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New Threat to Freedom – the Beer Police

Can there be any more proof that the police have too much time on their hands or maybe there are too manycops enforcing the law than this story of beer busts in Pennsylvania?  The Philadelphia Daily News has an incredible story called “Troopers raid popular bars for unlicensed beers” that starts:

IT WAS ELIOT NESS and the Untouchables, as played by the Keystone Kops.  More than a dozen armed State Police officers conducted simultaneous raids last week on three popular Philadelphia bars known for their wide beer selections. The cops confiscated hundreds of bottles of expensive ales and lagers, now in State Police custody at an undisclosed location.  The alleged offense: Although the bar owners had bought the beer legally from licensed Pennsylvania distributors and had paid all the necessary taxes, the police claimed that nobody had registered the precise names of the beers with the state Liquor Control Board.”

Consider for a moment that “more than a dozen” cops raided the three bars for selling beer that had been legally purchased.  TWELVE COPS on a beer bust!   The State  Police confiscated  four kegs and 317 bottles of the illegal contraband aka beer.  There must not be any unsolved murders, violent crimes, home burglaries or other serious crimes anywhere in Pennsylvania.  TWELVE COPS on a beer bust!   Why didn’t one cop or a civil service pencil pusher just go to the bars and ask to inspect the beer inventory and issue a citation if there were a problem?

Amazon Tax Signals Business Unfriendliness & Will Worsen Short-Term Budget Problems

In their never-ending thirst to raise tax money to pay for their unlimited spending habits, some states have adopted what is called the “Amazon” tax and others are considering it.  This is a tax on online companies that have no connection with a state, but are required to collect and pay sales taxes on sales within the state if the online company has affiliates within the state who earn commissions on in state sales.  It’s called the “Amazon” tax because Amazon is the most well known online business that makes sales using affiliates.

Currently New York, Rhode Island, North Carolina, and Colorado have adopted Amazon taxes.  These laws are unconstitutional and violate the law of the United States expressed in the famous Supreme Court case called International Shoe Co. vs Washington, 326 U.S. 310 (1945) learned by every first year law student since 1945.  This case held that a state cannot tax an out of state business unless the out of state business has sufficient minimum contacts within the taxing state.  International Shoe established the concept of ‘nexus,” which means that an out of state business cannot be taxed within a state unless the out of state business has  minimum contacts within the state such as an office or a single employee that resides in the state or that goes into the state regularly on business.

The Tax Foundation published a detailed article on this topic called “Amazon Tax Signals Business Unfriendliness & Will Worsen Short-Term Budget Problems.”  This article begins:

Contrary to the claims of supporters, Amazon taxes do not provide easy revenue.  In fact, the nation’s first few Amazon taxes have not produced any revenue at all, and there is some evidence of lost revenue.  For instance, Rhode Island has seen no additional sales tax revenue from its Amazon tax, and because Amazon reacted by discontinuing its affiliate program, Rhode Islanders are earning less income and paying less income tax.

When I first heard about this type of tax I predicted that the result would be less tax revenue for the states that adopt it because the online businesses would terminate their affiliate programs with affiliates who reside in the taxing states with the result that the affiliate would no longer earn revenue and the taxing state would lose the income tax revenue on the lost income of the affiliate.  The Tax Foundation reports supports my earlier prediction.  It’s the law of unintended consequences that results from all legislation.  Frequently laws have an affect that is the opposite of the legislative intent.

Update:  See the interesting post made by the Tax Foundation on March 10, 2010, about the reaction to its Amazon tax paper and on these significant developments:

The Criminalization of Almost Everything

The Cato Institute published an article called “The Criminalization of Almost Everything.”  It discusses a subject that important in a free country, but it is ignored by the main stream media that is too busy stalking Tiger Woods and Paris Hilton.  The subject is that federal state and local governments have passed so many laws that is it impossible to live a normal life without constantly violating laws of which we are totally unaware.

