No I won't. I'm not done with it yet. But here's what I've got now, for further commentary and suggestions:
The Federal Land Theft Protection Act of 2012
Infamous anti-[[Fen] legislation passed shortly after the launch of the SV ''[[Grover's Corners]'' from West Virginia on April 20, 2012, frequently referred to as the "Land Theft Act". Rushed through the legislative process and signed into law in a matter of weeks, the Land Theft Act is now regarded as one of the great examples of the Law of Unintended Consequences in modern American legislation.
==History==
In the immediate wake of the launch of the ''[[Grover's Corners]'' from West Virginia, a bipartisan group of United States senators (including [[Wallace Webster] (R-NH), [[Isabella Ward] (R-TN) and [[Kendall Dixon] (D-NJ)) drafted a bill intended to outlaw the creation of [[Unreal Estate] within the borders of the United States. The hastily-written legislation was the first time the term "[[Land Theft]" was used in an official government document, and the bill classified it as a [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Classes_of ... ederal_law Class A Federal Felony], with each count punishable with up to life imprisonment and/or a $250,000 fine.
The classification of Unreal Estate as a criminal activity was based on an argument invoking "the public good". While acknowledging (and indeed, celebrating almost to the point of enshrinement) the right of individuals (and corporations) to own land, it put forth the legally dubious claim that to remove such land from the surface of the Earth robbed future generations of its use, and (more importantly, claimed more cynical observers) also deprived Federal, state and local governments of any future tax revenue on such land.
The bill was introduced to the United States Senate on 9 May 2012 as S.2767. It was immediately referred to the U.S. Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs. This surprised many outside observers, who expected it to be handled by the Senate Committee on Energy and Natural Resources. Senator Webster explained in a press conference on 10 May 2012 that all matters concerning Handwavium and the Fen were considered national security issues, and in accordance with White House guidelines issued in 2008 the bill was referred to committee accordingly. The 115-page bill received committee approval in a matter of days, which prompted some observers to object that it had not been reviewed thoroughly enough. Despite this, the committee report on the Land Theft Act was published on 18 May, and the bill was subsequently placed on the Senate's Legislative Calendar.
Debate on the bill was held on 12 June 2012, and lasted barely two hours. The Land Theft Act passed on a voice vote with 79 yeas, 17 nays, and 4 abstentions/absences. It was immediately referred to the House of Representatives, where it became H.R.5789 and followed an almost identical track, starting with referral to the House Committee on Homeland Security. Once again it was approved by the committee in a matter of days (several congressional watchdog organizations characterized this as a "rubber stamp" approval). It came up for debate before the House on 9 July 2012, endured just under four hours' discussion (characterized by observers as "perfunctory" and "lackluster"), and was passed by a vote of 391 for, 37 against, and 7 abstentions/absences.
No reconciliation was necessary between the Senate and House versions of the bill, and President Rudolph Guiliani signed it into law in front of the press on 10 July 2012.
==Prosecutions==
The first arrests and prosecutions under the terms of the Act took place less than a week after it was signed, suggesting to many that the Federal Government had had several "candidates" under surveillance in anticipation of its passage, and had delayed moving against them in order take advantage of the harsher terms of the new law. By the end of July 2012, the FBI had raided nearly a dozen locations, including sites in California, Wisconsin and New Jersey, followed closely by EPA HAZMAT teams. Almost all the individuals arrested were said to have been inspired by the launch of the ''Grover's Corners''. (It is perhaps emblematic of the United States government position that during these and all subsequent proceedings the ''Grover's Corners'' was never identified by its proper name, but only with such euphemisms as "the 2012 theft of American territory from West Virginia".)
Indictments and trials took place with an alacrity which prompted observers as well as several Congresspersons to accuse the Justice Department of "fast-tracking" them over more important cases in order to intimidate and discourage other potential Fen. In no case did any trial last longer than a week, and almost every one returned a "guilty" verdict.
