This image was published by The Onion on September 13, 2012, under the headline “No One Murdered Because of This Image.”
The image to the right may, at first glance, be seen as an insult to the religions whose figures are depicted. Upon second glance, we might see in context that the image pays compliment to those religions, while the insult is instead to the one whose Prophet was omitted.
Vulgarity in satire becomes provocative think piece.
The same Charlie Hebdo images deemed racist by some are interpreted as mocking racism by others. There is no right or wrong answer. Subjectivity is inescapable; offensiveness being in the eye of the beholder, the only way to avoid it is not to speak at all.
A Charlie Hebdo cover: “If Muhammad returned.”
I find some of Charlie Hebdo’s images grotesque and unpalatable, others almost touchingly sweet. I interpret the one on the left as a defense of Islam against those who would distort it with their violence, and the one below as a heartfelt insistence that our common humanity will prevail over all differences.
Others will look through the lens of their own perspective, find different meaning in the same images, and take offense or not accordingly.
It changes nothing.
There can be no “but” because freedom has no meaning if we censor ourselves based on the dictates of any conscience but our own.
A Charlie Hebdo cover: “Love is more powerful than hate.”
The battle between those who would be free and those who would be reverent is not between different races and religions, between east and west, or between nation-states. It is a battle between those who love freedom, in all its messy, imperfect glory, and those who would spill blood in pursuit of their own personal utopia.
We must never fail to love our liberty more than they hate it.
Those who qualify their defense of freedom with any “but”—but we ought not mock religion; but we ought mind our own prejudices and hypocrisies; but we ought not be surprised when the profane elicits violence—are trying to straddle a fence that cannot sustain the mighty weight of such freedom.
There can be no “but,” because the stakes are too high.
A war not fought with words and ideas, however cutting, will be fought instead with drones and bombs. Rewarding the murder of satirists with suppression of images, rather than publication of a thousand more, foregoes the peaceful power of the Streisand Effect in favor of enhanced interrogation.
Those who would be free, of every race, religion or nationality, must form a circle of defense around the indefensible. We must give rein to that rebellious voice inside that whispers, If you tell me I must not do something, I will do it to prove I can. We must value freedom over respect, not just when it is tasteful and without cost, but always.
Every. Time.
It is where we stand in the hard cases that defines us.
Are you pro-life? Opposed to big government? Do you believe in reducing government spending? Do you support the death penalty? If you answered yes to all of these questions, then you may want to re-think your position on the death penalty. As supporters of life, liberty, property, and limited government, I believe that all conservatives and libertarians should oppose the death penalty.
I used to be a staunch supporter of the death penalty. I firmly believed that one should repay an “eye for an eye” or a “life for a life.” I can remember exactly where I was when I reformed these beliefs. It was on January 23, 2006 and I was participating in the March for Life in Washington DC. As I was walking down Pennsylvania Ave, I noticed a sign that read: “Pro-Life No Exceptions.” I thought back to the many debates with my girlfriend at the time, when she would ask me how I could be pro-life but still support the death penalty. Being pro-life, I had to ask myself, “how could I say that I support life, but support the state-sanctioned taking of life?”
Cost of the Death Penalty
Furthermore, as someone who believes in limited government, I also had to ask myself another important question. “If I don’t trust the government to make decisions about my wallet, how can I trust the government to make decisions about killing people?” Crazy, right? Oftentimes, we conservatives and libertarians rail against government spending, and rightfully so. So why do we still overwhelmingly support a policy that costs taxpayers about four times more than cases where the death penalty is not involved?
This figure only takes into account the cost of trial. We also have to take into account the costs for appeals and to house prisoners. According to Forbes:
And let’s not forget about appeals: in Idaho, the State Appellate Public Defenders office spent about 44 times more time on a typical death penalty appeal than on a life sentence appeal (downloads as a pdf): almost 8,000 hours per capital defendant compared to about 180 hours per non-death penalty defendant. New York state projected that the death penalty costs the state $1.8 million per case just through trial and initial appeal.
It costs more to house death penalty prisoners, as well. In Kansas, housing prisoners on death row costs more than twice as much per year ($49,380) as for prisoners in the general population ($24,690). In California, incarceration costs for death penalty prisoners totaled more than $1 billion from 1978 to 2011 (total costs outside of incarceration were another $3 billion). By the numbers, the annual cost of the death penalty in the state of California is $137 million compared to the cost of lifetime incarceration of $11.5 million.
