Posted on 05/05/2015 12:31:18 PM PDT by SeekAndFind
Watching the Right’s reaction to the Freddie Gray case, I’ve had a horrible nightmare: Aliens from a distant planet—big-government, statist aliens from Planet Obama, perhaps—have snatched millions of American conservatives and replaced them with Progressive pod people.
How else to explain the sudden, sweeping abandonment by my fellow conservatives of that most precious icon of our movement, the Constitution?
The Grey case is a constitutional fiasco. A guy walking down the street approached by the authorities because—literally—he “looked at them?” He’s pursued, frisked, found in the legal possession of a weapon (a pocketknife) and is arrested? No crime? No theoretical charge of a crime?
Then he’s shackled, laid on the floor of a police van on his stomach—unsecured and in violation of police rules—and bounced around the city for hours, while being repeatedly denied requested medical treatment.
The Police Can’t Just Grab People
Freddie Gray was an American citizen who started his day having not committed a crime, and ended the day with fatal injuries sustained while in custody of the government. And Republicans are defending…the government? Who are you, and what have you done with my conservatives?
Real conservatives—my Tea Party friends and limited-government activists—understand that the Constitution is a document of “negative rights.” An officer of the government sees you and decides he wants to search you, or grab you, take your stuff, or even kill you. Can he? For most of the history of mankind, the answer was “Shut up, peon, and get back in your cell!”
Our founders committed a truly revolutionary act when they wrote a Constitution that is a document of “No.” It tells agents of the government, “No, you can’t.” It doesn’t matter if the citizen is a pillar of the community or a punk. He’s still an American, so hands off!
You Don’t Need to Be Good to Get Rights
But why am I having to explain this to the Right? I learned all this from you. You explained to me that gun ownership has nothing to do with the question “do you need a gun?” or “are you a good enough person to be allowed to own a gun?”
We wear “What Part Of ‘Shall Make No Law’ Don’t You Understand?” t-shirts to remind big-government liberals that, whether they like guns or not, we have constitutional rights they can’t touch. You explained to me that the Obama administration’s assault on Tea Party groups—using the Internal Revenue Service; Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives; the Federal Bureau Investigation, etc. to intimidate activists during an election cycle—was precisely the sort of government thuggery the founders feared. Even though the IRS has the power to audit citizens, laws and institutions must check that power in the name of citizens’ rights.
But now you’re telling me that you support cops who arrested a guy legally in possession of a weapon, and you’re on the side of “Lois Lerner” law enforcement? Who are you people? Whoever you are, you definitely aren’t conservatives.
Alleged “conservatives” making their angry, foamy-mouthed defense of the Baltimore police tell me that what I don’t understand is that Gray is “different.” He’s “different” because he’s a known drug dealer, not a good, upstanding citizen.
To which I reply: Do you think President Obama thinks you “bitter clingers” are good citizens? Do you think he believes opponents of same-sex marriage, or businesses that don’t want to pay for abortions, or skeptics of climate change are good citizens?
Conservatives taught me that the founders understood we needed the Constitution specifically to protect the rights of Americans the government considered “bad.” When conservatives take the position that some citizens are so “bad” that the government should be free to ignore their constitutional rights, they are kicking the door wide open for a Hillary Clinton to use the power of the White House to do just that to Americans she thinks are “bad.”
No real conservative would support such a flawed, unconstitutional view of the relationship between the citizen and the state. Government agents free to kill unarmed Americans—and have the support of conservatives while they do it—is simply unimaginable.
So I’m left with only one possible conclusion: RUN AWAY! THE POD PEOPLE ARE COMING!
-- Michael Graham is a radio talk show host in Atlanta, Georgia.
So let them file a case against the constitutionality of the law prohibiting the knife. That doesn’t justify this prosecutor charging these officers with an illegal arrest when it wasn’t an illegal arrest.
And we are especially averse to the liberal tactic of jumping on bandwagons.
Something I learned a long time ago as a child, which sounds trite but still holds true.
Two wrongs do not make a right.
Freddy Gray was a small-time hood with a lengthy rap sheet of drug busts and petty crimes.
But there is no way in hell that a suspect being transported to jail for such crimes should wind up having his spine severed.
There is no conflict in saying both are wrong.
Throw the rioting and looting on top of that and you can say that three wrongs don’t make a right.
First, the guy shold have been in jail for all the crime she commited. Second, he shouldn’t have died at the hands of police officers. I think most “right” people agree to that.
What a concept.
Seem Mosby wants to sic a lynch mob on the police officers involved.
I’m not defending anything until the facts come out.
I’m not defending anything until the facts come out.
How about we wait and see the actual toxicology report rather than rely on some guy on Hannity who won't identify himself but says that's what he heard?
Except that there is no toxicology report. Only an anonymous guy on Hannity who says that's what he heard.
What court has ruled that the knife was legal? They knew this guy, he had a record longer than his leg.
Anyone who gets their “facts” from NoJusticeNoPeace Mosby is a fool.
I don’t think there is anyone in this whole scenario worth defending, except maybe the driver (who somehow gets the murder charge)
RE: When a guy with his record which is known to the cops runs I’d say they have probable cause to chase
Is Freddie Gray KNOWN to these cops?
After being seen in a hand to hand transaction, Gray did not have the drugs on him when he was search. Gray is not known for heroin use, yet it showed up in his urine test. Ingestion of heroin in a substantial dose causes breathing difficulty, convulsions, heart failure, and coma. Is it just a coincidence that Gray had all of these symptoms? Could the thrashing around reported by the other passenger have been heroin induced convulsions that also resulted in Gray’s injury which the medical examiner said was consistent with a bolt in the back of the van?
Unless the injury was caused by the victim thrashing around while being transported because he ingested the heroin he was dealing.
And, pooooor Freddie would never have been in the back of a police van if he hadn't been dealing drugs. He wouldn't have been forced into the van if he hadn't run from police.
In the 1992 primary campaign Buchanan was thought to be the conservative alternative to the RINO Bush.
You know as well as I do Hannity and his producers would never have let anyone but a real Baltimore police officer on his program. That is the sort of thing you verify so you can avoid risking a lawsuit.
But, there is affidavit from the prisoner in the van that said Freddie was banging his head against the wall of the van, for whatever reason. Do that and you spill and land head first, you can break your own. Again, prove otherwise.
The author obviously has not followed the case with any scrutiny. He is factually wrong on virtually every claim he makes.
This article demonstrates the tools of false reporting and outfight lying that produce the kinds of disturbance so in vogue by communist agitators.
Graham has gone over to the dark side.
How about you providing any evidence whatsoever that police caused Gray's injuries. No one should be accusing police of anything but failing to put on his seat belt if they don't have any evidence they caused his injuries.
That was when many discovered they were incorrect about his conservative credentials.
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