"Do Violence to No Man"

John "the Baptizer," perhaps preaching somewhere between Nazareth and Jerusalem, in "the region around the Jordan River" (Luke 3:3), appeared to display incredible ignorance of basic marketing principles. To the "publicans" ("tax farmers" who made their profits by extracting a percentage above the minimum required by the Roman Empire), John told them not to collect more than the Empire required (Luke 3:12). He called the religious leaders a bunch of "snakes" (Matthew 3:7). And to the soldiers, Jesus said, "Do violence to no man, neither accuse any falsely; and be content with your wages" (Luke 3:14).

Lawrence M. Vance, with extraordinary perception, makes this application:

Are you a soldier in Iraq? Do violence to no man. Do you know a soldier in Iraq? Tell him to not accuse someone falsely of being a terrorist. Are you thinking about enlisting in the military? Be content with your wages and don’t covet the Army’s $20,000 signing bonus to be a hired killer. Isn’t it time, after the loss of a million Iraqis and almost 4,000 U.S. soldiers, to say enough is enough?

All Americans have choices. Germans under Hitler had choices.

For the soldiers currently in the United States who face the possibly of going to Iraq the solution is a much simpler one: Don’t go. Go AWOL, go to jail, get court-martialed, get dishonorably discharged, lose your rank, lose your retirement – just don’t go. Make the military drag you there kicking and screaming.

Marketing Guru Seth Godin asks questions about marketing the war. How could America have marketed the idea that the ideals of America are good, and the ideals of terrorism are bad? I have suggested that we should have sent missionaries instead of soldiers. Let people in the Middle East see America's charity, small business loans, tariff-free trade, hospitals, universities, irrigation and advanced agriculture, and see how well the religion of suicide bombing looks in comparison.

As it stands now, suicide bombing looks more attractive than being an American.

There's a word for what the world's superpower is doing in the Middle East. The word is "genocide." Three thousand Americans died on 9-11. The U.S. has killed not just twice as many Iraqis, not just seventy-seven times as many Iraqis, but three hundred times as many Iraqis as died on 9-11. But it's "good for the economy," especially military contractors, because U.S. forces have expended at least 250,000 small-caliber bullets for every one insurgent killed in the present wars.

And Christians in America who believe Iraq had something to do with 9-11 and support the wars are often baptists (boasting of some connection to John the Baptist) who claim to be followers of the "Prince of Peace."

Two Manifestos, Two Different Nations

On this day, September 19, 1796, American newspapers published George Washington's "Farewell Address." It was not actually a speech, but an open letter to America in the form of a speech. (American newspapers also serially published the essays in defense of the Constitution which are today known as "The Federalist Papers." American newspapers had different standards than they do today, as we will see shortly, perhaps because Americans today have different reading habits, if they read at all. But that's a chicken-and-egg question for another day.)

Washington's Farewell Address quickly became a basic political document for the new nation. It was reprinted as part of the membership paraphernalia of the Washington Benevolent Societies that sprang up after his death in 1799. It was printed in children's primers, engraved on watches, woven into tapestries and read annually before Congress. The Address received widespread fame and became a symbol of American republicanism, the nation's guiding political philosophy. It was used as a benchmark with which to judge the two-party political structure, foreign affairs, and national morality. It was regularly memorized and recited by American students.

There were three major themes in the address, all of them relevant to today's political scene.

First, Washington warned America "in the most solemn manner against the baneful effects of the spirit of party." It

leads at length to a more formal and permanent despotism. The disorders and miseries, which result, gradually incline the minds of men to seek security and repose in the absolute power of an individual; and sooner or later the chief of some prevailing faction, more able or more fortunate than his competitors, turns this disposition to the purposes of his own elevation, on the ruins of Public Liberty.

The spirit of party dominates politics today, and as Washington predicted, it is leading to tyranny. Republicans tolerate socialism and mass-murder if it's committed by the right Party. Democrats denounce a war they would support if it were led by a member of their own Party. Christians won't vote for Ron Paul.

What should unite us instead of a political party, are "the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God" (to quote here the Declaration of Independence). Many in our day claim that Washington and the other Founding Fathers created a secular government. This is simply not true, and couldn't have possibly taken place in a country dominated by Christianity. Washington declared that the idea of a secular government is contrary to reason:

Of all the dispositions and habits, which lead to political prosperity, Religion and Morality are indispensable supports. In vain would that man claim the tribute of Patriotism, who should labor to subvert these great pillars of human happiness, these firmest props of the duties of Men and Citizens. The mere Politician, equally with the pious man, ought to respect and to cherish them. A volume could not trace all their connexions with private and public felicity. Let it simply be asked, Where is the security for property, for reputation, for life, if the sense of religious obligation desert the oaths, which are the instruments of investigation in Courts of Justice? And let us with caution indulge the supposition, that morality can be maintained without religion. Whatever may be conceded to the influence of refined education on minds of peculiar structure, reason and experience both forbid us to expect, that national morality can prevail in exclusion of religious principle.

Finally, Washington criticized our current foreign policy 200 years in advance:

The great rule of conduct for us, in regard to foreign nations, is, in extending our commercial relations, to have with them as little political connexion as possible.

The policy was echoed by Jefferson in his First Inaugural Address (1801)

I deem [one of] the essential principles of our government, and consequently [one] which ought to shape its administration,…peace, commerce, and honest friendship with all nations, entangling alliances with none.

The Address was invariably cited whenever an alliance was discussed. Not until 1949, with the signing of the treaty that established NATO, did the United States again enter into a military alliance. Then, continued violations of the Founders' policies characterized the federal government, notably alliances with Muslim terrorists in Afghanistan and aid to Saddam Hussein in his war with Iran.

As Washington D.C. continued to abandon the wisdom of its Founding Father, it was ironically appropriate that on this very same day in history, in 1995, the Washington Post chose to publish the "manifesto" of the "Unabomber."

War and Public Relations

The first Gulf War gained irreversible momentum with reports that Saddam Hussein's soldiers were tearing infants out of their incubators and throwing them to their deaths. Congress and the rest of America were shown the passionate pleas by a Kuwaiti peasant girl in October of 1990.

But the incubator raids never happened.

When contemplating war, beware of babies in incubators csmonitor.com

The Kuwaiti peasant was the daughter of Kuwait's Ambassador to the US. And the Washington D.C. PR firm that put together the story for President G.H.W. Bush was led by a former staffer for then-Vice President G.H.W. Bush.

How PR Sold the War in the Persian Gulf Center for Media and Democracy

Two weeks ago, G.H.W Bush's son was seen on Television shaking hands with "Sheik Abu Risha," who, we were told, had united Sunni tribes in Anbar Province against Al Qaeda and other insurgents, and provided ample evidence to Congress that "the surge is working."

Then it was announced last Thursday that "U.S. Ally Sheik Abu Risha" had been Killed in Anbar Province. President Bush was choked up over the report.

