Will Grigg?s Liberty Minute

February 16, 2011

Rafid Ahmed Alwan al-Janabi admits that he lied about Iraq?s alleged weapons of mass destruction, and that his lies were used in the service of a war in which more than 100,000 civilians have been killed. The Bush administration described Janabi as a ?hero in error,? and the Iraqi expatriate insists that his lies were an act of virtue.

After fleeing Iraq in 1995, Janabi acquired a well-earned reputation as a serial liar and con artist. So well-known was his propensity for falsehood that the CIA gave him the code name ?Curveball.? He knew nothing of importance about Iraq?s weapons programs. Nevertheless, his stories provided the basis for the dramatic allegations made by then-Secretary of State Colin Powell in his early 2003 UN Security Council presentation.

Janabi recently told the Guardian of London that he is ?comfortable? with the role he played in precipitating the war. His is the serenity of the sociopath, a trait he shares with Bush, Cheney, Rumsfeld, and the other war criminals who found Janabi useful.

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

Will Grigg?s Liberty Minute

February 15, 201

During a panel discussion in a recent installment of The McLaughlin Group, Fox News commentator Monica Crowley declared that ?the only Arab democracy that we currently have in the [Middle East] is the one built by the United States in Iraq.?

This sound-bite has been recited numerous times, typically by Republican-aligned pundits, since Hosni Mubarak was ousted from power in Egypt. Those who retail that talking point don?t examine their logic very carefully.

The Iraqi ?democracy? extolled by Crowley and her ilk has a national constitution ? written by the Bush administration ? that enthrones Sharia Law. Iraqi Christians who had endured Saddam?s dictatorship are being murdered or driven from their country.

Whatever may be the result of Egypt?s upheaval, it was led by people who don?t seek the establishment of Sharia, but rather an end to the 30-year state of emergency under military rule.

From the perspective of those who defend the war in Iraq, ?democracy? exists wherever we find a regime obedient to Washington ? even one that imposes Sharia law at gunpoint.

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

Will Grigg?s Liberty Minute

February 14, 2011

A political organization that conducts public purges and accuses dissidents of suffering from mental disorders is clearly a totalitarian cult. The so-called Young Americans for Freedom (or YAF) displayed that totalitarian mindset by purging Representative Ron Paul from its board ? just minutes after the Texas Republican had won the presidential straw poll at the Conservative Political Action Conference.

"Rep. Paul is clearly off his meds and must be purged from public office,? sneered YAF director Jordan Marks. ?YAF is starting the process by removing him from our national advisory board.?

Rep. Paul is seen as a heretic by YAF because of his opposition to the patently unconstitutional and economically destructive wars in Iraq, Afghanistan, and elsewhere.

Marks, a soft-handed Beltway lobbyist, accused Paul ? an Air Force veteran ? of something akin to ?treason? for his insistence that the military be used only in constitutionally appropriate wars of national defense. YAF?s version of conservatism requires allegiance to the military-industrial complex, not the U.S. Constitution.

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

Will Grigg?s Liberty Minute

February 10, 2011

Australian citizen Mamdouh Habib was abducted in Pakistan by bounty hunters. In Pakistan, Habib was tortured under CIA supervision; in one session he was hung by a ceiling hook and subjected to electric shocks until he bled from every bodily opening.

Habib was then sent by way of ?extraordinary rendition? to Egypt, where he was tortured for five months under the personal direction of Omar Suleiman, head of the Egyptian secret police and the country?s newly appointed vice president. Habib was beaten, shocked, immersed in water up to his nostrils, hung from metal hooks, and had several fingers broken. On one occasion, an interrogator ? seeking to wring a confession from Habib -- killed a shackled prisoner in front of him. This was done at Suleiman?s direction.

Like the dictator he will replace, Suleiman was trained by the Soviets. The thugs who carried out his orders, however, received their Soviet-style training in torture from the CIA and the FBI.

Once again we should ask: Which side really won the Cold War?

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

Will Grigg?s Liberty Minute

February 9, 2011

There is an Arab nation whose gross domestic product has grown consistently for the past thirty years, even as the percentage of its population in poverty has grown even faster.
Its military dictator has amassed a fortune estimated in the billions.

The military elite ? including the dictator and his second-in-command ? was trained by the Soviets. It has also received training and sophisticated missile technology from Communist North Korea. fill in words here To this day, the ruling dictator is on intimate terms with North Korea?s ruling Kim dynasty.

The head of the secret police in this Arab country was trained in the Soviet Union. He is one of the most notorious torturers in a region where that occupation is common. During one torture session he supervised, that thug offered to cut off the arm of a prisoner in order to please representatives of his regime?s chief foreign sponsor.

That Arab nation is not Iraq, Iran, Libya, or Syria. It is Egypt under Hosni Mubarak, the second-largest recipient of foreign aid from Washington.

