"FREE-RANGE CHILDREN" BUSTED AGAIN BY COPS

Two children in Silver Spring, Maryland, were taken into custody on Sunday after they were found playing at a park alone. These are the same children who were picked up by police last December while walking home, less than a mile away, unaccompanied by an adult. Officers responded to a report of children without an adult at a park Sunday afternoon. They took the 10-year-old boy and 6-year-old girl to Maryland Child Protective Services. The children have since been released to their parents, Danielle and Alexander Meitiv, after the parents signed a “safety plan.” Danielle Meitiv posted on Facebook that the “police coerced our children into the back of a patrol car, telling them they would drive them home. They kept the kids trapped there for three hours, without notifying us, before dropping them at the Crisis Center, and holding them there without dinner for another two and a half hours.” Back in December, police stopped the kids as they were walking home from a park without an adult. Child Protective Services accused the Meitivs of neglect, saying unless they committed to a safety plan, the kids would have to go into foster homes. Maryland law says that children younger than 8 must be under the care of a person who is at least 13. At the time, Danielle Meitiv said, “Frankly I think that raising independent children and responsible children and giving them the freedom that I enjoyed is a risk worth taking. In the end, it’s our decision as parents.”
* That Maryland law makes it tough on their state’s tourism board. Right now their slogan is: “Visit Maryland, Where We Make It Perfectly Clear Even Children Aren’t Safe.”
* The other alternative is: “Visit Maryland, Where It Actually Is Safe, But We Passed A Law To Harass Families And Raise Money Through Fines.”
* Guess who made the report to police? A couple of 7-year-olds who aren’t allowed to go out and play.
* Silver Spring? You’re kidding. They named the town after a Fleetwood Mac song?
* What? Would you rather have me wade into this debate?
* 10 is 5th grade, right? I knew kids who were driving cars by then.
* Oh, I see. This is our chance to do one of those, “Back in my day” observations.
* “Back in my day, we didn’t have a park to go to. We had to chop trees down and make our own park.”
* PHONE TOPIC: Who’s right – the parents or the state?