Regular readers here know that when the question of cops being “peace officers” or “law enforcement officers” comes up, my answer is, “They have to be both. They can’t keep the peace against law-breakers without enforcing the law, and the enforcement of the law does keep the peace.” I said pretty much the same in another publication I write for frequently, and a letter came in to the editor there from a reader I’ll call “W.” He said in part:
“There was nothing in (Ayoob’s) statements that wasn’t false or misleading. Back when we were living under the common Law, sometimes referred to as “Public Law” (set aside back in 1933 when the bankers stole our Lawful money), there was no such thing as ‘law enforcement officers,” because under the common Law there was only one Law, summed up in the golden rule; ‘Do unto others as you would have them do unto you.’ Preserving the peace is what ‘Peace Officers’ are for. When Marshal Dillon made his rounds visiting the Long Branch, and other saloons in Dodge City, he was keeping the peace by letting his presence be known. Dillon’s purpose was to remind the ne’er-do-wells and rowdies to behave themselves. The people knew when they were interfering with the rights of others; the common law was considered to be self-evident—common sense, and ignorance of this Law was no excuse. Peace officers didn’t go around ‘enforcing’ anything; the People were free. But once Marshal Dillon ordered a person to turn over his gun while he was in town, he was breaking the law by enforcing an unconstitutional man-made rule. We all have the right and duty (if we are capable), to arrest those who violate the law, but that is not ‘enforcing the law,’ by forcing obedience to man-made rules. We have been dumbed down so far that today people actually believe that we cannot live without millions of statues (sic) to regulate us, and cops everywhere—to charge us (bill us) whenever we break a rule. Most, if not all of the 63-million statutes ‘enforced’ by ‘law enforcement officers’ today are unlawful; they do not even apply to most people, who put far too much trust in the British Accredited Registry (BAR Association) and it’s (sic)attorney members (including judges) who have taken over our judicial system.”
Wow. At first glance, one might have thought his writing “statues” when he meant “statutes” was just a typo, but a full reading showed he probably didn’t know a statute from a statue. Using TV fiction as an example is a dead giveaway (does this guy think Marshal Dillon wasn’t enforcing the law when he blew bad guys away on the streets of Dodge City in almost every episode?) But you couldn’t finish the above without getting a very strong whiff of the bizarre alternate history of the self-declared “sovereign citizen.”
I figured I should get a little more familiar with “W” before I responded to his strange screed, so I did a bit of research. It didn’t take long to determine why “W” didn’t like law enforcement: he had been convicted for illegally manufacturing and selling firearms subsequent to a BATFE investigation. I found a hilarious transcript from his time in court where one of the world’s most patient judges decisively shot down the meaningless drivel “W” pompously babbled in court for the record.
And “W” had enough hate to go around, way past law enforcement. Elsewhere, “W” had written among other things,
“I do not relate to homosexuality, suicide, or race mixing— especially with Negros.”
However, “W” reserved his most potent vitriol for his raging anti-Semitism. Some examples from his babbling elsewhere:
“All of the suppression and problems in this world can be traced to some agenda of the self-chosen Jews and the Protocols spell them out for us.”
“The reason for all the (JFK assassination) conspiracy theories was to distract us from the fact that Oswald was one of their own, a communist (the Jews invented communism through their god Lucifer), and they didn’t want us to focus on Oswald because we might begin to connect the dots and figure out how despicable these troublemakers really are.”
“Jews consider us, the true Israelites, goyim, non-Jew cattle or farm animals for their use and harvesting.”
Haters gonna hate…and sometimes, they hate everything and everyone. In poor “W’s” case, it apparently led him straight to a diagnosis of batshit crazy.
I dunno man, meth is a hell of a drug.
Sounds like a drunken tirade.
But my money’s on him being a SOBER CRAZY CITIZEN.
Scary Huh?
My diagnosis: your diagnosis is spot on, Doc Ayoob.
Plenty anti-American Lefties just as batshit crazy, too. I wonder what would happen if they all got locked in a barn together.
There would very soon be a lot fewer of them. And a mess for someone to clean up.
But, outside of the barn I do believe life would get signficantly better.
Wow Mas, Do you think he’s flipped out ? (yeah)
A guy like that needs psychiatric supervision.
It’s very hard on cops to deal with people like that.
We don’t want to end up hearing about them on the
National News someday. (Vegas)
I say 72 hour hold for that boy
if he wanders into my hood.
