Mar 24 2008
Legislators Look at Excessive Laws
COLUMBIA — Government has all sorts of creative ways to strike a balance between enhancing your life and regulating it to death, and this two-year legislative session is no different.“There are more inane laws introduced than you could shake a stick at,” House Majority Leader Jim Merrill, R-Daniel Island, said. “Somebody at the grocery store says they’re having trouble with this or that, and they (some legislators) feel they need to introduce a law about it.”
Among the several thousand bills filed this session were proposals to stop parents from smoking in cars if a child younger than 10 is riding along, suspend driver’s licenses for high school students who are absent too often and require restaurants to post notices if they serve food with trans fats.
There’s also a proposal that would prevent people from suing restaurants if they get fat.
I can’t believe I am actually hearing a lawmaker acknowledge this. I mean, he’s right. There are a lot of stupid laws out there and there are people in government who think that another law is the solution to every problem. Those kind of people do not belong in Columbia or Washington. There was a state legislator in Pennsylvania a few years back who introduced a bill that would have required people to seat belt their dogs when they have them in the car, had it passed. This inanity is a waste of lawmakers’ time and our tax dollars at work.
Now that they acknowledge that such silliness inhabits the law books I would like to see them start introducing bills to repeal some of these laws.
[...] Who comes up with this crap? Special smoking hours? A smoking bar permit? Special access areas for adults only? What happened to clamping down on the laws that go too far?? [...]
Smoking should be banned in all restaurants. Its been proven that second hand smokes kills and it smells while your trying to eat. When I use to smoke in the 70’s and 80’s I always went outside or just waited until I was finished eating and when outside I had a cigarette. Yes this should be the law and believe me it will be the law. Its just a matter of time. If the State itself doesn’t do something I’ve heard there will ba a nationwide law mandated by the congres and the president that all states will be no smoking in public buildings which includes restuarants. Smoking is so the minority now. Its been proven in all the other states that have implented this no smoking policy in restuarants there business has picked up.
Here’s a crazy idea: let’s let the businesses decide whether or not they’ll allow smoking on their premises, and let customers decide whether they want to use those businesses.
“If the State itself doesn’t do something I’ve heard there will ba a nationwide law mandated by the congres and the president that all states will be no smoking in public buildings which includes restuarants.”
Yeah, right.