Police Protection: Protection comes from local policing

October 10, 2011

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Protecting Rights
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Foundations: The Shadows of Power

Their Power and Influence

A searching analysis of some of Americas most powerful tax-exempt foundations; their actions, as opposed to their stated purposes; the interlocking groups of men who run them; and their influences on the country at large. First published in 1958. (1993ed, 412pp, pb, $19.95) BKFPI

James Perloff exposes the subversive roots and globalist designs of the Council on Foreign Relations. (2008ed, 272pp, pb, $10.95) BKSOP

Dollars & $ense, by John F. McManus, is an excellent tool for teaching Americans about the nature of money and how to solve inflation. Given the current economic crisis, it is a must-see! (2008, 48min, cased DVD, 1/$5.95; 10-24/$4.95ea; 25-49/$3.95ea; 50-99/$2.95ea; 100-249/$2.25ea; 25+/$1.75ea) dVddASC (2008, 48min, sleeved DVD, 1/$1.00; 11-20/$0.90ea; 21-49/$0.80ea; 50-99/$0.75ea; 100-999/$0.70ea; 1000+/$0.64ea) dVddAS

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Enhanced remake of Ezra Taft Bensons 1968 filmstrip classic. This DVD provides a roadmap for restoring our freedoms and rights. (2005, 24min, cased DVD, $5.95) dVdMFg (2005, 24min, sleeved DVD, 1/$1.00ea; 11-20/$0.90ea; 21-49/$0.80ea; 50-99/$0.75ea; 100-999/$0.70ea; 1000+/$0.64ea) dVdMFgPS

Man, Freedom, & Government

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This classic expos of socialism and communism as lawful plunder explains the fundamental principles involved in determining the proper scope of government. It explains socialist fallacies. (2007ed, 74pp, pb, $4.95) BKL

Author Dennis L. Cuddy, Ph.D. effectively presents potent quotes revealing the designs of the theoreticians, architects, and technocrats of one-worldism. (2008ed, 144pp, pb, $9.95) BKRTS

1984

The nightmarish world of the foreseeable future is described in horrifying and realistic detail, a time when the state reigns supreme and the words individualism and dignity are nowhere to be found in the politically correct vocabulary of newspeak. Originally published in 1949. (1981ed, 328pp, pb, $8.95) BK1984
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The Creature From Jekyll Island

G. Edward Griffin unmasks the secrets behind the manipulation of our nations money supply by providing an insiders look at how the Federal Reserve came into being and how it controls the value of the dollar. (2010, 5th ed, 608pp, pb, $22.95) BKCFJI

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First Ten Amendments to the Constitution

Article I.
Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances. property, without due process of law; nor shall private property be taken for public use, without just compensation. In all criminal prosecutions the accused shall enjoy the right to a speedy and public trial, by an impartial jury of the state and district wherein the crime shall have been committed, which district shall have been previously ascertained by law, and to be informed of the nature and cause of the accusation; to be confronted with the witnesses against him; to have compulsory process for obtain-ing witnesses in his favor, and to have the assistance of counsel for his defense.

Article VI.

Article II. A well-regulated militia being necessary to the Article III. No soldier shall, in time of peace, be quartered Article IV. The right of the people to be secure in their

security of a free state, the right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed.

in any house, without the consent of the owner, nor in time of war, but in a manner to be prescribed by law.

Article VII. In suits at common law, where the value in

persons, houses, papers, and effects against unreasonable searches and seizures shall not be violated, and no warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.

controversy shall exceed twenty dollars, the right of trial by jury shall be preserved, and no fact tried by a jury shall be otherwise re-examined in any court of the United States, than according to the rules of the common law. excessive fines imposed, nor cruel and unusual punishments inflicted.

Article VIII. Excessive bail shall not be required, nor

The enumeration in the Constitution, of certain rights, shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people.

Article 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 or public danger; nor shall any person be subject for the same offense 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

Article IX.

Article X. 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.

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10

vol. 27, no. 19

october 10, 2011

Cover Story
Law EnforcEmEnt

10 Protecting rights: Loyal americans targeted by the SPLc

19 Police Protection

by Charles Scaliger To Protect and to Serve The difficult job of law enforcement is being undermined by the dangerous trend toward nationalization and militarization of our police agencies.

19

FeatureS
Law

24 watched now more than Ever

24

by Jack Kenny Big Government has gone on a growth spurt since 9/11, especially in the area of security agencies, which are so numerous that its likely no one knows what theyre doing.
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28 the rights of accused terrorists

by Thomas R. Eddlem George W. Bushs and Barack Obamas treatment of accused terrorists in the War on Terror has often fallen outside constitutional boundaries and thats bad for Americans.

28

HiStory PaSt and PErSPEctivE

35 military commissions throughout U.S. History

by Thomas R. Eddlem Military commissions have a long and irregular history of being created by federal authorities, and U.S. courts have been just as inconsistent in rulings on their constitutionality.

tHE LaSt word

by John F. McManus

DepartmentS
5 Letters to the Editor 7 inside track 9 QuickQuotes 34 the Goodness of america 40 Exercising the right 41 correction, Please!

35

covEr Design by Joseph W. Kelly, Photos: iStockphotos

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44 a way out of impending Economic chaos

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iStockphotos

by William F. Jasper Law-enforcement agencies rely on the Southern Poverty Law Center to keep them abreast of hate groups, and the SPLC has been using its clout to stigmatize and slander conservatives.

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LETTERS TO THE EDITOR

Publisher John F. McManus Editor Gary Benoit Senior Editor William F. Jasper Associate Editor Kurt Williamsen Web Editor Warren Mass Contributors Bob Adelmann Dennis J. Behreandt Raven Clabough Selwyn Duke Thomas R. Eddlem Larry Greenley Gregory A. Hession, J.D. Ed Hiserodt William P. Hoar Jack Kenny R. Cort Kirkwood Patrick Krey, J.D. Alex Newman Llewellyn H. Rockwell, Jr. Joe Wolverton II, J.D. Art Director Joseph W. Kelly Graphic Design Intern Katie Carder Research Bonnie M. Gillis Manager of Public Relations/Marketing Bill Hahn Advertising/Circulation Julie DuFrane

Good reason to fear the coming inflation

Recent issues of The New AmericAN refer to a number of factors causing increases in the price of food around the world, especially inflation of the U.S. currency. (See, in particular, the two companion cover-story articles by Bob Adelmann Food Prices Rocket and Using the Food Crisis that appeared in the July 18, 2011 issue of The New AmericAN.) To give an idea of the true extent of that inflation, consider that the present years deficit is about $1.5 trillion, almost all of it paid by the creation of money by the Federal Reserve. This amounts to nearly $5,000 for every man, woman, and child in this country. Small wonder that prices are rising. And please note that a great deal of government spending goes to wasteful and anti-economic purposes. For many years our governments deficits were largely funded by the purchase of U.S. government securities by foreign central banks, but that day is over. The Chinese and others have stopped investing their money in depreciating U.S. government debt. This is the unstated reason for the Federal Reserves full funding of the deficit. As if to prove the point, the bipartisan deal that just raised the debt ceiling by $2.4 trillion calls for unspecified cuts in spending of $1.5 trillion over the next 10 years. If one were to assume, over-optimistically, that the present level of deficit $1.5 trillion per annum were to continue without increasing for the next 10 years, this implies that the total of the additional debt incurred in that period would be $15 trillion. The so-called cuts would only reduce this by 10 percent, to $13.5 trillion. That would nearly double our national debt. And since our government has long since ceased to publish figures on the money supply, God knows what increase in the money supply that would mean. Of course, we all know that the aging of our population, the shrinking of a workforce to support retir-

ees (50 million abortions did the trick), and the export of our industries guarantee that the situation will be much worse. The rising price of gold tells us that someone is getting smart. Unfortunately, it appears to be the Chinese, the Indians, and the German government, not the Americans. The debate about raising the limit on our national debt should be seen as debate over how much money is to be printed to pay for our governments deficit spending. If the issue were so baldly stated, how many would support such increases in the money supply? JuAN ryAN New Providence, New Jersey

constitutional cash cow

When 60 percent of the American people depend on government (or so they believe), how can our Constitution maintain its main thrust and reason for being? How can it keep free this society and create a Republic in which the individual citizen is free to create real wealth, in order to further create a base for the groups increased standard of living, with the majority free from rules and laws that would be aimed at impeding them from achieving their goals so that those not involved in the creating and producing of real wealth might live off those doing the work? Were a far cry from that concept today! The problem is that the majority today will vote for government ahead of liberty and/or freedom. How did that happen? Time. Too many have forgotten why our early citizens broke from their English government: It was because government all governments act for self ahead of acting as trustees for their citizens freedom to work and produce real wealth. AlAN ScoTT Sent via e-mail
Send your letters to: The New AmericAN, P.O. Box 8040, Appleton, WI 54912. Or e-mail: editorial@thenewamerican.com. Due to volume received, not all letters can be answered. Letters may be edited for space and clarity.

