Authorities show fear of free speech, free enterprise

There are a lot of scary things in the world today, ISIS or ISIL or Daesh (the latter a derogatory term favored by opponents), Russia and the conflict in Ukraine, global warming, stray asteroids, cancer -- but there seems to be one common fear in the news, at least among some of those in power: Freedom.

Put Bound Brook, New Jersey, officials on the list.

When Matt Molinari and Eric Schnept, both 18, wanted to raise some money during an expected blizzard, they took the initiative to go door-to-door in their neighborhood, handing out homemade flyers offering their services as snow-shovelers.

It was probably the printed flyers that did them in.

When the local police saw one of them, they didn't ticket the young men, but ordered them to stop because the town was in a "state of emergency" in advance of the storm.

Molinari said the police "weren't jerks" about the incident, but he and his shoveling partner just didn't know the law.

What does the law require?

A door-to-door solicitation permit would have cost Molinari and Schnept $450, and was good for only 180 days at a time. Unless residents were willing to pay $100 or more to have their driveways and sidewalks cleared, there was no way they could turn a profit.

You could also add the University of Nebraska at Kearney Office of Business and Finance to the "scared of freedom" list, implementing a policy alowing student organizations to use sidewalk chalks only from 7 a.m. t0 11 p.m. on Mondays and Tuesdays to advertize events.

The policy was implemented shortly after student political science and pro-life groups chalked messages on the school's sidewalks.

The rule prohibited them from chalking out social or political messages and mandated a $50 "cleaning" fee on the faculty adviser of any student organization that violated the policy.

"I think it was a direct response to our pro-life group, said Marilyn Synek, a freshman from Kearney and a member of both UNK's Locke and Key Society and the UNK Students for Life.

The former chalked questions like "Why is marijuana still illegal?" and "Is the Constitution still relevant?" and the latter chalked pro-life messages recently.

Fortunately, the UNK Chancellor's office pulled the policy and plans to "re-examine it," a spokesperson said.

Let's do what we can to see that regulation efforts are focused on real issues instead of petty offenses like these.