(or if he finds himself stretched over my hood)
The thought that this gentleman “W” is “batshit crazy” (those exact words entered my thoughts) came to me about 30 seconds before I read those same words at the end of your essay (confirming once again for me that great minds often do think alike). 🙂
Best wishes,
John Mohan
I just keep repeating to myself, “Marshal Dillon was only TV character” a few dozen times before reading W’s other comments. I want a mule, like Festus, and I do think Oswald was a communist.
I think W may have a point…..on top of his head. Thanks for sharing this. I love the variety of these columns.
Well, Mas, I can agree with some of what W says about past Times, when things were simpler, justice, while not always right, was swifter, and more final!
Wish we could roll back the time clock to those days? Of course today’s Sheeple, who never learned the difference between Right and wrong, let alone God, and Duty, Honor, or Country would be totally lost back then too!!
Paul
There are some scary folks in the world. That’s the unwritten but understood second reason for the Second Amendment IMO.
Sometimes, as a psychologist, I found it hard to distinguish between “crazy” and evil.
If “W” wants to know why things are as they are all he needs do is look in a mirror. The answer will be looking at him.
Eeek!
It helps to think of the political spectrum as represented (graphically) by a normal curve (AKA Bell Curve). The X-Axis of this curve represents the political spectrum from extreme, ultra right-wing moving to center right, moderate, center left and then finally ultra left-wing. The Y-Axis would represent the number of people (i.e. portion of the population).
The center of the curve (top of the bell) represents the politically moderate and sane people of the world. The tails of the curve, stretching out to the Right and the Left, represent the radical and politically insane people of the world.
It is too bad that we can’t quantify political extremism exactly. If we could, we could identify the political nuts and then pack them off for treatment in mental institutions instead of electing them to congress or other public office or giving them a voice in the mainstream media! 🙂
My point is that the people in the extreme “wings” of the political bell curve are truly insane and are very dangerous people. Based upon your description, it seems that “W” may be an individual of the extreme, ultra-right-wing type. However, he is no more insane than ultra-left-wingers like Rachel Maddow. The only difference is that Ms. Maddow is given a TV Program, by MSNBC, and paid millions of dollars to spew forth her extremist nonsense instead of being packed off and given the mental health treatment that she and “W” both so clearly need!
The idea that prior to 1933 we lived under “common law” using the “golden rule” without law enforcement would have been news to the folks who survived Prohibition during the Roaring Twenties. In fact, I haven’t found any such time, back as far as there have been written histories.
This guy IS barmy. If laws work to keep things more peaceful, and they DO if allowed to, then they who enforce the law ARE keeping the peace, and they who keep the peace do so by enforcing the law. Its sort of like Ohm’s Law and light bulbs. One is useless without the other. Duhhhhh….. and this guy is a few watts short of a lightbulb. Reminds me of that old bub Mr. Bell. You know, Bell’s a bub……..
Yep. I knew his rant was “sovereign citizen”, even before you said it.
In the “I know what I am but what are you?” department:
We all probably agree on about where W sits on the political spectrum, but where do _you_ sit? (Skip to the bottom of this post for the fun part.)
The Pew Research Center just released a poll they do every few years which groups the respondents into political categories and explores what, exactly, each category believes, how politically active they’re likely to be, and what their concerns are. Based on in-depth interviews with more than 5,000 American adults, the nonpartisan group divided everyone across the political spectrum into eight groups, along with a ninth group of politically disengaged “Bystanders.” (That’s a giant sample, and commentators are saying that the methodology is airtight.)
The summary and a link to the full poll reports can be found here:
http://www.people-press.org/2017/10/24/political-typology-reveals-deep-fissures-on-the-right-and-left/
There’s a lot to digest there, but there’s a fun part, too. They’ve created a 17-question online quiz to create a rough indication of where you would fit in. The quiz is here:
http://www.people-press.org/quiz/political-typology/
I’ve taken quiz several times and almost consistently come out as “Solid Liberal”. But I only have to answer one question on which I’m somewhat ambiguous differently to shift into “Opportunity Democrat”.
Where do YOU end up?
Liberal Dave – Thank you for the link to the online quiz. These kind of quizzes are interesting for classification purposes as to general ideology. However, they still fall short in the area of separating the sane center-left or center-right individual from the insane, extremists found in the far left or right.
I am not surprised that you ended up being classified as a “Solid Liberal”. I would guess that you will not be surprised that I ended up being categorized as a “Core Conservative”. It was not a surprise to me! 🙂
The one thing I noted about the quiz is that it tended to juxtapose an absolute statement with a qualified one including “most” or “usually”. I think that biases the outcome. It certainly did for me as I went for the qualified statement almost every time.
