A bill to lift Iowa's ban on the use and possession of fireworks has managed to survive the legislative funnel and is still alive and kicking for now, but the Des Moines Register weighed in on the issue with an ill-thought editorial on the subject. The thrust of their argument: fireworks can kill people. They cite a tragic accident that killed one Des Moines teenager in 2000, a fire that destroyed most of downtown Spencer in 1931 and a few other accidents and fatalities that happen over the years.
Not to put too fine a point on it, but cars, alcohol and guns also kill people and yet the Register is not gunning to ban any of those. Vending machines, roller coasters, dogs and hot dogs and many other things have been known to kill people from time to time and yet, curiously, the Register is not interested in banning all of those.
The better argument (at least to me) for maintaining the fireworks ban is a simple one: NIMBY! Not in my backyard! This past 4th of July, not long after The Cigarillo had arrived, the Missus and I took him to Omaha so he could meet his cousins for the first time- and I was blissfully unaware that in Nebraska, fireworks are legal. Omaha, I can now report from first hand experience sounds a lot like what I imagine an urban warfare zone would sound like in the middle of say, an American invasion or a Serbian-led siege of some kind. The Register's underlying point was somewhat proved due to the fact that the combination of alcohol, patriotic fervor and potentially undercooked meat on the grill turned people into crazed pyromaniacs that thought nothing of setting off a flipping firework in my in-law's cul-de-sac as we were trying to get The Cigarillo to relax and go to sleep. (I was somewhat displeased, to say the least.)
So, from that point of view, I'd be okay if the fireworks ban stayed in place.
However, the counterarguments tend to win the day on this issue for me. We, as a state spend a shit ton of money in Missouri and, I guess, Nebraska buying fireworks that we're not legally allowed to have for the 4th of July. That's money we could be spending in our own state.
From a purely professional point of view (yes, I'm about to make a vague, generalized reference to my job- so buckle up): I can tell you that around that time of year, law enforcement gets a lot of calls about 'shots fired' or 'fireworks' and the vast majority of them turn out to be nothing- or the people have set off their fireworks and have skeedaddled before the fuzz get there. It ties up law enforcement resources- dropping the ban would use them more efficiently at the very least.
The fire argument could hold a little more water (heh: see what I did there?) with me- however, in my experience (again, vague reference to my job) every farmer in the county seems to wait until the first warm day with 40 mph winds to start controlled burns of their undergrowth and fire departments seem to handle that just fine, so in the unlikely event that someone drops a match in a fireworks factory I think we'd be okay. Provided, of course, that no one is actually nearby or even in the fireworks factory when that happens.
In short, I don't like sending money to Missouri, the ban doesn't seem to stop people from getting fireworks and setting them off anyways, so if it's that ineffective, then why have the ban in the first place? The arguments about safety are certainly worthy of thoughtful debate and discussion, but fireworks and here, they're not going anywhere and it's the 4th of July- why can't we as Iowans, 'MERICUH it up a little bit and set off some fireworks?
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