Free Republic

I do not understand why she was not made to answer every question. And why has Congress not subpoenaed her computer (home and office)?

American citizens can be ordered to decrypt their PGP-scrambled hard drives for police to peruse for incriminating files, a federal judge in Colorado ruled today in what could become a precedent-setting case. Judge Robert Blackburn ordered a Peyton, Colo., woman to decrypt the hard drive of a Toshiba laptop computer no later than February 21--or face the consequences including contempt of court. Blackburn, a George W. Bush appointee, ruled that the Fifth Amendment posed no barrier to his decryption order. The Fifth Amendment says that nobody may be "compelled in any criminal case to be a witness against himself," which...

The U.S. Senate has approved of a $109 billion bill that provides two years of funding for transportation and transit projects around the country. The bill may or may not be taken up by the U.S. House Representatives depending on if they choose to write a separate House bill, but hopefully what will be left out of any final version is an amendment by Montana U.S. Sen. Max Baucus. His amendment funds the Land and Water Conservation Fund (LWCF) to the tune of $1.4 billion for fiscal years 2013 and 2014 — quite a jump from the $323 million it...

Today in Yemen, U.S. air strikes killed American citizen Anwar Al-Aulaqi. Al-Aulaqi has never been charged with a crime. Last year, the ACLU and Center for Constitutional Rights represented Al-Aulaqi's father in a lawsuit challenging the government's asserted authority to carry out "targeted killings" of U.S. citizens located far from any armed conflict zone. We argued that such killings violate the Constitution and international law, but the case was dismissed in federal court last December. In response to today's killing of Al-Aulaqi, ACLU Deputy Legal Director Jameel Jaffer said: The targeted killing program violates both U.S. and international law. As...

A smart middle-ground play for independents, but I thought he was supposed to be the great evangelical hope. Last week he said he was “fine� with New York legalizing gay marriage before clarifying today that he’s not fine with gay marriage itself. (In fact, he supports a Federal Marriage Amendment.) Now this. Why would a social-conservative voter looking for a champion who has traction in the polls prefer him to, say, Bachmann?Maybe Perry’s willing to shed some votes in Iowa in exchange for picking some up in New Hampshire. Despite holding personal pro-life beliefs, Texas Gov. Rick Perry categorized abortion...

The Colorado prosecution of a woman accused of a mortgage scam will test whether the government can punish you for refusing to disclose your encryption passphrase. The Obama administration has asked a federal judge to order the defendant, Ramona Fricosu, to decrypt an encrypted laptop that police found in her bedroom during a raid of her home. Because Fricosu has opposed the proposal, this could turn into a precedent-setting case. No U.S. appeals court appears to have ruled on whether such an order would be legal or not under the U.S. Constitution's Fifth Amendment, which broadly protects Americans' right to...

AUSTIN — The ceremony was brief and drew few mourners, but the Trans Texas Corridor is finally dead. The Senate unanimously passed a bill that strikes from state law any language, reference and authority once connected to the massive highway envisioned to slice a swath through Texas. The same measure already has passed the House. There are some minor differences that still need to be reconciled, but the bill is expected to go to Gov. Rick Perry, who will have to decide whether to join in the final rites for his once-prized project. Legislators did keep a provision that was...

The following is adapted from a speech delivered on February 16, 2011, at a Hillsdale College National Leadership Seminar in Phoenix, Arizona. TO BEGIN, consider one of the most important measures of property, the kilogram. It’s a measure of mass or, for non-scientific purposes, weight. According to the papers last week, a global scramble is under way to define this most basic unit after it was discovered that the standard kilogram—a cylinder of platinum and iridium that is maintained by the International Bureau of Weights and Measures—has been losing mass. You may think that this is impossible. Of all the...

RALEIGH — At a press conference Tuesday, environmental activist and celebrity Erin Brockovich offered a rambling defense of the state’s efforts to take control of four central North Carolina hydroelectric dams between Salisbury and Badin owned and operated by Alcoa Power Generating Inc. “My job here today is not to sit here and bash Alcoa,” Brockovich said at a briefing that took place before an invitation-only event for state lawmakers at the exclusive Capitol City Club. “Agencies, industries, and attorneys need to get together collectively and do what’s right by people,” she added. “It’s time to … give back, and...