Among the convicted were:
* Terrance and Patricia Klaus, of Guilford, Kansas. The Klauses were convicted for the smallest known instance of Unreal Estate, a patch of land approximately 10 feet by 10 feet (3m x 3m) occupied by an inexpensive steel shed.* Daniel and Felicia Williamson, Donnie Curtis, Freddie Carpenter, Amanda Gonzales, Scott and Nicoline Aylmer and Bryant Kelley of Prentice, Wisconsin, who had attempted to emulate the ''Grover's Corners'' by converting an entire neighborhood into Unreal Estate.* Suhayl Mansur of Rocksprings, Texas, a naturalized American citizen originally from the United Arab Emirates. In addition to Land Theft, he was also charged under Federal anti-terrorism statutes, apparently simply for being a Muslim of Middle-Eastern extraction. The extra charges were dismissed by the judge partway through his trial, but not before he was thoroughly tarred in the press as a "terrorist".
==Flaws in the Act==
Almost from the first the Land Theft Act was criticized for its vague and overly-broad language, as well as its apparent intent to restrict an entire American subculture. The Act's authors made a token attempt to keep it from looking like an explicitly anti-Fen law -- several of them had been burned badly in [[Subversive Literature Act of 2009|the abortive 2009 attempt to criminalize the science fiction and fantasy genres], and all were aware that support for the Fen among American citizens was growing at that time, especially with some commentators lauding the launch of the ''Grover's Corners'' as a bold and courageous journey to a new frontier in the grand American tradition. Still, the intent behind the law was considered obvious by many, and its fast-tracking through the Homeland Security committees was seen as a ploy to avoid possible Fen sympathizers in the Science and Technology committees.
However, in the process of "genericizing" the Act's terms and definitions to dodge accusations of Fen persecution, its authors accidentally opened up its targets to include far more than just those who intended to go into space. At some point during early revisions, language which had initially required the use of Handwavium to alter the "shape, form, nature, composition and/or location" of a tract of land had unintentionally become uncoupled from the description of the new Federal crime, which was now defined simply as any such alteration, regardless of means, motive or intention. As finally passed, the Act considered the use of Handwavium an "aggravating factor" mandating a maximum sentence, but no longer a ''requirement'' for a violation.
===Exploitation by Environmental Groups===
Activist environmental groups such as Greenpeace quickly discovered this flaw in the Act. While historically environmentalists have been sharply divided on the subject of Handwavium, a coalition of several such groups came together to exploit the law. A small number of volunteers allowed themselves to be caught and prosecuted for "attempted Handwavium-assisted land theft" over the course of nearly a year. Some pleaded guilty or no contest; others pled not guilty then put up half-hearted or inadequate defenses that resulted in their conviction. No appeals were made, and the Land Theft Act was never challenged; in fact, defense attorneys went out of their way to acknowledge the validity of the Act. Combined with the "legitimate" prosecutions of actual cases, the result was a considerable and weighty collection of legal precedents.
Once the last of these trials had entered into case law, the coalition sprang its trap. Land theft accusations were made against several large mining concerns, most notably Newmont Mining Corporation (who operated gold strip mines in Nevada and Colorado) and Arch Coal (infamous for mountaintop removal mines in the Appalachians); complaints complete with chapter-and-verse quotations of the Act were sworn out against them, and arrests were made of both corporate officers and field supervisors. As corporate lawyers attempted to extricate the mining firms from the charges in Federal courts, several P.R. companies hired by the coalition began astroturf campaigns with the theme of "same crime, different results" and emphasizing how "the little guys" were prosecuted, but big companies were able to ignore Federal Law.
That in a number of the earlier "trap" cases the charges were in fact dismissed or ignored only helped these campaigns. They received a further boost when Stephanie Flores, a Federal Prosecutor assigned to one of the cases, was recorded in an unguarded moment saying that the Land Theft Act applied "only to the Fen, not legitimate American businesses", and that accordingly she was making only a token effort at prosecution. The video clip and sound bite spread virally across the Internet, and were distributed by virtually every major news outlet save for FOX News. Flores was fired, and as damage control the Justice Department immediately stopped making deals for reduced or dismissed charges with accused violators and began pursuing their remaining prosecutions with a vigor rarely seen before or since.
Within a year of Flores' slip, Newmont and Arch were both found guilty of multiple counts of violating the Act. They were each fined in excess of US$5 million and were forced to shut down all their mining operations, and several executives from each company were sentenced to a minimum of 25 years in Federal prison. At the same time, the Justice Department launched new cases cases against those companies which had initially escaped prosecution.
