Apr 24, 2008

Lieber pushes more bad legislation

Editorial

Lawmakers should reject state Assemblywoman Sally Lieber's latest bill ostensibly targeting child abuse, which is unnecessary and has generated some of the same criticism that greeted a similar bill she pushed a year ago.

The first problem with Assembly Bill 2943 is that many of the forms of abuse listed are already illegal. On the one hand, her bill suggests that a strike to the head or face of a child under 3 could be a factor in such cases. Another factor could be the use of any implement on a child. It also lists other factors - no-brainers, really - like interfering with a child's breathing and throwing, kicking, burning, punching and cutting a child.

Why do we need AB 2943? Existing law allows a parent or guardian or a person in similar position to use force that is "reasonable," according to Steve Wagstaffe, San Mateo County's chief deputy district attorney. And whether it is "reasonable" force is up to a jury in a criminal trial, he wrote in an e-mail to the Daily News. That seems sufficient. Have our legislators nothing better to do than to criminalize matters that are already illegal?

Lieber, D-Mountain View, said she wants to build on her efforts to raise the issue of child abuse, but that's also problematic. Her anti-spanking bill last year did start a national discussion - but the talk was about how meddlesome and ridiculous politicians in California could be. Critics seized on the fact that Lieber herself had no children. The whole sorry affair hardly helped to establish Lieber as an effective advocate for abused children.

Lieber, who will be termed out of the Assembly at the end of the year, would be better off putting this chapter of her political life behind her and focusing her attention on bills that might have a chance of becoming useful laws.

AB 2943 would do little to address the problem of child abuse but would be a waste of lawmakers' time. We don't need this legislation.