Will Grigg?s Liberty Minute

February 1, 2011

As hundreds of thousands throng the streets of Cairo demanding an end to Hosni Mubarak?s rule, media pundits in America are earnestly discussing the question, ?Who lost Egypt?? That question assumes that Egypt would somehow be lost without the guidance of the brutal U.S.- supported dictator presently ruling that country. It also assumes that Egypt is somehow ours to lose in the first place.

Many worry that Mubarak may be replaced by a regime hostile to the United States. Owing to decades of unwise and unconstitutional meddling by Washington, this is a legitimate possibility. Further intervention would make that outcome more, rather than less, likely.

There are also concerns that the fall of Mubarak would have negative consequences for the Israeli government. This may be true, but the government in Washington has no moral or constitutional mandate to defend the interests of any foreign government, including the one in Israel.

As our Founders recognized, America is neither authorized nor qualified to run the world.

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

Will Grigg?s Liberty Minute

January 31, 2011

Writing in the Idaho Statesman, Professor David Gray Adler of the University of Idaho rebuked the state legislature for discussing the possibility of nullifying the patently unconstitutional Obamacare measure.

Adler describes nullification as ?a pillar of Southern resistance to the federal government,? intimating that it was a shield for racial bigotry. In fact, nullification was first embraced by abolitionists who refused to enforce the Fugitive Slave Act.

Adler admits that Thomas Jefferson endorsed nullification in 1798, but dismisses this because Jefferson ?was not a Framer of the Constitution.? Adler studiously omits mention of the fact that James Madison, the Constitution?s chief architect, co-wrote a nullification resolution with Jefferson.

Adler?s most remarkable assertion is that the states that wrested their independence from Great Britain and sent delegates to Philadelphia in 1787 are somehow ?creatures of the Constitution? they created.

Professor Gray claims to be an internationally recognized expert on the Constitution. On the available evidence he knows little about the document respects it even less.

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

Grigg?s Liberty Minute

January 28, 2011

Before the collapse of the Soviet Union, Russian comedian Yakov Smirnoff would wring laughter from American audiences by describing his homeland as the reverse of the U.S. A typical punchline would be: ?In America you can always find a party; in Russia, the Party always finds you.?

Perhaps the Los Angeles District Attorney?s office was inspired by Smirnoff when it charged 18-year-old Jeremy Marks with ?attempted lynching.? Marks was one of several high school students who witnessed an incident in which a female police officer beat and pepper-sprayed a 15-year-old boy who was smoking at a bus stop.

One student supposedly used a vulgar expression in urging the 15-year-old to fight back. Videos taken on the scene clearly demonstrate that Marks didn?t make that statement. Yet he was arrested and charged with ?attempted lynching.? He faces a three-year prison term for an offense he didn?t commit.

The Los Angeles DA wants us to believe that unarmed, frightened black teenagers lynch abusive police officers. Sadly, this isn?t a joke.

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

Will Grigg?s Liberty Minute

January 27, 2011

Six months ago, the FBI conducted a series of raids against the homes and businesses of people associated with left-leaning peace and labor organizations.

Despite the fact that this crackdown was described as a counter-terrorism operation, no arrests were made, and no criminal charges were filed. Whatever one thinks of the political opinions of those targeted by the raids, the operation has to be considered a heavy-handed act of repressive intimidation.

On January 25, peace activists in Memphis gathered at a Congregational Church to fill out Freedom of Information Act requests. Their intent was to learn if they were under FBI scrutiny as part of the nation-wide crack-down. While the meeting was underway, the FBI, elements of the local Joint Terrorism Task Force, and the Memphis PD?s SWAT team surrounded the church. When asked why this was done, a police commander on-scene made the implausible claim that this high-profile show of force was carried out to protect the activists.

Again we must ask: Who will protect us from our protectors?

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

Will Grigg?s Liberty Minute

January 26, 2011

Meadow Nickel died on the night she turned three months old. She suffocated while sleeping next to her father, Wyatt Grenough, who had been drinking. Meadow?s mother, Betsy, spent the night with friends after asking Wyatt not to drink. She later testified that on a previous occasion Wyatt, after drinking, had rolled on top of the child in bed.

An autopsy concluded that the death could have resulted from either positional asphyxia or sudden infant death syndrome. This would mean that Meadow?s death was either a tragic but preventable accident, or a simple tragedy. Prosecutor Ty Ketlinski insists that Wyatt was criminally reckless. If this is true, why isn?t the mother being prosecuted for culpable negligence for leaving the child at home when she knew this to be risky?

Samuel Johnson wrote: ?How small of all that human hearts endure, that part which laws or kings can cause or cure.? Although the fact is often obscured by a prosecutor?s professional vanity, some horrible human mistakes reside entirely within God?s jurisdiction.

