"It's a Police State"

Our Constitution is being trampled! Just look at the 1986 Civil Asset Forfiture Law. (Reagan's drug war, ya I know, I voted for him too. He's a great guy, just got some bad advice.)

It allows the Police to steal your money, house, cars, and everything else, under the guise of drug profits. People carrying a couple thousand dollors in cash are "assumed to be guilty" of drug 'something' and the police can then steel the cash. You are then under the the CIVIL asset forfiture law, where you must go to CIVIL court to get it back. You are never charged with a CRIMINAL crime. You must put up a bond worth 10% of the begotten loot, to begin your civil case. YOU AER ASSUMED GUILTY! And must prove your innocence. At your own expense. I saw that COPS show, or was it MOST WANTED.... where they actually showed Flordia police's video tapes from the squad car's camera. The date on the tape was from 1989. This was just on TV last week. I am amazed that it has taken this long for the media to see the real crime here.

I could relay many more stories of the POLICE STATE. Get a copy of the Constitution and read it! Then support representatives who have read it too and are willing to support it as well.

Campaign finance reform will help get our elected representatives representing us, rather then minority special interests who have the needed cash for them to get elected (or re-elected). Only if this is eliminated will we own our officials again.

PS. This mean "Labor Dues" cannot be used for political purposes as well.

If we do not regain control of our gov'ment once again, and only by controling how those will to run collect dollors for elections can we do this, we will lose what little influence we have left.

Otherwise, the words "You Ain't Seen Nothin' Yet" will have more meaning than you could image in 10 live times!

Good Luck to all of us!

 

Check out how the Libertarain party feels about "Big Brother" issues: www.lp.org

 

jgorka - you are correct about England having cameras on street corners looking at everyong and their computers can I.D. any person and send the police to get them on the street.

You are correct that here the over the road truckers are monitered all the way via satilite and the dispatcher knows exactly where they are and how much break thime they take.

You are also correct that people will go along with all of this survelance in the name of lower cost.

The typical response is "well what do you have to hide?" "Only the bad people have something to hide". "If your not a criminal then you dont have to worry." This is the way things get passed into law.

I used to hand out copies of the constitution to people at work but they seemd to not care and even if they did read it they had no idea what it meant.

 

54regcab - I have been a member of the libertairian party for many years. In my opinion they are the only party that wants to stick exactly with the constitution and nothing else.

 

Your right, Insect2, about people not caring.

I too have tried to drum up interest in the Constitution all to no avail. Lets face it, two thirds of this nation are SHEEP, the rest are divided and confused, regardless of party. I belive only about 10% - 15% really understand our liberties (the greatest of all earthly governments) and how they are slowly being reduced and limited - in the name of "you ain't got nothin' to hide, right, so why wouldn't this be alright".

All the while distroying the very thing which allowed this nation to be formed - the power of the people, by the people, NOT by the gov'ments allowance for you to go your own way or do your own thing. "If you ain't got nothing to hide" is NOT an acceptable governing solution. Our rights and our liberties are granted not from a benevolent gov'ment, but from the Creator, and we set up this gov'ment with specifically limited powers because of that. ....remember?

Regardless of your personal regilious beliefs, this was how it was done (quite fortunately, for all the agnostics and atheists out there).

(I'm not getting on your case here Insect2, I just can't resist another chance to remind the sheep, they're asleep again. :-)

Remember, it used to be WE, the sovereign people, the state, and the Fed. But now its' the FED, the state, and their 'subjects' - us.

Armed revolution is obviously not the answer. Only a quiet revolution, at the ballot box, will accomplish anything in todays world.

AND .....
An interest by all of us in the things Congress does. Email your elected officials, and let them know your watching. I've found this is easiest rather than faxing, or even calling. But calling is really the most impressive method - when their switch board gets flooded on an issue it makes them think.