===Reaction===
By 2014, the American mining industry had essentially ground to a halt as a result of the prosecutions; collectively they lost billions of dollars in lost revenues and only the complete exhaustion of existing stockpiles prevented most mining companies from going bankrupt. Even so, several smaller companies went under.
Second- and lower-order effects of the Act were as severe. The paralyzation of the mining industry resulted in mass unemployment among their labor base. Their reduced output had a domino effect among industries directly and indirectly dependent on them -- prices went up and availability went down for everything from automobiles to electronics. With the help of the Federal government some of the nation's mining production was replaced by imports; while they helped bolster production, they did little to help prices.
The response of the mining industry was swift and politically brutal. All Congresspersons who had voted for the Land Theft Act and had previously enjoyed support from the industry had that support abruptly and very publicly revoked. On March 11, 2014, the National Mining Association held a press conference at which they identified those politicians who had lost the favor of the industry. The NMA also announced that they would be backing pro-Fen and anti-Land Theft candidates on the local, state and Federal level for at least the next several election cycles, including the next Presidential race in 2016. They also funded a series of full-page newspaper ads across the country, identifying local elected officials who had supported the Act. Other industries who suffered as a result of the Act threw in with the NMA, forcing Congress to face a veritable revolt of what once were some of their most generous contributors and supporters.
Simultaneously, public outcry in those areas of the country most severely struck by the economic side-effects of the Act all but exploded. The NMA's newspaper campaign resulted in a storm of voter backlash, and incumbents began losing their positions almost immediately, with the first effects visible in Congressional primaries held during the summer of 2014. In particular, the authors of the Act were singled out for especially vicious and persistent attacks. Dixon in particular lost his bid for re-election that fall, and Ward resigned in summer 2015 after more than a year of attack ads steadily eroding her approval rating among her consituency.
Meanwhile, the environmentalist coalition shifted its efforts from encouraging the prosecutions to a word-of-mouth campaign to maintain the Act. Unfortunately, they were the victims of their own achievements -- they had succeeded on a scale they had never before dreamed of, but in the process had done so much damage to the economy and the lives of ordinary citizens that their accomplishment was doomed to be undone.
==Repeal==
The first calls for the repeal of the Land Theft Act were heard in Congress in late 2013, but it wasn't until the NMA's press conference in March 2014 that a repeal bill actually made it out of committee.
[[Repeal passes in Senate almost unanimously (only original authors do not vote yea, but abstain), and passes House with almost the same numbers as the Act passed. Guiliani threatens to veto, but doesn't because it's clear the veto will be overturned with ridiculous ease, and maybe because the NMA offers to not work against him and the Republicans in 2016.]
===Pardons===
[[Repeal of the law does not result in automatic pardons for those convicted, nor are sentences automatically commuted -- this is standard in American legal system. President needs to pardon or offer amnesty -- and Guiliani is pressured by multiple industries to pardon the mining executives now in Federal prison. He does so. He also (*very* reluctantly) pardons the various Fen and Fen-wannabes and the environmentalists who were convicted to prevent a PR nightmare. He doesn't pardon them for environmental/Handwavium possession and use crimes, though, so while the rich white guys get out, the poor folks stay in jail for quite a while longer. This causes its own P.R. problems which ripple through to the 2016 presidential election and beyond. ]
==Long-Term Effects==
[[Republicans lose both Congress and White House in 2016. Massive influx of new congresscritters as incumbents get thrown out in 2014, 2015 and 2016 -- and possibly onward through 2019 as various senators' terms end. Attempts at anti-Fen legislation (appear to) end here. Mining industry takes a decade to recover; secondary industries recover quickly, some with Fenspace imports? Asteroid mining gets a boost? More?]
{{gazetteer}}{{Mundania}}[[Category:Government][[Category
anelaw government][[Category:Fen History][[Category:Fen Politics]
While I finish this up, anyone want to brainstorm the circumstances around the "Subversive Literature Act of 2009", which is described above as "the abortive 2009 attempt to criminalize the science fiction and fantasy genres"? I'm sure it was a bit more subtle than I make it sound, and might have had a different name which wasn't quite so obviously eeeeeevil. I also envision the entire entertainment industry banding together to tell Congress to go to hell in response to its proposal, among other groups.
Edit: Revised and expanded, with notes for unwritten sections. Contributions for long-term effects of the Act are welcome.
-- Bob
---------
Then the horns kicked in...
