One Step Forward, At Least Three Back

I couldn’t believe what I read in the paper this morning. The Utah Legislature is contemplating electronic scanning of licenses to verify age for consumption of alcohol.

.

On its face this doesn’t sound that bad. It could make evaluating an ID for authenticity a thing of the past.

.

Despite my first impression that “wow, Big Brother will have all our names, addresses and how often we imbibe”, I reasoned in my own head that our esteemed leaders will be sensible about it, and it will cut down on underage drinking in clubs.

.

The next few sentences washed away any illusion that the Utah Legislature was thinking with anything but their seats. They want to employ this method of checking ID in restaurants as well, and they want to store the information so that, in the words of the article, “law enforcement could access [it] for accident investigations or in the event of a traffic stop” or “if the restaurant patron left the restaurant and went to a bar, the bartender could know the customer may have already been drinking and might need to be watched more closely”. You’re kidding, right?

.

Do you get that same creepy feeling that there was a camera in that public restroom? Hasn’t the Utah Legislature heard that the days of unbridled trampling of the US Constitution are over?

.

We have come so far. Gone are the days that we have to sign in, fill out our order and hand it to the clerk at the liquor store. Gone are the days when we have to bring our own wine to a restaurant or pay large annual fees to join a club to drink.

.

Do we really want to become known as the state that scans your grandmother’s ID if she orders a drink with a meal in case she busts out and drives to the nearest bar for a few more? Do we really want the financial burden of the constitutional challenge to every DUI arrest that the accused was profiled from their drinking habits? Haven’t we suffered enough in the recent past over the “Zion Curtain” sneeze guard child protector shield in restaurants aimed at preventing young impressionable eyes from seeing the bad man (or woman) mix the bad drink?

.

After the Olympics, or maybe because of them, the spotlight that appeared trained on the absurdity of our liquor laws was dimming. There was even the excitement that the talk of doing away with the private club requirements might take away some more of the ridicule.

.

It appears we are back on the same track. We appear headed back into the glare of the spotlight of national ridicule at light speed. This won’t just affect our pride, it will most likely result in loss of revenue because those on the outside won’t want to deal with our “peculiar” habits.

.

I wonder if this is what the Legislature talked about with representatives of the Mormon Church in their yearly “we’re not trying to influence anyone” meeting?

.

-Pedro

Don’t Break Two or More Laws At Once

My father taught us one rule that has stuck with me for more than 30 years. That rule is; don’t break two or more laws at once. It sounds kind of mundane but it had a huge impact on me.

What he was really saying was if you are going to break the law, don’t be stupid and flaunt it or compound it so you will get caught. For instance, if you were going to drink and drive, don’t speed or fail to put your headlights on because you will dramatically increase your chances of getting caught. Or more simply, if you are going to drive a car that is seriously late on its registration renewal make the headlights are operating properly. My brother’s favorite example is; if you are going to transport illegal herbage in the car, don’t flip a U turn in front of a cop. Yes it really was my dad that taught me this.

At the time I didn’t think much of this but I often refer to it and change my course of action so I don’t do two or more illegal things at once. I have said on more than one occasion “If I hadn’t followed Dad’s advise I would have gotten caught __________________________”. I also comment how often others seem to get caught violating this simple principal.

For instance take this guy driving along I-15 who made an illegal lane change in front of a cop (although it doesn’t seem like it, it is illegal to change lanes on the highway without signaling). The cop pulled him over and smelled the odor of marijuana. He called the pot sniffing dog over and they found 50 sealed bags of the green gold. The guy and his girlfriend are going away for a long time because he violated the dumb criminal principal.

One final note, it seems this guy compounded the problem beyond just illegal lane changing with 200 lbs of dope in the car. The smell couldn’t have come from the sealed bags so the guy was smoking while making an illegal lane change with 200 lbs of dope in the van. He deserves to get caught.

When None of the Idiots Have Guns, only Guns will be Idiots

Why do we hold onto this mystique of a bygone era? The frontier days where a person needed a gun because there was no law enforcement have been gone for over 100 years. We fanaticize that we can protect ourselves and our families if we only have a gun. Of course we want the latest, most high powered automatic killing machine to defend what is rightfully ours. The problem is that there is a disconnect between this dream of self defense and the reality that guns are very dangerous weapons that carry a very serious consequence with their use.


