Friday, April 15, 2005
(9:10 AM) | Adam Kotsko:
Friday Afternoon Confessional: I am a libertarian now
I just got back from the alderman's office, where I was informed that it will take over a month for them to issue a permit for me to park my truck on the street, that is, if they issue it at all. And of course, this is contingent on my appealled tickets not "counting" as tickets that must be paid before the permit is issued. They require a photo of all four sides of the vehicle, to make sure it's not dented and shabby-looking. Apparently they're worried that some country hick on the make is going to come up an hickify their neighborhood. Like there might be cans of Busch Lite on the ground instead of MGD.
I informed the woman at the alderman's office (who incidentally had no time for me or my remarks) that I thought it was a stupid regulation; she said I was lucky that my ward so graciously made an exception to the city-wide rule. So I called up the apartment manager right after I left and said, you know what, I will take that parking spot, for $40 a month. One could wish that the apartment manager could have said when we moved in, "If you want to park on the street, you need to go to the alderman right away to get a permit" -- but unless he had fallen victim to it himself, there's no way to expect any human being to know that such a stupid law exists.
That's not really what made me a libertarian, though. The real problem is hearing on the news this morning that the brutal CTA changes are all going to take effect, and that they're eliminating bus routes, primarily in "outlying areas." I'm so proud to be living in a city in which a poor old lady living on Social Security on 59th St. who can't afford a car gets to walk four extra blocks any time she needs to go somewhere, because her bus line has been eliminated, while the city of Evanston basically has its own fucking train line. In response to this situation, I figure that becoming a libertarian is just plain easier than actually coming up with a way to make the structures of government a little less flagrantly biased toward the rich.
