Here in Pensacola, there has been a scandal breaking the past few days about a group of people, including the county sheriff, a county commissioner and the county administrator who went on a hunting trip in Wisconsin and are now being investigated for illegally hunting deer and other wildlife as part of an organized tour group. Now, however you feel about hunting, it is every individual's responsibility to know and abide by the laws of the state you are in. If it's illegal in Virginia to have a radar detector, for example, and you have one, the police are going to charge you, regardless of your knowledge of the local statutes.

Which brings me to my point. The sheriff had a news conference yesterday about his involvement in this hunting trip (for which he will possibly be charged with a misdimeanor) and one of his statements was:

"My explanation overall is that when you go somewhere and hire a licensed person to take you on a hunt, you assume that they know the laws and that the State of Wisconsin is regulating them... I had no intent to violate the rules of Wisconsin. I will challenge the fact that I intentionally did something wrong."

I assume that this defense would not work for a speeder going 55 in a 35 zone because he didn't see the sign, and did not intend to break the law. The rest of the story from today is here.

The charges are here.

I think it is very funny that each of the elected officials is a Republican "law and order candidate", with no quarter given to anyone who breaks the rules unknowingly... This is not to let the Dems off the hook- there are plenty of Democrats who do the same thing. Hypocrisy still extends throughout the political process. But the "personal responsibility" argument breaks down when each elected official is examined... why is this so? I might vote for someone who actually admitted his or her mistakes and issued a sincere, contrite apology. Life is about learning and growing as a person. It's no wonder that it is nearly impossible to find any truly good people to run for office. The hypocrites are in charge of both entrenched parties...

This story just makes me laugh, because it is the epitome of "Those without sin casting the first stone..." And it's almost like an episode of Reno 911!, but this is real life...