http://www.thestar.com/…

The first American war resister deported from Canada – where he had fled after refusing to be deployed to Iraq – was sentenced to 15 months in jail yesterday at a court martial hearing in Colorado.

Pte. Robin Long, 25, of Boise, Idaho, was also given a dishonourable discharge after pleading guilty to charges of desertion.

The sentence was the longest any convicted army deserter had received since the beginning of the 2003 Iraq war, said retired U.S. Army Col. Ann Wright, a former diplomat who resigned from her post out of protest at the war’s outset.

Wright testified against the legality of the Iraq war on Long’s behalf.

Of the thousands of soldiers sentenced for desertion or going AWOL – and the estimated two dozen tried for protesting the war – only former army sergeant Kevin Benderman received an equal sentence in 2005.

About two-dozen anti-war supporters gathered around the courthouse at Fort Carson in Colorado Springs, Colo., yesterday afternoon as a military judge handed down Long’s sentence.

Though initially sentenced to 30 months in prison, that time was reduced to the 15-month maximum military prosecutors had agreed on when arranging a plea deal last week.

Long, 25, came to Canada in 2005 to flee a scheduled deployment to Iraq. While here, he was briefly engaged to an Ontario woman – with whom he had a child last year – before he moved to British Columbia, supporters have said.

He was deported and taken into the custody of the U.S. Army last month following a series of failed attempts to gain refugee status or permanent residency in Canada.

Late last week, Long’s lawyers reached an agreement with prosecutors that would see him plead guilty on charges of desertion with the intent to stay away permanently.

In return, prosecutors agreed not to move forward on the most serious charges of desertion with the intent to shirk hazardous duty.

Standing calmly and waiting for his sentence after three hours of testimony at yesterday’s hearing, Long appeared stoic and ready to serve his time in a military jail, supporters said.

“He was very calm and very measured,” said Wright. “He fully anticipated that he would be serving the entire 15 months.”

The dishonourable discharge he received could also go down as a felony offence and could restrict his future right to vote or carry a firearm, his lawyer said.

“(He) would pretty much become a second-class citizen,” his Oklahoma-based civilian lawyer, James M. Branum, told the Star earlier this week.

Like many of the other roughly 200 other American war resisters currently living in Canada, Long has said he opposed the conflict in Iraq on legal and moral grounds.

13th Amendment of the United States Constitution:

Section 1. Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except as a punishment for crime where of the party shall have been duly convicted, shall exist within the United States, or any place subject to their jurisdiction.

Section 2. Congress shall have the power to enforce this article by appropriate legislation.

Unlike property, a man’s will is inalienable and therefore intransferable. Should a contract provide for payments upfront then breaking the contract would constitute theft which the person breaking the contract and therefore commiting the theft would be expected to pay back. However, that person would still be free to exit without the threat of violence against them.

Murray Rothbard covers this in better detail in The Ethics of Liberty.

http://www.washingtonwatch.com/…

Republican Senator Tom Coburn of Oklahoma didn’t come to Washington, D.C. to grow the government.

A long time critic of federal spending and power, he has made prolific use of “holds” to prevent legislation he doesn’t like from moving forward.

Now Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV) has reached his wit’s end. He has cobbled together into one bill a long list of measures that Coburn has been working to slow or stop. He’s hoping to roll over Senator Coburn and move them all forward. The bill is S. 3297, the Advancing America’s Priorities Act. But the nickname it has gotten is the “Coburn Omnibus.”

Majority Leader Reid is expected to try to bring the bill to the Senate floor later this week.

We have done our best to figure out which bills have been rolled into the Coburn Omnibus, using a copy of the bill he posted on his Web site. Thirty-six bills are listed below. The last would authorize the construction of a greenhouse in Suitland, Maryland.

Coburn has reportedly said the bills in the Coburn Omnibus would create 77 new federal programs. By our count, passage of the Coburn Omnibus would spend just under $65 per U.S. family, though six of the bills do not have cost estimates.

