June 11, 2015 6:33 AM

The good news is they weren't thrown to the ground and placed in a choke hold

THE WORST PERSON IN THE WORLD

(apologies to Keith Olbermann)

Police Chief Clyde Carter

OVERTON, TX — Two girls wanted to raise money to buy a Father’s Day present, so they set up a lemonade stand in their neighborhood. Andria and Zoey Green were selling lemonade for 50 cents and kettle corn for a dollar. The girls had earned $25 in about an hour when police arrived and shut down the operation for not having a permit, according to KLTV. Police chief Clyde Carter told KLTV that even though it is a lemonade stand, a permit is required, saying state health guidelines must be followed.

Once upon a time, I was a Army Reserve Military Police officer. While my law enforcement experience is neither deep nor vast, one of the lessons I learned along the way is that wisdom often lies in knowing when to enforce the spirit of the law vis a vis the letter of the law. There are times when it’s not so much about looking the other way, but about knowing which battles are worth fighting…and which one are going to result in a PR nightmare. Good police officers know where to draw that line, and they know when enforcing the letter of the law is just plain silly. If every law was enforced to the hilt, there’d be no one left to make my morning lattes, because most of the population would be behind bars.

I’m not certain what risk is posed to public safety and good order by two little girls trying to raise money for a Father’s Day present. If they’re willing to sell lemonade outside during the midst of a Texas summer…may the Flying Spaghetti Monster bless them and keep them well-hydrated and slathered in sunscreen.

So what lesson did our two enterprising young moguls learned from this experience? Perhaps that adults can be kinda stupid and self-important, even when they have a badge and a gun. This probably represents their first abject lesson in official oppression…though shutting down a lemonade stand doesn’t exactly rise to the level of police brutality.

Being that Overton’s a small town, it would stand to reason that the local constabulary, like most understaffed and underfunded small town police departments, would have better things to do than generate bad PR. Then again, perhaps writing parking tickets and arresting vagrants gets old on occasion. Even with that in mind, it’s difficult to imagine how a police chief can see the sense in shutting down a lemonade stand that’s a threat only to lemons.

Protect and serve…or not.

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This page contains a single entry by Jack Cluth published on June 11, 2015 6:33 AM.

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