The Political Whore

Just in from the Winter Strawberry Capital of the World:

PLANT CITY – Commissioners, in a unanimous vote Monday night, decided to ban distribution of candy and beads at parades.

The commissioners took the action in response to the death of a 9-year-old Inverness boy who was run over by a float at the Plant City Christmas Parade. Jordan “Booka” Hays was helping distribute candy from a church float when he was killed Dec. 7.

The Trib’s Dave Nicholson goes on the report just how young Booka was killed:

Hays was reaching for candy from a box located forward of the float’s wheels when he was caught under the wheels killed. A city report faulted the float’s design and said Hays was too young to be walking the parade route, but there was no finding of recklessness.

The float was poorly designed and Booka was too young to be actually in the parade but nobody was at fault?? So the typical government solution is … BAN THE ACTIVITY INVOLVED IN THE HORRIBLE, TRAGIC ACCIDENT!! Trib commenters nailed it, calling Plant City’s vote “kneejerk” and the “easy way out.” It is likely more cost effective and efficient, not to mention it will give the city attorney reason to sleep easy every night, to simply ban candy and beads (and therefore, essentially, kids) from the parade rather than simply enforce common sense rules, like don’t have bead boxes at the the front of floats or let kids under a certain age march in the parade.

More than a decade ago, Philip K. Howard wrote a brilliant book, “The Death of Common Sense: How the Law Is Suffocating America,” a tract that every single elected official should not only be required to read but should be tested on, with 75 percent as the lowest acceptable grade.

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