Problems:
(1) Sheik Abu Risha wasn’t a sheik.
(2) He wasn’t killed by Al Qaeda.
(3) The new alliance with former insurgents in Anbar is as fake as the sheik - and a murderous deceit.

This according to BBC reporter Greg Palast. His dauntless cameraman, Rick Rowley, went into Anbar where network cameras dare not go, to see the Sunni militias -- alongside the U.S. militias -- guarding against insurgents.

And taking vengeance on the Shia.

And "whacking" the "Sheik."

The General Petraeus Show was not as effective as the "Kuwati Babies" Show, but about as genuine. "Sheik" Abu Risha had been paid millions by the U.S. government, something other tribal leaders may not have been enthusiastic about. The former Sunni war criminals have also been paid by the U.S. to turn against "al queda," with promises that after their probation they will be given jobs with the Iraqi government.

With the U.S. bribes, "al queda" has disappeared!

You can view Rowley's report on the Al Jazeera website.

As you view the Al Jazeera report, notice that:

• The Al Jazeera reporter, Samah El-Shahat, is not wearing a burqa.
• The people seen on film are not nomadic Bedouin tent-dwellers. A couple of aerial scenes look like shots of San Bernardino, Calif. Before U.S. bombing and destruction, Iraq was a highly-developed nation.
• Children are carrying machine guns.
• General Petraeus told Congress that the U.S. was not giving them weapons. But weapons can be bought with the money the U.S. is admittedly giving them.
• Rick’s film shows US commanders placing their headquarters in the homes abandoned by terrorized Shia -- terrorized by the Sunnis being paid by the U.S. military.
• Notice how easily the "insurgents" are bought off. Western money and western goods are more highly valued by many in Iraq than the religion of Osama bin Laden.
• Rick followed the Shia to refugee slums, a result of U.S. policy.

I wish every voter could watch these films instead of O'Reilly and Hannity. Just for one evening. Then ask yourself if you're happy you're paying somewhere between $3,000 and $6,000 for each member of your family for the U.S. to overthrow Saddam, bomb hundreds of thousands of Iraqi homes and hospitals, destroy the lives of children, and now to pay off Sunni insurgents' "protection money."

Part One


Part Two


Amy Goodman interviews Rick Rowley

Constitution Day?

Today is "Constitution Day."

This has to be a cruel joke.

Not a single person who signed the Constitution would agree that the United States is governed by or subject to the Constitution in any meaningful sense.

The fundamental structure of government created by America's Founding Fathers no longer exists. The separation of powers has been replaced by "The Administrative State," and the system of federalism ("states' rights") embodied in the 9th and 10th Amendments and vigorously defended by Madison and Jefferson has been destroyed by what is today a powerful centralized federal government.

The values behind the Constitution have been abandoned. By joining the modern secularist trends and repudiating the Christian foundations of the Constitution, the courts have stripped the Constitution of all meaning. The oath to "support the Constitution" or to be "attached" to its principles likewise lacks any meaning.

America is no longer under the British Crown. America is no longer under the Articles of Confederation. And -- not just de facto, but (arguably) de jure, -- America is no longer under the Constitution. Anyone taking an take an oath to "support" a Constitution which no longer exists must not be oblivious to Secularism's march toward tyranny.

Does the Constitution uphold private property? At one time it did, but no longer. In 1933, a state of "national emergency" was declared. Some researchers contend that wartime powers were invoked to suspend the Constitution. World War I produced legislation ("The Trading with the Enemy Act") which was conscripted for duty in Roosevelt's "war" against the "Great Depression." Congress approved his Executive decrees which essentially declared all those who might believe in a Constitutional Free Market to be "enemies" of the State, and the gold of all these "enemies" was confiscated.[7]

In 1973, a special Senate committee led by Senators Frank Church and Charles Mathias confirmed that

Since March 9, 1933, the United States has been in a state of declared national emergency. [H]undreds of statutes delegate to the President extraordinary powers . . . which affect the lives of American citizens in a host of all-encompassing manners. This vast range of powers, taken together, confer enough authority to rule the country without reference to normal constitutional processes. . . . A majority of the people of the United States have lived all their lives under emergency rule. For 40 years, freedoms and governmental procedures guaranteed by the Constitution have, in varying degrees, been abridged by laws brought into force by states of national emergency. [A]ctions taken by the Government in times of great crises have - from, at least, the Civil War - in important ways shaped the present phenomenon of a permanent state of national emergency.[8]

In 1943, the Supreme Court ruled that it could not be said for certain that an admitted member of the Communist Party, holding positions in the Communist Party's National Committee and being the Party's nominee for Governor of Minnesota, was not "attached to the principles of the Constitution."[9] In addition to working for the violent overthrow of Representative Government, the Communist Party denies the legitimacy of private property. But that was no problem for the Court.[10] Through "New Deal" policies, the "organic law" of the Founders was completely overturned. According to such organic charters as the Declaration of Independence, human beings are created by God with unalienable rights to life, liberty and property. These rights exist prior to the State. No longer. The "theoretical basis" of property rights embodied in the "New Deal" was "far different from what it had been"[11] under America's organic law (e.g., the Declaration of Independence: rights given by God, unalienable by the State):

Property rights, from this [new] perspective, are simply a "delegation" from the state to the citizenry . . . . No longer did "property" represent some prepolitical "natural" entitlement; it now represented a public policy judgment by the state that, overall, important social values would be realized by leaving certain controls in the hands of ordinary citizens.[12]

To facilitate the State's unalienable rights over the citizens, "a fourth branch of government"[13] was established, which, to use Madison's words in The Federalist, "may justly be pronounced the very definition of tyranny."[14] For years, government officials with strong Communist leanings had "urged differing degrees of governmental ownership and control of natural resources, basic means of production, and banks and the media of exchange, either with or without compensation."[15] Between 1913 and 1937, most of the planks of the Communist Manifesto had been put into law in America[16] by high-ranking government officials, including President Roosevelt;[17] officials who had taken a solemn oath to "support the Constitution," and therefore, according to the Court, officials "whose attachment to the general constitutional scheme cannot be doubted."[18]

Today the oath to "support the Constitution" is not taken seriously. This is because oaths in general are not taken seriously. At the time the Constitution was written, an oath was understood to be a solemn declaration made to and in the presence of God. In 1961 the US Supreme Court ruled God out of the oath of office. But removing God from an oath is like removing water from a swimming pool: all that is left is an empty shell. The Court in Cole v. Richardson correctly noted that the oath had been reduced from a solemn and weighty act of eternal consequence to a mere "amenity."[1]

No one takes an "amenity" seriously. The rise of Secularism has meant the decline of oaths. Prof. Sanford Levinson, having been admitted to practice in California, suspects that

many of us did not reflect with any great seriousness on the[] meaning [of the loyalty oaths we have signed]. Assuming that we noticed them at all, many of us probably treated them roughly the same way my law students responded to part of a document that they are required to submit to the Bar Association as part of the process of becoming a lawyer. All applicants must sign a statement indicating that they have read the Code of Professional Responsibility and pledge their adherence to its demands. The overwhelming majority of my students freely indicated that they had perjured themselves: They had not in fact read the Code, and they treated the affirmation that they had as a mere formalism, not to be taken seriously . . . . How many of us who have taken loyalty oaths are any different?[3]