Eminent Domain: Four years after the Supreme Court told a Connecticut homeowner that no one's house is safe from developers, Brooklyn homeowners may lose their homes to a pro basketball team. On June 3, 2005, by a 5-4 margin, the U.S. Supreme Court effectively repealed the 5th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, deciding that your constitutional right to be secure in your home didn't matter if your state or community decided your property could produce more revenue as a shopping mall or condominium development. Pfizer coveted Susette Kelo's working-class neighborhood for an office park and condominium complex. The city fathers...

There are two video lectures on YouTube a friend recently shared with me about when it comes to talking to the police. Even if you, like me, never expect to encounter police officers in a hostile situation, these are important videos to watch. This is especially true when it comes to law-abiding citizens who carry concealed or open weapons in self-defense. Don't Talk to Cops, Part 1Don't Talk to Cops, Part 2This is not anti-police at all, but it is vital information for dealing with them.

The fact that we have been ignored so long means other methods are required. http://boycottgm.wordpress.com/2009/06/02/boycott-general-motors-for-the-sake-of-america/ That is the link to a petition to Congress saying we will boycott GM products until the company is back in private hands. What more do they need to know? so little has been said about how Obama's thuggery violates the takings provisions of the 5th amendment. Since the cretinoids we voted in can't get a clue, we start here.

The former director of the government's pension agency took the Fifth Amendment at a Senate hearing where lawmakers quizzed him about allegations that he had inappropriate contacts with three Wall Street firms. ### The former director of the government's pension agency took the Fifth Amendment Wednesday when senators asked about allegations that he had inappropriate contacts with Wall Street firms while running the operation, which insures the pensions of 44 million Americans. Charles E.F. Millard denies that he had improper communications with the firms that recently won multimillion-dollar contracts to advise the agency on a new strategy to invest its...

·11250 Waples Mill Road ·   Fairfax, Virginia 22030    ·800-392-8683   Registration & Licensing 5th Amendment, Self-Incrimination, & Gun Registration   5th Amendment, Self-Incrimination, & Gun Registration by Clayton E. Cramer A recurring question that we are asked, not only by gun control advocates, but even by a number of gun owners is, "What`s wrong with mandatory gun registration?" Usually by the time we finish telling them about the Supreme Court decision U.S. v. Haynes (1968), they are laughing -- and they understand our objection to registration.In Haynes, a Miles Edward Haynes appealed his conviction for unlawful possession of an unregistered short-barreled...

The jailers of the 19th century — even in the pre-Civil War South — largely abandoned the practice of imprisoning people for falling into debt as counterproductive and ultimately barbaric. In the 1970s and ’80s, the U.S. Supreme Court affirmed that incarcerating people who can’t pay fines because of poverty violates the U.S. Constitution. Apparently, though, some states and county jails never got the memo. Welcome to the debtors’ prisons of the 21st century. “Edwina Nowlin, a poor Michigan resident, was ordered to reimburse a juvenile detention center $104 a month for holding her 16-year-old son,” the New York Times...

"The fact that Olbermann lashes into Obama is the best thing I have seen in weeks. If the mainstream media turns on the anointed one, Obama, then the liberals in this country will have nowhere to turn. They will certainly not go groveling back to the GOP who hosed them just months prior. And given that they gave the crown to the anointed one in their own party, it will be difficult for them to find another amongst their ranks to fill the void of Obama." http://politicallore.com/blog/?p=193

Americangrandjury.org " Please take a moment to read this: This website has a specific purpose in mind. AmericanGrandJury.org can HELP YOU if are looking to start, organize and manage a Citizen's Grand Jury. Grand Jury, History, Powershttp://americangrandjury.org/history_power.html Grand Jury Evidence, Rules, Indictmentshttp://americangrandjury.org/grand-jury-evidence-rules-indictments Grand Jury Forms and Etiquettehttp://americangrandjury.org/grand-jury-forms-and-etiquette " Bill of Rights Amendment V " No person shall be held to answer for a capital, or otherwise infamous crime, unless on a presentment or indictment of a grand jury, except in cases arising in the land or naval forces, or in the militia, when in actual service in time of war...

