Vigilant:

I take your meaning – and I disagree with it. They should NOT have to get a license for that small a business! The government should not even have the right to license these things.

I could see them investigating the lack of care of some animal. Near us, someone put over twenty horses and cattle, and then stopped feeding them. They were discovered when the buzzards were noticed. Where was the government agent? Not here! But when it is obvious the animals are healthy and cared for, why are they involved? Why aren’t they where they are needed?

45caliber,

“They should NOT have to get a license for that small a business! The government should not even have the right to license these things.”

I never argued in that direction, in fact, if you re-read my posting, you’ll see that we agree.

Just leave it alone and let it die bruh…semantics are rarely worth the time and effoert to argue.

Kindly refer to your dictionary for the definition of “semantics” before you misuse the word. It was never about semantics, it’s about the omission of facts that had a bearing on the argument.

Why are you nit picking today? You have a great site to post your ideas, don’t help to destroy it.

But the requirement to obtain a license may or may not have applied to that farmer, Vigilant. Do you know that it did? On what basis do you apply that particular regulation to that particular person? Do you know something about this particular case that no-one else knows?

“But the requirement to obtain a license may or may not have applied to that farmer, Vigilant. Do you know that it did? On what basis do you apply that particular regulation to that particular person? Do you know something about this particular case that no-one else knows?”

No, dear, I know what’s reported in the news. A simple check of the link I initilly provided will clear up all your questions.

No, your article did not address that question at all, and YOU sir seem to have completely missed the point.

The point is that a license is ONLY required if the individuals ran a company (with a TIN) or engaged in commerce as a federal agency trust (with a SSN). Otherwise they DO NOT fall under the regulation that requires a license. The article didn’t even mention this and offered NO evidence at all that the family selling rabbits met these criteria.

So, anyone who says “They needed a license and broke the law because they didn’t have one,” is engaged either in slander or in giving legal advice (or both), until they can prove whether that regulation applied to this family based on the actual facts of this family’s case.

P.S. – There may be other contracts which would require licensing as well; I didn’t provide an exhaustive list above. But the point is that the licensing requirement doesn’t apply to you unless you’ve voluntarily entered a contract agreeing to be bound by those requirements.

Oh, and nothing I say on these forums is legal advice.

Jazzabelle
Live Free! – http://teamlaw.org

Vigilant
I think your nit-picking and over reacting to the article. Did Livingston leave out some info? Yes. Was it info that would have changed the tenor of the post? No. The relivent facts were there and have been and are being debated. Your creating a tempest in a teacup, and for what? A Gotcha!!!moment, that ultimeatly serves no purpose.

Amen, ain’t that the truth.

Tom and libertytrain,

See my above comment, please.

The small town I lived in before I moved to the country required yard sale permits. You could get I believe 4 for free but after that you had to pay for them. The stated purpose was to prevent people from making yard sales a business (having one every other week which some did). I am not agreeing or dissagreeing with the policy just noting the whys and wherefores of it.

The answer can be very simple, if you live in a middle class neighborhood how would you like it if your neighbor decided to make a busniess out of maintaining a 24/7 yard sale busniess operated out of his garage, all he would have to do is roll up the door every morning and drag out the goods onto the front lawn and be set up for the day. Dont laugh cause I have seen it happen.
This has happened to someone in this environment and they complained so thus their local leaders created the license requirement to control it.
Bottom line is most of these laws/regulations are actually created due to demand by the public for such protections. Remember Mad Cow???
Be careful what you ask for.

I used to raise chickens in chicken houses for sale. Basically there is a fixed size of house depending upon the number it is to hold. The owner places about 6 inches of sawdust or similar on the floor and brings in the chicks. They are fed and watered around the clock with lights on at night. At three months of age, they are picked up and hauled to a plant to be turned into food.

Does the chicken house smell? Yes. So do the chickens. How do you propose to keep it spotless? Worse, how do you propose to bathe the chickens when they don’t bathe themselves? To try to keep such things spotless, the industry has to put the animals/chickens into small cages and hose them down daily. Then you complain about the tight quarters.

I think your real complaint is that we actually eat them. If you don’t want to eat them, feel free to ignore them. I do eat them. Man was made to be omnivorous. If you prefer to be a vegetarian, that’s your problem. Incidently, do you hear those beans scream when you drop them into boiling water?? They aren’t dead yet, like the chickens are…

45
I read some where a guy actually recorded the screams of a plant when it was cut.So I sent it to my sister that is a vegetarian.Probably wasn’t one of my best decisions but it felt right at the moment.

I think the whole idea is to get us onto artificial food anyway. Some chemical plant can make it to “save” the environment – the plants and animals we normally eat. It would also put all the farmers and ranchers out of business. One of the environmentalist goals is for all humans to live in high-rise apartment complexes with a high wall around it (ever see the movie “Judge Dredd”?) and never be allowed to leave it. Except for them of course. They would live in ranch style houses and ride horses around the country to make sure the environment was doing okay.

Soylent Green?

Never said I was vegetarian…..stop making ASSumptions. I too, have been on the raising end of chickens, but these were kept in a yard, with small “hut” type shelters. I always thought a chicken tasted better with humane treatment, than one that was kept as a prisoner.

The commonly accepted mechanism amongst researchers is that the resistant bacteria thrive after the antibiotics kill off their competition. So, by saying that, they are admitting that the resistant bacteria already exist. If they already exist, what keeps the resistant bacteria from spreading when antibiotics aren’t in the equation? Nothing.

it sounds like he’s saying they should work for want they get and pay for what they did .no free ride sounds go to me. the government does not have to run it private companies can.

Don’t hold back, Louie, how do ya really feel? Got ideas to resolve the issues?

Sounds like an excellent idea to me. Were you aware that some federal judges have even specified how many frisbees a prison must have for criminal entertainment?

Nothing like giving them extra plastic for their shivs huh?

Cawmun:

It is called “shanks” – not “shivs”. I think the gangs use shivs but I’m not sure. It’s been too long since I paid any attention the gangs.

I believe both apply.

http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=shiv

A shiv is most commonly a homemade (inside prison) cutting/stabbing tool made of anything other than metal. A shank is the metal equiv.

Now don’t you feel sorry you suggested that?

We need to be careful about the convict labor. While it would be perfectly fine for them to grow their own food, if they are required to do productive, worthwhile labor for outside benefit, that would make it even more lucrative for Government to jail us for any reason they can muster. If the labor has no commercial value, it would be okay.

45,
WOW… don’t want to go there (mentally more than physically), but it looks like it is coming here.

Getting ‘permission’ to travel out of one’s locale is what they make people in America do who are on probation for an accused criminal misdemenor or other felony crime.

They are already “getting us to stay put” and not travel… (by not drilling for oil independance) with the high prices of gas and the TSA groping and irradiation scanners for air flight travel.

Your national I.D., Please…

That IS the purpose of the TSA and high gas prices…to ease us into being limited to our immediate locale.

This is coming, and soon.

Your papers please. Except that now, in the name of freedom, we can get a CHIP. No need to carry that pesky purse or wallet, and risk having it stolen.

In the Phillipines, a tourist hotel is chipping folks so they can wear their swimsuits without having to carry ID and money. In other words, so they can be free!

It will come as a convenience and voluntary, at first. Most will comply.

It is fashionable now among the more affluent to chip children. Supposedly that will make it easier to find them if they are lost or kidnapped. So it is certainly coming …

kate
Another point I might add is the fact that our jobs have moved out of this country and now they want us to work from home.And now they are planning on taxing everything that you buy or sell on the internet.
Isn’t freedom great?

45 – I always wondered what would stop kidnapers from digging the chip out, or cutting off an arm.

Dan az – They also are now passing legislation requiring permits to work in the private sector.

kate
Can you say Seek hail!

Kate8. You ALREADY have to have a permit to work in the private sector. It is called a social security card. (Or at least you have to provide the number which is much the same thing).

Dan – The SC Legislature just made a deal with Amazon. Amazon is building a facility that will provide 2000 jobs, but they were pulling out of the deal if the state mandated that they have to charge SC residents sales tax. The lawmakers caved thank goodness. It almost didn’t happen; but this state sorely needs those jobs. I’m glad the legislators saw the light.