The Death Penalty and Crime Deterrence
I often hear the argument that the death penalty is the best method of reducing the murder rate. After all, if one is facing the threat of death, one would be less likely to commit murder, right? Well, according to the Death Penalty Information Center, states which impose the death penalty had an average of 4.4 murders per 100,000 people as opposed to only 3.4 murders per 100,000 people in non-death penalty states.
Furthermore, let’s look at the murder rate based on region. According to the Death Penalty Information Center, the South consistently has the highest murder rate per capita, yet they have, by far, the most executions (as the chart shows below) since the death penalty was reinstated by the Supreme Court in Gregg v. Georgia in 1976.
MURDER RATES PER 100,000 PEOPLE
REGION
2013
2012
2011
2010
2009
2008
2007
2006
2005
2004
2003
2002
2001
EXECUTIONS SINCE 1976(As of 11/19/14)
South
5.3
5.5
5.5
5.6
6.1
6.6
7.0
6.8
6.6
6.6
6.9
6.8
6.7
1133
Midwest
4.5
4.7
4.5
4.4
4.6
4.8
4.9
5.0
4.9
4.7
4.9
5.1
5.3
170
West
4.0
4.2
4.2
4.2
4.6
5.0
5.3
5.6
5.8
5.7
5.7
5.7
5.5
85
Northeast
3.5
3.8
3.9
4.2
3.8
4.2
4.1
4.5
4.4
4.2
4.2
4.1
4.2
4
NATIONAL RATE
4.5
4.7
4.7
4.8
5.0
5.4
5.6
5.7
5.6
5.5
5.7
5.6
5.6
If the death penalty is a deterrent for crime, shouldn’t the states with the most executions have the lowest murder rate per capita?
The Death Penalty and The Innocent
According to the Innocence Project, at least ten people have been executed in cases where there is evidence that may exonerate them. Since 1973, 150 people on death row have been exonerated through new evidence and been pardoned, acquitted by a new trial, or had their charges dismissed. In 2014 alone, seven death-row inmates were exonerated including Ricky Jackson and Wiley Bridgeman, who were convicted of murder in 1975. These men spent 39 years on death row, their entire adult lives. Yet if supporters of the death penalty had their way, these men would have been executed 38 years ago.
I prefer to adhere to the saying by conservative jurist Sir William Blackstone that “It is better that ten guilty persons escape than that one innocent suffer.”
Albert is a licensed attorney and holds a J.D. from Barry University School of Law as well as an MBA and BA in Political Science from The University of Central Florida. He is a conservative libertarian and his interests include judicial politics, criminal procedure, and elections. He has one son named Albert and a black lab puppy named Lincoln. In his spare time, he plays and coaches soccer.
Some laws are so egregious they ought morally be resisted, however destabilizing such resistance might be. Only the most mindlessly authoritarian would disagree.
The hard part is knowing where to draw the lines.
New York City cops are in rebellion, taking a de facto hiatus from policing victimless “crimes.” Whether this is an “important step” toward improved safety and constitutional policing, or a dire threat to the rule of law, seems all a matter of perspective. Cops being as diverse as humans generally, their motivations presumably range from “[a]cting like a bunch of high-school jocks protesting a ban on keg parties” all the way to heartfelt questions about the legitimacy of a system that leaves a man dead for the “crime” of selling loose cigarettes.
Either way, the reduced issuance of petty crime summonses and parking violations will starve the city of revenue, while endangering no one. This strategy, of hurting the mayor’s budget without turning a blind eye to real crime, exposes an unpleasant truth about modern policing: that cops are sent out armed with guns to risk their lives ginning up revenues needed to cover budget shortfalls.
Let that sink in.
I understand the importance of the rule of law. But morality dictates consideration of a system that encourages forceful interaction over such trivialities as selling loose cigarettes, and for the purpose of insulating politicians from the consequences of overspending.
The rule of law is but a means to an end, not an end in itself.
A provocative law review article entitled “The Myth of the Rule of Law” asks the reader to consider the following:
“Congress shall make no law . . . abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; . . . .”
