Civil Liberties – Page 34 – Shall Not Be Questioned

House to House Searches? Why Not

Dan Simpson, a retired diplomat writing in the Toledo Blade, writes:

The disarmament process would begin after the initial three-month amnesty. Special squads of police would be formed and trained to carry out the work. Then, on a random basis to permit no advance warning, city blocks and stretches of suburban and rural areas would be cordoned off and searches carried out in every business, dwelling, and empty building. All firearms would be seized. The owners of weapons found in the searches would be prosecuted: $1,000 and one year in prison for each firearm.

Dan, buddy. If it ever comes to that I’m turning in my ammunition first. I suspect many of my fellow countryman would too. We have a term for the society you envision. It’s called a police state.

There could conceivably also be a rash of score-settling during hunting season as people drew out their weapons, ostensibly to shoot squirrels and deer, and began eliminating various of their perceived two-footed enemies. Given the general nature of hunting weapons and the fact that such killings are frequently time-sensitive, that seems a lesser sort of issue.

Yeah, because the people murdering each other in America are hunters. Not drug dealing gang members. Seriously Dan, how do you call yourself a proud American? Perhaps you’d find Russia, China or some other police state more to your liking.

And how is it that the Toledo Blade thought this was a serious enough editorial as to publish it? Is the Toledo Blade advocating bringing a police state to America? Looks like it to me.

UPDATE: Looks like David found this turd’s article too.
UPDATE: Eugene Volokh too.

This is what happens when I post something before checking other blogs :)

No IPA For you Alabama

My currently fermenting “Bitter Bitch IPA” it turns out would be illegal in the State of Alabama, since it’s original gravity reading predicts it will have about 6.7% alcohol by volume.Â Â Check this out:

The Alabama House said “no” Tuesday to a bill that would have increased the alcohol content allowed in beer sold in Alabama. Rep. Thomas Jackson, D-Thomasville, sponsored the bill, which he said would have allowed the sale of some imported and gourmet beers that have a higher alcohol content than the 6 percent now allowed. Jackson’s bill would have increased the allowable alcohol content to 14.9 percent. …

“I can’t see us doing something that’s going to encourage people to drink more and get drunk faster,” said Rep. DuWayne Bridges, D-Valley. Bridges said the measure would increase the problem of teenagers drinking by making more potent brew available to them. “Our children don’t need to increase their alcohol consumption,” Bridges said.

Read the whole thing.

I think Alabama is the only state in the union where home brewing is still illegal.Â So you won’t find me moving there unless pigs grow wings and begin to fly.

What are we supposed to use, harsh language?

From Slashdot, the Brits are talking about installing CCTV which can scold scofflaws through a loudspeaker.

Home Secretary John Reid told BBC News there would be some people, “in the minority who will be more concerned about what they claim are civil liberties intrusions”.

“But the vast majority of people find that their life is more upset by people who make their life a misery in the inner cities because they can’t go out and feel safe and secure in a healthy, clean environment because of a minority of people,” he added.

I don’t know about you, but having a camera who can lecture an attacker doesn’t exactly help me feel more safe.Â When you surrender your safety and security to the government, this is the kind of result you can expect.Â We need to make sure this idea never makes it across the pond.

Licsensing Rights

Cathy Young gives us a strong reminder of why free societies don’t license rights:

In March, Putin signed a decree merging two existing federal agenciesâ€”one for media oversight and the protection of culture, the other for telecommunications monitoringâ€”into a single body, the Federal Service for the Oversight of Mass Communications and Protection of Cultural Heritage. It is perhaps no accident that the Russian word for “oversight” used in the agency’s name, nadzor, has a somewhat sinister ring for a Russian speaker: It commonly refers to the supervision of a prisoner. The new agency, which will start its work in about three months, will oversee and license broadcasters, the print media, and websites.

Now, what’s the likelihood that broadcasters, print media and bloggers who have a rather unfavorable view toward Vladimir Putin are going to be able to get this license?

More On Employers & Guns

Readers have made some really thoughtful and persuasive comments on my last post about the Texas bill that would force employers to allow employees to keep guns in their vehicles on company property. Persuasive to me because I do agree that it’s absolutely silly for a workplace to have a policy on guns with an aim to prevent workplace violence, but I’m afraid I still have to come out against these laws.

I think there’s a distinction to between discrimination because of someone’s race, ethnicity, national origin, or religion, which people largely are born as and have little control over, and discrimination based on specific behavior, even if that behavior is generally protected from interference by government.

It’s true that employers are preventing employees from exercising a right, but employers are generally free to do this. Employers may dictate how you dress, what time you come to work, what you may or may not say on behalf of the company, what you can or can’t say in the workplace or to customers. They may do things like forbidding you from talking about your political views with clients. They may prevent you from handing out religious leaflets, running prayer groups during business hours, etc. You could be fired for saying something negative about the CEO. These things are all ingfringing on some fundamental rights that, if we were talking governmental action, would be prohibited by the constitution.