Plans to keep people contained in tight locales:

http://dprogram.net/2011/01/06/eco-fascists-call-for-prison-cities/

And if the affluent children are chipped, 45, they will want others to be chipped. You know, misery loves company.

Kate8. Think “logans run” or “soylent green”

45caliber writes:
“She said something that startled me. “It’s so nice here! We drove to Florida recently and didn’t have to provide a permit to the police anywhere to show permission to go there!”

And here is different how? If I were to drive to Florida without carrying my papers (drivers license, proof of insurance etc) that give me permission to take my private property (car) I would be in trouble here too. She must have missed that little detail.

Maybe there she had to show a permit to be there even without a car.
Then again we have that problem here in some places. Usually vagrancy laws or some such

Vicki:

She had to go to the police station and pick up a permit signed by someone there (I didn’t go into that) that granted her permission to leave the designated area (her village area). If she went to a larger town about ten miles away, she was supposed to get a permit. If she worked in the larger town they would give her one that stated she could go there to work. It was NOT a driver’s license or other such things. Here we can go anywhere in the US without having to get permission from the nearest police station. And we don’t have to provide that permit in other areas to prove we have permission to be there.

45 – There are already plans for that very thing.

Coming soon, unless we stop it.

45caliber writes:
“Here we can go anywhere in the US without having to get permission from the nearest police station.”

As Kate8 says “yet”

However we do have to apply for permission to take our private property on the kings highway. We do have to apply for permission to possess and or consume some herbs. We do have to apply for permission to make changes to our personal property (house). We do have to apply for permission to work (Social Security). We DO have to apply for permission to be in many areas owned by the public but not open to the owners.

I could go on and on.

Free we were. Free we are not.

(I chose the red pill.)

What you are saying about the woman from Scotland shouldn’t surprise you. The police or the town councils in the past kept track of who came in to a town or who left the town.
Pray it never happens in the US.

Well said, Bill!

I second that.

I’d say that the Dept. of Agriculture serves to harrass the little guy and protect the BigBro corporate producers. After all, they are allowed to do anything they like, including provide us with produce from tortured, disease ridden animals that make us sick.

Don’t look to your congressmen to help. They’ve already been paid off by the corporations. And they already take all of our money they want.

Waldo, we used to have a thing in this country called free enterprise where one could start a business and be of benefit to his family and provide a service or product to his community. This sort of overt action by government is literally sucking the wind out of those of such spirit. Government interference in our lives and business IS the disease we should be concerned about, not some well cared for rabbits. As for your ideas about the Islamists unfortunately they have infected more than just the sandbox they came from so it would solve nothing and literally be a premature end of the world as we know it with resulting nuclear annihilation.

Marty
I have to agree with Vigilant in all his posts as Mr. Livingston used another second hand account of the story on which to base his and did not bother to look up any other facts regarding this issue.
How many of you followed Vigilant’s suggestion to go to the link he provided to view yet another version? How many took what he printed as gospel and just started venting?
Mr. Dollarhite ran his own busniess thus was aware of the fact he needed a busniess license especially when the busniess started to grow beyond just a couple of bunnies and they started to make multiple sales. Mr. Dollarhite aparently knew for years he needed license but chose to continue to operate illegally under the pretense he was just teaching his son responsibility, well some education his son has gotten eh?
I have no argument with the fact the government has gotten too large and does not administer the laws equally nor am I defending it, all I am saying is there is always two sides to every story and everyone should research the facts for themselves before venting.
Mr. Dollarhite got caught breaking the law and now is playing on the publics disdain for the government to help pay his fines by seeking contributions to his defense fund and Mr. Livingston has an agednda for this blog and will use any information that suits this agenda to get readers, the more controversial the better.
Rabbits like all animals can carry contagious disease’s that can be transferred to humans and thus must be regulated for the benefit of the many. http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/uk/health/article614798.ece

The only thing Mr. Dollarhite did wrong was fail to learn the mountain of regulations that might or might not have applied to him, or might have applied to him only under certain circumstances, or might have applied to him only if he did or didn’t structure his business in a certain way and/or pay certain taxes. End result: he may have violated a regulation, but since he didn’t create any actual victims, he didn’t actually violate the Law. (Regulations are contracts that are only imposed when you enter them.)

Those of you who whine about contagious diseases apparently don’t believe that the free market can solve that problem. If someone gets sick from your rabbit, they sue you. That’s justice. That’s libertarian freedom for EVERYONE. The problem is that government licenses remove the responsibility for raising animals properly from the farmer and place it on the agency that issued the license. That’s why there are limits to liability, “acceptable” levels of pollution, and real victims often can’t get what they deserve. If you just sell your rabbits on your own behalf, there are no regulations and you are responsible for the quality of your product–responsible to your buyers, who have remedies at law, not to the government. Thank goodness there’s NO law that requires a license to run a business! Those who want to live under libertarian freedom, can.

Dear Waldomountainman,

You write: “Mr. Livingston has an agednda (sic)for this blog and will use any information that suits this agenda to get readers, the more controversial the better.”

Yes, I have an agenda. It is to promote freedom and liberty and point out the fascist nature of our Federal government.

What is your agenda? It appears to be promoting the Federal thugocracy.

Best wishes,
Bob

This is just another way to strong arm not only small business but small enterprising children.Freedom does not come from restricting and taxing the people to death for the sake of redistribution.Your safety dose not come from increasing the strong arm of the guvmnt, but by reducing their grip on your ability to make a living anyway you so decide.
The reason for this economic outcome lies in savings and capital. When people are free to keep everything they earn, they inevitably save a part of it. Their savings provides the capital that businesses use to expand their operations. The expansion produces higher revenues and profits, enabling firms to pay higher wages. In that way, standards of living rise. In the totally statist society, where the state owns everything, private savings and capital are squeezed out of existence, thereby dooming everyone to a life of extreme impoverishment, possibly even starvation.

In the middle of the spectrum are the welfare state and the managed economy, whereby the state attempts to extract sufficient wealth from the private sector to sustain its ever-growing welfare sector. What inevitably happens, however, is that the welfare sector becomes so large and so voracious that the private sector shrinks to a point where it cannot sustain the burden. The result is an environment of crisis and chaos, one in which people in the parasitic sector are demanding that the government do something to save them.
There lies the problem.We need less guvmnt not more.we need to look outside of the box and see what is really going on,We have become the slaves of the elite and they are just laughing at us.Its time to do something and that’s flush this overbearing cesspool of waste and replace it with the ones that believe in the constitution and the bill of rights not just gives lip service.Ron Paul is just that person and with the right congress and senate we can take this nation back.You know what the other way is and its not pretty.

It is one aspect of human to defend what is just, in this case breaking a law. But, please use your mind to see the greater injustice. We have allowed our government to become a runaway train, passing laws that regulate nearly every aspect of life. He broke a licensing law. Most on this site would contend it’s a stupid law, reaching far beyond what a government should be regulating. The point Livingston is making is, do we really need the breadth of government involvement in our daily affairs in order to function as a society? Would we really just come completely unhinged as humans if we didn’t have tens of thousands of laws and rules to follow? If we’re working to pay our taxes, and paying our taxes so the government can keep us in line, aren’t we saying we can’t handle free will?

Dan az and RW – Well said, indeed.

We seem to always forget that any Congressional Act that goes contrary to our Constitution IS NOT LAW, but only statute, and we are only bound by it if we agree to comply. No Act can be Law if it violates the Supreme Law written by our Founders.

We have been so snowed by this system, and have walked willingly, albeit unwittingly, into slavery.

It may be too late to wake up from this snowjob, but we won’t know unless we give it a try.

I need to add to Supreme Law written by our Founders…acknowledging our God-given rights bestowed on us by Him only, by virtue of our humanity and natural sovereignty, and cannot be infringed by government.

Unless we choose to give it away and enter into servitude to the Beast.

“How many of you followed Vigilant’s suggestion to go to the link he provided to view yet another version?”

I did. I also read all the cites in the links Mr Livingston provided.
Then I wrote my opinions to Vigilant. (And you

Vigilant goes off the deep end when his knowledge (or lack of) gets challenged. He threw a virtual hissy fit when I dared to expose Lincoln as the Dictator that he was. And that without having done any study on the subject first. In his rebuttal comment on this page he basically admits that he researched the subject, but that was after he threw his hissy fit, not before.
Ignore people like him.

