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Author: Remso Martinez

Beloved Cat Kicked Out of Business Thanks to Nosey Patron

Written by Remso Martinez on . Posted in Issues, Personal Liberty. 3 Comments on Beloved Cat Kicked Out of Business Thanks to Nosey Patron

It’s your property, do what you want with it, right? Wrong, and one local business in Alaska learned the hard way after a nosey patron decided she was going to protect others from the gravest threat imaginable –  a cat. According to Reason Magazine, Stormy, friendly cat who was a hit among customers, was spotted by a patron during her regular cat nap in the store. Apparently, the presence of the cat was enough to prompt this random individual to file a formal complaint against the business to the Alaska Department of Environmental Conservation. A representative from the DEC’s Food Safety and Sanitation Program spoke to the local press also confirming that an Environmental Health Officer (EHO) also spotted Stormy going about her day in the store, causing the EHO to take additional action. According to the DEC, “Under the state’s food code, live animals, with the exception of service animals, seafood, and pet fish, are largely not allowed in Alaska food establishments.” This begs the question, the cat obviously wasn’t a bother before, so why did this person decide to go out of her way to go ahead and bring in the State to solve an issue she could have just brought up to the store owners? Your guess is as good as any. From the rise of internet memes ranging from “Permit Patty” to “BBQ Becky” what we are witnessing is  a rise in the number of individuals who instead of trying to resolve a conflict themselves, they bring in the heavy hand of government to take actions far beyond what many would consider reasonable. Now, Stormy is being evicted from the home where the customers grew to love her and she grew comfortable at her old age. Some loyal friends of Stormy the cat have spoken to the local paper defending the cat, saying that the health concerns were out of line with reality. “I’m in there every day, and it just seems like if the DEC is concerned about hygienics, having the cat there is a lot more hygienic than not having the cat there because the cat keeps the rodent population down,” one local customer said to the Homer News. Either way, out of loyalty to the friendly cat, the store owners will be bringing Stormy home instead to live out the rest of her days. The moral of the story is, in a world where there is an ounce of control over another person’s private property, there will be people who try to cause trouble, even if that trouble is the existence of a fat cat named Stormy.

Student Advocates for Gun Rights Amidst Campus Carry Controversy

Written by Remso Martinez on . Posted in First Amendment, Gun Rights, Personal Liberty. No Comments on Student Advocates for Gun Rights Amidst Campus Carry Controversy

In a true act of bravery, South Dakota State University student Keegan Reeves put himself in the public square as he laid out a firm stance criticizing the University’s anti-firearms policies, which he claims make the school a prime target for those with criminal intent. According to the student-run paper the Collegiate, Reeves went to speak on behalf of multiple pro-firearms student groups at a meeting of the university’s Student Association, stating here was there to represent the many “students who feel the gun rights issues weren’t given a chance to be fully represented by both sides,” and that “We feel we were truly ignored.” Currently, students and faculty may conceal carry firearms on campus but must go through a process of notifying campus police and store their firearms at the campus police department overnight. Criticisms over campus carry laws over the last decade have escalated due to the increase in school shootings, but the spotlight fell on SDSU when a student discharged his weapon in his dorm room, causing only increased animosity from certain students and faculty wishing to change the current policy, which the Student Association intended to vote on last week. In the South Dakota state legislature, a bill was pushed to ban gun-free zones on public university campuses. According to a statement provided to the Argus Leader by one of the bill’s sponsors, “The South Dakota Constitution guarantees citizens’ the right to bear arms” and that “gun-free zones do not work.” The bill also covered issues ranging from student classroom safety to “potential complications to Title IX sexual assault, stalking and harassment cases on campuses.” Time after time, each travesty shows that gun free zones are hotbeds for criminal activity. Gun rights activist Antonia Okafor stated in a fact-based op-ed at the Hill that “In the United States, guns are used as many as 2.5 million times a year in self-defense, according to some estimates, preventing countless tragedies from ever becoming a news story.” Currently, students can conceal carry firearms at public universities in Arkansas, Georgia, Colorado, Idaho, Kansas, Minnesota, Oregon, Texas, Tennessee, Utah, and Wisconsin. It is the libertarian position that all gun regulations are an infringement upon individual rights and that no man or woman should be deprived of a way of properly and effectively defending their life, liberty, and property.

