Tag: police state

Fight Erupts When City Takes Private Property for ‘Park’

A fight has erupted over a decision by the Long Island town of Southold to take private property that the owners of a chain of hardware stores bought for a new location.

The problem is that the town took the land against the wishes of the owners using eminent domain, but it had no legitimate reason for doing that.

According to officials at the Institute for Justice, that’s known because the city insisted it needed the land for a “park,” but that turned out to be a “passive park” with no cleanup, no improvements, and the remnants of an old home and greenhouse left there.

The IJ explained, ‘When every legal effort to stop someone from using their property has failed, can the government simply take the land using eminent domain? That is the question at the heart of a new U.S. Supreme Court petition filed by a family-owned hardware store business whose property was taken by a small Long Island town.”

It is the Brinkmann family whose members already have five Long Island stores and obtained the Southold property for another.

“The town did everything it could to stop construction. After failing to drive the Brinkmanns away by attempting to interfere with the Brinkmanns’ land purchase, then imposing an exorbitant fee for a market impact study that the town never performed after being paid, and even deploying a selectively enforced moratorium on building permits to stifle the Brinkmanns’ permit application; the town voted to take the land by eminent domain for a park,” the IJ said.

At the 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, the judges said, “the government can take your property for almost any reason at all—including because it just doesn’t like you—so long as the government lies about why it is using eminent domain,” explained IJ lawyer Jeff Redfern.

“This is a dangerous precedent, and the Supreme Court should take this opportunity to clarify that it is unconstitutional to use eminent domain in bad faith, simply to stop someone from making a lawful use of their property.”

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“We Have Met the Enemy and He Is Us”

The famous line “We have met the enemy and he is us” is from Walt Kelly’s comic strip, Pogo. Kelly adapted the line from a U.S. naval commandant who, during the War of 1812 against Great Britain, reported to his superior, “We have met the enemy and they are ours.” Kelly did the parody for the first Earth Day in 1970, a pro-state, antimarket, antihuman occasion.

More constructively, we can apply Kelly’s slogan to a bigger matter, namely, who’s to blame for the bad policies that representative democracy turns out? Is the culprit an elite group of politicians, bureaucrats, and Big Business/Big Labor cronies, that is, a ruling class that conspires against the public interest? Or is the culprit ” us,” or, more precisely, the voters?

Most libertarians, like most progressives, would reply “ruling class,” although David D. Friedman, a leading libertarian free-market anarchist, has been a major exception. (See The Machinery of Freedom: Guide to Radical Capitalism, 3rd ed., ch. 38, free online.) So too is economist and anarcho-capitalist Bryan Caplan.

Two important libertarian thinkers, Frédéric Bastiat (1801-1850) and Ludwig von Mises (1881-1973), also dissented from the common view that democracy is routinely hijacked. “One striking feature of the Bastiat-Mises view,” Caplan writes, “is that politicians are actually tightly constrained by public opinion. On their account, democratic competition keeps elected officials in line; if they deviate from majority preferences, they lose elections and their jobs.”

In his classic work The Law, Bastiat, the fantastic French classical-liberal political-economic essayist, pointed out that in a democracy with universal suffrage, the main potential threat to liberty and property would come not from a ruling elite but from the voters, who previously had no voice in the government.

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The UN Cybercrime Draft Convention is a Blank Check for Surveillance Abuses

The United Nations Ad Hoc Committee is just weeks away from finalizing a too-broad Cybercrime Draft Convention. This draft would normalize unchecked domestic surveillance and rampant government overreach, allowing serious human rights abuses around the world.

The latest draft of the convention—originally spearheaded by Russia but since then the subject of two and a half years of negotiations—still authorizes broad surveillance powers without robust safeguards and fails to spell out data protection principles essential to prevent government abuse of power.

As the August 9 finalization date approaches, Member States have a last chance to address the convention’s lack of safeguards: prior judicial authorization, transparency, user notification, independent oversight, and data protection principles such as transparency, minimization, notification to users, and purpose limitation. If left as is, it can and will be wielded as a tool for systemic rights violations.