Waldo, pretty soon you’re gonna need a license, or a permit to take a crap, well maybe we do now. I just use 2-55 gal. drums and a small leach field, I live so far out in the hills the county doesn’t even know whats going on, and they never come out because their afraid of people that live out in in the middle of nowhere, even the law won’t come out.

Marty as you probably already know—-FREE INTERPRIZE CANNOT BE TOLERATED IN A SOCIALIST< OR COMMUNIST COUNTRY!!!
Thats what they are trying to push on us by FUNDEMENTALLY CHANGING out GREAT NATION. There is no more of the GOOD LIFE to be had and thats just what it is all about.
GOD BLESS AMERICA

There would be no outcry if the little boy had only thought first about “outsourcing” the building of the cages to China. They face no penalties. Did we not receive in many of our most expensive pet foods made in China and sold in Vets. offices as well as giant chains of Pet Stores, grocery stores etc. “tainted” pet food that had to be recalled? The recalls were approx. two full pages in length. I had been paying a fortune for one of the expensive brands that were recalled. Where was the penalty imposed on China?

“There are good reasons for some of these rules”. Yes, there are. However, they should be unilaterally applied. Take, for instance, the chicken industry. They are allowed to make a kind of “stew” for feeding their charges. This “stew” consists of chickens that have died under dubious circumstances along with meal and bugs. Chickens DO eat meal & bugs in their natural dietary enviornment, but certainly NOT themselves. Ever wonder how chicken legs became so large? They’re confined in such tight quarters, they literally CAN’T STAND UP. Another instance where the rules are not applied appropriately is the cattle industry. Feed lots have, for the last 20 yrs been feeding their charges a mixture of grain & a protein concoction of THEMSELVES to boost slaughter weight. If you eat conventionally grown meats, you’ve been made a cannibal by proxy. Still think the USDA is doing such a fine job????

The “mad cow” episodes put a stop to forced bovine cannibalism quite a few years ago. That practice is now illegal. Chickens will cannibalize each other if they are overcrowded, but not under normal circumstances.

Regardless, the big issue here is another federal agency going out of bounds. Unless the Dollarhites actually sold their rabbits across state lines, the USDA has no Constitutional authority, at least not according to the Constitution. Matters of licensing, regulation, inspection etc. properly belong with the state and local governments. Unfortunately, we have a court system that decided the Constitution doesn’t say what it means, but means what the Court says, and the Court says that if your sneezing affects a person’s decision to buy something, you’re engaged in “interstate commerce” and subject to regulation.

MNice:

Chickens don’t need to be crowded to eat each other. Or even themselves. All they need is something to attract their attention. A different colored feather on a chick will almost always get it killed quickly because all the others will peck at it. A small wound will do the same thing. Heck, I’ve seen chickens eat THEMSELVES due to that. It helps if they are running free but even that isn’t a cure. Chickens are really just nasty birds.

As for chickens, should we AID them in this disgusting practice???? Mad cow disease aside; how about this pretty picture : most slaughter houses are inspected by USDA at best, 4 times a yr. Know what happens regularly when USDA isn’t around? The latest stats provided are around 10% of the animals ARE STILL ALIVE when they’re being cut up for your dinner table. The USDA isn’t serving anyone’s best interest in ANY of their many endeavors. And then this boy is being made an example of is hardly concionable.

ValDM,
I know you know this, but it has nothing to do with animal cruelty, and everything to do with Power. Your example of the chickens is a good one to illustrate that point.
The leaders (on both sides of the aisle) are making fools of the citizens. They want Power and Perks, and they will shower us with whatever propaganda helps them achieve that goal.

karolyn – What’s sad is, I really think you believe that.

Well, it probably does do SOME good. I don’t think throwing the baby out with the bathwater is a good idea either. The premise is sound.

Karolyn, Me thinkist that you are not awake.

karolyn:

The USDA isn’t really meant to insure the food you eat is good. The FDA’s stated reason for existence is that. The USDA is meant to keep on eye on the food to insure that the farm corporations can sell without competiion.

When was the last time you saw a farmer driving down the road, house to house, offering to sell some of his produce? It’s rare enough to see them sitting on a corner somewhere. And even then, most of the time they are selling packaged produce (like oranges) that were bought from some corporation.

If they control your food, they can control you.

45 Kind of reminds me of 5th grade civics class, when we learned how the federal agencies were there to protect us. Yes, by golly, we could trust them to keep us safe.

We felt so fuzzy and had no doubt that anything bad would be caught before it reached our dinner table, or anywhere else. After all, this is America!

Except that I, like you and many others, GREW UP.

Kate8

Yes that was the same lie I was taught in school. There was even a rather infamous book on the subject by Upton Sinclar called “The Jungle”.

Oh Please, Karolyn! If you were running a company would you poison your customers? If you did, you wouldn’t be around long. Corporate officers aren’t that stupid.
Look up the Jack in the Box incident (which occurred by the way under the ‘watchful’ eye of the Government). They dam near went under because there was too much E. Coli in their meat (not their fault). It took years for them to regain their customers.
For all the money that Government wastes “protecting us”, we could afford to be a lot more careful about what we purchase.

I knew I would get that response. That doesn’t help the people who are in the middle of these travesties, like the cheese making family in the northwest or the Amish farmer selling raw milk across state lines in PA. Yes, those of us who are online get all this news; but, sad to say, there are millions of Americans who need to get knocked over the head to see anything. Would that I were a millionaire. I would start a campaign – putting up posters, etc. – Going out into communities. I would hope that everyone who reads these blogs does contact his congressmen. It certainly is the LEAST we can do. Bitching and moaning amongst ourselves about it sure doesn’t help.

You are a babe in the woods. Any contact to a Congressman that does not include at least $10,000 untraceable dollars attached is handed to an intern who will send you a form reply. You wasted a $0.44 stamp.

I actually was called and left messages several times by my representative’s (Mick Mulvaney) office regarding one of my emails. It seemed as though they were really ineterested in what I had to say. I had a nice talk with one of the interns. Lindsey Graham always emails a response and sends a letter with mention of the specific item I am referring to. Jim DeMint does not usually respond at all, and he’s the one everyone thinks is so great. He doesn’t even have a Facebook page.

Randy__ that depends on who ya know!__Ya want action, make yourself well known to your congress people, but do it respectively. But be aware, if you Make yourself too well known and skewed and nasty, then the GUV will follow you for a while, to see if your a threat.

Karolyn, I agree that bitching/moaning amongst ourselves is useless, so the only way to get anything accomplished is to throw them out physically. We can do that if we’ll do it together. I written my congressional reps many times & all I ever get is a thank you form letter…I don’t write anymore…I’ve started trying to get people to lets band together & “throw the criminals out of office”. All I get is… oh, but that would be unconstitutional!?

Louie, the easy answer for the constitutional argument is that the constitution gives the people the right to remove any government that is detrimental to the welfare of our citizenry.

Congresspeople don’t even ever see these letters and emails. They go into the delete file.

I used to write my “reps” several times a week. I’d get a canned response, basically saying, “though I disagree with you, I’ll keep your thoughts in mind…”

Don’t even get that anymore. In fact, not so long ago, they were telling us to stop contacting them! In other words, they don’t answer to us. They have their instructions from the PTB, and we’ve become a nuisance…

If I had the money, I would get this guy an attorney and countersue the agent in charge…the one that would not do his real job and that is to help the American citizen with what they need to establish their business within the boundaries that the USDA puts forward. Refusing to help is the reason that this man was out of compliance, and it is the agent’s responsibility as he was the boots on the ground. Maybe, if some of these agents got sued individually, and their butts were on the line, they would get to see how it feels to get raped without vaseline. You can bet, if the agent received notice of being sued, he would lose his job with the USDA, and that would set a precedence for future agents and how they work with the public…because the rabbit farmer is one of the agent’s bosses, he helps to pay his salary.

Wandamurline writes:
“help the American citizen with what they need to establish their business within the boundaries that the USDA puts forward.”

You want to help the royal guard measure the length of the chains? For a free people you sound much more like you want to wear the chains of slaves.

Where is the righteous indignation in the oppressive laws and acts of the government claiming to be of a free people?