Printed in the U.S.A. ISSN 0885-6540 P.O. Box 8040 Appleton, WI 54912 920-749-3784 920-749-3785 (fax) www.thenewamerican.com editorial@thenewamerican.com Rates are $39 per year (Hawaii and Canada, add $9; foreign, add $27) or $22 for six months (Hawaii and Canada, add $4.50; foreign, add $13.50). Copyright 2011 by American Opinion Publishing, Inc. Periodicals postage paid at Appleton, WI and additional mailing offices. Postmaster: Send any address changes to The New AmericAN, P.O. Box 8040, Appleton, WI 54912. The New AmericAN is published twice monthly by American Opinion Publishing Inc., a wholly owned subsidiary of The John Birch Society.

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Inside Track
Libyan rebels are accused of Ethnic cleansing, Black Genocide
NATO and U.S.-backed rebel forces in Libya are reportedly engaging in systematic attacks against the black population in what some analysts have called war crimes and even genocide, sparking condemnation worldwide from human-rights groups and officials. Reports and photographic evidence indicate that numerous atrocities including mass executions have taken place even in recent weeks. Many black victims were found with their hands bound behind their backs and bullets through their skulls. Horrific internment camps, systematic rape, torture, lynching, and looting of businesses owned by blacks have all been reported as well. And countless sub-Saharan Africans have been forced to flee their homes in Libya to avoid the same fate. The al-Qaeda-linked rebels campaign of racist terror began shortly after the Benghazi uprising in February. More than a few videos surfaced on the Internet in the early months of the conflict showing brutal lynchings and beheadings while Western-backed rebels cheered. But as insurgent forces solidify their grip over most of Libya, the race-based persecution is quickly intensifying. Entire cities and towns formerly occupied by blacks have been ethnically cleansed and destroyed. The Brigade for Purging Slaves, Black Skin apparently a rebel slogan was found months ago scrawled all along the road to Tawergha. And today, the coastal city of about 10,000 mostly black residents has essentially been wiped off the map. Rebel forces rounded up remaining inhabitants and reportedly took them to camps, although reporters searching for the former residents have not been able to locate them. Homes, businesses, and schools were then looted before being burned to the ground. Finally, graffiti reading slaves, negroes, and abeed a derogatory term for blacks was painted all over the ruins by NATOs revolutionaries. The former city is now a closed military area, according to rebels guarding a checkpoint interviewed by the McClatchy news service. Tawarga no longer exists, a rebel commander told the Wall Street Journal.
Revolutionary fighters celebrate in Sirte, Libya.

federal reserve is coming to the rescue of European Banks (again!)

To the list of megacorporations bailed out by the U.S. government, we now must add Europe. In an Swiss bank UBS estimated announcement that a loss of $2 billion. rocked financial markets worldwide, the European Central Bank revealed September 15 a concerted effort in combination with four other major central banks the Bank of England, the Bank of Japan, the Bank of Switzerland, and yes, the U.S. Federal Reserve to use dollars rather than euros in an attempt to paper over the European Unions economic woes. Starting in October, the Federal Reserve and other major central banks will begin auctioning allotments of dollars to the European Central Bank, which will then use the new money to shore up shaky European megabanks. The allotments, which will have three-month maturities and will be structured like typical repurchase operations (repos), will be issued against euro-denominated collateral and repaid, with interest, in dollars. That at least is the theory. Currency swaps involving the Federal Reserve and other central banks are nothing new, and have been a focal concern of Fed opponents such as Congressman Ron Paul, who has long suggested that much of the Feds financial chicanery has been
www.TheNewAmerican.com

carried out in the form of such currency deals with foreign central banks, in total secrecy. This time around, the deal is being touted openly as an unprecedented exercise in international coordination by the worlds central banks, a decisive move to solve Europes long-running sovereign debt crisis. Under the terms of the arrangement, the Fed and other central banks will deal with the European Central Bank, which will then disburse dollars to European commercial banks as it deems necessary. There is no cap on the amount of dollars that the Fed may provide to the ECB under the terms of the swap arrangement, which was first agreed to in principle in May 2010. An earlier swap facility, created by the Fed in 2007 in response to the global financial crisis, had expired in February 2010. Christine Lagarde, managing director of the International Monetary Fund, applauded the upcoming currency swaps, telling CNBC that the action shows they will do what it takes to maintain stability in the financial system. The Federal Reserve, without so much as a congressional byyour-leave (let alone constitutional authority), has been playing Russian roulette with the American economy ever since the onset of the financial crisis, throwing bad money after bad and producing no outcome other than lengthening and deepening the crisis. Sooner or later, in an event economists like to call capitulation, the global markets will tumble to the reality that no amount of debt and stimulus will cure our malaise; only the shock therapy that the free market provides will do that.
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Inside Track
Study: romneycare Killed 18,000 massachusetts Jobs
Former Massachusetts Governor Mitt Romneys highly touted RomneyCare has cost Massachusetts some 18,000 jobs, reduced investment in the state by tens of millions, raised healthcare costs, and lowered per capita disposable income, according to a computer model study by the Suffolk University-based Beacon Hill Institute. RomneyCare became the model for Obamas national health care reform legislation Congress passed in 2010, including an individual mandate, tax penalties for companies that dont offer care, a health insurance exchange, and several other similar key components. The healthcare law does not exist in a vacuum, Beacon Hill Institute executive director David Tuerck wrote in a September 15 press release unveiling the computer modeling study. The shared sacrifice needed to provide universal health care includes a net loss of jobs, which is attributable to the higher costs that the measure imposed. As described by the release, the study concluded that the Massachusetts healthcare reform (HCR) signed by Mitt Romney in 2006 has: driven total health insurance costs up by [between] $3 billion and $6.1 billion; caused Massachusetts to employ between 15,551 and 21,422 fewer people; slowed the growth of disposable income per capita by $376; and reduced investment in Massachusetts by between $21.28 million and $29.33 million.
Mitt Romney

Romneys presidential campaign continues to defend the Massachusetts model, questioning the studys statistics. This study is deeply flawed. It is based on the assumption that Massachusetts health-care reform caused the rate of healthcare cost increases to accelerate. In fact, health-care cost increases have slowed since the passage of reform. This error, therefore, invalidates the study, Romney spokesman Ryan Williams told the Boston Herald September 16. However, though Massachusetts healthcare costs already the highest in the nation in 2006 have grown at a slower rate than before RomneyCare was adopted, they have nevertheless remained the highest in the nation. Beacon Hill Institute officials defended their own model. Our report is accurate, the institutes research director Paul Bachman replied. Indeed, the Beacon Hill Institute study admittedly underestimated the job losses. It did not account for all the job losses of RomneyCare, because much of the cost in jobs is being felt by other states that have had to subsidize the Massachusetts program with federal tax dollars. Some of these cost increases do not directly affect the Massachusetts economy, for example most of the federal Medicaid and Medicare dollars spent in the state derive from the rest of the country. Therefore, we consider only the cost to the state government and private firms and employees and exclude increase[d] costs of Medicare and the federal portion of Medicaid. In short, federal subsidies for Medicare and Medicaid have kept RomneyCare afloat in Massachusetts, and prevented even worse job losses.

al Gores 24 Hours of reality was Unrealistic

Al Gores non-profit group, The Climate Reality Project, sponsored a 24 Hours of Reality live broadcast that began on September 14 at 7 p.m. Central Time. Over the next 24 hours, essentially the same hour-long presentation was repeated 24 times by different hosts in each time zone around the globe. The 24 Hours of Reality was unrealistic, to say the least. The flawed claims included the assertion that climate scientists are in agreement that the planet Earth is threatened with eco-catastrophe owing to global warming caused by man. In fact, there is no such agreement. In making the claim of consensus on the issue, Gore ignores the growing number of scientists who publicly refute his assertions of eco-catastrophe. A report compiled by the U.S. Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works and presented to the United Nations Climate Change Conference in Cancun last December quotes more than 1,000 scientists refuting the idea
8

of anthropogenic (human-caused) global warming (AGW) and specifically contesting what they call Gores scientifically unsound allegations. Al Gore has taken a role corresponding to that of St. Paul in proselytizing the new faith, said atmospheric physicist Dr. John Reid. The quasi-religious nature of AGW is evidenced by the rancor which is generated when people like me express skepticism about the theory. The whole idea of anthropogenic global warming is completely unfounded, said astrophysicist Hilton Ratcliffe, a fellow of the British Institute of Physics. There appears to have been money gained by Al Gore as a consequence of this deception, so its fraud. Gore prompted me to start delving into the science again, said meteorologist Hajo Smit, who is a former member of the Dutch UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change committee. I quickly found myself solidly in the skeptic camp. n
THE NEW AMERICAN OCTObER 10, 2011

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QuickQuotes
GoP candidate Prefers a different Question Thats a difficult question because thats a long list. Id rather you asked me for a list of things we should keep. At South Carolinas Palmetto Freedom Forum, Congressman Ron Paul was asked which government programs he would abolish if he were to become President.
Ron Paul
AP Images AP Images

Soaring Poverty and falling median income make for a Lost decade We think of America as a place where every generation is doing better, but were looking at a period when the median family is in worse shape than it was in the late 1990s. The first ten years of the 21st Century should be known as a lost decade. Harvard University economics professor Lawrence Katz cited falling household income and 46.2 million persons living below the official poverty line. new york city area now Has two GoP representatives This is not something were used to doing. At the swearing-in ceremony for newly elected Republican Bob Turner, Representative Peter King, a rarity himself as a Republican in the heavily Democratic New York City area, acknowledged that the Turner victory was both welcome to him and unexpected by everybody.