No person shall be held to answer for a capital, or otherwise infamous crime, unless on a presentment or indictment of a Grand Jury, except in cases arising in the land or naval forces, or in the Militia, when in actual service in time of War or public danger; nor shall any person be subject for the same offence to be twice put in jeopardy of life or limb; nor shall be compelled in any criminal case to be a witness against himself, nor be deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor shall private property...

Slideshow: Oakland Train Station Shooting OAKLAND, Calif. – The transit officer who shot and killed an unarmed man may have mistakenly pulled his service pistol instead of a stun gun, his lawyer said Friday.

To nearly every question she was asked, Barbara Jessop gave the same answer: "I stand on the Fifth." "Can you name the children you have given birth to?" Texas Child Protective Services attorney Jeff Schmidt asked her during a contentious custody hearing here on Monday. "I stand on the Fifth," she replied stoically. "What dates did you live at the YFZ Ranch?" "I stand on the Fifth." "Is it wrong for a girl under 17 to marry a man more than 21 years older than she is?" "I stand on the Fifth." Child Protective Services is seeking to remove seven...

Local toll road activist Terri Hall, the Spring Branch home schooling mom who's campaign against toll roads made her WOAI's San Antonian of the Year for 2007,. is taking her populist campaign nationwide. Hall is among the speakers for Saturday's 'Freedom March,' in Washington DC, organized by supporters of former Republican presidential candidate Ron Paul, and designed to keep alive his message of smaller government and vigilance against encroaching government power. "They wanted someone to speak about the Trans Texas Corridor, and what's happening here, and the eminent domain abuses, and how all these toll roads are tied to corporate...

WASHINGTON — More than two and a half years after the disclosure of President’s Bush’s domestic eavesdropping program set off a furious national debate, the Senate gave final approval on Wednesday afternoon to broadening the government’s spy powers and providing legal immunity for the phone companies that took part in the wiretapping program. The plan, approved by a vote of 69 to 28, marked one of Mr. Bush’s most hard-won legislative victories in a Democratic-led Congress where he has had little success of late. And it represented a stinging defeat for opponents on the left who had urged Democratic leaders...

Holiday DUI suspects risk forced blood test Court's OK likely if breath exam is refused Wednesday, July 2, 2008 9:35 PM By Kathy Lynn Gray THE COLUMBUS DISPATCH Suspected drunken drivers won't be able to "just say no" to blood-alcohol tests in Columbus over the Fourth of July holiday weekend. Police have set up a "no-refusal weekend," meaning that anyone who refuses to take a breath-analysis test will face a blood test instead, courtesy of two local judges on call to sign warrants. Officers will take suspects to a local hospital to await the warrant and the blood draw. Ohio...

The U.S. Supreme Court created a huge political backlash when it ruled that local governments could use eminent domain to seize private property and transfer it to other private owners for "economic development." Since the Kelo ruling in 2005, 42 states have enacted limitations on eminent domain — not always effective ones. But like lawmakers in many other states, some California officials are trying to block real eminent domain reform. On June 3, Californians will vote on Proposition 99, a ballot initiative sponsored by groups representing cities, counties, redevelopment agencies and other pro-condemnation interests. It purports to protect property rights...

REFUGIO, Texas - With an abandoned Wild West-vintage town of storefronts slumbering just a block from old US 77, tiny Refugio is a place where myth and reality coexist in a ghostly silence. more stories like this Obama faces heat over aide's NAFTA remarks to Canadians Texas, Ohio could decide Dem nomination Canada says didn't misrepresent Obama over NAFTA McCain tags Dems on trade treaty NAFTA seen differently in Ohio, Texas And now this South Texas outpost is swept up in one of the more intriguing tests of myth vs. reality in today's political life: the battle over the so-called...

