US Politics

Extending the Drug War

This entry was posted in Capitalism Constitution Domestic Terrorism Drug Laws Federal Government Libertarianism US Politics on by

Perhaps the bushies* are also working on an obediance drug:

Alongside efforts to reduce the supply and demand of illegal drugs, the federal government has begun pursuing a new tactic, one that expands the drug war battlefield from the Columbian coca farms and the Middle Eastern poppy fields, to a new terrain directly inside the bodies and brains of drug users.
As Radley Balko says, this report from the the Center for Cognitive Liberty and Ethics is frightening.
*Yea, I know I can’t blame just the bushies as this fiasco has been going on for a long time. The bushies are, though, the ones currently violating people’s rights and wasting resources.

Taxing or Extortion?

This entry was posted in Capitalism Constitution Domestic Terrorism Economics Federal Government Government Libertarianism US History US Politics on by

Looks like the Italian Mafia may be taking some lessons from the US Gov/IRS:

Libero Grassi, owner of a thriving textile company outside Palermo, was killed in 1991 after he refused to pay a large monthly “pizzo,” the Sicilian word for an extortion payment.
The new strategy is to avoid exorbitant rates, such as the ones applied to Grassi’s factory, but to cast the protection net much further afield, even to small shopkeepers.

Yep, if you kill them they will not be around to pay you tomorrow. A much better method is to expropriate their assets and perhaps dump persistent refuseniks in jail.
And like much government and its tax collectors:

It means the Mafia selling itself as a fact of life, even a benevolent association that helps find a job or fix a problem. This makes it not just a criminal organization but a criminal phenomenon rooted in history and harder to extirpate.

It has long seemed that one reason the politician gangs have pretended to want to eliminate folks like the mafia is that they want the same business themselves: extortion taxes, your local lottery, etc.
Via Catallarchy.

How Not to Fight Terrorism

This entry was posted in bush cheney Iraq US Foreign Policy US Politics War on Terrorism on by

Do you really believe that the bush administration is tough on terrorism?

…NBC News has learned that long before the war the Bush administration had several chances to wipe out his terrorist operation and perhaps kill Zarqawi himself � but never pulled the trigger.

If you support a policy of taking action against known terrorists then why would you ever vote for bush or any bush supporters?
Via Mark Kleiman.