My first point is that you don’t need an assault weapon to defend your house. The purpose of a fully automatic weapon is to kill a lot of people in a very short period of time. This isn’t homeland security, it is war. You need to be trained to go to war and you need to know the difference before you can buy an assault weapon (that’s my opinion, but apparently not the law).

My second point is that this vision of defending your family against an assailant doesn’t play out in public. The Trolley Square shooting was the perfect place for a gun toting citizen to open fire on a crazed maniac bent on killing innocent people but none was to be found. An off duty police officer (translated – trained to use a gun) was the first line of defense who prevented further carnage. The same is true of the many campus and school shootings. Where were all the defenders of life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness?

I think there were there. I think when faced with the reality of shooting a person they couldn’t bring themselves to it. I’m not saying that is a bad thing, I just mean that this is an example of the disconnect between the dream and reality. We should leave the defense of human life to the professionals.

My third point is that without this reasonableness in our gun ownership laws we have amateurs caught in situations that have potentially dire consequences.

I read in the paper today (surprise) that a toilet in a restaurant in Salt Lake took one in the bowl because a legally licensed weapon dropped from the owner’s holster while he was pulling up his pants. The gun fired and the toilet was hit. Luckily there was no one else in the room at the time. Someone could have been killed because a person with a license and a concealed weapons permit was careless.

I also heard about a similar situation from a person who attended the Gun Show this past weekend. Everyone with a weapon has to check in before entering the main hall. My friend was in line to do this and about 10 people ahead of him, a gun discharged. The owner was pulling his gun out of its holster and it fired. The bullet hit the cement floor and ricocheted who knows where. This truly is a miracle no one was hit.

My point in all these points is that we need to bring the dream of gun ownership and reality of what guns do, closer to each other. We need to stop reinforcing the “Old West” illusion of self protection; we need to restrict those guns that are meant only for war to the professionals and we need to require more training and testing for those who have guns. We don’t let a 10 year old, who can buy a car, drive or a person who gets his or her private pilots license fly a 747.

-Pedro

Its Your Money

Isn’t it nice that congress is so concerned about the us. They worked hard to pass the $700B Economic Stimulus Act and get some of that money into the hands of the banks so we could all benefit from the boost in confidence. Now they are proposing a plan to further separate the bad loans those banks made from the good loans and they want more transparency in how Mr. Obama will spend the remaining money. They really are taking good care of the American people.


The reality is that over $300B was given to the banks without any requirements at all. The facts suggest that credit has not become more readily available, retailers have had a dismal 4Q and no one really knows where the money went.

The Fed yesterday proposed a plan to let banks separate bad loans into “Bad” banks (a completely separate entity) where the American public’s meager equity interest lies from the bank’s good loans. This will give the banks more incentive to loan if they aren’t bothered by the pesky bad loans. Isn’t this like saying to a person in Bankruptcy that they can keep the car, house and goodies, all their income and not get a black mark? The Bankruptcy Court will just separate those pesky debts and loans into another entity so the debtor can go out and spend more to stimulate the economy.

This morning I saw an article in the newspaper (aren’t most of my tirades prompted by something in the newspaper) where our esteemed senior Senator Orin Hatch was calling for more control and transparency in how the Obama administration distributed the rest of the Economic Stimulus Package. Isn’t that like a burglar saying he wants to make sure the police handle his stolen items in a reasonable manner?

This is your money they are so casually throwing around. You do have a say and you can complain to your Senator or Congressman or Congresswoman. Or you can just whine about it like I do and think there is nothing we can do about it. This is what started the civil unrest in the 60’s.

-Pedro

Can't We All Just Drive Together

I have taken two major road trips this month and this caused me to experience a lot of driving from both Utah and non-Utah drivers. I am not saying one is better than the other - alright I am. I think Utah drivers are particularly bad. They are bad because they do things that are dangerous. Here are my top 3 pet peeves about Utah drivers (or as a friend called them "Utards").

1. 
   
