When Playing Pool is Outlawed Only Outlaws Will Play Pool

Why ban smoking in bars when the real menance to society is pool playing?

Ugandan police have banned people from playing pool during the daytime because it encourages crime, local media said Wednesday.

The game is very popular in the east African nation, where pool tables sit under canopies outside thousands of small bars.

But Kampala police chief Grace Turyagumanawe said youths often played while drinking illegal spirits and smoking drugs.

"They also use this as a meeting place to make plans of robbing people of their property at night," he told the Daily Monitor newspaper. "We are not banning the sport, but we are stopping people from playing it during the day."

Bar owners like pool tables because they earn income but use no electricity. Uganda has suffered power cuts for months.

Other things that should be banned because people sometimes do them while they plot crimes: eating, drinking, watching television, sitting, and walking. Ah hell, why not just ban talking during the day?