Activist Drew Carey

My new favorite comedian is Drew Carey.

Not that Carey is funnier than, say, Don Knotts . . . or explanations of the national debt. I just like what Carey’s doing lately — helping turn local stories about political lunacy into national stories. Carey is working with reason.tv, spinoff of Reason magazine, to host professionally made online videos about threats to freedom.

One of the first, which you can watch at santanflat.com, tells of horrific abuse of power in Queen Creek, Arizona. The victim is Dale Bell, owner of San Tan Flat restaurant. Where something terrible is going on.

Dancing.

Not nude dancing. Just dancing. The county council opposes.

Mr. Bell says: “We are open, we never stopped people from dancing and we never will stop people from dancing.”

Ted Balaker, a ReasonTV producer, notes this is about the right to earn an honest living. “If you’re not harming anyone else and people enjoy dancing, that hardly seems like something that should be against the law and restricted in any way.”

County officials conducted what they called the longest “code compliance hearing” in the county’s history to decide how much the fine should be. Result? They want to fine San Tan $5,000 a day for letting his customers dance.

Remember H.L. Mencken’s definition of Puritanism? “The haunting fear that someone, somewhere may be happy.”

But it ain’t over. Not with lawyers from the Institute for Justice now on board; and not with Drew Cary promoting the story, aided by Reason.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.