How many federal crimes have you committed today?
You’re (Probably) a Federal Criminal:
While ubiquitous criminality has not undermined the criminal law’s moral force, it has changed the identity of those who make the law, in the practical sense. Since most people have committed at least one crime carrying serious consequences, police and prosecutors choose who’ll actually suffer for their crimes. Under the best of circumstances, most targets will be unlucky schmoes who happen to catch the prosecutors’ attention or people the prosecutors or the public think are particularly “bad.” At worst, a ubiquitous criminal law becomes a loaded gun in the hands of any malevolent prosecutor or aspiring tyrant.
It’s enough to make a libertarian out of you.
And thus the importance of SCOTUS decisions such as the recent one authored by Justice Neil Gorsuch in Sessions v. Dimaya.
Thank you, Neo, for the heads up about the very interesting article.
In the end this sort of thing doth not make libertarians but snipers.
More and more people are pointing this out these last few years i.e. we now have so many laws and regulations that practically every person in the country unwittingly, technically breaks one or more of these laws or regulations during the course of their daily lives.
Thus, if a prosecutor wants to, he can find something to charge each and every one of us with.
Along with this, you have things like the ambush* interview of Gen. Flynn that led to his prosecution.
Here’s how it apparently works.
You secretly gather information/testimony from multiple sources–witnesses, wiretaps, printed material, computer postings, etc.–about a set of facts, a situation, an action that someone has taken.
Then you interview the “target” and, if as is almost inevitable, something he says deviates from what your other sources have said, you don’t chalk it up to the normal forgetting of details that people are prone to, you charge him with deliberately lying.
* This was an “ambush” because the FBI agents involved–the lead Agent in charge apparently Trump Hater Peter Strozk–made it seem like they just wanted to come to his office in the White House to talk to Flynn, that this was a routine, innocuous meeting, and not an official interrogation.
Thus, they did not warn Flynn that he was under investigation, so that he could protect his rights by having his lawyer present to give him counsel.
Another aspect of this kind of malicious prosecution is that while the government has unlimited resources, an individual citizen usually has very limited resources. Thus, it has been reported that paying for his legal defense forced Gen. Flynn to sell his house (after, no doubt, using up all of his other financial resources).
Finally, it has also been reported that Federal prosecutors threatened Gen. Flynn that, if he didn’t agree to plead guilty, they would start to prosecute his son.
Does this kind of treatment seem fair to you? It sure doesn’t to me.
Due to what I view as malicious prosecution, Gen. Flynn’s reputation is shot, and his finances are in ruins.
Even if, say, President Trump eventually pardons Flynn, is there any way the Flynn can realistically put his life and career back together again?
Could, he, for instance, find some organization that would bankroll a lawsuit by him against the DOJ for malicious prosecution?
What, realistically speaking, are the chances of such a lawsuit succeeding?
Snow on Pine: As Mark Steyn has said, the process is the punishment.
Every new restraint they put upon liberty and every new injustice, brings closer the day when all that is left is “politics by ‘other’ means”…
They are willfully blind to the seeds they are sowing.
vanderleun Says:
April 20th, 2018 at 4:36 pm
In the end this sort of thing doth not make libertarians but snipers.
People said Trum’s election would do some harm to the Leftists. I didn’t find that persuasive. Real damage comes from the 3% guerilla fighters, which of course includes snipers like the ones used in DC.
Show me the man and i will show you the crime – Beria
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There is a bit of news on another general, General Davidson
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On another note the 888 billion kilo invisible gorilla has landed…
(A war is now unavoidable – the question is when – maybe this is why Kim can come to the table?)
This **** had 5+ years to really ferment (and stink)…
What if Nippon wants their lands back?
Possession is 9/10ths the law and I guess Japans 1/10th left isn’t worth diddly. The situation is quite a lot more complicated now… they are talking hyper-sonic weapons, breaking treaties, Laser weapons, kinetics.