(Warning: Do not look behind the curtain. You will see many many years of government adding a little link here, a little link there, till you really do wake up as slaves in the land of the free)

We can’t vote them out. There are too many fools that vote that agree with them. But we can throw them…that’s the only way to get rid of them.

Unfortunately, the “fools” are not aware of what is going on in the background. That’s why I posted that I would love to have a lot of money to do in-your-face PR campaigns regarding these issues. If I had to guess, I would imagine a great many of the computer-using people spend most of their time on Facebook and not on sites that raise awareness.

Go to facebook. Run the campaign there.

You cant vote out bureaucracy,but you can starve it to death…haw!

You will get more results reporting this to the Enquirer or another tabloid….it will be read by many thousands. Do you remember the Vietnamese farmer who ran over an “endangered” kangaroo rat with his tractor? Just so happens an agent from the EPA just “happened” to be out in the farmers very large garden and spotted the precious rat, which the poor farmer had no idea his tractor had run over it. They took away his farm. This was put in the Enquirer and because of the outcry from the public, he got back his farm. You know that they have nothing better to do than to walk around on your private property (unless you’re a far left liberal) and look for any violation, real, imagined or “planted” that they can find. Please all of us. Let’s report this to several tabloids and see what happens. The little boy learned a lesson alright, and it’s that we are losing our rights.

FreedomFighter, Oregon constitution allows for “WE THE PEOPLE” of the State to create a petition for a cause and then gather a certain number of signatures which will determine if the cause will be placed on the next ballot as a measure to be voted on.

I suggest creating a petition for the cause of passing a measure that states all candidates running for any given office can do so at no charge. All candidates will then be given the exact same kind, type, amount of, local and any other promotional support to ensure no one candidate has more “Face Time” than another candidate. Any deficiencies in this requirement will be made by the candidate themselves and authorized as “Acceptable Discrepancies” by such candidate.

I know this is a superficial and incomplete example of the petition “Cause” but I hope you get the idea.

The main point I am trying to make here is this….Money must be taken out of the picture in order to level the playing field. It has come to be that those with the most money wins and this is unacceptable for a democratic republic to flourish without becoming controlled by those who have the money.

I request all those who desire our country to return control to “WE THE PEOPLE” find a way to institute this petition method of creating a measure and placing it on the ballots of all our States in the Union. We can take back our Country by thinking outside of the box.

Good Luck and God Bless,
Jim

Sounds like the fairness doctrine to me.

It does indeed. A direct violation of the first amendment. We DO have a way to break the political machine that controls the media. The internet gives access to “the press” to ALL the people and not just those who can afford a press.

Use it. Here as we are now. Also go to facebook and other social network sites and take the campaign to the people. That way we don’t need any stupid law to “force” fairness in direct violation of the Constitution.

Jim, I need to check into this “cause” petition thing. Sounds like a big winner to me. At least it would put the politicians on notice that we the people are sick of the way the political game is played, with money.

Marty – It gets worse. Soon we will have the garden police arresting people for growing organic produce in the backyard. Probably start confiscating the land it’s grown on, too…

See my post and link , they broke the law. I don’t care for the duberment, but they made their own problems. How about if I start selling my steers to the food chain store’s, and I have not been inspected and have no records as to how healthy my animals for retail sale are?…what if I sold them my sick steers, goats, or lambs. Think about that when your in the meat section buying grocery’s.
http://www.aphis.usda.gov/animal_welfare/downloads/aw/awlicreg.pdf

jibbs – No animals are more mistreated, abused and unhealthy than those coming from the big producers. Guv doesn’t care about that.

It’s not about public health. We were much healthier when our produce came from the family farm, or even our neighbors. These folks were not running a major enterprise.

Government needs to leave us alone. You can go on about “the law”, but laws are made to benefit government, and control the people.

And BTW, jibbs. Inspections are random and rare, and usually only happen when someone gets sick…and it’s most always from a big, corporate producer…unless they are after some little guy, to run him out of business and make an example of what happens to someone who tries to be self-sufficient and enterprising on a smaller scale.

And also BTW, If I choose to purchase an animal, eggs or raw milk from a neighbor or small producer, I should have that right, without interference and intimidation from the government.

I’m still thinking about South America, where they still live free.

Kate,
Your dead on with your post. The fact is the USDA test only one in a 1000 if that.

Jibbs,
Who wrote the bloody laws that you think were broken? The Politicans who break the very laws they write daily.
Again all LAWS written for well over the last 100 years need to be removed from the books ASAP they are there to CONTROL down to the nano your life.

TIME – Government has spent many years indoctrinating we the people that government is the ultimate authority in everything, and that we must comply and obey without question.

It seems that they’ve succeeded. Like I said before, we no longer have any need to think or make decisions on our own.

Jibbs

I have no problem with the USDA putting a stamp of approval on meat from sources they have inspected.

I have a serious problem with them telling you that you can not sell your meat because you did not pay them “protection” money to get that stamp on your meat.

I can choose to buy your meat or the meat that has the USDA stamp on it.

I have a SERIOUS problem with the government of a (supposedly) free people telling me that I do not have the choice and MUST buy the meat with the USDA stamp on it.

Time,
I would like to see a Constitutional Amendment stating that no new laws can be created by the Congress without a 2/3 majority of both houses. And that all the old laws must be reviewed and approved by that same majority within 10 years or they become void.

DaveH – I would like to add that citizens be allowed to petition for redress of grievences…oh, wait…we are. Except that we aren’t.

I guess we need some new laws to reaffirm existing ones (?).

In any case, any statutes passed by Congress should be required to pass Constitutional muster, and also be subject to the acceptance of we the people. After all, they are SUPPOSED to work for us.

Guess its time to fill the basement with about 2 feet of black dirt and growing lights and start that victory garden indoors eh?

And incidentally what the gubment dont know will hurt you……

I become more dispirited with PLND every day. Instead of unbiased journalism, the short articles are now becoming skewed, incomplete, agenda-based and subjective. I am finding it necessary to go back to the original news reports to get the complete story.

Inevitably, your readers swallow the story hook, line and sinker because they have trusted you to tell the truth. Then they go off on a tangent, some explosively so, and know not what they are saying. Am I the ONLY person who trusts but verifies your aticles?

Case in point: the statement, “Their crime: They sold more than $500 worth of rabbits in a calendar year.” That statement is verifiably false, and if you want the whole story, go to http://www.news-leader.com/article/20110521/NEWS01/105210346/1007/Nixa-man-faces-penalty-over-90-000-rabbit-sales

From the link:

“A proposed settlement agreement from the federal agency, which oversees the sale of animals, said Dollarhite sold 619 animals from April 3, 2008 to Dec. 21, 2009, despite being told several times that he needed a license.

“USDA spokesman Dave Sacks said the agency learned about Dollarhite after an inspector looking at a licensed facility found that some of the facility’s animals came from Dollarhite.

“Sacks said licensed businesses are inspected regularly to make sure animals are properly cared for.

“Animal welfare is at the heart of everything we do,” Sacks said. “So we consider it very serious when there is an activity regulated under the Animal Welfare Act that is being conducted without a USDA license.”

Sacks said Dollarhite contacted a USDA office in March 2006, asking for a license application kit, which was sent to him. But Dollarhite said he didn’t ask for a license application until fall or winter of 2009, and that he’s never received it.”

Now, would you say that story is substantially different from the one at the top of this page? I sure would.

Mr. Livingston, please trust your readers with the whole truth, they can handle it. To do otherwise is simply a case of instigation and provocateurship.

Now just why in the “hell” should he or anyone else need a license to operate a business. Why…oh yes for others to tax/tell them what to do with their lives. When I was growing up, you could sell/do anything as long as you didn’t physically harm anyone…now it’s control, control, control…tax, tax, tax. We no longer live in a free country…we now live in a police state & have been for many years.

Dear Vigilant,

No that is not “substantially different” from the story I wrote. I could have reprinted the whole story from the Springfield News-Leader and the blog I cited and written a 2,000 word story. I chose to deliver the salient facts in a shorter version. The takeaways are these: Why should the USDA be interfering with a family business in Missouri? Why should they be hit with a $90,000 fine for selling a few rabbits that by all accounts were healthy and well cared for? And why must Federal bureaucrats behave so thuggishly?