German Town Seizes Family’s Dog and Sells it on eBay

Written by Remso Martinez on . Posted in Libertarianism, Personal Liberty, Property Rights. 2 Comments on German Town Seizes Family’s Dog and Sells it on eBay

I know what you’re thinking, this is obviously a joke right? Well, welcome to the Twilight Zone my friends, because this story is about to get seriously weird. According to the BBC, “A town in Germany has made headlines for seizing a family’s dog over unpaid taxes – and then selling it on eBay. German media report that officials in Ahlen initially wanted to seize the wheelchair of a disabled resident as the most valuable item on the premises. Instead, they settled on a pedigree pug bitch named Edda. One of the officials then listed the dog on eBay at an apparent bargain price of €750 – half of what its new owner expected to pay.” So imagine coming home after a long day of work, looking for your pooch, and then finding a letter on your door saying that because of owed taxes, the local government came into your house, stole your dog, and then sold it on eBay to teach you a lesson. Now I know what you’re thinking, this can’t happen in the United States right? Wrong. Small businesses are typically the victims of IRS seizures, also known as a levy. In this situation, the IRS will take your private property in order to pay back taxes. This creates a fundamental issue in regards in regards to property rights because it brings about a very elementary question- who owns your property, to begin with, you or the government? If you owe them money, why on earth would they think it was a good idea to take what you own and sell it? Did your car offend the IRS? Was the IRS on your deed when you purchased your home? It almost seems like the government owns all our stuff and we’re just renting it out to put it simply. First, they’ll issue a notice saying that refusal or inability to pay back what is owed to the federal government will result in loss of your business. According to Chron.com, “If you have personal liability for the business taxes — if you operate as a sole proprietorship, for example — the IRS can garnish your wages, retirement payments and Social Security benefits to pay the tax debt if necessary.” The IRS can seize your bank accounts, investment accounts and brokerage accounts to satisfy your back taxes. If you own a business, it can be taken. Personal property like cars, boats, and houses are among the last assets to be seized. Hundreds of thousands of Americans each year either mess up intentionally or fall into a bad luck streak and simply fall prey to the IRS because they can’t afford to go toe to toe with this massive system. Then again why fight? Many Americans just think its better to just let the IRS take their stuff, and for the feds. It is easier and more cost-effective for the IRS to seize liquid assets rather than market and auction off business equipment or a house. While this may seem drastic, especially if a business had a bad season or an owner made poor financial decisions, at a minimum at least you are getting a thirty-day warning and they won’t take your dog. The German’s, however, don’t play around, even for the most ridiculous of taxes. In the case of Edda the pug, she wasn’t seized because her owner had lapsed income taxes. She was kidnapped by local government because she didn’t pay a local dog tax.  Take that in and read it one more time, a dog tax. “Upon calling the number listed in the advert” the article continues, “she [the dog’s owner] spoke to an employee of Ahlen’s administration, who explained that the dog had been seized because the owner owed the city money – including for unpaid dog tax.” There were other problems regarding the victim and the city, what was most surprising was that the city claimed they didn’t even want the dog: they wanted the owner’s disabled husband’s wheelchair. (As if that makes the story any better.) The moral of the story is that through taxation, you don’t really own anything. From property taxes to car taxes and dog taxes, in the eyes of the state, we are all just borrowing things. Like disgruntled children, they can take our things from us for whatever reason they can conjure up.

South Carolina Attempts to End Policing for Profit

Written by Remso Martinez on . Posted in Capital Punishment, Personal Liberty. No Comments on South Carolina Attempts to End Policing for Profit

