Apparently around 100 college presidents are urging lawmakers to lower the drinking age to 18, under the banner of the Amethyst Initiative. Considering that a lower drinking age would reduce the reasons behind the ludicrousness and binge drinking we see on college campuses (as exemplified by foreign countries with a lower drinking age), and not to mention would increase individual responsibility at an age where persons can already give their lives to their country anyway, I'm for lowering the drinking age as well.

Senator Jim DeMint and Representative Jeb Hensarling have launched a website that counts down to "American Energy Freedom Day" - October 1, 2008, which is whent the prohibition on offshore drilling and oil shale recovery will end (barring, of course, extension of the bans).

As of this moment, there are 48 days, 11 hours, and 30 minutes to American Energy Freedom Day.

You may have read this column I wrote last week, sarcastically suggesting that knives should be banned because, just like guns, they could potentially be used to commit a crime.

Well, this may not be that far-fetched after all. A friend sent me this article discussing how Denver police want to prevent protesters from carrying pipes and chains. I'm sure that'll resolve their problems just like gun bans made DC and Chicago the safest cities in America.

The logic of the anti-gun crowd is: Since guns are used to kill, then we should ban guns.

My column today asks, then why not ban knives too?

Quite an amusing video making fun of California's new law banning cell phones while driving.

Talk about unintended consequences!

A new bill in Mississippi would revoke the license of any restaurant that feeds obese people. It is quite possibly the most asinine bill I have heard of in months, on so many levels. Are restaurant owners supposed to weigh their diners? And even if rejected, what do you think the obese people will do? Might they not go buy doughnuts in bulk or ask their friends to pick up the easiest carry out food for them: fast food? Besides, irrelevant of all of this, who do Mississippi legislators think they are, telling people whether or not they can buy food from private establishments?

Of course, if Mississippi didn't spend $220 million on "free medical care," as the article notes, people just might begin to have true incentives to remain healthy.

HT: Club for Growth

Congratulations to all those of us who love and cherish the Second Amendment! Yesterday, the Supreme Court confirmed that the Second Amendment does indeed protect individuals' right to own guns.

I would like to congratulate everyone who worked so hard on both this case and this cause, particularly the fine people at my law school, the George Mason University School of Law, who helped like no other legal academics and students ever would.

I haven't yet had the time to read Scalia's decision in is entirety, but I found this amusing piece in a news article:

Scalia noted that the handgun is Americans' preferred weapon of self-defense in part because "it can be pointed at a burglar with one hand while the other hand dials the police."

A Pennsylvania town is now in the business of banning couches (video) in people's porches. Apparently, among other reasons, the couches are a "fire hazard." Oh, and the wooden porches they're on are not?

This is absolutely ludicrous. My guess is that the real reason is that the local government officials don't want their town to look like a hick town. But regardless, it's unacceptable. What's the next step of government intervention?

The city council in Atlantic Cityvoted 9-0 to ban smoking in casinos. Casino employees cheered, because although casino players might be gambling away their daughters' college tuition, it would be really, really bad if they were smoking while doing so.

What these employees don't get is that no one forced them to work for the casinos. They knew precisely what they were getting into when they applied for a job there. It's like applying to be a dancer at a strip club and then petition the city council to make it so dancers have to be fully dressed while dancing.

The same goes for casino patrons. No one forced them to be at a place where others are smoking. You can't go to someone's house where you know smoking occurs, and when they refuse to stop smoking, go to the government to force them to stop doing it. Just don't go to the person's house. And the government has no business telling people what to do and how to make their own place more hospitable to others.

And all of this is coming from an avid non-smoker. 

A humorous story from Victorville, California tells how due to the candy ban in public schools, some clever kids are making a killing by selling candy to their friends. In the end, everyone who wants candy is getting candy.

Sound familiar? It is the exact same phenomenon we saw during the Prohibition in 1920-1933. Banning something popular for the sole reason that it could be harmful when abused while not make it impossible to get, it will just make it more expensive to get, and will reward the trouble-makers who provide it. It is also useful to think about gun control in the same way. Thank you for the lesson, children!