...and my shoes began to squeak.
The Federal Land Theft Protection Act of 2012
Infamous anti-[[Fen] legislation passed shortly after the launch of the SV ''[[Grover's Corners]'' from West Virginia on April 20, 2012, frequently referred to as the "Land Theft Act". Rushed through the legislative process and signed into law in a matter of weeks, the Land Theft Act is now regarded as one of the great examples of the Law of Unintended Consequences in modern American legislation.
==History==
In the immediate wake of the launch of the ''[[Grover's Corners]'' from West Virginia, a bipartisan group of United States senators (including [[Wallace Webster] (R-NH), [[Isabella Ward] (R-TN) and [[Kendall Dixon] (D-NJ)) drafted a bill intended to outlaw the creation of [[Unreal Estate] within the borders of the United States. The hastily-written legislation was the first time the term "[[Land Theft]" was used in an official government document, and the bill classified it as a [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Classes_of ... ederal_law Class A Federal Felony], with each count punishable with up to life imprisonment and/or a $250,000 fine.
The classification of Unreal Estate as a criminal activity was based on an argument invoking "the public good". While acknowledging (and indeed, celebrating almost to the point of enshrinement) the right of individuals (and corporations) to own land, it put forth the legally dubious claim that to remove such land from the surface of the Earth robbed future generations of its use, and (more importantly, claimed more cynical observers) also deprived Federal, state and local governments of any future tax revenue on such land.
The bill was introduced to the United States Senate on 9 May 2012 as S.2767. It was immediately referred to the U.S. Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs. This surprised many outside observers, who expected it to be handled by the Senate Committee on Energy and Natural Resources. Senator Webster explained in a press conference on 10 May 2012 that all matters concerning Handwavium and the Fen were considered national security issues, and in accordance with White House guidelines issued in 2008 the bill was referred to committee accordingly. The 115-page bill received committee approval in a matter of days, which prompted some observers to object that it had not been reviewed thoroughly enough. Despite this, the committee report on the Land Theft Act was published on 18 May, and the bill was subsequently placed on the Senate's Legislative Calendar.
Debate on the bill was held on 12 June 2012, and lasted barely two hours. The Land Theft Act passed on a voice vote with 79 yeas, 17 nays, and 4 abstentions/absences. It was immediately referred to the House of Representatives, where it became H.R.5789 and followed an almost identical track, starting with referral to the House Committee on Homeland Security. Once again it was approved by the committee in a matter of days (several congressional watchdog organizations characterized this as a "rubber stamp" approval). It came up for debate before the House on 9 July 2012, endured just under four hours' discussion (characterized by observers as "perfunctory" and "lackluster"), and was passed by a vote of 391 for, 37 against, and 7 abstentions/absences.
No reconciliation was necessary between the Senate and House versions of the bill, and President Rudolph Guiliani signed it into law in front of the press on 10 July 2012.
==Prosecutions==
The first arrests and prosecutions under the terms of the Act took place less than a week after it was signed, suggesting to many that the Federal Government had had several "candidates" under surveillance in anticipation of its passage, and had delayed moving against them in order take advantage of the harsher terms of the new law. By the end of July 2012, the FBI had raided nearly a dozen locations, including sites in California, Wisconsin and New Jersey, followed closely by EPA HAZMAT teams. Almost all the individuals arrested were said to have been inspired by the launch of the ''Grover's Corners''. (It is perhaps emblematic of the United States government position that during these and all subsequent proceedings the ''Grover's Corners'' was never identified by its proper name, but only with such euphemisms as "the 2012 theft of American territory from West Virginia".)
Indictments and trials took place with an alacrity which prompted observers as well as several Congresspersons to accuse the Justice Department of "fast-tracking" them over more important cases in order to intimidate and discourage other potential Fen. In no case did any trial last longer than a week, and almost every one returned a "guilty" verdict.