I'll get off the soap box now.
(But's thanks again for this opportunity to spew. I hope Online does not close this down anytime soon. This is great stuff.)
FrankP

 

I would love to see a requirement that ALL new laws and regulations must cite a specific reference to the Constitution, showing which amendment of the Constituion grants the government the power to make the new law. No authorization from Constituion = No new Law!

 

All laws should be decided by popular vote!
Ppl would have to vote a law in.
At one time it was impractical, but with todays technology it's practical.
Have a vote 3 times a year for ppl to vote on the new laws.
And all of them must be written in plain english not lawyer talk.

 

FrankP,
>>>>That's not exactly how the drug forfiture works. I have been working in law enforcement for over ten years. I have been assigned to work on and with violent crime/drug task forces and have yet to see anyone lose any money or property that didn't have something to do with the drug trade. The only time I know of that money was taken when there were no charges is when known mules (drug couriers) are stopped with tens/hundreds of thousands of dollars with them, drug dogs hit (indicated odor of drugs) on the said loot, and the couriers denied any knowledge of the money or how it got there (like anyone could have tens to hundreds of thousands of dollars with them and not know how it got in the car), besides those kind of cases there are always criminal charges accompanying forfitted assets, to say you are never charged with any crime is incorrect. The only problems I feel that there are in asset forfiture is when someone is using someone elses property in the commission of a crime/drug distribution/transportation without the property owners knowledge, said property owner can possibly lose their property.

>>>>The media presents law enforcement in such a dim and untrue view in this day and time that the public has been misinformed on many issues. People carrying a couple of thousand dollars have nothing to fear if they are not transporting narcotics in a quanity that can be considered for distribution and not for personal use.

>>>>I can understand how you feel about some things. But our country is far from a police state, take a look around the world and see how police states really look. We live in the greatest country in the world, citizens have more rights than the average person has any idea. If you really want to know who seems to be losing their rights just go to a court room and watch as a spectator some time. As a police officer I am sick to death of all the liberal agendas in todays society. When I charge someone for a crime, when I go to court, the system puts the very officer who placed the charge on trial and the judicial system itself, with the law breaker wrapping hiself or herself up in a cloak of legal beauracracy that'd make you sick. Sometimes things are not quite as bad as some with political agendas would like us all to think.

P.S. Frank, please don't take this as a personal attack on you, you were obviously only repeating what you have heard from others or seen on TV. Those cop shows do for police work what Judge Judy and the Peoples Court do for our judicial system...........

..............later Patrick



[This message has been edited by JPF1715 (edited 01-11-2000).]

 

The problem is not with the police, but with the legislators and special interest groups that use their power (real or perceived) to push their ideas, morals and values on everyone. Also, the power to sieze property believed to be used in a crime, drugs in particular, has been limited by the courts, in that it must be shown that the owner knew that the property was being used in the commission of a crime.

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99 XLT 4X4 Reg Cab, Sport Package, 4.2 with 5 speed, 265/70/17 tires, 3.55 axle, 4 wheel discs and 4 wheel ABS, K&N air filter, a Dynamax Race Magnum muffler, Redine synthetic lubricants in motor and trans and a Kenwood CD stereo system.

 

Right On, Now we're cooking with gas!
(This is a far cry from trucks, so I hope I (we) don't cramp anyone's style here.)

54regcab,
1 person, 1 vote = MOBocracy. The founding fathers were extremely careful NOT to allow this. It is easy to assume the reasons a Republic was created was simply distance and communication limitations. But it was not. Fortunately for all of us, many of our founding fathers, at least the key writers, were well educated. The ancient greeks warned us about MOBocracy and we listened.

JPF1715,
My heart goes out to you when your in court and watch the plea bargining and legal wrangling.

-My view: no plea bargins, and no mandatory sentences - Let the Judicial Branch of gov'ment do their job in the courts, not the legislature. It seems mandatory sentences are a breach of the check and balances of the 3 branches of gov'ment.

