Walter In Denver

Yes, I Have A Libertarian Bias

Or a pro-freedom instinct, if you will. I try to practice it, keep it honed. It tends to dull when I read a lot of news articles, which unsurprisingly, rarely consider liberty as part of reporting. Here's a cute story as an example:

N.Y. Cracks Down on Mystery Meats

A food safety inspector noticed an interesting special posted in the front window of a market in Queens: 12 beefy armadillos.

In Brooklyn, inspectors found 15 pounds of iguana meat at a West Indian market and 200 pounds of cow lungs for sale at another store. A West African grocery in Manhattan sold smoked rodent meat from a refrigerated display case.

All of it was headed for the dinner table. All of it was also illegal.

When I first noticed the story, via Amygdala, I reacted probably as the author intended. Eww, gross. But then I pondered this bit:

Authorities say the discoveries are part of a larger trend in which markets across New York are buying meat and other foods from unregulated sources and selling them to an immigrant population accustomed to more exotic fare. State regulators have stepped up enforcement, confiscating 65 percent more food -- 1.6 million pounds -- through September than they did in all of 2005.

And:

If all else fails, Corby will get a court injunction and shutter stores, something the state did 66 times in 2005 and 72 times through September of this year.

Holy cow! So to speak. That's a lot of meat! And a lot of people put out of business. Surely there must have been some tragic series of food poisonings which prompted drastic action. But I reread the story, and there's no mention of any such occurence. Maybe it's happened, maybe a batch of illegal cow lungs killed a bunch of folks there, but the newspaper story doesn't mention it. I think it would be crucial to the article, to dispell my libertarian suspicion that NY bureaucrats are making themselves busy at the expense of immigrant communities.

Too many people totally lack any such instinct. You may have seen this appalling story on ABC TV a couple nights ago. A vicious hoaxer called a McDonalds in Kentucky, claimed to be a policeman, and convinced the managers that a young female employee was suspected of theft. At the caller's behest, they strip searched the employee, and forced her to perform degrading sexual acts over several hours while the hoaxer remained on the phone.

Even more bizarrely, this hoax has been repeated at least 70 times over the last decade around the country, with varying degrees of success. The first thing that jumps out when hearing the story is the colossal stupidity of the people whe fail to recognize they're being had. The second, by my way of thinking, is the lack of healthy suspicion of the supposed authority figure on the phone. Even if they are dumb enough to believe the fraudulent caller, they should have enough respect for individual rights to balk at complying. These people are completely missing libertarian instincts.

Posted by Walter at December 2, 2006 10:40 PM