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Peter King

Exclusion of clergy from 9/11 commemoration Provokes anger This is America, and to have a memorial service where theres no prayer, this appears to be insanity to me. I feel like America has lost its way. Former New York City Deputy Mayor Rudy Washington wasnt alone in protesting the barring of clergy from the 10th anniversary memorial service held where the Twin Towers once stood. congressman makes Startling admission Today, the ignorance around here is staggering. Nobody has any idea what theyre voting for. Pointing to then-Speaker of the House Newt Gingrichs decades-old abolition of the Democratic Study Group that analyzed measures brought before Congress, Representative Jim Cooper (D-Tenn.) may have overstated the amount of ignorance in Congress, but probably not by much. Sharp criticism aimed at Environmentalists Jim The environmentalists are for any energy source unless it actually works. Cooper Energy specialist Stephen Hayward of the American Enterprise Institute noted that leading environmentalists who once favored the use of natural gas have reversed their opinion after the discovery of abundant natural-gas deposits. Jobs arent Plentiful for college Grads You dont expect someone who just spent four years in Ivy League schools to be on food stamps. A 2009 graduate of Dartmouth University, Stephanie Morales ended up as a waitress while still facing student-loan debts. House approves Bill to curb nLrB meddling This legislation tells job creators they dont have to worry about an activist National Labor Relations Board telling them where they can locate their business. Minnesota Republican John Kline led the fight in the House for a measure that would overturn the NLRBs prohibition of Boeings plan to create an assembly plant in South Carolina. The measure, passed in the House by 238 to 186, now goes to the Senate. n compiled by JohN F. mcmANuS
9

AP Images

John Kline

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Law EnforcEmEnt

Protecting Rights
Loyal Americans Targeted by the SPLC
by William F. Jasper

Law-enforcement agencies rely on the Southern Poverty Law Center to keep them abreast of hate groups, and the SPLC has been using its clout to stigmatize and slander conservatives.

C
10

arol Swain is an apologist for white supremacists. That was the jarring headline of a front-page article that greeted Dr. Swain in her local paper on October 17, 2009. The headline was a quote from Mark Potok, a top spokesman for the Southern Poverty Law Center, the self-anointed watchdog that presumes to be the preeminent monitor of hate groups and racial extremists throughout the United States.

Carol Swain, then, must be a very bad person, no? Probably joined at the hip to the neo-Nazis, KKK, and Aryan Nations, right? After all, the folks at the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC), and especially the organizations founder, Morris Dees, have acquired sainted reputations as heroic crusaders against these nefarious groups and other purveyors of hatred, bigotry, and violence. Dees, Potok, and their colleagues at SPLC are regularly paraded as the go-to experts on all the various extremists that threaten the realm.

Surely, they must know something dark and sinister about Dr. Swains collaboration with these forces. Undoubtedly, Professor Swain was not the only one shocked by the SPLC allegation; many of her academic peers and students, as well as the many fans of her books and published columns, would have considered her to be one of the last persons to fall under such loathsome accusations. In fact, on the surface, she would appear to be a natural ally of the SPLC, since she is a certified
THE NEW AMERICAN OCTObER 10, 2011

academic expert on the subject of white nationalism and racism in the United States. Her two books on the subject The New White Nationalism in America: Its Challenge to Integration (2004) and Contemporary Voices of White Nationalism in America (2003), both published by Cambridge University Press were critically acclaimed. Dr. Carol M. Swain is a professor of political science and law at Vanderbilt University in Nashville, Tennessee. In 2007, she was appointed to the Tennessee Advisory Committee of the U.S. Civil Rights Commission. In 2008, the U.S. Senate confirmed her nomination to the National Council on the Humanities, which is the advisory board of the National Endowment for the Humanities. Professor Swain also happens to be black, which, in itself, makes her an odd choice, to say the least, for Potoks claim of being an apologist for white supremacists. In fact, Carol Swain would seem to be the perfect poster child for the kind of racial harmony and tolerance the SPLC claims to be aiming at. Moreover, her life is a bootstrap success story that serves as inspiration to many aspiring black scholars. Dr. Swain relates this biographical information: I am one of 12 children raised in rural poverty by parents who had little education. Our poverty was so great that one by one all 12 of us dropped out of school at around the 8th or 9th grade. Three of us earned high school equivalencies. I dropped out of school after completing the 8th grade, married at 16, and had three children before becoming the first in my family to reach college. She not only reached college, she graduated magna cum laude with a bachelors degree in criminal justice, while also making the National Deans List and membership in the Phi Beta Kappa and Alpha Chi national academic honor societies. She went on to receive her masters degree in political science at Virginia Polytechnical, her Ph.D. in poli-sci from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, and a masters degree in law from Yale Law School.
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Her childhood, curriculum vita, professional oeuvre, and ethnicity certainly dont fit the profile of the typical apologist for white supremacy. What is going on here?

derided for dissenting According to Professor Swain, its fairly simple: She is being smeared as payback for her beliefs regarding immigration and illegal aliens, as well as her criticism of the SPLCs methods, especially its virulent attacks on former CNN news anchor Lou Dobbs, which she describes as shameless vilification. In a March 2010 panel discussion entitled Immigration and the SPLC at the National Press Club in Washington, D.C., sponsored by the Center for Immigration Studies (CIS), Swain stated her belief that Potoks attack on her was really about immigration. I had edited a book in 2007 called Debating Immigration, in which I tried to bring diverse voices into the conversation, she explained. One of those was the voice of Peter Brimelow, a British-American immigrant, former financial writer for Forbes, Fortune, and the Wall Street

For advocating enforcement of our immigration laws, Brimelow and Vdare were added to the SPLCs list of haters, alongside Ku Kluxers and Aryan skinheads.
Journal, and currently the editor of Vdare. com, a website that opposes our ongoing open-borders policies and amnesty for illegal aliens. For advocating enforcement of our immigration laws, Brimelow and Vdare were added to the SPLCs list of haters, alongside Ku Kluxers and Aryan skinheads. Swain says she also wanted to include in her book the voice of Christians that were not open-borders Christians, that believe that the state has a right to enforce the laws of the land, and that we can expect immigrants people who come here illegally to obey the laws and [that we] are a nation of laws and not a nation of just total chaos. Well, because of that book, which has been well received, I think they wanted to shut my voice down on the immigration issue, said Swain. But it was not only her immigration

Smear victim: Prof. Carol Swain was defamed by the SPLC as an apologist for white supremacists after she spoke out in favor of enforcing our immigration laws.

Newscom

11

Law EnforcEmEnt
views that stirred the SPLCs wrath. She noted at the CIS panel discussion at the National Press Club: The Southern Poverty Law Center tries to silence people on a range of issues. Its not just immigration. Its also people that are pro-life; its people that are concerned about racial preferences, people that are concerned about same-sex marriages, gun control, immigration and patriots. She made the same point in her response to the Tennessean article that launched the SPLC smear. Today, conservatives and Christians (of which I am both) are targeted by groups like the Southern Poverty Law Center that regularly seek to discredit us, she wrote. What is hap-

no tolerance for morality: Prominent black pastors, such as Rev. James Meeks of Illinois (pictured), are under attack by SPLC because of their opposition to homosexuality and gay marriage.
AP Images