Best wishes,
Bob

Sir, I would say you spend entirely too much effort in believing the media reports that are written BY the government For the government. I won’t say anything in this article is any more accurate. I will say, if you believe the garbage put out by the media, you’re nuts.

Thank you Vigilant. I will certainly not trust Mr. Livingston as much anymore.

Mr. Livingston,

“Salient facts?” Such as the licensing requirements? Such as animal cruelty considerations? I’ll leave it to the readers to determine whether or not those are substantial differences.

No sir, you could have mentioned those salient facts in two sentences without extending your article to 2,000 words. And the discussion thread that followed would not have been seriously impacted by the addition of those very pertinent facts. That you chose not to include those facts simply confirms my advice: trust your readers with the truth instead of attempting to channel the discussion in a way that is suitable to your small-government Libertarianism.

Dear Vigilant,

From the Springfield News-Leader : Dollarhite said he didn’t know he needed to be licensed. “There was nothing ever said that a license was required for a pet store to buy them,” Dollarhite said. “No one ever asked, ‘Are you USDA certified?’”

Also from the Springfield News-Leader: Sacks said licensed businesses are inspected regularly to make sure animals are properly cared for.

Make note that Dollarhite was not cited for improperly caring for the animals. He says that he asked the inspectors if he needed a license and they were non-responsive. Obviously we have conflicting stories about the conversations between Dollarhite and USDA fascists. I choose to believe Dollarhite. You choose to believe the fascists.

If you choose to live in a land with a tyrannical government, that’s your prerogative. As for me, I will fight for freedom and a return to a small and less powerful government as outlined by our Constitution.

You write: … attempting to channel the discussion in a way that is suitable to your small-government Libertarianism.

Promoting small-government libertarianism is the purpose of this site. If that troubles you, feel free to troll the Huffington Post where you might find the conversation more to your liking.

All the best,
Bob

Dear Karolyn,

Don’t appear so simple minded that you would suddenly “not trust” what appears here. Vigilant pointed out no discrepancies. He merely highlighted different facts of the story. Had I been trying to hide something I would not have cited sources and provided links with other sources.

Don’t miss the takeaway: The USDA is an over-reaching, thuggish Federal bureaucracy working to stifle free enterprise and dictate all that we do.

Best wishes,
Bob

Bob – I still do believe that the USDA overreaches. Any discrepancies pointed out by Vigilant do not change that fact. However, I don’t have the time to check everything everyone writes and do appreciate when someone else does it and points out additional facts.

Mr. Livingston, it gives me great pain to see that you’ve lost touch with the reality of my comments.

I’m confident that you’ve seen my postings many times on this site, and to make the diversionary, gratuitous accusation of “If you choose to live in a land with a tyrannical government, that’s your prerogative” is completely irrelevant and you know it to be completely untrue. Those are Alinsky tactics, both intellectually dishonest and beneath the dignity of one who expects serious consideration.

“Obviously we have conflicting stories about the conversations between Dollarhite and USDA fascists. I choose to believe Dollarhite. You choose to believe the fascists.” I “choose to believe the fascists?” Putting words in my mouth with this cheap fabrication hits a new low. Where did I say that?

“Promoting small-government libertarianism is the purpose of this site. If that troubles you, feel free to troll the Huffington Post where you might find the conversation more to your liking.” Another gratuitous comment.

What, sir, in my posting or previous postings have EVER led you to think I’m against small government? I’ll not let you channel this discussion into something it never was. It’s about journalistic honesty, not Libertarianism.

I would expect a person of your stature to man up in a graceful way to your errors of omission. But, I’m sad to say, that is not the case. In the desperation of being caught, you’ve compounded the error by both making unwarranted insinuations about me, and outright lying (by accusing me of believing the fascists). That is something, sir, I will not stoop to.

Will Mr. Livingston and Vigilant both please cut it out? There were NO material omissions in Mr. Livingston’s article. The fact is that there is NO LAW requiring real people to get any sort of federal license for just about anything, certainly not to sell rabbits (unless they’re selling across state lines). The FACT is that licenses are only required for businesses that choose to operate as federal agency trusts. There is NO law requiring that businesses be run this way. If the people in this article were selling rabbits on their own behalf, the feds have nothing to say about it. That’s current law. If you don’t understand or don’t believe me, do the study yourself. Eric Madsen at http://teamlaw.org can help.

You’re right Karolyn, it’s nice to see additional information, what I found offensive from my reading is the way it was worded by vigilant, it came across very demeaning to the site and I lost respect for him. Rather than adding to the conversation it greatly diminished the conversation about the USDA.

You argue over words?A man has been inappropriately charged 90,000 dollars for basically selling rabbits?You are clearly not seeing the big picture here.It is government intrusion that is being spoken of.I am pretty certain(from years of watching them do it)that the press will support the government(slanting the story their way)in their story-telling. Vigilant,why would you attack based on the information(or lack thereof),and not on the content?It seems to me that if you were to apply that verve to the nightly news,you probably wouldnt ever have any time to do anything else.Thank you Mr. Livingston,for another repressive bureaucracy gone mad story.Eventually if you tell enough of them,maybe it will soak into some of these thick skulls,that we are actually over oppressed by the g-men.

I believe the truth is this; It isn’t about the rabbits. It’s all about control. More government control. If the rabbits are underfed or ill treated they will be much more difficult to sell. They would not have the vigour that well taken care of rabbits would have and the farmer would stand to lose money. I believe the real story is this; there is constant watch by paid government employees to control and regulate everything that is possibly imagined by anyone who wants to do anything to eak out a living. This is just another control, tax and intimidate theme that is now the norm in this police state we now live in. 200 years ago you could build a log cabin with no permit or license or permission from anyone as long as you did not infringe upon the life , liberty or property of another individual. Now, our founding fathers would be fined,attacked and jailed by government employees just like the one that decided to attack the guy raising rabbits. I personally could care less how he treated his rabbits! I don’t have a right to control that man’s behavior toward his rabbits. I believe the gov. emplyee who intimidated and attacked the rabbit farmer should be layed off and then have to go out into the world and find gainful employment in the private sector. I believe the attack on the rabbit farmer was also for the gov. employee to help justify his job. I sympathise with the rabbit farmer and wish there was something I could do to help him. I don’t want my tax money going to the gov. to do this sort of thing. When will my public servants in the government represent me? Truthseeker.

Dear Vigilant,

This is my last word on this matter.

You ask where you said that you chose to believe the fascists?

Look at your comment above where you pulled quotes from the USDA spokesthug. You did not include any of Dollarhite’s quotes on the licensing issue. From this I drew my conclusion. So if my COMMENTARY (which implies an opinion) was biased, then what was your response but biased in favor of the USDA thugocracy?

You wrote: “’Their crime: They sold more than $500 worth of rabbits in a calendar year.’ That statement is verifiably false…”

Your statement, sir, is the one that is verifiably false. The Dollarhites were charged with violating [C.F.R. § 2.1 (a) (1) “Any person operating or intending to operate as a dealer, exhibitor, or operator of an auction sale must have a valid license.” The threshold for becoming a dealer is $500 in sales in a calendar year.

You write: I would expect a person of your stature to man up in a graceful way to your errors of omission.

I made no errors of omission. I highlighted certain facts in the story and gave the readers the sources from which I pulled said facts. Your “gratuitous comments” (which I don’t think means what you think it means) “Instead of unbiased journalism, the short articles are now becoming skewed, incomplete, agenda-based and subjective. I am finding it necessary to go back to the original news reports to get the complete story. Inevitably, your readers swallow the story hook, line and sinker because they have trusted you to tell the truth. Then they go off on a tangent, some explosively so, and know not what they are saying. Am I the ONLY person who trusts but verifies your aticles?” are what prompted my response.

Surely a man of your “vigilance” understands the difference between straight journalism and commentary. I don’t claim and have never claimed to be acting as a journalist with my postings here. I provide OPINION based on fact. Opinion is always agenda-based and subjective, and could be called “skewed” by those with a contrary opinion. My opinions are not “incomplete” as they are mine and mine alone. Plus, I cite the sources from which I take my facts.

Have a good day,
Bob

I’m with Mr. Livingston here. Regardless of the details, what this spells is that the government want total control of our lives.

