Slippery Slope, Sloppy Slippery Slope

Boy, California just doesn't quit.

They seem to be on this addictive coercive progressive track. The state needs an intervention.

When the smoking crusade began to gain traction back in the 1990s we were "assured" it was just in public spaces. But even I knew that was BS. Once the government is in, they see it as permanent consent to expand a ban. They know how to start small and think big.

/Hand job gesture.

People would argue "you're paranoid if you think the government will tell people to not smoke in their homes." Actually, I seem to recall journalists and academics saying this.

/More hand job gestures.

Anyone who paid close attention to this it has gone beyond the original intent. It expanded from smoking in public and protecting us for our own good to shamelessly kicking people out into the streets to smoke (no health study is available looking at how many smokers get sick going out in sub-zero weather to smoke) to speciously interpreting studies about second-hand smoke.

It's all arbitrary bull shit at this point and here we are. California did cross over and look to ban smoking IN PRIVATE SPHERES.

Slippery slope in pure action.

Funny though how the government is addicted - excuse the pun -to the tax revenues. What a creepy relationship. Funny that.

****

It's the same thing unfolding with Quebec's language laws and how people are changing their attitude towards non-Francophones. It used to be sold along the lines of with a soft pat on the shoulder, "look, we just want to protect our language" and "all we want is an effort for people to speak French" to "we must protect our protection at the expense of other people no matter what" and "it's not enough to show effort anymore."

All this is in action with the government's discriminatory French proficiency tests and Bill 14.

And English is no longer the problem. It's all languages. It was bound to come to this. And if Bill 14 passes, it'll set a foundation for another assault.

They took it up a notch. And that notch is reactionary and ugly.

****

Talking about the PQ always makes me think of this iconic scene in Deliverance.

That's some banjo playing!

Actually, it's not fair to the banjo player up in the tree to be compared to them.