And I thought Congress was bad. This week’s city government activities proved to be another interesting round in the drawn-out battles between liberals and wacko liberals over the benefits of increased regulation versus drastically increased regulation.

The Section 8 housing-voucher decision reached Tuesday night at the Common Council meeting is yet another affront to the free-enterprise system presented by the Emerald City does little more than undermine the ability of landlords to operate a solvent, independent business.

While I support the basic concept of housing vouchers in principle, those who reject the principle or simply reject the impracticality of cash in the form of a non-guaranteed government pink slip, should not be forced to comply with the mandate of an already bloated and intrusive institution.

Further regulation does little to keep rent in this city down for the average consumer (students), encourage entrepreneurial development or ease the plight of the increasingly rare, independent rental-property owner.

I am equally leery of this language of “compromise,” especially when it pertains to additional regulation. This has the affect of dulling the insidious edge of creeping government interference in the lives of constituents ? an encroachment this town is steadily advancing to the level of an all-out blitz.

***

I really don’t like smoke. I grew up with a tinge of asthma as a child, which I essentially grew out of, but cigarette smoke in large quantities over a period of time is one of the things that sets me off like I’ve got a chipmunk in my esophagus. Outside of the occasional, and I mean occasional, cigar upon which I gingerly puff, carrying a smug expression in a vain attempt to look sophisticated, I tend to shy away from tobacco products.

It’s hard to look sophisticated while wheezing or to look masculine while trying to brush hot ash off of your white shirt and silk tie with your free hand that happens to be holding a sifter full of scotch, attempting to shift that sifter full of scotch into the same hand with the cigar and summarily ashing into the drink, thus splashing precious drips of dark spirits onto the already soiled white shirt. Personal experience, anyone?

I’m quite certain the vast majority of the student population agrees with me on that point. And even the ones who don’t shy away from tobacco products probably wish they would have at some point in their recent past.

But the reality remains that individuals make a choice to enter a bar where they know patrons will be lighting up in much the same way a smoker makes a choice to take that first drag. And, inconvenient as it may seem, choosing employment in the bar business holds the same negative externality.

So this leads me to the question of why hasn’t anyone dreamed up the fanciful idea of a smoke-free bar?

By all accounts, I hear the idea would have some legs. Though it might attract a different clientele, I’m confident the market exists for such an establishment, and, if the status quo remains, they will become a reality in the not-too-distant future.

In the event that there isn’t a market for smoke-free watering holes, why is the city broaching this idea in the first place? If the bar market is heavily dependent on smokers (which it is), and the bar economy is vital to the cultural attractiveness and fiscal health of this city as a whole (which it is), what is the city’s underlying motivation for attempting to push the better part of its serviceable clientele out onto the sidewalks?

Last year, I read in a Madison city resolution regarding drink specials that the “pools of human effluent” that flow onto the streets at bar time are an ever-present worry for city officials.

How does a steady stream of Marlboro-toting effluent in and out of every corner pub sound to the fire and police departments already worried about overcrowding? How will those same overburdened public-safety officials enforce this new ordinance while they are already inundated with far-more-pressing concerns? What does the prospect of several over-served patrons sneaking a smoke in the bathroom full of paper waste do to the risk of fire inside said crowded establishment?

The only viable reason I can see to ban smoking in a bar is to protect would-be socialites with poor motor skills, such as myself, from their own chubby fingers.

***

And what of the hubbub that the Council is planning to issue a resolution condemning the Patriot Act and instructing Madison Police not to obey its stipulations?

I don’t have a lot of doubt as to where this stems from. The particular policy points articulated within the legislation don’t mean a thing; the safety of Madison (and American) citizens is thoroughly inconsequential.

This comes down to the fact that the legislation bears a deep association with John Ashcroft — that alone is reason to disallow its edicts inside the gates of the Emerald City.

I just hope a crime wave of guys with stained shirts doesn’t break out before this gets passed.

That might put me in a fix.

— Eric Cullen ([email protected]) is a sophomore majoring in political science and history.