Murphy’s Bye-Laws

Perusing the local paper’s website today for the foolishly ridiculous took only a few seconds to find the following story: Campbell lawmaker says gun prohibition takes away rights.
The headline is dangerously misleading and has very, very little to do with the actual story; rather it appears to be aimed at the discrediting of the lawmaker, who I would guess is unpopular at this paper. While the legislation does indeed interfere with rights*, the fact that this councilwoman said so is moot.

The headline should read “Policy-making Patsies Prevent Production in Prototypical Pandering Performance”. Ok, maybe not, but it is all true. This “emergency” legislation took away a person’s opportunity to add some productive service to his community. Zoning laws had already made this man’s opening of a firearms repair business more difficult, the council then sought to make it impossible. Based on the comments under the article, the council is surely pandering to the police force (who’d have imagined the police want a disarmed populace?) and other weak-kneed, uninformed citizens.

The fact that this person had thought to ask permission of government to try and make a living is repulsive. Governments create jobs?! HAHAHAHAHA! That’s laughable. This unidentified man should refuse to pay his property tax because he cannot use his property the way he sees fit; a way that does absolutely no harm to the people around him. Is the City of Cambell also going to become a dry town, not allowing the sale of alcohol to protect its citizens from the vastly more dangerous threat it causes? Or ban the sale of automobiles or hammers or stairs, since all of these things are very dangerous tools? Perhaps the practicing of law should be outlawed; we all know how dangerous a lawyer can be!

Even though this story is mostly focused on guns, I won’t rehash all the pro-and anti-gun arguments. I will say in closing, though, that prohibiting the sale of guns wouldn’t likely prohibit the sale of service on guns. Maybe this person has a case, after all.

*Read The Law of Conservation of Rights to see why rights cannot be taken away.

In Cabaret Touches No-No Zone back in May, I told of an adult establishment shut down by police after a raid resulting in drug and theft charges. The club drew the attention of police after running into trouble for zoning violations concerning a banner hung outside the club and were under constant scrutiny thereafter. Two months later police officals are denying placing targets on any businesses.

In Cops Place No Targets On X-rated Businesses, Austintown Police Chief Bob Gavalier, the jurisdiction where the Go-Go Cabaret was located, remarked in the latest story, “…though no other adult businesses in the township are being targeted specifically, it’s important to keep eyes and ears open” (quote is from the article not a direct quote of Mr. Gavalier). No other businesses?  Seems like The Vindicator mixed up the headline.

So the tools used to close the business were not related to the nature of the business, but drugs, mostly. Does that mean other establishments wherein drugs are an issue should also be closed?  I’ll offer as an example Howland High School. From this 2001 Vindicator article: “Students think that high school teachers do not do enough to stop drug use in schools, according to an independent poll done by a Howland High School student.” This is the same accusation that closed Mr. Ricci’s business, yet schools continue to be open and recieve more and more loot from the government.  And children are forced to attend and be in that environment. Think of the children and close down the schools!

In relation to yesterday’s post about the governmental mafioso wielding the club of zoning laws to close a business, today’s post is also another story from the same front of the War on Business powermongers in the Youngstown area are waging on local establishments.  The Go-Go Cabaret probably stepped on a few toes just by trying to exist in the first place, but it was some silliness about the size of a banner they hung outside their establishment that allowed the authorities to get their foot in the door.  Since then the club owner feels as if a vendetta has been carried out against him.  From the Youngstown Vindicator:

[Sebastian] Rucci [the club owner] said he believes the Go Go has been unfairly targeted for months — retaliation by the township for issues with signage and lighting.

Personally, I find nothing as dangerous and irresponsible as undermining a bunch of blow-hard’s sense of control lighting and signage outside of regulation.

“There was justifiable reason for the club to be closed, and it’s been an ongoing problem for the township,” [Lisa Oles, township trustee chairwoman] said. “We like to promote business in the township, but not at the expense of our residents’ well-being.”

(Sounds like someone could use a lapdance!)

Unlike yesterday’s targeted business, the zoning laws were but temporary, non-lethal weapons in this War on Business; once the signs and lighting were removed it was a much harder target.  That is why weapons from a much “hotter” war were deployed.  I’m talking, of course, on the wide-sweeping War on [Some] Drugs.  (They throw in some prostitution, too, for the puritan crowd.)  Based on complaints from the red-faced nannies in this community (the club is far from any residence and is nestled next to a major interstate off-ramp) who blush at the thought of such vices as a mutual, voluntary, but unsanctioned exchange, a veritable invasion force embarked on a raid of the club looking for chemicals of all kinds.  The selective weapons of the War on Drugs are not blunt instruments; they have the accuracy of smart bombs.  At any given bar from the hole in the wall neighborhood joint to the kitchens of chain restaraunts, drugs could be found on any given night.  This time the thugs had a specific target, though.

So as the nation collectively moans about the economy going to crap, I beg them to think of all the business and commerce being openly opposed by those in the business of force.  Government holds the monopoly on force, and business is good.

For other stories about this on Vindy.com, here are the search results I used to find three stories regarding the Go-Go Cabaret: http://www.vindy.com/search/?q=Go-Go+Club+Austintown&x=0&y=0&all=on&author=&from=&to=2009-05-21

The economy is collapsing like an 800-pound gorilla on balsa stilts (wearing an Uncle Sam getup, no less).  Most everyone, including the governments at all levels but the top, are feeling the pinch as business slows.  Businesses that are “too big to fail” are dropping one after the other, and small businesses and entrepreneurs are struggling as much or more.  Many people in this situation turn to the government to “do something,”  anything,  to solve the crisis – and not in a “you made the mess; you clean it up” kind of way, either.  In the Youngstown area, this apparently means forcefully trying to close a business because it isn’t in the proper zoning district.  From the Youngstown Vindicator article:

On Nov. 3, 2008, Judge Durkin, of Mahoning County Common Pleas Court, issued a permanent injunction barring operation of the winery in its lakefront location off Southeast River Road, which is zoned as a residential district.

The injunction followed Judge Durkin’s October ruling that the winery cannot validly claim to be an agricultural land use that is exempt from township zoning regulations.

Perhaps they should claim to be cultivating alcohol from the sugar in the grape juice, or even cultivating fertilizer since they started a business and bullshit just pops up!

It is no surprise that zoning ordinance billed as being for your protection really aren’t – unless, of course, you are the owner of an established business with established political ties.  Governmental interference in commerce via zoning, tax, regulations, prohibitions, and accounting laws may as well be the weight tied to the people’s ankles as they try to tread the water that the Federal Reserve just keeps releasing as they open the flood gates further and further open.  My hometown’s economic landscape isn’t any deeper under the water than most, but the residents have been wading through this stagnant filthy water for so long, they seem to thirst for it.

I guess I’ll have to make a trip to partonize this winery in the near future.