I have read and heard many Professors of Constitutional Law admit that they do not require their students to read the Constitution from "We the People" to "ratifying the Same." Indeed, with the current controversy over "originalism" or "original intent," it may be academically unfashionable to require students to read the complete text of the Constitution.[4] The great constitutional scholar E. S. Corwin was

told that Professor Powell of Harvard carefully warns his class in Constitutional Law each year against reading the Constitution, holding that to do so would be apt to "confuse their minds." Certain it is that of the 6,000-odd words of the constitutional document, at least 39 out of every 40 are totally irrelevant to the vast majority, as well as to the most important, of the problems which the Court handles each term in the field of constitutional interpretation.[5]

It is not stretching credulity to claim that a large proportion of law students who have successfully passed a Constitutional Law class in law school have never actually read the Constitution.[6] And as the quest for high salaries in legal practice begins (to pay off school loans) the likelihood of taking time to read the increasingly-irrelevant Articles of the Constitution becomes even smaller. As a result, no one can seriously doubt that a large percentage of people who have been admitted to the Bar or have assumed public office and have taken a solemn oath to "support the Constitution" have never even read the Constitution in its entirety.



Transport any of the Founding Fathers into the first decade of the 21th century. Let them look at our schools, our tax-rates, our mortality rate for pre-born children,[20] and ask them if they will take a (secular) oath to "support the Constitution." I dare say none of them - except perhaps Alexander Hamilton - would take such an oath.[21]

Constitution Day by Harry Browne

A Very Inconvenient Document by Vin Suprynowicz

The Most Successful Fraud in American History by Gary North

Is Our Government Legitimate? by Laurence M. Vance

Walter Williams, in The Freeman, Ideas on Liberty, published by The Foundation for Economic Education, explains why James Madison or Thomas Jefferson could never make it as a political candidate today.

BOVARD » Celebrate Constitution Day Bush-Style

Remembering the Constitution

America's Founding Ideals -- The New American

Petraeus: America Safer? "I don't know."

Virginia Senator John Warner asked General Petraeus if victory in Iraq will make America safer. Petraeus, seen here, admitted, "I don't know."

Was it just a softball question from the Republican Senator, giving Petraeus a chance to shout praises for the Bush Iraq policy, and Petraeus missed his cue? Or is he honest?

It's the President's job to determine the global strategy, he hinted, and his job is merely to implement the military tactics that the President believes will carry out that strategy. The General is just "doing his job," "just following orders," even if those orders will not accomplish any lasting good (or even a temporary good). He's focused on his local objective, which is . . . I don't know, maybe he does . . . kill all al Qaeda members, I guess, and wait for new ones to pour into Iraq to fight the infidel oppressors who are there in Iraq waiting for the terrorists to come. I guess this is the general's objective.

I'm sure some will reply that his objective is to "bring democracy to Iraq." But Petraeus' means to this end are soldiers, guns, and bombs. Undoubtedly neither General Petraeus nor President Bush agrees with America's Founding Fathers in their belief that "free government" is the product of Christian morality.

Significantly, Petraeus admits he doesn't know if the military objective Bush has ordered will actually make America safer. Perhaps Petraeus doesn't "know" this because any non-partisan disciple of Christ could see that the military occupation of Iraq is only being used as an excuse for terrorists to pursue terrorist acts against the U.S., making us less safe. The more determined we are to impose our will on the Middle East by military force, the more determined the terrorists will be to "resist the oppressors."

The War on Terrorism is giving terrorism an excuse to perpetuate itself.

"But if we withdraw from Iraq," I was told the other day, "America will eventually be converted to Islam."

There are few ways this can happen. First, Osama and his terrorists can invade the U.S. and overpower a nation that no longer understands the meaning of the Second Amendment. All 300 million of us. For some reason, I doubt this scenario.

Second, Osama and his terrorists run a slate of political candidates who win the popular vote and gain control over Congress and the White House, and immediately declare America to be an Islamic Theocracy under Sharia Law. For some reason, I doubt this scenario as well.

Third, Americans convert to Islam, a million a day, and America goes Islamic.

Name your favorite scenario for the Islamicization of America, and my response will be the same: What strategy does Jesus advocate to prevent such an event, and what policies does He require of us if it does take place? Can we bomb or shoot a million civilians in Iraq to prevent it? If millions of American join al Qaeda, can we shoot or bomb them?

"No, no," I'm told, "the terrorists will get a nuclear bomb from Iran and detonate it on American soil."

And our military occupation of a muslim nation makes this less likely?

And given the fact that Pakistan's CIA wired the money to alleged 9/11 mastermind Mohammed Atta, combined with the fact that Pakistan (not Iran) already has nuclear weapons, why is the Bush Administration gearing up for a coming war with Iran? Why not Pakistan?

Iraq was never a threat to America's safety, the real threats are being ignored, and our unconstitutional and unChristian military presence in Iraq is only enraging the terrorists.

This is why, when asked if the war in Iraq makes America safer, General Petraeus, the man anointed by President Bush to lead the forces in Iraq (and confirmed by the Senate, 81-0) had to answer, "I don't know." Complete honesty might have cost him his job.

Family Research Council on 9/11

I received this email from Dr. James Dobson's think-tank, Family Research Council (I'll interrupt along the way):

Amid flags at half-mast and a capital city shrouded in clouds, the sixth anniversary of September 11, 2001 has arrived quietly in a nation still divided over the war it provoked.

The war on Iraq was not provoked by 9/11. The Bush Administration planned on overthrowing Saddam's dictatorship before 9/11. - video - The attack on 9/11 was simply the new Pearl Harbor desired by Bush Administration figures which was used to galvanize support for Bush's war from an "isolationist" American electorate.

From Ground Zero to the broken ring of the Pentagon, we can't help but remember how many of the fallen were heroes that day. They were men and women on planes, in skyscrapers, charging up stairwells, and digging through rubble. As diverse as they were, the victims had one thing in common--they were all patriots.

I'm sorry, but how do we know this is true? Did they become patriots simply by being in the wrong place at the wrong time? Their deaths were a horrible and unjustifiable tragedy, but they would not all have supported the war in Iraq.

Today, the spirit of 9-11--that of selfless determination--is still very much alive in our brave troops overseas. Despite months of bickering and distractions at home, our soldiers have carried out their mission valiantly, many of them making the ultimate sacrifice while their fellow citizens, speaking from the safety and comfort they provide, feel free to question what these soldiers are giving their lives for.

No doubt some soldiers are patriotic and selfless. Others are in it for the money. Others love the thrill of military action. You and I might not want to go to Iraq and do what soldiers are doing there, but there are people who do.

While the news is trained on the war, few seem to remember why we're fighting it--not for Iraq but for the liberty Americans so quickly take for granted.

