June 6, 2020
fromTheRutherfordInstitute: "Freedom from servitude comes not from violent action, but from the refusal to serve. Tyrants fall when the people withdraw their support.” —Étienne De La Boétie, The Politics Of Obedience
Police State America
fromReason: Biden voted for the 1997 bill that created the Pentagon's 1033 program, which allows surplus military gear to be passed along to local cops. It took 23 years, but he finally changed his opinion.
Police State America Politics and Other Official Acts of Corruption
fromAmmo: Asset forfeiture is having devastating consequences: In 2014 alone, law enforcement took more stuff from American citizens than burglars did.
Police State America
fromLibertarianInstitute: The state is far more punitive against those that threaten the comfort and authority of government institutions and workers than they are against crimes against citizens.
Police State America
fromNationalReview: Last week, the media, politicians, and many experts decided that every argument they made for destroying the lives of millions of people in America could be deferred to advance a preferred political cause.
The Government is Not Us
fromReason: The episode illustrates the perils of confirmation bias on both sides of the debate about disease control measures.
Police State America Politics and Other Official Acts of Corruption
June 4, 2020
fromTheVolokhConspiracy: Much can and must be done to curb police brutality. The task is difficult, but far from hopeless. But riots and looting are both wrong in themselves, and likely to have counterproductive results.
Police State America
fromWattsUpWithThat: No one “knew” the weather would cancel the SpaceX flight, but rather scientists used data to make the best educated guess which is part of the scientific method we learned about in third grade.
Indoctrination and Censorship
fromMattTaibee: "We have two systems of enforcement in America, a minimalist one for people with political clout, and an intrusive one for everyone else."
Police State America
fromNationalReview: The issue of rogue police officers who routinely violate constitutional rights and their superiors and unions who protect them is no longer a right-versus-left issue.
Police State America
fromFoxNews: Nothing has demonstrated the citizen's need for self-protection guaranteed by the 2nd Amendment after watching days of looters having free reign, holding private property owners at their mercy.
2nd Amendment Assaults
fromCreators: After accounting for income, charity and noncash welfare benefits, "the poorest 20% of Americans consume more goods and services than the national averages for all people in the world's most affluent countries."
Economic Policy: Statism Versus The Free Market
June 1, 2020
fromReason: The Supreme Court could announce as early as Monday that it's revisiting qualified immunity, a doctrine that shields rotten cops from civil rights lawsuits.
Police State America
fromRefinery29: The Minneapolis police officer who killed George Floyd had a history of misconduct. In 2006, he had been placed on leave after using lethal force, but prosecutor Amy Klobuchar refused to press charges.
Police State America
fromNationalReview: The claim that the prosecutor had to wait to authorize an arrest until the investigators nailed down all the evidence is nonsense.
Police State America
fromAmericanConservative: Rather than burning and looting, protesters should turn their ire on lawmakers and judges who facilitate police immunity.
Police State America
fromReason: What big-government, fascist, left-wing indoctrinationists never thought would happen: homeschooling, the end of doctoring, reliance on self-care and vitamin pills in place of vaccines.
Individual Liberty: America's First Principle
fromUSAToday: There's a legal obstacle that's nearly impossible to overcome when police officers and government officials violate our constitutional and civil rights.
Police State America