Go Utah?? Normal 0 false false false EN-US X-NONE X-NONE MicrosoftInternetExplorer4 Well it seems Utah is not as conservative after all. Utah Governor Jon Huntsman (r) has vetoes video games and movie retail restriction bill. To those who don’t know about it, it’s the bill (that was originally written by Jack Thompson and legislator Mike Morle) that would enforce strict penalties on retailers who sells M-Rated games and Rated R movies to “buyers subject to an age restriction or recommendation.”  

Utah Governor Jon Huntsman (r) wrote a letter to House Speaker David Clark and Utah Senate President Michael Waddoups about why he vetoed the video game bill:

(from Sainless: http://saintless.com/2009/03/25/gov-vetoed-hb-353/)

“Dear Speaker Clark and President Waddoups:

After careful consideration and study, I have decided to veto HB 353, TRUTH IN ADVERTISING ACT AMENDMENTS, and have transmitted it to the Lieutenant Governor for filing.

While protecting children from inappropriate materials is a laudable goal, the language of this bill is so broad that it likely will be struck down by the courts as an unconstitutional violation of the Dormant Commerce Clause and/or the First Amendment.

The industries most affected by this new requirement indicated that rather than risk being held liable under this bill, they would likely choose to no longer issue age appropriate labels on goods and services. Therefore, the unintended consequence of the bill would be that parents and children would have no labels to guide them in determining the age appropriateness of the goods or service, thereby increasing children’s potential exposure to something they or their parents would have otherwise determined was inappropriate under the voluntary labeling system now being recognized and embraced by a significant majority of vendors.

Sincerely,

Jon M. Huntsman, Jr.
Governor”

I for one is glad that he vetoed this bill as it forces parents to actually be parents rather than have a law telling them what is good and what is not good. Maybe this will open the eyes to some parents to actually pay attention to what their children are into. Utah Governor Jon Huntsman I applaud you.