Is everybody going ‘Bananas’?

The Review-Journal editorialized recently, ridiculing the California Legislature for wasting its time — and again confirming the late Rafael Tammariello’s prediction that everything which isn’t banned in California will eventually be made mandatory — by proposing criminal penalties for those who don’t neuter their pets.

"The Democrat-dominated body that sought to make spanking a crime, wanted calorie totals listed on restaurant menus and tried to allow workers to sue their bosses if they were abused by customers has another meddlesome measure up its sleeve: fining pet owners who don’t sterilize their cats and dogs by the time they turn 6 months old," we wrote on July 16.

Predictably, a handful of letters poured in, basing their often condescending arguments on the belief that the editors don’t realize the merits of spaying and neutering pets.

I was tempted to say "the pretended belief," just above, but let’s acknowledge a disturbing possibility: A large number of graduates of our mandatory government youth propaganda camps can no longer discern any difference between saying something is wise and good, and saying government must punish those who fail to do it.

After all, buying car insurance is prudent — so it’s required. Wearing set belts or motorcycle helmets is prudent — so they’re required. Why not punish "failure to spay"? How about failure by men older than 50 to get one of those colonoscopies, like the president just underwent? Aren’t they a wise precaution?

Prayer is a good thing. Why not make them all mandatory? Why not ban tobacco, alcohol and gambling, while requiring jogging and cod liver oil? Aren’t we our brothers’ keepers?

I was going to use another example. I was going to say, "Sex is good. It’s healthy and a way for people to express their love and it procreates the race, so why don’t we punish the celibate by taxing them and using the booty to subsidize sex among those who fail to wait till they can afford to raise families?"

Only it turns out we’ve already got that. It’s called "Aid to Families With Dependent Children," followed up with free government day care ("public schools") and all that free emergency-room care and so forth bundled under the rubric "La Reconquista."

If you want to know where this will eventually lead, go watch an old Woody Allen movie called "Bananas," in which a lovable revolutionary more than a little reminiscent of Fidel Castro gains total power, only to immediately go nuts and start issuing bizarre decrees, including an edict that everyone will now wear their underwear on the outside, "so we can check."

— A regular reader writes in:

"Dear Mr. Suprynowicz — You saved my daughter’s educational life.

"Three years ago when she was in seventh grade I read your articles about the schools and read (John Taylor) Gatto’s books. Not only was my daughter’s education awful at the school in Clark County, there were so many social problems that it got kind of scary when they bused in a bunch of no-child-left behind thugs who had failed at their school and were coming in to ruin a school that was doing okay until they came. Additionally, she was losing the love of learning due to the mind-numbing, low expectation instruction. I took her out of school at the end of seventh grade two years ago.

"I am proud to say that at the age of 15 she can pass a GED (though Clark County won’t allow her to do so until she is 17) and has made high scores on the SAT. I took the plunge and took her to CCSN this summer where she took the placement test and passed it so well that she’s starting college level courses for credit in August. Our plan is to see her through an associate degree there and then switch to university for the last two years and the bachelors.

She is a lovely girl and has not been saddled with all the social ills of public school. She is well-educated and fairly well adjusted for a teenager.

"At the rate we are going she will be out of college at age 21, have a far better education than if we had left her in the public schools. Statistics prove that the kids coming out of public school to college are failing and ill-equipped to handle college work.

"Please keep urging people to remove their children from the system that actually promotes juvenile delinquency through their way of doing things. It’s not as hard to home school as you think. And each day there are more and more options to assist parents in educating their children.

"Thank you, Vin. If not for your dedication to the theme in your articles my daughter might be a very different person today. — C.A.

— Apparently less happy with some of my recent efforts was the letter writer who signed his name simply "Chris." His missive follows, unedited:

"Mr Suprynowicz, I find your article on the use of no knock warrants in the law enforcement, idiotic. You obviously have no idea about the Justice system and the way it works. I don’t try to pretend like there aren’t a few bad apples in the law enforcement community. However this is the reason why divisions like internal affairs exist in every credited law enforcement community.

"However your examples like the Branch Davidian Compound (by the way is not a church, but rather a cult) shows your lack of knowledge on the subject. Your like a child who chooses a side only looking at half the fact. You leave out all the good that no knock warrants have done in getting dangerous criminals off the streets, and the drugs they peddle. You leave out the fact that no knock warrants give police the opportunity to subdue the subjects before they have a chance to retrieve firearms and kill more officers line of duty. It is a shame to see innocent people die or who are wrongfully prosecuted, but that is why justice is blind.

"And also to assume that race must be playing a role in any case in which a white jury happens to be called to serve, and then taking quotes out of context just to justify your point is irresponsible. When SWAT does execute a warrant they do handcuff everyone regardless of wounds and the look of innocents, this is due the fact that dangerous criminals rarely tell the truth as to their guilt or innocents, what would you have the police simply ask ‘are you a bad guy?’ before handcuffing people.

"You should start doing serious research of you want to be taken seriously instead of as a joke. I am certain if you were in trouble and needed police assistance you would praise God to see an Police Officer to help you out but you seem quick to judge them for something you know nothing about, a monday morning quarterback if you will.

"I hope you seriously think about your article and the ideas you pose, maybe you’ll realize that the police aren’t evil people who kill everyone in site but rather brave men and women who risk their lives every day of the week running into burning buildings, and into the line of fire for no other reason then protect and serve."

Vin Suprynowicz is assistant editorial page editor of the daily Las Vegas Review-Journal and author of the novel "The Black Arrow." See www.abebooks.com/servlet/SearchResults?vci=51238921.