The Tyranny of Good Intentions
One regret, dear world,
That I am determined not to have
When I am lying on my deathbed
Is that
I did not kiss you enough.
(I Heard God Laughing - Renderings of Hafiz - Daniel Ladinsky)
Paul Craig Roberts at LewRockwell.com - From Blackstone to Bentham: Why Wrongful Conviction Is On The Rise - A summary of the death of justice in American courts. Courts used to protect people from tyranny. They have become a tool of tyranny. A good intro to The Tyranny of Good Intentions, a book that Mr. Roberts coauthored with Lawrence M. Stratton.
Withholding exculpatory evidence has become routine, and suborned perjury is often the only "evidence" in a case. Juries are unaware that in many cases the witness giving incriminating testimony is not only rehearsed in the role but also paid by the prosecutor with money or reduced prison time. In 1998 the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette summed up its investigative reports of prosecutorial misconduct: "Hundreds of times during the past 10 years, federal agents and prosecutors have pursued justice by breaking the law. They lied, hid evidence, distorted facts, engaged in cover-ups, paid for perjury and set up innocent people in a relentless effort to win indictments, guilty pleas and convictions. Rarely were these federal officials punished for their misconduct. . . . Perjury has become the coin of the realm in federal law enforcement. People's homes are invaded because of lies. People are arrested because of lies. People go to prison because of lies. People stay in prison because of lies, and bad guys go free because of lies." It casts doubt on the integrity of the entire criminal justice system when the limited resources of one newspaper are sufficient to expose hundreds of cases of criminal behavior by federal law enforcement officials.
Conservatives need to understand that the problem of corrupt justice goes deeper than law enforcement personnel and cannot be corrected by cleaning out the Clinton DOJ. The very concept of law that protects us from tyranny has been lost. No longer the people's shield, law has become a weapon in the hands of government. Justice is no longer a concern of the justice system.
Dennis Bernstein and Larry Everest at NarcoNews - "TRAFFIC" From Reel to Real - an "unabridged longer form of a review that appeared in the Boston Globe and the San Francisco Chronicle in late March". They think that Traffic was good, but it left out some important parts of the picture that would have been very embarrassing to the U.S. government. [grabbe]
cluebot.com - DOJ Anti-Child Porn Plan Regulates Digital Cameras: I was worried until I noticed the 4/1 date and "from the it's-that-day-of-the-year-again dept." Still, it's a bad idea to give the DOJ ideas like this. They might take it seriously. [grabbe]
There's a new issue of The Libertarian Enterprise, "Foo+l":
- Letters to the Editor - lots of responses to Susan's Libertarian beginner questions from last time.
-
Napsterama by L. Neil Smith - L. Neil learns the wonders of Napster
when a friend of his finds four out-of-print cuts from the Whiskey
Hills Singers that he hadn't heard in 20 years.
Here's the big one: do you check books out of public libraries? It may surprise you to learn that I've always detested libraries for the same reason musicians are supposed to detest Napster: people too cheap to pay for it still get access to my work for nothing. Yet Napster is regarded as some kind of sleazy bootleg operation, while libraries are the temples -- the very temples -- of Jeffersonian democracy.
Nonsense. Libraries are the Napsters of the 18th century. -
Surprise Complete in Theme Park Opening by Vin Suprynowicz - A
good April Fool's piece.
Messrs. Shalmy and Bible seemed to particularly enjoy the final segment of the Nuclearland train ride, in which patrons get to choose a raw steak or live lobster from a trackside tank, whereupon Chef Toshiro affixes the meal-to-be on a skewer outside the window of the rider's car. The train then proceeds through the eerie, blue-lit "Grotto of the Casks," emerging on the other side to disgorge its passengers at Picnicland, where Mr. Toshiro's tableside demonstration chefs quickly chop up the now-thoroughly-cooked entrees, much to the patrons' mouth-watering delight.
