My remarks are not originating from a sense of elitism, snobbery, etc. It’s about realizing that rights are something that require continual protection, lest they become casualties of fads…or pogroms. And that if the citizens don’t defend those rights from encroachment, then a signal is given for government to further erode those rights, until nothing is left. I see that you do not dispute that.

And if the majority of citizens not only fail to defend those rights, but acquiesce in their further erosion, then who is to blame? The object of the official pogrom (i.e. ‘druggies’)…or the citizens, themselves?

The entire DrugWar from its’ inception, can be proven to be a product of ‘elitism’, ’snobbery’ etc. From the get-go it has followed Professor Whitebread’s ‘Iron Law of Prohibition’, in which a substance prohibition is created by an identifiable “Us” to attack and identifiable “Them”.

And if by doing so, basic freedoms are savaged and rights endangered? I ask again: who is more at fault? The target of the laws, or the supposed ‘upstanding citizens’ who’ve allowed those laws to stand, when they cause that very damage to basic freedoms our great-grandparents took for granted as being inviolable?

In the end, the one person responsible for maintaining those freedoms is none other than the one who stares back at you from the bathroom mirror each morning. Abrogate that responsibility, and no one can stand in for you.

But in abrogating that responsibility, then you also place the rights of others in danger. If ’silence = assent’, then the majority of Americans have assented to the erosion of their rights by not speaking out against this insanity…but they are not only assenting to just the erosion of their rights, but those of their neighbors, as well. And it is that which I object to most strenuously.

Really, what does it take for a cop to dress up like a door-to-door salesman, walk up to the door (with the vice squad in place in case the tip was true), ring the doorbell and wait for someone to answer the door? With that, he could surveille the domicile and assess the threat level, find out if the “man-of-the-house” was home and take it from there? They should find this “confidential informant,” take away his plea deal for the bad tip and throw his ass in jail, like they should have done in the first place. And make him pay for the woman’s misery.

The War on Drugs is a joke that’s costing us billions of dollars every year. If they just legalized it, they could tax it. It’s a win-win situation for the users and the government. The users will find a way to get it anyway, regardless of whether or not it’s legal. Legalizing drugs would also reduce, if not outright eliminate, the wars over turf proliferated by gangs on which to sell their drugs. Sometimes, the solution is so simple that people can’t even see it.

1. You’ll piss off those who probably would be on your side. Usually not a winning strategy.

2. You aren’t smart enough to see this isn’t an either/or situation.

I’ll explain that last one to you. It isn’t that you are either just a,

1. an aware ‘dick’,
2. a somnolent sheep, grazing placidly until The State shows up with a SWAT van.

You can be aware and not be a dick. Then when that somnomlent sheep wakes up, it will realize it isn’t alone and can help in changing things.

Anyone aware enough to have a sense of history knows that government tends to gather power to itself, at the expense of the people. The Founders made that quite clear. iThey knew that rights had to be guarded jealously against continual, amoeba-like encroachment by government.

That’s why the Bill of Rights might as well have had the international “NO” sign attached to it; in its’ entirety, the point is made that NO, the government may not do this, and NO the government may not do that. Allow it to encroach upon one right, and all are endangered. As we have seen it do, particularly since the first two decades of the last century.

Because of that encroachment, ostensibly for their own good, the people have become inured to that encroachment, and proof of that is seen in the DrugWar. Most people couldn’t give a rat’s @$$ should their neighbor be the recipient of one of The State’s idea of a ‘Welcome Wagon’ visitation, as this woman was. After all, it’s only the ‘bad people’ who are supposed to suffer when that happens, right? Not the law-abidin’, church-goin’, Bible-collectin’ ‘good people’…so they must have ‘deserved it’.

Or so many of these (either tacit or vocal) supporters of the DrugWar think…until they are on the short, sharp and sh*tty end of the stick held by their putative ’servants’.

And when those servants show no remorse for their actions? When they are contemptuous of the very idea that they should show remorse for terrorizing one of the ‘good’ people? Who is to blame, then? The ‘druggie’? Or the ‘upstanding citizens’ who’ve allowed their rights – and everyone else’s! – to be ground up beneath the Juggernaut they supported?

I point the finger where nobody wants to look, for the fact remains that the DrugWar, and its’ bastard son, the War on Terror, which are stripping us of our rights, are being tacitly supported by no small number of ‘good Americans’. And all too often, those who try to sound the alarm are castigated as ‘dicks’.

Well, to paraphrase Aristotle, I’d rather be an aware ‘dick’ than a somnolent sheep, grazing placidly until The State shows up with a SWAT van. Pity there aren’t enough of us left…

The State’s seal of approval, then just how much of a ‘victim’ is she when she finds herself ground under Juggernaut’s treads?

