Balancing the common good

[Dale_M]

When free enterprise is predatory, indifferent to the suffering it creates and caring only for profit, what is the responsibility of the government to step in? What is the proper course of action?

Here is a case in point:

WHITECLAY, Neb. — Four rickety metal shacks that line the main road in this town of maybe 10 people sell an average of 13,000 cans of beer and malt liquor a day. The nearest sizable city is two hours north. But just 240 yards north — across the state line in South Dakota — is the sprawling Pine Ridge Indian Reservation, where alcohol has been banned since the 1970s.

Nearly all the alcohol bought in Whiteclay winds up on Pine Ridge or is consumed by its residents, tribal officials say. Pine Ridge is home to the Oglala Sioux Tribe and is one of the poorest places in the country, according to 2010 census data.

In February, the Oglala Sioux filed a federal lawsuit against the stores, and Anheuser-Busch and several other large American brewing companies, accusing them of encouraging the illegal purchase, possession, transport and consumption of alcohol on the reservation. Fetal alcohol syndrome, fatal drunken driving accidents and beer-fueled murders have cast a pall over Pine Ridge for decades.

nytimes.com/2012/03/06/us/next-to-tribe-with-alcohol-ban-a-hub-of-beer.html?pagewanted=all&_r=0

Just recently, a US federal judge dismissed the lawsuit. He noted the dire circumstances, but also that the federal courts didn’t have jurisdiction to address the problem.

The lawsuit alleged that the stores and beer makers had knowingly allowed alcohol sales to residents of the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation, which has banned alcohol since 1832, knowing it would be smuggled to drink or resell.

The Oglala also argued that the beer distributors supplied the White Clay, Nebraska stores with “volumes of beer far in excess of an amount that could be sold in compliance with the laws of the state of Nebraska”.

Pine Ridge Indian Reservation’s county is consistently ranked among the poorest in the country, and one in four children born on the reservation suffers from foetal alcohol syndrome or a foetal alcohol spectrum disorder.

bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-19795838

 

[april32010]

dale,i agree this is unconscionable.i believe that this should be stopped, i just don’t know how it can be done .

 

[Julia_Mae]

dale,i agree this is unconscionable.i believe that this should be stopped, i just don’t know how it can be done .

Families of the victims and victims should file a class action civil suit. If they win, the award will cripple the businesses. And, they could start asking us all to boycott the beer company.

 

[jeannetherese]

I wonder if the state might be able to use zoning laws to restrict alcohol sales within state boundaries to a certain distance from the reservation border?
Or perhaps, public pressure upon the store-owners, financial backers?
to Julia Maes’ suggestions. Gerry Spence plus a boycott could make a difference.

 

[Qwestions]

Am I understanding that people who are adults shouldn’t be allowed to decide for themselves what they consume, as long as it isn’t against the law in the rest of the country? Because it’s not good for them?

And you propose to do what about the fetal alcohol syndrome afflicting other babies throughout the U.S.?

So… dictatorial, draconian, arbitrary measures are better than creating better conditions on the reservation? Especially since ensuing lawsuits would cripple the outside businesses, especially the breweries?

How very…UN-American.

God help us! Please deliver us from our trespassers and do-gooders. Amen!

 

[jeannetherese]

I’ll admit I have little loyalty to breweries.
I also am comfortable with having the people we elect establish zoning and regulations in response to the will of the people. (At present there does not seem to be a will to do this in relation to alcohol sales in this area, but that could change… )
If a group of citizens want to pool their resources and file a class action lawsuit, that seems quite democratic to me.
I have not seen any posts that posit and either /or situation in which boycotting a company or using legal means to addresses grievances, precludes creating better conditions on a reservation or working to address the problem of fetal alcohol syndrome in other places.
It is kind of you to express concern. May God bless you and all who visit CAF. Amen.

 

[austenbosten]

Perhaps instead of automatically going to our knee-jerk reaction of getting the government involved…we should ask why these people are consuming so much liquor in the first place? Sounds to me just driving the liquor stores into bankruptcy is just going to drive the reservationsits to harder drugs or other liquor stores. So we’re gonna put the liquor shacks out of business and give other liquor stores or drug-dealers business…Brilliant! What a way to do nothing to solve the problem but stroking one’s ego

God help us! Please deliver us from our trespassers and do-gooders. Amen!

Amen!

 

[ringil]

Shut these predatory vulture businesses down.

The Church does not support unbridled capitalism and profit at any price.

How do these shack-store owners sleep at night/ Disgusting.

 

[austenbosten]

Shut these predatory vulture businesses down.

The Church does not support unbridled capitalism and profit at any price.

How do these shack-store owners sleep at night/ Disgusting.

How about we help those struggling with alcohol addiction instead of shutting down the shack-stores, stroking our own egos to the point of moral sin, and driving these poor addicts to hard drugs like heroin or pot.

Shutting down a shack-store doesn’t help the victim, it just puts people who work in the store out on the street.

So:

The addicts are still addicts and are probably going to get hooked on worse drugs
The store owners lose their businesses
and
The employees of the shack-stores lose their livelihoods
.
.
.
But we did something that made us feel good about ourselves…greaaaaat

Look help the addicts break free of addiction and the shack-stores will loose their precious profits.

 

[jeannetherese]

hmm…13,000 cans/bottles per day divided by 4. Those shack store owners aren’t doing too badly at the expense of their fellow men and women and children.
I wonder just how small these small businesses are? I wonder what sort of taxation would be necessary for such a business to successfully internalize the externalities of addiction? I wonder what the true cost of a bottle of beer would be if those costs were factored into the purchasing price?
We’ve been subsidizing this through our tax dollars for an awfully long time. Couldn’t we find something more positive to spend our money on?

