Posted on 06/18/2012 4:14:48 PM PDT by BCrago66
At 7 a.m. on January 20, 2007, DEA agents battered down the door to Thomas and Rosalie Avina’s mobile home in Seeley, California, in search of suspected drug trafficker Louis Alvarez. Thomas Avina met the agents in his living room and told them they were making a mistake. Shouting “Don’t you *ucking move,” the agents forced Thomas Avina to the floor at gunpoint, and handcuffed him and his wife, who had been lying on a couch in the living room. As the officers made their way to the back of the house, where the Avina’s 11-year-old and 14-year-old daughters were sleeping, Rosalie Avina screamed, “Don’t hurt my babies. Don’t hurt my babies.”
(Excerpt) Read more at reason.com ...
I had this happen to a neighbor of mine. It was a middle-aged couple from Alabama. They bought the house next door to us that had been vacant for 3 years.
The people who owned it previously were definitely BAD people. They had been a blight to everyone in the neighborhood and basically terrorized the entire block to do anything to stop them because they did retalliate - not directly, but to your property (tires ice-picked, garbage in your yard, on your roof, eggs on your car and house) - stuff you could never prove.
Anyway, the BAD family were using their 5 year old kid to sneak into peoples homes and steal stuff. They finally got caught but they all beat town and were never seen again. Several family members and extended family members had lived in the house and no doubt drug dealing was probably going on.
Back to the couple from Alabama. As I mentioned the house was left vacant three years. HUD had the place remodeled - they had to completely tear everything out of the house, carpet, dry wall, all appliances - bathrooms - tile - everything. It looked pretty nice after the remodel and then this couple, with a 15 yr old daughter, from Alabama bought the place.
We got to meet them and found them to be very nice and great neighbors. After they had been in the house for a few months, in the middle of the night, cops by the truck full, SWAT, etc. broke down the door with guns drawn. They dragged this couple out of bed, as well as their daughter out of her bed, to the floor, guns to their heads, handcuffed, the works.
After several minutes the cops finally realized this was not the people they were after - it was someone from the BAD family that they wanted - who had left the place over three years ago. The easiest indicator that they had the wrong couple was that the people the cops were after were black - this couple from Alabama was white. Kind of difficult to miss even at night with thirty flashlights on you.
After they realized their mistake the “police” left - no apologies - no offer to fix the damage. This poor shaken couple unfortunately did not pursue legal action. I guess they didn’t want any trouble since they had just moved in, I don’t know. Anyway, how could that happen??
Don’t these guys recon these places before busting in the door, don’t they watch the place? I mean they must have spent thousands on that raid - how in God’s Name would they have not made absolutely sure they had the right people. They had the right place - three years too late - and totally wrong people!!
Certainly.
LOL, certainly? Judging from you prior response and this one on the matter, it's not certain at all that you'll join me.
But I hope you'll understand, I'm leery of folks who are willing to support violations of some parts of the Constitution, such as the original Commerce Clause and the Tenth Amendment.Well, you'll have to pardon me for thinking you'd rather argue about making drugs legal than join others in eliminating a very dangerous and threatening policy.
As for your interpretations of our Constitution, it seems to me you have a railroad tie in your eye, and are trying to get the splinters out of every elses eyes. I do apprecaite your willingness to help though. Well, okay..., I don't.
Administrative Punishment; TEN LASHES
Then they are fired.
No pay, no benefits, no retirement, no rehire, no nothing.
.
It’s not within the enumerated powers of Congress to ban or restrict simple possession of illicit drugs within the borders of a state. Period. (Gonzales v. Raich and its predecessor, Wickard v. Filburn, were wrongly decided.) So your bringing up other, quite different, area that are with Congress’ Commerce Clause power is irrelevant.
No. Congress is delegated that authority under the power to regulate foreign commerce and to repel invasions.
How about their immigration policies, do they set them?
I believe that power was delegated to Congress by I.9.1, if memory serves.
Do states set their own tariffs, and trade policies?
Congress was delegated that power under I.8.3 (foreign commmerce), and states are expressly forbidden to do so.
