Cop Haters Often Wrong

It is no secret here that I tend to be pretty hard on law-enforcement, from a lot of different angles. From a high political level, through the perspectives of sociology, and finally on down to zero tolerance for officer criminality. I am often accused of being a "cop-hater." But the truth is, I am not a cop-hater, even though the moniker does not really upset me much. What I hate is injustice. More to the point, I simply cannot abide hypocrisy, which our modern law-enforcement apparatus seems to be overflowing with.

From TSA agents being our friendly local social terrorist molesting people at airports and railway platforms, to cops who maim and murder the very people they are sworn to protect. One need look no further than our own police-state column to see the reality of the tyranny we now live under.

But this article is not about bad cops or bad laws.

Today I want to talk about the other side of the coin. I want to have a look at the genuine cop-haters. The folks who will, no matter what, always say that the cop is wrong. My friends, this is another hypocrisy I cannot abide. The cop is not always wrong. It does a disservice to those of us who are striving for genuine and positive changes, to pick at justifiable police activity as being some travesty of justice and abuse of authority. The reality is that the job of a police officer is a very difficult one. One that does include justified instances of all sorts of unsavory acts, up to and including the use of deadly force. Just because a cop shoots someone dead, does not mean that a murder has been committed.

I have seen instances in the past of people ripping on the police for simply doing their job. That is no more fair-play than a cop planting a joint in your glovebox.

What got me going on this subject today was the following pic and video which has been splashed across anti-law-enforcement blogs and Facebook pages.

I got completely suckered in by the caption. What is frightening of course, is that the performance of our police forces made this entirely plausible, and I started salivating about the prospect of posting yet another instance of a cop going berserk.

What I got instead though, was a dose of cop-haters going out of their way to be offended by a cop doing his job.

Let's have a look at the video now, before I comment further.




The video starts as the officer engages the suspect vehicle and initiates a traffic stop. The vehicle matches the description given by other motorists who reported a reckless and/or speeding driver. This is confirmed by the suspect himself in his own video description.

"...Pulled over for no reason except someone said I was swerving on the interstate a lil bit because i had broke the stick shift knob and was screwing it back on. Is this a legal traffic stop. I thought officers had to witness me committing a violation but not this case. Someone was pulling some road rage making up that I almost hit them when in fact they cut me off and I had to slam on my breaks because she limited my distance to stop..."

So right here he has admitted that he was indeed swerving. I don't care if he was screwing on a broken shift knob, texting, or getting his knob polished. If you are swerving in traffic, especially at high speed on an interstate, you are putting lives in danger. That is reckless.

Then, another motorist also complains that the subject was driving recklessly, but he claims to be the "victim" of road rage here, and that the second complainant (presumably the female in the video) had actually caused a hazard. I find that claim on his part to be dubious, especially considering other admissions on the part of the suspect.

Regardless, the officer had several complaints of an erratic vehicle. This certainly is enough probable cause to initiate a traffic stop. No, an officer does not have to see an offense in order to investigate a potential crime. (Note that the suspect was never charged with other highway infractions which were not committed in the presence of the officer.) You will also notice in the video, that the suspect vehicle has malfunctioning tail/brake lights, which is also probable cause for a traffic stop.

In short, the officer engages a suspect vehicle that was reportedly, and by later admission of the operator, driving erratically. The reasons were, of course, unknown to the officer and not justified by the suspect anyway.

The officer sees the suspect vehicle lurch forward, against a red light, but with another vehicle in front of the suspect vehicle blocking the path. The suspect tries to explain this by saying that "the light was about to turn green" but this may in fact be another traffic violation, as it is in many jurisdictions, to proceed against a stop light once stopped. That would be yet another point of probable cause, and a ticketable offense committed in the presence of the officer. At the very least, the officer would be right to see this as a sign of  anxious or aggressive driving. And for what reason, the officer had yet to determine. Was the suspect attempting to flee, was the vehicle in distress and unsafe for the roadway, or was the operator simply dangerously incompetant?

At that point the suspect vehicle chooses to proceed, rather than remain stopped. Again, by his own admission, the suspect had indeed seen the lights of the police car, was stopped, and chose to proceed anyway. That is a violation of the law. To generally paraphrase most traffic codes, you must stop and pull to the side if possible, when it is safe to do so. The suspect was stopped, there was no danger, and chose to proceed anyway.

"Yes I was stopped but he didn't say to stay there. Its always taught you pull over for emergency vehicles. How is this resisting I need to know? I had never been in trouble and any other time I had been pulled over I get yelled at to pull over to a safer spot. Well not this time."

His muddled self-justification is actually hard to interpret there. But right off the bat he makes a critical error in judgement. The officer most certainly did say to "stay there" through use of his warning beacons and siren. Not only did the suspect fail to yield, but also, willingly chose to proceed after acknowledging the police presence and lawful order to yield. Just because officers in the past had "always" yelled at him to pull over to a safer spot, that was not the case in this instance. The officer issued no such command.

Furthermore, it is hardly reasonable to move an almost completely disabled vehicle from a side street onto a main thoroughfare, as we saw was done in this video. I don't see that as reasonable even without the police presence, which is also something that the officer likely considered.

So at this point the officer sees a suspect vehicle that is stalling out repeatedly, has a broken taillight, is leaking fluid all over the ground, with a driver who has been driving erratically, aggressively proceeding against a red light, and then for some unknown reason chooses to proceed into heavy traffic rather than remain stopped on a side street. The motorist was actually creating a more dangerous situation, not moving to safer ground.

The officer, at this point, is reasonably jacked-up with all sorts of suspicion. Is the person drunk or high? Was the truck damaged from hitting another car or even a pedestrian perhaps? Is the driver simply woefully incompetent? Maybe in emotional distress, or having a medical problem such as a seizure or some sort of dementia? Even a diabetic episode? Is the truck blowing fluid all over the place because the suspect just beat the hell out of the motor fleeing from the scene of an axe murder at a daycare center? Who the hell knows? With all those questions and more, would you walk up to a vehicle like that with a fine "Howdy doo? What seems to be the trouble today?"

Hell no. I would pull my Glock and and give him a straight "what da fuck man?!"

And to break it down even further, ask yourself this. How often would you actually love to pull a Glock on some asshat driver and ask him that very question before you proceed to break his cellphone and knock out his high beams with a lug wrench? I have been tempted to do just that many times. Now imagine it is your job to actually stop that person, but you can't even give him so much as a Three-Stooges eye-poke? That you have to swallow your emotions, protect yourself from a possibly fatal encounter, and act professionally. That takes balls of steel and an almost inhuman sense of humility at the same time.

So to wrap this up here, like I said to start, I have a lot of beef with cops in general. From the laws that they enforce, to how they enforce them. But at the end of the day, fuck that job. Not for me man. I would crack someone in the head.

