One More Law

  ONE MORE LAW

There oughta be a law.  Soon there may be one.

The defeat in the Senate of the watered down gun control law and the solution of the Boston Marathon bombings have eliminated two back drops for free face time  for politicians on national TV.

Just in time, a third opportunity has arisen for the publicity hungry White House and Congress.  Two communities in Texas and one in Oklahoma have been devastated by man made catastrophes.

The tremendous explosions in Texas City and West resulted from human error, negligence, or both.  The destruction of the federal building in Oklahoma City was due to human evil. 

Rules, regulations, and laws were and are in place to prevent such destruction, but human frailty or depravity ignored them and wreathed havoc on the localities.

The problem thus must be the very existence of the substance that permits such abuse. The cause and effect obviously is man made fertilizer.

There, then, is the new platform for politicians seeking attention.  As human behavior is not being controlled by rules, let’s abolish synthetic fertilizer. 

Arranging a group of the scarred and maimed survivors of the West tragedy behind the politicians demanding an end to deadly fertilizer, as the President has done with the survivors of the New Town massacre, would draw scores of sympathetic viewers.

Then those smart Senators and Congressmen with all the answers, so long as expanding the big federal government is concerned, can push legislation to prohibit the manufacture, storage, or use of chemical fertilizer on American soil.

The effective date of the law will have to be delayed several years to allow existing supplies to be shipped off to third world countries.  After all this dangerous substance is removed from American hands, there will be no more life threatening calamities.

An additional benefit will be protection of the nation’s water supply, as there will be no more pollution of water ways with dangerous fertilizer run off.  Our food in the future will come from agriculture produced on soil enriched with that natural fertilizer coming from animals.

This may make everyone happy except Al Gore.  To get all the manure needed to replace the efficiency of man made fertilizer, the nation’s cattle herds will have to be increased tremendously.

That means the methane released by the cows belching and passing gas will also rise at an exponential rate.  This will make Gore nervous, as the methane may aggravate global warming more than an occasional fertilizer explosion.

This spoof of the West tragedy is not intended to diminish the terrible loss of life and property in that small Texas town.  It is merely a vehicle to illustrate the foolishness and dangerousness of the politicians who think a big federal government is the answer to every problem.

This folly was aptly illustrated by President Obama’s failed attempt to enact even more restrictions on gun ownership after the Newtown disaster.  At least one Senator, in announcing his opposition to the President’s proposal, noted that the proposed new law would not have prevented the massacre.

Adam Lanza broke four laws in his shooting rampage.   

First, he stole his mother’s legally acquired weapons and car.   Next, he carried the guns into a weapons free zone.  Then he broke and entered the school building.  Finally, he broke the most serious law of all by murdering more than 20 students and teachers.

If four specific laws did not prevent this tragedy, how many other laws would have been required to avoid the rampage?  What words could have persuaded Lanza not to kill people?

This illustrates an important point.  Enact a multitude of laws to make it very difficult to acquire and own guns legally.  Law abiding systems will comply and dot every “i” and cross every “t” to have the weapons they want to protect themselves, hunt, shoot clays, or to engage in other legal activities. 

Those intent on evil, however, will, if necessary, follow the Lanza example and steal the weapons they want from legal gun owners.

So here’s the perspective.

The worst laws on the books are those that are knee jerk reactions to some tragedy.  Enacting another one of those laws was narrowly averted last week.

The Senate could not muster enough votes to pass the President’s emotionally charged gun control measure.  Some members of his own party even voted against the measure.

Senator Harry Ried, the Senate Majority Leader, however, vowed to bring the proposed legislation back for another vote.  The chances of it passing the second time around are slim, but no one can predict with certainty what politicians will do.

If more restrictions are enacted on purchasing and owning guns and if the use of fertilizer were prohibited, what would be the effect?  The answer is nothing.  There would just be another law or two to break.