HEALTHCARE PROVISIONS

• S. 1382, the ALS Registry Act - $0.62
• S. 1183, the Christoper and Dana Reeve Paralysis Act - $0.85
• S. 999, the Stroke Treatment and Ongoing Prevention Act
• H.R. 20, the Melanie Blocker Stokes MOTHERS Act - $0.16
• S. 1117, the Vision Care for Kids Act of 2008
• S. 1810, the Prenatally and Postnatally Diagnosed Conditions Awareness Act - $0.17

JUDICIARY PROVISIONS

• H.R. 5524, the Reconnecting Homeless Youth Act of 2008
• S. 535, the Emmett Till Unsolved Civil Rights Crimes Act of 2007 - $0.58
• S. 2304, the Mentally Ill Offender Treatment and Crime Reduction Reauthorization and Improvement Act of 2008 - $4.34
• H.R. 4120, the Effective Child Pornography Prosecution Act of 2007
• H.R. 4136, the Enhancing the Effective Prosecution of Child Pornography Act of 2007
• S. 1210, the Drug Endangered Children Act of 2007 - $0.18
• S. 1079, the Star-Spangled Banner and War of 1812 Bicentennial Commission Act - $0.03
• S. 1738, the PROTECT Our Children Act of 2008 (Combating Child Exploitation Act of 2007) - $4.93

ENVIRONMENT AND PUBLIC WORKS PROVSIONS

• H.R. 2964, the Captive Primate Safety Act - $0.15
• S. 2707, the Chesapeake Bay Gateways and Watertrails Network Continuing Authorization Act - $0.04
• S. 2844, the Beach Protection Act of 2008 - $2.56
• S. 496, the Appalachian Regional Development Act Amendments of 2008

FOREIGN RELATIONS PROVISIONS

• H.R. 1469, the Senator Paul Simon Study Abroad Foundation Act of 2008 - $3.76
• H.R. 1084, the Reconstruction and Stabilization Civilian Management Act of 2008 - $5.75
• H.R. 2798, the Overseas Private Investment Corporation Reauthorization of Act of 2008 - $0.66
• S. 2020, the Tropical Forest and Coral Conservation Reauthorization Act of 2008 - $0.65
• H.R. 1678, the Torture Victims Relief Reauthorization Act of 2008 - $0.93
• H.R. 3320, the Support for the Museum of the History of Polish Jews Act of 2008 - $0.05

COMMERCE, SCIENCE, AND TRANSPORTATION PROVISIONS

• S. 1492, the Broadband Data Improvement Act - $1.85
• S. 675, the Training for Realtime Writers Act of 2007 - $0.62
• H.R. 3352, the Hydrographic Services Improvement Act Amendments of 2008 - $5.92
• H.R. 1834, the NOAA Undersea Research Program Act of 2008 (National Ocean Exploration Program Act) - $2.36
• H.R. 2400, the Ocean and Coastal Mapping Integration Act - $1.03
• H.R. 5618, the National Sea Grant College Program Amendments Act of 2008 - $2.69
• S. 950, the Integrated Coastal and Ocean Observation System Act of 2008 - $6.36
• H.R. 4174, the Federal Ocean Acidification Research and Monitoring Act of 2008 - $0.70

HOMELAND SECURITY AND GOVERNMENTAL AFFAIRS PROVISIONS

• S. 1446, the National Capital Transportation Amendments Act of 2008 - $10.40
• H.R. 390, the Preservation of Records of Servitude, Emancipation, and Post-Civil War Reconstruction Act - $0.12
• S. 3175, the Predisaster Hazard Mitigation Act of 2008 - $6.18

RULES AND ADMINISTRATION PROVISIONS

• H.R. 5492, To authorize the Board of Regents of the Smithsonian Institution to construct a greenhouse facility at its museum support facility in Suitland, Maryland, and for other purposes - $0.02

And does anyone believe those who will vote for this monstrosity actually read it? That they could possibly justify even 70% of it constitutionally? After they pull shit like this how could anyone not support DownsizeDC.org’s “One Subject at a Time Act?”