   No Lane Discipline on the Freeway - The left lane is for passing, that is why there are signs every few miles or so that say "Slower Traffic Keep Right". People will get into the left lane and just cruise there, they won't move out of the way when you pull up on them but they will pull into the left lane and go imperceptably faster than the car in the left lane they were mindlessly following for the past few minutes, just as you get close to them. My friend from England used to tell a joke that driving in England is a lot like driving on the freeway in Utah - the fast lane in on the far right.
2. 
   
   Distractions - It is amazing the number of people who are eating, talking, putting on make up and who knows what else they are doing while they are driving that takes their mind off the task at hand. It usually shows itself by what appears to be a drunk driver; weaving, not paying attention to the traffic pattern or brake tapping. I actually saw someone on the belt route with a book in the steering wheel. That can't be good.
3. 
   
   Entitlement Driving - This is the strangest of the Utard phenomenon in that it takes many different forms. Anything from blocking the left lane so you can't pass to going three cars deep into a red left turn signal to yanking out on you from a side street to flipping a Uee in front of you without any forewarning to signaling and then squeezing in between two properly spaced cars, like they are entitled to the space because they put on the blinker.

Here is my moral of the story - we all need to drive with all of us in mind. Driving is a group effort - the objective should be to get everyone to their destination as quickly and safely as possible. This means we need to put our cell phones and food down, look around more often than every few hours and think about our next move more than a few miliseconds before execution. We don't do this on any other form of public transportation (yes I think driving in a city or on a major freeway or belt route is public transportation). We don't get to the airport or the train station and announce "I am here, we can leave". Can't we all just get along on the road?

-Pedro

If the Shoe Fits

It seems fitting that President Bush would get pelted by shoes. No one wants to kill him, just throw their footwear at him.

Last week, while in Iraq at a news conference, an Iraqi journalist attending the news conference took off his shoes, one at a time, and threw them at the President of the United States.

In an interview after the incident President Bush was heard to say “ I saw his Sole”. Another journalist was quoted saying in his effort to avoid the pedal projectiles “President Bush hasn’t ducked that far left at any time during his 8 years in office”.

In a twisted way things seem sort of right with the world. In Iraq, throwing shoes at a person is an insult akin to flipping someone the bird. It shows a level of global disrespect that we aren’t used to, but which is all too prevalent toward the US nowadays. To us this act seems sort of silly, a lot like Bush himself. To the world it is just another in a long line of cartoon charactures of our man-child leader. It may even be one of the things that defines his presidency, like Jimmy Carter’s famous pond hopping rabbit.

After a while Bush seemed to recover with his typical swagger, not quite sure what went on but knowing he was out of danger. Sound like most of his reactions to Presidency defining moments? It did to me.

Unfortunately we are the recipients of his legacy and we will have to live with this on the world stage. We can only hope that the next President will repair our tarnished image, or put a shine back on things (no that isn't a racial reference, just a footwear one).

We can also hope that the Secret Service is quicker under the new administration. Why did it take two independent shoe removal and launchings before the armed (or should I say footed) assailant was subdued? Let’s just hope that the next group is better trained or the next attempt at humiliation of the President is done with something equally innocuous.

-Pedro

Solution to the Energy Crisis and the Auto Makers

I heard this on the NPR show "Car Talk" with those guys Click and Clack.

They said we should do two things to help our economy, the car industry and our environment:

1. Raise the tax on gas - Gas was $4.00 a gallon a few months ago, if we put on a $.50 tax per gallon it will raise the price now to $2.50 a gallon. It won't be that hard to handle and we will get a lot of benefit from it. Of course this will raise lots of money, money we can use to repair the ailing network of roads and highways that were built in the 50's and 60's and now are in need of significant repair. It will also curb our desire to go back to gas guzzling. It is shown that we are price sensitive to gas and as the price goes up we will drive less (putting less polutants in the air and killing fewer people) and we will seek out more alternative fuels and low consumption transportation options.

2. Restructure the Auto Makers - as part of our bailout we should insist that the big three automakers develop a mass transit division. They should re-tool their factories to make those high speed trains that can go between big cities. This would help them get back on their feet and would encourage mass transit.

My comment to this last suggestion is that we should also insist on more fuel effecient cars as part of our bail out plan. If the cigarette companies can re-tool to become high tech firms the auto industry can simillarly reinvent themselves for the betterment of all.

- Pedro