SACRAMENTO, CA -- During the heyday of Stalinism, George Orwell noted that some ideas were so stupid only an intellectual could believe them, a fitting summation of this century. California now offers its own variation, ideas so stupid only a politician could believe them. But politicians have the power to take stupid ideas and make them into stupid laws. That is especially true when the politician’s party controls the assembly, the senate, and the governor’s office.

Nell Soto, a Pomona Democrat and apparently not an intellectual, authored Assembly Bill 531, which requires gas stations to provide free air and water, to display a sign notifying customers of this free service and, yes, to offer a toll-free number for customers to lodge complaints. Governor Gray Davis, who recently showed both good sense and backbone by vetoing some anti-competitive measures, showed he has a lot of Jerry Brown flakiness in him by signing the Soto bill. In its original form, it would have required the police to monitor the condition of service station rest rooms, a kind of California Latrine Patrol (CLP). But even without this ludicrous measure it’s a bad idea.

The bill promotes the lie politicians love, that there can be "free" services. There can’t, not even air and water. As service station owners have been pointing out, compressors, hoses, and nozzles--an item often stolen--and the power to run them all cost money. Gas stations, like houses, also get a water bill. These can be high in the more arid parts of the state. Soto is forcing owners to give away property without compensation, crowing that "this is a good day for consumers." It isn’t.

The bill also forces station owners to distinguish between those who have bought gas, and who are therefore entitled to free air and water, and those who did not. As one proprietor noted, this will lead to fights. Gas stations are already contentious places, particularly on busy days, with cars jockeying for position.

Service station operators can keep their coin operated air and water machines, but will be forced to provide tokens to customers. This imposition will bring additional expense and confusion at gas stations, a regular and mandatory stop for virtually all working Californians. It apparently never occurred to Soto or Davis that all of this is unnecessary.

A hand pump may be purchased for under $10, enabling motorists of all genders to fill their tires before they leave home. California houses and apartments also feature running water. Any motorist who can fill their radiator at the local Shell station can also do so in front of their dwelling, with much less trouble.

In the end, this measure serves no purpose other than helping a misguided politician maintain the conceit that she is helping ordinary people by punishing some faceless entity called "business." Actually, those who run businesses are people too. They vote and pay taxes. But fewer of them will now want to operate service stations.

Soto and her soulmates could easily make life easier for working people by reducing or eliminating the punitive fees they still pay on their cars, by reducing taxes, including the tax on gasoline, and by cutting regulation in general. But they’d rather help California maintain its status as a national laughing stock. We await a measure mandating free hors d’oeuvres in every bar.

--K. Lloyd Billingsley