Civil Asset Forfeiture (CAF), in which law enforcement can tie inanimate objects to crimes without a charge and confiscate them from innocent civilians and criminals alike, is a bipartisan issue which has been an issue Americans across the aisle have taken a negative look at for several years now. Currently, in the South Carolina general assembly, steps are being taken to end this foul practice once and for all. According to the Tenth Amendment Center, a “bill introduced in the South Carolina House would reform the state’s asset forfeiture laws to prohibit the state from taking a person’s property without a criminal conviction in most situations. Passage of the bill would also close a federal loophole that allows police to circumvent more strict state forfeiture laws by passing cases off to the feds.” The loophole described is in regards to a federal practice known as “equitable sharing” which allows state prosecutors to bypass certain laws preventing CAF abuse by passing the buck to federal law enforcement, who then shares a piece of this theft flavored pie with the state since now the case regarding the stolen property is within the jurisdiction of both state and federal law enforcement. CAF as a practice is wrong because it enables policing for profit since most private property obtained is auctioned off and sold so the money comes back to certain agencies and departments. According to the Pulitzer Center “The practice skirts the Fourth Amendment’s guarantee that Americans are free from unreasonable searches and seizures, and it provides a potentially corrupting incentive for police to circumvent the law to fund their departments.” A report from the Institute for Justice has stated this legal and controversial law enforcement practice “has all the hallmarks of an inviting target for public-interest litigation and advocacy: a cutting-edge legal controversy, sympathetic property owners who have little or no involvement in criminal activity, and simple, outrageous facts that show ordinary Americans facing the loss of their property.” With this program allowed to run amok, cops can turn law-abiding citizens into criminals for any reason in order to seize their property. Police have seized everything from letters traveling through the postal service with cash to even a person’s own car. This injustice is currently under well-earned scrutiny from Democrats and Republicans since the current state of policing for profit has turned the entire citizenry into a criminal cash pot where only through the legislative process can this wretched legal plunder be stopped once and for all.

NYC Workers Aren’t Jazzed About the $15 Minimum Wage

Written by Remso Martinez on . Posted in Business and Economy, Economic Liberty, Economics. No Comments on NYC Workers Aren’t Jazzed About the $15 Minimum Wage

At the beginning of 2019, some New Yorkers were excited for the minimum wage to jump from $13.50 to $15 an hour. However, the enthusiasm for that higher wage dropped as workers are now experiencing the impact of artificial wage increases on their wallets and job security. According to TheBlaze, “Restaurants are raising prices to adjust for the higher salaries they must pay workers. But, they’re increasingly worried about discouraging customers with too high of prices.” The artificial inflation of the minimum wage means that employers will have to pick up the tab to meet the expectations of the new law. When employers are forced by the government to increase the wage, they have to raise the prices on products and services at a rate inconsistent with consumer demand. Because of this, employees are making “more money” but the prices of products and services around them will have to increase as well. All this means is that the cost of labor and products/services may look higher on face value, but the overall problem is that nothing is solved by this artificial intervention into the marketplace, where consumers and producers determine the price of goods and services based off the basic principles of supply and demand. Jazz Saw at HotAir summed up this whole debacle perfectly, stating none “of this required a Ouija Board to figure out. If the government artificially drives up labor costs, the restaurants (who always operate on very thin margins) were going to have to make up for the surge in costs someplace. They could either fire some of the staff, reduce the hours they work, or raise prices. Usually, it was going to be some combination of all of them. But you can only operate a business with a skeleton crew for so long.” Over time the full effects of the minimum wage increase will show the full effects of the government intervention, but for now, employees are beginning to worry as to whether they’ll even be able to keep their job as the market surrounding them becomes more difficult to live in. This drastic campaign to raise the minimum wage has been around for several years across the nation, but in 2017 (several years after a bill passed in the city council) the city of Seattle which was one of the first metropolitan cities to raise the wage to $15 an hour, began to see the harmful ramifications of such a decision as the people they intended to help began to lose hours on the clock, and some even their jobs. Immediately certain larger businesses left the city and the state entirely where the minimum wage was lower, leaving many Seattle residents unemployed in a city where the rise in costs made life more difficult than before. While the intentions of a law may be for the good of man, the unintended consequences prove that intervention in a market dictated by the laws of supply and demand show the lesser of us will always be the first to drown in a flood of good intentions.

