Judge Rules That a Six-Year-Old Can be Sued. Is the World Going Nuts?

When I first read this, it was on Reuter's Africa, so I thought the story must be coming from some third world country.

But it was the African media rightfully suggesting that this was NEWS!

In New York, a judge decided that it was OK for a child to be sued for negligence.

In a ruling made public late Thursday, the judge dismissed arguments by Breitman's lawyer that the case should be dismissed because of her young age. He ruled that she is old enough to be sued and the case can proceed. The decision also will allow for the lawsuit to proceed against the Kohn family for the incident.

"For infants above the age of 4, there is no bright-line rule," Wooten wrote, adding that the girl had been three months shy of turning 5. Wooten also disagreed with the lawyer's assertion that Juliet Breitman should not be held responsible because her mother was supervising the children at the time.

For infants above the age of 4? When Garry Breitkreuz, back in his Reform Party days, suggested that children as young as 10 should go to prison, we were shocked. When Stockwell Day as leader of the Alliance Party thought that children as young as 12 should be given the death penalty , we kicked him to the curb. Boy, I'll bet Stephen Harper is rewriting our crime laws (again), as we speak.

Is the world going nuts? I mean seriously.

Rob Ford as mayor of Toronto. Republican kooks and Tea Partiers poised to win the mid-terms?

Maybe, I'm being punked.

Or if I pinch myself, I'll discover that it was all a bad dream.

OUCH!