shorts are getting shorter, the tops are getting smaller, the cleavage is getting larger," he warned his colleagues.  (And, presumably, the pants are getting lower.)  "When are we going to say, 'Enough is enough'?"' 

How about now, was the answer of the Senate's Judiciary Committee, which killed the measure.  Committee member Sen. Yvonne Dorsey said she did not like baggy droopy pants any more than Shepherd does, but felt that people should have the right to wear them.

This was Shepherd's second attempt, and second failure, to raise standards and waistlines throughout the state.  As I previously reported, at least three Louisiana towns have passed ordinances against pants that droop or sag excessively, and the AP stated that about a dozen either have such laws or are considering them.  But with the failure of Shepherd's bill, most of his state will continue to be overrun with underpants.

A similar measure appears to be on the ropes in Florida, where Sen. Gary Siplin, who we last saw leaping a fence to escape a difficult press conference, introduced a similar bill last year.  SB 302, titled "Public School Dress Requirements," passed the Florida Senate in March and is now before the House.  Siplin seems to be trying a different tactic, since his bill was directed at the underwear itself as opposed to the pants that may expose them:

Section 1. Exposure of undergarments.--
      (1) A student may not wear and expose below-waist underwear while on the grounds of a public school in a manner that exposes or exhibits one's covered or uncovered sexual organs in a vulgar and indecent manner.

This version might need some tweaking, since as drafted it doesn't require pants to be worn at all, as long as one's underwear does not indecently exhibit one's sexual organs -- although even that is apparently okay as long as one's underwear is at or above one's waist.  My guess is that we would see some extremely interesting protest undergarments in Florida if this bill passed.

Sadly, an amendment to the bill offered by two Republican senators did not have enough support to pass.  That amendment would have clarified that the low-pants ban would "not apply to students who are studying refrigerator repair or plumbing."

While the bill is still on schedule in the Florida House (under the more descriptive title "Indecent Wearing of Below-Waist Underwear"), it appears to have been gutted by the committee to which it was assigned there. Without much comment, the committee reported the bill "favorably," but only after adopting a "substitute strike everything amendment" that replaced all the text.  The new text does not appear on the website, but would apparently refer the matter to local school boards, directing them to establish "dress-related requirements."

Given that state or local legislative bodies in at least five states (Florida, Virginia, Missouri, Louisiana, and Georgia) have now taken up this important issue, hopefully Congress will start work on a federal measure to standardize waistlines across the country.

Link: Florida House (Committee Analysis of HB 335)
Link: Orlando Sentinel

New York Town Takes Serious Action Against Silly String

On March 3, the town board of Huntington, New York took decisive action to maintain public order by banning the sale of Silly String within 1,500 feet of a parade route.  It joined several other U.S. communities in doing so.

Dangerous times call for drastic measures, ladies and gentlemen.

Silly String, originally known as "Foamable Resinous Composition," which I think is also an early Pink Floyd song, is a liquid sprayed from a can that comes out in string form "because of the structural properties of the plasticized resin" in the liquid.  (That's from the patent.)  Basically, a skin forms on the outside of the spray when the stuff hits the air, and this keeps the contents in a relatively stringy shape.  (That's not from the patent.  I don't think patents use the word "stuff" very often.)  More technically, it's this:

FOAMABLE RESINOUS COMPOSITION  Cox et al.

 

(I'm sure there's a reason why that last sentence can't say, "Such a combination is substantially silly," but this is not really my field.)  The Huntington experience suggests, however, that Cox et al. underestimated the tackiness of their resinous composition.  The board's measure, which passed 4-1, was apparently prompted by concerns that the string can damage the paint on city vehicles.

Those were the concerns raised by 80-year-old Ruth Fahlbusch, one of three citizens who showed up at the board meeting (and appear in the website's video clip).  "It's gotten out of hand," Fahlbusch cried.  "It's not only the children and the teenagers, it's adults.  I really want the town to ban the use of Silly String.  It really ruins a parade."  (Fahlbusch then loudly announced that she had fallen, and could not get up.)  At the other end of the spectrum, 18-year-old Jessica Schulz, who obviously doesn't care about western civilization, said people shouldn't spray Silly String at vehicles, but otherwise "it should be fine."

The only board member to vote against the ban, Mark Cuthbertson, did not think the ban would be effective and feared it would put the city on a slippery slope.  "I don't know where you draw the line," he said.  "Do you ban whipped cream next?  Or toilet paper?  I just don't see this as an area into which we should delve."  I think we can all agree that banning toilet paper is not an area into which they should delve.

"We certainly don't want to ban Silly String totally," said the town supervisor, Frank Petrone.  According to the report, Petrone said he was "hoping residents take it upon themselves to use Silly String responsibly," but there was no indication that he suggested how anyone could actually do that.

In other ridiculous Silly String news, reports in 2006 and 2007 said that U.S. troops were using the product to help find tripwires set up as bomb triggers, but that they were having trouble getting enough of it.  A New Jersey family that collected over 80,000 cans for the troops was not allowed to send it for many months because the product, which of course is an aerosol, was considered too dangerous to ship.