I don’t know how this slipped through the libertarian blogosphere but this is pretty hardcore. Looks like it was on 3/13/2008 and the blog is from 6/15/2008.

http://politicalinquirer.com/…

STATE OF OKLAHOMA
2nd Session of the 51st Legislature (2008)
HOUSE JOINT
RESOLUTION 1089 By: Key
AS INTRODUCED
A Joint Resolution claiming sovereignty under the
Tenth Amendment to the Constitution of the United
States over certain powers; serving notice to the
federal government to cease and desist certain
mandates; and directing distribution.
WHEREAS, the Tenth Amendment to the Constitution of the United
States reads as follows:

“The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.”; and
WHEREAS, the Tenth Amendment defines the total scope of federal power as being that specifically granted by the Constitution of the United States and no more; and
WHEREAS, the scope of power defined by the Tenth Amendment means that the federal government was created by the states specifically to be an agent of the states; and
WHEREAS, today, in 2008, the states are demonstrably treated as agents of the federal government; and
WHEREAS, many federal mandates are directly in violation of the Tenth Amendment to the Constitution of the United States; and
WHEREAS, the United States Supreme Court has ruled in New York v. United States, 112 S. Ct. 2408 (1992), that Congress may not simply commandeer the legislative and regulatory processes of the states; and
WHEREAS, a number of proposals from previous administrations and some now pending from the present administration and from Congress may further violate the Constitution of the United States.

NOW, THEREFORE, BE IT RESOLVED BY THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES AND THE SENATE OF THE 2ND SESSION OF THE 51ST OKLAHOMA LEGISLATURE:

THAT the State of Oklahoma hereby claims sovereignty under the
Tenth Amendment to the Constitution of the United States over all
powers not otherwise enumerated and granted to the federal
government by the Constitution of the United States.
THAT this serve as Notice and Demand to the federal government,
as our agent, to cease and desist, effective immediately, mandates
that are beyond the scope of these constitutionally delegated
powers.

THAT a copy of this resolution be distributed to the President of the United States, the President of the United States Senate, the Speaker of the United States House of Representatives, the Speaker of the House and the President of the Senate of each state’s
legislature of the United States of America, and each member of the
Oklahoma Congressional Delegation.

http://www.okhouse.gov/51LEG/Leg_Votesxx.aspx?include=okh01983.txt
http://www.ok-safe.com/files/documents/1/HJR1089_int.pdf

And as other sovereignty issues arise like with Real ID hopefully the states can exert enough pressure to cripple the federal government. At least slow its march toward total national control.

http://www.wreg.com/…

Traveling around Memphis, you probably don’t think much about terrorists, but law officers do.

It was front and center stage at a round up Saturday.

Operation Sudden Impact included police, deputies, FBI, drug agents, and even gang units all working together to see how crimes may be linked.

“People committing crimes down in Crittenden County might have some kind of warrant, and we might be looking for them in Shelby County. We in turn feed that information into state police, which can give us a national and international nexus if one exists,” says Shelby County Sheriff Mark Luttrell.

He says terrorists usually have other links and because Memphis is a distribution center, it has to be especially on guard. That includes the waterways.

The U.S. Coast Guard in Memphis was a part of Saturday’s round-up, checking a boat on the river.

“We look at everything, the safety of the tow boat in general. We also check out the crew members, just to make sure there is nobody hiding out on the tow boat, felons, criminals etc.,” says Lt. Timothy Martin of the U.S. Coast Guard in Memphis.

They say sharing information and building relationships is a big step in fighting back against those intent on harm.

The Sheriff’s Department says 332 people were arrested, 142 of whom are were fugitives.

Hundreds of dollars were seized and drugs recovered, and 1,292 traffic violations were handed out.

They are determining if and when they plan another round-up.

http://www.commercialappeal.com/…

“Not all of this initiative is to arrest people,” said Deputy Chief Donna Turner of the Tipton County Sheriff’s Department.Many agencies put an emphasis on traffic stops. A little after 8 p.m. Saturday in Hickory Hill, Sgt. Chris Harris of the Shelby County Sheriff’s Office street crimes unit stopped a white SUV that was booming with music. The driver was driving on a suspended license — he received a citation — and there was marijuana residue in the car, but “not enough to weigh out,” Harris said.

Still, every traffic stop holds the potential of netting much more than expected.

“Timothy McVeigh, who bombed the federal building in Oklahoma, was stopped because of a busted tail light,” said Shelby County Sheriff Mark Luttrell.

Todd said he expected Bartlett police to hit more than 50 houses Saturday night and this morning in search of fugitives. Those they didn’t find and arrest, he expected they might apprehend within a few days.

“Some of these people will turn themselves in later once they know we know where they live,” Todd said. “Family members will put pressure on them.”

Lt. Timothy Martin, chief of response for the Coast Guard’s Sector Lower Mississippi River unit, said in recent weeks they have been working with local police and fire departments.

