You Commit Three Felonies a Day

Originally posted by schrodingers dog
I share your concern in principle, but ...

Wait, are you suggesting we change the constitution to become a direct (referendum) democracy?

It all comes down to balance of power. Our government was intended to be of the people, by the people and for the people. Representatives were supposed to be common citizens, not the elite, nor were they supposed to serve Special Interest Groups and Lobbyists, but were there to do the will of the people as a whole.

Since 1829 our Congress has grown increasingly corrupt and the divide between Congress and the people has grown considerably. You have second and third generation lifetime politicians in office who comprise a new Aristocracy, which our Revolution and form of Government was supposed to prevent.

The power of Congress needs to be reigned in. I don't know an American alive that wouldn't agree with that sentiment.

The sticky widget is how one would accomplish that.

Their powers of oversight of the Executive Branch are fine. Those things should not be changed. That purpose is still being served and remains in check.

However, where Congress has run afoul for the past 180 years is accepting bribes from Special Interests, Corporations, Lobbyists, and the Rich to enact legislation geared solely towards their interests, in diametrical opposition to the interests of the people, or the Nation as a whole.

Even if we could get Congress to reform themselves and pass Legislation limiting Campaign Contributions and gifts from Lobbyists, Special Interest Groups, Corporations and the Rich they would find loopholes to still take advantage of those laws.

We could vote out everyone in Congress and replace them, but it would be the same story as the past 180 years but with different names.

The only sure way to end corruption in Congress is to take away their ability to both Draft and Pass Legislation.

If Congress were limited to only Drafting Legislation then the power that the Lobbyists, Special Interest Groups and Corporations have over our Government would be halved. If Congress had no say in whether Legislation was to be passed by popular vote of the people, they would have little or no incentive to Draft Legislation that was not in the interest of the people.

With modern communication technologies, there is little reason against doing such with our form of government. The only valid argument against this would be that the majority of people in the United States are idiots (which is the premise of a Republic over a Democracy). However, a Republic doesn't safeguard against the majority of people being idiots either. How do you think those corrupt officials in Congress got into Congress to begin with? The idiotic majority voted their elite idiots into office! Unless we were to have a reverse political vote, where those who received the least number of votes were voted into office, the argument that one shouldn't have a Referendum Democracy on the basis of the majority of the population being idiots is a hollow one.

I believe that taking away the right to vote and pass Legislation from Congress and giving it directly to the people would prevent asinine Legislation from being passed in the first place. Certainly, it would prevent Legislation that criminalizes the common citizen for things that everybody does. Do you think that the American people would pass a law that gave broad sweeping powers to the FBI/NSA/DHS to conduct invasive Domestic Surveillance without oversight? Do you think that the American people would pass a law that gave Law Enforcement the ability to conduct Illegal Search & Seizure without due cause or a warrant? Do you think that the American people would pass a law like the DCMA Act that would give a greater penalty for copying a CD or DVD than First-Degree Murder or Raping a Child? Yet these are all instances where our Congress has failed us, serving Special Interests and Lobbyists rather than their people.

So yes, I was suggesting a Referendum Democracy as a viable solution.

reply to post by getreadyalready


Luckily I think you are more likely to get arrested than me considering you work for the state and that puts you in a position to gather information that may or may not be used criminally. I'll come get you too though, so don't get arrested. lol.

imo Harvey Silvergate is a moron or crook for hire
because

FACT: He willingly represented the interests of the Fraud of Scientology

See Declan McCullough's page on him LINK

[edit on 30-9-2009 by seataka]

[edit on 30-9-2009 by seataka]

Originally posted by seataka
Harvey Silvergate is a moron or crook for hire
because

FACT: He willingly represented the interests of the Fraud of Scientology

See Declan McCullough's page on him LINK

I have more than my fair share of contempt for Scientology. However, I think that Harvey Silvergate was absolutely correct in that letter you linked. Despite what any of us may think of Scientology, they should be accorded the same First Amendment Rights as anyone else in the United States. There are a lot of whacked Churches with a lot of whacked ideas, but the premise of our Nation...so important that it was made as the First Amendment is the Right to Religion (or lack thereof). Government should not have the right to determine what beliefs should be allowed and what shouldn't be allowed. If the nutters of Scientology want to believe in an Extra-Terrestrial Galactic Overlord named Xenu who ruled the Galactic Confederation and took billions of political dissidents to earth and nuked them with Hydrogen bombs, ultimately creating Thetans, then that is their Constitutional Right. I still have the Constitutional Right to not be a Scientologist, just as I have the Constitutional Right to think them all to be nutters. However, when we deny Scientologists their Right to Religious Belief then we deny ourselves that same Right.

Silvergate was right when he said that it may have destroyed his credibility, but it doesn't make him any the less right in what he did defending the First Amendment Rights of the Church of Scientology. It is rare to find an individual who will stand up for the Rights of even those who don't believe as he does. I actually have a lot more respect for Silvergate after reading that letter. Thank you.

Originally posted by getreadyalready
reply to post by Tiloke

 

Martha Stewart spent time for Perjury, not for the crime she was accused of! That is abuse of the law.

