Fairlee, Vermont
Linda Hamilton - FBI Opens Investigation into Crimes & Corruption Surrounding Linda Hamilton Case: Linda comments on a conversation with Joe Tamarkin, an FBI agent based in Boston. My comment to her on this was:
I wouldn't put too much faith in the FBI. They are after all the organization that brought us Waco and Ruby Ridge. My guess is that there are more honest people in the FBI than in the BATF, but still, I doubt they're called dickheads for nothing. Remember, no FBI agent can arrest anyone. Only a federal marshall can do that.
James Langton of The Telegraph - Hillary faces prospect of Senate inquiry: Queen Hitlary is in trouble. Sweet! Hehe. [grabbe]
United States congressmen were intensifying investigations into whether presidential pardons that Bill Clinton issued before leaving office were bought for cash or political favours. Despite repeated denials of wrongdoing, Mrs Clinton risks being drawn deeper into the growing row, with the possibility that she could eventually face an internal investigation by her fellow senators who have the power to expel her in a simple majority vote.
There's a new issue of The Libertarian Enterprise, "Up With Civil Disobedience!"
- Letter from James Gholston: responses to commentary last week about the Browne/Hornberger food fight. I especially liked him comparing Hornberger to an "annoying horsefly", suing whom is much less important than suing the FEC to give a better chance to all third party candidates.
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Letter from Thomas L. Knapp: more Browne/Hornberger, but worth
reading for this idea:
At the presidential campaign level, we have always played by the rules of the major parties circa the late 20th century. We've had fundraising receptions, produced "mainstream-looking" commercials and infomercials, and tried to shoehorn our message into a form that appeals to the accepted voter blocs.
Hornberger's suggested campaign style is something different. He proposes to run a campaign that doesn't attempt to hide our principles, that takes them to the streets and puts them in front of people. That's a harder kind of campaign to run, but it's the kind that is necessary.
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Letter from Michael Kerner - Compares modern America to pre-WWII
Germany. First they demonized the jews. Then they confiscated their
guns. Then came the final solution. In Amerika, they're demonizing
drug users, gun owners, and defenders of the constitution. The drug
users are currently the worst off. There are 400,000 of them in jail,
for no real crime:
Can you conceive of these numbers. Four Hundred thousand people's lives ruined. Four Hundred thousand potentially productive individuals made useless and turned into a burden on the taxpayers for doing nothing that was anyone else's business. Four hundred thousand families made fatherless or motherless. Tens of thousands of police officers wasting their time arresting harmless people and empowering the worst people to make a fortune supplying them, when they could be spending their time on real crime. They even arrest sick people who desperately need marijuana as a medicine. They simply insist that it does not have medical uses in the face of overwhelming evidence that it does.
I am sure that as you read these words, a good number of you think that I am some sort of nut, or at least a drug user myself. How could anyone defend drug users? These are just the sort of feelings that ordinary German citizens had toward Jews and anyone that defended them in the 1930s, and with just as little justification.
...
My conclusion is that we have learned NOTHING from the Holocaust. We are following the same path to hell, just a little slower because two of our major constitutional protections are still somewhat in place, however shakily--Trial by Jury and the Right to keep and bear arms. When we lose either or both of those, it is GAME OVER. Then you will discover that all those laws that were passed to stop those evil drug dealers and gun owners will be used to destroy anyone who is not fully cooperative with Big Brother.
- Draconian net censorship push by Karen Dearne - The Aussies have a bill in congress that will allow police to fine folks up to $10,000 if they deem web site content to be unsuitable for minors. "Political censorship gone rampant."
There's a new article in The Libertarian series by Vin Suprynowicz:
- In two Nevada courtrooms, the good guys get their say - Ruby Valley rancher Cliff Gardner has to keep his cattle off of federal land, which may put him out of business, but at least the judge let him say his piece in court. Under the Klinton administration, he would likely have been jailed. Now he has a $1000 fine, suspended pending appeal, and the Forest Service has been commanded to meet with him. And secondly, the Institute of Justice argued for independent limousine operators, who are routinely denied licenses by the established firms because they might threaten their overpriced government-supported monopoly by charging less. A ruling is expected in six weeks.
