Children’s Minister Beverley Hughes said: “The guidance simply takes a commonsense approach to the fact that many young children and perhaps particularly many boys, like boisterous, physical activity.”

“Although noisy for adults such imaginary games are good for their development as well as good fun.”

But Steve Sinnott, general secretary of the National Union of Teachers, said: “The real problem with weapons is that they symbolise aggression.

“The reason teachers often intervene when kids have toy guns is that the boy is usually being very aggressive. We do need to ensure, whether the playing is rumbustious or not, that there is a respect for your peers, however young they are.”

Chris Keates, general secretary of the The National Association of Schoolmasters Union of Women Teachers (NASUWT) union said: “Many parents take the decision that their children won’t have toy weapons.”

Research by Penny Holland, academic leader for early childhood at London Metropolitan University, has also concluded that boys should be allowed to play gun games.

She found boys became dispirited and withdrawn when they are told such play-fighting is wrong.

Of course, as a parent I make sure my kids get constant exposure to the Eddie Eagle program as well.  The last thing I want is for my child to think that a real firearm is just the same as a toy.  We have a lot of Nerf guns in our house, and frankly I like the fact that it’s pretty darn easy for the kids to differentiate between the two.  All the same, Andrew knows that he is not to play with any “toy gun” that he finds laying on a yard, playground, etc.  It’s far better to let an adult check it out than to risk hurting himself or someone else. 

I’ll be back in full force on Wednesday, but in the meantime, have a very Merry Christmas and thank you so much for stopping by.

Not doing a heck of a lot while I’m on vacation.  It’s pretty much an opportunity to get caught up on all the chores and errands I’ve neglected to do over the past year or so.  I’m still posting over at On Tap, and the plan is to return here once the holidays are through.  I might be around now and again before the 2nd, but I’d say that’s probably when we’ll fire up the old blog again. 

Until then, here’s Hillary’s Christmas commercial.  Yes, it’s real.  And yes, it http://www.hillaryclinton.com/video/87.aspx”target=”_Blank”>speaks for itself. 

But this story bugs me, and for one big reason.  It’s this quote:

“Laws are made to protect the public,” he said. “Sometimes you have to protect the public against themselves.”

In this case, he’s saying we need to protect the public against evil sex toys.  I’m sorry if I just think there are more important things for the Alabama Citizens’ Action Program to worry about, like poverty, drugs like meth, heck… even divorce rates.  

I could go off on a two page rant, but maybe I’ll save that for On Tap. 

At the same time, I’ve been doing this fairly steadily since 2003… and it seems like such a waste to stop blogging entirely.  I enjoy writing about the nanny state stuff, but I want to do more than just provide quick links, and frankly I don’t have time to write a thought-out 400-600 word piece every day. 

I need my co-blogger back.

So, I’m not going away.  But I’m also probably not going to be doing much with this space for the rest of the year.  I’m heading back to Arkansas in a couple of weeks to help my mother with some things, and that’ll take up some time.  Holidays are always busy regardless, so I hate to say I’m going to get back at it right away and then fail as I’m crunched with work and personal stuff. 

So bear with me if you’d like and I’ll kick things back up around the first of the year.  Ideally I’d like to do one or two big posts a week and provide some quick links the rest of the time.  We’ll see how well that works out.

You have to take your nature shots where you can find them.  On the other side of those trees is the Capital Beltway, all 8 lanes of it.

That was taken in Old Town Alexandria.  It would have been a much better picture had the flag not been wrapped around the pole, but what are you gonna do? 

The Staunton grand jury indicted a Manassas man and his company Thursday on 16 felony obscenity charges concerning adult videos that were sold in October at After Hours Video, according to Staunton Prosecutor Raymond C. Robertson.

The six-person grand jury spent Thursday morning viewing parts of 12 videos bought at the Springhill Road video store from Oct. 15 to Oct. 18. It was the second time the grand jury convened within the last month.

Krial, the owner of 12 adult businesses in Virginia and Maryland, said in the past he has caught flak from communities but has never been criminally charged in connection with video sales. He labeled the Staunton indictments as “ludicrous.” Asked to elaborate, Krial said, “It is what it is. Everybody’s going to have their day in court.”

The opening of Krial’s Staunton business on Oct. 7 has spawned the Citizens’ Task Force Against Pornography and also generated a petition drive supporting After Hours Video. Thursday night, Krial said more than 800 people had signed the petition that’s being circulated at the Springhill Road store.

Rick Hudson, a free-speech expert and an attorney with the First Amendment Center in Nashville, said Robertson will have a tough time making the obscenity charges stick.

“They’re fairly hard to prove,” he said. “It has to be something really out of the ordinary.”

The story doesn’t mention the names of the videos, and I probably wouldn’t print them either.  I do have some sympathy for the community if they don’t want the stores in their area (and with 800+ signatures, sounds like there’s a decent grassroots effort there), but these are just your garden variety porn, I think it’s going to be a hard case for the prosecutor to win.