A Danger to Life and Freedom: SPLcs misdirection of Law Enforcement

by William F. Jasper

aw enforcement professionals are more likely to encounter dangerous extremists than virtually any other segment of American society and those confrontations are, tragically, sometimes fatal, says the SPLCs Law Enforcement Resources web page. With that in mind, the web page continues, the SPLC has undertaken a number of initiatives to equip officers with information and other resources that may help them carry out their duties with a minimum of danger to themselves. Over the past four decades, Morris Dees and the SPLC have parlayed their political and media connections into close ties with law-enforcement agencies. These ties are more troubling and potentially far more dangerous than their often-criticized fundraising scandals. During the administration of President Bill Clinton and his Attorney General, Janet Reno, the SPLC developed a continuing tight relationship with the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) and the FBI that has since expanded to include the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and many state and local police agencies. The SPLC sends its Intelligence Reports to thousands of police departments, and its so-called experts frequently provide seminars for law enforcement regarding conservative, constitutionalist, or pro-life groups that the SPLC smears by falsely associating them with the Ku Klux Klan or neo-Nazi groups. By vastly exaggerating the number of KKK/neo-Nazi groups and the alleged number of hate crime incidents, and by false12

ly tying these violent groups and incidents to legitimate, lawabiding organizations, the SPLC is attempting to demonize and criminalize, in the eyes and minds of law-enforcement personnel, those with whom the SPLC disagrees. Laird Wilcox, a recognized expert on extremist groups, is one of many critics spanning the political spectrum who see the SPLC as a danger to civil liberties. He is the founder of the Wilcox Collection on Contemporary Political Movements at the University of Kansass Kenneth Spencer Research Library and an awardwinning journalist, scholar, and author. The meticulous research provided by his Guide to the American Left and Guide to the American Right has made these works standard reference tools for serious journalists, political scientists, and law-enforcement intelligence personnel. In 2005 Wilcox noted that shoddy even fraudulent research methodology is standard operating procedure at the SPLC. He told The New AmericAN that with minimal effort I went through a list of 800-plus hate groups published by the SPLC and determined that over half of them were either nonexistent, existed in name only, or were inactive. Wilcox, Professor Carol Swain, and other researchers have pointed out that the SPLCs practice of exaggerating the extremist and hate group threat actually helps draw recruits to the groups they claim to be fighting. And the SPLC, notes Wilcox, has everything to gain: fundraising goes up, they get more media exposure, their credibility increases, and their political usefulness to the far left surges.
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pening is a bold attack on free speech and the inner workings of the Democratic process. We must not let this continue. Do her charges hold? Is the SPLC shutting down free speech in a very dangerous way, specifically targeting conservatives and Christians and maliciously smearing them with the racist, bigot, extremist, hater, anti-Semite and even terrorist labels? These charges are fairly easy to verify; simply go to the Southern Poverty Law Centers website (www.splcenter.org), pick up one of its Intelligence Reports, or catch one of its spokespersons on CNN, NPR, CBS, or MSNBC. One will discover that Dr. Swain is far from being the only unlikely suspect to be viciously traduced with one or more of the SPLCs hate labels.

focus of hate: Dr. James Dobson, founder of Focus on the Family, is one of many Christian, pro-family leaders who have been targeted by the Southern Poverty Law Center.

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The Humanist, a left-liberal journal, has also scorched Morris Dees and his associates for their anti-American attacks on constitutionally protected rights, noting: The SPLC campaigns for laws that will effectively deny free speech and freedom of association to certain groups of Americans on the basis of their beliefs. Six times a year, the SPLCs letter boasts, the center reports its ndings to over 6,000 lawenforcement agencies; then, with no discernible irony, it goes on to justify its Big Brother methods in the name of tolerance. The SPLC, says Wilcox, specializes in a highly developed and ritualized form of defamation, however a way of harming and isolating people by denying their humanity and trying to convert them into something that deserves to be hated and eliminated. They accuse others of this but utilize their enormous resources to practice it on a mass scale themselves. In his 1999 book, The Watchdogs: A Close Look at AntiRacist Watchdog Groups, Wilcox takes particular aim at the SPLC, writing: Watchdog groups can have a profound influence on law enforcement tactics in a number of ways. Both the Anti-Defamation League and Southern Poverty Law Center publish newsletters and other material directed at law enforcement, often giving these agencies names from their files accompanied by suggestions of dangerousness. Like all witch hunting operations, they occasionally find a real witch which enhances their credibility, especially in high-profile media cases. But mixed with those few witches are thousands upon thousands of people whose politics may be extreme, but with no illegal intent whatsoever. The SPLCs penetration of certain law-enforcement circles is especially alarming. In 2009, Homeland Security Secretary Janet
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Napolitano was forced to apologize to military veterans for a DHS report to law enforcement entitled Rightwing Extremism that warned of the danger of terrorism posed by returning military veterans from the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. The same report similarly smeared pro-life, pro-gun, and pro-Constitution activists with the terrorist label. When DHS was forced, under the Freedom of Information Act, to release the sources for its report, it was revealed that most of its information had come from the SPLCs discredited research. At roughly the same time, in March 2009, the Missouri State Highway Patrol issued a report entitled The Modern Militia Movement, which was the product of a federal-state law-enforcement Fusion Center. The authors of the report clearly were attempting to create in the minds of law-enforcement personnel an association between violent right-wing extremists and the millions of law-abiding Americans who oppose gun control, the United Nations, the Federal Reserve System, the income tax, illegal immigration, and abortion. After listing 18 incidents of what it called noteworthy militia activity from 1995 through 2008 some of which involved bombings or armed confrontations with law enforcement the report stated: You are the Enemy: The militia subscribes to an antigovernment and NWO [New World Order] mind set, which creates a threat to law enforcement officers. They view the military, National Guard, and law enforcement as a force that will confiscate their firearms and place them in FEMA concentration camps. [Bold emphasis in original.] The Missouri report reads as if it were taken directly from regular rants of the SPLC. And it sets up law enforcement to view law-abiding Americans who sport bumper stickers opposing abortion, the Federal Reserve, or the United Nations as dangerous extremists and potential terrorists. n
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crucifying christians A host of prominent black preachers have come under fire from the SPLC. Among them are Chicagos Rev. Gregory Daniels; the Washington, D.C., areas Bishop Harry Jackson; the Atlanta areas Bishop Eddie Long; the Detroit areas Rev. Keith Butler; Bishop Wellington Boone of Norcross, Georgia; Pastor Ken Hutcherson of Redmond, Washington; Rev. Jesse Peterson of Los Angeles; and the Chicago areas Rev. James Meeks. What is it about these Christian
marketing hate: The SPLCs notorious Hate Map lumps conservatives, Christians, and Tea Party activists together with images of the KKK and neo-Nazis.

SPLc: Scamming for Power, Lucre, and Control

by William F. Jasper

he SPLC was founded in Montgomery, Alabama, in 1971 by Morris Dees and Joseph J. Levin, Jr. as a nonprofit civil rights legal firm. By cherry-picking a relatively few high-profile cases against the Ku Klux Klan, White Aryan Resistance, and Aryan Nations, they have been able to establish themselves in the public eye as the premier champions against violent racism and hate. The name Southern Poverty Law Center conjures images of dedicated and near-penniless lawyers heroically assisting poor rural sharecroppers and destitute inner city families throughout the deep South in their struggles for justice. Those and similar images, like just about everything else promoted by the SPLC, are fraudulent mirages crafted by the organizations co-founder and PR genius, Morris Dees. Millard Fuller, an attorney and partner of Dees in the 1960s, has recalled: Morris and I, from the first day of our partnership, shared the overriding purpose of making a pile of money. We were not particular about how we did it. We just wanted to be independently rich. Dees has certainly succeeded in that. The SPLCs tax returns for 2010 show it is sitting on assets of nearly $229 million, making it one of the most successful fundraising organizations in existence. A decade ago the SPLC left its multi-million dollar
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headquarters, located on prime real estate a mere block from the Alabama State Capitol in Montgomery, for an even grander, new headquarters across the street, which critics have dubbed Poverty Palace. The Montgomery Advertiser in 2010 provided a lavish display of photos of Dees own ostentatious mansion and guesthouse on his luxurious estate outside Montgomery. Dees and company have squirreled away an undisclosed portion of the organizations assets in an offshore account in the Cayman Islands. The SPLCs IRS filings mention the Cayman account but do not provide any details. The organizations fundraising and spending practices have received poor or failing ratings from the Better Business Bureau, the American Institute of Philanthropy, and Charity Navigator. The Social Contract reports that, unknown to most donors, the tax-exempt SPLC flunked an audit by the Arlington-based Better Business Bureaus Wise Giving Alliance, which requires that a reasonable percentage, at least 50 percent of total income from all sources, should be applied to programs and activities directly related to the purposes for which the organization exists. The SPLC, far from meeting those standards, spent 89 percent of its total income on fund-raising and administrative costs. In 2009, the SPLCs president and CEO, Richard Cohen, the organizations highest-paid employee, took home a salary of $348,652. Morris Dees got $336,072. Mark Potok received $143,206. No telling how much they received in off-shore compensation in the Cayman Islands. At the same time, median household income for Alabama was $41,676. n
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pastors that has Morris Dees and the SPLC all afroth? Since theyre black ministers serving all-black, or mostly black, congregations, its not very likely that they are supporters of, or apologists for, white supremacy. No, their main offense, in the eyes of the SPLC watchdogs, is holding fast to principles of biblical morality in opposition to the militant gay lobby, and especially their opposition to homosexual marriage. The vast majority of AfricanAmericans do not support same-sex marriage, showing an even larger margin of disapproval than the American population as a whole. Senator Obama acknowledged this political reality when he was running for the presidency by staking out a position in favor of heterosexual marriage. Now he says his position on the matter is evolving, and he has been actively courting the big donors of the homosexual activist community. Former Obama aide and gay activist Kevin Thompson told the New York Times he believes this was Obamas plan all along. The black pastors under attack from the SPLC, however, appear to have taken their stands on marriage out of genuine commitment, not expediency. Thus the SPLC feels compelled to pummel them into submission. It has allied itself with the National Black Justice Coalition (NBJC), a black gay/lesbian/bisexual/transgendered rights group, and other GLBT groups to attempt to make the case that being antigay is hateful and closely akin to racist bigotry. I think its disturbing when black people join the contemporary Confederate army, Sylvia Rhue, a lesbian activist and spokesperson for the NBJC, told the Southern Poverty Law Center regarding the black preachers. They are no different, she says, than those who wanted a civil war to maintain slavery. Of course, the black Christian ministers now being tarred are just getting the first taste of the smear campaign that the SPLC has been waging against conservative Christian Right leaders and prominent Christian organizations for a much longer period. Among the many leaders
SPLcs terrorist comrades: While claiming concern over supposed rightwing terrorism, SPLC embraces unrepentant Weather Underground terrorist Bill Ayers.
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and groups that have been singled out for SPLC smears The SPLC has raised hundreds of are Dr. James Dobson and his millions of dollars for the ostensible Focus on the Family ministry, Beverly LaHaye and purpose of fighting hate and helping her Concerned Women for the poor and powerless, but in reality America, the late D. James Kennedy and his Coral Ridge has stuffed its own coffers, building one Ministries, Scott Lively and of the largest investment portfolios of his Abiding Truth Ministries, David Barton and his any NGO in the country. WallBuilders ministry, the American Family Association, the Family Research Council, the tion of homosexual practices is sufficient Chalcedon Foundation, Americans for to place these intolerant Christians on Truth About Homosexuality, the late Jerry the SPLCs Hate Map and put them in Falwells Liberty Council, the Traditional the organizations so-called Intelligence Values Coalition, Catholic Family News, Report sandwiched between photos the Christian Action Network, and the Na- of hooded Klansmen burning crosses and goose-stepping neo-Nazis. And if a hotional Organization for Marriage. These and other similar groups are rou- mosexual somewhere is bullied, beaten, tinely pilloried as purveyors of hate, or killed, then you know who is responeven though no proof is offered that they sible. Most Christian leaders realize promote or incite hatred toward homosex- that the SPLCs demonizing campaign uals. Indeed, most of the groups cited ex- is intended as the softening-up prelude plicitly state that they love homosexuals to pushing for prosecution of pastors as individuals and pray for their conver- and preachers (and teachers, professors, sion and healing, as they do for all souls talk-show hosts, journalists, and employtrapped in what the Christian faith defines ers as well as ordinary citizens) for as sinful practices. Nevertheless, simply homophobia, under current and future opposing homosexuality and the legaliza- hate crime legislation.