Pacom Nominee: China Military Islands Now Control South China Sea
Snipers have their place, but other methods are also available. Read Unintended Consequences by John Ross. 😉
To paraphrase Cicero- justice is inversely proportional to the number of laws.
I have thought, for a long time, that there are just too many laws, some out dated by hundreds of years.
Every law should have a sunset time, ten years or so. If at the end it is a good law, renew it, if it dosen’t have the desired effect or is just no good, modify it or let it go away. This will also give the preening legislators something to do rather than pass volumes of new statutes.
There are just too much opportunity for selective prosecution, or even the Police using old, unused parts of the Code to harass and/or try to make people “behave”.
Brian Swisher Says:
April 20th, 2018 at 4:56 pm
Snow on Pine: As Mark Steyn has said, the process is the punishment.
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A lot of what Steyn has said is fast approaching “Gods of the Copy-book Headings” territory.
Romey Says:
April 20th, 2018 at 7:38 pm
I have thought, for a long time, that there are just too many laws, some out dated by hundreds of years.
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Sunset dates for laws, and rules for “mission accomplished or abandoned” should be a Constitutional requirement, IMO>
A lot of statutes do have to be renewed, but it’s almost automatic, although I remember some spirited Congressional fights over the details of some of them.
As with the kabuki over debt ceilings, and “Pay as you go” laws, Congress has no trouble ignoring what they don’t want to actually do, law or no law.
Most people who own a bit of land are very vulnerable to the environmental laws that have been passed in the last twenty years. Got a low spot that holds water for more than a day after a hard rain? Don’t fill it in. There are wetlands preservation laws now that can apply to just about any low spot anywhere. They may not come after the average home owner for filling in a depression in their lawn, but, the way the laws are written, they could.
I was a shareholder in an irrigation system that had been in operation for75 years. The enviros waged war on us. We won two rounds in court , but it was very costly. They are still trying to shut it down. I sold out so I’m out of the battle. But be warned about environmental laws. There are many no one has heard of.
Congress is partially immune to the laws they pass. Witness the national healthcare corruption debacle deal.
The laws of the USA are to keep the peasants, peons, and lower class citizens under control. The elites don’t need to worry about it: look at Epstein and Clinton and Kennedies.
NASA is sucking up about 30 ish million US dollars per day, btw. They haven’t gone to the moon again, but now think they can go to Mars. Meanwhile the Mars rover apparently can never run out of battery power sending back those jpegs. I guess that was the technology they destroyed when they tried to go back to the moon and could not, because the technology used in Apollo was destroyed by NASA, they claim.
The “government” is often some kind of money laundering scheme for the residents of District of Columbia.
Read Harvey Silvergate’s “Three Felonies A Day” for the full story.
Back in another lifetime, I worked in the financial sector (a low level ‘Management Trainee’). I was fresh out of college and what one might have called a Law Abiding Citizen: I had never had any interaction with police other than a friendly wave or perhaps stopping to ask directions.
The Justice System traditionally has some presumptions about me (and everyone else) ‘law abiding’:
“Ignorance of the law is now excuse.”
But I later (through frustration and boredom) became an Law Enforcement Officer (I will not name the small agency because it’s so small I would immediately ‘Out’ myself to anyone who cared to look).
I learned (from court appearances and execution of warrants) that Judges, while holding people to that standard of Zero Ignorance, aren’t held to it themselves. They have staff like clerks and court attorneys to do research for them, to keep them within the bounds of a legal system so overburdened by statutes that no individual, even one as supposedly wise and learned as a Judge, could keep it all straight.
This knowledge was the beginning of my personal change story, not just from Left to Right, but from naively “Law Abiding” to something closer to the end of the spectrum. Not an Anarchist (but sometimes, I can see the lure). I’ve definitely moved a few notches in that direction however.
And vanderleun is right about where this all headed. Not libertarians but snipers. And other 4G directions.
LB100 beat me to it, so I’d say for today I have probably only committed one felony.