To my cop-hating buds out there, don't get it twisted my friends. A lot of assholery comes from the thin-blue-line. But don't believe the hype either. Propaganda works both ways. And to my police officer friends, this is for you you blue bastads! Lol. Gotta give you some props once in a while. 

And be safe on the roads all my friends. Don't be an asshat. Stay off the fuckin phone. No, you are not special, you cannot use the phone and drive, you are not superhuman. (And this goes for you cops out there too, exempt or not.)

Can You Use The Phone And Drive?


Here is the full video description by the self-desribed suspect in this matter:

Here is the in dash camera from a police officer in Lebanon, Indiana. While he was behind me at the stop light the truck kept dying because it was old and over heating from being on the interstate the radiator fluid was leaking out. I had borrowed this truck in Lafayette, Indiana and its been sometime since I had driven a clutch. The guy that let me borrow the truck told me it sometimes overheats. It needed a thermostat or something. I got charged Felony Resisting Law Enforcement with a motor vehicle. Is this justified. I pulled over in a safer spot outta of the middle of the road. I had no idea I was being stopped but I noticed during the stop light and waved my hand to signal okay I'll pull over. Yes I was stopped but he didn't say to stay there. Its always taught you pull over for emergency vehicles. How is this resisting I need to know? I had never been in trouble and any other time I had been pulled over I get yelled at to pull over to a safer spot. Well not this time. I need help because I was scared into taking the plea or I would lose the case my attorney Buchanan Law Office Inc: Buchanan Pamela said. She was appointed as my legal counsel since I couldn't afford an attorney. I waiting 1 year going to probation and I even filled to fire her but at court I in the last minute had been convinced by her that I was not going to do any different thru anyone else. Her husband is a Prosecutor for the Town Of Lebanon and I feel that this is all crap. This took place in Lebanon, Indiana. Pulled over for no reason except someone said I was swerving on the interstate a lil bit because i had broke the stick shift knob and was screwing it back on. Is this a legal traffic stop. I thought officers had to witness me committing a violation but not this case. Someone was pulling some road rage making up that I almost hit them when in fact they cut me off and I had to slam on my breaks because she limited my distance to stop. Is there any other options I can pursue to sue the law office or something I just wanted to get the process over with because 2 years was a long time for probation and I figured maybe she was right what do I know I have no other way of fighting it. NEED HELP. THIS IS KEEPING ME FROM HAVING A NORMAL LIFE I CANT GET A CAREER TO TAKE CARE OF MY WIFE AND KID. I AM SO FRUSTRATED WITH THIS.

This essay has been featured by CopBlock.org on their new "Welcome LEO's" page!



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Big-Brother Needs No Warrant to Put Surveillance Cameras on Private Property, Federal Court Rules

In a precedent-setting case, U.S. District Judge William Griesbach ruled that it was reasonable for DEA agents to enter private property without permission and without a warrant. Further, the judge adopted the recommendation of U.S. Magistrate Judge William Callahan that evidence collected by surveillance cameras, which were placed on the property by trespassing Federal agents, did not violate the Fourth Amendment rights of the defendants who now face life in prison for growing marijuana. The property in this case, was protected by a locked gate and marked with "no trespassing" notice signs.

"The Supreme Court has upheld the use of technology as a substitute for ordinary police surveillance," -Magistrate Callahan

There are actually two separate arguments to be made here. The first, is the Constitutional matter of the Fourth Amendment. The second would be to ask if the police have the right to vilate the law in order to enforce the law, which we will discuss below in a few moments.

Were the judge's wrong in stating that the rights of the defendant's had not been violated?

"The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized." -4th Amendment

Debatable, but the Amendment does not specify property, other than to say "effects" which is also defined as moveable property. Land is not moveable (though it is transferable.) This interpretation is more than likely they basis of  a 1984 Supreme Court case called Oliver v. United States, in which a majority of the justices said that "open fields" could be searched without warrants because they're not covered by the Fourth Amendment.

On the other hand, the word "houses" can be interpreted to include land in the common area immediately surrounding a home, any enclosed area of property adjoining a habitated building, and so forth. This is referred to as curtilage.

The word house is defined as: A structure serving as a dwelling for one or more persons, especially for a family.

In other words, once a fence is put up, the land could certainly be considered as part of the structure of the house and no longer an "open field." Again, in this particular case, the property was protected by a locked gate and signs notifying potential transgressors that they would be guilty of trespassing, should they cross the marked boundary.

So now we see that this land could indeed fall under the purview of the Fourth Amendment, through the word "house" if the enclosed property is a part of the dwelling of the property owner. Other examples might include your enclosed porch, a garage, a carport, a barn, and so forth.

The second argument to be noted here, is the fact that the Federal agents committed a crime in order to gather their evidence, and that the evidence was obtained as a direct result of that criminal act. Can police break the law in order to enforce the law? In many instances, the answer is an unfortunate yes.

Breaking the Law to Enforce It: Undercover Police Participation in Crime

However, in these cases, the breaking of the law is given special permission by operational commanders and may be specified by a court in individual cases or through "affirmative defense" clauses written in at the time a law is adopted. Statutory protections for law-enforcement are in place for run-of-the-mill police work, such as when a police officer makes a drug-buy from a criminal, and the drugs are turned over immediately as evidence, rather than taken home by the officer for personal use.Deception is permissible and cannot itself be said to be a violation of law.

Other more questionable but often approved activity might be deemed as necessary as part of peripheral concerns in an ongoing operation. An example of this might be when a narcotics officer operating in an undercover capacity is forced to ingest narcotics in order to maintain operational integrity and even his own personal safety.

While arguments could be made for or against these sanctioned violations of law by government agents, one place where we should certainly draw the line is when evidence is obtained through a direct violation of law. An extreme example of this might be to have a police officer carry out a killing at the behest of a mafia boss, in order to bring a murder-by-proxy charge against that mafia boss. Another example might be that a police officer can't buy a joint from a drug dealer, smoke it, and then arrest the drug dealer for selling him the joint. Yet nother example might be in a case where a police officer assaults a person in order to glean information. It is not and should not be allowed.
 
In essence, that is what we have here in this case though. Even if the defendants' Fourth Amendment rights were not violated the police still committed a criminal act against the property owner, in order to gather their information, and said information is a direct result of that violation. This is an important distinction. The police did not just violate a law, like maybe smoking a joint in order to get more information, they committed an act directly against the law in place to protect a citizen property owner.

If the police surveillance had been done from outside of the property and looking in, there might still be grounds for a Fourth Amendment defense. Do police need a warrant to use a telephoto lens to peer into the windows of your home? Do police need a warrant to fly overhead and take a heat-signature snapshot of your home and it's contents? Maybe, maybe not. Such evidence might be allowed or thrown out on a case by case basis.