It bothers me, disappoints me, when Christians think this way. This statement is completely mindless. We're not fighting for Iraq? Really? We're fighting for liberty? How has the war on Iraq increased my liberties? How have my liberties been made more secure by the hundreds of billions of dollars spent on destroying Iraqi infrastructure? The biggest threat to my liberties -- according to the Framers of the Constitution -- is the government. Our constitution was designed to "bind down" the government, whose powers were separated, checked, and balanced, then further hedged by a Bill of Rights. True patriotic Americans do not trust their government. How does expanding the power of the government protect my liberties?

Many in this country have forgotten that the best way to honor those who died on September 11--and since--is by upholding the commitment to do everything we can to keep it from happening again.

The best way to prevent another 9/11 from happening is to understand how the first 9/11 happened. This is something the government does not want us to understand, otherwise the government would have conducted a real investigation, with witnessess under oath facing jail time if they lie in their answers to tough questions by prosecutors who want a conviction. We've never had such an investigation.

Abandoning the war would be to abandon America's identity.

This may in fact be true. America was once the most admired nation on earth. America's new identity is one of imperialism, imposing our (i.e., the government's) will on subject nations, putting them under tribute. This is a new identity that needs to be abandoned. Doing so would likely lessen the powerfully persuasive grounds muslim recruiters have for securing new terrorists to fight in the jihad against America.

As Anne Applebaum writes today, "Perhaps it's time to take the main message [of Bin Laden] seriously: Al-Queda's long-term goal is to convert Americans and other Westerners to its extreme version of Islam."

What kind of people would be attracted to a religion of jihad that destroys innocent people in the World Trade Center? Certainly not Christians. But then, fewer Americans are Christians these day. Would teenagers who play violent video games be good candidates for a religion of jihad? Would members of America's armed services be willing to enjoy the thrill of battle for good pay under an Islamic flag?

Although millions more people in Europe are Muslim than a few generations ago, Philip Jenkins has doubts about whether Europe is going jihadist. But Jenkins has also pointed out that most Christians are going to be non-white in 2050, and America will not be the center of world Christendom.

But is military occupation in Iraq -- once secular, but now, thanks to the Bush Administration, an explicitly Islamic theocracy -- the best way to keep American youth from catching jihadist fever and strapping themselves with explosives? Anne Applebaum has written brilliantly on the Soviet Gulag system, but I doubt her fears of mass coversion to Osama's religion.

This is the ultimate struggle between good and evil, the long-standing battle for our ideals of faith, family, and freedom. In the end, this war is not only a military conflict, but a spiritual one. And the entire Western world hangs in the balance.

I certainly agree that this is a spiritual conflict. But why is it a military one? How will a military conflict in Iraq prevent Americans from being seduced into fundamentalistic Islam? The Family Reasearch Council should be the first to see the complete futility of dealing with an intensely spiritual conflict by incinerating Fallujah with white phosphorus.

Though, as Martin Luther King, Jr. once said, "I still have faith in America. ...I still have faith that we will hew out of the mountain of despair, a stone of hope." Let's pray, six years later, that as the stone walls of the Pentagon have been rebuilt and construction is under way at the site of the World Trade Center, so too are we rebuilding our resolve that those who have died in our nation's service will be honored not just in memorial remembrances but in victory over tyranny.

America's Founding Fathers would agree: Tyranny is winning. But tyranny is being imposed by Washington, D.C., not Baghdad or Mecca. The warmonger-wing of the Religious Right is a greater threat to our liberties than Osama bin Laden.

9/11 - Six Years Later

If there's one function of the government that everyone agrees on, it's national defense. There's disagreement about whether it's the government's job to educate, to provide charity, to subsidize pornography, to create a fraudulent retirement scheme, to fund the "World Toilet Summit," to grow tobacco, to determine the proper size of holes in swiss cheese, and a whole lot of other ways the government thinks it knows how we should run our own businesses, but everyone agrees that the government's job is to protect us from attacks by foreigners.

On September 11, 2001, the government failed Job Number One.

We're told that a bunch of guys from Saudi Arabia hijacked four planes and rammed them into buildings, killing nearly 3,000 Amercans.

We spend billions of dollars on radar systems to track unidentified aircraft. We spend billions of dollars on fighter jets to intercept attackers. For what? Where were they six years ago today?

The government told us that they would punish their accomplices, but the government didn't look in Saudi Arabia, it invaded Iraq. The masterminds of the plot were said to be in Afghanistan, but our government allowed them to escape to Pakistan, which is where the hijackers got their money. Pakistan and Saudi Arabia are said by our government to be our "allies," while Iraq, from whence none of the hijackers came, has been destroyed.

If you hired an exterminator to prevent termites, only to find that after hiring them your house became infested with termites, wouldn't you fire the exterminators? If they told you that you needed to pay them more money, and give them complete control over how you use your house, wouldn't you call the police? If they bombed your neighbor's house for no reason, wouldn't you not only fire them, but call an attorney to see about a lawsuit for damages?

But Americans have been willing to pay more money to the government, and surrender their liberties to the government. Nearly a majority of Americans believe that Saddam planned 9/11, and a majority of the hijackers came from Iraq. None did. After failing in its core responsibility, Americans now trust the government more than ever, as evidenced by the breadth and depth of control of their lives they yield to the government.

The terrorists undoubtedly had no illusions that they would, by their actions on 9/11, transform America into an Islamic Caliphate. Nor did they think of undoing "The Spirit of '76," and destroying what Jefferson, Washington, Sam Adams and John Hancock rought for. The terrorists had no such long-range vision, but were simply taking pot-shot vengeance on America for U.S. incursions into Muslim nations.

But I think the terrorists (or the government that created them) did in fact play a key role in destroying America and the Spirit of '76. September 11, 2001, may well be the most important date in American history. More important even than the birth of the U.S. on July 4, 1776. That birth has been swallowed up in death. If America's Founding Fathers could see America today, they would weep, and mourn the death of the America they fathered.

More on Military Corruption

"Corruption" occurs when government has the power to use force to extract money from the unwilling, and can use the money without accountability.

Corruption is accentuated when those paying the tribute believe they are more "patriotic" the more they pay. Corruption is rewarded when the quest for accountability is labeled "unpatriotic."

Warren Mass writes:

As Robert Welch warned long ago, the foreign policy elite shamelessly exploits our support for the military in order to insulate from criticism those policymakers whose actions precipitate such tragedies as 9-11. During the Vietnam War, for instance, relatively few Americans understood how U.S. aid and trade with Communist nations materially supported the Communist drive to conquer Vietnam.

That same aid resulted in the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan, which prompted U.S. aid to Osama and his "freedom fighters."

Panic, as well as patriotism, is an excellent "revenue enhancement" device, as Will Grigg writes in "Panic Profiteering."

But as with all government programs, in order to get $1 in "aid" to the designated recipient (whether it be the Soviet Union or Osama bin Laden), $2-3 taxpayer dollars must be spent to "administer" the funds. This is where "corruption" is rife.