But the day is young, and I have two more to go. Here’s an Amazon linky to the book LB100 mentions.
https://amzn.to/2K5KmiL
For instance, if I go out and mow my lawn, and there is a bald eagle feather out there and I roll over it and grind it into dust, I’ve committed probably two felonies: possession of the feather, and destruction of evidence of my possession.
You and your kids are walking in the woods and find an interesting feather or two.
Did you know that mere possession of an Eagle feather, and some other types of feathers as well, is a Federal crime? That, if you find such a feather, you can’t keep it. But, that the law requires that you must send that feather/feathers to the National Feather Repository that the Federal government has established.
Moreover, if the Feds want to push it, and you have one of those feathers in your possession, you could be looking at substantial fines, and even time in prison.
Just how many thousands of other such laws, that very few are aware of, are there on the books?
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J.J. Says:
April 20th, 2018 at 11:22 pm
Scott Pruitt is dismantling some of the EPA excesses such as this one — why else would the Left hate him so much more than just any random Conservative in the office?
Elected officials and their appointed bureaucrats, can half or sabotage the EPA’s transparently funded programs. But about their hidden and black funded projects? Once a government agency gets enough money, they can set up its own income shop and fund its own programs, even without notifying Congress. They just need an income or money laundering system.
The Drug whatever abc shop, gets money from running drugs and the CIA was also listed via Iran Contra and other shenanigans. All this money not only goes into people’s pockets, but it also funds certain projects that nobody at the elected level knows about.
So, it only appears like any elected official can dismantle the EPA and company.
There were subjects that Republican Eisenhower as President, was told that he lacked the clearance to know because he had no need to know as well. That’s the US President, btw, not some general.
Reagan said he didn’t know about Iran Contra. Obviously because he also didn’t have the need to know or clearance.
Even if the President tries to dismantle government programs, it won’t work. Because he would have to dismantle all the hidden programs that are funded without Congress or the President’s oversight first.
All of this reminds me of the quote from Dr. Ferris in Atlas Shrugged:
“Did you really think we want those laws observed?” said Dr. Ferris. “We want them to be broken. You’d better get it straight that it’s not a bunch of boy scouts you’re up against… We’re after power and we mean it… There’s no way to rule innocent men. The only power any government has is the power to crack down on criminals. Well, when there aren’t enough criminals one makes them. One declares so many things to be a crime that it becomes impossible for men to live without breaking laws. Who wants a nation of law-abiding citizens? What’s there in that for anyone? But just pass the kind of laws that can neither be observed nor enforced or objectively interpreted — and you create a nation of law-breakers — and then you cash in on guilt. Now that’s the system, Mr. Reardon, that’s the game, and once you understand it, you’ll be much easier to deal with.”
Ayn Rand wrote this in the ’50’s but we’re living it now.
Nice Atlas reference. I remember reading that book in a day or two.
FDR pretty much soft implemented much of what Ayn Rand warned about in her books. Minus the philosophical talk.
“Even if the President tries to dismantle government programs, it won’t work. Because he would have to dismantle all the hidden programs that are funded without Congress or the President’s oversight first.”
Anyone remember the “stimulus” funds sent to non-existent towns? IRS refunds sent in the dozens to the same address that doesn’t even have that many residences? Money “lost in the accounting” of the rebuilding of Iraq?
That’s before we get the pallets of cash shipped to Iran – we actually know about that one!
Aesop, starting to think like an FBI counter espionage agent ; )
Welcome to the fold.
Follow the money. Federal Reserve has the money. Where is the gold at Fort Knox. Even for mafia bosses like Al Capone, the money trail will get them sooner or later.
https://www.quora.com/Was-there-ever-an-explanation-for-the-missing-2-3-trillion-that-the-Pentagon-declared-the-day-before-9-11
Basically this would be like if Enron and Madoff had an account discrepancy and told the finance oversight board “oh, this isn’t due to embezzlement, this is just you know accounting software problems”. And they would be believed right? Well if they bribed Clinton, as Enron did, they were believed.
Operatives have a lot more “suspicious” of a mind set on this.