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99 lines
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AMERICANS ARE PUTTING UP WITH A SPIRALING GESTAPO STATE
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By Paul Craig Roberts
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Special to the Los Angeles Times
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What will become of "law and order conservatism" now that we know
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that our law-enforcement agencies -- from the Justice Department to
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local police forces -- can be as criminal as the miscreants that they
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are supposed to pursue?
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Unspeakable acts of cold-blooded murder and fabricated evidence now
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routinely characterize everyday acts of law enforcement in the United
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States.
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In Malibu, Calif., a 30-person raiding party of sheriff's deputies,
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federal drug agents and the California National Guard broke into the
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home of Donald Scott and shot him dead. Scott, it turns out, was a
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reclusive man, heir to a European fortune, whose $5 million, 200-acre
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ranch was targeted by federal agents under drug-forfeiture laws. No
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drugs or marijuana plants were found, but an alert Ventura County
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prosecutor, Michael Bradbury, did find that the raiding party had an
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appraisal of Scott's ranch, along with notes on the sale price of
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nearby property. Gideon Kanner, a Los Angeles law professor who has
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examined the case, concluded that the feds thought Scott might have a
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wife who indulged in drugs and decided to see if they could bag a $5
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million piece of property for the Treasury.
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In pre-democratic times, this was known as "tax farming". Government
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officials simply seized whatever they could and raked off a
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commission. Today, the commission is in the form of the
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bureaucracy's budget. Ever since President Reagan's budget director,
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David Stockman, invented "budget savings" from tougher Internal
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Revenue Service and drug enforcement, the pressure has been on these
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marauders to farm more revenues. The results are mounting abuses of
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citizens and occasional deaths.
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What will be done about it? Nothing. Scott, awakened from sleep by
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the sound of his door crashing in, made the mistake of walking out of
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his bedroom with a gun in his hand. The military force got off with
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a self-defense plea. Shades of Waco, Texas, where the FBI and the
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Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms folks killed 86 men, women
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and children, while the attorney general took all the credit to show
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how tough she is.
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Noted defense attorney Gerry Spence told the Montana Trial Lawyers
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Association in July that he had never been involved in a case with
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the federal government in which the government had not lied and
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manufactured evidence to gain a conviction. "These are not the good
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guys", he said. "These are people who do what they believe is
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necessary to do to bring about a conviction." The law gets hung with
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the victim.
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What, you might protest, about the Los Angeles and Detroit
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convictions of police officers who beat black motorists? Aren't
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these signs that checks and balances work and that we are free from
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the arbitrary application of power that medieval serfs had to endure?
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Alas, these police offers were not done in because they abused their
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power, but because they were charged with racism and violating the
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civil rights of a member of a "preferred minority". As incredible as
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it may seem, in the United States only blacks have any protection
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from abusive state power. They have a special, racial civil-rights
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shield. The rest of us must make do with happenstance.
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Formally, a person could protect himself by getting rich. But today
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that just makes you more of a target. Witness the fates of
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billionaires Michael Milken and Leona Helmsley -- and of Donald
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Scott. Politically ambitious prosecutors need drama, and they don't
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get that from the local drug pusher. Federal drug agents are not
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going to waste their time and risk their lives rounding up Jamaican
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drug gangs (who shoot back) -- especially when inner-city juries may
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not convict either out of fear or feelings of racial solidarity --
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when they can pick soft targets like Scott.
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Nothing makes it clearer that the United States is no longer a
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"nation of laws" than federal wetlands regulations. These "laws"
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have been created entirely by bureaucrats and courts. All over
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America, people are finding their uses of their property circumvented
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and themselves in jail because of these regulatory police and their
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"laws".
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Recently, the Clinton administartion said: "Congress should amend the
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Clean Water Act to make it consistent with the agencies' rule-
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making." And Sens. Max Baucus, D-Mont., and John H. Chaff, R-R.I.,
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have introduced a bill to codify all the wetlands regulations that
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are being enforced without any legal basis.
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Note that the two senators did not introduce a bill to stop unelected
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bureaucrats from illegally creating laws and running all over our
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constitutional protections. Not even a wrist slap. To hell with the
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U.S. Constitution, say the senators. Let's pass a law that future
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courts will use to give carte blanche to the regulatory police.
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Let's ennoble the bureaucrats. Divine rule cannot be blocked by
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special-interest lobbying.
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Roberts, former assistant Trasury secretary, is chairman of the
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Institute for Political Economy.
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