August, 2019, Part 4, Political Class Insanity: Jail Time For Feeding Two Cats, Orwell Is Back, and Inane Laws Across the Country

It is another month which means it is again time to review the latest political class insanity from Washington and around the world. Political class insanity takes many forms including the wasting of taxpayer wealth, criminal fraud within government programs, inane and stupid political quotes and actions, the inability to create and implement effective and efficient government programs, stupid and ill performing economic policies and strategies, and other forms of insanity that continue to evolve and surprise and shock us.

Let’s get started:

1) Hillary Clinton breaks Federal laws and government protocols by having an unsecure computer server, a server that is hacked by the Chinese and probably other countries, in her house and does not get in criminal trouble. Barack Obama breaks existing laws, shreds the Constitution and ignores judicial rulings and does not get in criminal trouble. A 79 year old woman in Ohio feeds two stray cats and goes to jail for 10 days.

Whoever says that justice is evenly distributed across all segments of the American population is obviously blind to how the political class gets away with so much more severe crimes than ordinary Americans:

• Ohio resident Nancy Segula, who is 79 years old, was recently sentenced to 10 days in jail for feeding two cats.
• One of her neighbors had moved away but had left her pet cats behind on the streets to fend for themselves.
• Being a kind hearted human being, Ms. Segula took pity on the cats and started to feed them so they would not starve.
• Neighbors called animal services and they dropped four citations on her for feeding the cats instead of taking the cats off of the streets themselves.
• By the time she got the fourth citation, she was required to report to the local government and was then sentenced to jail.

So remember, if you are not a politician, be careful what stray animals you feed, you could get jail time. The news report with additional details is at:

https://selfreliancecentral.com/2019/08/01/government-gone-insane-79-year-old-ohio-woman-sent-to-jail-for-feeding-cats/?utm_source=190802SRCAMFBF2&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=190802SRCAMFBF2

2) For anyone who has read the George Orwell novel, “1984,” you know that it predicts that eventually the government will overtake and destroy all of our freedoms. In that world, the government controls the news, the language we speak, the actions we take and if we dare to violate their dictates, then severe penalties are in store. In such a world, government surveillance is everywhere, there is no hiding from the prying and spying hand of the government and “Big Brother.”

Very scary reading, reading that just got scarier based on a recent USA Today article:

• According to the article, the Pentagon and Federal government are launching and testing unmanned surveillance balloons to observe what is going on on the ground within the country.
• The balloons are currently being launched from sites in South Dakota and are hovering via solar power over a number of midwest states.
• Theoretically, the balloons are to provide "a persistent surveillance system" to help counter drug running and homeland security threats.
• These purposes are on file with the FCC which had to approve the balloon launches for "experimental special temporary authorization." 
• The balloons float miles and miles above the surface (65,000 feet) so they are unlikely to be seen by criminals, terrorists and drug runners.
• But their high tech equipment allows them to track individual vehicles as these vehicles travel miles and miles through all kinds of weather and through days and nights.
• Each balloon can cover 25 square miles in detail and can communicate with each other and hand off tracking if necessary.

So many issues here:

• Why is the Pentagon involved in domestic crime fighting, a slippery slope on domestic use of military resources?
• Given that Obama illegally seized and spied on just about every American’s electronic communications, who and what is to prevent another person like him to do the same with this technology and turn it against their political rivals?
• Given that the Obama administration abused the FISA court process to illegally spy on Trump’s campaign, who is to say a future administration would not do the same thing relative this technology and abuse the need for a court order to use this balloon technology?

Privacy is key to living in a free society and the potential for the military or crooked politicians to take away our privacy via this technology is immense and would certainly help fulfill Orwell’s vision of Big Brother and the destruction of democracy in this country.

3) Let’s finish off today’s and this month’s political class insanity with something a little more light hearted than the destruction of democracy. We often maintain that American politicians are not smart enough, resourceful enough, or energetic enough to resolve real issues facing their constituents and the country. As a result, they waste time, resources, and taxpayer wealth on inane rules, laws, and efforts that in the big picture make very little sense and have very little impact on Americans’ lives.

I recently came across a source that listed out the most insane rules and laws in each state. As you read some of the craziest ones I have listed below, keep in mind that these ideas were proposed, debated, changed, and finally enacted by state and local politicians even though I am sure there were far more important issues (e.g. failing public schools, crumbling infrastructure, drug addiction, crime, etc.) that could have been addressed rather than enacting these laws:

• In Alaska you can only legally convert a picnic table into a boat if it contains the necessary safety equipment such as life vests and is properly registered as a boat.
• In Arizona it is illegal for a donkey to sleep in a bathtub.
• In California, it is illegal to eat a frog who died during a frog jumping contest.
• In Florida, pregnant pigs have the legal right to be unconfined and able to roam free while pregnant. No other animal in Florida has these same pregnant rights.
• In Pocatello, Idaho, it is illegal not to smile in public.
• In Iowa, the only legal size of all boxes used for picking hops has to be precisely 36 inches long, 18 inches wide, and 24 ¼ inches deep.
• In Topeka, Kansas, it is illegal to scream in a haunted house.
• In Missouri it is illegal to remove mattress tags or bring untagged mattresses into the state.
• In Montana it is illegal to raise pet rats unless they are used as reptile or bird food (that has to be a big bird).
• In New Hampshire it is illegal to collect seaweed off of beaches during night hours….but apparently okay to do it during the day.
• In New Jersey it is illegal to wear a bullet-proof vest while murdering, kidnapping, robbing, or raping, a law that I am sure all felons abide by.
• In Pennsylvania it is illegal to run a bingo game if you are a convicted felon. Could that really be a problem, massive numbers of felons running bingo games?
• In South Carolina it is illegal to play pinball unless you are 18 or older.
• In Huron, South Dakota is is illegal to cause static electricity.
• In Vermont, it is illegal to dress one’s horse up in a disguise and to disguise it as something other than a horse. I have to think it is pretty hard to dress up a horse and actually make it look anything other than a horse.
• In West Virginia is its illegal to hunt wild animals using a ferret.

Again, these are real rules and laws, negotiated, fine tuned, and enacted by inept politicians who cannot fix real problems but instead worry about disguised horses and other such nonsense.

More insanity next month, to be sure.

Our book, "Love My Country, Loathe My Government - Fifty First Steps To Restoring Our Freedom And Destroying The American Political Class" is now available at:

https://www.amazon.com/Walter-Bruno-Korschek/e/B002KYU08Q/ref=dbs_a_mng_rwt_scns_share

It is also available online at Amazon and Barnes and Noble. Please pass our message of freedom onward. Let your friends and family know about our websites and blogs, ask your library to carry the book, and respect freedom for both yourselves and others everyday.

Please visit the following sites for freedom:


http://www.reason.com
http://www.cato.org
http://www.bankruptingamerica.org
http://www.conventionofstates.com
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=08j0sYUOb5w