“Rightful liberty is unobstructed action according to our will within limits drawn around us by the equal rights of others. I do not add ‘within the limits of the law’ because law is often but the tyrant’s will, and always so when it violates the rights of the individual.”
— Thomas Jefferson
“Law Enforcement” is cops shutting down a kids lemonade stand, or cops in Florida booting a van delivering emergency food to people after the recent hurricane, and the utterly repugnant “asset forfeiture examples, all of which means cops don’t keep the peace, they are thug muscle for Jefferson’s “tyrants.
Each makes his choice in his career. Some of us saw which way things were going and quit after a few (11 in my case) years.
Mas,
As a recent commenter who has attempted to explain, from my perspective, why LEO’s are no longer strictly operating as “Peace Officers” but as enforcement agents of State policy, I feel that I must again try to communicate my understanding of the differences, although as I have stated before, I wish I were better qualified to make such an argument but this subject deserves more important discussion than an “ad hominen” attack on another commenter or the presumption that because a claim has been poorly argued that the claim itself must be wrong.
Peace Officers are those who help keep the peace between citizens and who only enforce “mala in se” laws, such as those against murder, rape, robbery, arson and other violations of true “evil” where there is an actual victim.
Law Enforcement Officers (LEO’s) are those that enforce ALL rules (“mala prohibita”) created by government, even those where there is no actual citizen victim. These are usually enacted for some nebulous “public good” or corporate benefit but it is rarely good for the individual being subjected to the enforcement, often violently.
If you believe that it is “peaceful” or right to kidnap a citizen for pursuing happiness, even if it may appear detrimental to the citizen, to extort money from them and to incarcerate them into labor camps (Prison Industries), we cannot agree on what the definition of peaceful is, much less the application of it in society.
“Peace , a state of harmony characterized by lack of violent conflict and freedom from fear of violence.”
Is this how you would characterize a drug bust or an arrest for selling untaxed cigarettes Mas?
Yes, many brave officers daily act as true “Peace Officers” in their duties, restoring harmony between citizens but when it comes to enforcement of arbitrary prohibita rules, using violence or the threat of violence, this is not peaceful and when the rules they are enforcing are contrary to the Supreme Law of Our Land, The U.S.Constitution, they are not even true “laws” but merely unconstitutional edicts of control and extortion.
I believe and hope that the true spirit of the American Peace Officer is alive and well in many of the Thin Blue Line. It is my prayer that they will realize this, in time to save our great nation from the dictatorial grasp it is now in.
Again Mas, I thank you for allowing opinions which are different from yours to be expressed.
Bob Grant used to say, “It’s sick out there, and getting sicker.”
Talk about crazy, I see arguments on the Internet for a flat earth, the Apollo 11 moon landing being a hoax, and chem trails putting out particles to harm the population. I’m sure physicians and nurses would be very content to let the government rain down harmful chemicals on them, their families and the general population. Oh, I know, the government threatens anyone who would tell us the truth about chem trails, and so the physicians keep quiet, right?
About Jew haters; I’m supposed to be afraid of the power of the Jews? There are lots of Jews in America, but they make up only 2% of our population. Oh yeah, and didn’t Adolf Hitler kill six million Jews? How could he do that if they were so powerful? Oh I know, the bankster Jews let Hitler do it because they are atheistic, one-world communist types. Well, even if some Jewish banksters control our money system, while I admit that is a lot of power, they do not control us. They cannot defeat us, they just don’t have the numbers.
I wonder if any sizeable population could be either enslaved or exterminated in our time. It would be pretty difficult to do that. Maybe even more difficult than conquering the old Soviet Union. So Hitler could kill six million Jews, but couldn’t conquer the Soviet Union. In fact he couldn’t even conquer Great Britain, and the Jews were less powerful than Hitler. Even if there are evil Jews who want to enslave the goyim, they can’t do it.
Communists wanted to rule by forcing people to obey them. Fabian Socialists want to rule by tricking people into obeying them, but neither of them can accomplish their dreams. The beat goes on.
Tahn, do you think selling heroin to inner city kids is malum prohibitum or malum in se? Particularly in the time of the opioid crisis?
If I park my car wherever I please — blocking a fire lane, blocking the ambulance entrance at the hospital Emergency Department, or perhaps blocking your driveway — should the police have the power to tag it or tow it?
Tah, (sic) do you think selling heroin to inner city kids is malum prohibitum or malum in se? Particularly in the time of the opiod crisis?
Mas, Child endangerment is a slippery slope. I would not but then, what if they are getting it at a pharmacy for their incapacitated parent, as many children used to run errands before the drug laws. I used to walk into the hardware store when I was 12 years old and buy shotgun shells. Now, that would be a felony for the seller, my parents and probably me. There will always be questionable situations but the parent is “usually” a better judge than the state. Is it mala in se or prohibita for a Doctor to proscribe tranquilizers for a child for ADD or is it better for a doctor and a parent to decide?