But we’ve generally accepted that, with a few exceptions for race, gender, age, and a few other types of discrimination, that employee employer relationship are private relationships governed by rules and standards of behavior agreed to by both parties for their mutual benefit, and both parties are allowed to terminate that agreement when the benefit is no longer mutual. I accept the government meddling in this agreement, even for the case of racial discrimination, very reluctantly, and I am not inclined to accept more government interference in private relationships, especially one that comes down to a matter of behavior, and not characteristics that people are born with. I am a strong believer in the “employment at will” doctrine, where either party can terminate employment when they no longer find it beneficial.

As a believer in liberty, free from undue interference from government in private affairs, I can’t accept much in the way of restrictions placed on private relationships between employers and employees. If we can force employers to accept guns on their property, we can force them to accept speech that the company does not wish to accept, or force them to accommodate religious preferences, like cab drivers refusing to pick up fares with alcohol, or cashiers refusing to ring up pork products. I am very reluctant to accept more government interference into private relationships, even if it would benefit me personally.

I am not saying this lightly. I can assure you that no employer will ever search my car or my person. My car is my property, and I will never offer my consent for an employer to have access to it. I absolutely accept this might get me fired. It’s my right to refuse this. If my employer damages my property, he is liable. If he interferes with my person, he is liable. I have a right to refuse my employer interfering with my person or property, but he absolutely has a right to discontinue the relationship for my violation of that private covenant.

There are many things about employment I don’t like. I wish I could say whatever I want without consequence, wear my “Peace Through Superior Firepower” t-shirt in meetings with clients. I wish everyone I knew at work would be comfortable with me carrying a firearm on me, and talking about what my favorite carry guns are. But that’s not the case, and I accept I could be fired for both activities.

I don’t think government can help us out much in our private relationships with others. In that realm we’re stuck with using persuasion, and trying to educate people that gun owners, and people who lawfully carry guns for self-defense, aren’t irresponsible and dangerous whack jobs who are going to instigate workplace violence incidents. But bringing more government into the situation just opens the door to a lot of unpleasant restrictions on private behavior that I’m just not willing to accept.Â I guess when it comes to this stuff, I’m a libertarian first, and a gun owner second.Â I hope you all don’t find that too terribly disappointing.

More on Jayton, Texas

I noticed some people picking up links to Bitter’s post about our law enforcement encounter in Jayton. I just wanted to note that I didn’t have any intention to make the town look bad, or to malign the Sheriff’s deputy, who, as I said, was very polite, friendly and professional during the entire incident.

But I do want the message to get out to small town folk that they should not be automatically suspicious of out of towners. As a legal technically, even though I’m not a lawyer, I’m pretty sure that two people sitting in the parking lot of a public library, with out of state tags, doesn’t amount to probable cause for the police to stop someone.

I’m not upset about what happened to us, nor do I think it was outside the bounds of tolerable. Truth is, I find the whole thing pretty amusing, and figured it would be something fun to blog about. But the whole thing does kind of sit badly with me, mostly because I have a pretty simple philosophy when it comes to the law.

The law should not be created or construed in such a way that an ordinary, decent person going about his daily business has to pay much attention to, or worry much about it. Ordinary people should never fear the strong arm of the law. That should be reserved for people who are truly causing harm to others. That’s why we establish concepts like probable cause for stops, and why, at least in theory, we restrain the federal government and, to some degree, the police power of the states.

As we become a more increasingly connected world, the definition of “outsider” will become increasingly fluid. Consider that the old lady in the library that called us in actually knew Carrie’s great-grandmother who owned the farm. I know Carrie’s family through the magic of Al Gore’s modern Internets. It’s an odd meshing of the old world and the new, but the old world will have to get used to the new, and learn to tolerate the way it works. The end result will be a lot more out of town tags and strange people in places like Jayton, Texas.

Thoughtcrime

One of the websites I frequent is The Martialist, and it’s attendant forums. The owner/author of the Martialist is Phil Elmore, who is a figure of some controversy in the self-defense world.

I don’t always agree with him, but no matter what my stance on his various opinions is, he is an excellent writer who both turns a phrase well; as well as takes a thoughtful approach to his topics.

His latest piece is on “Thoughtcrime”, and while it’s rather long; it’s also an excellent read. I may not always agree with him, but in this case I’m in absolute agreement. The whole post can be found here.

Thoughtcrime in contemporary society began as “political correctness” and “multiculturalism.” These are cultural movements that hold as their central tenets the notions that some terms, phrases, and lines of thought are intrinsically offensive and inappropriate for public discourse, and that history has traditionally been the exclusive domain of dead white European males whose injustices to all other cultures have been whitewashed (while the historical contributions of other cultures have been simultaneously omitted from the record), respectively. The scions of political correctness and multiculturalism took root in our schools and in our government, teaching our children and pushing through legislation that made it thoughtcrime to adhere to the old ways of the culturally insensitive, ethnocentric Anglos whose evil designs on power the movements were designed to foil. As these movements gained in influence and in converts, it became a cultural crime — punishable by social censure — to engage in politically incorrect language or ethnocentric attitudes. Thus, kicking and screaming, would those who adhered to traditional values be dragged into the brave new world advocated by political leftists (who are at the forefront of the establishment of thoughtcrime).

