Will Grigg?s Liberty Minute

December 17, 2012

One reason we're told it's never correct to resist arrest is that being arrested is supposedly a minor inconvenience. Pittsburgh resident Sara Reedy knows otherwise.

Eight years ago, Reedy was sexually assaulted at gunpoint at a convenience store. When the police interviewed her in the hospital, they refused to believe her account. Rather than pursuing her assailant, they arrested her and charged her with robbery and "false reporting." Although Reedy wasn't prosecuted, she lost her job.

A year later, the criminal who assaulted her forced himself on another victim. After his arrest he confessed to a number of earlier assaults, including the one against Reedy. She spent seven years and a great deal of money seeking redress through the courts, eventually winning a large civil settlement that fell short of adequately compensating her for what she had experienced.

As defense attorney Craig DeThomasis told The Gainesville Sun, ?We currently live in a world where an arrest destroys somebody?s life" by leaving an ineffaceable taint in databases used for employment and housing background checks.

Merely  being arrested can ruin an innocent person's life ? or at least steal a considerable portion of it ? even if the victim isn?t prosecuted or jailed.

Let us take back the liberty wherewith Christ has made us free. 

Will Grigg?s Liberty Minute

December 14, 2012

The Gospel according to Matthew describes how Satan, seeking to tempt Jesus, presented a vision of the world?s kingdoms and declared: ?All these I will give thee, if thou will fall down and worship me.?

Jesus rebuked Satan for tempting him. But He did not challenge that claim of ownership. The state is not God?s handiwork.

Nearly a century ago, as the Wilson administration prepared to entangle the U.S. in World War I, the magazine Christian Century published a blasphemous psalm in praise of government and its defining activity, war:

The strength of the State we'll lavish on more, than making of wealth and making of war; We are learning at last, though the lesson comes late, That the making of man is the task of the State.

Tragically, many people have been taught to see the state as a divine artifact, and to believe that war serves a sacramental function. This is the doctrine of modern totalitarianism, not the gospel of Jesus Christ. Boise area residents committed to carrying out Christ?s mandate to be peacemakers are invited to participate in the Peace on Earth rally on the Capitol Steps this December 15 at 3:00 PM.

Let us take back the liberty wherewith Christ has made us free. 

Will Grigg?s Liberty Minute

December 12, 2012

In Louisiana, the practice of civil asset forfeiture includes a system in which the loot is divvied up among courts, prosecutors, and police. This enhances the perverse incentives for officers to devise rationales to stop and search automobiles. It also helps explain a recent state supreme court ruling that upheld the confiscation of $144,000 from a motorist because the driver wasn?t able to offer what the court considered a credible explanation for the funds.

After Tina Beers was stopped for a suspected traffic violation, the officer conducted a search of her minivan because she appeared nervous. He found a large amount of cash that had been bundled in rubber bands and shrink wrap. He claimed that the method of packing the cash suggested that it was drug proceeds, and confiscated it.

The state Court of Appeal ruled that there was no probable cause to seize the cash. That ruling was overturned by the state supreme court.

No crime was committed, no charges were filed, there was no probable cause for the seizure -- but because the money was wrapped in a certain way, and the female driver was nervous in the presence of an armed tax-feeder, the highway robbers in uniform get to keep the cash.

Let us take back the liberty wherewith Christ has made us free.

LibertyMinute December 11 2012

An official document produced by the FBI and Department of Homeland Security describes photographers as potential terrorists. The ?Roll Call Release? of November 13 recounted several incidents in which innocent photographers were detained for using cameras in public facilities like airports and shopping malls. Those incidents were described as successes because they served ?awareness and training purposes? ? even though they had nothing to do with capturing terrorists or deterring terrorist acts.

A citizen activist inIndianapoliswho monitors police activity was told that his actions were suspicious and that he might be monitored by undercover police officers. Indianapolis Police Captain Chris Boomershine claimed that ?we have a lot of sovereign citizens that are targeting their officers? and that his department?s criminal intelligence unit will determine if the activist?s photojournalism constitutes ?a threat to law enforcement.?