But in this instance, we are talking about government agents actually breaking the law, not simply pushing back the boundaries of their legal purview to conduct a search. They did indeed knowingly pass onto private property. That is a violation of trespass law. The violation is elevated to a criminal trespass because the property was fenced. In some states, trespassing while armed is a felony, and it is more than likely that they were carrying firearms. The property owner might also be able to show that the placement of the surveillance equipment did damage to his property, which would constitute an additional charge of criminal mischief. Often too, each of these charges may be elevated when each act is committed while in the commission of another crime. In other words, their violation of law is no small thing, and if you as a civilian were to commit such an act, you would likely spend years in prison and be sued for extensive civil liability as well.

All in all, there is one final question you should ask yourself. Why should police and government agents have this power? Why didn't they just go get a warrant in the first place? The simple but scary answer is because the government is now setting the precedent that your private property is no longer private. That with or without cause, they can come onto your property and do whatever they want. Sounds like Communism to me, not the America I was raised to believe in.

How do you define police-state?

Court OKs warrantless use of hidden surveillance cameras- In latest case to test how technological developments alter Americans' privacy, federal court sides with Justice Department on police use of concealed surveillance cameras on private property.











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Local Paper Helps Spread Paranoia and Fear

Now, I am not going to say that people should not be aware of their surroundings and take precautions when something doesn't seem right, but when we have a newspaper raising the public alarm over nothing it's quite telling as to the state of mind the powers-that-be want to instill in society.

Of course, there will be those that say I am just being paranoid, that the mainstream media doesn't actually try to brainwash their customers, but ask yourself something. What makes this first article a truly newsworthy story? People see "suspicious" things every day. What makes this particular story a news event so important as to put the Hudson Valley on alert? The fear of a bald black man, preying on a (presumably white) teenage female student?

Of course, this whole thing is only one little blip on the radar. One minor story that no one will remember, but is still another example of the brainwashing our society undergoes every single day.

Town police investigates suspicious man

The Town of Poughkeepsie police are investigating a complaint of a suspicious male following a female student, police said.

The police received a complaint Tuesday at approximately 4:30 p.m. in the area of Autumn Drive in the Vassar Oaks development.

A teenage female student reported being followed by a bald, black, clean-shaven man in his mid-30s after getting off the school bus. He was driving a newer model, four-door sedan, possibly a Chevrolet, police said.

Police encourages residents to notify authorities if there is a suspicious person or vehicle in their neighborhood. Anyone with information on this case can call police at 845-485-3666 or leave a tip at townpolice.net.

(I don't claim to be some expert on the English language, but you would think that a newspaper would have writers and editors who are. Now maybe I'm wrong here, but that headline doesn't look like proper English. They should have dropped the "s" from "investigates." Town police are a plural, whereas the town police department is a singular. Just nitpicking here of course, but just another example of the fast junk-food flavor our mainstream news sources have taken on.)

All in all though, it was awfully nice of thePoughkeepsie Journal to print a retraction of sorts, with the following blurb.

Suspicious man just practicing for his road test, police say

An earlier report of a suspicious man in the Town of Poughkeepsie has been dropped, police said.

The vehicle was spotted again Monday, but it was revealed the man was a resident practicing for his driving test and no criminal conduct was involved, police said.

The complaint was reported in the Poughkeepsie Journal on Oct. 18.

Technically, the Poughkeepsie Journal, the most widely circulated newspaper in the mid-Hudson region of NY State did only actually report the facts. So there is no issue of libel or anything like that. What we are seeing here is more a matter of ethics, and professionalism. Why would such a mundane police report be elevated, by this newspaper, to the level of a public broadcast alert? Especially considering the resolution of the police investigation.

Not to mention the fact that some poor guy who was just out there practicing for his driving test wound up being the target of an intense police investigation.

Is it any wonder that a black man often says things like "Damn, can't a brotha even drive down the street without being harassed by the po-po?!" 

This dude didn't do anything wrong, just out there using a public street like everyone out there has the right to do. And suddenly he is the target of a police investigation and general insinuations by a major newspaper.

I hate to throw the race card out there, because there are an awful lot of white folk who are targeted for bullshit reasons too. But damn, can't a brotha ever catch a break?

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US Court Rules Paying Cash is Probable Cause for Detainment

"The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized." ~Amendment IV, U.S. Constitution


The dispute in this case stems from a suit filed by motorists who were detained after paying with cash on Florida toll highways. While the details may leave one with the impression that this is "no big deal," it is important to understand that this ruling by the US Court of Appeals has far-reaching implications and virtually nullifies the 4th Amendment.

This lawsuit, filed last year by a family of motorists and on behalf of all freedom-loving motorists, claimed that they were effectively held hostage by the Florida Department of Transportation (FDOT) and private contractor Fanueil, Inc. after paying their toll in cash. According to FDOT policy in place at the time, motorists were randomly detained for paying in "large denomination bill" as small as $5. Toll collectors would not let the motorist proceed until a "Bill Detection Report"  was completed, recording information about the vehicle and personal information from the motorist's Driver License.

Some have claimed that this detainment policy was actually a harassment technique, in order to punish drivers who refused to purchase the SunPass transponder. The device is used to collect tolls digitally, through a bank account linked to the device.

The benefit of these devices, which are in use by states nationwide, is an ease in congestion at toll-booth choke-points. The driver only has to slow down, rather than stop and complete a transaction manually, as they pass through the toll plaza. These systems are also thought to save the driver money, with a discounted rate on tolls. That is not always the case though. as erroneous ticketing and other glitches can actually leave the motorist paying significantly more.

The more prevalent drawback, for anyone who values their privacy, is that the government and private companies alike are compiling a profile of your personal driving habits. How that data is used, and who it can be shared with, is not exactly clear. It has become an urban myth that states are issuing speeding tickets by simply calculating the time between toll booths and sending you a ticket in the mail, but that data is recorded nonetheless, meaning that they could do this even if they aren't yet. Taking it a step further, it is not unreasonable to suggest that perhaps a private company running a toll road might not share that data, with say, your insurance company.

We do know that this information has been turned over to courts in non-criminal matters, such as divorce proceedings and other civil lawsuits. That is not speculative. This means that this data may be used against you, by someone who is suing you, aside from any criminal implications or traffic infractions. Attempting to protect one's privacy by refusing the digital device and paying cash instead, was made moot by these "Bill Detection Reports" which documented at least as much, if not more information about the vehicle and driver passing through the checkpoint.

Then again, you might just be a driver from out of state, who has little choice but to pay in cash. Of course, out of state drivers are also of keen interest to law-enforcement and agencies like Homeland Security. (Video) Suffice to say, there could be any number of reasonable reasons why a motorist might be paying cash at a toll booth, other than being a terrorist..

Is The E-ZPass Box A Trojan Horse For Privacy Invasions?

CBS 2 Investigates: Living Through An E-ZPass Nightmare


Nonetheless, none of those reasons are suffice to protect your 4th Amendment rights against illegal search and seizure, according to Wednesday's ruling.

"The fact that a person is not free to leave on his own terms at a given moment, however, does not, by itself, mean that the person has been 'seized' within the meaning of the Fourth Amendment," the court wrote in its unsigned decision. 

