Monday, November 9, 2009

Two Important Upcoming Pennsylvania Bills

While I wish I was in New Hampshire, there are two positive pieces of legislation coming up in my current (and so far lifelong) home of Pennsylvania. I would urge all of my fellow Pennsylvanians to support them:


Via NRA-ILA - House Bill 40 - “Castle Doctrine”  Self-Defense Bill:

HB40, sponsored by State Representative Scott Perry (R-92), would permit law-abiding citizens to use force, including deadly force, against an attacker in their homes and any places outside of their home where they have a legal right to be. Read More.


Via The False Rape Society  - Finally, a chance to reduce false rape claims:

We frequently talk here about how the crime of making a false report of rape is treated so cavalierly. Finally, as shown by the article below, some state legislators are looking to do something about it. Read more.

Thursday, November 5, 2009

Winners and Losers

Now more than ever, I wish I would have written a post last year congratulating Major League Baseball's Philadelphia  Phillies for winning the World Series. I kind of wish I would have written one congratulating them when they won the National League Pennant this year, though at least this way I can't be accused of jinxing them. Anyway, while it was disappointing to see them lose this year's  Series, it was a joy to see them go two years in a row. They are still winners in my book and should hold their heads high. I will certainly miss being near them when I move to New Hampshire.


As for the "Losers" referred to in the title of this post, no, I don't mean the New York Yankees fans, as obnoxious as many of them are. This is their moment and I don't begrudge them their celebrations. Well, not too much, anyway. No, the losers I'm talking about are more along the lines of the usual suspects.

First, there are the piece of shit Bensalem cops who arrested Susan Finkelstein for allegedly trying to trade sex for World Series tickets. How did these brave modern day Sherlock Holmeses discover this dangerous criminal? From an ad she posted on Craigslist. Aside from the ridiculousness of anti-prostitution laws in general, there are dozens of ads on Craigslist that are more explicitly offering prostitution than this:
DESPERATE BLONDE NEEDS WS TIX (Philadelphia) Diehard Phillies fan--gorgeous tall buxom blonde-- in desperate need of two World Series Tickets. Price negotiable--- I'm the creative type! Maybe we can help each other!

The Barney Fife KGB wannabes who responded to this ad were obviously more concerned with getting publicity for their little department than doing anything that would actually protect the public. I guess they wanted to make it appear that they are good for something other than writing parking tickets or harassing honest, law-abiding gun owners. Maybe also they were motivated by the idea that sports are supposed to be pure and wholesome and not to be tainted by anything the sanctimonious mavens of morality arbitrarily decide is wrong. Same mentality that allows officials of all of the professional sports leagues and the NCAA to swoon from scandalized outrage at the thought of expanding legalized gambling on their sacred rituals, while never missing a crass opportunity to gouge their fans for extra bucks. Also the same mentality that causes league officials suspend and sternly scold the players catch with marijuana, while these same pompous preachers don't think twice about accepting ads for beer and boner pills  (Not that I have anything against beer or hard-on pills, I enjoy beer quite a bit and am glad that there are pills to help me get an erection should I ever need them - it's just that it is the height of hypocrisy to accept money to promote drugs which do have considerable, if worthwhile, risks while condemning users of what overwhelming evidence shows to be the safest drug humanity has ever known).


And that brings me to the other losers I have in mind, two pieces of garbage from across the pond named Alan Johnson and Neil McKeganey. I usually don't get involved in the internal affaires of other nations (though I have severely criticized Harriet Harman on Antimisandy.com this was because she tried to make a United States governor submit to her will in her desperate crusade to subjugate her fellow British citizens). Anyway, Johnson and McKeganey are two nanny state extremists who are demanding that Professor David Nutt resign his position as chairman of Britain's Advisory Council on the Misuse of Drugs (ACMD) because he was brazen enough to commit the ultimate crime - telling the truth. Specifically, for saying that "alcohol and cigarettes are more harmful than cannabis," a position that no serious researcher would object to, except on ideological grounds. McKeganey, himself, even admitted “In terms of health harm there is no doubt that cigarettes and alcohol are both more harmful than many currently illegal drugs,” he added. “They are associated with many more deaths and with much wider rates of illness," but despite such an acknowledgment of common sense, he was perfectly able to adapt his authority worshiping doublethink to pretend to believe such obvious bullshit as this:

If you are the key person offering advice to the government you cannot then simultaneously, in public, criticize the government for the decisions it takes. David was going so far beyond his remit to raise fundamental questions about the direction of UK drugs policy in relation to cannabis and in relation to seeking to combine alcohol and tobacco with illegal drugs — in the process muddying the distinction between illegal drugs and legal drugs.

No, God forbid someone advising the government should disagree with them. Everyone should know that "advising" the government means confirming the fact that the almighty politicians and bureaucrats are always right. And yes, how dare Nutt  [muddy] the distinction between illegal drugs and legal drugs. He has no right to do that just because this distinction is based on anti-scientific, superstitious arbitrary moralism. Obviously, if drug laws were based on public health instead of manufactured prejudices alcohol would be of greater concern to authorities than cannabis, and tobacco would be of much greater concern than cocaine, heroin, or any other so-called "hard drug."

Don't get me wrong - I don't think any of them should be illegal. Even tobacco which is much deadlier than alcohol, cocaine, and heroin, to say nothing of the safer-than-aspirin drug cannabis, has been responsible for far fewer deaths than meddling authoritarian governments. But putting things into perspective, "muddying the distinction between illegal drugs and legal drugs" is a logical response to the arbitrary bullshit of morally bankrupt government drug policies. Well when my friend e-mailed me this story under the subject line: "Refuse to support Nutt's sacking!‏" and beginning with the line "It looks like Johnson is supporting Nutt's sacking", I said "What a couple of Johnsons Johnson and McKeganey are. They are not fit to lick Nutt's sack." I think that pretty well sums it up.