One major concern I discussed a few weeks ago regarding the Trans Texas Corridor is where the land will come from. Another concern is where the money will come from. Official government websites for the TTC assure that public-private partnerships will shield the taxpayer from bearing too much of the cost burden, but a careful reading shows the door is definitely open to public funding sources, while at the same time there is no doubt of the intention to charge tolls on the road. Taxpayers already pay for their transportation system through hefty gasoline taxes, vehicle registration fees, and other...

BELLVILLE — In what is becoming a regular occurrence in Southeast Texas, more than 1,000 Austin County residents and interested outsiders jammed a county fairgrounds exhibit hall Monday night to let a panel of state transportation officials know that the Trans-Texas Corridor was not welcome here. State Rep. Lois Kolkhorst, R-Brenham, opened the public remarks to thunderous applause when she told the panel, "You all thought I was crazy in Austin when I said my people don't want it and I don't want it." The panel, which included Texas Department of Transportation Executive Director Amadeo Saenz and Deputy Executive Director...

WEST COLUMBIA — When private property gets in the way of a road project, its owners will be moving out of the way, one way or another, in almost every case. With a widening of Highway 36 on the horizon and state and federal officials ready to drive the Trans-Texas Corridor through the Lone Star State, many land-owning Texans are preparing to defend their property from their own government. Brazoria County residents troubled by the looming eminent domain fights came to the Gulf Coast Christian Center on Saturday morning to voice their views to Tom Lizardo, chief of staff for...

Austin County residents get their chance Monday to comment on a massive “superhighway� that could be coming through their county. And if the public meeting in Bellville is anything like those already held by the Texas Department of Transportation, it will include hundreds of angry property owners lining up for a chance to lambast the proposed project, called the Trans Texas Corridor. Gov. Rick Perry first proposed the TTC six years ago. If completed as much as 50 years from now, it would roughly parallel interstate highways with up to a quarter-mile-wide stretch of toll roads, rail lines, pipelines and...

Hundreds showed up to a town hall meeting Thursday night in Lufkin, many with questions for Texas Department of Transportation officials about the I-69/Trans-Texas Corridor that could run through or around Lufkin, Nacogdoches, Huntsville and other East Texas towns. As it's drawn up, I-69/TTC would include toll roads, high-speed freight and commuter rail, water lines, oil and gas pipelines, electric transmission lines and telecommunications infrastructure in one corridor running north/south through Texas. One primary purpose of the corridor would be to help with the state's projected traffic congestion. Although TxDOT directors assured everyone that nothing is set in stone and...

CARTHAGE — James Mason doesn't want a new highway cutting him off from his property. James Boggs wants to keep American jobs here. They were just a sample of about 140 residents who asked, commented and listened during a public forum with state transportation leaders Wednesday night in Carthage. It was the second of several forums scheduled along the Interstate 69/Trans-Texas Corridor, a proposed superhighway that likely will parallel U.S. 59 from Texarkana to the Mexican border. "We haven't done a very good job of (communicating) in the past," said Steve Simmons, deputy executive director of Texas Department of Transportation....

During this year's legislative session, Texas had an "oh, wait, hold on, don't do that" moment on privately funded tollways. Fair enough, but now it's time to figure out what the state should do, including how to pay for what the state's highway czar calls a $100 billion shortfall in money needed for essential highway projects. Ric Williamson, the Weatherford businessman who is chairman of the Texas Transportation Commission, says "the entire future of the state transportation system" depends on potential revenue from private toll road investors. Without it, staffers with the Texas Department of Transportation told commission members at...

GREENVILLE, S.C. - Republican presidential contender Fred Thompson said Monday that while Osama bin Laden needs to be caught and killed, the terrorist mastermind would get the due process of law.

LUBBOCK, Texas — One Central Texas farmer said Monday he was "dumbfounded" by Gov. Rick Perry's veto of an eminent domain bill designed to protect landowners when the state wants to take their property. Robert Fleming is not alone in an area worried about the massive Trans Texas Corridor proposal. The planned route cuts through Fleming's Bell County farms. He's bewildered by Perry's veto. "We were so close to getting something done," Fleming said. "We've worked hard trying to get private property rights." Perry vetoed the bill, and 48 others, Friday. In 2005, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in Kelo...

