Politicians are graded on the amount of legislation they introduce. If a commissioner, legislator, or senator doesn't introduce any new legislation, then they aren't doing their job, right?

It was super-hilarious in my home town because in order to advance up the hierarchy at Los Alamos National Labs you had to demonstrate "civic participation." Which basically meant running for county council. And then introducing legislation so that you can prove that you were participating civically.

Nerdy-ass theoretical physicists attempting civic participation came up with legislation including (but not limited to)

- A cat leash law. Yep. Tried to pass a law requiring leashes for all cats.

- A dogshit law. Thou shalt not have more than 5lbs of fecal matter on your lawn or thou shalt face a $40 a day fine. This one ran aground when the subject of enforcement came up - nobody wanted to budget for an official dogshit weigher.

- A weed law. Thou shalt not permit any volunteer species of vegetation to grow taller than 18" under penalty of a $50 a day fine. This one actually passed - and then they tried to fine someone for "weeds" and he argued that "volunteer species" includes trees and that he was being singled out unfairly. It pretty much blew up and was never mentioned again when a rival councilman pointed out that the Lab's million dollars' worth of native plantings qualified as weeds.