On the basis of your personal understanding of this sentence’s meaning (not your knowledge of constitutional law), please indicate whether you believe the following sentences to be true or false.
_____ 1) In time of war, a federal statute may be passed prohibiting citizens from revealing military secrets to the enemy.
_____ 2) The President may issue an executive order prohibiting public criticism of his administration.
_____ 3) Congress may pass a law prohibiting museums from exhibiting photographs and paintings depicting homosexual activity.
_____ 4) A federal statute may be passed prohibiting a citizen from falsely shouting “fire” in a crowded theater.
_____ 5) Congress may pass a law prohibiting dancing to rock and roll music.
_____ 6) The Internal Revenue Service may issue a regulation prohibiting the publication of a book explaining how to cheat on your taxes and get away with it.
_____ 7) Congress may pass a statute prohibiting flag burning.
After exploring ways in which seemingly clear rules of law are malleable to reach different ends, based on the perspective of those with the power to apply them, the piece returns to those initial questions:
If your response to question one was “True,” you chose to interpret the word “no” as used in the First Amendment to mean “some.”
If your response to question two was “False,” you chose to interpret the word “Congress” to refer to the President of the United States and the word “law” to refer to an executive order.
If your response to question three was “False,” you chose to interpret the words “speech” and “press” to refer to the exhibition of photographs and paintings.
If your response to question four was “True,” you have underscored your belief that the word “no” really means “some.”
If your response to question five was “False,” you chose to interpret the words “speech” and “press” to refer to dancing to rock and roll music.
If your response to question six was “False,” you chose to interpret the word “Congress” to refer to the Internal Revenue Service and the word “law” to refer to an IRS regulation.
If your response to question seven was “False,” you chose to interpret the words “speech” and “press” to refer to the act of burning a flag.
… Why did you do this? Were your responses based on the “plain meaning” of the words or on certain normative beliefs you hold about the extent to which the federal government should be allowed to interfere with citizens’ expressive activities?
My own answer would have been that the First Amendment neither permits nor prohibits anything. The First Amendment is nothing more than words on paper, incapable of doing anything. It is only our collective willingness to enforce, expand or modify it that has any function; that sufficient numbers of us agree, consciously or not, to permit the exercise of collective force to do one or the other; and that sufficient numbers more passively do not resist.
We are unavoidably a nation of both laws and men, and needed change comes in many forms. Sometimes it comes because democratically elected representatives vote for it. Sometimes it comes because one person stops allowing her complicity to lend legitimacy to a bad law.
It bears remembering that enforcing the rule of law was what five New York City officers were doing when they placed Eric Garner in a grapple hold for the “crime” of selling loose cigarettes. As Professor Stephen L. Carter eloquently wrote:
It’s unlikely that the New York legislature, in creating the crime of selling untaxed cigarettes, imagined that anyone would die for violating it. But a wise legislator would give the matter some thought before creating a crime. Officials who fail to take into account the obvious fact that the laws they’re so eager to pass will be enforced at the point of a gun cannot fairly be described as public servants.
* * *
Of course, activists on the right and the left tend to believe that all of their causes are of great importance. Whatever they want to ban or require, they seem unalterably persuaded that the use of state power is appropriate.
That’s too bad. Every new law requires enforcement; every act of enforcement includes the possibility of violence. There are many painful lessons to be drawn from the Garner tragedy, but one of them, sadly, is… : Don’t ever fight to make something illegal unless you’re willing to risk the lives of your fellow citizens to get your way.
Some of the loudest complaints about police misconduct are from the same people who demand a leviathan government exercising control over vast areas of our lives. Such control must of necessity be exercised in the form of laws, laws that must be enforced at the point of a gun.
We all draw lines somewhere, between the laws we think ought be enforced, however misguided they might be, for the sake of preserving the legitimacy of the system; laws so egregious and vile in nature, that they must morally be resisted; and those that fall somewhere between, the close calls and grey area where good faith disagreement can be tolerated. The criteria we use, the lines we draw, are inherently subjective.
We should not ask cops to enforce laws that we are unwilling to have them kill to enforce. We should not risk lives enforcing prohibitions against victimless crimes.
If a rebellion by New York City cops is how this change comes—I can live with that.
