Will Grigg's Liberty Minutes
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Will Grigg’s Liberty Minute

November 24, 2009

Detroit, once the showcase of America’s industrial prowess, is descending into a bottomless depression. Residents trying to surmount the collapse confront a new and vicious enemy: Police who are resorting to undisguised theft, in the form of asset forfeiture, to fill empty municipal coffers.

The Detroit News reports: "Local law enforcement agencies are raising millions of dollars by seizing private property suspected in crimes, but often without charges being filed -- and sometimes even when authorities admit no offense was committed."

Sgt. Dave Schreiner, who is in charge of Canton Township's forfeiture unit -- which is to say that he's the kingpin of that community's most notorious criminal gang -- is astonishingly candid: "You'll find that departments are doing more forfeitures than they used to because they've got to -- they're running out of money and they've got to find it somewhere."

The city government’s out of money, so the cops become robbers. What will they do when there’s nothing left to steal?

Let us take back the liberty wherewith Christ has made us free.

Will Grigg’s Liberty Minute

November 23, 2009

Alma Minerva Chacon, a Spanish-speaking Mexican immigrant, lives in Maricopa County, Arizona, which is ruled by the demented thug known as Sheriff Joe Arpaio.

Several months ago, Alma was arrested on suspicion of being an illegal immigrant. Nine months pregnant at the time, Alma went into labor. She was taken to the hospital with her hands and feet in shackles, despite the fact that she was not charged with a violent offense.

Sheriff’s deputies refused repeated requests that the mother be freed long enough to deliver her child. Alma gave birth to a baby girl while shackled to her bed. Alma wasn’t permitted the rudimentary dignity of going to the bathroom without her restraints.

Deputies refused even to let Alma hold her newborn baby. They also threatened to seize the infant unless someone came to claim her within 72 hours.

The problem of illegal immigration is subsiding. The residual tyranny of Arpaio and his ilk will afflict us for a long time to come.

Let us take back the liberty wherewith Christ has made us free.

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Will Grigg’s Liberty Minute

November 20, 2009

If you tell a lie while being questioned by a police officer, you will be charged with obstruction – even if you are innocent of committing any actual crime.

However, if a police officer lies to you in an attempt to trip you up during questioning, that’s considered a valid interrogation technique.

In an essay published by the Officer.com website, former prosecutor Val Van Brocklin states the matter quite plainly: “Police lie. It’s part of their job.”

The most common lie told by police, Van Brocklin explains, is “that it’s in a suspect’s best interest to talk to police and confess without an attorney present. It’s not. A completely truthful officer would tell suspects this.”

Van Brocklin’s essay was meant to train police in the safest and most effective ways to lie, so that they can navigate what she calls the “tangled web” without professional consequences.
Keep all of this in mind if you ever find yourself being questioned by the police.

Let us take back the liberty wherewith Christ has made us free.

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Will Grigg’s Liberty Minute

November 19, 2009

Cory Maye, a young father from Prentiss, Mississippi, was asleep in his home when it was invaded by a pack of armed intruders. Maye grabbed a firearm and fatally shot one of the marauders, unaware that the intruders were a SWAT team conducting a narcotics raid on the wrong address.

Despite the fact that the police raided the wrong house, and Maye was acting in what he believed to be self-defense, Maye was convicted of first-degree murder and sentenced to death. Persistent appeals by Maye resulted in commutation of the death penalty, but he remains in prison, potentially for life.

An individual is within his rights to use lethal force to defend himself when his life is threatened by police who invade a home without a warrant. This is recognized in both law and judicial precedents. Fortunately, Maye will have a chance to make that case: On November 17, the Mississippi Court of Appeals granted Maye a new trial.

Let us take back the liberty wherewith Christ has made us free.

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Will Grigg’s Liberty Minute

November 18, 2009

The economy is collapsing and unemployment is mounting. Yet there is a class of Americans who are prospering: The so-called “public servants” employed by government at every level.

As Steven Greenhut documents in his indispensable new book Plunder, government employees “are a specially treated class of citizen….Private employees … in a down economy, work far later into life before retiring, while public employees retire far earlier – 15-20 years earlier, in some cases.” Americans who have seen their retirement accounts wiped out will be forced to pay for the retirement plans of their supposed servants in government.

Rather than being poor but honest public servants, Greenhut writes, many government employees “are made instant millionaires just for taking a job and sticking with it.” Greenhut also exposes scams whereby bureaucrats frequently receive a salary for one job while drawing a tax-paid pension from a previous one.

As St. Augustine would observe, the government ruling us is one vast band of robbers.

Let us take back the liberty wherewith Christ has made us free.

