Sen Valentine is off his rocker

http://www.standard.net/live/news/165406/

Ok so Sen John Valentine has introduced a bill to the Utah State Legislature which is seriously asinine. He wants restaurant's to get rid of their bars and put up a 10' high wall between the customers and where their drinks are made. He also wants to broaden the definition of being legally intoxicated.

Seriously? I want Sen Valentine to be checked for "illegal intoxication" because you would have to be to think this shit up. I mean come on! Utah is on the path to becoming more on par with the rest of the country on this subject and then someone has to go and introduce a dumb ass thing like this. If this passes I vote for changing the "Welcome to Utah" sign to "Welcome to Utah, but if you drink alcohol or in any way resemble a drunk person stay the heck out."

First off, HIDING ALCOHOL WILL NOT STOP UNDERAGE DRINKING. If anything it makes it worse because by hiding it people seem to think that then means that we don't have to talk about how to drink responsibly. Now this article says nothing about underage drinking but I would bet money thats part of his "justification" for the bill.

Secondly, if you broaden what classifies as being legally intoxicated, then you might as well put EVERYONE under house arrest. If you determine illegal intoxication by "easily observed outward manifestations of behavior or physical signs
produced by the over-consumption of an alcoholic beverage" then you are making things extremely SUBJECTIVE for law enforcement. A person who is very loud even sober or acts really funny when sober could both be legally arrested for illegal intoxication without having a single drop of alcohol! There is nothing "objective" about this! If you are judging intoxication by how a person talks, acts, looks, etc then YOU ARE JUDGING SUBJECTIVELY!

Excuse me while I brown bag my coke bottle and walk stumbling down the street for alas the rum is gone.