Many towns have over the years passed some idiotic laws against raising livestock in suburban backyards, and those laws do get enforced, as one Crystal Lake family found out (from the NW Herald):

On Tuesday morning, Crystal Lake city officials paid the Blomes and their feathered comrades a visit, letting the family know that possessing their four egg-supplying hens within city limits was in violation of city code.

Crystal Lake Building Commissioner Rick Paulson said that the Blomes had to remove the hens or they’d be subject to a $100 fine plus $50 in court costs for the initial ticket.

According to city code, residents within city limits may keep only cats, small cage birds, aquatic and amphibian animals, and dogs.

The city has no limit on how many domesticated animals a person can have, and the county doesn’t either, Paulson said.

In other words, a resident could have 50 cats living on their premises, no problem. But four well-kept chickens, and it’s a $100 fine. It seems the reason we have these laws is based on an outmoded notion that suburban yards are for show only and are not to be used for food production, or harbor any animal that that produces food.

Best wishes to the Blomes in getting Crystal Lake’s anti-chicken law scratched.

Related post: Agriculture moving back to the ‘burbs (DuPage Greens)

Obama’s ongoing involvement in Libya is on questionable legal ground, and the Congress apparently isn’t going to help him out any. House Joint Resolution 68, which would support ongoing involvement in Libya, went down in flames:

Among Democrats, 115 voted for it and 70 voted against it.

The Republican vote was more one-sided: only 8 voted for it, and 225 voted against.

After voting was complete, the lower chamber promptly began consideration of a bill that would limit funding for those operations.

Sens. Dick Durbin and Mark Kirk are unveiling competing plans (although details are sketchy) for privatizing public assets. Based on news reports, Durbin’s plan is the stricter of the two, but both plans are wrong-headed. Major public assets — such as roads, bridges, airports, mass transit systems, parking meters — should NOT be privatized at all. These privatization schemes are bad deal for tax payers. Not only does service not improve, but costs skyrocket. Furthermore, they often involve a huge upfront payment, that a politician then gets to spend at their whim — an invitation for massive corruption and future fiscal calamity.