Our Gun Problem | Glenn Loury & Rajiv Sethi | The Glenn Show
Oregon Health Officials Delayed a Meeting Because ‘Urgency Is a White Supremacy Value’
“The Oregon Health Authority (OHA) is a government agency that coordinates medical care and social well-being in the Beaver State. During the pandemic, OHA was responsible for coordinating Oregon’s vaccination drive and disseminating information about COVID-19—both vital tasks.
The agency’s office for equity and inclusion, however, prefers not to rush the business of government. In fact, the office’s program manager delayed a meeting with partner organizations on the stated grounds that “urgency is a white supremacy value.”
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Government employees who are unprepared for meetings should not cite white supremacy as their excuse.”
America’s Founders Raged Against Qualified Immunity, Trade Restrictions, and Anti-Immigrant Policies
“The Declaration of Independence is probably best known for the panache of its opening and closing stanzas. Those bits about “the course of human events” and the pledging of “our lives, our fortunes, and our sacred honor” suggest that the authors and signers understood the political and historical significance of the moment—and, after all, you can’t have a revolution without a little linguistic dancing.
But the bulk of the document—it’s just 1,330 words; take a moment to read it today—is dedicated not to grand statements about self-evident truths or sweeping philosophical claims.
Mostly, it’s a laundry list of complaints about how the government really sucks.”
The Founders Loved Jury Trials. Almost No One Gets One Anymore.
“What is the Sixth Amendment?
You wouldn’t be blamed for having to consult Google to answer that question. The Founders are rolling in their graves anyway.
It’s the right to a trial by jury, and it’s one that society has all but disposed of—despite the Framers’ insistence that it be included in the Bill of Rights as one of the primary bulwarks against government tyranny.
They didn’t exactly mince words. “Representative government and trial by jury are the heart and lungs of liberty,” wrote John Adams. “Without them we have no fortification against being ridden like horses, fleeced like sheep, worked like cattle, and fed and clothed like swine and hogs.”
One wonders what animalistic metaphors Adams would conjure today if he could see the U.S. criminal justice system in motion: one in which about 97 percent of trials are resolved without juries, devoid of the sacrosanct lifeblood that keeps human liberty from death by suffocation.
That tool has been supplanted by the plea bargain. In popular culture, that’s widely seen as advantageous to defendants. In reality, it’s been disastrous. It epitomizes government coercion. It epitomizes what the Founders warned against.”
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“The bulk of a prosecutor’s job is not spent in the hallowed halls of a courtroom participating in a high-stakes battle over someone’s liberty, all while journalists wait in the wings to capture the victor’s speech on marble steps. It’s spent in backrooms, with district attorneys “charge-stacking,” or filing multiple criminal charges against someone for the same offense, calculating a grisly potential prison sentence, and offering to make some of that go away—so long as the defendant in question does not exercise his or her constitutional right to a trial by jury.
If they refuse, then they will risk a substantially higher time behind bars, not because a prosecutor views it as necessary for public safety but because he or she dared to inconvenience them with a trial. After all, what the defendant is accused of didn’t change. But trials are expensive. And the government can never be sure when it will win, so better to avoid them where possible.
That latter part—the uncertainty—is supposed to be the point. It’s true that many criminal defendants are guilty. It’s also true that some are innocent and have been forced to pay with their liberty anyway. A person who is not guilty likely wants to go to trial. But why risk a decade behind bars for insisting on your Sixth Amendment right when you could be out in two or three?”
The War on Weed Continues in California, Which Supposedly Legalized Marijuana Six Years Ago
“The cannabis industry, of course, remains completely illegitimate in the eyes of the federal government. That means anyone who grows or distributes marijuana in California, even with the state’s approval, is committing federal felonies every day. But even though President Joe Biden wants to keep it that way, he has promised not to interfere with states that reject marijuana prohibition. So why are the feds not only busting marijuana merchants in California but doing so in collaboration with local law enforcement agencies?
The explanation, as you may have surmised, is that these particular marijuana merchants were breaking state law as well as federal law. Their businesses were not just “illegal” but also “unlicensed.” Yet the fact that unlicensed pot dealers continue to thrive in California is testimony to the ways in which the state has botched legalization. Most local governments do not allow recreational sales, and even those that do frequently impose caps that artificially limit the supply. Bureaucratic barriers, costly regulations, and high taxes are daunting deterrents for weed dealers who otherwise might be inclined to go legit.
Those burdens, combined with local bans, explain why unlicensed sales still account for about two-thirds of the marijuana purchased in California. As a recent report from Reason Foundation (which publishes Reason) notes, California has one licensed recreational outlet per 29,282 residents, compared to one per 13,838 in Colorado and one per 6,145 in Oregon. Worse, the report adds, California’s stores are distributed unevenly across the state, leading to “massive cannabis deserts” where “consumers have no access to a legal retailer within a reasonable distance of their home.””
Sorry, Biden, Gas Stations Can’t Just ‘Bring Down the Price’
“More than half the gas stations in the country are single-store operations run by an individual or a family, according to the Association for Convenience and Fuel Retailing (NACS), a trade association representing the stores that sell more than 80 percent of the
LAPD’s Militarized Response to Peaceful Abortion Protests Makes the Case for Police Reform—Again
“Armed with riot gear and brandishing rubber-bullet guns, the Los Angeles Police Department (LAPD) mobilized rapidly in response to pro-abortion protests near the city’s federal courthouse from June 24–27. Activists and journalists claim excessive use of physical force was rampant, with officers using batons against peaceful protesters.
The LAPD has maintained that it did not use force against peaceful protesters. “The vast majority of those involved [in pro-abortion protests] were peaceful and law abiding, however, a much smaller group of individuals took to the streets with the intention of creating chaos and destruction,” the LAPD said in a June 27 statement. “The Los Angeles Police Department has the distinction of facilitating First Amendment Rights for all Angelinos. Equally the Department will enforce the law when individuals engage in violence,” the statement continued.
While there were violent actors present at the protests, including one man who attacked police with a torch, videos shared online appear to show police using force against nonviolent protesters, including those trying to deescalate the situation. In one clip that received particular attention on social media, LAPD officers seemingly shoved Full House actress Jodie Sweetin to the pavement as she tried to defuse a confrontation between police and protesters on a Los Angeles freeway.”
Philippines ends stay of foreign peacekeepers in the south
“Foreign peacekeepers credited with helping ease years of bloody fighting between government forces and Muslim rebels have left the southern Philippines after officials decided to end their presence, but talks are underway to allow their possible return”
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“Deployed in 2004, the IMT initially consisted of armed peacekeeping forces from Malaysia, Brunei and Libya to help monitor the enforcement of a cease-fire agreement between the Philippine government and the Moro Islamic Liberation Front, the largest Muslim rebel group in the south, which signed a Malaysian-brokered peace deal with the government in 2014.”
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“The rebels, however, objected to the government panel’s decision and said that based on signed agreements, IMT forces should stay to safeguard the ceasefire agreement in the southern Philippines until “the full decommissioning” — a euphemism for the disarming and return to normal life — of all the 40,000 combatants of the Moro Islamic Liberation Front, the two officials said.
More than 12,000 Muslim rebels have been “decommissioned” and laid down about 2,000 firearms and other weapons so far. A new group of 14,000 rebels was undergoing the process when Duterte’s term ended on June 30 and Marcos Jr. took office. The rest have not been disarmed.”