While police are trained to treat cameras in civilian hands as lethal weapons, the government they serve keeps us under unceasing surveillance. [The Electronic Frontier Foundation recently obtained documents describing how the Pentagon is conducting missions in which full-sized Reaper drones are deployed over areas ofNevada,California, andUtah, using technology called ?Gorgon Stare? that can capture images of entire cities.]

In every totalitarian government, society operates like a one-way mirror.

Let us take back the liberty wherewith Christ has made us free. 

Will Grigg?s Liberty Minute

December 10, 2012

Under a little-known loophole in current law, the U.S. Treasury could solve the annual budget crisis by minting two one-trillion-dollar platinum coins for deposit at the Federal Reserve.

The Washington Post points out that this option has been endorsed by several well-respected mainstream economists.

Whatever the merits of this dubious proposal, it?s worth noting that none of its proponents are being treated as if they were terrorists. The same can?t be said of Bernard von Not Haus, the 68-year-old creator of the Liberty Dollar who awaits sentencing on counterfeiting charges. His supposed crime was to create a private currency made out of gold and silver, and to build a voluntary network of exchange that competed with the government?s fiat currency.

In other words: Not Haus was convicted of counterfeiting by offering legitimate private money that challenged the Federal Reserve?s officially sanctioned counterfeit. The FBI confiscated ? that is, stole ? millions of dollars in precious metals from the Liberty Dollar company, much of it freely paid for by customers nation-wide.

The U.S. Attorney who prosecuted Not Haus called him a ?domestic terrorist.? If that word retains any meaning it applies much better to the government that is persecuting Not Haus.

Let us take back the liberty wherewith Christ has made us free. 

Will Grigg?s Liberty Minute

December 7, 2012

U.S. Marines in Afghanistan?s Helmand Province saw what they thought was a group of insurgents planting improvised explosive devices. They called in an airstrike that killed all of the suspected guerillas ? only to find out later that three of them were children, aged 8, 10, and 12. The families of the dead children said that they had been gathering dried animal leavings, which are used as fuel.

The International Security Assistance Force in Kabul issued a statement acknowledging that the airstrike ?accidentally killed three innocent Afghan children.? That statement prompted Army Lt. Col. Marion Carrington to tell the Military Times that the children may not have been innocent.

According to Carrington, whose unit is training Afghan police, ?In addition to looking for military-age males, [we are] looking for children with potential hostile intent.?

Killing children in the name of military necessity is a fairly common tactic in Washington?s war on terror. Indeed, President Obama ordered a drone strike that killed 16-year-old U.S. citizen Abdulrahman al-Awlaki at a backyard barbecue. The teenager?s capital offense was to be the son of a man who had been killed in another drone strike a few days earlier.

Any war that involves targeting children is an affront to the laws of God and man ? and any government that does so is unworthy of the support of decent people.

Let us take back the liberty wherewith Christ has made us free. 

Will Grigg?s Liberty Minute

December 6, 2012

Following a murder-suicide involving NFL player Jovan Belcher, NBC sports commentator Bob Costas used the halftime segment of Sunday Night Football to offer a homily regarding the supposed wisdom of civilian disarmament. He insisted that ?handguns do not enhance our safety? and that if Belcher hadn?t possessed a gun, he and his victim would both be alive today.

Belcher?s victim was Kasandra Perkins, the mother of his child. During the weeks leading up to the murder-suicide, the couple had been arguing, and Perkins had announced her intention to leave the NFL star. For his part, Belcher had reportedly been using alcohol and painkillers to deal with severe head injuries received on the playing field. Thus it?s entirely reasonable to conclude that if Belcher had chosen an occupation that didn?t involve repetitive blunt force trauma to his skull, both he and Perkins would still be alive ? but Costas isn?t calling for the abolition of professional football.

