THE LAST WORD:It’s time to make peace

Marie Kolasinski is no stranger to the courtroom. It seems the founder of the Piecemakers religious sect and operator of their country store in Costa Mesa is forever at loggerheads with local government and its regulators.

So with her recent conviction and brief jail time for running a restaurant without a permit and resisting county health inspectors, we are left wondering if it isn’t it time to quit fighting.

Kolasinski, we’re sure, would say no. This is the same woman who in a letter last year wrote this about the public health officials who shut down her restaurant: “All these people are paid by your and my labor and sweat and blood and every other taxpayer laboring to keep tyranny and unfair practice alive and well. Wake up, America!”

While some may admire her principled stand, Kolasinski is forgetting one thing. We are a nation of laws, and it is incumbent upon us that we obey them and don’t pick and choose which laws we want to follow and which we don’t.

That’s called anarchy and to the best of our knowledge, we haven’t adopted that as our rule of law just yet.

The Piecemakers and Kolasinski need to face that fact and abide by the law. Then, they will have nothing to fear.