Vigilant, I don’t believe for one second that this has any bearing on animal cruelty concerns. If the gov’t cared about such things, they’d do something about the BIG animal producers, who engage in the most cruel, inhumane, barbaric treatment of animals that…well, stretches the imagination. Check it out.

When I was a kid, we raised chickens and rabbits, and sold them, too. We bough raw mild from a neighbor. For heaven’s sake, we kids set up lemonade stands (!). No one though a thing about it…it was our right as human beings to do whatever we wished. There were no such “laws” to infringe on…didn’t need a license…

We are being made into automatons, with no right to even personal thought. The truth about America is that it is one of the least free of all nations.

@ Bob Livingston,
I agree with you Vigilant. Bob’s article says the USDA came to his Rabbit Buss. and found two small infractions, but there is no such wording in the News-Leader article. In the man’s own words, “he admits he didn’t know if he needed a license or not” he didn’t know? well he should have asked first, if he didn’t get an answer, call again!! duh, do your homework! Gee,I saw the stop sighn, but I didn’t know I had to stop your Honor. Ignorance is no excuse. We have a lot of problems here in Missouri with animal abusers, and I’m sure Dollarhite is well aware of it. By the way, I’ve seen lemonaid stands shutdown for the same reason, and they were run by little kids.

***Here’s the catch*** They were being sold as pets, and for meat by the pound, they were selling to a pet store for re-sale and they sold between 4,000 and 5,000 rabbits! They is a USDA licence required if you sell over 500 rabbits.
So, the Dollarhite’s created their own problem, end of story.

P.S. I forgot to add, that the licence is required when selling to store that resells them.

Mr. Livingston,

This will be my last word.

“You did not include any of Dollarhite’s quotes on the licensing issue.” I think you’d better go back and read my first posting. I did in fact do just that. Got anything to say?

Then you say, “You wrote: “’Their crime: They sold more than $500 worth of rabbits in a calendar year.’ That statement is verifiably false…”

“Your statement, sir, is the one that is verifiably false. The Dollarhites were charged with violating [C.F.R. § 2.1 (a) (1) “Any person operating or intending to operate as a dealer, exhibitor, or operator of an auction sale must have a valid license.” The threshold for becoming a dealer is $500 in sales in a calendar year.”

YES INDEED! Thanks for proving my point, at last! It’s not about a pure dollar threshold, as your initial statement not just implies, but asserts. It’s about a LICENSING REQUIREMENT with a dollar threshold. The crime WAS NOT exceeding a dollar threshold, as you assert, the crime was, at long last you admit, failure to obtain a license. You cannot play with the English language and expect to keep clear thinking processes.

You think I’m wordsmithing? Not by any means. I’m clarifying. The implication of your first statement is that government is citing a vendor for selling above a stated limit, which would indeed be an unwarranted and unconscionable intrusion into the free enterprise process. But it’s not the same as the government requiring licenses for vendors to conduct business. While that, too, is arguable to a great degree, it’s not by any means the same as limiting sales for the sake of limiting sales.

There is only one way to see this. It is a person in a black leather coat with dark sunglasses on pulling up to a small business operator (little girl in a cool-aid, lemonade stand etc.), showing his badge and saying “SHOW ME YOUR PAPERS”. This is where we are heading make no mistake.

libertytrain,

Sorry to have lost your respect, but I admit I’ve never written with the intent of garnering anyone’s good opinion. I state facts, and when I find errors of fact (or omissions thereof), ON EITHER SIDE OF A QUESTION, I will always be there to hold the respondent accountable.

My frustration with PLND has been some time coming. I’ve not caught Mr. Livingston in any direct misdirection until today, and never thought that his pride of authorship was so virulent as to blind him to errors. I’ve made errors of fact on this site a number of times, and I’ve always owned up to them with humility, not defended them to the death just because the words initially came out of my mouth.

Within the last few months, I’ve caught major errors of omission in articles written under the byline the PL Newsdesk Staff.

One may recall how I railed against the Westboro Baptist Church article because it failed to furnish a very vital piece of information: that the demonstration was out of sight and earshot of the funeral-goers, and that the father wasn’t even aware of it until he saw it on the news. This (most likely purposeful) omission of fact left the reader with the impression that the demonstrators were disrupting the funeral with in-your-face insults and other wackery. And indeed, that’s just what the postings indicated on this site until I discovered and reported the omission.

On another occasion, PLND Staff tried to pawn off an article that purported to say that Fox News was suffering in the polls. An inspection of the poll revealed that, unlike the implications of the PLND article, FOX News had the HIGHEST ratings for trust amongst viewers than ANY other news outlet.

We’ve all grown to expect subterfuge, selective use of facts, half-truths and outright prevarication on the part of the leftists. If we on the right are to employ those Alinsky tactics, we put ourselves in the same trench as the statists. We have history, fact and logic at our backs; our arguments can be won on that basis alone without resorting to tweakings or omissions of the facts to suit ourselves.

Vigilant,
This is not the first article on this site to leave out information important to a balanced discussion and I doubt it will be the last. I commend you for asking the question “what’s missing here?”I have asked that same question many times before and found the same sort of exclusions, but few people on this site want to hear about it.

I think perhaps you’re looking too hard to find fault and should find some other place to hang out. You’ve made a mountain out of nothing. If you seek what you identify as perfection I think you need to start your own site…. – good luck with that.

My comment was for Vigilant and anyone else that seems to feel the need to denigrate rather than just share an opinion.

When it all comes down to it, these are the key points that should have been noted. Did they have a small wholesale business? Yes. Did they know they needed a license? Not at first. When they did they get one. No. Did anyone ask them for a license? Doesn’t sound like it? Does the noted punishment fit the noted crime – not even close- it is way over kill.

What should have happened? 1. When kid sells rabbits to store – store asks if he has licenses. If no license – kid and dad get one. Until then STORE does not buy rabbits. 2. USDA finds out about kid selling rabbits – checks out operation (an inspection)- if there are any infractions at the time of first write a warning and give a time frame for the infraction to be corrected – was this done – doesn’t sound like it. 3. USDA comes back to review to see if the infractions from original inspection were taken care of. If yes, case close, if note, then fine (not $90,000) the operation and set new date for infractions to be fixed. Did this happen? No. 4. USDA comes back if infractions are still not fixed and they are sever – close down operation – and arrest owners for animal abuse. Did this happen? There was no evidence of abuse.

It does not sound like to me that the USDA handle the situation correctly – especially for such a small operation and that the punishment does not fit the crime which is not in line with our own constitution. Even if there were omissions from the article to the opinion piece – it does demonstrate our government run amok. If they can do this over rabbits, they bill do this over anything – garage sales, fresh veggies, teenagers who babysit – maybe even for their own relatives – they might have to get a license if they are to be paid, the kid who mows the lawns and shovels snows for the neighbors and local businesses.
We are killing the entrepreneurial spirit in our youth and in our country and it is our country that is doing it. What does the $90,000 penalty rectify? All it does is take from a working American and give once more to our bloated Government so then can then give it to someone who is not working.

Vigilant

Bob is correct in the entireity of his opinion piece. He even warns the reader that
“In yet another example of Federal tyranny, the U.S. Department of Agriculture has come down with both feet on a Nixa, Mo., family for selling rabbits in a business that began as a way to teach their son responsibility.”

Unlike the common liberal Mr Livingston did provide (multiple) links to cites of his opinion so that we could read more. Those cites provided additional cites. None of which were necessary to substantiate Mr. Livingston’s opinion.

That you Vigilant for adding another cite. It helps validate every part of Mr. Livingston’s opinion.

Now let me ask you, Vigilant, Why do you want to live in slavery? I have read many of your posts here and you do seem conservative yet you choose to side with the king when he demands $90,000+ from a free person.

Why do you think that a free people need to get permission of the king to buy and sell their property? What else is that license other than a permission slip from the tyrant. That the tyrant wears the initials USDA does not change the nature of the beast.

This is the point of Mr. Livingston’s article. He made his point with cites.
I, for one, shall continue to trust (but occasionally verify) many of the writers on this site.

Notable exception for Mr. black. and most liberals who post comments here

vicki says, “Now let me ask you, Vigilant, Why do you want to live in slavery? I have read many of your posts here and you do seem conservative yet you choose to side with the king when he demands $90,000+ from a free person.