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Will Grigg’s Liberty Minute

November 17, 2009

In June 2005, the Supreme Court ruled that the City of New London, Connecticut was permitted to seize and condemn residential property in order to make space for a research and development facility run by the Pfizer Corporation.

Under the power of eminent domain, government is permitted to pay fair market value for private property for use in the public interest. The Supreme Court’s decision expanded the permissible use of the power of eminent domain to include property takings that benefit private interests.

This was supposedly justified by assurances that New London’s development plan would result in significant local economic growth, as well as increased tax revenue for the municipal government.

Last week, however, Pfizer announced that it would soon close its plant. The anticipated economic growth never came and the envisioned urban improvements failed to materialize. All that’s left of this venture in local central planning are demolished homes and a soon-to-be vacant research center.

Let us take back the liberty wherewith Christ has made us free.

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Will Grigg’s Liberty Minute

November 16, 2009

Alexis Hutchinson, an Army Specialist and, more importantly, the single mother of an 11-month-old boy, is presently being detained in anticipation of a court martial for failing to deploy to Afghanistan. She was unable to make suitable arrangements to care for her son. When Hutchinson was arrested, her child was temporarily placed in the custody of Child Protective Services.

Compounding this outrage is the fact that the Army had promised Hutchinson sufficient time to make proper arrangements.

The neglected last verse of our National Anthem refers to the duty of “free men” to stand “between their loved homes and the war’s desolation….”

For those who would be free men, protecting our homes and families from both foreign aggressors and the domestic enemies who preside over the warfare state is a solemn and sacred responsibility. Yet we have become the kind of country that permits the government to send women – including mothers – off to war.

Let us take back the liberty wherewith Christ has made us free.

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Will Grigg’s Liberty Minute

November 13, 2009

It was shortly after midnight on November 8, 2008 when Dustin Almon of Kensington, New Hampshire noticed two people following him.

Almon finally withdrew a tiny pocketknife from his pants pocket, turned around, and, holding the knife at his side, demanded: “Why are you following me?”

One of the stakers, Anthony Cattabriga, yelled: “Police!” He and his partner were undercover Liquor Enforcement officers trailing Almon as part of a training exercise. Almon eagerly cooperated with their demands – only to be charged with “criminal threatening.”

Cattabriga and his partner carried concealed handguns and Tasers. Almon was twenty feet away from them when he pulled his pocketknife, and he made no threatening moves. Yet Cattabriga insisted in court that “I feared for my safety.” This was enough to convince Judge Sawako Gardner of Almon’s guilt.

Almon’s only offense was to protect himself against unidentified strangers – and, perhaps, to expose the cowardice of police officers who had him outnumbered and out-gunned.

Let us take back the liberty wherewith Christ has made us free.

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Will Grigg’s Liberty Minute

November 12, 2009

In 1935, Major General Smedley Butler wrote: “War is a racket.…. It is the only one in which the profits are reckoned in dollars and the losses in lives…. Out of war a few people make huge fortunes.”

A November 11 New York Times story illustrated that fact by describing the huge personal war fortune made by Peter W. Galbraith. Ambassador Galbraith, who persuaded key Democrats to support the Iraq war, also helped draft the sections of the new Iraqi constitution dealing with the country’s oil wealth.

Now Galbraith is poised to reap tens of millions of dollars on account of the same constitutional provisions he helped write.

Jay Graner, who headed Iraq’s transitional government, and Zalmay Khalidad, former US ambassador to Baghdad, are also cashing inwith lucrative Iraqi consulting contracts. And hundreds made huge fortunes during the so-called post-war reconstruction.

It is an enduring obscenity to see innocent people killed to line the pockets of war profiteers.

Let us take back the liberty wherewith Christ has made us free.

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Will Grigg’s Liberty Minute

November 11, 2009

Despite its very visible opposition to so-called homosexual marriage, the Mormon Church has allied itself with the gay rights lobby in opposition to property rights.

On November 10, Salt Lake City’s municipal government became the first in Utah “to offer housing and employment protections for gays and lesbians – an action supported by the Mormon Church,” reported the church-owned Deseret News.reported the church-owned Deseret News.

The non-discrimination ordinance, which Utah homosexual rights activists hope will become a model for state and federal laws, would “bar landlords and employers from discriminating based on sexuality,” while exempting the Mormon Church and other religious institutions.

Under the ordinance, a private landlord or small business owner would face fines and other enforcement measures for refusing to employ or rent property to homosexuals – a decision that falls entirely within the realm of property rights.

The Mormon Church is behaving like any other politically active corporation by seeking to placate a pressure group at the expense of other people’s rights.

Let us take back the liberty wherewith Christ has made us free.