Wait, WHAT?! 

As it pertains to persons, rather than property, lawyers.com defines "seize" as follows:

 "to detain (a person) in such circumstances as would lead a reasonable person to believe that he or she was not free to leave"

These motorists were blockaded from proceeding, even after they had paid their toll. They were not free to leave. There was no sign when entering the toll road, warning them that they might be detained for reasons other than paying a toll, and thereby invoking an implied consent, by proceeding onto the tollway. Nor was their a policy sign stating that any denomination of US currency was not an acceptable form of payment. Indeed, the toll-takers did accept the bills, but only while detaining the motorist and demanding personal information.

It is important too to keep in mind, that these toll agents are not sworn police officers, but employees of a private company. Nor is any crime alleged, which might trigger a lawful state of arrest. Without an allegation that a crime has been committed, or a court order, there is no lawful basis by which to detain any person. It seems clear, that the FDOT, the private company, and the individual toll-takers themselves might actually be guilty of a crime, namely False Imprisonment, as defined in Statute 787.02 of the Florida Penal Code.

The term “false imprisonment” means forcibly, by threat, or secretly confining, abducting, imprisoning, or restraining another person without lawful authority and against her or his will. A person who commits the offense of false imprisonment is guilty of a felony of the third degree

By keeping the gate down, they did use force directly, and with threat of force from police should they proceed, in order to imprison and/or detain those motorists against their will. Is any private agent now a "lawful authority" qualified to detain another person for any reason, so long as it is a matter of "regulation?" According to this decision, the answer is now yes. It can now be written into public codes, that you do not have Constitutional rights.

"In Florida, a person's right and liberty to use a highway is not absolute; it may be regulated in the public interest through reasonable and reasonably executed regulations," the ruling of the panel continued.

In other words, you have no Constitutional rights when you "choose" to drive on a highway. So long as it is in the public interest, or seen to be in the public interest, regulations supersede your Constitutional liberty. Not only can your rights be written off by some public code that you never heard of before, but that code can also be enforced randomly, at the personal discrimination of the agents enforcing said codes.

The "Bill Detection Report" was not filed for all cash-paying motorists, or even for all motorists paying in specific denominations such as $100's or $50's. Instead, these toll-takers had free-reign to discriminate against any motorist they chose who did not use a digital payment device, and to detain them against their will, for an indeterminate amount of time, ostensibly to fill out this report.

Detaining these motorists really is the critical factor here too. It's not as if the toll-agent was simply reviewing a videotape, to record the vehicle information and license-plate details on travelers who had paid the toll in cash. The agent physically detained these motorists, and demanded personal information from them, in order to fill out the report, before they were allowed to proceed. The concept of "probable cause" has been reduced to something as trivial and non-criminal as paying a debt/fee with cash. A presumption of guilt as these agents hold motorists against their will while seizing personal information without a warrant.

"The Chandlers (Plaintiff's) have not alleged that they were forced to pay their tolls with large-denomination bills, thereby subjecting themselves to whatever delay was caused by completion of the Bill Detection Report," the court ruled. "They chose to pay their toll with large-denomination bills. Nor have they alleged that they asked to withdraw the large report-triggering bill in favor of a smaller delay-free bill and were denied that opportunity." 

Talk about putting the cart in front of the horse. The judge's seem to be collectively ignoring the gorilla in the room to focus on semantics. What difference does it make what denomination the Chandler's paid with?! It's not as if they were paying with a check that needed to be verified by a bank, and it's not as if there was any allegation the cash might be counterfeit. By what right does one private citizen (privately contracted toll-taker) have the right to detain another private citizen (motorist) simply because of the denomination of the cash in their pocket? If such a right cannot be specified, then this case should have absolutely been decided in favor of the motorists.

The Constitution specifies nothing about cash denominations or the authority of a toll-taker. It makes no difference whatsoever whether or not the Chandlers were "forced" to pay their tolls in large denomination bills. In fact, the 4th Amendment specifies that this right "shall not be violated" and then lists the only very specific exceptions. No public code or ongoing private enterprise is listed there among the causes for a search and seizure of any kind, much less imprisoning another citizen, however briefly. Even if the toll-collector themselves were required to make documentation of a cash payment, there is still no right prescribed by which to detain a person while they perform that task.

Furthermore, there is no "bargaining clause" in the Constitution by which the Chandlers might have been obligated to bargain for their freedom by offering to pay with a lower denomination. Nor were they informed what denominations would trigger such a "delay" as the judges term it. In fact, as we have already seen, the trigger was not even the bill itself, but rather the personal discretion of the toll-collector or some other unspecified arbitrary directive. Paying with cash was not in fact the trigger, as many motorists, even paying with large bills, were not detained.  The onus is not on the plaintiff to specify why they were detained, only to show that they were in fact seized and interrogate, without a warrant or probable cause specific to their person(s).

Let us imagine for a moment, that you pump $10 worth of gas into your car on your way to work, and you go into the gas station to pay the attendant with a $20 bill. Now imagine for a moment that the clerk says "Sorry, I can't let you back out of the store until I fill out this form. You will also have to provide me with your personal information so that I can include it on the form. You are not free to leave until you comply, and the form is completed." He then proceeds to roll down the security gate, barring you from leaving. You then stand there waiting for another ten minutes while the clerk wrestles around the back room trying to find the box of forms. You watch as other customers, also paying with $20 bills come and go. Finally, after submitting your private info and the clerk takes his own sweet time filling out the form, you are released to go and explain to your own boss why you are late for your shift. Does this sound reasonable? Certainly not. Yet this is what has just been made "legal" and justified by this ludicrous decision.

Worse, it also means that from now on, probable cause is no longer based upon you specifically as a citizen, but as a blanket which can be applied arbitrarily, any place, any time, and for any reason. Probable cause does not even require the allegation of a crime anymore. For all intents and purposes, with this ruling, there is nothing stopping a state from writing a law that says police no longer need a warrant to come into your home if you use cash, or for any other non-criminal reason. Or even a private security guard for that matter. A town could pass a law which says that a store employee can hold you in their store, for as long as they want, while filling out some form or another. Or perhaps can even come into your home without a warrant, to document its contents in order to check against their own inventory of recently stolen goods perhaps. What is to stop a mall security guard from holding you in the security office, after a store clerk reports that you paid for your lunch with a $100 bill?

Now these examples may sound ridiculous, but no more ridiculous than this ruling is, because this is effectively what these judges have decided. That the 4th Amendment no longer applies to anyone unless it serves the public interest and does not violate any other code.

PDF file of the court's decision

This is not the only assault against the 4th Amendment either, in Florida specifically, revealing a pattern of efforts to eviscerate this portion of our Constitution. Read under the "Constitutionality" argument in this article:

Why Drug Testing of Welfare Recipients is a Bad Idea 

You might also like to read:

Arbitrary Arrests and the Rule of Law

America is dead, long live America.

