While I probably should have been shocked by this news report from the front lines in the War on Foods and Drugs, nothing shocks me anymore.
Nor should it surprise anyone that pushers are recruiting young children to sell their unhealthy products on streetcorners, without permits:
VILLA RICA, GA — It sounds like a bad Saturday Night Live skit –police cracking down on a Girl Scout cookie stand.
It happened Wednesday at a strip mall on Hwy 78 in Villa Rica when a police officer asked members of Troop 7984 if they had a peddler’s permit.
Troop Leader Kathy Crook was stunned.
“We were just told that we would have to pack up our cookie booth [and] we would need to go and get a peddlers permit,” Crook said. “The customers that were there had to just be turned away.”
Crook was more disturbed at the reaction of the younger Daisies in the group.
“They were very upset that we were in real trouble and that we were all going to be taken to jail,” Crook said.
Both Villa Rica Police Chief Michael Mansour and Mayor J. Allen Collins said they have spoken with the officer who dealt with the Girl Scouts, and they believe he did nothing wrong.
Of course the police did nothing wrong! It’s typical for racketeers and other operators of criminal enterprises to enlist young children in their constant search for loopholes. But fortunately, the law is the law. And now the White House has declared war on fattening foods (which Girl Scout Cookies are!), it is high time for all patriotic citizens to remember that traitors in the Food War can be of any age, and anywhere.
Even in uniform!
More: Girl Scout cookies cause violence.
Beware!
Comments
6 responses to “No SWAT team this time. But youthful scofflaws, take note!”
Eric, just to play devil’s advocate, the linked video does include a speaker who claims that at least part of the motivation behind the peddler’s permit was that children were walking into traffic in order to sell their fund-raising wares, presumably at traffic stops.
AFAIK, no one was charged, or even threatened with charges in this case.
I’m not sure this case should be raised to a “nanny state” threat level. 🙂
More:
“Cookie Sales Barred In Front of Savannah Home of Girl Scouts’ Founder”
http://www.11alive.com/news/local/story.aspx?storyid=179997&provider=top
Making sure that Girl Scouts are kept safely out of traffic is a worthy goal, of course… but why on earth should anyone be required a permit to sell Girl Scout cookies in public? Or to set up a lemonade stand?
This type of post/news article comes up fairly frequently, and I am always astonished by the blogosphere’s harsh condemnation of the police response. We have laws concerning the selling of food, whether packaged (Girl Scout cookies) or fresh (lemonade). We have laws concerning the establishment of a business and, in particular, the requirement for a business license. We have laws concerning child labor.
You may argue that the laws are stupid, they should be changed, they should have well-defined exceptions for these types of activities, and I would agree. Until then, the law must be enforced.
Of course there are laws.
But there are also police priorities.
And police discretion.
When I was a kid an officer who did that would have been laughed off the force. What’s next — shaking down lemonade stands?
Re: police discretion… I actually feel there is too much selective enforcement of the law based on police discretion. (One of the things that really burns me is stories about how police officers will let other police officers off the hook for traffic violations out of “professional courtesy.”)
However, I’m not arguing the enforcement point, but rather the actual merits of the law in question. If there is a law which makes it illegal for a kid to sell Girl Scout cookies or set up a lemonade stand (even with the permission of the property owner), that law IS stupid and SHOULD be changed. There are now far too many laws, and far too many normal, everyday things which are illegal. Time to start rolling them back!