Countries committed to human rights and the rule of law must unite to demand stronger data protection and human rights safeguards or reject the treaty altogether. These domestic surveillance powers are critical as they underpin international surveillance cooperation

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New York governor proposes face-mask ban to combat anti-Semitism

New York state’s Democratic Governor Kathy Hochul has proposed a legislative ban on face masks on the NYC subway system to combat acts of anti-Semitism, claiming criminals are concealing their identities using the face coverings.

Before the Covid-19 pandemic, New York had a law banning face masks in public. However, that rule was suspended in 2020 in light of the pandemic and the city’s authorities made face coverings mandatory for all subway riders until September 2022.

Speaking to reporters during a news conference in Albany on Thursday, Hochul stated that she was in talks with lawmakers over details of a bill once again banning masks, noting that the policy has to be clearly defined to include “common-sense exemptions” for the use of face masks for health, cultural or religious purposes. 

“We will not tolerate individuals using masks to evade responsibility for criminal or threatening behavior,” Hochul said, adding that her team is “working on a solution.”

The Mayor of New York City, Eric Adams, had also mentioned reviving some version of a mask ban and returning to the way things were before the pandemic, insisting that people should not be able to wear masks at protests.

Hochul explained that she was moved to propose the ban after receiving a report earlier this week about a group of people donning face masks that “took over a subway car, scaring riders and chanting things about Hitler and wiping out Jews.”

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The “Antisemitism Awareness Act” Poses A Real Danger To The First Amendment

Totalitarianism rarely shows its true face when it arises. Instead, it often pretends to stand for good and decent values. A new bill claims to fight antisemitism, something all decent people oppose. But antisemitism—that is, bias and discrimination against Jews because of their religion or ethnic identity—is already barred under civil rights law. The real goal of the so-called “Antisemitism Awareness Act” is to suppress free speech.

This dangerous bill was already passed by the House of Representatives and now awaits a Senate vote. It outsources some of our constitutional rights to an outside organization, the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance, whose arbitrary definition of antisemitism poses a threat to civil liberties. It could be used to crush legitimate debate about Israel, its policies, and American policies toward it—policies that have given rise to one of the greatest acts of genocide since the Holocaust.

This bill could suppress historical research and ban the mention of facts that have been verified by international organizations. It could initiate lawsuits, funding cuts, and disciplinary action across all American “education programs or activities, and for other purposes.” (Those “other purposes” are not defined.) Student protesters, professors, writers, and even elected officials could face political repression and become legal targets.

It turns the USA’s much-celebrated sense of liberty into a funhouse mirror, a grotesque and distorted reflection of everything this country claims to see in itself. Its passage would make a travesty of everything America’s leaders claim to believe in.

The implications are enormous. The federal government spends more than $100 billion per year on education, including $85.3 billion for kindergarten through high school, $24.6 billion in federal student aid assistance, and $1.3 billion in congressional earmarks for colleges (for projects that range from equipment purchases and airport runways to prison education programs). All these expenditures could be used as leverage to stifle legitimate debate.

Despite its “antisemitic” branding, the bill targets Jews as well as non-Jews. As literature professor Benjamin Balthasar writes, it would effectively ban the teaching of “much Jewish history and culture.” Balthasar observes that Hannah Arendt, Albert Einstein, Ed Asner, and “countless other Jews would now be considered ‘antisemitic’ under the new law.”

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Seattle To Allow Illegals To Join Police Department

The Seattle Police Department will turn to illegals in an attempt to address its manpower woes, according to Law Enforcement Today.

The city will take advantage of Senate Bill 6157, signed into law by Democrat Governor Jay Inslee, to allow it to recruit illegals with DACA or “dreamer” status.

