Let’s Ban Silly Bans

What’s going on around the country with this flurry of dumb new laws and rules aimed at things we didn’t know we needed protection from? A homeowners association in Orange County’s Laguna Woods is preparing to crack down on too many porch potted plants and also wind chimes, which are really quite obnoxious, in case you didn’t know. Some Leisure World association directors are considering a total ban because while some wind chimes tinkle in the breeze, it seems others are more bong-like. Obviously, the bongers must go. But to discriminate between bongers and tinklers requires more than leisurely enforcement. And who ever heard of neighbors simply asking neighbors to move offending wind chimes?

Authorities in Maryland’s Montgomery County approved and then disapproved one of the nation’s most restrictive anti-smoking measures. Smoking curbs are fine and good and all, because by now we know smoking can cause cancer even if you’re just near the fume source. But Maryland’s regulation would have set a stiff $750 fine for anyone who smoked in his or her own home if it offended the neighbors. That’s right, you could have nailed your neighbor for smoking in his house if it offended you in your house.

County Executive Douglas Duncan vetoed the measure in the face of stiff criticism and even--imagine this--some ridicule. Imagine also possible future bans: backyard barbecue odors, T-shirts with dumb slogans and what about offensive twinkling Christmas ties?

California, like Hawaii, has long banned pet ferrets, thank goodness, because we all know what legalizing pet ferrets would mean to our society. Without the ban we’d have even more than the estimated half-million that already reside here invisibly. A new law granting amnesty from the old law to existing pet ferrets passed the state Senate in September but failed in the Assembly.

An Ohio legislator proposes a state law banning discrimination against motorcyclists who wear biker clothes with club insignia. It seems some restaurants with dress codes do not consider Harley T-shirts and decorated leather vests to be as dressy as, say, a coat and tie. Obviously, a new law would whip the restaurants and gangs of hungry, leather-vested bikers into shape right away. Just like the law banning motorcycles that make too much noise.

While we’re banning bad things, here’s another idea: a new law outlawing hyperbole. That would be the best law--EVER.