Open Thread (2/3/2010)

I wanted Dillard to win, but realistically at this point ... it doesn't look good (like I said yesterday at 10:40-ish).  I cannot believe that people actually voted for McKenna.  I hope that those votes came from democrats trying to sabotage the republican candidate.

I think Dillard can make up about 400-500 votes with the remaining precincts, but the gap is 750.

I think Brady is the only candidate that Quinn can beat. I think Dillard would trounce Quinn.

I guess we had better donate then. 

On February 3rd, 2010 at 03:44 PM, wayward said:
Quote from one of my FB friends: "A friend 'based her decision for Illinois State Governor on who would look best in an orange jumpsuit.

Only in Illinois do we worry about how they look in orange.

B is for Bozo needs to call for another conference of campus bar owners.

"B is for Bozo needs to call for another conference of campus bar owners."

I don't think so.   The liquor commissioner and the police department are already doing a great job of deterring underage drinking on campus and they are generating revenue from those efforts.  It is too bad that they did not catch the bars serving to minors in those two sweeps referenced in the N-G article so they could just push the bars to a 21 entry age already.   

I would suspect that if you enter a campus bar on a weekend while the entry age is 19, you are going to find some patrons under 21 in possession.   Station was cited the most with 16 total, or 8 per sweep.    I'm surprised they did not cite more than that on a busy friday/saturday night, just when the students just returned from break and are out in force.   I'm dissapointed they couldn't catch at least one bar serving to a minor.   

One noteworthy point taken from the article was that the police issued a citation to an adult, not a bar for serving a minor.   Hopefully, this will deter adults from providing alcohol to minors until they raise the bar entry age to 21. 

"This interesting sociological phenomenon deserves academic study. Perhaps it is a subject worthy of a doctoral dissertation - patron's bringing their own alcohol with them when they frequent bars. It may be unique to the U of I campus."

After reading the back and forth on this topic, it is more likely that the underage customers get their alcohol from customers over 21 vs. a bar serving underage customers.   Finding 5-10 underage customers in possession in a campus bar during a busy weekend evening is not suprising, especially when the bar entry age is 19.  

It is an extreme argument that the bars are serving underage customers when they are getting their alcohol from from patrons over 21.   Implying that the bars are serving minors is not consistent with the news article referenced.   

Keith, your argument will not sound so extreme left if you argue that bars knowingly allow underage customers to consume alcohol.   But this is not the same as serving minors.   Your post implying that bars are serving underage customers is intentionally misleading.  

Claiming bars are serving underage customers because 5-10 customers are found in illegal possession on a busy Friday/Saturday night is hardly impressive.  Citing 40 people in possession on campus on a busy Friday/Saturday is not suprising or concerning to me.   If the bars are not being cited for serving alcohol to minors and the police are only catching 80 people in sweeps over two busy weekend nights, what is newsworthy about that?

I don't think it is news to anyone that college students are going to drink alcohol.   All the stats in the world will not change that.   Writing 80 tickets every few weeks or moving the bar age to 21 will not deter underage drinking.  

"You'd think people's feet would be sliced up from dancing on this fine edge by now..."

I don't see the fine line, but I do appreciate the situation.   The bars serve the alcohol legally and it is relatively easy for underagers to get alcohol illegally from those 21 and over.   This creates a difficult situation to manage for both bars and law enforcement when the bar age is less than the legal drinking age.   The N-G specifically points out in the article that bars were not cited for serving minors.   The stats provided indicate that, what I assume is a small percentage of bargoers, were cited across two seperate weekend evenings.   Based on the facts and removing the misleading lies, you find exactly what you expect to find on a college campus where the drinking age is 19 and the bar entry age is 21. 

Wink! Wink!
Nudge! Nudge!
Know what I mean?

Apparently facts and your own referenced news reports are not important in the discussion.   I would just ask that you don't lie and imply the bars are serving minors.   If you are going to be so loose with your intrepretion of serving minors, why not just say the City Council is serving minors by passing and tolerating a 19 year old bar entry age?   Sure, the looser you get with you interpretation, the goofier it gets.   But it was goofy to begin with.

"Ha! Is someone actually trying to say that the bars don't serve underage patrons? Wow...talk about out of touch with reality...."

According to the article, no bars were cited for serving alcohol and relatively small percentage of the drinking population was cited in for possession.  

If the bars were serving to minors, why wouldn't the police issue citations to the bars for serving minors?   That is illegal.

Nobody assumes that every employee will follow every business policy in a business, including bars.   Why try to make it about that?   The challenge for the bars and the police department is that it is very easy for a 19 year old to get a drink from a 21 old while the drinking age is 21 and the bar entry age is 19.  

In the spirit of the enforcing the law, isn't littering illegal? If you drive through campustown in the morning after a weekend night it is trashed. How come there are never any huge sweeps to bust people for littering? If we had to prioritize, shouldn't our community focus on the more serious and visible problems? I hear regular complaints that the campus is trashed after a big party weekend but is there ever any initiative to deter littering? Maybe we can fine the businesses who serve the food that is served on plates and in cups and in pizza boxes that end up on the sidewalk/street. Maybe we can designate the Mayor to have the title of "Litter Commissioner". If there are too many plates on the ground from pizza slices, the Mayor could have the authority to shut down Antonios Pizza.

Those with driver licenses are licensed by the state.    Why not revoke the license of anyone who is knowingly present where there is underage drinking taking place?   We can make everyone accountable.  

"This sociological phenomenon is called, "I believe that everyone who is ticketed did something wrong and anyone who wasn't ticketed didn't do anything wrong."

Yes.  The police rarely write tickets to individuals who provide liquor to minors, so it must be acceptable to provide liquor to minors.   The police rarely write tickets for littering, so it must be acceptable to litter.    Very few people report such violations of the law, so it must be acceptable to do these things.   Nobody seems to be complaining about it.  Nobody seems to be doing anything about it.  

The logical solution is to target a business who stands to profit from such frowned-upon activities.   Campus bars, oil companies, gun companies, and banks.   We need to make businesses more accountable for invidivual behavior if society is not going to do anything about it.