Days before Belcher murdered Perkins, 13 police officers in East Cleveland, Ohio unleashed a 137-shot fusillade that resulted in the deaths of an unarmed male driver and his female passenger, who were apparently mistaken for criminal suspects. Why didn?t Costas ? or other gun-aversive celebrities ? react to that incident by calling for the disarmament of police?

Let us take back the liberty wherewith Christ has made us free. 

Will Grigg?s Liberty Minute

December 5, 2012

Michael Reichert is a professional liar and, therefore, a decorated police officer with theCollinsville,Illinois Police Department.

In April, Reichert, a K-9 officer who specializes in drug interdiction and seizures, was recognized as ?Officer of the Month? for what was described as his ?proactive and innovative philosophy of law enforcement.? His novel approach involves manufacturing evidence and lying under oath ? a fact recognized in multiple federal court rulings and Reichert?s brief termination in 2009 after he was put on a roster of police officers considered unsuitable to testify in court.

On December 4, 2011, Reichert stopped a vehicle driven by Terrence Huff, a filmmaker fromOhio who was returning to his home from a Star Trek convention. Using Reichert?s dashcam video, Huff made a short film documenting the tactics used by the officer to contrive probable cause for a vehicle search, and then lie about what he had found. Despite his best efforts to fabricate evidence, Reichert couldn?t invent a reason to arrest Huff and steal his car.

In a subsequent video deposition, Reichert has admitted to planting narcotics evidence on vehicles in motel parking lots near the interstate, supposedly as a training exercise.

This is the kind of criminal behavior that earns ?Officer of the Month? awards.

Let us take back the liberty wherewith Christ has made us free.

Will Grigg?s Liberty Minute

December 4, 2012

On one occasion recorded in the 22^nd chapter of the Book of Acts, the Apostle Paul, accused of disturbing the peace, was arrested by Roman occupation soldiers and taken to a local barracks to be interrogated under scourging.

As the interrogator was preparing to whip the apostle, Paul pointed out to the centurion in charge that it was illegal to flog a Roman citizen who had not been tried and convicted of a crime. This prompted the interrogator to desist immediately, and made the commander fearful that he could face criminal charges. As verse 29 points out, the commander was alarmed to realize that he had put a Roman citizen in chains.

Every day in this supposedly free country, police commit an act that was impermissible for their antecedents in imperial Rome: In the name of ?officer safety,? they handcuff American citizens who are not criminal suspects while conducting investigations. Police also routinely inflict summary punishment ? using batons, Tasers, pepper spray, or other means ? against those who resist being detained without cause. Within a few years police will have at their disposal handcuffs that can impart electrical shocks to detainees.

It?s a genuine pity that contemporaryAmericaisn?t as free as imperialRome.

Let us take back the liberty wherewith Christ has made us free. 

Political government is in the business of preventing solutions. It is an exercise in monetizing misery, and making problems profitable for politically connected interests.

This has been displayed to memorable effect by the response of the political class - and its enforcement arm - in the wake of Hurricane Sandy.

Since the storm, many residents of Rockaway Beach in Queens have been left without electricity, clean water, or suitable shelter. The retreating waters left many buildings infested with toxic mold that can have - and, for many residents, has had - severe health consequences, including acute respiratory difficulties.

Shortly after the storm, Mayor Michael Bloomberg visited the area for what he expected would be an adulatory photo-op. Instead, he was confronted by several residents who bluntly demanded that he explain why little if any relief had been provided.

During a return visit on November 29, Bloomberg was careful to limit his exposure by paying a brief, closed-door visit with the editorial staff of the local newspaper - after which he was whisked away to a helicopter by a phalanx of grim-faced police officers.

Rockaway Beach will recover through the help of the market and volunteer action - and at that point they can expect another visit from Bloomberg to take credit. That's what people of his ilk do.

Let us take back the liberty wherewith Christ has made us free.