Among the convicted were:
* Terrance and Patricia Klaus, of Guilford, Kansas. The Klauses were convicted for the smallest known instance of Unreal Estate, a patch of land approximately 10 feet by 10 feet (3m x 3m) occupied by an inexpensive steel shed.* Daniel and Felicia Williamson, Donnie Curtis, Freddie Carpenter, Amanda Gonzales, Scott and Nicoline Aylmer and Bryant Kelley of Prentice, Wisconsin, who had attempted to emulate the ''Grover's Corners'' by converting an entire neighborhood into Unreal Estate.* Suhayl Mansur of Rocksprings, Texas, a naturalized American citizen originally from the United Arab Emirates. In addition to Land Theft, he was also charged under Federal anti-terrorism statutes, apparently simply for being a Muslim of Middle-Eastern extraction. The extra charges were dismissed by the judge partway through his trial, but not before he was thoroughly tarred in the press as a "terrorist".
==Flaws in the Act==
Almost from the first the Land Theft Act was criticized for its vague and overly-broad language, as well as its apparent intent to restrict an entire American subculture. The Act's authors made a token attempt to keep it from looking like an explicitly anti-Fen law -- several of them had been burned badly in [[Subversive Literature Act of 2009|the abortive 2009 attempt to criminalize the science fiction and fantasy genres], and all were aware that support for the Fen among American citizens was growing at that time, especially with some commentators lauding the launch of the ''Grover's Corners'' as a bold and courageous journey to a new frontier in the grand American tradition. Still, the intent behind the law was considered obvious by many, and its fast-tracking through the Homeland Security committees was seen as a ploy to avoid possible Fen sympathizers in the Science and Technology committees.
However, in the process of "genericizing" the Act's terms and definitions to dodge accusations of Fen persecution, its authors accidentally opened up its targets to include far more than just those who intended to go into space. At some point during early revisions, language which had initially required the use of Handwavium to alter the "shape, form, nature, composition and/or location" of a tract of land had unintentionally become uncoupled from the description of the new Federal crime, which was now defined simply as any such alteration, regardless of means, motive or intention. As finally passed, the Act considered the use of Handwavium an "aggravating factor" mandating a maximum sentence, but no longer a ''requirement'' for a violation.
===Exploitation by Environmental Groups===
Activist environmental groups such as Greenpeace quickly discovered this flaw in the Act. While historically environmentalists have been sharply divided on the subject of Handwavium, a coalition of several such groups came together to exploit the law. A small number of volunteers allowed themselves to be caught and prosecuted for "attempted Handwavium-assisted land theft" over the course of nearly a year. Some pleaded guilty or no contest; others pled not guilty then put up half-hearted or inadequate defenses that resulted in their conviction. No appeals were made, and the Land Theft Act was never challenged; in fact, defense attorneys went out of their way to acknowledge the validity of the Act. Combined with the "legitimate" prosecutions of actual cases, the result was a considerable and weighty collection of legal precedents.
Once the last of these trials had entered into case law, the coalition sprang its trap. Land theft accusations were made against several large mining concerns, most notably Newmont Mining Corporation (who operated gold strip mines in Nevada and Colorado) and Arch Coal (infamous for mountaintop removal mines in the Appalachians); complaints complete with chapter-and-verse quotations of the Act were sworn out against them, and arrests were made of both corporate officers and field supervisors. As corporate lawyers attempted to extricate the mining firms from the charges in Federal courts, several P.R. companies hired by the coalition began astroturf campaigns with the theme of "same crime, different results" and emphasizing how "the little guys" were prosecuted, but big companies were able to ignore Federal Law.
That in a number of the earlier "trap" cases the charges were in fact dismissed or ignored only helped these campaigns. They received a further boost when Stephanie Flores, a Federal Prosecutor assigned to one of the cases, was recorded in an unguarded moment saying that the Land Theft Act applied "only to the Fen, not legitimate American businesses", and that accordingly she was making only a token effort at prosecution. The video clip and sound bite spread virally across the Internet, and were distributed by virtually every major news outlet save for FOX News. Flores was fired, and as damage control the Justice Department immediately stopped making deals for reduced or dismissed charges with accused violators and began pursuing their remaining prosecutions with a vigor rarely seen before or since.
Within a year of Flores' slip, Newmont and Arch were both found guilty of multiple counts of violating the Act. They were each fined in excess of US$5 million and were forced to shut down all their mining operations, and several executives from each company were sentenced to a minimum of 25 years in Federal prison. At the same time, the Justice Department launched new cases cases against those companies which had initially escaped prosecution.
===Reaction===
By 2014, the American mining industry had essentially ground to a halt as a result of the prosecutions; collectively they lost billions of dollars in lost revenues and only the complete exhaustion of existing stockpiles prevented most mining companies from going bankrupt. Even so, several smaller companies went under.
