Standard Mischief

I woke up today to CBS news on the radio. They thoughtfully reminded me that even though Chicago will more than likely lose their case, not all gun laws will instantly be struck down. That’s a good reminder, because otherwise I’d be outside, shooting guns in the air immediately upon hearing the decision [sarcasm/].

There’s three dissents to read. Somehow Stevens, Breyer, Ginsburg and Sotomayor think you can pick and chose from the Bill of Rights which ones will be allowed to be applied to the states. I’ll personally want to read these three dissents first.

5-4 is too damn close.

I’m going to the range.

…is that it will make you look like an idiot. Getting all sides of the story, and my obsessive-compulsive reading disorder is the reason why I seek out the voices of others I commonly disagree with. Plus you get gems like this.

My favorite wacknut feminists (the ones that call other feminists “anti-feminists” [1]), puzzle over the idiom “(I) don’t dial 911″.

They quickly conclude that it’s some kind of tea party racist thing. Classy. Someone offers a link to Public Enemy’s “911 is a joke”. Having figured that out, the subject is dropped for more hand-wringing elsewhere.

Wrong video.

Just in case I manage to pierce the seal, I’ll issue the standard feministe “trigger warning” for the following video. It doesn’t end in a tragedy, though I can hardly call it a happy ending. And the police do show up, eventually.

Armed Citizens: Calling 911 Doesn’t Always Work 6:45 min.

Click here for pop-up | Direct link

Video by DaveLoneRanger, using images courtesy of Oleg Volk and http://a-human-right.com.

At 4:42, the operator says “…it’s only been two minutes”. Later, while she’s struggling with the stalker, dispatch helpfully quips that the police “are almost there”.

Here’s another expression important for the culturally literate: “When seconds count, the police are only minutes away”.

[1] Feminists who do believe all the equity stuff, but aren’t true believers that the federal government is the solution to all society’s ills are labeled “anti-feminists”. No, I don’t get it either.

I’m checking online to see if the Bob Etheridge scandal has finally got the coverage it deserves from the legacy media.

What do I find but the Associated Press – world famous for suing bloggers over linking or printing short excerpts of AP news stories – have stolen an independent video clip, plastered their branding all over it, and went live with it, pimping it on their own YouTube channel.

The original, from StageRightShow, with almost 2.5 million views.

The ripoff, from the Ass. Press

AP Invokes DMCA Against Obama “Hope” Poster Artist

Linking, Short Excerpts Draw AP DMCA Takedown Notices

Blog Community Launches “F U AP” Campaign

This year, people wanting to go saltwater fishing are required by law to “register” themselves in the new “National Saltwater Angler Registry”. As fed-gov online forms go, this one is pretty benign, only asking for a name, address, date of birth, phone number, and where you think you will go fishing. You can either go to the web space, or do the registration over the phone, and you get a number that will let you go fishing that day.

The phone number lets NOAA possibly call and contact you for a survey about your catch. The DOB is to, I assume cross reference you with federal tax data so NOAA does not have to put themselves in the sticky situation of needing to ask for your social security number. Doing that is just begging for massive non-compliance. Notable is that native subsistence fishing is exempt for special people. Also notable is that there is a captcha on the online form, presumably to increase the time it takes to register multiple bogus identities.

The standard mischief here is that next year, they’ll start charging for the privilege. Estimated cost is $15-25 per year, every single year. You can see what NOAA has plans for with all that cash by looking at their friendly FAQ page. Here you will find what they plan to do with the registry (call some of the people on the list and do a phone survey) and you will also learn that with the data collected, NOAA is certain to be able to save recreational fishing. The very last question has to do with non-compliance. If you want to know what your civil disobedience will cost you, here they link to a document that you will undoubtedly require two days and two lawyers to decode.

Let’s do a bit of “back of the envelope” calculating. If they contact 1 out of every hundred people for a survey, and the tax is $20, then massaging the data and creating the powerpoint slides will come to $2000 per person surveyed. Government efficiency at its finest!

Now I’m all for the minimum amount of government to ensure we always have reasonable access to the commonwealth that is recreational fishing. But I’m not convinced that taxing what used to be a right or the $2000 a head powerpoint slide presentation will save us all.

So how did this 2011 “tax on fun” come about? It’s a little sneaky so the answer isn’t in the FAQ. I had to do a bit of digging. User MetalMan at edgeangling.com:

On January 12, 2007, President Bush signed the Magnuson-Stevens Fishery Conservation and Management Reauthorization Act of 2006. Our elected officials had plenty of time to challenge it and did nothing. We the people had plenty of time to contact these officials and urge them to protect our rights and for the most part did nothing. If something is taken from you don’t blame others blame yourself for allowing it to happen.

(I’ll disagree with MetalMan on the lack of the citizens’ will to involve themselves.)

Got that? The Magnuson-Stevens Fishery Conservation and Management Reauthorization Act of 2006. So the law was enacted back in 2007 (after a vigorous public debate where it was a complete fluke that I totally missed out on everything). Passed as a “voice vote” and “Unanimous Consent”, so our representatives will not have this come back and bite them in the ass. Then the bill slept silently for a few years while our critters at NOAA have a small three line ad in the local paper declaring a period of “public comment”. [1]

Now I’ll admit right off that having finally found the bill, I haven’t yet read the important parts (other parts do something to the polar bears and possibly Coca-Cola commercials [2]) but I think the stealth Five-Year Plan is to get every coastal state to adopt a saltwater fishing license. Because if they do adopt or create a saltwater fishing license, and they do collected the proper info, and if they do pass that info over to the government for free, that resident of that state is immune from the federal tax. States without a required license will be encouraged by this to create one because they get to keep all the money. I guess what this really screws is the poor guy in Nebraska who wants to surf-fish one day out of the week while on vacation. He’ll be required to get an out-of-state license now. The states without taxes will now be at parity with the states that tax everything that moves. I have no idea how NOAA will be able to afford to survey anyone they don’t get a double sawbuck from, but that’s probably not the real reason for the bill anyway.

I’m sure the real reason is to raise a future generation that won’t flinch for a second when the gimmie wants to impose a “Fresh Air and Sunshine Tax”.

[1] Of course, the planning charts and demolition orders of this event have been on display in the local planning department of Alpha Centauri for fifty years, and it’s not the Vogon’s fault if we haven’t been able to travel the measly four light-years to get there.

[2] “…and for other purposes”, standard boilerplate legalese mischief.