An American Autobahn? California Imagines a Road Without Speed Limits

Written by Remso Martinez on . Posted in Libertarian Answers on Issues, Personal Liberty. 1 Comment on An American Autobahn? California Imagines a Road Without Speed Limits

Every day, Americans abide by rules we don’t like. In some states, it is illegal to collect rainwater. (That means collecting water that literally falls from the sky can get you in trouble, how ridiculous is that?) Also, haven’t we all been tempted at one point in time not to stop at that “STOP” sign in the middle of a country road where no other human is around? For those that do stop, do you stop because you really fear to hit another car in the middle of nowhere, or because a cop car hiding behind the bushes might give you a ticket? California is considering an experiment in radical freedom, and the two words to justly describe it are fast and furious. During the first several days of the legislative session in the California State Senate, one senator “introduced a new bill that would create an American autobahn. The proposal titled Senate Bill 319 would allow unlimited speed lanes on two major highways. SB-319 would add two lanes each to the north- and south-bound lanes of I-5 and Highway 99. Those lanes would have no speed limit and allow you to go as fast as you darn well please” according to Brobible.com. Afraid of a road without speed limits? The facts about the Autobahn in Germany might lay those to rest. The Autobahn in Germany is not necessarily a road-rage free for all, there are “recommended speed limits.” As far as traffic safety is concerned, “A 2008 report from the European Transport Safety Council (ETSC) looked at 645 road deaths in Germany, and found that 67 percent occurred on highway sections without limits.” That may seem like a reason to oppose an Autobahn here in the US but “60 percent of road deaths in Germany occur on rural roads, not the Autobahn (which is responsible for only 12 percent).” The general thought is that because of other drivers on the road, speeding drivers will be more cognizant and less likely to do something insanely reckless. According to HG Legal Resources out in California, “Experts essentially split down the middle when it comes to whether they think higher speed limits contribute to traffic accidents and fatalities. In 2000, the Automobile Club of Southern California performed the first in-depth analysis of the effects of higher speed limits in California. The study showed that higher speed limits set in 1995 and 1996 did not increase the rate of fatal or injury traffic crashes. In fact, actual travel speeds on roads with increased speed limits barely changed. People were already traveling faster than previous speed limits, and once speed limits were altered they generally did not speed faster than their comfort zone.” Therefore the real question remains: Should states be allowed to develop roads without speed limits? Or is that question a race for another day?

The Anniversary They Hope You Missed

Written by Remso Martinez on . Posted in Criminal Justice, Elections and Politics, Military, National Defense. No Comments on The Anniversary They Hope You Missed

February 19th came and went, and for the most part, I really doubt many woke up wondering if that day had any significance. Few websites covered it, the radio was silent in regards to it, and the mainstream cable news outlets may have touched on it for perhaps a few passing seconds. For a country that often reflects on the sins of our past, Americans have all but forgotten the anniversary of the fascist decision by the Roosevelt Administration during WWII to take Japanese-Americans and stick them in concentration camps. February 19th, 1942, Mises Institute writer Ryan McMaken reminds us, was when FDR “issued Executive Order 9066 authorizing military personnel to lock Americans of Japanese descent in concentration camps that are often euphemistically called ‘internment camps.’” Now “internment camps” sounds a lot less worse than “concentration camps” but the differences are non-existent. According to McMaken “the term ‘concentration camp’ is not a pejorative term. Using the term to describe the camps for Japanese-Americans is both appropriate and properly descriptive.” Upon FDR’s Executive Order, 66 percent of Americans of Japanese descent were forcibly relocated to the camps for the duration of WWII after the bombing of Pearl Harbor. Imagine if we took 66 percent of our Arab population and put them in camps after the attacks on 9/11 for the duration of the War on Terror. According to Softschools.com, “Because the camps were not yet completed when Roosevelt signed the executive order, the Japanese prisoners were held in temporary shelters such as stables in racetracks.” Many thousands of Japanese-Americans were forced to sell their homes and all their property, and even military veterans of WWI, who fought and served their country, lost all their constitutional rights and were sent to the camps. The only option for leaving the camps was if one chose to enlist to fight on behalf of the same country which treated them and their families as criminals based solely on their race and heritage. “So, while the American camps were relatively safe and healthy,” McMaken writes, “it would be unwise to attribute to assumed American generosity. The fact is the US regime could afford to feed the residents while the general population more or less forgot about them. Had the US experienced something like Stalingrad, the Roosevelt Administration — which was not above prosecuting peaceful Americans under the Espionage Act — may have turned to harsher measures against interned populations.” Twenty-four years after the end of WWII, the US Government finally began to pay back restitution for the survivors of the camps, but the survivors would not see a dime of the $20,000 each were allocated for another 24 years in 1988, in which only 60,000 survivors were still alive. Often terms like “fascist” and “dictator” are thrown around, but American society has either forgotten or made excuses on behalf of Roosevelt and the American government, turning their backs on the rights of American citizens during a time of war, and barely making amends several generations later.

