Or maybe it's a religious ritual?

Owning a rental property is more than an investment — it's a business. You have to be willing and able to commit the time and resources necessary to run your business successfully.
--GMAC Mortgage website

Did you know that to search the Internet for “rental property” +business is to generate more than 3,000,000 hits?

Amazing, isn’t it?

Ask Pat Harrison about this, and she’ll respond – presumably with a straight face – that amassing hundreds of rental properties for the ostensible purpose of charging renters a fee to inhabit them, and retaining the leftover cash (commonly referred to as "profit") is somehow not the same thing as a business venture, and should not be regulated.

She has yet to divulge whether entering into such a "non-business" contract to accept payment for the daily use of a piece of property she owns should be defined as a hobby, charitable service or sexual fetish. Being perverse at heart, I’m guessing the latter.

What other crazed, biochemical impulse could possibly lead her to publicly differ with standard, accepted English usage?

All of this has quite a lot to do with the city council’s Greatly Unnecessary Smoking Debate of ’08. There’ll be more to say about this later, but for now, here’s my viewpoint:

(a) Undeniably, both workplace smoking and slumlord proliferation pertain to public health.

(b) Of the two public health issues, curtailing slumlord proliferation through rental property regulation and overall code enforcement stands to be of greater benefit to all, as opposed to merely some, city residents.

(c) Assuming (as CM John Gonder informs us) that there indeed exists a city council voting bloc that is genuinely concerned with public health issues (not so fast, Dan Coffey – your conversion to tender concern is a transparent ruse), it has been a potentially critical tactical mistake to select workplace smoking as the first public health task to be addressed, primarily because it will alienate the same people who must be brought aboard when it’s time to bring slumlords to heel.

As the only pro-ban council member with the courage to venture into the blogosphere and engage in discussion, Gonder has assured his readers that meaningful rental property reform will be achieved shortly, and that we should give the present council time to facilitate the kneecapping of slumlords -- something that, given the proclivities of past New Albany councils, will be regarded as miraculous when and if it finally occurs.

Meanwhile, precious political capital is being expended to achieve the smoke-free workplace and permit Jamey Aebersold to once again play Hughie's.

Will enough remain in the council’s collective wallet to ensure the long overdue regulation of Ms. Harrison’s non-business fetish?