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Another Useless 'Amber-Alert' Jolts Public

As with so many of these "novelty" public warning systems put into action by "feel-good" legislation, the Amber-Alert system seems to be an utter failure.

On the surface, it seems like it might be a good idea. But on a practical level, one sees that this system has done more harm than good. A system of  "crying wolf" meant to make people feel safe, but at the same time, putting the public on edge frequently, without true cause. We don't usually hear if the missing child has ever been found all, or how the alert was finally resolved. Instead, we get a bunch of quick headlines on the news ticker, a flash on the highway traffic sign, and our Facebook walls are inundated for a day. But we never hear how things wound up.

Which is probably because, in most cases, these alerts are activated of a custody dispute, not a genuine abdusction.

But I thought this one was different. So I jumped on the public-concern bandwagon and posted about how a little girl was abducted right off the street, kicking and screaming, by two men in a truck. It sounded to me like this might be the genuine article, or the sort of case this alert system was really meant for.

As it turns out, the police can't tell when a few kids on a playground are lying and would rather create public panic rather than reach a proper investigative conclusion before crying wolf and getting the public all riled up for nothing.

According to Mid-Hudson News:

NEWBURGH – City Police in Newburgh have examined the South Junior High surveillance videos along with street camera video and footage from privately owned surveillance systems in the area of Monument Street where a five-year-old girl was reported abducted Wednesday by two men and have determined there is no indication that the abduction or any incident that could be perceived as an abduction had occurred.

There was no pickup truck, other vehicle or small child during the time of the reported incident, police said Thursday. The children who reported the supposed incident were observed on the video playing around the school without incident.

Police have not received any missing person reports and have determined the incident did not occur and have closed the investigation.

After the neighborhood children reported the incident, police issued an Amber Alert looking for two men in a pickup truck with green writing on it. The girl purportedly abducted was said to be wearing a pink shirt at the time.

One really begins to wonder why we even have programs like this in place at all. "Boutique" laws and systems named after some poor child who died in a horrific manner, and is brought back from the dead to make a cameo appearance every time the government wants to jolt the public into submission and soak us for even more dollars for inflated police budgets.

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Judge Finds Jail Not Appropriate for Voyeur Who Spied on Child

Dutchess County, NY - A 50-year old former Catholic high school teacher has been found guilty of spying on a 13-year old girl for his own sexual gratification. The man had placed a hidden camera in the bedroom of the young teen, who was the daughter of his live-in girlfriend. The woman contacted police when she discovered the pen-camera, and the man was arrested in November of 2011.

The Poughkeepsie Journal reports...

"Judge Stephen L. Greller found that jail was inappropriate because McCoy failed to grasp the impact his actions had on the victim."

Wait, what? Is that a typo, or are they really telling us that a judge believes a criminal does not belong in jail because that person doesn't understand the impact of their crime on the victim? Or maybe just doesn't even care?

To be intellectually honest here, there is the principal of mens rea, which basically tells us that a person cannot be guilty of a crime unless they understand that their actions were indeed criminal. This is how we sometimes see that a person is not guilty be reason of mental default, the old "insanity defense" so to speak. I don't dispute the validity of this measure of criminal liability. This principal is also how we distinguish, in cases of a homicide, between murder and manslaughter, as another example. Between a person who intentionally kills another person, as opposed to a person that didn't know they were going to kill someone, but should have known that their actions might get someone killed unintentionally.

But we are not talking about guilt or not here. This deviant's mind is clearly aware that what he was doing was both wrong, and a crime, hence the conviction. I ask, what relevance is it then that this man does not recognize the gravity of his crime? Either he is not guilty at all, under the principal of mens rea, or he should be sentenced according to the standard measures by which this crime would be sentenced. Things like his history, character, remorsefulness, whatever judges normally use to sentence a convict, including the impact the crime has had on the victim. The actual impact, often clarified at sentencing through victim impact statements, not by what the perpetrator believes the impact was.

To look at this another way, let us suppose that a man rapes a prostitute. Should he get off with no prison time, simply because he believes raping a hooker is no big deal? Or what about a murderer? Let's say one gang-banger who kills another? Is the crime any less serious because the killer believes it is not serious? Or what about a full-blown child molester pedophile, who believes that his victim actually "wanted it" and doesn't see the true impact of their crime?

The standard applied in this case is completely absurd, and frankly, it sounds like cronyism to me. Favoritism shown to this man because he spent years as a schoolteacher rather than as a cab driver, or some-such. It seems that a bias of some sort is the real justification for the light sentence applied.

And truth be told, that is the only issue I am really addressing here. The absurdity of the court's statement, not even the actual sentence itself, which I do find reasonable actually. The man was found guilty of Unlawful Surveillance in the Second Degree, which is a Class E felony violation of NYS Penal Code 250.45
.
He was sentenced to 4 months in jail, ten years of probation, and fined $1,425. Again, the sentence itself does not sound unreasonable to me if this is a first offense. On the other hand, the lack of remorse does seem to allude to the likelihood of recidivism too. It is also very alarming that the victim was a minor. Finally, why wasn't he charged with a felony count for each and every instance he observed the girl, rather than just for one count of deploying the device and watching the girl? Still, it was a non-violent offense and I hate to be a knee-jerk reactionary when it comes to certain crimes where many people would shout "off with his balls!" He didn't actually touch the girl, though it certainly seems that some mental health evaluations might be in order here too.

At the end of the day though, for a first-offense class-E felony the sentence does not seem out of line, only the reasoning by which the judge explains why he didn't throw the book at the offender. It's almost as if the judge was being apologetic to the public for not putting a sex offender on the stake, and at a loss to explain why. A political liablity for him of course. I would have much more respected he simply said just because the man was a sex offender, that doesn't warrant an unduly harsh sentence based on a social bias against sex offenders.

In this day and age it must be difficult for a judge to push back against the tide of public opinion, and follow his conscience, to even follow the law itself, when the public is so easily swayed by rhetoric. So we wind up now with jutice wrapped in untruths and obfuscation rather than people willing to stand up and tell it like it is.

We have become a nation of people who lack the courage of their own convictions.



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Officer Confronts Open-Carry Activist

This situation certainly could have gone a lot worse. But while many people are commending the officer for his calm demeanor here, and touting this video as a "textbook" example of how an interaction of this nature should be conducted, the truth is that the police officer did in fact violate the rights of this citizen. Let's have a look at the video, and then I will discuss it further, point by point.

http://www.liveleak.com//view?i=589_1345502474

As the officer steps out of the car, the citizen announces that he is recording the encounter. This may seem confrontational, but if you are recording, you better damn well make that perfectly clear, lest you wind up like this news reporter.

Freedom of Press Now a Felony In America

And in this day and age, it is certainly a good idea to record every encounter with police. Just have a look at the Police-State section here to see hundreds of instances where police have done horrible things to people without cause. But this thread is not about bashing the police for the sake of bashing the police. Instead, it needs to be pointed out that even when it looks like the police are doing their job well, they are actually violating liberty and the law. That is what we have come to in America, that general society doesn't even recognize it anymore, when the government and their agents tread on our liberty. 