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who insist on hewing to the same view as our nations Having been showered with adulatory Founders, that the people media coverage for decades and having be armed, are falsely categorized by Dees group as built up an obscenely huge endowment anti-government and ex(over $200 million), Dees and company tremist. Likewise the self-prohave grown supremely arrogant and claimed watchdogs claim appear to believe they can slander and that the widespread Tea Party groups are shot through defame with impunity. with rich veins of radical ideas, conspiracy theories an anti-hate Group that Hates widely and racism, a familiar meme echoed by The SPLC also has put the Second Amend- Nancy Pelosi, the Obama White House, ment in its crosshairs, attacking either di- and their many sympathetic acolytes in rectly or with their typical sandwich smear the mainstream media choir. technique, the National Rifle Association, However, in going after so many mainLarry Pratt and Gun Owners of America, stream groups that millions of Americans the late Idaho Rep. Helen Chenoweth, are affiliated with and that tens of milConservative Caucus and Constitution lions more agree with and identify with Party founder Howard Phillips, former the SPLC may have outstripped itself. HavArizona Sheriff Richard Mack, and other ing been showered with adulatory media constitutionalists who uphold the right coverage for decades and having built up of the people to keep and bear arms. The an obscenely huge endowment (over $200 SPLC prefers to interpret the Constitution million), Dees and company have grown to mean that the government shall have supremely arrogant and appear to believe a monopoly, or near monopoly, on fire- they can slander and defame with impunity. arms, which is a surefire prescription for The SPLCs atrocious actions have enNazi- or communist-style tyranny. Those ergized many on the political Right and have alienated even many of their erstwhile allies on the Left. Over the past several years this has prompted many who had previously given the SPLC a pass or had even applauded and supported them to start serious investigations of the organizations fundraising activities, their incessant, fear-mongering hype, and their radical, left-wing political agenda. The many investigative articles and studies that have appeared in Harpers, the Washington Times, Reason, the Nation, the Progressive, Human Events, Breitbart. com, World Net Daily, FrontPageMag. com, Middle American News, Vdare.com, and the Social Contract powerfully confirm the findings exposed by The New AmericAN in articles we have published on the Southern Poverty Law Center over the past two decades. Here are some of the serious charges that are amply substantiated by the SPLCs public record: The SPLCs Intelligence Report and its other publications grossly inflate the number of actual hate groups and hate crimes, while wildly exaggerating the threat from so-called right-wing groups. The SPLC engages in the promiscuous use of epithets such as hate group, extremist, racist, anti-government, and terrorist, and as a standard practice lumps completely law-abiding, non-racist groups with the violent KKK and neo-Nazis. The SPLC has raised hundreds of millions of dollars for the ostensible purpose of fighting hate and helping the poor and powerless, but in reality has stuffed its own coffers, building one of the largest investment portfolios of any NGO in the country. The SPLCs demonizing attacks are aimed not only at destroying the reputations and credibility of political and social conservatives, but actually criminalizing their beliefs and their expressions of those beliefs, as protected under the First Amendment. Utilizing its ties in the media and the Clinton administration, the SPLC developed a close relationship with the federal Justice Department and FBI, and has parlayed that relationship into ties with federal, state, and local police agencies. Its incendiary misrepresentations thus have the potential to cause some jittery and misinformed law-enforcement officers
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SPLc hitman: SPLC spokesman Mark Potok is regularly featured by the major media, who uncritically accept his smears of conservatives.
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to violate the rights of members of the groups targeted by the SPLC, or even to use unjustifiable deadly force. While straining to find even the most tenuous (and oftentimes nonexistent) connections between a targeted conservative organization or individual and some real or reputed member of a genuinely racist or violent group that it can exploit, the SPLC exercises no similar vigilance concerning its own affinity for actual leftist terrorists and communist revolutionaries.

Lauding the Left and its terrorists Concerning the last point above, the SPLCs unabashed promotion of unrepentant Weather Underground terrorist and self-proclaimed communist Bill Ayers should itself be sufficient to thoroughly discredit the organizations claims to concern over the dangers of terrorism. Although he had been largely forgotten by baby boomers and never heard of by Gen-Xers, revelations of President Obamas longtime association with Ayers and his equally notorious wife, Bernardine Dohrn, brought the Weather Underground couple back into the limelight again. Thanks to their connections with old comrades in radical academia, Ayers and Dohrn were able to walk from fugitive status as bombers on the FBIs most wanted list into sinecures as distinguished professors at prestigious universities. In his 2001 autobiographical Fugitive Days, published on the eve of the 9/11 terrorist attacks, Ayers says, I cant imagine entirely dismissing the possibility of setting off bombs once again. In a September 11, 2001 interview with the New York Times Ayers stated: I dont regret setting bombs. I feel we didnt do enough. Nevertheless, the SPLCs Teaching Tolerance website still proudly carries a glowing interview of Ayers by SPLC activist Gabrielle Lyon entitled, An Unconditional Embrace. Lyon writes admiringly:
Throughout his career as a civil rights organizer, radical anti-Vietnam War activist, teacher and author, Ayers has developed a rich vision of teaching that interweaves passion, responsibility and self-reflection. Ayers has taught in public schools and spearheaded alternative education projects.... As a professor of eduCall 1-800-727-TRUE to subscribe today!

