Drivers Narrowly Escape Death from Cops

A family claims that while waiting to pass through a DWI checkpoint in south eastern North Carolina, officers began indiscriminately firing into one of the vehicles. Jared Cleerdin described the scene, saying that “every cop turned around and started unloading like super trigger happy […] everybody was just blasting this car to pieces. It was absolutely terrifying.”

He went on to say that “it was way beyond reckless […] these are professional people, professional officers, and they’re training, they’re highly trained and they’re not supposed to do stuff like that.”

According to the original report from WECT, the sheriff’s office would not comment on the incident, or provide any information as to why officers suddenly opened fire. All reporters could gather was that seven officers in total had placed on administrative leave.

The comment section of the report (at least this morning) was a typical mixture of sycophantic police-worship and disgust for the reckless behavior. Here’s one of the former variety:

No reports of other vehicles being hit by stray bullets. No reports of bystanders or passerbys (sic) being hit by stray bullets. I would say that these trained officers performed as they were trained to perform. What may look random to the untrained can very well be precisioned (sic) and calculated by those who are trained. People can make all the comments they wants out these officers being reckless but they can’t escape these two facts that rebuke such remarks.

If we are to believe that each of these officers acted in a manner consistent with the above description, shouldn’t we expect to hear that from the police departments involved? If this wanton disregard for human life is indeed the appropriate way in which to handle this sort of thing, wouldn’t the police spokesmen be heralding the officers as heroes? The refusal to comment on the incident seems to raise doubts over this claim.

Furthermore, the use of lethal force is meant only to be used in the event that an innocent life is at risk. In which case, taking the life of a suspect is said to be justified. If indeed someone’s life was in danger, and the police employees used “precision,” how did the two targets manage to survive the fusillade? Considering that “officer safety” is the watchword of public relations officers and police unions across the country, we ought to be hearing all about the grave danger these two individuals posed to the officers.

Silence from the government’s police force appears to speak volumes in this situation.

It’s Okay, He Has a Badge

Without a doubt, anyone who suddenly dispatched a litter of kittens with a pistol in a residential neighborhood would be charged with a number of crimes. Of course, if someone employed by the government’s police force does this it’s fine, because he has a badge.

What’s the Matter with (Mission) Kansas?: Part 2

A review by The Kansas City Star of area police departments revealed that Mission is the number one for traffic tickets in the metropolitan area. This is hardly surprising, since driving through the town’s main thoroughfare is not unlike commuting in a third world country, considering how bad the road conditions are. Adding a heightened risk of highway robbery only makes the experience all the more authentic.

The study showed that last year, police in Mission issued two tickets per hour, twenty four hours a day, for a total of more than 16,000. Considering the town’s main road is only 1.5 miles, and the total area is just over two and half square miles, this number dwarf’s all neighboring communities.

Local coverage has been surprisingly hostile toward the city of Mission, as commentators haven’t been shy about questioning the methods of the city’s police and political elite. In an effort to defend the practice, the mayor told reporters that one fourth of all police stops result in only a warning. Of course it’s not really encouraging that instead of pulling over more than 16,000 drivers, they’re actually harassing more than 20,000 motorists a year.

At least one caller into local radio made the tired, illogical argument that “if you haven’t broken the law, you have nothing to worry about.” This is not an argument, though, since it merely begs the question of whether the law is legitimate in the first place.

In all questions related to crime, there first must be a victim. If there is no victim, then it follows no crime has been committed. Failing to signal, having a broken license plate light, and even speeding cannot be rightly described as crimes if there is no victim.

There’s a trend in Mission; see also this post from a couple years ago.

A Few Points on Nullification History

Opponents of nullification — at least those intellectually capable of moving beyond “but, the civil war settled things” arguments — often appeal to the states who opposed Virginia and Kentucky. I wrote this piece just for them.

The Supreme Court: Not Free Market

Here’s another back-and-forth I’ve had over the past few days with another blogger on WordPress. The person who manages MyPressureValve weighed-in on the Supreme Court’s opinion regarding Monsanto’s claimed intellectual property in modified seeds. The blogger began with: “So, the free market strikes again. Monsanto has won a Supreme Court decision….”

Anything involving the government is by definition not free market. The Supreme Court is a government institution. It is staffed by government employees who are appointed by government employees and confirmed by government employees. It presides over laws written and passed by government employees. Government employees enforce the rulings from the Supreme Court.

My initial response was as follows:

As you note, this isn’t a free market. I don’t know any libertarians personally who would call this environment free market, nor have I read anything from a libertarian who accepts such intervention as legitimate.

After several exchanges, the blogger left this comment:

Government is only as good as the society it represents. Is government inherently bad? You can say the same about power being inherently bad. But the problem is that we have nothing to replace it with. Using the US as an example, how do you not have laws to structure 300 million people? Without laws, how do you insure (to start) the safety of all persons in the country? I understand the abstract of having everyone live their life the way they want with no interference, but real life doesn’t work that way.

We need laws to enforce even simple things such as electrical wiring in houses. Laws for food safety. Laws to enforce driving at safe speeds on the right side of the road, etc. The hard part is the balancing of enough laws without onerous laws encroaching. And as we are talking about humans, we will unfortunately never achieve that balance. But it doesn’t mean we shouldn’t try.

My latest reply:

No legal system can ensure the safety of everyone; a completely unhampered market can’t do that, and neither can a totalitarian state. The fact that such a large and dynamic society exists in the United States makes governing it all the more difficult for a single entity. Controlling even a few hundred people’s lives through regulation would be difficult enough, but trying to achieve this end with hundreds of millions of people, all with constantly-evolving preferences, is all the more unfeasible.

We have laws for food safety and agencies to enforce them, and yet people still are harmed by tainted food. Government assumes a monopoly on roads and 40,000 people die driving every year. The idea that all it takes is enough laws, or enough agents to enforce the laws is simply wrong.

No government ever set out to develop language, or approve translations between the thousands of dialects, and yet the market has figured out how to do this. The same is true of the market for shoes. There’s no central committee that decides how many shoes to produce, in what style, size, or material. And yet shoes are everywhere, there are warehouses filled with them, and stores all over the country provide inexpensive footwear for the masses.

You admit that achieving a balance between “good” laws and “bad” cannot be done. This seems to support my position that letting the market (that is the voluntary interactions of everyone in society) decide these matters is preferable to a violent, coercive body constantly encroaching on our lives.