“Why do you think that a free people need to get permission of the king to buy and sell their property? What else is that license other than a permission slip from the tyrant. That the tyrant wears the initials USDA does not change the nature of the beast.”

With all due respect, you have made the same error that Mr. Livingston and some others have made today. In fact, you may be referring to Mr. Livingston’s own posting when he accused me of agreeing with the fascists. It just ain’t so, and I never said it.

I am as much against the encroachment of government into our lives, perhaps more so, than many of the posters here. I was taking Mr. Livingston to task for not telling the whole story. For example, his URL cite is to an OPINION BLOG. My cite was more extensive with regard to the actual reasons for the fines.

It was ONLY after I insisted that the infraction was of a licensing requirement, NOT a pure dollar threshold as Mr. Livingston claimed, that you or anyone else here put the discussion on the correct track.

So, (1) kindly don’t accuse me of being a big government person, I am just the opposite, and (2) please excuse me when I detect a lack of pertinent facts (NOT semantics, not wordsmithing and not nit-picking) that giove a new meaning to the discussion thread.

Unbelievable Vigilant. That coming from the guy who went off on me because I dared to state the truth about Abraham Lincoln which offended your propagandized sensibilities.
Does Bob Livingston need to hold your hand and explain every little detail so that it sinks in that the Government is out of control? Licensing isn’t to protect the consumers who are quite capable of protecting themselves. It’s to protect the incumbent businesses from competition, which is something only Government can do.
Lighten up.

Bob, when I read the newspaper article I came to a conclusion not that different from yours and I thought “What’s the big deal?” Why is this guy complaining? It must be because he believes that government is good (rather than that government is necessary) and that the bigger the government the better (although as we know, common sense and experience proves otherwise). I know it is irritating when those who only see what they want to see always take the side of government, as if government could do no wrong but don’t get ruffled by such people. Jesus himself said that what they did to him (vilifying him, and lying about him, and falsely accusing him) they would do to us. If you are a follower of Jesus then you have to expect this. Sometimes I fight back with how I see it but sometimes I just pray for myself for the other person.
Many of the liberals on this site are atheists and although they are wrong in wanting to ultimately destroy our form of government, not all of them are evil, or even realize where their ideas will lead us. Of course some are evil and we will never convince them with words and logic. As you know there are liberals and progressives and Marxists who write here who think that if government were just big enough and the rich were destroyed that we would have a paradise. Even I was even shocked a years ago when I heard someone say, “What do you need God for, you have the Democratic party?” Some of these misguided people do not believe that freedom is worthwhile or that man is capable of governing himself and needs a ruler to make him do what he should (God only gave us ten commandments but there have been in the neighborhood of a million laws passed since our nation was founded). I’m not talking about Vigilant who just likes to find what he perceives as errors but what is truly ironic is that this is the USDA! The same ones who let millionaire chicken farms operate under the most incredible filthy conditions until someone dies or many get deathly sick, then they take notice but seldom require significant changes. It is the same USDA who oversees the slaughtering of cattle under such conditions that would make a steak lover become a vegetarian or at least never eat out again. I’m not talking about all the hormones and antibiotics that are allowed (and required because of the filth in such USDA approved places) as that is another matter, and the increasing coming of age of girls as young as eight and men developing female breasts is the apparent result. I’m not a vegan but I am getting to a point that I only want grass fed free range beef and organic chickens who do not eat genetically modified corn that has caused rats in England to develop liver problems in a matter of weeks (guess they aren’t as hardy as Americans who can eat anything). We need to fight for pure food but often we have to fight the government elitists who ‘know what is best for the little people’.
We have deviated far from the founding fathers but even they realized that the form of government they left us would only work for a moral people. As we become less moral and more Marxist (Karl was even opposed to marriage) and lawless, we can hardly expect our government to work well. It has become what it was never intended to be. The end of all democracies is always chaos and dictatorship of one kind or another and there are many who are working towards that end. Those who are determined to spend until they crash the system, the dollar and the economy, think that they are going to build a better world more to their liking. Think of the assassin in the Sci-Fi movie SERENITY and you will have a good picture of what they are about. Some have not thought it out that far and they are more akin to those involved in religious cults who believe that only their way of understanding is the true way. They can be persuaded otherwise more easily than the gravely misinformed like the North Carolina cult leader who has been wrong twice in predicting the end of the world. Many of these misinformed are atheists and they must be opposed as they try to set up an alternative kingdom. That was tried once eons ago and resulted in the creation of what we call HELL. Well, keep up the good work but realize that the results are all in God’s hands. You can only do what you can do. I highly recommend two books to you which I mention in both my books and which are more important than either of mine. They are entitled GOD CALLING edited by A. J. Russell and PRISON TO PRAISE by Merlin Carothers. Both are paperback, both are very different from each other and both have helped millions more fully understand what life is really all about. If you haven’t read them than I highly recommend them. They might help you to focus more on what you can do in trying to save our country from those who want to destroy it, even if they don’t realize that is what they are doing. The Brave New World of the NWO is not going to be something anyone is going to enjoy except the few thousand at the top and even they are going to be greatly affected if they succeed.
Jesus was talking about something else but I recall he once said, “They know not what they do!” Some do of course and those are the ones who will steer the masses towards the chaos they want and those are the ones who must be voted out of office in less than 18 months. Of course we can’t vote out Union Leaders who hate our country because they were never voted in the first place. We are at the tipping point and those who understand the power of prayer must continue to pray that God will work His will in every situation. If enough of those who love God will do this we can at least forestall the collapse of our country and that is worth doing. May God bless you and all who read this.

Vigilant writes:
“Now, would you say that story is substantially different from the one at the top of this page? I sure would.”

The OPINION at the top of the page is != to the story you quoted. It is also of very little relevance to the point of the opinion. Another poster below indicated the existence of a state law that DOES involve a dollar amount. When writing about the things (opinions and stories) we read some facts do get adjusted a bit. That is why most of us (including yourself) provide links to some of the opinions/facts we are reading to come up with our opinion.

Since Mr Livingston’s opinions whole point was stated in his very first sentence the little factual error in the $ amount being a state law not a USDA law has minimal impact on Mr Livingston’s point.

None the less I would like to thank you for the additional link supporting Mr Livingston’s assertion that our government is way out of control.

Cawmun says, “Vigilant,why would you attack based on the information(or lack thereof),and not on the content?”

That’s a rather confusing comment, since “content” is precisely that: information (or lack thereof).

For some time now, I’ve cherished the idea, which may turn out to be a polite fiction, that Conservatives and Libertarians appreciate facts, figures, history and logic as great starting points for discussion. For that reason, I find it MORE incumbent to point out errors or omissions of fact when they come from the right. We’re all accustomed to the fluff/emotion/fuzzy logic and double standards of the left.

It serves to de-legitimize and dilute any argument when the premises for that argument are incomplete or incorrect. Most do not check or doublecheck sources, but take the first thing they read and run off with it as if it’s gospel truth. That may be fine for Jerry Springer but it has no place in a forum that purports to facilitate discussion based on fact.

I’ve caught up this site before for doing just that. As I’ve mentioned the Westboro Baptist and the Fox News poll articles, both short of some crucial facts, started a chain of comments that were completely off the wall until I corrected the factual material, at which time the discourse assumed a more intelligent thread.

I don’t accuse them of purposely distorting the argument in their favor, but I do believe that they are sometimes guilty of the same thing: taking a quick, unresearched piece and perhaps prematurely publishing it.

I’d just like to inject my wee little bit of common sense here. The FDA and USDA were created partially due to a novel, “The Jungle” by Upton Sinclair about 100 years ago. I would highly suggest this book to those of you who believe we don’t need any regulation in the food industry. Also have a look at an episode of “Chef Ramsey’s Kitchen Nightmares” and you’ll have a new found appreciation for your local health department.

These government agencies were established by our ancestors to protect average consumers from the disgusting practices that were commonplace prior to their existence. And yes, they have gone way, way off the deep end lately, and seem to be populated with uncaring, inflexible bureaucrats that could be easily classified as “control freaks”. But I have to believe that the vast majority of these Federal employees just want to earn a paycheck, it’s the ones described in this story that make them all look like thugs.

