Utah Mulls a Database of Bar Customers

sundancing alerts us to a political dustup in the state of Utah, which doesn't have bars like the rest of the country does. Instead, "private clubs" require you to fill out an application and pay a fee if you want to have a drink outside the home. While there is pressure to reform this arrangement — one argument is that it's bad for tourism — the head of the state senate recently floated a proposal to create a database of every bar patron's visits. Now Utah's governor has called that idea "almost Orwellian," adding that "it's very difficult to legislate adulthood," and its supporters seem to be backing off. The idea of requiring bar patrons to swipe their drivers licenses as proof of age is still on the table, though.

Comments

Re:Yeah... Ok

[v1]

Lethal injection is considered humane because no pain is felt.

Civilized societies have long moved towards executions that are as respectful of life as possible, as opposed to some societies which still publicly rape and stone to death.

Criminals get many of their rights temporarily suspended because they have deprived others of their rights. If you've behaved badly enough to deserve death, society has very little moral obligation left to you.

I think the criminal view of the death penalty has lost a lot of its "deterrent-factor" over the years, partly due to the slowness of justice (spend 4 yrs on death row etc) and all this effort to make executions more "pleasant". There was a time in the past when a bank robber would make it a point not to shoot their gun for fear of "gettin the chair". Nowadays they'll cap the old lady that's blocking the door on the way out.

Bring back stoning. It might help.

Re:Out of curiosity

[geekoid]

What's a murder? Is it all murders? 1st degree? 2nd degree? is manslaughter in one country murder in another?

Do they take population density into account(Cities vs. Urban)

You used different years. was there anything happening that year that was unusually? the olympics, a bombing?

Are any other the years anomalous? meaning unusually high or low.

So yeah, it can be "fucked up".

Re:depends what you mean by nice

[pauljlucas]

They generally politely try to excuse themselves if they disagree with something or avoid the issue, rather than lambasting you about whatever their pet issue is.

... and instead break open their checkbooks and send tons of money to the Yes on 8 campaign in a state that isn't even theirs. Yeah, that's so much better.