AUSTIN – A property rights bill that went awry and a mandate for the Trans-Texas Corridor to follow the state's existing highway system were among the 49 bills that fell victim to Gov. Rick Perry's veto pen on Friday. Mr. Perry targeted at least two bills that he believed would open the courthouse doors to more litigation, including a bill that would have provided a greater balance in eminent domain proceedings. The bill spelled out what public land uses were acceptable in order to take private land and provided more recourse for land owners. But a provision tacked onto the...

"Those who would give up essential Liberty, to purchase a little temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety" - Benjamin FranklinThe response was predictable. After sending our alert last Thursday regarding the passing of the Military Commissions Act, we received a flood of email. Many were supportive, but others took exception: "Don't you care that terrorists want to kill us?" "Olbermann's obviously a left-wing nut who wants conservatives out of power." "The act isn't that bad..." It is bemusing to watch certain conservatives -- conservatives who once screamed that Bill Clinton was going to suspend the Constitution, establish martial law,...

For 3 1/2 years, Long Branch residents fighting to keep their homes out of the city's oceanfront redevelopment plan mostly battled alone. That changed yesterday. The state public advocate and a national constitutional rights advocacy group will lend their legal muscle to the residents of MTOTSA -- Marine Terrace, Ocean Terrace and Seaview Avenue -- as they appeal a ruling allowing their oceanside homes to be given to a private developer though eminent domain. "As of today, this neighborhood is ground zero in the fight against eminent domain abuse, not only in New Jersey but across the nation," said Chip...

Gov. Rick Perry's ceremonial signing of the eminent domain bill Monday in Waco didn't get a positive reaction from his rival for his 2006 reelection, Republican Comptroller Carole Keeton Strayhorn, or from Richmond resident and private property rights activist Jack Myska. Strayhorn accused Perry of grandstanding and said the bill is filled with loopholes, and Myska concurred. "I agree with her wholeheartedly," Myska said Tuesday morning, adding he has not yet read the bill thoroughly. Perry officially signed the law into effect on Sept. 1, but the ceremonial signing was postponed due to hurricanes Rita and Katrina. He said Monday...

Even before the US supreme court 'legislated' their opinion that our constitution allows government entities to take property from one citizen and profit on the 'exchange' of that property to another private individual or group, our own Texas leaders (some elected and many non-elected-TxDOT personnel) have been working overtime to assure that toll roads and the Trans Texas Corridor (TTC) are forced on Texans before too many of us become aware, stand up, and protest. Probably due to many groups protesting the TTC and toll projects allowed by law in 2003 with HB 3388, our Texas leaders came up with...

A Supreme Property Rights Disaster In The Making More Kelo on the SCOTUS horizon?... [James S. Burling] 8/15/05 After a term marked by the Supreme Court’s utter contempt for property rights, those of us who happen to think there is something special about allowing old widows to keep their homes were not prepared for an even more bitter defeat. Yet, that is what President Bush handed us with the nomination of John Roberts. The battle over property rights is not a conservative versus liberal thing. It’s more a struggle between those who believe in the power of the state to...

The five-four decision of the Supreme Court of the United States in Susette Kelo et al v City of New London, Connecticut et al (June 23, 2005) well could trigger the terrifying risk to private property which Justice Sandra Day O'Connor envisions in her Dissent (joined by the Chief Justice and Justices Antonin Scalia and Clarence Thomas): " . . . Under the banner of economic development, all private property is now vulnerable to being taken and transferred to another private owner . . . who will use it in a way that the legislature deems more beneficial to the...

Surprise Bill Disempowers Communities and Privatizes Surplus Public Lands. With less than 24 hours before a scheduled vote, a radically different bill for disposing of state surplus land was unveiled yesterday. According to Massachusetts Coalition for Healthy Communities (MCHC) board member Nat Fortune "The Legislative leadership is using summer vacation and a last-minute release to get the bill passed before there can be a public response. Considering what’s in this bill, it’s no surprise its proponents were keeping it under the radar.” Jill Stein, MCHC president noted, “This bill takes disempowerment of communities to a new extreme. Like the other...