Link: Newsday.com

Bill Would Make KFC the "Official Picnic Food of Kentucky"

On January 18, Kentucky State Rep. Charles Siler introduced a bill that would designate Kentucky Fried Chicken (specifically, Original Recipe) as the state's "official picnic food."  The provision itself is just one sentence, but the preamble offers some interesting details:

WHEREAS, Harland Sanders opened his first restaurant in Corbin, Kentucky in 1930; and

WHEREAS, Kentucky Governor Ruby Laffoon made Harland Sanders an honorary Kentucky Colonel in recognition of his contributions to the state's cuisine in 1936; and

WHEREAS, Colonel Sanders's "Original Recipe" fried chicken was first cooked in Colonel Sanders's restaurant in 1940; and

WHEREAS, the first "Kentucky Fried Chicken" franchise restaurant selling the Original Recipe chicken was opened in 1952; and

WHEREAS, today, the Original Recipe chicken is sold in more than 11,000 Kentucky Fried Chicken restaurants in more than 80 countries and territories around the world, bringing recognition and fame to the Commonwealth of Kentucky;

NOW, THEREFORE,

Be it enacted by the General Assembly of the Commonwealth of Kentucky:

SECTION 1.  A NEW SECTION OF KRS CHAPTER 2 IS CREATED TO READ AS FOLLOWS:

Original Recipe Kentucky Fried Chicken is designated the official picnic food of Kentucky.

The background facts in the "whereas" clauses are a bit of a mixed bag.  It's good to know that KFC actually did get its start in Kentucky, although it's a little disillusioning to learn that Col. Sanders didn't actually serve in the military.

Perhaps predictably, the bill is being opposed by People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals.  PETA claims that the chickens KFC serves are abused, even tortured, although it wasn't clear from the report whether PETA claims KFC is the one doing the torturing.  (In a related story, Attorney General Michael Mukasey refused to confirm or deny that chickens had been waterboarded, but said that if they were he wasn't sure if that was torture or not anyway).

"If the state legislature moves forward with this one," said PETA vice president Bruce Friedrich, "then they should change Kentucky's state bird from the cardinal to the debeaked, crippled, scalded, diseased, dead chicken."

Link: CBS News
Link: Kentucky State Legislature

Proposed Law Would Require Thai Drivers to Stop for National Anthem

Apparently believing that citizens (or at least motorists) are not sufficiently patriotic, a group of lawmakers in Thailand have proposed a new law that would require drivers to stop whenever the national anthem is played, which in Thailand happens every day over loudspeakers at 8 a.m. and 6 p.m.

Thailand has been run by a military junta since 2006, and the 250 members of the legislature have been appointed by the generals since then.  The group proposing the new "Flag Bill" is itself made up of retired and active-duty generals.

According to the report, most Thais already stop what they are doing and stand at attention when the national anthem, Phleng chat thai, is played twice daily.  (The report didn't say whether they do this out of patriotism or a desire to not get shot.)  Gen. Pricha Rochanasena, speaking for the supporters of the Flag Bill, said that the new law would simply "allow motorists to be patriotic too."  Seems hard to argue with that -- that, and bullets.

Also supporting the extreme reasonableness of the proposed legislation: the Thai anthem is supposedly really short.  "The national anthem lasts only one minute and eight seconds, so why can't motorists stop their cars for the sake of the country?" said Rochanasena.  "They already spend more time [than that] in traffic jams anyway."

Information on the relative length of national anthems is surprisingly hard to find, but according to one report the shortest anthem is Qatar's at 32 seconds.  No trouble there -- you could respect that one while you were stopped at a red light.  There doesn't seem to be any agreement as to which is the longest, although Greece and Uruguay get mentioned a lot.  Of course, it would depend on who's singing.  For example, according to Sports Illustrated's "Dr. Z," who says he has been timing "The Star-Spangled Banner" at sporting events for 50 years, that one has been sung in as little as 1:03 (at a Falcons game in 1977) but more often is around 1:30.  Beyonce dragged it out to 2:09 in 2004.  Longest ever: somone named Leona Giles at an Oakland Raiders game -- 2:34.8.  "It was an awful, awful thing to listen to."

Point is, the Thai anthem is short but not that short.  Luckily, a vote on the bill scheduled for November 22 was deferred to allow further study, said another party member, the awesomely named Wallop Tangkananurak.  "It would be chaotic if the bill had passed as it is now," he said.

Link: Reuters
Link: Wikipedia's list of national anthems

Legislator Says Lack of Science at Hearing on Global Warming Is Due to Lack of Scientists

Kentucky state representative Jim Gooch held a hearing on November 14 to debate the issue of global warming.  He won this particular debate, since Gooch didn't invite anyone who actually thinks global warming is real.