We are posting this as a public service and informational notice, for our cannabis using, interested, curious, or just plain liberty oriented readers and friends…
It seems the controversial $1.1T spending bill that is preventing the U.S. government from shutting down is chock full of surprises.
As you may know, much to the dismay of marijuana activists and lovers of democracy everywhere, the bill smacked down Washington DCs referendum that legalized recreational marijuana in the nation’s capital. What you may have missed (because those shifty politicians are doing everything under the table) is that the bill also quietly, but effectively lifted the federal ban on medical marijuana.
Let us be VERY clear… NO the federal government has not legalized, or ended the federal prohibition of medical marijuana.
No, really, they didn’t, no matter what High Times says.
Manufacture, distribution, transportation, storage, sale, possession, and use, of Marijuana are all still federal crimes. Further, they are automatic disqualification on a background check, or a drug test, or a security clearance etc… etc…
They also make one a prohibited person with respect to firearms, explosives, and destructive devices.
Yes… even in Washington and Colorado.
All they did in this omnibus appropriations bill, was to partially defund and deprioritize enforcement of federal marijuana prohibition, against medical marijuana dispensaries only (NOT grow ops, or users) in those states with medical marijuana, between January and September.
That’s it.
Here is the actual text, of the portion of the bill in question:
“Sec. 538. None of the funds made available in this Act to the Department of Justice may be used, with respect to the States of Alabama, Alaska, Arizona, California, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, District of Columbia, Florida, Hawaii, Illinois, Iowa, Kentucky, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, Mississippi, Missouri, Montana, Nevada, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New Mexico, Oregon, Rhode Island, South Carolina, Tennessee, Utah, Vermont, Washington, and Wisconsin, to prevent such States from implementing their own State laws that authorize the use, distribution, possession, or cultivation of medical marijuana. Sec. 539. None of the funds made available by this Act may be used in contravention of section 7606 (“Legitimacy of Industrial Hemp Research”) of the Agricultural Act of 2014 (Public Law 113-79) by the Department of Justice or the Drug Enforcement Administration.”
There has been no real change in the law, there is just a change in the administration of a small subset of enforcement.
In fact, this action makes getting the changes we need in the law harder and less likely.
Far worse though, it furthers the toxic notion that we can just arbitrarily, capriciously, and disparately, choose to not enforce the law, when we feel like it… But then any time we change our mind we can go ahead and start enforcing it again.
This disrespects and debases the very foundation of rule of law.
I am a cynically romantic optimistic pessimist. I am neither liberal, nor conservative. I am a (somewhat disgruntled) muscular minarchist… something like a constructive anarchist.
Basically what that means, is that I believe, all things being equal, responsible adults should be able to do whatever the hell they want to do, so long as nobody’s getting hurt, who isn’t paying extra
A) Simplify the Department of Education by Block Granting Most of its Budget to the States
Ron Paul, Rick Perry and Herman Cain all tried appealing to conservatives in the primaries in 2012 with the simple-minded proposal that we should simply abolish entire Federal departments. There is a certain libertarian appeal toward deleting expensive and useless departments with good-sounding mandates but bad results. We get that. But the public – the conservative public – rejected such notions and elected the guy that wanted to streamline the government and increase state power in an attempt to make government work properly, rather than giving up on government entirely. We believe most in the middle class want to see their government achieve results, rather than gambling that the results will happen naturally without government interference. We believe the GOP must embrace the notion of governing. One way to do that, is to let the states make decisions about education policy by handing them the money and reducing the role of the Federal department to that of balance sheet management and effectiveness monitor with a mandate to make sure that state programs are producing results and striking state policies that fail. We recognize that much of the spending is already block granted to the states – we are proposing to further shrink the Federal budget and return that money to the states with fewer restrictions on how it is spent.
B) Pass Federal Legislation Protecting the Right of Parents to Choose Homeschooling
There is a move afoot in some states to ban homeschooling – we have seen the same sort of movement in the EU and elsewhere in the developed world and it has led to some frightening limitations on liberty that no one should wish to see replicated in the US. The middle class, in particular, is interested in new and innovative education solutions including massive open online courses (MOOCs) at all educational levels and a variety of other homeschooling models. Some of these models are even designed to help benefit those children who may be better suited to the one on one educational method due to learning impediments such as Non-Verbal Learning Disability (Read more here: https://littlethinkerscenter.com/parents-guide/learning-challenges/non-verbal-learning-disability/) that could impact them greatly in a traditional classroom. Instead of forcing a change for the sake of ease of management, let’s get on the right side of history and liberty before we find ourselves unable to act decisively.
