Maybe it's just me but when I watch old TV shows I have lots of questions.
When I see Michael Landon on 'Little House on the Prairie' driving his wagon I wonder if he had to get a drivers license or a registration tag for his wagon.
When I watch 'Bonanza' I wonder if Ben Cartwright' had to have a permit from the EPA and the DEP to dig a pond on his property
When I watch the 'Waltons' I wonder if they had to have a logging permit to cut the trees for their lumber mill or if they had to worry OSHA would come by to inspect their operation.When I watch 'The Andy Griffith Show' I wonder why someone who walks into the sheriff office with a shotgun is not immediately arrested and turned over to the ATF
When I watch 'Gunsmoke' I wonder if Miss Kitty had to worry about filing her taxes on April 15th or if the blacksmith had to have an occupational license and liability insurance to run his shop.
When I watch any old western I wonder if the train engineer, fireman and conductor had to be a union members or if the rail road had to get Army Corp Engineer permits to build the railroad over rivers and streams
When I watch the 'Rifleman' I wonder if he had to fill out a form and get a background check to buy his rifle.
I wonder if John Wayne in any of his westerns was concerned if he would get sued for busting up a saloon.
I think it would make an interesting spoof to do a movie set in the 1800's and apply modern day laws and conditions. I would love to see Tom Selleck do a movie where he would play a rancher. I could see him building a new home on his property and the code enforcement people would show up with the health department and try and stop him because he did not get a clearing permit or building permit or septic tank permit or pay his down stream pollution charges, or electric permit or plumbing permit or get his plans approved through the neighborhood development commission.Sometimes my mind wanders and I think how would our forefathers have handled all the restrictions we have in our lives today.
Sounds like a movie for Mel Brookes.
ReplyDeleteIt does doesn't it. Thanks.
DeleteOur forefathers would have been shooting by now.
ReplyDeleteNo doubt about that.
DeleteMy wife thinks you and I need to get together.Something about crazy men and thinking too much alike or something. Do you think we could get Tom Selleck?
ReplyDeleteI seriously wish someone would do a movie like that to show how far we have let freedoms slip.
DeleteBubba, you need a drink. As you well know this isn't the country in which you and I were born...it's gone. I always watch Gunsmoke at dinner, and sigh. Ah, for the good old days...
ReplyDeleteI've a fresh pot of coffee brewing as I write. Come on over. You too, HillBilly.
Maybe some other time. Thanks.
DeleteGive me a few. Be over soon...
DeleteThe fact that only a very small number of Americans still think like you do is a testament to the fact that American public is almost 100% brain dead.
ReplyDeleteIt seems that way. Maybe they could be educated somehow though.
DeleteWell, one item on your list hasn't changed that much. Americans have always sued each other. The famous Hatfiled-McCoy feud for example has a lawsuit as one of its central initiating points. That lawsuit, if I recall correctly, was a straight business dispute, but a lot of the older suits were to settle matters of honor without resorting to pistols in the street.
ReplyDeleteAnd you may recall that Fiske and Gould (when they weren't trying to corner the gold market) got into with Vanderbilt and had deuling arrest warrents from bought judges out against each other. Gould at lest twice got into violent confrontations over business disputes: possesion being 9/10ths of the law meant a lot more then.
On the other hand, I don't think you need to go back to the old west to find examples of people who never would have gotten anywhere in todays regulatory climate. Building codes in the heart of town go back over a century, but much of the rest of it seems to be post WW2.
But at least back then gun fights were still good ways to settle disputes. Building codes may be old but they weren't as restrictive. The more power they go the more they wanted.
DeleteBiblical Solutions for the Worlds Problems. http://theunchartedforest.blogspot.com/
ReplyDeleteThanks for the link.
DeleteGood scene, that would be one for sure.
ReplyDeleteThey wouldn't have given to much thought before they reacted
ReplyDeleteProbably not my friend.
Delete