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

Will Grigg?s Liberty Minute

February 8, 2011

Last December 17, a 26-year-old Tunisian produce stand owner named Mohammad Bouazizi committed suicide. Bouazizi, who lost his father at age three, managed to eke out a living as a street vendor. He was driven to fatal despair when a municipal police officer confiscated his merchandise.

The matter could have been cleared up if the officer had accepted the seven-dollar fine for operating an unlicensed merchant stand. But the sadist insisted on berating Bouazizi, slapping him, spitting in his face, and insulting his dead father. Heartsick with inconsolable despair, the young man set himself on fire. Public outrage over this incident grew into a revolt that eventually unseated the incumbent dictator.

Fortunately, Americans don?t face that kind of petty tyranny. If only that were the case. The government ruling us licenses, regulates, taxes, and harasses us in myriad ways. Someday, as our economic misery deepens, an official regulator or sadistic cop will push a helpless, honest man too far. That?s when things will get really interesting.

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

Will Grigg?s Liberty Minute

February 7, 2011

The reporters covering demonstrations in Cairo?s Liberation Square were among dozens who were arrested and detained by the regime?s secret police.

?Where are you taking us?? one asked a soldier, who replied: ?My heart goes out to you. I?m sorry.?

The journalists saw dozens of people, both Egyptian and westerners, handcuffed and blindfolded. The interrogator who subjected them to the display told them: ?We could be treating you a lot worse.?

From a nearby cell, the reporters heard dull whacks followed by screams of pain. They also caught snippets of a remarkable conversation:

?You are talking to journalists?? demanded the torturer. ?You are talking badly about your country?? The victim defiantly rebuked his tormentor: ?You are committing a sin. You are committing a sin.?

How many Americans ? of any religious background ? would display such determination in similar circumstances? How many American Christians understand that the civil government is under God?s law, and that officially sanctioned torture is a sin?

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

Grigg?s Liberty Minute

February 4, 2011

In early January, dozens of Egyptian Christians were killed, and scores were wounded, in attacks by Muslim terrorists. The prospect of additional attacks haunted Coptic believers as they prepared to celebrate Christmas, a holiday they observe in January.

Thousands of Egyptian Muslims volunteered to protect their Christian neighbors by attending Christmas celebrations to act as human shields against terrorists.

Later in the month, many Egyptian Christians and Muslims united in protests against the Mubarak regime. They also found themselves facing violent armed gangs that were organized by the government and protected by the police. As state-sponsored terrorism raged in the streets, Egyptian Christians joined hands to form a protective barricade while their Muslim neighbors prayed.

To paraphrase Paul?s observation from the tenth chapter of Romans, the zeal of Muslims toward God is not according to true knowledge.

But they are not beyond the reach of His Spirit. Rather than being zealous to send Muslims to hell, Christians should be eager to share with them how they can go to heaven.

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

Will Grigg?s Liberty Minute

February 3, 2011

The ongoing upheaval in Egypt offers a potent illustration of the fact that government police agencies are instruments of plunder, rather than protection -- and that protection of person and property is best handled privately.

When they weren't beating people in the streets or hauling them off to be murdered, plainclothes thugs from Egypt's Central Security Service brazenly looted private businesses or provided protection to looters. Much of the damage was done by deputized criminals, former prisoners who were released from jail by the Mubarak regime to act as subcontractors for the secret police.

Egyptians not employed in the coercive sector responded by creating private anti-looting patrols. Some western news correspondents, including CNN?s Anderson Cooper, were beaten by government security forces; others found safety in the company of private vigilante patrols. "I do not recall ever being so pleased to be surrounded by blade-wielding Arab vigilantes,? reported Graeme Wood of The Atlantic magazine.

Civilization is the product of the spontaneous cooperation of free people, not the imposition of ?order? by government.

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

Will Grigg?s Liberty Minute

February 2, 2011

Karen LeVert-Woitalla was baking cookies for her grandchildren when the police showed up. A few minutes later she was beaten and bloody, handcuffed and on her way to jail, where she would spend the next three days.

LeVert-Woitalla?s problems began when her daughter got into an argument with her boyfriend outside the house. A neighbor who overheard the argument called the police. Two Carver County deputies showed up and demanded to search the home. LaVert-Woitalla, who had a batch of cookies in the oven and was distracted by telephone calls, tried to accommodate the officers but eventually told them to leave.

Angered that the grandmother wasn?t properly submissive, the deputies assaulted her and abducted her at gunpoint, filing spurious charges of ?obstruction? and ?disorderly conduct.? The charges were dismissed when a judge ruled that the deputies had no legal authority to be in the home.

?I?ve always taught my children to respect police and go to them [for] help,? LaVert-Woitalla points out. ?I would never tell my granddaughter that now.?

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