King of hate: Attorney Morris Dees and the SPLC have amassed vast wealth and influence by exaggerating the size of the KKK/neo-Nazi threat and falsely labeling conservative organizations as hate groups.

cation at the University of Illinois at Chicago, he helps aspiring teachers recognize and tap the potential of every child. For Ayers, challenging stereotypes and reforming inner-city schools is as much about fighting for social justice as about improving the quality of teaching and learning. Naturally, Lyon asks not a single challenging, probing question of Professor Ayers that might cause him any angst. He is not questioned about his murderous Weather Underground bombing rampage that caused, for instance, the death of San Francisco police sergeant Brian V. McDonnell and the wounding of nine other officers. Nor was he asked about his involvement in the Weather Underground bombings of the U.S. Capitol, the New York Police Department, and the U.S. State Department in Washington, D.C., in the 1970s. Neither did SPLCs Lyon ask Ayers about his more recent visits to Venezuela and his relationship with that countrys Marxist dictator, Hugo Chavez, who was his host. Unfortunately for Dees and com-

pany, the Ayers promotional is not just a one-time website aberration but a symptom of the organizations overall far-left sympathies and agenda. Those sympathies and agenda are underscored by Dees and the SPLCs longtime ties to the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU). In addition to many SPLC staff members who also once served as ACLU staffers (including SPLC attorneys Katie Schwartzmann, Christine P. Sun, and Sam Wolfe), the ACLU and SPLC also team up together on lawsuits. Dees is a proud recipient of the ACLUs annual Roger N. Baldwin Award, named for the ACLUs co-founder and longtime executive director. Baldwin was one of the young Soviet Unions staunchest advocates and an ardent defender of Stalins dictatorship. He traveled to Stalinist Russia and wrote glowingly of it. William Z. Foster, Elizabeth Gurley Flynn, and Louis Budenz, all of whom served on the ACLUs original executive board with Baldwin, were actual top officials of the U.S. Communist Party. While Baldwin may not have been an official Party member, he was with them completely in spirit. Later in life he wrote:
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I am for socialism.... I seek social ownership of property, the abolition of the propertied class, and sole control by those who produce wealth. Communism is the goal.... I dont regret being part of the communist tactic. I knew what I was doing. I was not an innocent liberal. I wanted what the communists wanted and I traveled the United Front road to get it. Although for awhile during the 1940s and 50s the ACLU went through the pretense of expelling Communist Party members, many communists remained in the organization. Communist Party members Anne Braden and Frank Wilkinson were even awarded the same Baldwin medal as Dees, in 1989 and 1999, respectively. And the ACLU has remained wedded to the same militant atheism it inherited from the communists. Hence its incessant attacks on religion and all laws based on Christian morality, as, for instance, our laws against abortion and sodomy. The SPLC appears to be wedded to the very same atheist, anti-Christian agenda. Sitting on the SPLCs board of directors is James Rucker, the chairman of the board of ColorOfChange.org, a radical group Rucker co-founded with Van Jones. Yes, that Van Jones, the Obama Green Jobs Czar who was forced to resign after his extreme communist views and activities were exposed. In October 2005, Jones said he was a rowdy nationalist before the [Rodney] King verdict [in Los Angeles], but by August of that year [1992] I was a communist. Jones became a leader in STORM (Standing Together to Organize a Revolutionary Movement), an ultra-radical collective that declared its commitment to revolutionary democracy, revolutionary feminism, revolutionary internationalism, the central role of the working class, urban Marxism and Third World Communism. STORMs manifesto declares: We began with Marxist basics, laying a foundation on which to build.... We studied philosophy, Lenins theories of the state, revolution and the party, and the political ideas of [communist mass murderer] Mao Tse-tung and [communist theoretician] Antonio Gramsci.
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no enemies on the Left: SPLC director James Rucker is co-founder of ColorOfChange.org with self-described radical communist Van Jones (above).

Jones SPLC comrade James Rucker served as director of Grassroots Mobilization for the far-left, Soros-funded MoveOn.org Political Action, and MoveOn.org Civic Action. Much more could be written about the SPLCs hard-left connections. No mainstream journalist whom we are aware of has ever asked SPLCs Mark Potok to explain his chummy 2006 interview with the Socialist Workers Party, a Trotskyite communist terrorist group. (The interview has since been taken down from the SWPs website.) Perhaps it was set up for him by Chip Berlet, who frequently writes for SPLC. Berlet, who runs Political Research Associates in Somerville, Massachusetts, used to work for the Socialist Workers Party and was a staff member for the National Lawyers Guild, which was described in a U.S. congressional investigation as the foremost legal bulwark of the Communist Party, USA. He has also written for the communist Guardian newspaper of New York, and for the Institute for Policy Studies, a conduit for the Soviet KGB and the Cuban DGI.

Most importantly, as it relates to national security, extremism, and terrorism, Chip Berlet has been a key player, working closely over the past three decades with the top activists of the ACLU, the National Lawyers Guild, the Communist Party, and the Socialist Workers Party to abolish the House and Senate internal security subcommittees, the investigative committees of the state legislatures, and the intelligence agencies of all the major metropolitan police departments. They were successful in this subversive effort; most of these investigative agencies were dismantled and their intelligence files destroyed. Incredibly, now the SPLC pitches itself to law-enforcement leaders as their intelligence lifeline that can help them survive the ever-present threats from the radical Right. n

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Police Protection

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To Protect and to Serve The difficult job of law enforcement is being undermined by the dangerous trend toward nationalization and militarization of our police agencies.
by Charles Scaliger

o extended society has ever existed without some form of law enforcement. However, it is important to understand that there are two very different approaches to maintaining public order. One of them envisions the police, or whatever the law-enforcement apparatus is called, as public servants, whose job is to protect the public against violent and fraudulent criminal elements that exist in every society. This mindset recognizes that the public must also sometimes protect themselves, since a police force limited to public service by definition cannot be everywhere at once. It also contemplates strict limits on police powers, such as those embodied in civil protections against arbitrary searches and seizures and in the hallowed right of habeas corpus. Where law enforcement exceeds its carefully defined and limited powers, it is held responsible, and officers guilty of abuse of power are subject to punishment like any other lawbreakers. This view of policing is embodied in the
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motto To protect and to serve, coined by the Los Angeles Police Department in 1955, and now used by many other police departments as well.

the Police and Power In a free society, the ordinary citizen sees the police officer as a respected and trusted public servant and his presence is welcome. The other, and withal, more prevalent view of law enforcement throughout history is that its primary function is to protect the class that wields political power. This class may be a monarchic dynasty, as in Rome under the Caesars; a tribe, as in Gadhafis Libya; or a gang of ideologues, as in the former Soviet Union and modern Communist China and Cuba. Call them what you will frumentarii, mukhabarat, KGB, Gestapo, or secret police the function of police forces charged with protecting such regimes from their own citizens is the same: to ensure the maintenance of power by terror and brute force. Their methods vary little from age to age, depending as they do upon their willingness to use violence to stifle dissent and to

spy upon the public to identify and keep tabs on enemies of the regime, both real and imagined. They are implacably hostile to the private ownership of weapons; so absolute was the power of the secret police in despotic Venice in the final years of its independence that the possession of a weapon was punishable by death. And secret police by any name are conditioned, in exchange for impunity for their actions, to close ranks around the regime they protect. Thus did the secret police of Ceaucescus Romania reveal true priorities when it engaged in wholesale slaughter of peaceful demonstrators in an attempt to terrorize its citizenries into submission. While recent incidents of police abuse many of which have been caught on video and posted on the Internet may make it rhetorically tempting to liken American police to the Gestapos and frumentarii of other times and places, Americas law enforcement has a long way to go before meriting any such comparisons. Most of the officers and deputies of Americas local police agencies, no doubt, still view seriously their duty to protect and to
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My father, amused that they had gone to such lengths to issue a $20 speeding ticket, mailed off a check. The whole episode seemed unreal, since America in the 1970s made no use of hidden traffic cameras or checkpoints. Such were then regarded as the trappings of societies much less free than our own, where governments did not trust their own citizens. Over the years, I have encountered military police in many countries, from Argentina to Sri Lanka, and have grown accustomed when abroad to the indignities of checkpoints and oddly dressed men on street corners with military-style weapons. But of far greater concern is that most of the activities of military police that were once so foreign have become familiar and even accepted in much of the United States. Checkpoints, where motorists are frequently hassled and questioned without cause, are routine in many areas of our country, and traffic cameras snapping pictures and recording the speed of every passing car are prevalent in many urban areas. The courteous neighborhood policeman helping a would-be runaway in Norman Rockwells classic painting has given way in some precincts to officers seemingly schooled in thuggish, adversarial behavior, for whom foul language and the gratuitous use of physical violence are habitual (as any YouTube user can easily verify). The behavior is not ubiquitous, but it is alarmingly common.

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Big Brother is watching you: Surveillance cameras, like these in New Yorks Times Square, have become ubiquitous, moving us toward the totalitarian society depicted in George Orwells 1984.

serve their fellow citizens and hold sacred their oath to uphold the Constitution. But it is fatuous to dismiss the very real and very dangerous direction in which American law enforcement is headed. It is not so much the transformation of Americas police forces into a full-blown Gestapo that is of immediate concern; rather, it is the more realistic fear that their objective is no longer civilian protection. Many countries of the world, while far from the fullblown tyrannies of Caligula, Hitler, and Stalin, nevertheless make use of a style of militarized law enforcement intermediate between servants of the people and protectors of the regime. The hallmarks of such military police include the surveillance camera, the checkpoint, and the use of some extreme measures with impunity detention and occasional torture without charge, and excessive willingness to resort to lethal force in adversarial circumstances while not generally resorting to the systematic terror tactics of true secret police. The usual justification for such police is an extraordinary internal threat like an insurgency or active terrorist network. Military police tend to be corruptible and to favor the rich and well-connected over the poor. Such are the Guardia Civil in Spain, the Carabinieri of Italy, and the Federales of Mexico, among many others. I remember well my first encounter
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with militarized police. As a teenage boy in the late 70s, I traveled to Spain with my family on vacation for a few weeks. I noticed then the ubiquity of Spains military police, the Guardia Civil, with their distinctive tricornered hats and automatic weapons. During the dictatorship of Franco, the Guardia Civil had been used to ferret out enemies of the regime, and had acquired a rather formidable reputation. Their officers were frequently targeted by Basque separatist terrorists, who correctly perceived them as an arm of the Spanish military. A large part of their resources over the last several decades has been dedicated to antiterrorist activities. The Guardia Civil have also served alongside Spanish military units in military deployments overseas, including a number of UN peacekeeping missions. I knew none of this 33 years ago. But I was surprised, along with the rest of my family, when my father received in the mail, some six months after our return from Spain, a traffic citation from the Guardia Civil. Despite the fact that we had been American tourists driving a car rented in Paris, the Guardia had somehow identified my father and, despite grotesquely misspelling both his name and address, had succeeded in issuing a fine. From the citation, we gathered that a hidden camera had snapped a photo of our license plate.