C) Incentivize States to Enact School Choice Laws
It is not within the appropriate jurisdiction of the Federal legislature to mandate open school choice, in our opinion, but we can encourage the states to accept that school choice is in high demand by the lower and middle classes by increasing federal awards to states that back successful public charter, public magnet, private, parochial and homeschooling alternatives, such as the CLEP program and the clep prep supplementary material that follows, monetarily and favor successful schools over bad ones in the distribution of education budgets, and by giving states bonuses that are efficient with their education funds (generate better performance to dollar ratios).
D) Back Trade Schools, MOOCs and Private Colleges with Oversight
One of the biggest problems with the alternatives to public colleges that prevent employers from giving much value to job applicants who obtain certifications and technical degrees from private technical schools, MOOCs and trade schools is that it’s the wild west for these colleges and they are under no obligation to provide a useful and quality education. Take a note here – because you will rarely see us asking for more federal regulation, but this is one such case. The Federal Government must promote alternatives to expensive public colleges to help ameliorate the growing higher education bubble and keep young people out of debt (and, in so doing, grow the future middle class). In order for us to break our addiction to student loans – click here to learn more – we must empower high school kids to choose high school and college curricula that lead to technical certifications and trades, and we can’t do that until we can guarantee that our private and technical/trade colleges meet basic standards of educational value that will convince employers to hire people certified and degreed by such institutions. The standards need not be identical to the public system, but quality assurance should be required.
E) Encourage States to Enact Reforms that Limit Public Degrees that Do Not Produce
Here again, it would be beyond the scope of Congress to start outlawing college degree programs that do not produce expected revenue that justifies their existence – what we can do, however, is increase the available federal assistance for students who are majoring in a STEM, manufacturing, or technical field (and any other degree program with a solid history of wealth creation), decrease federal assistance for less productive or overrepresented majors, and tie interest rates to risk (a risky degree like puppetry or cultural studies should come with much higher interest rates than a STEM degree). Federal student loans should be treated like the investment they were billed to be, not like a pipeline of money that students may use and abuse to their heart’s content. Although student loans can seem like free money, it’s important to understand that the money is provided to make your university experience less stressful for you; The loans are intended to prevent you from having to worry about economic factors. However, if you find your loan doesn’t fully cover your university experience, you might want to see if you could get free money for college. Remember, college degrees should improve the US economy, not burden it.
F) Pass a Law Requiring a Government Census of College Degree performance and Making Info Available Online
Openness and transparency in financial outcomes and expenditures usually has the immediate impact of change the demand for products based on rational financial decision-making. College degrees are a bit more emotional than the average investment opportunity, so having good data on which degrees are good investments and which are not will not stop bad degrees from existing, but I believe it will alter the number of students falling for them (because it will cause parents to deny their children’s requests to attend expensive colleges in order to study something that has a poor earning potential, along with making some students think twice about choosing bad or, at least, over-saturated, degrees). So require the department of education to conduct a census of colleges and universities and their various degree programs and report information such as the default rate on student loans for each school, each degree program and each combination of the two, the graduation rate, the employment numbers, and the net earnings of students (per capita) by degree program at each school. If a college degree is an investment, we should know what the investment is worth.
G) Pass a Law Guaranteeing the Right of Refusal to Parents
One more thing that Congress cannot tackle directly, but must move to address in what ways it can is ‘Common Core’. The concept of a Federally mandated curriculum is not compatible with liberty and the GOP should move to guarantee the right of all families to refuse to participate in common core and choose a different standard. This won’t help parents who are currently stuck in public schools and don’t have a viable alternative, but as GOP governors work on the problem of school choice, it will be crucial that alternative programs have the right to opt out of common core and use different teaching methods and standards.
Education is a state problem for the most part, as it should be, and in spite of efforts by leftists to nationalize and further institutionalize learning – but that doesn’t mean the legislature can’t take certain steps to lead on education policy and encourage the states to be bold and innovative o their own. Middle class families are aching for a better way forward for their children ad Congress should show that this is a priority for them as well.
William Blackstone