The article described Gooch as a "longtime ally of the coal industry" -- his district is a center of the state's coal-mining industry -- and also as "the House Democrats' chief environmental strategist" because of his post as the chair of the Agriculture and Natural Resources Committee.  His strategy on this particular issue is to not listen to anybody who believes in that global-warming nonsense.  Gooch said he did not invite anyone like that because it wasn't necessary.  "You can only hear that the sky is falling so many times," he said.  "We hear it every day from the news media, from the colleges, from Hollywood."

Carbon emitter Jim Gooch (D-Providence)

This made the guest list fairly short, though -- as in two.  One is a lawyer who works for the Heartland Institute, described as a "free-market think-tank in Chicago partially funded by ExxonMobil."  The other one, Lord Christopher the Viscount Monckton of Brenchley -- no, he's not from Kentucky -- is a journalist apparently best known for his recommendation that people with HIV or AIDS be locked up forever.  Or, as he put it, "isolated -- and in the kindest and nicest way -- but isolated so they couldn't spread it to everybody else."  His theory about global warming was not very clear from the article, but he did apparently quote the Bible and suggest that the sun might be getting hotter.

These two talked about something or other for two hours.  After objections by other committee members, Gooch let two audience members talk about their opposing viewpoints for five minutes each.  That seemed to be all the time he had for them.  "It really wasn't my intention to get into so much science today," he said.  As in, any.  Gooch conceded he hadn't invited any actual scientists to talk about the issue but said that was because there aren't any in Kentucky.  "Well, I mean, where are we going to get scientists?" he said.  "We're limited here in Kentucky as to what we can do.  I don't know how we'd necessarily get scientists to come here."

Well, you could e-mail this one and tell her to take St. Clair Street to Blanton, then turn right on Ann, left on Main, then right on Capitol Avenue and just take that to the end.  That would get Jo Hargis there from her office at the state Environmental Quality Commission.  It should only take her about 5 minutes, depending on traffic.  Or you could try the University of Kentucky, where the local paper was able to dig up at least one.  That is over in Lexington, though, which is more like 40 minutes away.

Link: Lexington (KY) Herald-Leader

After "Evaluation of the Past," City Says Stalin Will No Longer Be Honorary Citizen

The city government of Kosice, the second-largest city in Slovakia, voted on Friday to take away the honorary citizenship it granted in 1947 to Josef Vissionariovich Dzhugashvili, also known as Joseph Stalin, apparently having learned a few disturbing facts about the guy that had not previously come to its attention.

After a "moral evaluation of the past," said a spokesperson for the city, "Kosice councillors have decided to take back this title."  According to the article, the title was awarded in 1947 "in recognition of the Red Army's liberation of the city towards the end of World War Two."  It may have also had something to do with not wanting to be murdered by Mr. Stalin, who it seems was leader of the Soviet Union at the time.

The extent of the government's investigation into Stalin's past is not clear, but a quick check of Wikipedia reveals that Stalin was the Secretary of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union from 1922 until his death in 1953, and must have been a really good secretary because he got to make a lot of important decisions.  According to Wikipedia, some of these decisions may have been a little questionable, such as having almost a million people executed and letting another 2 million die in concentration camps, and also causing a famine in which maybe 6 to 8 million died.  He does not seem to have actually killed anyone in his own family, although he reportedly did respond to learning that his oldest son had tried but failed to commit suicide by saying "He can't even shoot straight."

So with that kind of evidence of good citizenship, it is easy to see why the 1947 citizenship honor was still in place 54 years after Stalin's death and 14 years after the breakup of the Soviet Union itself.  A similar motion brought before the Kosice city council actually failed in 2001, and a number of local lawmakers reportedly abstained from the successful vote on Friday, arguing that a "more exhaustive analysis" was necessary.

I haven't researched the topic as long as they have, but I'm not really finding anything all that positive.  What's somebody going to argue?  "Yes, Mr. Stalin was a thug and a butcher who may have killed as many as 20 million people, but on the other hand, he was a marvelous dancer."

Link: AFP via Yahoo! News

CORRECTION Re: Taiwan Legislative Tactics

A few days ago I commented on another brawl that had broken out in Taiwan's legislature, this time over the makeup of the country's Central Election Committee, and also noted that past legislative tactics have included not just brawls but the throwing of various things, and on at least one occasion the eating of a bill that the eater strongly opposed.  After that post, I heard from scholar Michael Turton, at Chaoyang University in western Taiwan, who knows one hell of a lot more about the country's legislature than I do, and had a couple of points to make.

First, I had suggested that the CEC was not the most important thing to be brawling about, but Mr. Turton pointed out that Taiwan is still emerging from a time of authoritarian rule, and that the CEC is extremely important as the country's guarantor of fair elections.  So, point taken -- given how our last few elections have gone (didn't someone offer to send international observers to Florida in 2000?), I probably should not have called this unimportant.