 

[Julia_Mae]

Am I understanding that people who are adults shouldn’t be allowed to decide for themselves what they consume,…

Heroin.

as long as it isn’t against the law in the rest of the country?

There are a lot of “dry” counties in the US.

Because it’s not good for them?

Because those around them are paying a price. Like being assaulted and killed by them. Having to house them when they commit crimes.

 

[ringil]

How about we help those struggling with alcohol addiction instead of shutting down the shack-stores, stroking our own egos to the point of moral sin, and driving these poor addicts to hard drugs like heroin or pot.

Shutting down a shack-store doesn’t help the victim, it just puts people who work in the store out on the street.

So:

The addicts are still addicts and are probably going to get hooked on worse drugs
The store owners lose their businesses
and
The employees of the shack-stores lose their livelihoods
.
.
.
But we did something that made us feel good about ourselves…greaaaaat

Look help the addicts break free of addiction and the shack-stores will loose their precious profits.

Ho about we walk and chew gum at the same time?

Social Justice Doctrine of the Church does not allow for profits at any cause.

How do these store owners sleep at night?

 

[Bill_7154]

I thought that businesses used ‘the state’ to benefit themselves. Benefiting by doing things like creating barriers to entry into different occupations/companies/corporatioins/etc.

I know the state inhibits free trade, making it more difficult for me to conduct business with my neighbor. And I know it makes a lot of barriers for me to open up whatever business I might want to open up. Making me jump through a bunch of hoops in order to do so, and makes me keep jumping through hoops to stay in business.

Who is at the top of that food chain? Are not the business conglomerates at the top, using the state as a tool/weapon against the common man who wants to hang out a shingle and start his own business?

Why not allow free trade and let people vote with their wallets around who they want to do business with?

God Bless,
Bill

 

[austenbosten]

Ho about we walk and chew gum at the same time?

Social Justice Doctrine of the Church does not allow for profits at any cause.

How do these store owners sleep at night?

If you work on helping the people on the reservations with their addiction you will kill two birds with one stone. The reservationists will no longer go to the store to get their “fix” and the store selling the liquor won’t make a dime exploiting people’s addictions.

Just shutting down the shack-stores is not going to solve the problem but drive the problem underground.

 

[Dale_M]

Just shutting down the shack-stores is not going to solve the problem but drive the problem underground.

Isn’t that the same argument used against restricting or banning abortion?

I think it reasonable to assume that if alcohol is harder to obtain, it will decrease availability. That seems to be the case in Poland, where abortion was freely available and highly used in the Communist era, but is now largely banned. Illegal abortions are still very common, but the estimates of how many are occurring are still below what the numbers were when fully legal.

 

[april32010]

Ho about we walk and chew gum at the same time?

Social Justice Doctrine of the Church does not allow for profits at any cause.

How do these store owners sleep at night?

:clapping:

 

[april32010]

Am I understanding that people who are adults shouldn’t be allowed to decide for themselves what they consume, as long as it isn’t against the law in the rest of the country? Because it’s not good for them?

And you propose to do what about the fetal alcohol syndrome afflicting other babies throughout the U.S.?

So… dictatorial, draconian, arbitrary measures are better than creating better conditions on the reservation? Especially since ensuing lawsuits would cripple the outside businesses, especially the breweries?

How very…UN-American.

God help us! Please deliver us from our trespassers and do-gooders. Amen!

how very catholic…and the conditions do not cause the alcoholism ,native americans have a genetic predisposition to alcoholism.and setting these shacks in such close proximity is unconscionable.

 

[Julia_Mae]

Why not allow free trade and let people vote with their wallets around who they want to do business with?

God Bless,
Bill

It’s a Reservation. Theoretically, it’s a nation unto itself with it’s own laws and own law enforcement.

Columbia made a lot of money, the corrupt government officials not just growers, exporting drugs to the US. This is like that, not like you have to be licensed to run a business.

 

[Bill_7154]

It’s a Reservation. Theoretically, it’s a nation unto itself with it’s own laws and own law enforcement.

Columbia made a lot of money, the corrupt government officials not just growers, exporting drugs to the US. This is like that, not like you have to be licensed to run a business.

I didn’t realize that was what was being talked about until just now. Consider my post more on a general basis and not specific to that situation.

I see at the heart of the second sentence, human greed. Anyone have a solution for that to sprinkle on the heads of every human on the planet handy? Otherwise I woudn’t expect for things like that which you are talking about there to ever change. Corruption and greed happens this side of the border too. A case can even be made that the drug war itself is steeped in corruption and greed. Larger budgets, higher salaries and more room for promotion the larger it gets. Plus local law enforcement gets to keep a portion of drug money seized to use for their police departments. Not sure that is the best use for that money. Treatment seems to be more effective than jail in getting people off of drugs…but I digress…

 

[Julia_Mae]

. A case can even be made that the drug war itself is steeped in corruption and greed. Larger budgets, higher salaries and more room for promotion the larger it gets. Plus local law enforcement gets to keep a portion of drug money seized to use for their police departments. Not sure that is the best use for that money. Treatment seems to be more effective than jail in getting people off of drugs…but I digress…

I think this is a reasonable point here, as others have suggested that attacking the alcoholism problem on the reservation would be an effective strategy.