These agencies don’t need to be eliminated, but the people running then do need some common sense slapped into their heads, and need to be reminded who they work for. And we shouldn’t classify all of the low-level employees of these agencies as “thugs”. If/when we are approached by an official, treat them the way we would like to be treated. Labeling all government employees and looking down our noses at them is just as bad as our government officials painting us all with the same brush.

Bob L. did not omit the main focus of what occurred. If he in any form gave you a verbatim article he would have a plagiarism suit on his hands. He can link.
As always, we have to have discernment and verify everything we read and hear.
As an aside, my sons when they write papers for their college courses have to document everything. The professors check,there is supposedly so much plagiarism.

DaveH says, “Unbelievable Vigilant. That coming from the guy who went off on me because I dared to state the truth about Abraham Lincoln which offended your propagandized sensibilities.”

“Offended my propagandized sensibilities?” This coming from the guy who reads a few books out of thousands about Lincoln, and decides that the most denigrating of them all must be true. And especially Thomas DiLorenzo, an admitted revisionist historian whose sole claim to legitimacy (in Dave’s mind) is his membership in the Ludwig von Mises Institute. Tell me Dave, does your view of history change every time you read a new book? Or is it just those that you feel philosophically comfortable with?

“Does Bob Livingston need to hold your hand and explain every little detail so that it sinks in that the Government is out of control? Licensing isn’t to protect the consumers who are quite capable of protecting themselves. It’s to protect the incumbent businesses from competition, which is something only Government can do.”

Your comment indicates that even you have not perceived the thrust of my comments. BTW, you might thank me that the thread of the discussion has turned to just that: licensing, not dollar thresholds.

I guess you weren’t satisfied with the truce I called regarding the Lincoln issue. Or is it that my experience in the Terry Lakin issue, and my impeccable reading of it, was just too much for you?

Since you bring up Lincoln one more time, I’ll tell you what I discovered: yes, he was a racist, as were most whites at that period in our history. But he was something far more important than that: he was anti-slavery. His party was founded on that, Lincoln always believed the slaves were wrongfully chained, and that the promises of the Declaration of Independence were for everyone, whether you are racist or not, black or white.

“Lighten up.”

Oh, I will. Now that I realize there are sheeple on both sides of the issues, something made abundantly clear to me today, I’m going to take a sabbatical.

I hear the sighs of relief now. Mr. thin-skinned Livingston, you won’t have to worry about accountability while I’m gone, but I hope you’ve taken a lesson on accurate statements and sourcing.

Dave, learn to admit when you’re wrong and try to avoid insulting anyone of whatever political persuasion if they don’t always agree with you.

Others have shown support for me, and that’s fine, and I thank you, but some of you still need to learn how to read a sentence to avoid misconstruing the meaning of the writer. My prose is clear and straightforward, and it’s not my fault when you misinterpret my comments.

Don’t worry, I won’t let the door hit me in the ass on the way out. Bye!

Vigilant,
I’m beginning to wonder if you are yet another of Jovianus’s personalities. You come into Bob’s house and call him a liar (in so many words). And your proof of such is just one other author’s take on the story. And the varying facts are insignificant to the point that Bob was making.
Then you make light of a well-written book (The Real Lincoln) whose facts all come from other accepted publications, with references for virtually everything the author claims. And you make the ignorant statement that it is just one book against thousands. As if that, by itself, would make the facts wrong.
Did anybody invent the light-bulb before edison (well, actually there was another, but that’s beside the point), yet there were millions, probably even billions of people before that inventor had his ‘ah ha’ moment. Does that make Edison wrong? Obviously not.
And by the number of Socialist societies in the world, it is safe to say that a very large number of people (probably over a Billion) believe that Socialism is the best for a country.
Just how many ignorant people does it take to outthink one intelligent and informed person?
Admit when I’m wrong? Show me. I have no problem admitting I’m wrong. But first you have to show me I am.
Obviously by the volume of words you expend to say nothing really, you do have a problem admitting you’re wrong.

And Vigilant (you certainly are misnamed), Lincoln was not anti-slavery. Four of the states that fought for the Union were slave states. Lincoln was willing to kill (or get killed) 600,000 people to force his way on the South, yet he conveniently allowed those 4 states to have slavery? Slavery was being abolished in all the civilized countries around that time, peacefully. If Lincoln wanted to end slavery he could have done the same.
And I’ll bet you didn’t read the book, after all that blustering? Because if you had, you wouldn’t be so quick to judge.
You, Vigilant, are the worst kind of ignorant, because you refuse to consider other points of view, choosing instead to attack anybody who doesn’t match your chosen set of beliefs.

Vigilant says “Or is it that my experience in the Terry Lakin issue, and my impeccable reading of it, was just too much for you?”
Your statements about Terry Lakin were Opinions, that is all. Vigilant. It would be a cold day in the hot place before you can outthink me.
And Vigilant also said “Others have shown support for me, and that’s fine, and I thank you, but some of you still need to learn how to read a sentence to avoid misconstruing the meaning of the writer.”
I counted 3 supporters, and 11 non-supporters. By Vigilant’s own bogus rules (the majority is right), he loses.
By the way, Vigilant, you may have a high opinion of yourself. I don’t.

Also, I want to point out that 2 of the 3 Vigilant supporters are known Liberals who look hard for any opportunity to jump on Bob Livingston. They are hardly credible.

Vigie, Duuuu, you must work for the corrupt, greedy, government. Are you one of the antichrist and his band of of Chicago mob or are you just bumb as a rock?

I would like to apologize about my previous comment and tell you how sorry I am as the rock may think I was calling it a government employee!

Vigilant writes that Mr Livingston should trust his readers with the whole truth.

He did. He provided links. He provided enough information to allow you to locate additional information.

Vigilant further writes that we have misread what he said. I assert that he called Mr. Livingston a lier. I offer as evidence

————————————————————
Vigilant says:
May 25, 2011 at 7:34 am

I become more dispirited with PLND every day. Instead of unbiased journalism, the short articles are now becoming skewed, incomplete, agenda-based and subjective. I am finding it necessary to go back to the original news reports to get the complete story.

Inevitably, your readers swallow the story hook, line and sinker because they have trusted you to tell the truth. Then they go off on a tangent, some explosively so, and know not what they are saying. Am I the ONLY person who trusts but verifies your aticles?

Case in point: the statement, “Their crime: They sold more than $500 worth of rabbits in a calendar year.”
————————————————————————-

I further assert that Vigilant was attacking the messenger and not the message. This is a typical action of a liberal and thus provides support for the assertion of DaveH that Vigilant is another name for Jovanus or any other of the liberals who post here.

If we did not get the message that Vigilant tried to communicate then perhaps the fault lies in what Vigilant said rather than what we read.

I assert that perhaps Vigilant mis-spoke rather than we mis-read.

Oh puhlease!!! Bottom line,pal; we don’t want BIG GOVERNMENT interfering in our daily lives!!! We want FREEDOM AND LIBERTY, that’s why the majority of us read these blogs! Why in the world, WHY, WHY, WHY, would you attack someone who fights for that??? They’re RABBITS for cryin’ out loud!!! The government needs to back the hell out of our lives, if they don’t, we need to force them, one way or another!!!
If you, sir, are not ready to take it to that level, then we DO NOT want or need your help and may posterity forget you were our countryman!!!

“Gather Your Armies!!!”–Samuel Adams

I’m trying to understand your efforts to muddy the waters. Do you work for government, or middle school writing assignment. The article you referenced says same thing like one copied from other. Any way we recognize your attempt. The fact remains, idiotic federal government, a hint of PETA and any other animal right’s supporter.

This is just another example of having to get permission from “mommy” government to do, that which a truly free people, just do.

Karolyn, Can you feel the chains yet?

They gave ONLY one job to Federal Government, protect the UNITED STATES. Do that and stay out of everyone’s private life. If we had honest worthwhile Congress they would destroy 100 regulations per day, until we could see light. Burn the paper they have wasted give it to the power plants might as well get some benefit.

Well, while I can’t say what’s in the minds of those in Government (in relation to eugenics), I can say confidently that they are most likely aiding and abetting Big Pharma. How else do they continue feathering their own nests?