The citizen is a bit of a wiseass, telling the cop where he should park. I don't think I would have bothered to tell the cop how to do his job in that instance, but at the same time, the kid does have a point. Police officers tend to have the mentality that they own the raod and don't have to follow any of the rules of the road. We have all seen it, the cop who speeds all over town and runs red lights while not on a call, or who parks in the fire lane in front of the coffee shop, etc. hardly crime of the century sort of stuff, but if you were to do it, you would pay a hefty fine. We see the same here. Granted, the officer was indeed conducting an investigation at that point and not just running into a store for a bagel, but there was no real reason for him to block that lane, especially not without some caution lights flashing. He doesn't even have his 4-ways blinking to caution traffic moving on the street, while forcing motorists to corss the yellow line, in an intersection, to move around him. Clearly he has created a road hazard and didn't have the courtesy to warn motorists of that hazard with the array of blinky-lights at his disposal. I suppose this is nitpicking though, so let's continue on.

The officer declares his intent to inspect the citizen's weapon, which is being carried over the shoulder and not concealed. It is perfectly legal to carry a weapon in this manner in most parts of the country, without any sort of permit, which is apparently the case in this jurisdiction as well. The officer bases his intent on a phone call from a concerned citizen, and the fact that the weapon outwardly appears to be similar to a fully-automatic weapon, which falls under a different legal code for carrying. What the officer fails to do however, is establish actual "probable cause" or a legitimate "reasonable suspicion" that the weapon is a machine gun being carried in violation of the law. For the officer to proceed, he must establish that the person has either committed a crime, or is in the process of committing a crime. The police can't simply place you under a state of arrest and search you because you "might" be a criminal. Now this really is the crux of the whole matter here, that the officer does not establish legal grounds to conduct this search and seizure.

Just because the weapon outwardly appears that it "might" be a fully automatic machine gun is not probable cause. Just because the weapon looks the same or similar to a model used by the officer's comrades in the SWAT unit, does not give him reasonable suspicion that it is in fact a fully automatic rifle. It is just as likely that the weapon is semi-automatic, an air-soft, or possibly even a non-operable replica. A person might "look" Mexican, but that doesn't mean that they are an illegal immigrant or give the police the right to stop and search them. A person might be wearing a t-shirt that says "I love marijuana" while purchasing a Phillie Blunt at a gas station, but that is not probable cause for an officer to conduct a stop and search. This is the same standard of evidence we are dealing with here, in this instance. It makes no difference that "guns are dangerous" or that there have been a string of nationally reported shootings that have put citizens on edge. The fact remains that the officer failed to establish probable cause.

A call from a concerned citizen is not probable cause in or of itself, unless they are reporting an actual crime. The officer's observation that the object "might" be an automatic weapon, is not reasonable suspicion that a crime has occurred or that there is a crime in progress.

If the call from the concerned citizen was combined with some specific and credible information of a crime, that would be a different story. If, for example, the caller made a sworn statement that they were told by the subject that the weapon was fully automatic, and that the person was not authorized to carry such a weapon, that would establish probable cause. If a caller reported automatic weapons-fire in the area, that would be enough for probable cause on suspicion of an illegal discharge. But for the officer to order the subject to surrender his weapon for inspection simply based on his observation that it "looks like" it "might" be an automatic weapon is a violation of that citizen's right, and in essence, a violation of all of our rights as citizens, to carry a firearm. After all, any semi-automatic weapon can be made into a fully automatic weapon, and can thereby "look like" a machine-gun. Moreover, the officer had no way of knowing, even if it was an automatic weapon, that the subject was not legally allowed to carry such a firearm.

Now we will take it as granted in that jurisdiction a person with an automatic weapon must produce identification and/or related paperwork on demand, but the onus is still on the officer to show that the weapon is indeed an automatic before he conducts his search or renders his demand to invoke the permit obligations. Remember too, that we have a right to not self-incriminate. In other words, if that had turned out to be an automatic weapon being carried illegally, the suspect could not be charged with the crime, as the officer did not have a reasonable suspicion and the subject did not consent to the search. So not only is this a violation of our rights as citizens, it is a display of poor police-work in that the criminal would have gone free on a "technicality."

Here is a better example of a police stop and search of an open-carry advocate:


Notice how the officer in that video is proactive in expressing his authority and imposing his will, using his demeanor and speech as a sort of "Jedi mind control" skill. There is a key difference there though in this stop, as opposed to the one above. Did you notice it? It was subtle, but it makes all the difference in the world.

"I'm gonna check it for my safety before we go any further, okay?

That officer has achieved consent, or at least implied consent as the subject in that video does not refuse. In the top video however, the subject explicitly refuses to consent.

In one breath the officer is telling the subject he is going to issue a "lawful order" but when the subject refuses to consent to the search and seizure, the officer gives a time-out hand signal and states "stop with the rules."

Those rules happen to be the very rules he is sworn to uphold, as an officer.

When the subject asks if he is being detained, the officer replies "yeah." Which means that the subject is now under arrest, without reasonable suspicion of any crime. As was stated above, even if the weapon were fully automatic, that is not necessarily a crime. Which means that this officer has now conducted an unlawful arrest. (Keep in mind here folks, that being under arrest has nothing to do with being read your rights or having the cuffs slapped on like on TV. When you are not free to go, you are under arrest. Even in a minor traffic stop, for something as petty as a dirty license plate, you are technically under arrest for the duration of that traffic stop.)

The officer then goes on to state, "I'm not seizing anything," just as he is in fact seizing that young man's firearm without reasonable cause. Granted, the weapon is eventually returned, but the fact remains that the weapon was seized by a government agent, without reasonable suspicion of a crime. Just as the subject was placed under a state of arrest and released, so too was his weapon seized, or also "arrested" so to speak, before it was returned. What that boils down to is this. The officer, without reasonable suspicion of a crime, did forcefully disarm a peaceful citizen.

After an unlawful arrest and then an unlawful seizure, the officer conducts his unlawful search of the weapon itself, and then finally declares that based upon his own training and experience he "no longer has any reasonable suspicion to detain" the subject. But as we have already established, there was never any reasonable suspicion to begin with. The officer had no right to detain the subject, seize the weapon, or conduct the inspection.

The officer had every right to stop and talk to the subject. The officer had every right to inspect the weapon with consent. The officer had every right to demand proper paperwork if the weapon was in fact an automatic falling under those specific regulations for said weapon. But short of that, the officer had no right to place the subject under arrest and order a weapon-check any more than a police officer has the right to pull you over and search your car because it looks fast.