Can the federal government even federalize their national guard troops?
Yes. Congress shall have power...
To provide for calling forth the Militia to execute the Laws of the Union, suppress Insurrections and repel Invasions;
To provide for organizing, arming, and disciplining, the Militia, and for governing such Part of them as may be employed in the Service of the United States, reserving to the States respectively, the Appointment of the Officers, and the Authority of training the Militia according to the discipline prescribed by Congress;
-snip-
The federal government has set drug policies so that they are uniform between the states. The federal laws on drugs have been judged to trump state laws.
Would you tell us which section of the Constitution you believe delegates to Congress the authority to regulate intrastate drug policies?
Extra! Extra! Blind squirrel finds nut!
Kindly explain what the hell that has to do with anything.
I am against the ‘War on drugs’, no knock raids under any circumstances and pretty much anything else that is anti constitutional. There has never been a need to NOT get a warrant and not the slightest need to execute a SWAT style raid with the exception of hostage rescue.
We lost a lot of civil liberties under Bush 43 but few on here cared because it was a Republican. My view is that the government should *NEVER*, under any circumstances and for any reason, have more power, funding or authority - even if currently being run by the BEST of men- than we would want it to have if run by the worst of men.
Agreed, but it didn't include me.
My view is that the government should *NEVER*, under any circumstances and for any reason, have more power, funding or authority - even if currently being run by the BEST of men- than we would want it to have if run by the worst of men.
And I'd go even farther -- no more of any of that stuff than the bare minimum they need to discharge their Constitutionally mandated duties. IOW, even if a given power could only EVER be used for good, even by the worst scoundrel, they still don't get that power if they don't need it to do their job as defined by the Constitution.
There was a *LOT* of “if you aren’t doing anything wrong, what do you have to worry about” right after 911 used to justify the Patriot Act and Gitmo. Then once we have a socialist neo revolutionary in the White House all the supposed ‘conservatives’ wake up to maybe renditions, wiretaps/phone intercepts and vehicle tracking without a warrant aren’t such a great idea.
“Every totalitarian government makes use of it.”
True, but remember in the Ukraine, behind every stalk of wheat there was...wheat. In America, behind every blade of grass, there is a gun. Yamamoto was right about that, and since his time the number of guns owned by law abiding citizens has exploded. Any tyranny would quickly come to grief here (although they might take California and New York...but they can have ‘em anyhow;)
“The War on Drugs is a war on innocent Americans.”
Fixed.
How nice of the DEA to condition young girls to become easy prey for criminals.
What’s next? Will the want ad literally read:
Wanted: Men who are willing to scream obscenities at and bind young girls after ordering them from their beds. — The DEA
Au contraire.
The Republicans are not ignorant of the consequences of their actions.
To claim as much is to make excuses for them.
They are perfectly aware.
You are assuming the wrong house raids *are* mistakes.
They are not. They are yet another step to conditioning the American public to fear The State.
Yes, it is. Glad to see someone finally put it that way.
I’m just curious if you can think of any other laws that are on the books today that Congress can’t come up with because they aren’t enumerated within the U. S. Constitution.
As you well know, there are literally thousands of them.
The only reason nobody cares, is that they can’t smoke them. So acting as if these laws don’t exist, and that drug policy is something totally different is... well... childish.
When I was a boy, I read about the holocaust, and all the terrible things that happened in Germany to the Jews and others in those dark times. You look at those pictures, all the bodies, and you wonder where the SS could find people to do such things. How could someone? How could they do it? These victims weren’t soldiers.Just like the victims in the article, they had no guns, or tanks. They declared no war.
They were helpless.
I sadly must admit that I have found the answer. We have them right here in this country, just waiting. Just like the scumbag assholes in this particular case. They are no better than SS men. They have the same mentality, it is identical. They get off on it.
Would you tell me what section of the Constitution specifically grants Congress the authority to devise any federal statutes? And yet there are federal statutes.]
There are thousands of them. There are thousands of them that go across state lines.
You are aware of that right?
I haven’t bought into that yet, but I’ve lagged behind on some other beliefs too, only to buy in later.
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