This is a very pertinent question these days, when we hear daily of transgressions against us by our Intelligence Services, the Tax-collecting agency, and our own Justice (?) Department. When the powers-that-be on all levels of government are delegating more and more quasi-legislative power over us, to un-elected bureaucrats. When even the federal Department of Education has its own SWAT team! You may protest, you may complain, you may write letters to the editor, but you may not change the Rules. Herewith are some examples.
–> The City of New York has a crime rate that has shrunk dramatically in the last few years. This has been the result of much better crime-data gathering that led to better concentration of policing in high-crime areas. More cops right on the street, becoming known to the locals, so they felt comfortable with the police, and would come forward with information when needed. And NYC has an enforcement method called “Stop, Question, and Frisk”. When a policeman sees a person acting in a suspicious manner, he may stop the person, ask them what they are doing, and if the answer is not acceptable, only then do the Frisk the person. According to NYC officials, this system works well, often catching potential wrong-doers BEFORE they do wrong.
Well, a group of the usual “minority suspects” (including our favorite, Al Sharpton), have sued the City to stop that crime-fighting policy, based on the “disparate impact” of the policy on minorities, i.e. more minority people than white people are being “stopped and frisked” (note the absence of “questioned”). No mention of the fact that, perhaps, more minorities than whites were exhibiting suspicious behavior! And this even in a city that has a large number of minority cops! So if the suit is successful, the city will be forced to abandon a crime-fighting policy that demonstrably works, and the mostly-minority residents will again be subjected to being preyed-upon by their own (criminal) gangs.
–> The federal Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) has issued “enforcement guidance” saying that businesses may not employ criminal background checks when screening potential employees. So now businesses must choose between risking federal lawsuits if they initially reject someone with a criminal conviction, and risking losses if an employee with a conviction on his record steals from the employer, or ruins his equipment.
–> Your local government institutes zoning laws that essentially tell you what you may and may not do with your own property. Farmers lose the use of whole acres of their land to rules regarding how far they must be from waters, even those waters totally enclosed by their own boundaries. Property owners are told which trees on their land they are prohibited from cutting down, and what percentage of their property they may cover with buildings.
–> The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau tells your bank what they may and may not charge you if you overdraw your account (even though you voluntarily engage in the banking relationship).
–> The new ObamaCare regulations require businesses that provide health insurance to their employees to provide contraceptive services at NO CHARGE to the employee (meaning that the employer must pay for it).
–> The State dictates how many hours per day you may work, and dictates that you must take a lunch break. Your employer is afraid of the state coming down on them if you do not take lunch!
–> The US Department of Justice allows injustice by refusing to prosecute New Black Panthers who engage in verified voter intimidation at polling places, and refuses to stop illegal immigrants from crossing the porous borders.
–> The president, by executive order, enables illegal alien youth to go to college on taxpayer money.
–> The National Labor Relations Board, whom an Appeals Court has ruled has NO quorum, continues to promulgate rulings that favor their Labor Union buddies at the expense of private employers.
–> And perhaps the worst of all, the Internal Revenue Service continues to target conservative groups seeking tax-exempt status for extra scrutiny, thus silencing their voices. The IRS has the unchecked power to simply ruin any citizen by seizing their property, freezing their bank accounts, garnishing their wages, and shutting down their businesses. The power to tax is the power to destroy, and it happens all across America.
So what do you think? Are we still free-born citizens of this Greatest Nation on God’s Green Earth, or are we now simply Subjects of all-encompassing Government?