In summary here we see that the officer:

1) Made an unlawful arrest
2) Unlawfully seized private property
3) Disarmed a peaceful citizen by force (as the officer did not disarm himself)
4) Conducted an unlawful search
           and
5) Would have set a genuine criminal free on a technicality due to his lack of professionalism, if there were a crime

Once the citizen's rights have been raped, and the police are ready to be on their way having stuck their junk all up in his personal business, they ask if the subject has any questions or concerns. This is much like the same dynamic we see from sexual "rapist guilt" after they have concluded their business. Often times, a sexual attacker will try to normalize relations after an attack, and try to befriend their victim in order to convince themselves, and the victim alike, that what just happened was not really a violation at all. That dynamic plays out here as well.

Once gain the subject asks how the officer knew it was a fully-automatic firearm, and he replies that it was based on his experience, when clearly his experience is flawed and inaccurate in making such an arbitrary determination. He knows this, and immediately shifts gears in order to flatter and befriend his victim now, by offering gifts and friendship. He tries to humanize himself to his victim, just like many sexual rapists do.

While the officer espouses his adherence to the virtues of the Second Amendment, he has utterly destroyed this young man's Fourth Amendment rights.

He then goes on to try to recruit the young man into the "league of rapists" with promises of training, and that they will even issue the young man a full-auto machine gun.

Now, finally, having said all of that, I want to toss this whole article on it's head in a way. In the interests of peace and public safety, I do expect our police officers to note unusual activity and to investigate possible dangers. I also commend that primary officer and his backup for not making up some sort of bullshit charge to legally harass the subjects. (Heh, I know, commending officer for not beating up a citizen and making false charges.) And while I do believe that his post-rape friendliness was self-serving on the one hand, it may still have been genui9ne enough that he would go out to the range with these guys and squeeze off some rounds.

But finally, at the end of the day, there is a right way to do things, and a wrong way. While I would not call for this officer to be criminally charged, or fired for his conduct necessarily, I do believe that this video is an example of what NOT to do as a police officer.

Thanks for reading.




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Fat Tax: The Socio-Economics of Obesity

Venus

Throughout most of human history being overweight was a sign of wealth. beauty, and even good health. The robust and jolly outwardly displayed their access to a wide variety of food and plenty of it. In fact many cultures still today hold that obesity is desirable, rather than unhealthy or grotesque as we have come to view it in modern western society in the last century.

So why this shift in thinking? Well, we are told now it's not healthy to be plump. Thanks to decades of media manipulation and the opinions of so-called experts, even in trusted positions of government, we as a society have come to accept a number of erroneous conclusions about obesity and public health. False conclusions which are actually highly profitable to any company associated with our healthcare industry or any of the industries involved in anything we eat. From the fertilizer companies to the grocery stores, the pharmaceutical companies to the insurance conglomerates. A huge portion of our economy operates and is stimulated by this big lie that is literally killing us.

We mistakenly accept that obesity is a cause of diabetes, heart disease, cancer, and a wide variety of other health afflictions. We have also jump to the erroneous conclusion that people who are overweight are lazy, degenerate, mentally unsound, and ultimately a financial threat to our own well-being because of the public costs associated with healthcare. We postulate that the overweight are collectively responsible for this plague, rather than victims of it. Even we who are overweight, find ourselves in an impossible situation we don't fully understand but which tends to fill us with anger and self-loathing, rather than addressing the actual causes of obesity.

I have made a study of these issues myself over the years, and for a few brief moments I saw a glimmer of hope that the-powers-that-be were finally ready to acknowledge true causes of obesity and affiliated health concerns when I read these few headlines...

• Report: Obesity societal problem, not personal
• Obesity fight must shift from personal blame-U.S. panel

Imagine my disappointment when I realized that headlines like these were nothing more than propaganda as usual, controlled opposition, put out there to set the stage in order to rip off the public financially, yet again, through taxation in a typical problem-reaction-solution scheme. Another shove against the goalposts encroaching personal freedom, and another way to scam us out of a buck. One week the media is telling us that obesity has nothing to do with personal choice, and then in the next week they are broadcasting proposals for steep penalties on personal choice. Their "solution" is to impose a fine on individuals who purchase foods classified as unhealthy by whatever committee is thrown together to act in the interests of government and corporate profiteering. 

• Report: 'Fat Tax' Could Curb Nation's Obesity Problem 
• 'Fat tax' on unhealthy food must raise prices by 20% to have effect, says study

I have a better idea. Let us levy fines against the corporations who are pumping unhealthy, even deadly franken-foods at us relentlessly through clever advertising, manipulation of the media, economic pressure, government payoffs, and leaving us with a total lack of real choice. Obesity is not the cause of our ill-health, it is just another symptom of it. The things that are being done to our food is what is causing most obesity, organ damage, etc. The fat itself is not the problem.

As pointed out already, obesity has never been associated with ill-health, just the opposite actually. Today there are plenty of people suffering diseases which are commonly associated with obesity, yet they are not fat themselves. Even scientists have been so indoctrinated by the brainwashing telling us obesity is the cause of health problems, that they are confounded when their own studies show that one can be obese and perfectly healthy. Discriminating against fat people is as ignorant as poking fun at cancer patients, a limbless war veteran, or saying that blacks are a liability to the healthcare system because of sickle-cell anemia. Obesity might be a sign that someone is having health problems, but it is not the cause of those problems. A fat tax completely misses the point.

Let's imagine for a second that our food supply is like a town's water supply. Now lets imagine that all of the chemicals and treatments and genetic modifications being done to our food supply, are like bacteria in our water making everyone sick, even killing people. The source of the bacteria is a new condo community who decided to start dumping raw sewage into the reservoir, rather than pay for proper processing. What do we do to solve the problem? Do we impose fines against the townspeople down below who turn on the tap? Do we penalize someone who got sick from drinking poisoned water? Certainly not, because that does not address the source of the problem. Instead we would levy fines against the condo community. Fines that are more costly than what they have been saving by dumping their waste in the reservoir.

That is what must be done here. The profit motive for corporations (and the government by proxy) to pump us full of chemicals and ruin our food must be removed, so that they start growing and distributing food of a quality we still had as little as fifty or sixty years ago. To deliver food that is actually food, not a simulated food-like product with addictive qualities, toxic ingredients, and stripped of nutrients. A tax on these foods only creates a financial incentive for the government to support unhealthy foods, not protect us from them.

A retail tax on certain foods would actually increase obesity and sickness very quickly which, some conspiracy-theorists might say, is actually the plan of the puppet-masters. To simply kill off certain segments of society, namely the poor and disenfranchised. It's frightening to think that such a theory actually has some merit too, considering this is actually what is happening already, even if not specifically planned that way by cabals of corporate overlords. The sad fact of the matter is that those in poverty run the highest rates of obesity and ill health. That is not because the poor are lazy either. If that were true, then we must also assume that our pets have all decided to become lazy as well. No, the simple truth is that our food is being poisoned. So many Americans, especially the poor, do not have access to healthy, completely organic foods. Which does of course have an impact on health, and which will make a less and less viable candidate for whatever jobs might be available in the long run, so an and so forth. The poorer you are, the greater your risk. A fat tax just makes people poorer.