I have seen the above example first hand, where the positive actions of my ancestors are dismissed out of hand because simply because there were rich Anglos. I now celebrate my heritage with a certain amount of guilt, simply because even I have been indoctrinated to the point where I feel as though I should be remorseful for the actions of people long dead.

Legally, the first of the “hate crime” legislation gave political correctness and multiculturalism the force of law. Now, the government is not merely supposed to concern itself for punishing you for what you’ve done. No, now we presume that it is possible to know what you were thinking when you committed a crime, and to punish you more severely for thinking incorrect thoughts while engaged in your crime. It is not enough to prosecute you for assault or vandalism, for example; now we must further punish you if your victim was one of a number of protected socio-political and/or ethnic pressure groups (and thus a member of a specially protected class). While prosecution under “hate crime” legislation is notably rare (if not absent entirely) for crimes committed by ethnic minorities whose victims are white, any and all crime commited by white men and women against persons of color or those who are members of other pressure groups (such as homosexuals) usually becomes national news and prompts calls for further indoctrination — excuse me, sensitivity and anger-management training — in our government and educational institutions.

I am a huge opponent of “hate crime” legislation, as it does in fact created a protected class. All crime against another person is a hate crime; regardless of skin color, sexual orientation, or religion. By making it worse to commit a crime against a person because of the color of their skin, you actually feed racism instead of curtailing its spread.

The entire article is excellent, and well written. You should go check it out.

They Can Have My Lightbulbs…

… when they pry them from my cold, dead hands:

[Australian] Federal Environment Minister Malcolm Turnbull this morning announced standard incandescent light bulbs would be phased out within three years in a bid to reduce energy consumption.

“We are introducing new energy efficiency standards and these old lights simply won’t comply, they will be phased out and basically over a period of time they will no longer be for sale,” Mr Turnbull said.

What about sockets that won’t take compact flourescence? I like my halogen spotlights, thank you. What about the fact that those flourescent bulbs make me feel like I’ve been institutionalized? Not that it’s really a concern for those in power, because all that matters is that we’re unable to make choices for ourselves, at least not the “right” choices.

I really hope we can move to Mars eventually, because honestly, it’s just not going to stop until government runs every aspect of our lives. Oh sure, you’ll still have some freedoms, except the most important one: choice.

Carolyn McCarthy Hates Due Process

H.R.1168:

To amend chapter 44 of title 18, United States Code, to extend the firearm and ammunition prohibitions applicable to convicted felons to those convicted in a foreign court.

I’ve always said fighting these people is about a lot more than guns. Removing someone’s liberty based on the actions of a foreign court violates our right to due process. McCarthy is not just anti-gun, she apparently has no issues with suspending due process and subjugating our legal system to foreign powers. This one has 5 cosponsors who I wish you could see so I could tell you who else is violating their oath to uphold the constitution.

But if that’s not enough for you, there’s H.R.1167:

To increase public safety and reduce the threat to domestic security by including persons who may be prevented from boarding an aircraft in the National Instant Criminal Background Check System, and for other purposes.

On the no fly list? Lots of people are and we don’t know why or how to get off. Now you won’t have any second amendment rights either. Foreign citizens already can’t by a firearm legally; that’s reserved for citizens and permanent residents. So who is this meant to affect?

Carolyn McCarthy is violating her oath of office by crapping all over the constitution she promised to uphold. It’s time for the Congresswoman to revisit some wisdom from James Madison in Federalist 51:

If men were angels, no government would be necessary. If angels were to govern men, neither external nor internal controls on government would be necessary. In framing a government which is to be administered by men over men, the great difficulty lies in this: you must first enable the government to control the governed; and in the next place oblige it to control itself. A dependence on the people is, no doubt, the primary control on the government; but experience has taught mankind the necessity of auxiliary precautions.

Emphasis mine. Due Process is one of those obligations set on government to oblige it to control itself, and the second amendment is the last resort of auxiliary precautions. How can Carolyn McCarthy support these things and still claim to be serving our country and upholding her oath of office? I’d really like to know. I’m disappointed more of her constituents aren’t asking.

More Tyranny of Public Health

Do you like salty food?Â I do.Â Apparently that really upsets the American Medical Association:

We know what you’re thinking: Yawn. Well, wake up. Our national “salt tooth” is so bad that the American Medical Association recently asked the FDA to remove sodium from its list of food additives generally recognized as safe.

That’s right folks, the AMA thinks salt is so bad for you, they want the FDA to regulate it as an unsafe food additive.Â Nevermind the fact that it’s been used in food for thousands of years.Â It’s for your own good, you see.

I hope everyone can join me in telling the AMA to go to hell and mind their own damned business.

Hat Tip:Â Nobody’s Business