the Path away from Protection What is changing the behavior of our police forces? In a word, federalization. Because of the longstanding War on Drugs, as well as the more recently launched War on Terror, local police have been dragooned into collaborating with federal law enforcement, including the quasi-military Transportation Security Administration (TSA) charged with airport security in the post 9/11 world. Such cooperation, it need hardly be said, has nothing to do with enforcing speed limits or investigating petty delinquency. Instead, especially since the latter part of the last decade, local police are being drawn particularly into the TSAs campaign of surveillance and intimidation of the American public, in the name of ferreting out terrorists. The TSAs Visible Intermodal Prevention and Response (VIPR) program, for example,
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has involved state and local law enforcement in massive security sweeps conducted along military lines, and displaying the same indifference toward civil rights and personal dignity shown by the TSAs airport security personnel. In April of this year, for example, a team of TSA officers, attired and armed like SWAT personnel, swept into the Greyhound bus station in Tampa, Florida, and began subjecting bus passengers to the same indignities perpetrated against air travelers. Accompanying the TSA operatives were federal, state, and local law-enforcement officials, as well as federal government bureaucrats. This motley swarm conducted intrusive patdowns on unhappy passengers and warrantless searches of their luggage, with the help of canine sniffers. According to TSA chief John Pistole, speaking to a Senate committee in June, the TSA conducted roughly 8,000 such sweeps across the country last year alone, and more is coming. Also in June, the TSA, in cahoots with state and local law enforcement, led an unprecedented threestate security sweep involving reconnaissance aircraft and Blackhawk helicopters, in a VIPR tour de force covering 5,000 square miles. John Pistole, never one to shy from controversy, has made public his intention to take the TSA to the next level and build it into a national security, counterterrorism organization, fully integrated into U.S. government efforts. The consequences of drawing local law enforcement into matters of alleged national security are plain enough. More and more local police are acting like agents of the federal government, and are willing to use tactics favored by military and counterinsurgency units for matters of local law enforcement. The vision of John Pistole and the rest of the TSA/Homeland Security crowd was articulated, perhaps unintentionally, by Senator Barack Obama during his run for the presidency. We cannot continue to rely only on our military in order to achieve the national security objectives that weve set, Obama told an audience of enthusiastic supporters on July 2, 2008, in Colorado Springs. Weve got to have a civilian national security force thats just as powerful, just as strong, just as well-funded. Obama made these unscripted comCall 1-800-727-TRUE to subscribe today!

ments in the midst of a series of proposals to grow everyMany countries of the world, while far thing from the Peace Corps from the full-blown tyrannies of Caligula, and USA Freedom Corps to employment and benefits for Hitler, and Stalin, nevertheless make use veterans, so it is not entirely of a style of militarized law enforcement clear what he may have had in mind. But it is difficult intermediate between servants of the to escape the inference that people and protectors of the regime. he meant essentially what he said, namely, that Amera range of tasks such as crowd and ica needs a military-style national police riot control, special weapons and force. And part of this vision, if the betactics (SWAT), and investigations of havior of the TSA is any guide, involves organized criminal groups. In its abilmilitarizing existing state and local police ity to operate in stability operations, forces in the name of combating terrorism. it is similar to such European forces A series of studies by the Rand Coras the Italian Carabinieri and French poration for the United States Army over Gendarmeri. the past several years suggests that federal policymakers intend to accelerate the nationalization and militarization of our po- Indeed, the Rand authors are highly posilice forces. One 2009 Rand study, A Sta- tive toward the model exemplified by the bility Police Force for the United States, European Gendarmerie, the new transnacontemplates greatly expanding either the tional SPF formed by several countries of U.S. Marshals Service or the Military Po- the European Union in 2006. Although the lice of our Armed Services. According to SPF proposed for the United States is, ostensibly, to be used primarily overseas, to the Rand study: stabilize those countries where U.S. military forces are engaged in nation-building An SPF [Stability Police Force] is a operations, the study also focuses on high-end police force that engages in

Sheriff richard mack: The founders of our nation were afraid of one thing more than any other ... government having too much power!
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to all the objects which, in the ordinary course of affairs, Military police tend to be corruptible and concern the lives, liberties, to favor the rich and well-connected over and properties of the people, and the internal order, imthe poor. Such are the Guardia Civil in provement, and prosperity of Spain, the Carabinieri of Italy, and the the State. In the minds of Madison Federales of Mexico, among many others. and the other Founders, the police powers were preemithe possible uses of the SPF for HLS nent among those reserved powers that (Homeland Security) operations within were to remain the closely guarded dothe United States. To this end, it proposes main of the states and local governments. Richard Mack, the former sheriff of ways in which various SPF options may be exercised by evading the restrictions on Graham County, Arizona, and the founder the use of military forces for policing im- of the Constitutional Sheriffs and Peace posed by our federal Posse Comitatus Act. Officers Association, is one of many law The Rand authors also speak of the need enforcement officers who share this view to fix the U.S. Constitutions limitations with the Founders and see the trend toward on federal policing powers. A Stability Po- nationalization of our police as a grave danger. Sheriff Mack, together with Sheriff Jay lice Force for the United States notes: Printz of Montana, won the historic 1997 Supreme Court case against the Clinton In the United States, policing funcadministration and the notorious Brady tions are generally carried out at the gun control bill. The founders of our nastate and local levels, with only limittion were afraid of one thing more than ed law enforcement powers granted to any other ... government having too much the federal government. For example, power! says Sheriff Mack. Which is why agencies such as the Federal Bureau he is working with other law enforcement of Investigation (FBI) and the Drug officers to keep police control local and Enforcement Administration (DEA) reverse the trend toward nationalization. investigate suspected violations of Although Hitlers Gestapo and S.S. are federal law and lack jurisdiction over state and local matters. Limits to federal power are constitutionally rooted in the Tenth Amendment and have been recognized, especially in the policing arena, since the earliest days of the country. The cost of not fixing this gap is significant, say the Rand authors. But what they see as a gap that needs fixing is the very heart of the checks and balances in our system of federalism that our Founders intended as a bulwark against the dangers of tyranny, which naturally flow from the centralization and concentration of governmental powers. In the Federalist, No. 45, James Madison underscored a fundamental premise of our constitutional system: The powers delegated by the proposed Constitution to the Federal Government are few and defined. Those which are to remain in the State governments are numerous and indefinite. Madison went on to say: The powers reserved to the several States will extend
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automatically associated with terror, tyranny, and oppression, too few Americans realize that the road to empowerment of those infamous police agencies was ominously similar to the path our nation has been taking. In The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich, historian William L. Shirer traces the fateful path that led to Germanys fatal embrace of the centralized Nazi state. A series of laws decreed between 1933 and 1935, he notes, deprived the municipalities of their local autonomy, and brought them under the direct control of the Reich Minister of the Interior. Nationalizing the local police departments was the next critical step. Shirer writes: On June 16, 1936, for the first time in German history, a unified police was established for the whole of the Reich previously the police had been organized separately by each of the states and [Heinrich] Himmler was put in charge as Chief of the German Police. This was tantamount to putting the police in the hands of the S.S., which since its suppression of the Roehm revolt in 1934 had been rapidly increasing its power. It had become not only the praeto-

Heavily armed members of the Metropolitan Transit Authority patrol Grand Central Station in New York during a morning rush hour drill. Federal TSA police have conducted thousands of similar drill raids at bus and train stations.
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rian guard, not only the single armed branch of the party, not only the elite from whose ranks the future leaders of the new Germany were being chosen, but it now possessed the police power. The Third Reich, as is inevitable in the development of all totalitarian dictatorships, had become a police state. Since the terror attacks of September 11, 2001, our federal government has assumed vast new police powers and hired tens of thousands of new federal police officers. With more than 200,000 employees, the recently formed Department of Homeland Security (DHS) is already well on the way to becoming, in President Obamas words, a civilian national security force thats just as powerful, just as strong, just as well-funded as the military. In addition, the federal Department of Justice (DOJ) and DHS have greatly expanded and accelerated the already dangerous trend under way for several decades of co-opting local police departments through federal grants for equipment (police cruisers, motorcycles, helicopters, armored vehicles, bullet-proof vests, computers, etc.), training, hiring additional personnel, traffic safety, emergency preparedness, overtime pay support, and other supposed necessities. Of course, the fact that the federal government is already broke and hopelessly in debt has not stopped the politicians and bureaucrats in Washington from escalating this false largesse; they simply have the Federal Reserve print up more money, something the states and local governments cannot do. Unfortunately, state, county, and city politicians and chief lawenforcement officers all too often find the lure of free federal money to be irresistible.