Second- and lower-order effects of the Act were as severe. The paralyzation of the mining industry resulted in mass unemployment among their labor base. Their reduced output had a domino effect among industries directly and indirectly dependent on them -- prices went up and availability went down for everything from automobiles to electronics. With the help of the Federal government some of the nation's mining production was replaced by imports; while they helped bolster production, they did little to help prices.
The response of the mining industry was swift and politically brutal. All Congresspersons who had voted for the Land Theft Act and had previously enjoyed support from the industry had that support abruptly and very publicly revoked. On March 11, 2014, the National Mining Association held a press conference at which they identified those politicians who had lost the favor of the industry. The NMA also announced that they would be backing pro-Fen and anti-Land Theft candidates on the local, state and Federal level for at least the next several election cycles, including the next Presidential race in 2016. They also funded a series of full-page newspaper ads across the country, identifying local elected officials who had supported the Act. Other industries who suffered as a result of the Act threw in with the NMA, forcing Congress to face a veritable revolt of what once were some of their most generous contributors and supporters.
Simultaneously, public outcry in those areas of the country most severely struck by the economic side-effects of the Act all but exploded. The NMA's newspaper campaign resulted in a storm of voter backlash, and incumbents began losing their positions almost immediately, with the first effects visible in Congressional primaries held during the summer of 2014. In particular, the authors of the Act were singled out for especially vicious and persistent attacks. Dixon in particular lost his bid for re-election that fall, and Ward resigned in summer 2015 after more than a year of attack ads steadily eroding her approval rating among her consituency.
Meanwhile, the environmentalist coalition shifted its efforts from encouraging the prosecutions to a word-of-mouth campaign to maintain the Act. Unfortunately, they were the victims of their own achievements -- they had succeeded on a scale they had never before dreamed of, but in the process had done so much damage to the economy and the lives of ordinary citizens that their accomplishment was doomed to be undone.
==Repeal==
The first calls for the repeal of the Land Theft Act were heard in Congress in late 2013, but it wasn't until the NMA's press conference in March 2014 that a repeal bill actually made it out of committee.
[[Repeal passes in Senate almost unanimously (only original authors do not vote yea, but abstain), and passes House with almost the same numbers as the Act passed. Guiliani threatens to veto, but doesn't because it's clear the veto will be overturned with ridiculous ease, and maybe because the NMA offers to not work against him and the Republicans in 2016.]
===Pardons===
[[Repeal of the law does not result in automatic pardons for those convicted, nor are sentences automatically commuted -- this is standard in American legal system. President needs to pardon or offer amnesty -- and Guiliani is pressured by multiple industries to pardon the mining executives now in Federal prison. He does so. He also (*very* reluctantly) pardons the various Fen and Fen-wannabes and the environmentalists who were convicted to prevent a PR nightmare. He doesn't pardon them for environmental/Handwavium possession and use crimes, though, so while the rich white guys get out, the poor folks stay in jail for quite a while longer. This causes its own P.R. problems which ripple through to the 2016 presidential election and beyond. ]
==Long-Term Effects==
[[Republicans lose both Congress and White House in 2016. Massive influx of new congresscritters as incumbents get thrown out in 2014, 2015 and 2016 -- and possibly onward through 2019 as various senators' terms end. Attempts at anti-Fen legislation (appear to) end here. Mining industry takes a decade to recover; secondary industries recover quickly, some with Fenspace imports? Asteroid mining gets a boost? More?]
{{gazetteer}}{{Mundania}}[[Category:Government][[Category
anelaw government][[Category:Fen History][[Category:Fen Politics]While I finish this up, anyone want to brainstorm the circumstances around the "Subversive Literature Act of 2009", which is described above as "the abortive 2009 attempt to criminalize the science fiction and fantasy genres"? I'm sure it was a bit more subtle than I make it sound, and might have had a different name which wasn't quite so obviously eeeeeevil. I also envision the entire entertainment industry banding together to tell Congress to go to hell in response to its proposal, among other groups.
Edit: Revised and expanded, with notes for unwritten sections. Contributions for long-term effects of the Act are welcome.
-- Bob
---------
Then the horns kicked in...
...and my shoes began to squeak.