Alarmed by the prospect of local governments seizing homes and turning the property over to developers, lawmakers in at least half the states are rushing to blunt last month's U.S. Supreme Court ruling expanding the power of eminent domain. In Texas and California, legislators have proposed constitutional amendments to bar government from taking private property for economic development. Politicians in Alabama, South Dakota and Virginia likewise hope to curtail government's ability to condemn land. Even in states like Illinois - one of at least eight that already forbid eminent domain for economic development unless the purpose is to eliminate blight...

By KATE MORAN Day Staff Writer, New London Published on 7/19/2005 New London — However improbable their chance for success, attorneys at the Institute for Justice asked the U.S. Supreme Court on Monday to reconsider the decision in the Kelo v. New London case that allows the city to take private property in the Fort Trumbull neighborhood to make way for a huge new development. In the three weeks since the court handed down its decision, the Institute for Justice has pressed local and state leaders to conserve the dozen houses and single apartment building the city has planned to...

Wednesday, July 13, 2005 Woman settles with Hesperia, gives up land By KATHLEEN STINSON Staff Writer HESPERIA — The case between the school teacher who owned land in Hesperia and the city that tried to foreclose on her was settled Monday. Ellen Zunino owned a 10-acre parcel of land in what is referred to as the "Golden Triangle" area of Hesperia that increased dramatically in assessed valuation, but she said she was unable to pay the assessment. ..... Before the city established an improvement district in the area — west of Interstate 15 and south of Avenal Street — Zunino's...

With Justice Sandra Day O'Connor gone from the Supreme Court, choosing her successor is NOT the most important task before us. More critical is reducing the damage a clueless and arrogant Court can do. Thankfully, there are signs that America is moving toward a new declaration of independence. The Court unleashed its latest shocker on June 23. In a 5-4 decision called Kelo vs. New London, the Court declared that it's okay for the government to seize your house just for the purpose of giving it to someone else. [snip] Only Congress is authorized to make laws or spend money....

The New York Times welcomed the Supreme Court's recent endorsement of virtually unfettered eminent domain powers as "a setback to the 'property rights' movement." The fact that the Times not only celebrated a defeat for property rights but felt a need to put the phrase in scare quotes speaks volumes about the left-liberal misconceptions that have been brought to the fore by the Court's decision in Kelo v. New London. According to the Court, the Fifth Amendment, which allows the government to take property "for public use" provided it pays "just compensation," is a license to transfer any parcel of...

Throughout the course of history, the overriding tendency of those in power is to manipulate that power to their own benefit. Regardless of any noble premises on which governments might be founded, over time they nonetheless degenerate into self-serving conclaves, whose ultimate purpose is the betterment of their own lot through the implementation of their own agenda. In the end, those at the apex of power assume dictatorial control, while the rights of the common person are obliterated. The latest rash of outrageous Supreme Court decisions demonstrates that this nation’s governing institutions are already well on their way down that...

Five Supreme Court Justices with myriad educational degrees fumbled the simple meaning of the word “public”. Apparently the new meaning of the term “public use” is any use involving people. This is a brazen moving of the goal posts to rig the game in favor of powerful corporations and political interests. The Kelo vs. New London recision (it’s not a decision) is nothing less than a nail in the coffin of government by the people, for the people, and of the people. Here are five reasons why this has happened. BIG GOVERNMENT IS #1: The liberal wing of the Supreme...

I Thought We Won The Revolution By Kevin Fobbs As our nation leads up to our celebration of its birth, we seriously have to wonder whether or not we will have anything left of our Constitution to truly celebrate. After the "Kelo vs. City of London" decision handed down last week, where the U.S. Supreme Court performed a seeming abrupt about face on the 5th Amendment and more importantly on America, when will the Constitution be returned to the American people? The U.S. Supreme Court's surgical disembodiment of the Fifth Amendment was, not a quick and deliberate action. Rather, it...