State fire marshal calls for ban on novelty lighters

What else is a fire marshal supposed to do with all the time on his hands? As if the law can actually ban anything. Bureaucrats, and I think most people, think the law is somehow magical. Banning them will not make them go away. It may reduce the number of novelty lighters, but at what cost? Will the government start spending money on paying people to go undercover to catch these new "bad guys" that have novelty lighters?

But really, what is the real meat of his argument? Why should people not be allowed to own these lighters? The argument is that kids will think they are fun and light stuff on fire. Apparently children like to walk out of windows on third floors too, as happened unfortunately a few weeks ago here. Does that mean we should ban windows? Another toddler recently lit himself on fire after poring gasoline on himself. Shall we ban gasoline?

Life is not just about living as long as possible, but enjoying the stay as well. This is just another example of a bureaucrat trying to make our lives a little more miserable so we can live a little bit longer.

Regardless, if the fire marshal were really interested in reducing the number of fires, he would privatize firefighting. They have a better track record at encouraging fire reduction as opposed to fire fighting (http://www.thefreemanonline.org/columns/fire-fighting-for-profit).