“We’re out there to show that just as the land side is covered by police and the sheriff,” Martin said, “we’re on the water, boarding boats, checking bridges, refineries and power plants.”

All crime-related information will be forwarded to the State of Tennessee’s Homeland Security Center in Nashville to see if there are possible ties to terrorism.

This is not something which hasn’t happened before but it is no less unnerving. A Google News search for “operation sudden impact” results in only 7 hits at the time of writing. Only one seems to be about it before it occurred. Notice how it’s all in the name of catching terrorists yet they go after generic criminals, setup traffic check points and issue tickets for minor traffic violations and search for drugs, board and search ships and businesses. Of course InfoWars.net has their take on it all calling it a preparation for martial law. I have a hard time disagreeing. These events are fairly board in scope and implication yet completely under reported. Given the laws passed in last few years allowing for more and more executive control over all aspects of law the belief that they may in fact utilize such power has only gathered strength.

http://freedominourtime.blogspot.com/…

Unless a police officer is dutifully enforcing a legitimate warrant, or has unassailable probable cause to believe that an individual has committed a felony, he has no business attempting to arrest anybody. That was the understanding that prevailed in the Anglo-Saxon world, in one form or another, from 1215 until the mid-1960s to mid-1970s, at least here in the United States.Fifty years ago, the statutes of nearly every state recognized the right to resist unlawful arrest. Today, it is recognized only Michigan, Wyoming, Oklahoma, Alabama, Georgia, Louisiana, Maryland, North and South Carolina, Tennessee, West Virginia, and Mississippi.* The question has been examined, and upheld in remarkably candid terms by courts in Mississippi. This is ironic, given that Mississippi is the same state where Cory Maye was convicted of first degree murder for killing a police officer who invaded Maye’s home in a late-night paramilitary raid at the wrong address.

A 1963 Mississippi Supreme Court decision (King v. State) favorably cited a legal scholar’s conclusion that “the right of personal liberty is one of the fundamental rights guaranteed to every citizen, and any unlawful interference may be resisted. Every person has a right to resist an unlawful arrest; and, in preventing such illegal restraint of his liberty, he may use such force as may be necessary.”

Not quite four decades earlier, a judge presiding over the criminal trial of a police officer accused of murdering a man who resisted arrest underscored the fact that a citizen has the right to kill a police officer attempting to arrest him without probable cause or a valid warrant. The judge instructed the jury that if the officer had been attempting an illegal arrest, the defendant was permitted to employ “whatever force was necessary to avoid the arrest, even to the extent of taking the life of [the] defendant.”

In other words: A police officer who kills a civilian in the course of an unlawful arrest is a murderer; a citizen who kills a police officer when threatened with lethal violence in the course of an unlawful arrest is exercising his innate right to self-defense.

Like jury nullification the right to resist unlawful arrest is something simply not talked about by those in power and generally not know by the public. It’s something which as our nation moves closer and closer to a police state needs to be taught to others in an attempt to counteract some of the government’s abuses.

http://www.cnn.com/…

Ron Paul, as of the end of the 4th quarter 2007, is the number one Republican fundraiser still in the race in the following states:

• Montana¹
• Alaska¹
• Hawaii
• Kansas¹
• New Mexico
• North Dakota²

Is second in:

• Washington
• Oregon
• Idaho
• Iowa
• Wyoming
• Arkansas
• Wisconsin
• Kentucky
• Nebraska²
• Minnesota²
• Oklahoma²
• Indiana²
• Tennessee³
• Mississippi^2,3
• Georgia^2,3
• West Virginia^2,3

¹ Including Democrat candidates. ² Giuliani raised more before dropping. ³ Fred Thompson raised more before dropping.

Obviously money doesn’t mean votes nor will those locations where he has gained rank because of some dropping out help him much. It is however interesting with regards to how the MSM regards him as a gadfly. He’s raised more from the numerous branches of the military than all other candidates combined. He raised more than twice what any other Republican did in the 4th quarter at nearly $20m. He’s the number one Republican fundraiser in 5 states and second in 8 without removing those who have dropped out.

My ranking of donations per capita has been updated with 4th quarter numbers, top 5:

1. New Hampshire
2. Wyoming
3. Nevada
4. Alaska
5. Montana