Be that as it may, if you have any money on you, 20's or larger, you must realize it is full of cocaine. Any drug sniffing dog will let you know! The drug war is that much of a failure. (I'm for legalization, BTW. Just was in Switzerland, and it works great - "let them eat (their) cake" and the drug war is over. Lets not waist time on this anymore, it is hurting too many people.)

As for the liberals, you're right they're everywhere. I'm one of the few who is with both the NRA and the ACLU however (I know the ACLU seems silly sometimes, but when you think about it, if we cancel the constitution for the obviously guilty, then why not cancel it for the rest of us - we havn't done anything wrong - who needs it!). Yes, they both have an important roles to play. I love my guns and I love my freedoms. What better two orginizations to back - actually the NRA is blowing it lately.

Now as for the Civil Asset Forfeiture. Flordia, 1989, small county, no money, harrasing blacks, stealing their money! Fact not fiction. It took a TV media program close to 11 years to air this. Because.... it was no longer a gamble, a rumor. For sure like, if the FEDs were investigating, their US Senator's were investigating, and so forth - must be safe to air now.

In Malibu CA. An elderly retiree shot and killed. Opps! Wrong house! Not really, they knew what they wanted - his ranch. No really, the local police wanted this guys ranch and wanted to... spook him or who knows what. Anyway, he's dead, his wife is suing the state, the county, the city, the DEA, .... Get the picture. In the mean time, they got the ranch!

Now I know mistakes happen. And I know most Asset forfeitures are for real druggies - but let us not forget the main issue here - the 6th Amendment. Druggie or no, ill gotten loot or no, the fact is you cannot take my life, liberty or property "without due process of law". And this is cleary being done. The alledged "process" claimed, is a Civil one, where you must prove your innocence. But you cannot use civil law against criminals - That's Criminal Law! Only under criminal law can you be forced to pay punishment or be physical incarcerated. Under civil law, no such actions are possible. Only redress for injury and a host of other things.

I know your heart is in the right place, and I know you know, mine is too. But I still say its a Police State because, many an officer has used this law without even questioning whether its violates the constitution. After all, its in the name of fighting crime! Who could be against that? Or perhaps you were the sole voice back in 1986 when it first passed, saying whoa, wait a minute,.... I think not. Most police were all down and the watering hole celebrating.
-- Don't mean to imply you are anything than a just and honest man, doing his part for God and country. It takes a lot of guts to do what police do. I actually know several police officers and we argue about this all the time. Cops are people too, have kids, some still have wives, and make mistakes like all of us. Just look at the Rampart division of LAPD - Couldn't resist

Why did it take so many years for the law to be finally limited, as Ron Kaltenbach points out. It wasn't because of the Police were saying, 'this is too much, we got to water this down some'. In the mean time, every police force in the nation was buying new prowlers with this money.


Ron is dead on with the legislators and special interests. Only when we take back control of our elected officials by controling the money machine that they work for - instead of you and me, can we ever expect them to answer to us again.

The Constitution:
To protect us from a tyranical government, that's what its for. It is designed to let some of the guilty go free, rather than harm the innocent once. (And we can all see how well that works... Just think if our freedoms deteriorate any further.)

I don't trust the police to protect my rights.

 

I agree with the legalization of drugs. To many bodies, to much money p*ssed away. Didn't America learn anything from Prohibition? With the government artificially creating high prices on the drugs there will never be a shortage of dealers or people killing/being killed over high profit corners. When herion was made illegal it was the price of aspirin, around $0.24 a gram. On the other hand cocaine is about 10 times the price of pure 24karat gold right now. Plenty of people killing/being killed for those kinds of dollars. All of this brought on by governments inept attempt to protect us from ourselves. There will always be a segment of the population(a very large one) that will use drugs recreationally whether they are legal(alcohol,nicotine, etc.) or not. No amount of legislation will stop it. Accept reality and move on.

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