“If I park my car wherever I please — blocking a fire lane, blocking the ambulance entrance at the hospital Emergency Department, or perhaps blocking your driveway — should the police have the power to tag it or tow it?”
Yes certainly, property rights would be superior.
Mas, Why would you give this guy your time or ours?
So Tahn, a police officer should only arrest the intoxicated driver after he has run over and killed your child, not before he has that opportunity?
Mas,
I see stopping an obviously drunken driver the same way I see stopping someone drunkenly waving a firearm around. You are stopping a threat. That does not mean I believe in arbitrary blood level tests. Someone may be on prescription drugs or booze, if they are a threat, they should be stopped. Carrying a holstered firearm is not a threat (nor should it be a crime) but waving it around (brandishing) is, IMHO.
I sense that a major portion of our possible disagreement is in the definition of what is a “victimless crime”. We are not alone in attempting to understand. The following is a link to an article, some of which you might agree with and some that I might.
http://www.encyclopedia.com/social-sciences-and-law/law/law/victimless-crime
Mas, the war on some drugs is, again in my opinion, a major factor in the discord between police and minorities of color or culture. Eliminating this false war and allowing all citizens access to our courts and the right to self defense, would do much to restore trust between all Americans.
Again, I appreciate the attempt to understand and recognize our differences, even if we don’t agree about them.
W: If you study the history of “The Protocols of Zion,” I believe that you will find that they were not genuine, but were devised and promoted by troll-type anti-Semites like the Nazi Alfred Rosenberg. “The Protocols” actually helped the pagan Hitler, who professed belief in them, to proceed to bring about the destruction of his beloved, beautiful “Aryan Germania” by emulating George Armstrong Custer’s plan to annihilate the Sioux and Cheyenne nations with a small regiment at the suicidal Battle of the Little Bighorn. Those who live by the sword do tend to die by it, especially when heavily outnumbered. Hate acts consistently like a vindictive boomerang. Study the actual teachings of Christ, instead of antagonistic racial theories, and work on developing a fully positive attitude, where forgiveness works wonders. Christian charity is our greatest tradition, which sets us above hate, and preserves us.
“Protocols” was originally composed as anti-Masonic propaganda. Then some antisemitic Russians tweaked it into a Jewish conspiracy.
So, Tahn, how about this one. An officer sees a car stopped on a dark semi-rural road and hears cries coming from it. He steps up and sees a man having sexual relations with a young girl. On investigation it turns out the man is 28 years old and the girl is 14. The age of consent in that state for girls is 17. On investigation, the man has done nothing which would constitute rape if the girl had been 17 or older; that is, if the law didn’t say that 14 year olds are legally unable to consent, what the girl did and said would have constituted consent. When the girl’s parents are consulted, they aren’t concerned, saying, “She’s old enough to do as she likes.” Would a statutory rape charge be malum prohibitum or malum in se? Would it have made any difference to your answer if the girl had been 9 or 16 instead of 14?
And here’s the thing: It’s one thing to advocate for the decriminalization of things that you consider to be malum prohibitum, but do you _really_ want cops to have the right to make that decision on the street on a case by case basis? The fact is, one person’s in se is another person’s prohibitum.
Finally (and there is an element of self-criticism here, since I’ve engaged in the debate), this entire discussion is wholly impractical. The question of whether laws in the US should be malum-one-or-the-other is long over. You could probably kill two or three Supreme Court justices due to them having strokes or heart attacks from them laughing so hard if you brought this argument up there. This argument has just as much validity as those folks who believe that they don’t have to pay their income tax because of the Magna Charta and the Northwest Ordinance of 1787. If you’d been around at the time of the Founding Fathers you might have issued a few broadsides or pamphlets and, maybe, obtained some traction on this issue, but here in the 21st Century, your ship has sailed. Even if there are a few libertarians and anarchists who grin and say “yeah, man” they represent a fraction of the U.S. electorate which is so small that there is no hope, _whatsoever_, that their views will ever prevail. The whole notion is sophomoric and, dude, you should give it up and spend your political capital for something that can actually make a difference.
Liberal Dave,
The problem in answering specific questions concerning mala prohibita, especially those related to statutory crimes concerning minors is our varied and ever changing culture norms. According to Wikipedia “in the 1880’s, the age of consent was set at 10 to 12, with the exception of Delaware, where it was 7.” https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ages_of_consent_in_the_United_States
It is now from 16 to 18. I would prefer that this be a personal and family choice, although I’m sure there would be decisions we would both disagree with but who has the most potential for error or benefit, the family or the state? If we had lived in Delaware in the 1880’s, we would both have probably disagreed with the states definition.