Second, though, I told him we might have to agree to disagree about whether bill-eating is a good legislative strategy, but in the interest of fairness I will just post his comments on that particular issue, and let readers decide:

Take the bill eating exercise. The DPP legislator stopped a critically dangerous piece of legislation by that simple act. In Taiwan there are five branches of government, and the opposition parties, working in concert with China, have paralyzed several of them, either by refusing to provide budgets, or by refusing to approve nominees (one of the narratives of the pro-China side is that Taiwan cannot govern itself). The opposition maintains a thin majority in the legislature, which is overly powerful in Taiwan's unbalanced constitutional system.

Previously Taiwan's bizarre governmental arrangements didn't matter, since the government was merely the exoskeleton of a one party state run by the Chairman of the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT), who sent down orders through the Party heirarchy. Previous Presidents derived their authority from their position as Chairman, not because they have any under the Constitution, which was never meant to actually function. Hence, the Presidency is too weak, while the legislature is too powerful. The eaten bill would have stripped the Presidency of most of its remaining powers over foreign policy -- opening the way for the legislature to conduct its own foreign policy -- a pro-China one -- while paralyzing another branch of government.

By eating the bill, which there was no way to stop legislatively, that woman put a stop to a major effort to undermine governance on the island. Simple, effective, and brilliant.

Assuming, of course, they didn't have another copy.

Brawl in Taiwan's Legislature Does Not Result in Compromise

Here's how democracy really should work.  Like America, Taiwan has a representative legislature and not direct democracy.  This means that we choose representatives to beat the crap out of each other so that we don't have to do it ourselves.

The latest legislative brawl in Taiwan was apparently sparked by a proposal to adjust the make-up of the Central Election Commission.  The negotiating tactics deployed by Taiwan legislators in the past have included wrestling, shoe-throwing, tie-pulling, and the throwing of microphones, lunchboxes, and books.  Also, rather than "tabling" legislation, representatives have, on occasion, eaten it:

"I would like to remind my colleague
from Taipei that a simple 'no' will suffice"

The video of today's incident, however, doesn't show any of that (maybe some wrestling), but it does show other favorite strategies such as climbing onto the speaker's podium, throwing water and paper at each other, and the time-tested strategy of punching an opposing representative in the face.  At the beginning of the clip, note the clerks trying to pry legislators' fingers off the podium.  Not a bad way to end a filibuster.

So far, our relatively more mature democracy has had only one caning, during the run-up to the Civil War.  Whether or not you support these more direct negotiation tactics I assume depends on who has the majority in Congress at any given time.

Link: Reuters
Link: Reuters Video

Cohabitation May No Longer Be Sex Crime in North Dakota

North Dakota's state senators passed a bill Friday that, if it passes in the House of Representatives, would remove "unlawful cohabitation" from the state's list of sex crimes, where it has been since the territory became a state in 1889.  Specifically, it currently appears at Chapter 12.1-20-10, right between adultery and incest.

As it stands, the law makes it a class B misdemeanor sex crime to live "openly and notoriously with a person of the opposite sex as a married couple without being married to the other person."  As originally introduced, SB 2138 would have repealed that entirely.  But, apparently feeling that a leap forward to the 20th Century was enough for now, senators amended the bill instead, so that cohabitation is now a crime only if one of the cohabitors "falsely represents the couple's status as being married to each other."  So now you can do it, but it's a crime to try to cover it up.  SB 2138 would at least move the offense out of the list of sex crimes, making it just boring old fraud.

The new bill still does not define what it means to live with someone "notoriously."  I suppose that's one of those things that you can't define, but you know it when you see it.  It's also apparently not a crime to pretend that you are married to someone of the same sex, I guess on the theory that since North Dakota's constitution now bans same-sex marriage, you wouldn't be able to fool anybody anyway.

Also a class B misdemeanor in North Dakota: displaying the flag of any country other than the U.S. or a "friendly foreign nation."  Ch. 12.1-07-03.  (List of "friendly" nations not provided, but these days I wouldn't go much further than the U.K. and El Salvador if I were you.)

Also on North Dakota's legislative agenda this term: making it illegal to strangle somebody.  Senate Bill 2185, as introduced, would have defined the crime of "strangulation" and made it a felony.  The bill would also have clarified that it matters how you do your strangling.  Strangling somebody with an object would have been a class C felony, but class B if you use your own hands or if you had strangled somebody before.  Sadly, in a victory for the serial-strangler lobby, this bill was gutted and instead a watered-down definition of strangulation was added to the existing definition of "serious bodily injury."  Neither version of the bill explains what loophole in North Dakota law has been letting people get away with strangulation before now, but if that's on your to-do list you better hurry -- the amended bill passed unanimously.

Link: Yahoo! News
Link: North Dakota Legislature

Iraqi Parliament Actually Has a Quorum on Monday

Further proof today that things are going great in Iraq -- the New York Times reports that on Monday, the parliament was actually able to conduct business because, for the first time since November, enough people showed up to vote on things.  The report said that almost every session since then has simply been adjourned because as few as 65 of the 275 members could or would show up for work.  Monday was a big day, then, because "attendance actually surpassed the 50 percent plus one needed to pass laws."