Gotcha, punishing someone for breaking the law (perjury) is abuse, thanks for clearing that up.

The Set-up with OJ I referred to was with him violently accosting the guys that stole his paraphenalia, not the police.

Not his paraphanelia, if it was, he had it illegally.

They intentionally baited and provoked him with a camera present and the intent of extorting money from him. When he acted predictably, he was the one arrested. Sure, he was guilty, but I would probably have done the same thing in his shoes!

Wow, you are so wrong here it's hard to believe your talking about OJ Simpson. He was not baited or provoked,there was no camera present, and NOBODY tried to extort money from him.

In September 2007, Simpson was arrested in Las Vegas, Nevada and charged with numerous felonies, including robbery with a deadly weapon, burglary with a firearm, assault with a deadly weapon, first-degree kidnapping with use of a deadly weapon, coercion with use of a deadly weapon, conspiracy to commit robbery, conspiracy to commit kidnapping, and conspiracy to commit a crime. A jury found Simpson guilty of all charges on October 3, 2008; and he was sentenced on December 5 to at least nine years in prison. He is currently serving his sentence at the Lovelock Correctional Center in Lovelock, Nevada.

But, since you mentioned it, why is it a crime to lie to a police officer, but it is ok for a police officer to lie to you? Not just stretch the truth, but flat out lie! Say, "We have your fingerprints" when they don't! Or say, "Your wife is writing out her confession now" when she is not!

Because the police aren't the ones suspected of breaking the law, the people being questioned are and it is the police officer responsibility to find out the truth, if he has to lie to get a suspect to tell the truth, so be it. I honestly can't believe you think that this is an argument.

I wish I could find the link to the Alaska story, it was not misrepresented at all! He had all the proper licenses and lab and permits, but he failed to place one sticker on a package.

Did the law say he had to attach that sticker? Only breaking the law a little bit is no excuse for breaking it.

Admittedly my last scenario was a made up example. It came to me as I was driving home from a Casino one night! I didn't get pulled over, but I did have a bunch of cash, no receipts proving I had one it (because I won a lot of small pots, not one big one), I had my gun, my NRA sticker, tinted windows, nice car, etc.! I was actually scared, even though I had done nothing wrong, I realized how easy it could be made to look very bad!

Give me a break. You got all up in arms over a made up scenario? Over what MIGHT have happened, only because it may have been possible?

My neighbor might get in his car drunk and kill little babies, but you don't see me or others getting pissed of that he has a drivers license.


[edit on 30-9-2009 by Tiloke]

Originally posted by seataka
imo Harvey Silvergate is a moron or crook for hire
because

FACT: He willingly represented the interests of the Fraud of Scientology

See Declan McCullough's page on him LINK

[edit on 30-9-2009 by seataka]

[edit on 30-9-2009 by seataka]

So, everyone in America is entitled by the Constitution to legal representation, except those entities that you don't like....

A few observations and comments...

1) This is a very cool thread. Hats off to the OP.

2) If someone in power wants you in jail, you will go to jail.

3) U. S. citizens need to learn more about the concept of JURY NULLIFICATION. District Attorneys, Judges and Bar associations nationwide make it a point to hide this concept from jurors primarily because it is a direct method for citizens to extract power from operatives within the growing police state.

4) A Federal Grand Jury has enormous power. When convened, they essentially have the authority to investigate anything that falls under the purview of federal law.

Seriously though...make a study of the JURY NULLIFATION concept. It will change the way you think of getting called for jury duty.

reply to post by fraterormus


Excellent post and I am trying to resurrect it and bring this most important thread back to everyone's attention.

The average professional in this country wakes up in the morning, goes to work, comes home, eats dinner, and then goes to sleep, unaware that he or she has likely committed several federal crimes that day. Why? The answer lies in the very nature of modern federal criminal laws, which have exploded in number but also become impossibly broad and vague. In Three Felonies a Day, Harvey A. Silverglate reveals how federal criminal laws have become dangerously disconnected from the English common law tradition and how prosecutors can pin arguable federal crimes on any one of us, for even the most seemingly innocuous behavior. The volume of federal crimes in recent decades has increased well beyond the statute books and into the morass of the Code of Federal Regulations, handing federal prosecutors an additional trove of vague and exceedingly complex and technical prohibitions to stick on their hapless targets. The dangers spelled out in Three Felonies a Day do not apply solely to “white collar criminals,” state and local politicians, and professionals. No social class or profession is safe from this troubling form of social control by the executive branch, and nothing less than the integrity of our constitutional democracy hangs in the balance.

Book description Source: The book "Three Felonies A Day".

America is in the throes of overcriminalization: We are making and enforcing far too many criminal laws that create traps for the innocent but unwary and threaten to make criminals out of those who are doing their best to be respectable, law-abiding citizens. Key developments in criminal law and practice over the past few decades have raised troubling questions about the fairness of our criminal justice system as it affects the average American. It is time to confront these questions, analyze them, and subject them to serious, vigorous debate.

reply to post by fraterormus


No i really dont.