Going for a swim? Put on a life vest, county says...
 

via the drudge report...

King Co. requires life vests for swimmers, floaters

People who hope to beat the summer heat by swimming, floating or boating on rivers in King County must wear a life vest or face an $86 fine.

Anyone live in King County?

I don't even know what to say about this other than retarded. Is this because people have become to fat and lazy to learn how to swim. Fat people should float anyways.

F that.... I'd battle that ticket till the day I died. Straight unconstitutional. Next thing there will be a regulation about walking without tying your shoes. So dumb.

hahahahaha- makes me think of the mastercraft lawsuit.

"kid trips on shoelace, Nike sued and forced to pay 30mil."

Will someone please call the Sheriff to be on hand for the first organized triathlon in King County this year. They'll make a killing with first time warnings & $86 repeat offenders.

It sure is going to slow their lifeguard responsiveness down to have to put a life vest on when making rescues.

I think they put that in affect when some high school kid died while "floating" the river and got caught up is some current and drowned.

Weak if you ask me... why not just ban swimming altogether?

Agreed. Unconstitutional. :eek:

Is it really swimming when you don't do any work. The earlier comment about lazy fat people, this would be another reason we would have fat people in this country. Can't they just put a warning lable on the river?

While I agree with most of the comments above about the Nanny state we seem to be moving to/in. I read through the entire article and it appears as if this is for rivers only, "he new county law says everybody must wear the vests when they are on rivers", and also does not seem to affect public beaches, "The new ordinance does not apply to people at designated public beaches or for people who are skin diving." I'm not too familiar with Washington, but I thought that this would maybe only affect the people out at the river by Vantage.

Yes, and most lakes in that county are considered to be "rivers", like the Sammamish!

http://lagomarproperties.com/assets/...ke-to-east.jpg


Guido and JJ,
Can we please discuss why you think this law is unconstitutional? What part and why? Can you cite some part of the Constitution?

Unconstitutional? Lol!

haha! yeah, i'd like to know which part of the constitution is being broken here. ;)

no, i don't agree w/ the new law or whatever it is, but unconstitutional? that's a bit dramatic.

Yep, we all know the Constitution guarantees the govt the right to force us to wear bubble wrap for our own protection. Our govt wasn't founded so that people could take a swim without buying products from good ole American industry. Or Chinese as is probably the case for life preservers. Americans don't have a right to wash themselves off unless they purchase something. That's in the Constitution. Or maybe it isn't, but it oughta be. Support business!!!

You guys are taking me too seriously, but really...... this is some serious BS.

How about the right to bare arms........and not to have an orange vest covering up my muscles and disappointing the ladies?

lmao

^Evan, I'm not sure how you took my post but I'm on your side. The Constitution has been demonstrated to be a meaningless document. Just because something isn't in the Constitution spelled out letter for letter, it doesn't mean that we as individuals can't interpret (for right or wrong) it's underlying principles.

I have a hard time accepting that the govt can force you to by a USCG approved life vest to take a swin in the river. It seems like a basic right for someone without a dollar to their name or a pot to piss in to be able to jump in a public river and wash off the dirt and sweat.