As if the recipient itself isn't evidence of corruption, as Warren Mass continues:

In similar fashion, relatively few Americans are aware that the same CFR brain trust presiding over the Iraq War helped bring Saddam to power and created his war machine. Even fewer are aware of the material support given to international terrorism by the “former” Communists in power in Russia, including particularly President Vladimir Putin, a veteran of the KGB (and whom President Bush regards as a soul mate). Russia and Communist China are treated as strategic allies in the “war on terrorism,” despite their abundant — and continuing — support for international terrorism, particularly in the Middle East.

The Federal Government has long supported terrorist regimes. Mass continues:

In his 1967 essay about Vietnam, Mr. Welch asked rhetorically if it were possible “that any war carried on against the Communists by [Secretary of Defense] Robert Strange McNamara or [Secretary of State] Dean Rusk is going to be any different from the one they sponsored in the Congo — or more recently in the Dominican Republic — where the net result was the destruction or demoralization of as much as possible of the native anti-Communist strength?”

We could as easily ask the same about the current crop of CFR elitists presiding over the “war on terrorism.” Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld visited Baghdad as a presidential emissary in 1983 and 1984, offering to provide Saddam with valuable military and economic aid. During the late 1990s, future Vice President Dick Cheney was CEO of Halliburton, a taxpayer-subsidized conglomerate that made huge sums doing business with Iraq and Libya. L. Paul Bremer, the Bush administration’s colonial viceroy in Baghdad, was a prominent player at Kissinger Associates, the international consulting firm that arranged many of the deals that built Saddam’s arsenal in the 1980s.

Added to this direct aid to America's enemies is the cost of administrative fees charged by the federal bureaucracies.

More on the absence of accountability in the federal government's military:

Iraq War: The Biggest Boondoggle Ever

Controversy in the Military -- Will Anything Change?

The Walls of Jericho

The total amount of money transferred from Americans to Cheney-Kissinger-Bush-BinLaden family interests is staggering.

The Boston Globe reports that The Congressional Budget Office estimates that as of June, up to $500 billion has been spent on combat operations in Iraq. But the Christian Science Monitor reports that researchers led by a Nobel Prize-winning economist has concluded that indirect costs may bring the figure above $2 Trillion.

Too many libertarians are willing to privatize the Post Office, but not the military. The argument for military "inefficiency" and corruption are great arguments for privatizing defense, to say nothing about the military's role in giving aid to communism and terrorism. The complete privatization of the U.S. federal military would have saved hundreds of millions of lives and trillions of dollars in private wealth over the last century.

Corruption in the Military

Many people are willing to privatize the Post Office, cut government welfare, education, and corporate welfare programs, but they draw a line at the military. Let private charities help the poor, give parents choice in education, and get government out of commerce, but "national defense" is too holy to be touched by the unclean hands of the Market. All other government programs may be wasteful inefficient socialist programs, but the military (which is also socialist) can never fall to the same criticism.

"Government" -- being a monopoly enforced by threats of violence and shielded from competition -- encourages the worst in human nature. Government is inescapably a culture of waste and corruption as Citizens Against Government Waste confirms on a daily basis.

Why should we think there's no waste or personal selfishness in the government military?
Why should we think that the military is any more efficient at providing promised benefits than any other socialist government program?

MSNBC recently carried a story on how Iraq fraud whistleblowers are vilified. Government inherently resists efficiency and accountability. That's what "the chains of the Constitution" are all about; that's our whole theory of government in America.

Theory is borne out in practice: Bush's "War on Terror" Tactics Make America Less Safe, Less Free. Government makes everything it attempts to solve worse. Government claims to be protecting our freedoms, but we have less freedom as a result of their efforts. Government claims to be protecting us from terrorists, but the terrorists are stronger than ever, thanks to the government slaughter of terrorists' relatives and creation of a terrorist recruiting paradise. And the war in Afghanistan is making opium production better than ever.

Socialist programs are always good for the government and bad for America, and America's socialist military programs are no exception. Privatize them. Like the Post Office. The same economic laws that make socialism a disaster in the economy make socialism bad for "National Security."

The Myth of National Defense

"Corruption" is Inescapable

If you're like most Americans, you don't vote.
If you're like most Americans, you're not interested in politics.

I sympathize with those who don't vote.
I basically stopped voting for politicians in 1982.
I realized they all had basically the same message:

"Vote for me, and I'll confiscate wealth from your neighbor and give it to you."

Even if you're stealing from the rich, you're still stealing.

Some politicians will promise you benefits (if you vote for them) without stealing directly from your neighbor, but indirectly. They promise to "cut taxes," while still promising benefits for those who vote for them. This means DEBT.

The Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis recently released a report which revealed that politicians have legally obligated the United States to pay out over $60 trillion in government benefits at some point in time -- money the government doesn't have now, and does not expect to have unless taxes are raised significantly. How much? A "terrifying" amount, to quote the St.Louis fed report.

Over $60 trillion in unfunded legally-obligatory promises made by politicians to those who will vote for them. Unbelievable.

The report is entitled, "Is the United States Bankrupt?" The answer is "yes." If these politicians were officers of private corporations like Enron, these politicians would be in jail.

These practices are fraudulent and unethical.

But these practices are not an aberration. They are not "abnormal."

Stealing from Peter to buy the vote of Paul is what "the government" is all about. This is how it preserves its life.

The only reason "the government" exists is to permit the governors to do things against the governed that would otherwise be immoral and unethical:

• Take money from other people.
• Kidnap people.
• Kill people.
• Take vengeance on one's enemies.

All these things are unapproved in polite society, unrewarded by the Free Market, but they are legal and taxpayer-financed in the world of "the government."

We cannot eliminate "government corruption" without eliminating the entire concept of "the government." It is an out-dated idea. It was never a good idea.

If you disagree with this, but do indeed want less "corruption," your best bet is to vote for a candidate that believes all government action is corrupt. If you vote for someone who believes some government confiscation of the life, liberty or property of others is morally and ethically legitimate, you vote for someone who has no ultimate restraints on his corruption. America's Founding Fathers crafted what they believed was the greatest political charter in the history of the human race. It was designed as carefully as they knew how to prevent the rise of the very government we have today. Obviously the Constitution is a failure. The promises of today's politicians are worth even less than the Constitution. Everything the greatest sages of the ages have discerned about human nature warns us that a license to steal (taxation) will never atrophy, but will always be used with increasing frequency.

Computers, automobiles, medical supplies, air conditioners, telephones, refrigerators, and everything else that raises our standard of living, can be produced better, more efficiently, more inexpensively, with higher quality, by the Free Market than by "the government." There is nothing that human beings need that can be produced with higher quality and a lower price for more people by "the government" than by the Free Market.

Our system of government is supposedly based on "the consent of the governed." "We the People" don't need to consent to anything anymore. History has taught us that socialism always fails, and capitalism triumphs. Government lowers our standard of living, capitalism raises it.

We didn't need London in 1776, and we don't need Washington D.C. today.