Since “dreamers” are in the country illegally, they are not allowed to carry a firearm. But Biden’s ATF ruled that DACA recipients could carry weapons and possess ammunition as part of law-enforcement roles.

In Los Angeles, Police Chief Michael Moore changed department policy so that DACA recipients who are members of the police department could carry their weapons off-duty, buy reclassifying off-duty hours as part of the “performance of their official duties.”

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State Department Won’t Say If It’s Colluding With Big Tech To Censor Speech Ahead Of 2024 Election

The State Department is refusing to say whether it is communicating with Big Tech platforms to censor free speech online leading up to the 2024 election.

The agency’s silence on the matter came after The Federalist asked about a new working group launched by the United States and Poland on Monday that seeks to counter Russian “disinformation” about Moscow’s ongoing invasion of Ukraine. Called the “Ukraine Communications Group (UCG),” the body will involve the two aforementioned countries and representatives from NATO states, and work to “coordinate messaging, promote accurate reporting of Russia’s full-scale invasion, amplify Ukrainian voices, and expose Kremlin information manipulation.”

According to the Associated Press, James Rubin, the special envoy and coordinator for the State Department’s Global Engagement Center (GEC), was involved with and attended the UCG’s inaugural launch in Warsaw. As The Federalist’s Margot Cleveland previously explained, GEC “funded the development of censorship tools” that work to silence (primarily conservative) speech online and “used ‘government employees to act as sales reps pitching … censorship products to Big Tech.’”

Notably, Rubin and the GEC are named defendants in a lawsuit filed by The Federalist, The Daily Wire, and the state of Texas in December to stop the federal government’s censorship operations.

When pressed by The Federalist on whether the UCG or its participating members — including the State Department and GEC — will be collaborating with Big Tech and social media companies to censor what they deem to be “Russian disinformation,” a State Department spokesman claimed the working group “is a coordination mechanism between governments and will not involve collaboration with private technology companies or social media companies.”

“The UCG member states intend to work together to unify our communication efforts and ensure the world hears Ukraine’s story and never forgets the Kremlin’s ongoing efforts to wipe Ukraine off the map and subjugate its people,” the representative said.

However, when subsequently pressed on whether the State Department or GEC are collaborating or plan to collaborate with Big Tech and social media companies outside of their work with the UCG to counter so-called “disinformation,” the spokesman did not respond to The Federalist’s request for comment.

Meanwhile, the FBI confirmed to The Federalist last month it has resumed communications with social media platforms ahead of the 2024 election. The Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) — another wing of the government’s censorship-industrial complex — declined to comment when asked about its alleged resumed communications with Big Tech.

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Timely Lessons About Tyranny from the Father of the Constitution

Take alarm at the first experiment on our liberties.” — James Madison

James Madison, often referred to as the “Father of the Constitution,” once predicted that the Bill of Rights would become mere “parchment barrier,” words on paper ignored by successive generations of Americans.

How right he was.

Although Madison initially felt that the inclusion of a bill of rights in the originally ratified Constitution was unnecessary to its success, Thomas Jefferson persuaded him that “a bill of rights is what the people are entitled to against every government on earth, general or particular, & what no just government should refuse, or rest on inferences.”

The Bill of Rights drafted by Madison—the first ten amendments to the Constitution—was a document so revolutionary at the time that it would come to be viewed as the epitome of American liberty. The rights of the people reflected in those ten amendments encapsulated much of Madison’s views about government, the corrupting influence of power, and the need for safeguards against tyranny.

Madison’s writings speak volumes to the present constitutional crisis in the country.

Read them and weep.

