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Show PAGE 24 THE ZEPHYR DECEMBER 1994 Somewhere Left of Right shooting?" Here's another definition I had wrong. Exactly how would you define a "drlve-bshoots at and car a chives in I thought it was that awful urban crime where somebody by a is someone else or at their house. In the 1994 General Index for Utah laws, there listing for "Drive-b- y under "Weapons". There you find Shootings." It refers you to Utah Code a law entitled "Discharge of firearm from a vehicle, near highway, or in direction of any person, building, or vehicle." What's interesting is that the first part of the law deals simply with discharging a firearm from a vehicle, or from, upon, or across any highway. It looks to me like that means anyone caught firing a gun at a road sign, or just standing on one side of the road and shooting at a tree on foe other side, in or out of their vehicle, is guilty of a drive-b-y shooting. It's a class B misdemeanor. The rest of foe law deals with third degree felony violations when foe gun is knowingly aimed at a person or a house or a car. So, you might want to take those Utah drive-b- y shooting statistics with a grain of salt I'd like to think things aren't as bad as we thought. y rrs A WHOLE NEW POLITICAL WORLD OUT THERE The always grouchy citizens of our community haven't been too happy lately with the makeup of the Grand County Council. Voters turned out a few weeks ago to make sure that they elected people who have lived here for more than just a few years. Sure, new residents have brought in good ideas, fresh approaches!, and a diversity of experience and opinion which I have really appreciated. Unfortunately, these new neighbors show their lack of understanding almost every time they turn around. With the election of residents and natives will be better Mosher, Pene, and Leavitt to foe council, long-tim- e By Jane S. Jones THE WOWI FILES: THE COST OF RAISING A CHILD I ran across some astonishing figures recently about the costs of raising a child. The numbers were 1985 USDA statistics, reprinted by the Utah Legal Gink. The types of expenses covered were food at home and away from home, clothing, housing, medical care, education, transportation, personal care, and recreation. According to foe averages, at our 10 year old child's next birthday, we should have already spent $61,842 on him. That would leave us needing a mere $39,309 to properly raise him during the next 7 years. That's right The estimated amount to raise a child from birth to age 18, here in foe western states in 1985, was at least a hundred thousand dollars. A few qualifications in foe fine print led me to believe foe amounts were way off for lots of us frugal families. But, even so, it represents some kind of average measurement of waste in hometown America. Wow! $100,000! And then, we're supposed to put him through college. I also looked at the guidelines which Utah courts now use when determining child support. Right off I got thrown by the monthly salaries covered, which went all the way up to $10,000 per month. Does any family you know make $10,000 per month? I ran my finger back to the monthly salary of $1000 per month, more my speed. The amount shown to support one child for one month at that combined family income level was $176. That's probably at least $100 more than we've ever spent on our poor kid on any month except when we bought him the Sega and that other time when he had to have an Looking at I can much as foe $5000 per month income (as family bringing imagine any decent, 1 in), one child would require monthly support of $517. Maybe this is why our child always says, "I wish you were like everyone rise's parents." From Ids point of view, he is being discriminated against. Can the kid help it if he was bom to such worthless parents? Doesn't he deserve to have at least that $517 spent on him each month? Isn't it his right as an American citizen to become a consumingbuying machine who spends like there's no tomorrow? After all, he's nobody special. I guess his mind should be as distorted as everyone rise's. X-ra- y. law-abidi- ng . well-disciplin- ed represented. Nationally; I think Republicans have about 6 months, maybe less, to show their stuff. If they can manage to come off as honest statesmenwomen, Clinton will be out I don't think they can pull it off. WERE NOT ON THE SAME PACE AND I FEEL LIKE PICKING A FIGHT WITH SUWA "We hold these truths to be begins the second paragraph of the Declaration of Independence. At that time of revolution in 1776, Thomas Jefferson was appealing to understanding, to a recognition of common ground among the colonists. He sought to express the basic beliefs that didn't need to be proved or defended in any way, that everyone could agree were that we were all