Abolish the USA!

Here is a popular representation of federal spending:

Politicians who have taken an oath to "support the Constitution" have violated one of its most central principles: that of "enumerated powers." They have exercised powers which were never given to the federal government in the Constitution. In the above graph, this includes job training, environment, education, nutrition, housing, income security, health, and, most likely, "other." Cutting "unconstitutional" programs would mean cutting more than 90% of the federal government. Instead of the people of Missouri sending their money to Washington D.C. where bloated bureaucrats take their cut and send the rest back to Missouri in a long, leaky hose, the People of Missouri could spend their money in more efficient ways, on more effective local programs, and eliminate the federal middleman.

In recent posts we have observed that "corruption" is inescapable in government, even in the military, because transactions which are governed by force are inherently corrupt and corrupting, unlike voluntary transactions. Therefore if we were to abolish all "unconstitutional" federal programs, as well as all inherently corrupt and inefficient federal programs, we would abolish the federal government altogether.

There is no service which is necessary for an orderly and prosperous society which can be better provided by the Federal Government than by the Free Market.

Back in June I asked, How Big is America? Based on those numbers, let's ask two additional questions:

1. How big would Missouri be if we abolished the United States?
2. Why should we even think about abolishing the United States?

We just answered the second question in part, but there's more. Here is the answer to the first question:

If we abolish the United States federal government, and create 50 new sovereign nations, the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) of top nations, based on data from the 2007 CIA World Factbook, compiled here, would be as follows:

1. Japan $4,911,000,000,000
2. Germany $2,858,000,000,000
3. China $2,512,000,000,000
4. United Kingdom $2,341,000,000,000
5. California/France $2,154,000,000,000

What's wrong with a world where Japan is the largest nation, followed by Germany, China, the UK, and California? Would Japan, Germany, China, or Great Britain have any reason to invade California? Right now Japan's military is non-existent, provided for by the U.S.

7. Italy $1,780,000,000,000
8. Texas/Canada $1,089,000,000,000

Would the Republic of Texas and Canada be safe from Italy and those other nations above?

10. Spain $1,081,000,000,000
11. India $796,100,000,000
12. Florida/South Korea $768,500,000,000
14. Illinois/Mexico $741,500,000,000
16. New Jersey/Russia $733,000,000,000
18. Ohio/Australia $645,300,000,000
20. New York/Brazil $620,700,000,000
22. Pennsylvania/Netherlands $612,700,000,000
24. Georgia/Switzerland $386,800,000,000
26. North Carolina/Sweden $371,500,000,000
28. Massachusetts/Belgium $367,800,000,000
30. Washington/Turkey $358,200,000,000
32. Taiwan $353,900,000,000
34. Virginia/Austria $309,300,000,000
36. Tennessee/Saudi Arabia $286,200,000,000
38. Missouri/Poland $265,400,000,000

Should Bill Gates tremble in the state of Washington for fear of an invasion by the superior power of Belgium?

Should Missouri fear an invasion by Saudi Arabia?

Maybe.

But why is this?

Because the federal government of the United States sells weapons to the nation that gave us 17 of the alleged 19 9-11 hijackers. Saudi Arabia is the federal government's largest Arms Client. Just last month the federal government offered another $20 billion in arms to Saudi Arabia and other Gulf states.

Do we really need the federal government to keep us safe?

The federal government in Washington D.C. is the greatest threat to peace in the world today. Abolish it entirely and we will all be better off.

America's Founding Fathers would see this instantly.

Just as they worked to abolish the government set in place by the British Empire over the colonies, they would work to abolish the government they themselves set in place over the states, were the Founders here today.

They risked their lives, their fortunes, and the sacred honor in defense of the principle of "Liberty Under God." They were motivated by Micah's vision of everyone owning private property and dwelling safely under their Vine & Fig Tree. That vision is threatened more by the U.S. federal government than by any other nation or terrorist organization on the planet.

OK, so Belgium and Germany won't be attacking Missouri if we abolish the federal government. But would Osama bin Laden attack the Republic of California or Texas or Missouri?

No, because Osama stated clearly why he issued a Fatwa calling for Holy War against the U.S.:

(1) the U.S. has troops in the Saudi Arabian holy lands
(2) the U.S. bombed Iraq
(3) the U.S. supports Israeli terrorism against Palestinians.

Abolish Washington D.C. and these grounds for attack on the American people are eliminated completely. Let California go on record as

(1) opposing sending troops from the California Republic to Saudi Arabia,
(2) opposing sending B-52's from the California Republic Air Force to bomb Iraq
(3) opposing sending military and financial aid to the Israeli government

and California will enjoy more prosperity and security than it does paying tribute to the U.S. federal government so the feds can sell arms to dictators that harbor terrorists at the same time the feds anger terrorists by killing the terrorists' relatives.

America's Founding Fathers understood that national security comes primarily from trusting God, and secondarily from not selling arms to your enemies.

OK, but why should we think about something like abolishing the United States? We opened the post with the reason: It is 99% unconstitutional and what is not unconstitutional is inherently corrupt.

But there is a second reason we should think about abolishing the United States.

The answer is, Because THEY already are.

THEY want to Abolish the United States

Find out who "they" are, and their goal.

We must take control of this movement.

The U.S. federal government is at war with the principle of LIBERTY which animated America's Founding Fathers. The federal government is at war with the principle of non-aggression, which the Libertarian Party has traditionally embraced:

I do not believe in or advocate the initiation of force as a means of achieving political or social goals.

The federal government teaches all of us that violence is a better way to get what we want than persuasion. Because in addition to opposing the "Liberty" part of "Liberty Under God," the feds oppose the "Under God" part. The federal government prohibits us from teaching "the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God" in our neighborhood schools. We can't even post a copy of the Ten Commandments on a classroom wall.

I grew up thinking that kind of tyrannical atheistic stuff only existed in the Soviet Union.

God's laws are opposed by Washington D.C. because Washington D.C. is fundamentally unethical and corrupt. They have no moral scruples against killing a million Iraqis or seizing hundreds of billions of dollars of other people's money, if that's what it takes to solidify their political power.

There are a handful of exceptions, of course, but even the exceptions believe in "reform" rather than abolition.

I want to be as RADICAL as America's Founding Fathers would be if they were here today.

I propose a change as momentous as that described by Benjamin Rush, Signer of the Declaration of Independence, upon hearing of Locke's rejection of the doctrine of the Divine Right of Kings:

Never before had I heard the authority of kings called in question. I had been taught to consider them nearly as essential to political order as the sun is to the order of our solar system.

Lawrence Cremin, a Pulitzer Prize-winning Professor at Columbia Univ. writes:

For Rush, the events surrounding the creation of the Republic marked nothing less than a turning point in the course of human history. "I was animated constantly," he reflected in later years, "by a belief that I was acting for the benefit of the whole world, and of future ages, by assisting in the formation of new means of political order and general happiness."

