The government’s war on children’s lemonade stands has been the subject of much mockery on the right for years, but here’s a new one:

You may have seen one of these little bird house turned mini-libraries in your neighborhood. They’re a lovely idea. Simple, no fuss, and quite fun. Donate a book, borrow a book. Nothing to sign, no due date, no late fees, just common courtesy.

Conor Freidersdorf of The Atlantic explored the ridiculous trend of “shutting down” unregulated community book sharing.

At the first stop, of course, this is a story of excessive government, but the Legal Insurrection post linked above brings out a key consideration that’s often overlooked: “The Leawood City Council said it had received a couple of complaints about Spencer Collins’ Little Free Library.”  Not only do people contribute to the creation of invasive zoning laws, but they exercise them, too.

What our current approach to government does, in this country, is to allow the curmudgeons to project their old remonstrance for the kids “to get off of my lawn” across the street, allowing them to tell them to get off of their own lawns.  To be clear, people should have a right to develop communities that are free of just about anything they find offensive.  It’s safe to say, however, that the rest of us have become too tangled up in our political philosophies to stop the curmudgeons from giving themselves far too much power.

We need to push back, even if it means getting into ridiculously heated battles over silly matters in local government.