For example, did you know that there is a federal law (the Lacey Act) that says it is a crime to possess certain types of wood?  See “Wood Police Raid Gibson Guitar Plant.”  Are you sure your home and office are free of all federally controlled woods such as wood from Madagascar?  Check your wood immediately before the feds swat team breaks down your door and arrests you for being a wood perp.  Just say no to Madagascar wood!  You say you and the rest of the citizens of the United States can’t tell Madagascar wood from Canadian wood, but that’s just tough tennis shoes.  The law is the law and ignorance is no excuse.  You will go to jail if the frame around the picture of your family is made from an illegal wood.

The Cato article begins:

When laws grow so voluminous and vague that they oppress those who live under them, society can become as unlivable as if it were lawless. Subject to the arbitrary scrutiny of prosecutors overcome by ambition for their own 15 minutes of fame, ordinary citizens face the horrors of becoming criminal defendants. At a Cato Book Forum in October, Harvey Silverglate, author of Three Felonies a Day, and Tim Lynch, editor of In the Name of Justice and director of Cato’s Project on Criminal Justice, discussed the growing threat of federal criminal law.

An average, busy professional gets up in the morning, gets the kids to school, goes to work, uses the telephone or e-mail, has meetings, works on a prospectus or bank loan, goes home, puts the kids to bed, has dinner, reads the newspaper, goes to sleep, and has no idea that, in the course of that day, he or she has very likely committed three felonies. Three felonies that some ambitious, creative prosecutor can pick out from that day’s activities and put into an indictment.

An excellent article on this topic is “Where were you when wood became a felony?”  See also “Confronting Big Cereal, unregulated garage sales, and other evils.”

7th Grader Says No to Drugs is Suspended Five Days

A 7th grade girl was suspended from school for five days because a friend put a single prescription drug pill in her hand.  The pill was Adderall, an  ADHD drug.  The girl who said no said no and gave the pill back to her friend.  The school supseded the girl for five days for possession of a drug.  The girl’s parents said they were proud of her for saying no to drugs just as she had been taught in the school’s DARE (Drug Abuse Resistance Education).  The instructors must have forgotten to tell the kids not to touch the drugs when saying no.  The Greater Clark County Schools zero tolerance policy says one touch equals a five day suspension.

How do we get educators who don’t have a clue?  Where’s the common sense, fairness and justice?  Why can’t they realize that punishments like this  sends a message that the system is unfair and you will be punished even if you are innocent?  If a kid 1 puts a pill in the hand of kid 2, how would kid 2 know what the pill was or that the pill was a legal vs. an illegal drug?  To me and to kids, one white  round pill looks just like another white round pill.

Is Adderall an illegal drug that cannot be possessed?  I don’t know.  Do you?  Are all pills considered drugs that cannot be possessed?  When is a pill legal to possess vs. illegal to possess?  If a student touched an aspirin pill, would the student be suspended for possessing a drug?  What about possession of a single M & M candy?  It looks like a pill.  Is an M & M a banned drug because of its  pill-like shape?  The schools don’t teach the kids reading, writing or arithmetic so my guess is they are not teaching drug recognition.  Maybe the school should have a full-time drug counselor to further waste precious  funds who is qualified to examine pill-like items and determine if an item is an illegal drug or ok to possess on the school grounds.

Billboard Police Arrest Perp Who Put Ad on a Building

Apparently there is a major new crime wave in the Los Angeles area, but fear not, the billboard police are on it.  Kayvan Setareh was arrested and held on $1 million bail for putting up a movie advertisement on an eight story building.  I wonder what his bail would have been if he were accused of a more serious crime involving death or injury?   The sign perp is accused of violating three City of Los Angeles misdemeanors, two of which are violations of the city sign code.  After filing a lawsuit against more than twelve other brazen billboard advertisers, Los Angeles City Attorney Carmen Trutanich warned that “The days of lax and inconsistent enforcement of billboard and outdoor advertising laws in this city are over.”

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