And that was because our buddy Moktada al-Sadr let his group show up.  The 30 members in that bunch returned from a months-long boycott, during which they were probably all taking glaring lessons from Moktada, and the news that they would be returning "created a public relations blitz" that ended up getting 189 of the 275 members to attend.  Whether the quorum would last long enough to get any work done was anybody's guess.

Many members do not even live in Iraq anymore, including Ayad Allawi, the former prime minister.  London is looking a lot better to him right now.  Another member, Adnan Pachachi, phoned in from Abu Dhabi to tell the Times that he had left to get some decent medical care for his wife.  He hoped to return in a few weeks.  "One has to be there," he admitted, to serve in Parliament.

Although members earn the equivalent of about $120,000, which is an awful lot of dinars these days, many still claimed that they were unable to make ends meet.  Pachachi, for example, said he can only afford 20 of the 40 guards he has to hire to protect him when he does come to Iraq.  (Good thing all the members don't show up, I guess, or else there wouldn't be any place for the guards to sit.)

The current speaker of Parliament, Mahmoud al-Mashadani, sympathized with the security concern.  He said Parliament should set aside more money for members' security, and that he thought members should come back to Iraq to vote for that.  He also argued that attendance would be improved by new bills that provide for fines and possible replacement of members who do not attend.  The bills that would help ensure a quorum could be passed as soon as there is a quorum to pass them.

Link: New York Times

Jesus May Not Have the Votes to Become King of Poland

Lawmakers from Poland's majority party, Law and Justice, have introduced a bill that would make Jesus Christ the honorary king of Poland, but the bill appeared doomed to defeat, at least without some kind of Christmas miracle.  Only 46 of the 460 members of parliament currently support the bill, while the other 414 would apparently prefer to go straight to hell.

Jesus does appear to have the support of a relatively large number of Law and Justice representatives as well as backing from two smaller parties, the League of Polish Families and the opposition Peasants Party.  One group He does not have the support of, oddly, is the Roman Catholic Church, which it was my understanding He was in charge of.  But the Polish bishops have criticized the Christ-based initiative, saying that it was only "propaganda" and that parliament should stay out of religious affairs.  "Let parliament deal with passing better laws that we need," said Archbishop Tadeusz Goclowski of Gdansk, probably thinking of measures needed to address the desperate shortage of vowels in that consonant-stricken country.

A spokesman for parliamentary speaker Marek Jurek said that the resolution was not likely to be voted on until early next year, which will at least spare the sinners from having to vote against Jesus on His birthday.

Link: Yahoo! News

Texas Bill Would Assist Blind Hunters

A bill introduced this week would help end long-standing discrimination against a group that until now has been unable to hunt effectively -- blind Texans.

I personally had not known that there were a significant number of blind hunters out there, thinking that although certainly each of us has a God-given right to shoot at things, the ability to see those things was an important factor in exercising one's right to hit them with a bullet. And a complete inability to see does seem to be a disqualifier, but this bill would at least make it possible for those hunters who are only legally blind to participate.

It would do so by authorizing the use of laser sights by the legally blind during regular hunting hours, so long as the blind person carries written proof of blindness and is assisted by a person who is not legally blind. The bill would amend existing Parks and Wildlife Code section 62.005, which currently prohibits the use of any artificial light, including headlights, to illuminate a game animal or bird that you are about to shoot.

The bill's sponsor, Rep. Edmund Kuempel, said that the legislation would simply add approval for laser sighting devices to Texas hunting laws, which already allow the visually impaired to hunt with the aid of the not visually impaired. Or at least they do according to Rep. Kuempel, who did not cite the law that allows this activity, but says he has seen it on TV.  "I've seen this on TV before," he said, "when they're taking target practice.  When they [the blind hunters] aim the gun, the guide tells them, aim two inches higher or two inches lower and you're on the target, and you're off and running." Extending this from target practice to actual hunting was the next logical step.

If the bill passes, the state would have until 2008 to come up with a definition of "legally blind," which apparently it does not currently have on the books.

Link: Yahoo! News
Link: Texas House Bill No. 308

Minnesota Charges Wife With Having Sex With Husband

Minnesota's Department of Health is prosecuting LaRae Lundeen Fjellman, not for her recklessly unpronounceable name but for something much more serious: having sex with her husband.

Fjellman was cited because she is a massage therapist and her husband, Kirk Fjellman, is a former client.  She massaged him intermittently from October 2000 to May 2002, and (according to them) they started dating in July 2002.  But when they got married (the article uses the phrase "when they consummated the relationship," which I'm sure can only refer to the actual wedding date) a few months later, they "ran afoul" of a state law that bans sexual relations between massage therapists and clients for no less than two years after the massage relationship ends.

Exactly how this came to the attention of the State of Minnesota is not clear.  But the state has filed charges and Fjellman could be fined or could lose her license for daring to sleep with her husband during the first 18 months or so of their marriage.