DonorSee Shows Voluntary Cooperation in Action

Written by Remso Martinez on . Posted in Communicating Liberty, Elections and Politics, Personal Liberty. No Comments on DonorSee Shows Voluntary Cooperation in Action

Charity is often put aside during presidential election years, as politicians on both sides of the political spectrum want to use your taxpayer dollars to fund their pet projects. Additionally, politicians will attempt to guilt you into voting for them because they claim they are better stewards of your money than you are. Hate poverty? Pay more taxes. See a natural disaster? New government agency. A neighbor in a tough financial spot? Sign up for a welfare program. The more we push away responsibilities to our government, the more disconnected we become towards each other and become less incentivized to ensure our money is being spent the right way. While online crowdfunding platforms such as Indiegogo and Kickstarter are a great way to help fund a cause ranging from inventors to covering someone’s funeral expenses, there is always the likelihood you are being tricked into something that intends to take your money and run. In the world of government, it is well known that fraud, waste, and abuse also run rampant. Whereas the market treats you like a customer, the government treats you like a liability. There is a large disconnect in the mentality regarding service, quality, and outcome because of these mindsets. So how does one take more individual responsibility in one’s community instead of granting the government more authority, while at the same time course correcting the supervisory aspect consumers are supposed to have on private organizations? Enter DonorSee, founded by humanitarian Gret Glyer several years ago. DonorSee is as simple as it is revolutionary; its goal is to provide funding for humanitarian projects that users oversee and have a direct role in, and during the process, they have to submit proof over a period of time that your money is going directly towards the project. These personalized updates are the difference between suspicion and trust. According to the site, “When you give on DonorSee, your money is sent directly to help people in need via our network of on-the-ground partners. After you give, our partners send you personalized updates showing you exactly how your money is helping. For example, if you give to a project for a malnourished baby that needs formula milk, we will send you updates of that baby returning to a healthy weight because of your donation.” This is different compared to so many other private charities, NGO’s, and government organizations, where most the donated money is consumed in overhead expenses and never reaches the destination donors thought they were going to. What makes DonorSee quick to respond and efficient in their progress is that “all projects on DonorSee are $500 or less. They are small ways to make a sustainable impact in the lives of real people in real need.” DonorSee is so effective, the Peace Corps saw it as direct competition and therefore banned their employees from using the platform. DonorSee is voluntaryism in action, showing that when people see a problem, they can cooperate and develop progress in ways government simply can’t.

Legal Weed Reduced Smuggling

Written by Remso Martinez on . Posted in Business and Economy, Drugs, Economic Liberty. No Comments on Legal Weed Reduced Smuggling

A basic understanding of economics can simplify complicated issues regardless of what politicians and news pundits would have you think. When we look at marijuana smuggling, for example, weed used to be the cash crop in terms of illicit drugs smuggled from Mexico over into the U.S. However, the rise in the number of states with legal weed is providing the government with some numbers they might not feel too happy about. According to David Bier, a policy analyst at the Cato Institute who analyzed the drug trade in a recent piece at Reason Magazine, in 2018 “the average Border Patrol agent was seizing just 25 pounds [of marijuana] for the entire year, or less than half a pound per week– a drop of 78 percent from 2013.” So has the threat of the wall diminished drug smuggling across the border? Are Americans just tired of weed? No to both, consumers would just rather go in broad daylight to a legal store where their product isn’t laced with rat poison instead of dealing with someone that might shoot them in an alleyway. Bigthink.com explained this cause, stating that back “in 2014, Colorado and Washington moved to fully legalize marijuana, and more states began to follow. This legalization correlated with not only a decrease in marijuana seizures at the U.S.–Mexico border but also a drop in seizures of all drugs.” Basic economics can explain this even further; the supply from Mexican cartels is being blocked by the supply from legal marijuana growers in states where it is legalized, meaning the supply drop has everything to do with the legalization of the drug and less with a wall, or at least the threat of one. The constant and growing U.S. demand for drugs from Mexico is what has ramped up drug trafficking across the border the last forty years, and now that Americans can get their product domestically instead through legal means, they don’t have to go through the drug cartels meaning the cartels have less incentive to cross the border carrying substances no one wants to buy anymore. However, the tug of war between legal drugs and illegal drugs has caused some cartels to increase the supply of dangerous drugs such as fentanyl and heroine, meaning “these rises, which were measured in the value of drugs seized, only occurred at ports of entry where a border wall would have no effect.” What all this shows is that education, legalization, and decriminalization will do more to reduce crime and usage of drugs and substances which are killing a record number of Americans each year.