equal, and that we all on. The truths he identified as being had the right to life, liberty, and foe pursuit of happiness. I thought the concept of freedom was also that it was understandable and obvious without proof or reasoning. But apparently I was taking things for granted. A few sentences penned by Scott Groene in last month's Zephyr suggests a lade of understanding that may be indicative of environmentalists as a group. Groene was commenting on Dale Mosher's advocacy of individual property rights in his bid for a County Council seat. Scott stated, "What if a private land owner wanted to build a porno palace next to the grade school? Should the rest of the community be able to say no, or would sacred private property rights win?" (Canyon Country Watchdog, November 1994 Zephyr, page 29) Let's go over a few things. self-evident-..." self-evide- nt self-evide- nt, Freedom, liberty, and license are Important words. As a group, they all have something in common: they all mean the power or condition of acting without someone holding a gun to your head. Another important point the first two require responsibility, foe last does not. Freedom is the state of being free, without coercion or constraint in choice or action. It is liberation from slavery. It is freoioin from restraint or from being under foe power of someone rather than be controlled by else, as in independence. To be free is to rely on someone else. Liberty suggests release from a former restraint or compulsion. It's what many of us want, the release from overpowering rules and regulations we never agreed to. It is that if you're going to live within a society of other liberty requires responsibility and self-contr-ol self-evide- nt self-contr- ol people. THE WOW! FILES CONTINUE: DEFINmONS YOU'D NEVER DREAM OF usually know what words mean. But I've been wrong all this time cm foe definition of "infernal machine." I always thought it was just a colorful phrase, probably used most often by polite auto mechanics. If pressed, I would have come up with synonyms for it like "consamed machine" or "dadblamed machine." But according to state law (Utah Code under "Explosives!, enacted in foe Utah in 1973): Legislature "An infernal machine is any box, package, contrivance, bomb, or apparatus containing or arranged with an explosive or add or poisonous or inflammable substance, chemical, or compound or knife, loaded pistol, or gun, or other dangerous or harmful weapon or thing, constructed, contrived, or arranged so as to explode, ignite, or throw forth its contents, or to strike with any of its parts, unexpectedly when moved, handled, or opened, or after foe lapse of time cv under conditions or in a manner calculated to endanger health, life, limb, or property." Read the paragraph again, out loud, if you wish to savor the full effect. After I got over the lampoon-funn- y impact of this paragraph, I began to fed uneasy. Somewhere a nutcase bureaucrat is really proud of this appalling creation. Needing to define something in this minute way is absolutely, no question about, pathological. Why would any system of law and justice find it necessary to make something so simple so insanely complex? A system gone completely mad? And average Americans still turn to their government for more laws to solve their problems... I Li: Q GtsSpPEiBai) Tran License is the total absence of restraint. It is an abuse of freedom, as in "Freedom without " responsibility may degenerate into license, to quote a phrase in Webster's Collegiate Dictionary. License is freedom without Now we return to Greene's scenario, where building a pornography shop next to a grade school is an example of freedom of individual property rights. As you can see, that would be incorrect. Building a pornography shop next to a grade school would be an act of license, of example of abuse of individual property rights. A irresponsibility. It would be a to get neighborhood and school support lined up and then build a responsible act would be snack shop. So let us be clear about the issue of individual property rights. These rights are a freedom, ' which means they must be exercised with responsibility. Neighbors, adjoining landowners (however you wish to label them), have the important individual responsibility to communicate with each other, to work out their differences, as they enjoy their traditional freedoms to live on and work on and develop their own land. self-contr- ol. self-evid- : DO BABY BOOMERS NEED AN EDUCATION ON BASIC CIVICS? Many of us under the age of 50 have lost track of the meanings behind certain words and phrases. People who were adults during the depression or WW II have great self-evide- I HAVE A MERRY YES; CHRISTMAS FROM ALL OF US AT NELSON'S BUT I DON'T GO WHITE BEARD. WHO I HO AND DONT SLIDE DOWN CHIMNEYS. nt |