As determined by the various ages of consent changing over time, the drug laws which were almost nonexistent prior to the late 1880’s and the concealed carry and other restrictions on firearms about the same time, we would not have to go back to the founding fathers to find a time when we were free from the plethora of mala prohibita rules we now have. Many of the drug and gun laws were an extension of the Jim Crow laws of the south in wanting to control minorities. Nixon greatly expanded the Drug War because he wanted to suppress two of his political enemies, anti war hippies and blacks. http://www.drugpolicy.org/press-release/2016/03/top-adviser-richard-nixon-admitted-war-drugs-was-policy-tool-go-after-anti
Dave, There will always be individual aspects of personal liberty we might both disagree with but my contention is that leaving those decisions to each free person is more in line with the original intent of our founders and the Constitution, than the myriad of laws criminalizing everything from large sodas to natural medical herbs.
Will there be individual tragedies, unfortunately yes but not the scale of tragedy we see daily in the war on some drugs.
The main reason I continue to speak out is because I see a widening gulf between our thin blue line and the people they are supposed to peacefully represent, instead of controlling their personal actions, especially when those rules are enacted for corporate profits or the totalitarian growth of an overpowering state.
Even more important Dave, I see a fully informed officer corps, as the last bastion of responsibly sworn Americans able to peacefully stop the oppression and heal our country, just by saying NO. No victim, No crime, No cop.
LOL!!!!
HAHAAAAA
No Way?! Thanks Mas, laughter is the best medicine.
ROTFL
😀
Okay, so it’s been a few days since this blog has been posted and I have tried to understand it through logical, critical thinking. FIRST THOUGHT: why would Mas bring this conversation up here, unless W really infuriated him and he wanted more perspective? SECOND THOUGHT: some of the wordy replies here, lost me in the puddle of opinions, of which I understood the points germane to Mas’ rant, but still …
PEACE OFFICERS= one who is duly deputized to act as public official to assist in keeping the peace? We see how well that has worked in Europe with unarmed “peace officers”.
LAW ENFORCEMENT OFFICERS= one who is duly deputized to enforce the laws as they are written, unfortunately, sometimes misinterpreted by said LEO. Enforcing laws committed by criminals can be violent, but in many cases don’t have to be. For example, what part of these commonly known phrases incite violence; “STOP-LET ME SEE YOUR HANDS! DO YOU KNOW WHY I PULLED YOU OVER? STEP OUT OF THE CAR…”
What if the subject is suicidal? PEACE OFFICER= “Sir, please come down from the bridge, you could hurt yourself” LEO= “Sir, you have someone who cares about you, I CARE about you, please take my hand and I’ll help you get some help, personally, please, just take my hand…” And as the jumper jumps, the LEO lurches to grab the jumper from certain death, succeeds, only to be punched in the face by the jumper. BTW, suicide is still illegal in many jurisdictions and I could argue that if it is suicide by police, why isn’t the decedent charge with a crime, instead of the cop?
Lastly, the war on drugs has failed. To Mas’ disappointment, the author of this reply isn’t in favor of the drug war anymore. It’s a losing battle. Just as prohibition way-back-when didn’t work. When alcohol was legalized, mafia-mob violence and blackmarkets quickly faded, moonshiners no longer concocted hazardous materials–to the extent they did, and the jails were not as crowded as before. Shux, you have LICENSED practitioners writing ‘scripts for everything under the sun, including weed and opiates. The war on drugs is lost to the cop/courts, but a big money maker for the doctor. Go figure.
W? Can’t form an opinion, don’t know him, but he sure ticked someone off.
Stay safe, Larry
Larry McClain,
The problem I see in this country is we have a wide spectrum of beliefs, but one-size-fits-all laws. I think it would help if the citizens of each state could vote on controversial issues, and then the states’ laws would reflect that vote. So citizens could vote for laws on drugs, abortion, prostitution, gun carry laws, and others issues which divide us. People could live under the set of laws with which they agree. When visiting other states, they would have to abide by the laws in that state.
Human history shows there are no solutions which last forever, but this may be one way that the anger in this country could be reduced. There would still be problems, but maybe the problems would be smaller and less divisive than they are today.
I am glad that Mas did some research on ‘W’ and found out he actually exists. Otherwise I’d be wondering if the guy was a Troll striking an absurd caricature. -sigh-
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