The Autobiography of Benjamin Rush, edited by George W. Corner (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1948), p.161, quoted by Cremin in American Education: The National Experience, 1783-1876, NY: Harper & Row, 1980, p. 114-15.

We don't need a king to rule us.
We all agree with this statement, radical as it was in 1776.

We don't need the federal government either.
Not all agree with that statement, even though it flows logically from the premises laid down by America's Founding Fathers.

We don't need the post office. We don't need federal control of education, welfare, business, and every other area of human action and society.

We don't need Homeland Security and federal arms sales to terrorists.

America didn't need London in 1776, and America doesn't need Washington D.C. today.

By being an anarchist, I am, like Benjamin Rush, "animated constantly by a belief that I am acting for the benefit of the whole world, and of future ages, by assisting in the formation of new means of social order and general happiness." That new means is nothing less than 100% pure laissez-faire capitalism, conducted "with a firm reliance on the Protection of Divine Providence," in accord with "the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God," "appealing to the Supreme Judge of the world for the rectitude of our intentions." In short, "Liberty Under God."

The 21st century will be an incomparable blood-bath if human beings do not repudiate the political mythology of institutionalized vengeance and pursue the anarchist policy of "non-aggression." Christians brought liberty to the Western world by questioning the universally-accepted belief in "the divine right of kings." Now is the time for a "paradigm-shift" of equal magnitude. Our concept of social order should depend on personal responsibility nurtured by Godly families, not institutionalized political violence.

"Power tends to corrupt" -- Lord Acton
"Liberty has not subsisted outside of Christianity." -- Lord Acton

"I agree we need smaller government," you say, "but I think abolishing the federal government entirely is taking that too far."

Fine. Is there another candidate for Congress that is even going in the right direction? Is there another candidate who is committed in any meaningful way to smaller government? No. Look at the graph at the top of this post. Our current Congressman has been voting us in the wrong direction for 10 years, expanding the federal pie year after year. I want to abolish the pie altogether, piece by piece. You and I both agree that cuts must be made. Politicians do not get elected by cutting, but by promising a bigger pie. You need to battle these politicians with someone who is philosophically opposed to the pie. If you really believe in smaller government, you must vote for the candidate that's going in the right direction. Give that candidate a two-year term, then maybe another two-year term, and when you finally conclude that this candidate has abolished enough of the unconstitutional and wasteful programs and agencies of the federal government to suit you, don't send him to Congress for another term. (You won't live that long.)

So far, in the last 100 years, we haven't even started cutting. The pie has only been expanding. It's time to start moving in the opposite direction. Only a radical can be trusted to move that way, against the tide.

Secret Military Intelligence

Libertarians face their fiercest opposition when it comes to the military.

Any meddling with the Pentagon whatsover -- even modest cuts in the defense budget, proposals for reorganization, or criticisms of strategy in Iraq and elsewhere -- are met with rebukes based on the idea that the military has "intelligence" that we (the lowly general public) do not and should not have access to. This "intelligence" renders the Pentagon qualified to make decisions costing us hundreds of billions of dollars and millions of lives, and "We the People" have no basis for criticizing military policy.

This is a myth.

I believe it was in the movie "9-11 Press for Truth" where I first heard CIA analyst Ray McGovern say

Here I have to reveal a trade secret, which punctures the mystique of intelligence analysis. Generally speaking, 80 percent of the information one needs to form judgments on key intelligence targets or issues is available in open media.

This is important for those of us who wish to privatize national defense.

Arthur Silber has taken McGovern's observation and concluded in his worthwhile essay, You, Too, Can and Should Be an "Intelligence Analyst". Not that an ordinary American can render judgments on specific, detailed, bullet-level covert operations, but ordinary Americans have enough facts that they can render judgments about theatre-wide foreign policy commitments. We have and had all the information needed to conclude that the federal government should not spend $900 Billion to overthrow Saddam Hussein and set up an Islamic Theocracy in Iraq. There is no arcane "intelligence" hidden away in the untranslated transcript of a foreign wiretap available to and comprehendable only by highly-trained intelligence specialists which can justify the entire war and authoritatively silence any public opinion to the contrary.

"We the People" may not be able to identify specific species of trees by genus and phylum, but we can see a forest.

And we can see a forest fire.

The Bush foreign policy is going up in flames.

But the inferno cannot be blamed only on Bush and his adivsors. The same policies animated Clinton, LBJ, Truman and Roosevelt. Ordinary well-read Americans have every right to criticize all their wars without being told they don't have access to "the same intelligence" they did. All of these Presidents and those who supported them believe that the State is our Savior. There are no classified technical intelligence briefings that can possibly justify the idolatry of the Messianic State.

America's Founding Fathers would still agree.

Now let's have that discussion about privatizing "national defense."

"Suspicious Behavior"

"I love these people," said Gregory Gibson, 47, a tall man in dreadlocks who regularly eats at the Los Angeles Catholic Worker's skid row kitchen at 6th and Gladys. He said he has been living on skid row for 13 years, landing there after a run of "personal problems."

"They do it out of the kindness of their heart," Gibson said of the Catholic Worker. "Isn’t that amazing?"

He was waiting for a friend at the dental clinic, which sees patients on Fridays. Rolling Hills Estates dentist Rich Meehan has been volunteering there for 16 years.

"I don’t have any financial worries, so why not do something?" said Dr. Meehan, 72, whose workspace in the clinic is set off by a rickety 5-foot partition. The dental chair is a relic.

"This is pretty basic," Meehan said with a laugh. "We don’t do crowns."

Rich Meehan has worked as a volunteer dentist at the Hippie Kitchen for so many years, and has been to Skid Row so many times he probably couldn't even guess at the total number. But last month was the first time he was ever arrested, on Skid Row, or any place.

Ed Pilolla, who lives and works with the Los Angeles Catholic Worker part-time and is also busy writing a book, describes the incident in an article which appeared in the August 2007 Catholic Agitator. The following is Pilolla's account of Meehan's arrest:

All he was doing was leaving "the Hippie Kitchen" after doing his usual four-to-five hour shift filling cavities, scraping off plaque, and pulling rotten teeth for free.

Rich, 72, recalls the incident as if he made some sort of mistake. "I was parked on the wrong side of the street," Rich recalled, a couple weeks later while working on a patient sitting in the worn leather examination chair. "I was saving goodbye to Jesse, and he put his arm in the (car) window and I shook it," Rich said.

Jesse, a full-time community member, supervises the garden on Fridays while Meehan sees as many as a dozen or more patients. Jesse helps homeless folks get comfortable, refills water jugs, fetches folks’ plastic bags, and asks others not to play the radio in the garden. Basically, Jesse runs a tight ship, and when Rich is done seeing patients without any means to pay for dental work, Jesse feels it's appropriate to shake his hand in order to say thanks.

From now on, however, Jesse is going to shake Rich's hand inside the garden and not out on Gladys Street. "I don't reach into any white person's car anymore because I don't want them to get arrested," Jesse explained.

After laughing and saying goodbye to Jesse, Rich put his gearshift in drive and headed back home to Rolling Hills Estates—or at least tried to.

