20120224-Stossel Special-[Illegal Everything].Fox News Channel.C

----------

[Illegal Everything]

a Fox News Channel special, with John Stossel

2012, February 24, Friday

Xvid/MP3 AVI - encoded from medium quality ReplayTV stream

----------
[excerpted from John Stossel's blog:]

Tonight, I argue that America has become a country where no one can know what is legal.

Kids who open lemonade stands are now shutdown by police. I tried to open a lemonade stand legally in NYC. That was quite an adventure. It takes 65 days to get permission from the Department of Health and Mental Hygiene.

With government adding 80,000 pages of rules and regulations every year, it's no surprise that regular people break laws without even trying.

A small businessman spent 6 years in federal prison for breaking Honduran regulations (and, to make it worse, the Honduran government said he didn't). A family in Idaho can't build a home on their land because the EPA says it's a wetland-but it only resembles a wetland because a government drain malfunctioned and flooded it.

TAXI TROUBLE; ILLEGAL FOOD; ILLEGAL DRUGS; ILLEGAL SEX

One bit of good news is that while there may be so many laws that no one knows if he's a lawbreaker, it has never been easier to "watch the watchmen." Tiny cameras in our iPods and cell phones allow citizens to film law enforcement and hold our government accountable. But in the last few years, cops have arrested and jailed people for taping in public. The arrests are not legal, but they happen anyway. Fortunately, arrests are caught on tape.