Labor laws and personal beliefs collide

The Seattle Times ^ | 7/8/04 | Lisa Heyamoto

[Modernman]

Yer talkin' to yerself, perfesser.

That's probably for the best. Nobody else can understand what he's saying, anyway.

[Modernman]

What 13 year old wouldn't want to operate a backhoe, or ride on top of a slow moving house helping dad by lifting the lights out of the way? None of the ones I ran with would have missed the chance.

The point is, the kids' parents should be the ones with the good sense to prevent them from doing such incredibly dangerous things.

[Modernman]

They have a classical education, apparently, and they can run a backhoe and make good money - while most kids will just continue in prolonged adolescence well into their 20's and 30's. I wouldn't look down my nose at this guy and his family.

Nothing against working in construction, but this guy seems to have predetermined that his kids should go into that trade.

It seems a little premature to decide that your kids should spend the rest of their life working in a dangerous, hard and financially risky profession when there are so many better options out there.

[Gone GF]

Let's try it from this angle then. The government says this same 11 year old is too young to drive a car. Should the parent be the one to decide when his child is old enough to drive safely?

After reading the whole article, I think this man has some serious problems -- and they're not all caused by the goverment I certainly don't see him as somebody to look up to.

[Critter]

I'm philosophically opposed to that. I guess I thought more here were, too.

It used to be that way here.

Someone along the line, there was a massive sellout to the nanny state crowd. I'm thinking that this place should change it's name. It has nothing to do with a free republic any more.

[Critter]

Does a principled man scam the workers comp system?

Yes.

Principled men scam any and all communist policies and laws.

[ClintonBeGone]

Principled men scam any and all communist policies and laws.

No, cowards scam; real cowards encourage them; principled men change the polices and laws.

[Old Professer]

The vast majority of 12-year-olds are not capable of operating heavy equipment.

Neither, for that matter are the vast majority of adults.

296 posted on 07/09/2004 1:01:29 AM CDT by Smokin' Joe

As far as I'm concerned this statement should be the final word.

[Old Professer]

You've got that right.

[Old Professer]

Diogenes is still searching...

[MARTIAL MONK]

I've seen a lot of dozer drivers. It's like flying a plane, anyone can do it until something really, really bad happens. I've seen an embankment start to crumble with a semi-somnolent good-old-boy riding on top of it. In half an instant he's wide awake and pulling from every minute he ever spent in the seat. He uses the other half of the instant to crank thirty tons of slithering steel around by brute strength. When he feels that hunk of runaway metal reach the spot where it can pull itself out of the death slide, his fingers become as light as a fairy dancing on the wheel and levers. He is the soul of the machine.

No safety classes can teach that. These are the boys who learned from their fathers at 10 or 12 or 13. These are the boys who ran equipment 'till dark and then worked on it until midnight. These are the boys who learned how to be men. They have as much steel as any Cat. That is what is missing today.

[Critter]

No. Communism doesn't change, unless it collapses. We live in a communist country now, in case you haven't noticed, and it will not change, until it collapses.

The best any principled man can do is scam the system, hopefully accelerating it's collapse. :)

[Cagey]

Religion belongs in the church...not the home.

That may be the dumbest comment I've ever read on this forum.

[verity]

This guy is not playing with a full deck!

[ClintonBeGone]

The child would have been properly sedated and controlled with psychotropic drugs.

Yeah, right after the perp who spanked the kid took a shank to the aorta. At least in my world.

[bvw]

Do you think the Federal Government has any charter by the Constitution to make and enforce such laws outside of federal districts and military reservations? I do not. The States do have such authority, and can be very harsh if that is their choice.

Moreover I'd gainsay that a state court could act on historically well-established violations of personal safety under general laws of reckless endangerment, without the states making all sorts of regulation.