“The accumulation of all powers, Legislative, Executive, and Judiciary, in the same hands, whether of one, a few, or many, and whether hereditary, self-appointed, or elective, may justly be pronounced the very definition of tyranny.” — James Madison

“The people are the only legitimate fountain of power, and it is from them that the constitutional charter, under which the several branches of government hold their power, is derived.” — James Madison

“If men were angels, no government would be necessary. If angels were to govern men, neither external nor internal controls on government would be necessary. In framing a government which is to be administered by men over men, the great difficulty lies in this: you must first enable the government to control the governed; and in the next place oblige it to control itself.” — James Madison

“A standing military force, with an overgrown Executive will not long be safe companions to liberty. The means of defence against foreign danger have been always the instruments of tyranny at home.” — James Madison

“Wherever the real power in a Government lies, there is the danger of oppression.” — James Madison

“Knowledge will forever govern ignorance: And a people who mean to be their own Governors, must arm themselves with the power which knowledge gives.” — James Madison

“I believe there are more instances of the abridgement of the freedom of the people by gradual and silent encroachments of those in power than by violent and sudden usurpations.”— James Madison

In the years since the founders laid their lives on the line to pursue the dream of individual freedom and self-government, big government has grown bigger and the rights of the citizenry have grown smaller.

However, there are certain principles—principles that every American should know—which undergird the American system of government and form the basis of our freedoms.

The following seven principles are a good starting point for understanding what free government is really all about.

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U.S. Department of Commerce Has Plan Already in Place to Digitize the Identities of all Americans Receiving ‘Public Benefits’

Federal ‘Guidelines’ have already been secretly adopted for a Digital ID program that will start off as ‘voluntary’ but only the most gullible Americans would believe that’s anything but temporary.

In the globalist drive toward the creation of a national digital ID for all Americans is well under way, and the first group of citizens to be coerced into accepting a digital ID will be those receiving public benefits of one type or another.

Government healthcare benefits, Veterans’ benefits, Social Security benefits, and of course low-income welfare programs of every type will all be fair game for digital IDs, and the U.S. government is already far down the road to adopting a strategy of digitizing all government-dependent citizens.

It all begins with a little-known program within the U.S. Department of Commerce.

I bet you didn’t know that the federal Commerce Department has a sub-agency called the National Institute of Standards and Technology, NIST for short, and that NIST has already adopted a set of “digital identity guidelines.”

These guidelines are ostensibly designed “to better support public-benefits programs.” Biometric Update reports that these programs assist beneficiaries with essential needs such as food, housing, and medical expenses, and then goes on to explain NIST’s role in digitizing all these government beneficiaries.

As is almost always the case, the federal agency has partners in the private sector to help it fulfill its mission of bringing in the technocratic/biometric beast system designed to replace people’s free will with government mandating every facet of their lives.

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Attorney General Garland Targets “Conspiracy Theories” After Launching “Election Threats Task Force” with FBI, Sparking Censorship Concerns

Some might see US Attorney General Merrick Garland getting quite involved in campaigning ahead of the November election – albeit indirectly so, as a public servant whose primary concern is supposedly how to keep Department of Justice (DoJ) staff “safe.”

And, in the process, he brings up “conspiracy theorists” branding them as undermining the judicial process in the US – because they dare question the validity of a particular judicial process that aimed at former President Trump.

In an opinion piece published by the Washington Post, Garland used one instance that saw a man convicted for threatening a local FBI office to draw blanket and dramatic conclusions that DoJ staff have never operated in a more dangerous environment, where “threats of violence have become routine.”

It all circles back to the election, and Garland makes little effort to present himself as neutral. Other than “conspiracy theories,” his definition of a threat are calls to defund the department that was responsible for going after the former president.

Ironically, while the tone of his op-ed and the topics and examples he chooses to demonstrate his own bias, Garland goes after those who claim that DoJ is politicized with the goal of influencing the election.

The attorney general goes on to quote “media reports” – he doesn’t say which, but one can assume those following the same political line – which are essentially (not his words) hyping up their audiences to expect more “threats.”

“Media reports indicate there is an ongoing effort to ramp up these attacks against the Justice Department, its work and its employees,” is how Garland put it.

And he pledged that, “we will not be intimidated” by these by-and-large nebulous “threats,” with the rhetoric at that point in the article ramped up to refer to this as, “attacks.”

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