Prime Minister Brown tells families: 'Stop wasting food'

Yes, you read it right... the head of a prosperous, democratic government scolded his subjects about food wasting. People are starving in China!

Of course, as children we all wanted to sass to our mothers, "Then let's put the leftovers in a box and mail it to them!" Which would have gotten us a now-illegal spanking.

And that is what this is all about... governments that treat us like children. A nanny state mentality.

Could it be that when government takes over raising children through public schooling, provides a safety net wherever we go and do, that a whole nation becomes one of adults who think like children? It has happened in the UK and is spreading to the US.

The fact is that governments have created this food crisis through food-to-ethanol programs and not allowing the exploration of oil. Then they have the gall to tell us to conserve!

Fertilizer is made from fossil fuels. These costs have gone through the roof as of late, which will manifest itself on the supermarket shelf.

And speaking of fertilizer, let's get back to Prime Minister Brown. Here's a list of what this patronizing government has banned:

Junk food commercials
Smoking in bars
Certain video games
Throwing your trash out - without separating plastics
Knives
Guns
Fighting back during a home invasion
Children going to fast food restaurants

White goalposts in soccer fields
Pencil cases banned at school

Foam swimming aids in pools

Meatballs taken off school menus

Fire extinguishers

Suncream banned over allergy fears (don't worry - UK socialised medicine will attend to your skin cancer - someday)

And the list goes on and on...

What is needed is a spirit of resistance. The guts to tell a bureaucrat NO.

I recall the story of a friend of mine speaking with the county planner. "So what kind of teeth do you have?" my friend asked in regards to a building permit. The bureaucrat looked dumbfounded. "I ask again, what kind of teeth does your office have?!" The public servant meekly confessed he didn't have much enforcement power. My friend went on to build the structure regardless of the forms to fill out.

That's the kind of guts we need - to do what we morally need to do in life, even if it tweaks some meddling bureaucrat the wrong way.

Just say no to the nannyists.

"A society of sheep must in time beget a government of wolves."
- Bertrand de Jouvenal

Hugh Farnham