The 3 Immediate Outcomes of “Free” College

Written by Remso Martinez on . Posted in Business and Economy, Economics. No Comments on The 3 Immediate Outcomes of “Free” College

The “free” college scam seems to be in bloom this election season once again. The last time I ever spoke of this was all the way back in 2015, however, despite all the evidence showing that this plan isn’t free nor practical, some politicians are willing to say anything in order to win your vote. So what are the main points to take away the next time you hear someone discuss the glittery and amazing benefits of a tuition-free college education? The Value of Your Degree Diminishes Simple economics show that when the supply of something goes up, the price of it goes down. No item or service immutable to the laws of supply and demand. College degrees, which were once only available to the wealthy and affluent, has expanded into more affordable options over the years so more people have the opportunity to rise up the socio-economic ladder. In 2017, a report was conducted stating the “the Census Bureau said 33.4 percent of Americans 25 or older said they had completed a bachelor’s degree or higher. That’s a sharp rise from the 28 percent with a college degree a decade ago. When the Census Bureau first asked respondents about their education levels, in 1940, just 4.6 percent said they had a four-year degree.” With competition in the workplace as high as its ever been, this means it is less rare for most professionals to have a college degree, meaning its value is less. In a Washington Post op-ed from 2018, author Ellen Shell discussed degree inflation stating “We appear to be approaching a time when, even for middle-class students, the economic benefit of a college degree will begin to dim. Since 2000, the growth in the wage gap between high school and college graduates has slowed to a halt; 25 percent of college graduates now earn no more than does the average high school graduate.” The root of the problem? An oversupply of individuals with college degrees. If Americans who would not typically have the drive or desire to go to college end up completing their degree like so many other students, they might not be as marketable as they assumed they would be in a world where anyone can easily obtain a diploma because of the taxpayer covering the costs. What Does This Mean for College Admissions? If you are applying for school, I have news for you; college admissions do conduct a scan to see whether you can afford to attend their school or not. They want someone who won’t drop out from finances early in the game and someone whose family could potentially donate to the school longterm. If tuition is an off the table discussion because now everything is free, why should we have any admission standards anymore? If all Americans have a right to a tuition-free education, doesn’ that also implies they have the right to obtain a degree from any university? Should GPA and activities even be part of the vetting process? Soon a degree from Harvard will be lesser than that of a degree from Radford, meaning that even the reputation of your attended school will begin to mean less. Extremely Overqualified, Unqualified People Some people shouldn’t attend college because college isn’t meant for everybody. Talents, interests, and other soft social factors play into this. Should a person who wants to become a hairdresser go to school? What about a plumber? Instead of paying for school, why not pay to start a business instead? There are more unemployed people with diplomas now than at any point in US history. Tuition-free college is a hammer that treats all our social and economic issues like a nail, and while its premise might sound enticing, its results are less desirable.