I’d say just as much as if you were. The fact that she was out agitating against this doesn’t mean she should be ground up by the juggernaut anymore than you should be. Recall our rights are considered to be inalienable, not conveyed only if you happen to have the right ideas and agitate in support of those ideas.

And I’d also caution you about showing your contempt for people such as this. Stepping up and offering support might turn such people into valuable allies. Turning your back after scoffing at them is likely to have exactly the opposite effect.

In short, don’t be a dick.

Support doesn’t have to be active; acquiescing to the steady erosion of rights that silent acceptance of the DrugWar produces is the same as being a foaming, wild-eyed rah-rah cheerleader for it. Degree doesn’t matter in this case, results do. If she never spoke out against it, if she never gave any thought as to why it was inherently wrong in punishing people for choosing to put something in their bodies without The State’s seal of approval, then just how much of a ‘victim’ is she when she finds herself ground under Juggernaut’s treads?

I am reminded of what Goethe said about people getting the governments that they deserve. I am also reminded of something I read long ago, about the governors inevitably become contemptuous of the governed – for having let themselves be led about by those no better than themselves.

The people of this country have forgotten that they were supposed to be masters of The State, not the other way around. And this is what happens when that lesson is forgotten…and the governors become dismissive of the governed…

No-knock raids are extremely dangerous to everyone involved. They are only reasonable in cases where no practical safer alternative exists, and even then only when performed by real SWAT teams–not by pseudo-SWAT wannabes.

I doubt that even 1% of the raids which are designed to prevent the target from being able to determine that their raiders are police are even remotely justifiable. If a cop deliberately acts in such a fashion that a person could reasonably believe that he is a (1) not a cop and (2) poses an immediate threat of bodily harm, that cop is entirely to blame if he is mistaken for a criminal and forfeits all claim of self-defense against such a mistake. Of course, the government routinely rigs cases involving defense against cops, probably because they don’t want to lose.

Oh, this is an easy one. Your average gang of thugs doesn’t enjoy the protection of the DAs office.

Well, our thugs in blue aren’t average, they’re ‘Special’. They even tell us so, “Special Weapons and Tactics,” L.A.’s Special Investigative Service,” etc.

The folks who foot the bill? Not special. Now shut up and pay your taxes and if they throw granades in your house you probably did something to deserve it.

Yeah, I can’t think of one either.

Oh, this is an easy one. Your average gang of thugs doesn’t enjoy the protection of the DAs office.

Of course I’m not saying these particulr cops are justified. But rather the most important thing, in a way, is to examine WHY this mistake occurred and see what shortcuts were used or where things could be improved. Obviously the police here don’t seem to want to get into any sort of self-evaluation and they are stonewalling to prevent any outside evals which is the biggest problem of all. But there is, conceptually, the possibility of a thoroughly investigated, and duelly executed search warrant that turns up nothing, and it’s just an honest mistkae or one piece of wrong information that could not be double-checked. We shouldn’t be so quick to punish the cops who crossed every T, but rather the lazy, stupid cops who failed to do even a reasonable amount of investigating (not unlike a negligence standard).

This thing was duly processed. Just ask ‘em.

Move along, citizen. Show’s over, nothin’ to see here.

But just because you don’t want to intentionally and specifically see an innocent person put in jail (congrats! you’re not a raging fascist!) doesn’t mean you’re taking the appropriate steps to ensure that they don’t OR that you are, ya know, following the law. It’s a bit like saying “The last thing i wanted to do was shoot my buddy in the stomach – he’s my friend- but I just spun around in circles with my eyes closed firing my uzi, so I don’t see why that’s a crime.”

Besides as I think we all know, many wrong-door victims or worngfully convicted victims became such because somone “just knew” they were guilty.

Of course there has to be limits, because sometimes mistakes will be made no matter how much double checking everyone does.

Cops want respect because they have a gun, and power over you, and they aren’t afraid to use it…the exact same way criminals get respect.

And

That comes close to saying we can’t make bad cops pay for their screw-ups because if we did, they would “show us who’s boss”. Seems like a form of extortion.

As I’ve said several times before:

cops ≡ criminals.

# Sgt. Dean: “That there were weapons in the house, or that the drugs were stored in that manor.”

The meaning here is not totally clear (manor or manner?), but does he really mean “or” — that drugs alone, even with no weapons, justify a military style raid?

He more clearly says that when they serve a warrant on people who are gun owners, they can expect grenades being thrown into their homes.