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Will Grigg’s Liberty Minute

November 10, 2009

Although the media are abuzz with worry whenever a knot of hapless cretins in Nazi regalia stage a demonstration, they consistently ignore the significance of authentically fascist policies enacted by Congress or imposed by the executive branch.

A splendid example is offered by the so-called health care reform measure passed on November 7. That bill requires all Americans to pay a huge premium for a government-approved health insurance policy, or to suffer fines in the form of punitive tax, under the threat of fines of up to $250,000 or prison sentences as long as five years.

In addition to being a means of forcing all Americans into a government-operated system, this would create what liberal congressman Dennis Kucinich, who voted against the measure,describes as “a for-profit system that the government subsidizes.” This corrupt fusion of corporate and government power is, by strict definition, a fascist arrangement – but don’t expect it to be described as such in the mainstream media.

Let us take back the liberty wherewith Christ has made us free.

Will Grigg’s Liberty Minute

November 5, 2009

The housing market collapse has driven many experienced, qualified tradesmen to seek part-time employment. In Florida, the Broward County Sheriff’s Office has targeted those skilled but desperate workers for a pernicious “sting” operation.

An undercover deputy will pose as a homeowner seeking to hire unlicensed, unemployed tradesmen. After the job is described and a price is negotiated, a team of armed deputies storm into the room with guns drawn. The contractor is thrown face-first to the floor, handcuffed, and otherwise abused — for the supposed “crime” of offering to perform a needed service at an appropriate price without government permission.

“The BSO and state officials said the operations have a double purpose: to show construction professionals they need to do work legally or face the consequences, and to warn homeowners about the dangers of using unlicensed tradespeople,”pontificates the South Florida Sun-Sentinel.,

Of course, the actual purpose is to enforce state-created monopolies and guarantee employment for armed tax-feeders.

Let us take back the liberty wherewith Christ has made us free.

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Will Grigg’s Liberty Minute

November 4, 2009

Thirty-two years ago,”Omaha residents Terry Harrington and Curtis McGhee were charged with murdering a retired police officer in Council Bluffs, Iowa. ,

The only evidence against Harrington and McGhee was the account of a 16-year-old with a criminal record. That dubious witness had already changed his story twice, first fingering two other men as the killers, and then equivocating about the kind of firearm used in the murder.

Records discovered in 2003 confirmed that the prosecutor and police conspired to frame Harrington and McGhee by suborning perjury, intimidating defense witnesses, and ignoring a more credible suspect.

Thanks to that discovery, the two men went free after 25 years in prison. They have filed suit against the officials responsible for their unjust imprisonment. An attorney representing the defendants insists that “there is no … constitutional right not to be framed.” This would mean that corrupt prosecutors who conspire to send innocent people to prison are a protected criminal class.

Let us take back the liberty wherewith Christ has made us free.

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Will Grigg’s Liberty Minute

November 3, 2009

Former President Bill Clinton recently visited Pristina, Kosovorecently visited Pristina, Kosovo to witness the unveiling of a monument to his most notable crime – the 78-day terror bombing of Serbia, a country that never harmed or threatened the United States.

Next to Pristina’s main boulevard – which is called “Clinton Street” -- can be found a ten-foot statue of the former president, in tribute to his supposed liberation of Kosovo. In fact, the bombing was an illegal aggressive war that ripped Kosovo from Serbia and turned it over to the rule of a squalid clique of radical Muslim terrorists and gangsters allied with Osama bin Laden.

To be fair, this was a bipartisan accomplishment. That’s why Kosovo’s gangster government has named another street after George W. Bush, whose administration lavished foreign aid on the terrorist junta. Perhaps Bush will soon dedicate a statue of his own in Pristina.

We learn all we need to know about our rulers from the fact that foreign terrorists pay tribute to them.

Let us take back the liberty wherewith Christ has made us free.

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Will Grigg’s Liberty Minute

November 2, 2009

As the Obama administration tells it, the “Great Recession” is over. From July to September, we are told, the Gross Domestic Product grew at an annual rate of 3.5 percent.

In exchange for the $787 billion stimulus spending bill, the administration claims, some 680,000 jobs were either created or “saved.” Assuming that those figures are accurate – which they aren’t, but we’ll treat them as if they were -- this translates into a cost of more than $1 million per job.

The much-heralded “Cash for Clunkers” program is said to have played a large role in the supposed economic revival. According to Edmunds.com, an automobile-focused consumer advocacy service, the Cash for Clunkers program cost taxpayers $24,000 per vehicle.

A business that pays its employees much more than the value of what they produce would soon have to shut its doors. A government, however, can simply keep extracting wealth from producers until it destroys the economy altogether.

Let us take back the liberty wherewith Christ has made us free.