LaRae Fjellman does not deny that she violated the statute, but says she didn't know it existed.  Kirk, of course, is outraged:  "There's no harm, no victim," he claimed.  "What's this about?"  It's about protecting the integrity of the massage relationship, Kirk, that's what it's about.

Note: the use of the phrase "happy ending" in this piece was carefully considered, and rejected.

Link: AP via My Way News

Anti-Fluffernutter Legislation Sparks Battle in Massachusetts

Always looking for more ways to divide the party internally, Democrats are now arguing amongst themselves over whether or not to ban Fluffernutters in New England schools.

Yet more evidence that all other problems have been solved by our state legislatures.

Like most of you, I wrongly assumed that a "Fluffernutter" was some bizarre kind of sex act, and so at first glance I supported banning it from schools, or at least grade schools.  Turns out that in fact it is a bizarre kind of sandwich, which according to the AP involves Marshmallow Fluff and peanut butter on white bread, sometimes with banana slices included.  Yum.  The concoction and Marshmallow Fluff itself apparently have a "long history in Massachusetts," and many parents use it as a "food of last resort for finicky eaters."

Not Jarrett Barrios, a Democratic state senator who was outraged -- outraged! -- that his third-grade son was given a Fluffernutter (again, not a kind of sex act) at his school for lunch.  He has proposed a bill that would ban schools from offering the sandwich more than once a week.  He said that his legislation may seem "a little silly," but seems to have somehow argued that it was not.

Don't tell that to Kathi-Anne Reinstein, a Democratic state representative whose district includes the company that makes Marshmallow Fluff, Durkee-Mower Inc.  Not only was it not silly to her, but she has responded with her own proposal to designate the Fluffernutter the official sandwich of the entire Commonwealth, and stated that she will "fight to the death for Fluff."

Stung by the opposition, Barrios said (through a spokesperson) that he was not "anti-Fluff" and would even co-sponsor Reinstein's bill, finding that not inconsistent with restricting the Official Sandwich to once per week.

"He loves Fluff as much as the next legislator," said the spokesperson.  That, I believe.

Link: AP via My Way News

Canadians Pass $204 Billion Spending Bill by Accident

Bloomberg News reports this week that the Canadian government's $204 billion budget package was passed in the House of Commons by accident, after legislators of the opposition parties forgot to stand up to debate it.

Isn't that what the Democrats say happened on Iraq?  Well, it's good to know this kind of thing happens in other countries, too.  I think.

The opposition lawmakers said they had been expecting one more member of the Conservative Party to talk in support of the spending plan, but that person did not show up, and so they were not ready and remained seated when the opportunity to debate arrived.  Seeing no opposition, the Speaker of the House moved on to the next item, and presto, legislation was born.

In fact, it was "unanimous," the government finance minister told reporters later.  Sort of.

Canada's governing party needs support from at least one opposition group to get a bill through, and so any objection could have defeated the budget.  Under Canadian rules, apparently, a defeated budget would be grounds for entirely new parliamentary elections, which were averted by the failure to stand up and say anything.

"Let's not make a mountain out of a molehill," said Bill Graham, leader of one of the two snoring opposition parties.  "We oppose the budget.  [Sitting there on our butts was] an unfortunate error, but it doesn't change anything."  I guess he's referring to the fact that they will have another chance in the Senate, which as in most bicameral systems is designed to be the legislative body that pays slightly more attention to what it's doing.

Link: Bloomberg.com

How They Filibuster in Taiwan

A fight broke out (yes, again) in Taiwan's parliament on Tuesday over an opposition party's proposal to reinstate direct air and sea transit links with mainland China.  In a weak democracy like the United States, such a proposal might die in committee or be indefinitely tabled, or something decadent like that.  In Taiwan, they still do it the old-fashioned way.

When the proposal was brought up for review, members of the ruling Democratic Progressive Party charged the podium and "protested noisily," causing pandemonium in the chamber.  One legislator spat on another one ("She spat saliva!" yelled Hun Hsiu-chu, accurately describing what had been spat), and as others battled, DPP deputy Wang Shu-hui grabbed the draft document from the speaker and tried to eat it.

CSPAN, are you reading this?  This would do more for your ratings even than Stephen Colbert.

Wang was immediately set on by Nationalist Party delegates, who tried to get her to cough up the bill by shouting and pulling her hair.  Wang stuck it out, though, and later spat out the document and tore it up.  According to Reuters, this was the third time that "filibustering by the DPP had prevented a vote" on the measure.

That kind of "filibustering" hasn't been seen in the United States since Strom Thurmond ate the 1964 Civil Rights Act.  Luckily, somebody had a copy.

Link: Reuters via My Way.com

Oklahoma Ends Tattoo Holdout

Caving in to the degradation of moral character so evident in the other 49 states, Oklahoma has finally legalized tattooing, passing legislation last week that ended a forty-year-old state ban on the practice.  Surprisingly, Oklahoma was the only state in which tattooing remained illegal.