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

Will Grigg?s Liberty Minute

January 21, 2011

Serious discussions are underway on Capitol Hill about the creation of a national agency to manage the impending bankruptcy of municipal and state governments. Predictably, the chief concern here is to preserve the salaries, benefits, and pensions of public employees.

In a state or municipal bankruptcy proceeding, public employee contracts would be subject to renegotiation. Unfunded public employee pensions would be treated as unsecured debts to be paid off for as little as pennies on the dollar.

Government employee unions are seeking to forestall this development by lobbying Congress to federalize management of their benefits through a Public Pension Funding Authority. A related proposal calls for federal legislation to regulate state government bankruptcies. None of this is necessary, since state governments can arrange bankruptcy settlements through their own courts.

Lew Rockwell of the Ludwig Von Mises Institute points out that ?as part of bankruptcy, taxes should be drastically lowered, bonds repudiated, pensions abolished, and employees fired.? This would be a painful process. But pain is an inevitable component of repentance.

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

Will Grigg?s Liberty Minute

January 20, 2011

On January 19, President Barack Obama took a brief break from his administration?s assault on what remains of the Bill of Rights to contemplate the sins of the Chinese government. Obama met in the White House with three Chinese activists to discuss, as one administration official put it, how "the arbitrary exercise of power is felt in the everyday lives of the Chinese people."

"One thing he kept coming back to was, how does the omnipresence of the state, how does corruption, affect the lives of real people," related the anonymous official. "And he asked how we should use our leverage.?

That is an interesting question. Since Washington continues to borrow vast sums from Beijing, the administration doesn?t have any economic leverage. And since the government ruling us engages in arbitrary detention, summary executions via drone strikes, torture, all-pervasive surveillance, military aggression, and massively corrupt public subsidy of favored corporate interests, it can?t exercise the leverage offered by a compelling moral example.

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

Will Grigg?s Liberty Minute

January 19, 2011

Now that he?s no longer California?s governor, Arnold Schwarzenegger can admit to suffering from a powerful, personality-distorting addiction: In an interview with an Austrian publication, the former governor admits that he became ?addicted? to power while in office.

Addiction is a terrible thing, a form of bondage to sin. Government facilitates and profits from addiction to gambling ? through state lotteries and licensed casinos ? to tobacco ? which is subsidized by federal price supports ? and to alcohol, which is licensed and taxed.

But government owes its existence to the fact that people can easily grow addicted to exercising power over others. This is easily the deadliest and most pernicious of all addictions.

Arnold Schwarzenegger claims that his political career cost him $70 million he could have made as a movie star. No alcoholic, cokehead, pothead, or meth user has ever squandered that much in the service of his addiction. And no mood-altering chemical has ever done as much damage as government routinely inflicts on the innocent.

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

Will Grigg?s Liberty Minute

January 18 2011

In a July 1990 diplomatic cable recently publicized by the WikiLeaks whistleblower group, then-U.S. ambassador to Iraq April Glaspie described a now infamous meeting with Saddam Hussein in which she told the dictator that the U.S. government would not intervene in Iraq?s dispute with Kuwait.

Iraq, Saddam insisted, ?was in serious financial difficulties? as a result of its war with Iran, which had been supported by Washington and its Arab allies. The Iraqi dictator accused Kuwait of being ungrateful and selfish by waging ?economic war? on Iraq by undercutting OPEC?s oil price targets. This dispute eventually led to Iraq?s attempted seizure of Kuwait?s oil assets.

Just a few days ago, , Saddam?s complaint was repackaged by Fox News commentator Sean Hannity only this time the problem is rising ? rather than falling ? oil prices.

Referring to Kuwait?s supposed ingratitude, Hannity fumed: ?You know, we have every right to go in there and frankly take all their oil and make them pay for [their] liberation."

Hannity would have made a splendid mouthpiece for Saddam Hussein.

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

Grigg?s Liberty Minute

January 14 2011

The epistle to the Galatians teaches us that God?s Law is summarized by the commandment, ?Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself.? The same chapter lists many of the virtues displayed by those who are in-dwelt by God?s Spirit, and observes that ?against such there is no law.?

Unfortunately, those in charge of the mechanism of misery called government frequently enact what they are pleased to call ?laws? intended to impede the exercise of charity. Witness the case of Houston residents Bobby and Amanda Herring, who have been told by the local municipal government that they will no longer be allowed to feed and care for the homeless without a license ? and that no such official permission is likely to be granted.

Every night for the past year, the couple has provided professional-quality meals for up to 120 people. The food was donated by local businesses and prepared in immaculate conditions. Yet this enterprise will be shut down because the couple isn?t part of the local government?s compassion cartel.

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