http://ap.google.com/…

A college student claimed it was all a joke when he put his vote in this fall’s presidential election up for sale on the Web auction site eBay. But prosecutors didn’t see the humor.

University of Minnesota student Max P. Sanders, 19, was charged with a felony Thursday in Hennepin County District Court after allegedly asking for a minimum of $10 in exchange for voting for the bidder’s preferred candidate.

“Good luck!” Sanders wrote under the eBay handle zepdrummer612. “You’re (sic) country depends on You!”

Sanders was charged with one count of bribery, treating and soliciting under an 1893 state law that makes it a crime to offer to buy or sell a vote.

According to a criminal complaint, the Minnesota secretary of state’s office learned about the offering on the Web site and told prosecutors. Investigators sent a subpoena to eBay and got information that led to Sanders.

The student told investigators he made the eBay posting, adding, “That was a joke. It’s no longer listed,” according to the complaint.

“We take it very seriously. Fundamentally, we believe it is wrong to sell your vote,” said John Aiken, a spokesman for the office. “There are people that have died for this country for our right to vote, and to take something that lightly, to say, ‘I can be bought.’

“It’s a real shame,” he said. “I can imagine the conversations being held in American Legion Clubs and VFWs about whether this is a joke or not.”

The scarcely used law had its heyday in the 1920s, when many people sold their votes in exchange for liquor, Assistant County Attorney Pat Diamond said.

“There are two things going on here in terms of why it’s a crime,” he said. “One is the notion that elections should be a contest of ideas and not of pocketbooks — at least not in the sense of straight-out ‘I can buy your vote.’ The second notion is that everybody gets one vote, and you don’t get to buy another one.”

Sanders and his attorney, Steven Levine, declined to comment Thursday. The charge carries up to five years’ imprisonment and a $10,000 fine.

As for the offer on eBay? It got no bids.

It’s OK to vote one way or another for free but the second it’s in exchange for something we’re going to have to pull out the guns to keep you from soiling the wonderful institution of mob rules democracy.

http://www.startribune.com/…

What started as a quirky idea to get around the statewide smoking ban appears to be spreading like wildfire.Dozens of bars are expected to stage “theater nights” this weekend in which patrons are dubbed actors. The law, which went into effect in October, permits performers to smoke during a theatrical production. “Two weeks ago, we had one bar doing this,” said Mark Benjamin, a criminal defense attorney who launched the theater-night idea. He estimates 50 to 100 bars could be on tap for theater nights this weekend based on phone calls, e-mails and requests for the how-to-stage-a-theater-night packet that he’s devised. And many bar owners are passing on the information quickly among themselves without getting in contact with him.

State Health Department officials didn’t return calls Thursday, but said earlier this week that they are waiting for a state attorney general’s opinion on the legality of theater nights. State legislators who championed the ban said last week that the loophole likely will be plugged and the bar theater nights will end.

And Karen De Coster over at LRC writes:

Imagine the lobbying that went on which allows smoking during a “theatrical production” while it is banned nearly everywhere else? Just how invasive is the Minnesota smoking ban? Right here it states that:

The Minnesota law applies to bars, restaurants, private clubs such as VFWs and American Legion halls, bowling alleys, country club lounges, lobbies of hotels and motels, public transportation, taxis, home offices where employees work or customers visit, home day cares when children are present, and smaller commercial vehicles carrying more than one person.

Home offices and smaller commercial vehicles? Surely that will be easily enforced. Exemptions include privileged people, places, and things such as Indian casinos and lands, “scientific studies, sleeping rooms of hotels and motels, tobacco shops, small family farms, traditional Native American ceremonies, and theater productions. Smoking would also be permitted at the Disabled Veterans Rest Camp in Washington County, and locked psychiatric wards.”

While I love what they are doing I’d hope that all those participating in these things actually get out and try to get smoking relegalized instead of eventually creating tobacco speak easies. There is already a large black market for tobacco. I see it every day in NYC. Guys standing outside subway stations quietly saying “Newports, Newports” as people stream by. Everyone from blue collar men in construction dress to white collar Wall St. suits purchase their wares. How sad it is that the government has put these people in a position to do this.