The governor signed the bill on Wednesday, May 10, saying that "Regardless of one's personal views about tattoos, the plain fact is that tattooing is prevalent."  My own personal view is that I wish the low-rider-jeans fad did not make the prevalence of tattoos all too plain, but maybe it makes more sense to address that by banning low-rider jeans in the first place.  Those are "prevalent" too, though, so I guess our hands are tied if "prevalent" = "legal," but I see an interesting slippery slope ahead on that one.

The state's health department endorsed the bill, saying that despite moral objections to tattooing (apparently originating in the Biblical condemnation of Mary Magdalene's lower-back tattoo) it was more important to legalize and regulate it in order to prevent hepatitis or other diseases that can be contracted by "unsanitary tattooing practices."

The bill does make it illegal to tattoo anyone younger than 18.

Oklahoma has a history of restrictive social legislation.  According to the Wikipedia article on the state, Oklahoma continues to have some of the most restrictive liquor laws in the country.  Prohibition was not repealed there until 1959 and about half of the state's counties still do not allow alcohol.  Last year, the state House of Representatives passed a bill banning "happy hour" promotions, which has led many bars and pubs in the state to use alternate phrases such as "hour of happiness" or "hour of joy."  I like "Hour of Joy" a lot better anyway.

Link: Findlaw
Link: U.S. Census Bureau QuickFacts about Oklahoma

Tangerangian Osculation May Not Exceed 4:59

The local government of Tangerang, a comically named suburb of Jakarta, Indonesia, has been trying to crack down on prostitution and address other moral issues for the past several years.  The Tangerangian city council's laws first sparked protest in February after a waitress waiting for her husband on a Tangerang street corner after dark was arrested on suspicion of being a prostitute.  (The report did not say what about the law that led to the arrest of the "waitress" was objectionable.)

This week, the Tangerang council went even further by making kisses illegal.  Not all kisses, of course -- just those between unrelated people who kiss each other on the lips for more than five minutes in a public location.

That definition may leave open a number of disturbing loopholes that I really should not discuss.

The new law has caused an uproar, but the Tangerang government defended its law at a press conference Friday, in Tangerang.  "Please do not dramatize this," said Ahmad Lufti, head of the Tangerang department of public order.  Which frankly is not the best way to start a statement about something you don't want to be dramatized.

Hey, remember that scene in The Naked Gun where a burning circus bus crashes into a fireworks shop, and Drebin is out in front telling the crowd, "Okay, show's over.  Move along -- nothing to see here.  Show's over," while behind him clowns and acrobats are doing spectacular tricks as fireworks are going off all over the place?

Man, what a great scene.

Anyway, Lutfi asked everybody not to "dramatize this" because "we will not arrest people at will as we are not oppressors."  Oh, well, that's different.  Because oppressors always admit they are oppressors, which is how you can tell.  Lutfi was then asked by a disrespectful press whether officers would be provided with stopwatches to time any public kissing between the lips of unrelated people that might occur, but he declined to comment.

Indonesia's national parliament has circulated draft legislation that also bans public lip-kissing, but it is unclear whether that article will become part of the law.

Tangerang.

Link: Reuters News

Senator is Unclear "What a Trillion Is"

On Thursday, the U.S. Senate voted to (again) raise the government's debt limit to nearly nine trillion dollars.  The government has been running huge deficits for the past few years and Congress has had to raise the limit every year for the last four years.  This year, it was raised to $8,965,383,933,372.98, or thereabouts.

Actually, I made up the digits after the 5, because the new limit is reported only as $8.965 trillion, so obviously the remaining four hundred million bucks or so is not that important.  The government probably left it in the pocket of those pants it was wearing the other night.  It'll turn up.

Maybe part of the reason it keeps going up is that it just doesn't seem like real money at this point.  Or maybe they just aren't any good at math.  Senator Judd Gregg (R-NH) said earlier this week that "It's hard to understand what a trillion is.  I don't know what it is."  That wouldn't worry me so much if he weren't the chairman of the Senate Budget Committee.

Reuters interviewed a math professor, John Nolan, to try to provide some sense of "what a trillion is."  To him, of course, it was "not a big number at all" as numbers go.  For the rest of us, he suggested this: to hit a trillion dollars you'd have to spend a million dollars every day for almost three thousand years; or, to put it another way, to spend that much in an average lifespan you would have to spend well over thirty-five million dollars a day.  Ironically, the work required to spend that much money would probably kill you pretty fast, so you'd never actually get the trillion spent.  One of God's little jokes upon thee.

Don Albers, who is associate executive director of the Mathematical Association of America, and past president of the Society for Getting Beat Up and Having Your Lunch Money Taken, said that the big numbers are not really the issue.  He said, "I don't think the problem so much is understanding that number as just understanding whether they've got more money coming in than is going out."  Oh.  Well, they don't.  They really don't.  Can I be Senate Budget Committee Chairman now?