As Rich pulled his car away from the curb, two mounted police officers up the block waved for him to pull over. "What's going on?" Rich remembered asking.

"That's what we want to know," one of the officers responded.

The officers explained that they witnessed "suspicious behavior" when Rich shook hands through his car window. The police are trying to eliminate the drug trade on Skid Row and that behavior appeared to be a drug exchange, they said.

Rich, who described the officers' behavior as both professional and courteous, handed over the usual things: driver's license, registration, proof of insurance. The officers asked why he was on Skid Row, and Rich told them about his "job" with the LA. Catholic Worker, and showed the officers his dental license with the hope of proving to the officers he was telling the truth. While one of the officers continued to ask questions, the other officer began searching his car. (Rich doesn't remember whether the officers asked to search the car or not.)


The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.
The Bill of Rights, Amendment IV


"I wasn't worried," Rich said. "There was nothing there (in the car). Then he came out with a Zip-Lock bag, with a bread crumb inside the size of your thumbnail. And he says, 'Here's the evidence.'"

Rich's response: "Evidence of what?"

The officers said the substance looked like cocaine. The plastic bag was inside a paper bag, and the cocaine-like substance was a bread­crumb. The officer found it on the floor of the car beneath the seat.

At this point, Rich went fishing, so to speak. He dropped a name. Rich asked the officers if they happened to know a police officer he knew. Turned out, the man Rich knew for many years was the officers' lieutenant. Still, the officers patted Rich down, handcuffed him, and informed him the substance must be tested at the police station. The officers did allow Rich to make a phone call from his cell phone, and Rich phoned his daughter to inform her that he was, apparently, going to be late coming home that day.

After the phone call, Rich's daughter called the lieutenant, and the lieutenant, according to Rich, said he couldn't do anything, and that the substance had to test negative before Rich was let go.

I want to give credit to the lieutenant and the officers for not giving Rich any break based on the fact that he happened to know a high-ranking Skid Row police officer. The officers did do him one favor: they handcuffed Rich's wrists together in front of his body instead of behind his back, which was nice.

The conclusion of this story is that one of the officers drove Rich's car, with Rich sitting in the passenger seat, back to the police station. Rich sat on a bench and waited until they tested the bread crumb and found it not to be cocaine. Then Rich was released. (A short time later, Jeff and Catherine, leading a throng of summer interns, burst into the police station intending to stage a sit-in until the LA. Catholic Worker dentist was released.)

What's the moral of this story? Police officers are all over Skid Row looking to make arrests, any kind of arrest, especially drug arrests.

In the ongoing effort to please wealthy developers and clear Skid Row of its low-income and not aesthetically pleasing residents, the police, with the blessing of the mayor, have been jailing as many folks as possible. Routinely, the police handcuff people on the street and search their property, hoping to find drugs. This sort of search is only legal, though morally indefensible, to anyone on parole. However, the Los Angeles Police Department handcuffs and searches residents of The Row who are not on parole, according to the American Civil Liberties Union, which has interviewed dozens of folks over the past year or so.

Rich was able, and thankful, to drive out of The Row. "I was probably treated a little better than some of my patients,” Rich said.

For those living on Skid Row, there's no escaping the police, guilty or not. You walk from your low-rent hotel room to the grocery store and the police might stop you, handcuff you and search your pockets. It happens routinely, every day for many people.

One homeless man in the garden at the Hippie Kitchen described the police behavior this way: “they’re terrorizing people, man."

At random, I asked a homeless man the other day how often the police search him on the street. "Every day," he said.

Skid Row is the poorest neighborhood around. Some people like living on The Row, but many live there because they can’t afford any other neighborhood. So you're stuck on The Row if you don't have much money. You think to yourself, "I'd like to get out of here." But you can't because you don't have enough money to move. Meanwhile, the police stop and search you every time they see you on the street.

A sincere Thank-You to Rich, who has helped so many low-income and homeless folks with his years of dedication. A Head-Shake to the police for dedicating themselves to arresting as many as possible by searching as many as possible.


Readers of Pilolla's fine article may recall that Benjamin Franklin was about Meehan's age when he signed the Declaration of Independence, risking his "Life," his "Fortune," and his "sacred Honor" to defend liberty against tyranny. Did Franklin or any of the other Founding Fathers risk so much to give us a "War on Drugs" which would arrest Dr. Franklin and Dr. Meehan without probable cause, without warrant, with no oath-bound witness, for the "suspicious behavior" of volunteering dental services to the poor and shaking hands with a social worker, a war with a total cost of about $100 billion per year (according to Nobel Prize-winning economist Gary Becker), with no measurable success in accomplishing its stated goal?

No, without question, the Framers would have opposed the "war on drugs." Had the British imposed police forces upon the colonies such as are now waging the "War on Drugs" in America today, this alone would have fomented the American Revolution.

Why do Americans put up with this costly, unconstitutional, failure of a "war?"

Inventions and "National Security"

• On this day in 1851, Isaac Singer was granted Patent No. 8294 for his sewing machine.
• Also on this day, Henry Ford built the first Model T. (The first production Model T was built on September 27 [or October 1], 1908, at the Piquette Plant in Detroit, Michigan, a plant secretly built by Ford in 1906.)
• Finally, on this day in 1981, IBM first released the IBM PC. (The Hewlett-Packard 9100A was the world's first personal computer, first appearing in 1968. The cost was about $5,000. or $30,000 in today's money.)

If Osama bin Laden were to figure out a way to disable all of America's cars, computers, and appliances like sewing machines, his attack would be deemed a "national emergency" and a "national security crisis." Dozens of "Executive Orders" would go into effect giving the federal government nearly complete control over the economy in order to "restore the Free Market."

One might even agree that Osama's actions would constitute a grave threat to our "national security" even without his firing a single shot, hijacking any planes, or detonating any bombs. There can be no doubt that automobiles, computers, and appliances are vital for the "American way of life." Three hundred million Americans would quickly be thrown into poverty without them. All Americans -- and the rest of the world -- lived in poverty before capitalism.

But if these things are so important, why didn't Congress pass a law bringing these critical inventions into existence? Why did we have to wait for the unpredictable vicissitudes of the Market? Why didn't Congress step up to bat decades sooner to end poverty?

Most Americans might correctly answer that Congress doesn't have the power to end poverty the way Capitalism did, but they don't know why this is true. Americans don't understand why Capitalism is creative and productive, and why Government can only forcibly redistribute the fruits of capitalism. Government cannot lead, but can only follow, and never keep up. Capitalism grows from an acorn into a mighty oak; government is a parasite that sucks the lifeblood out of the oak until it dies.

If Congress could not have passed a law creating the computer, automobile and labor-saving devices, why do we believe it can pass a law which will protect all these vital inventions and "save capitalism from itself" through "New Deal" regulations?

Government efforts to "reduce poverty" create more poverty. Capitalism's efforts to increase wealth -- even when capitalists are oblivious to the poor -- eliminate poverty.