Indiana’s War on Energy Drinks Misses the Point

Written by Remso Martinez on . Posted in Business and Economy, Drugs, Personal Liberty. No Comments on Indiana’s War on Energy Drinks Misses the Point

In a country of over-incarceration, an opioid epidemic, and a national debt of more than $20 trillion, it only makes sense that some lawmakers need to pick up the slack and go after energy drinks, right? You’re correct if you said “yes,” because there is a proposed bill in Indiana that wants to restrict access to energy drinks to consumers of eighteen years of age and older. According to an Indiana news outlet, newsnowwarsaw.com, “Senate Bill 369 aims to make it a class C misdemeanor to sell, give or distribute an energy drink to someone less than 18 years of age.” The bill cites CDC studies that report that energy drinks make children and teens “alert” which is hilarious because that is the point of energy drinks. You know what also makes kids hyper, therefore, should be banned? Coffee, soda, sugary cereals, artificial food coloring, and essentially everything else that has caffeine or sugar. Yes, energy drinks for kids aren’t great, but it isn’t great for the health of adults either. If we start banning or restricting everything that isn’t good for us, where is the line drawn? In 2011, the city of San Francisco banned free McDonald’s Happy Meal toy’s because they thought the toys forced kids to have their parents buy them fast food in order to obtain the toy. In 2014, New York City failed yet got very close to banning Big Gulp’s from gas stations in order to fight adult obesity. Philadelphia in 2018 placed a controversial tax on soda to curb consumer habits, but it ended up putting certain stores out of business and the whole tax was exposed to have been a way to attack teamsters unions. Just because something isn’t explicitly healthy for you doesn’t mean there needs to be a law banning access. By limiting consumer choice with regulation to attack things you don’t like, you are creating unintended consequences which in an essence, end up endorsing things or creating riskier alternatives to the items you tried to prevent consumer access too. In the San Francisco situation, McDonald’s got around the free toy ban by charging only ten cents per Happy Meal toy, in which the toy proceeds went to the Ronald McDonald House children’s charity. The New York City Big Gulp fight was lost in the courts because it was unconstitutional, but even banning a Big Gulp didn’t mean people couldn’t just buy a large bottle, or even two bottles, of the same soda they wanted. The Philadelphia soda tax, while “well-intentioned” according to some supporters, turned out to be the product of some corrupt officials using the regulatory enforcement arm of the government to attack their opponents. If the state representatives in Indiana really wanted to stop minors from drinking energy drinks, they could have started a privately funded education campaign or started a non-profit to expose any dangers of energy drinks to minors. Instead, they jumped straight to legislating their opinions onto others because these self-anointed elites decided they knew better than consumers.

Building Schools Around Students

Written by Remso Martinez on . Posted in Education, Personal Liberty. No Comments on Building Schools Around Students

Our current public education model is like the Wright brother’s airplane — dangerous, not for everyone, and a relic of the past. In the one-size-fits-all, cookie-cutter K-12 system, children are squeezed into a system which fails to set them up for life after graduation. Age segregation, “multiple guess” multiple choice testing, and forcing them to succeed in academic areas they have no use for forces them to submit and conform to a system driving them mad instead of driving them towards success. At an alternative school called the Academy of Thought and Industry (ATI), students typically came from a traditional classroom setting where they didn’t conform or feel comfortable. Annie Holmquist, at Intellectual Takeout, describes the success students are achieving at ATI:
Every morning begins with a Socratic dialogue in which students presumably debate and discuss the ideas they have read in assigned texts. These texts apparently aren’t a walk in the park, either, as one photo from the site pictures students reading Dante. According to an article on the ATI website, the school believes in challenging its students with high-level texts in order to prepare them interaction with the deep ideas of the world.
Socratic dialogue, in which students informally debate ideas and are allowed to form and justify their own opinions, goes against the standardized structure most traditional school curriculums try to enforce. Some public school teachers believe in the benefit of encouraging civil, academic dialogue on such topics, but they don’t have the time. Most feel pressured to simply prepare students to do well on arcane standardized testing. At ATI however, this one aspect isn’t just a tool in which to facilitate learning, but an extension of their overall philosophy. According to ATI faculty, “If students read, think about, and learn how to understand very sophisticated and complex texts, in addition to the obvious benefits of simply building these skills for the sake of being a more discerning reader and writer, they will do well on … [the critical reading and writing] portion of the SAT exam.” In a nation where national standardized tests have been plummeting for decades, ATI has shown they aren’t afraid to bet on their students instead of force-feeding them material that won’t help them grow as people. Schools like ATI show that there is more than one way to help our students grow, thrive, and succeed outside of the outdated public education system, which has been proven repeatedly to fail by every standard.