Ask yourself, what you would prefer for dinner tonight. A bologna sandwich, or a steak? A pack of ramen, or a nice stir-fry with crisp, fresh vegetables and strips of lean meat? Poor or not, you probably picked the more nutritious, more expensive meal. The truth is that most people would prefer to eat healthier in general, but many simply cannot afford to. That is not a matter of personal choice. Granted, any of us might get a hankerin' for a Big Mac once in a while, but I can tell you from personal experience that surviving on the McDollar menu for any length of time will leave you with a feeling that you would prefer to never eat fast food again all the rest of your days. This is not to say either, that we should suddenly ban fast food joints, or Coca-Cola, or Doritos. We should maintain the right to eat whatever we want, even if it kills us. But there is a better solution anyway, an actual solution, to this health crisis.

The answer is not to make the (regrettably) most affordable foods less affordable to folks who are already having trouble paying for groceries. The answer is to make healthier foods more affordable and accessible to everybody. The fat tax creates financial incentive to block that access. Keep in mind here too, that we aren't just talking about folks on food stamps and in downright poverty either, but average middle class families who have had to cut corners in every facet of the household budget. Friday night pizza night has shifted from a few takeout pies, made fresh with whole natural ingredients at their local pizza shop, to heavily processed frozen pizzas from Wal-Mart. Now some might say that pizza in general is bad for you anyway, but that is not entirely accurate. It is the processed, refined, modified, hydrogenated pizza-ish product in a box that is unhealthy. A fresh pizza made with genetically unaltered semolina wheat, olive oil, fresh tomato sauce, fresh toppings, and fresh cheese is actually a quite healthy dish.

Which now bring us to the question of how the tax-man is actually going to decide which foods are healthy or not. What foods will this 20% tax be applied to? Butter perhaps? Surely the bacon will get whacked with the tax. So if we don't want to hand over one-fifth of our breakfast money to the cafeteria bully, I guess we will have to eat Quaker 100% Natural Granola, Oats, Honey n' Raisins. That was sarcasm actually, click those links and you'll see what I mean. We are lied to so often by "health officials," the media and so forth, that it's hard for anyone to actually know what we are actually supposed to be eating. This is one big reason the government cannot regulate what food can or cannot be purchased with food stamp benefits (.pdf), despite much public outrage over the years about how those benefits are spent.

Here we can also point out the fact that in many states things like soda-pop are already taxed, and require a nickel deposit per container. So we can foresee the failure of a proposed tax on a wider selection of foods labeled as "unhealthy" since the current tax is already proved to be no deterrent. Even if the government were to impose a 100% tax on things like a 99-cent gallon of store-brand fruit-punch flavored high fructose corn syrup, it will still be cheaper than a $6 gallon of orange juice, that may not actually be any healthier anyway.

So the fat tax still doesn't create any substantive incentive to eat healthy, it's just another government rip-off. And here's the real kicker. Those most at risk of obesity are immune from food tax. Even if the fat tax idea passes, the only people who are going to be affected by it are the middle class, and people on the verge of winding up on food stamps. Such a tax might even be the proverbial straw that breaks the camel's back, and finally shoves a person or a family into poverty as they see 20% of their grocery budget swept away into the pocket of the tax man. Meanwhile, the folks who have already slipped below the poverty line, the ones we know are most at risk for obesity, are tax-exempt when they swipe their EBT card. So best case scenario is that this big plan to tax people into better health, will still completely pass by the people who need better food the most. Not to mention that it will actually encourage people on food stamps to use those benefits for junk food, or even to become exploited in fraud where they purchase these items for other people in exchange for cash. The higher the tax rate, the more profitable such fraud would become. So some might say we must remove the tax exemption, but all that would do is again, remove 20% of the grocery budget for people already on the edge of starvation, and force taxpayers to pay poor people's taxes. Basically it would be a double-tax on the working stiff for an idea that will never achieve its stated goal of encouraging people eat foods that are deemed to be more healthy. 

Which now brings us to another startling point. Studies show that people have already made a conscious effort to move away from fatty, sugary, and salty foods toward what were are told is a more healthy diet, to no avail. We are already eating more of what they tell us to eat to be healthy, yet we are still getting fatter and sicker by the year. The only conclusion that can be drawn there is that we are being lied to, suffering terrible health consequences as a result, and then being blamed for those consequences.

This graph is from a UK study, but is comparable to the US considering that we share very similar lifestyles, and is also relevant considering that these health concerns are now a global issue:

So we can see here a moderate decrease in vegetable purchases, but hardly enough to cause an epidemic of obesity and non-communicable disease. Especially considering an offset with a dramatic increase of fruits, which are often touted as the wonder drug for anti-obesity. Then too, especially considering the graph on the right, which shows a severe downturn in sugar, a significant downturn in fat, and a moderate downturn in salt. From those figures we might conclude that obesity is a actually a result of trying to eat more healthy. That theory is not quite in keeping with the data either though, considering that the obesity epidemic didn't starts until the 1980's but the food-type trend began in the 1940's. Either way, it seems logical to conclude from that data that obesity has some other cause than the types of food we are eating.

Prevalence of Obesity

What changed in our food supply in the 1980's? That is when genetic modification of food began. That is also the same time that other industrial processes to our food such as irradiation became regular practice. Processed foods are the culprit behind our health woes. Processes which start right in the seed, which has had it's DNA altered. Processes which start in meat from animals that have been treated with growth hormones. If we are all eating foods that have been treated in a way to grow larger and faster, doesn't it stand to reason that by ingesting such foods we too would begin to take on those characteristics, of growing larger at a pace we could never possibly keep up with through normal exercise and activity?

Will this proposed "fat tax" be imposed on all processed foods, or selectively against whatever foods the government chooses? Considering that roughly 90% of key crops such as corn and soy are genetically modified, and that those crops are in turn used in so very many other products, any shopper is already hard-pressed to find completely natural and organic foods. Especially considering that GM foods don't have to be labeled, and that the whole "organic" labeling trend is more of a public relations stunt than a mark of true organic foods. Even something as simple as beef, straight from the butcher's block at your local supermarket, is processed food. It is fed genetically modified grain, pumped full of steroids and growth hormones to bring it to market faster, and then after slaughter the meat is exposed to another whole series of industrial chemical processes.

There is so much more information out there about obesity and what is being done to our food supply, but given the information shared here we can conclude that a consumer "fat tax" on any foods is, at best, ineffective in combating our public health crisis. Our government has already shown negligence in failing to protect the consumer from the corporate predators, despite the billions of dollars we already pay in taxes for regulatory agencies such as the FDA and the EPA. For the government to become openly complicit and turn a direct profit from the killing of citizens, well that would be a high crime on a level the world has rarely seen from the most tyrannical regimes throughout history.





Also see:

Codex Alimentarius and 'Soft Kill' Eugenics





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