Reuters.com

Massachusetts State Legislature: Hard at Work

In our federal system of government, the states retain a great deal of authority and autonomy.  Despite the fact that their legislative bodies frequently seem determined to prove that this is a stupid idea.

Various sources have reported on Massachusetts Senate Bill 1384, which would address a vital public safety issue by prohibiting the possession of machetes.  This does not apply if said machete is being transported for the purpose of cutting vegetation.  It shall be presumed, however, that "such carrying of a machete is not for the purposes of cutting vegetation."  Happily, "[s]uch presumption may be rebutted."  Needless to say, any machete to be carried for the purposes of cutting said vegetation shall be registered with the local police department and a permit obtained to allow said vegetation to be cut with said machete.

Not to be outdone, the Mass. House of Representatives has introduced House Bill No. 1880, which would make it unlawful for any officer of the law to engage in "name-calling or profanity" whilst on duty.  Other language in this cleverly drafted provision makes it unlawful to use "language which cast [sic] a negative reflection toward" a characteristic of any individual that would qualify as a "category of negative stereotyping."  This kind of language just screams constitutionality.

The stalwart legislators of Massachusetts have also proposed legislation to preclude children from riding in shopping carts, and to preclude operation of any kayak not equipped with a compass and whistle.

Mass. Sen. Bill 1384
Mass. H. Bill 1877
Mass. H. Bill 1880
Mass. H. Bill 1934

Nebraska County Will Proceed With Pointless Recall Election

A recall election has been scheduled in Howard County, Nebraska, aimed at the removal from office of Sheriff Troy Kaiser, who is accused of intimidating employees and threatening the county attorney.  (It's nice to know there is at least one place in America where threatening an attorney is still a crime.)  And the recall election will apparently proceed despite the fact that Kaiser resigned from office a month ago.

According to the County Board, state law requires a planned recall election to be carried out and there is no provision for cancelling it even if the target has already resigned.  The Nebraska Attorney General has recommended the election be cancelled, but board members said he had not provided any documentation to support his decision.

The unnecessary election is expected to cost between $2,500 and $3,000.  The report did not estimate what the turnout would be for an election to recall an official who is not in office.

AP via MyWay.com

Rhode Island Anti-Autograph Bill Doomed to Failure

Rhode Island Senator Roger Badeau says he was appalled when Red Sox players participated in an autograph-signing event in his state last year and charged children $200 per autograph.  Feeling that the state need to send a message that sports figures should not be preying on children, he sponsored a bill on the subject that has now passed the state Senate unanimously and is being considered by the House.

The bill imposes a $100 fine on any professional athlete or entertainer who charges anyone under 16 for an autograph.  Since the going rate for autographs in Rhode Island is apparently $200, I'm not exactly sure what message that really sends, other than maybe, "autographs in Rhode Island will now cost $300."

Boston Globe

Iowa Bill Would Protect Public From Deadly Spinner Hubcaps

The latest deadly public threat to be the subject of legislation is the "spinner hubcap," the flashy spinning wheel covers that have become increasingly popular in recent years. Iowa House Bill 108 would make it a misdemeanor to operate any vehicle bearing any "removable hubcap or wheel cover that is attached to the wheel of a motor vehicle and continues to rotate, or appears to rotate, after the vehicle has come to a stop."

Iowa state representative Doug Struyk (R-Council Bluffs) introduced the bill after he was nearly injured by the deadly spinners in November. Struyk said he was driving a truck pulling a 16-foot trailer loaded with a dozen ladders when he approached an intersection at which was a car bearing spinner hubcaps. He told the Omaha World-Herald that the spinning spinners "made it appear as if the car might still be moving through the intersection, so he braked hard and the trailer nearly jackknifed." Possible solutions: (1) resolve to look in the future at the actual chassis of an approaching car rather than its hubcaps in order to determine whether it is moving or not; (2) outlaw distracting hubcaps. Thus, House Bill 108.

Another suggestion: raise the pay of Iowa legislators to the point where they don't have to deliver ladders in their spare time to support themselves.

Unsurprisingly, representatives of spinner-hubcap manufacturers were not pleased. Brian Kaminski of Wheel-One, Inc., a Los Angeles manufacturer of the deadly devices, said he did not understand how the wheel covers could be considered dangerous. "I've heard of people saying stuff like that," he said. "The way I think of it is, if you can't tell a car's not moving and you start going, maybe you shouldn't have a driver's license." (Let alone a license to haul ladders.) But Struyk defended his bill. "I've talked to fellow legislators," he said," and haven't had anybody tell me I'm out of my mind yet." Hey, that's a pretty good rule of thumb for legislation -- if nobody has told you you're out of your mind, you must be on the right track.

Rep. Struyk's other projects this year include the unfortunately-titled "A bill for an act allowing certain senior residents to hunt deer during the youth and severely disabled deer hunting season," which is certainly bad news for severely disabled deer.

Omaha World-Herald
The Iowa Legislature