Governmental Affairs in September 2009, DHS Secretary Janet Napolitano spoke of the Obama administrations ambitious plans to expand the number and scope of fusion centers, which at the time of her testimony already stood at 72 centers nationwide. DHS has already demonstrated the dangers inherent to this baleful centralizing trend in American law enforcement. In the months prior to Secretary Napolitanos testimony, DHS and I&A had issued a hyper-alarmist report to law-enforcement agencies entitled Rightwing Extremism that smeared military veterans, pro-life activists, gun-rights advocates, and political conservatives and constitutionalists as dangerous extremists closely akin to terrorists. A similarly hysterical report distributed by the federal-state fusion center in Missouri, entitled The Modern Militia Movement, went even further, warning police agencies that they are being targeted and the inference is that they are being targeted for violence by supporters of presidential candidate Ron Paul and people who are opposed to the United Nations and the Federal Reserve. These and similar incidents are ominous signs that the growing federal police powers are already being used as weapons against political opponents. Incidents such as these not only endanger the citizens who may be subjected to unwarranted harassment (and even lethal force) by misinformed and jumpy police officers, but they also endanger the law enforcement officers by promoting situations that may lead to violent confrontation and creating an adversarial attitude and wall of distrust between officer and citizen. These indicators should cause every lover of liberty to demand a screeching halt to this mad rush

toward a nationalized police force. As long as America remains in the thrall of an open-ended War on Terror, the temptation will persist to continue federalizing (and, as a consequence, militarizing) our local police. Our oncetrusted local police are gradually morphing into a force more to be feared and avoided. And should the campaign to militarize our local police succeed, we may then anticipate even worse developments, chief among them the creation of a bona fide secret police to secure the interests of a regime altogether hostile to the people it once purported to serve. The corruption and militarization of Americas police is not a trend to be taken lightly. While there is undeniably some need for specially trained units to deal with extraordinary circumstances, like a terrorist attack or a hostage situation, Americans must insist that their local police remain local and faithful to the twin goals of protection and service that prompted their creation in the first place. n

POLICE
LAW

ORDER

LO CAL

POLIC

And Keep Them IndependenT!

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the Politics of federalized Policing One of the proliferating federal programs that has already bared some alarming fangs is the federal-state-local police operations known as fusion centers. In her testimony to the Senate Committee on Homeland Security and
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POLICE
LAW

SuppORt YOuR

ORDER

LOCaL pOLICE
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LO CAL POLICE

And Keep Them IndependenT!

to Protect and to Serve: The John Birch Society launched its Support Your Local Police and Keep Them Independent! campaign almost 50 years ago to head off the trend toward a nationalized police force and maintain our constitutional checks and balances on police power.
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Watched Now more than Ever

Big Government has gone on a growth spurt since 9/11, especially in the area of security agencies, which are so numerous that its likely no one knows what theyre doing.

significant but largely unreported relationship between the CIA and local law enforcement in a partnership that has blurred the line between foreign and domestic spying.

david cohen, left, NYPD Deputy Commissioner for Intelligence, is seen here with, Mayor Michael Bloomberg, Police Commissioner Raymond Kelly, and Manhattan District Attorney Cy Vance, and a display of weapons captured from alleged terrorists. by Jack Kenny

building superintendent in New Brunswick, New Jersey, opened an apartment door and was startled to find terrorist literature strewn about on a table and a computer and surveillance equipment in the next room. He immediately called 911, and police and FBI agents rushed to the apartment, arriving in time to meet its mysterious occupants a secret team of intelligence officers from the New York City Police Department. From that apartment, about an hour outside the departments jurisdiction,
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the NYPD had been staging undercover operations and conducting surveillance throughout New Jersey, the Associated Press reported. Neither the FBI nor the local police had any idea. Like much of what has taken place in law enforcement in the past decade, the roving jurisdiction of the New York police is related, however tenuously, to the global war on terror. And though the departments presence in New Brunswick was unknown to local police and the FBI, it was probably no surprise to the nations Central Intelligence Agency. The APs recent investigative report describes the

cia in the city David Cohen, a former head of operations at the CIA and a 35-year veteran of the agency, came to New York in January 2002, just a few months after the 9/11 attacks, to become the police departments first civilian intelligence chief. Since then at least two veteran operatives from the agency have been assigned to work for the New York police, while remaining on the CIA payroll. The police have also had a detective trained at the Farm, the agencys spy school in Virginia. Though the CIA is forbidden by law to engage in domestic spying, it seems likely that some of the information obtained by Cohens intelligence unit finds its way to agency headquarters in Langley, Virginia, if only by informal conversations and unofficial channels. The wall between foreign and domestic operations, intended to protect Americans from overly inquisitive agents of their own government, can easily be breached. Its like starting the CIA over in the post-9/11 world, Cohen wrote in Securing the City, a 2009 book about the NYPD. What would you do if you could begin it all over again? Hah. This is what you would do. This includes dispatching undercover officers, called rakers, into predominantly Muslim neighborhoods to go raking the coals and looking for hot spots by observing residents at bookstores, Internet cafes, nightclubs, and other gathering places. It includes attending mosques to monitor sermons and compiling analytical reports on every mosque with 100 miles. Police have asked the Taxi Commission for reports on every Pakistani driver, looking for evidence of fraud in the license application or other wrongdoing that could be used to pressure a driver to cooperate in police investigations. While FBI rules require some evidence of criminal activity before an investigation is launched, Cohen pushed for greater latitude for the citys
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intelligence officers. In the case of terrorism, to wait for an indication of crime before investigating is to wait far too long, he wrote in successfully petitioning a U.S. District Court judge in New York for more lenient rules governing surveillance operations by city police. Cohen has also taken greater latitude geographically, with undercover officers operating in Pennsylvania and Massachusetts as well as New Jersey. Anything connected to a potential terrorist attack on New York is a target for surveillance anywhere. Cohen has stationed 11 of his officers in foreign cities. A terrorist attack in Jerusalem brings the NYPD rushing to the scene, Mordecai Dziakinsky, who worked for the department as an intelligence officer in Israel, told the AP. I was there to ask the New York question, he said. Why this location? Was there something unique that the bomber had done? Was there any pre-notification. Was there a security lapse? Even when operating on its own turf, Cohens unit crosses constitutional boundaries protecting freedoms of speech and assembly, raising questions over how proactive police may be in attempting to prevent civil disturbances from occurring. The intelligence unit infiltrated antiwar groups prior to the 2004 Republican National Convention in New York. During the convention police used mobile blockades to keep demonstrators out of sight and hearing of the President, Vice President, and other VIPs. Protesters who were arrested were, according to court records, asked questions such as: What are your political affiliations? Do you do any kind of political work? and Do you hate George W. Bush? As extensive and expensive as these operations are, the New York City Council exercises little to no oversight over a unit that last year had a $62 million budget. The city comptrollers office has audited other units within the NYPD since 9/11, but not the intelligence unit. Nor is there oversight from the federal government, despite all the federal money directed to the nations largest police force. Homeland Security officials review NYPD grants but not its underlying programs, the AP reported. Oversight is also missing from the federal governments surveillance operations,
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an enterprise so vast that perhaps no real ongoing overAnalysts who study documents and sight is possible. Not only conversations obtained by both foreign have the dossiers the government keeps on the American and domestic spying write 50,000 people grown, but the numintelligence reports a year, including ber of agencies and government officials employed in many that are routinely ignored. surveillance operations is beyond calculation, according to a 2010 investigative report appear- tions across the United States, they found. ing in the Washington Post. Analysts who study documents and conversations obtained by both foreign and domestic spying write 50,000 intelligence will the wondering never cease? The top-secret world the government reports a year, including many that are created in response to the terrorist attacks routinely ignored. An estimated 854,000 of Sept. 11, 2001, has become so large, people, nearly 1.5 times as many people as so unwieldy and so secretive that no one live in Washington, D.C., hold top-secret knows how much money it costs, how security clearances, the report said. And many people it employs, how many pro- there appears to be plenty of work for grams exist within it or exactly how many them to do. Every day, collection systems agencies do the same work, wrote Pulit- at the National Security Agency intercept zer Prize-winning reporter Dana Priest and and store 1.7 billion e-mails, phone calls author and military expert William Arkin and other types of communication, Priest in a report called Top Secret America. and Arkin reported. When the USA Patriot Act was reTheir two-year investigation led them to conclude: After nine years of unprec- newed in May, U.S. Senators Ron Wyden edented spending and growth, the result (D-Ore.) and Mark Udall (D-Colo.) sent a is that the system put in place to keep the letter to Director of National Intelligence United States safe is so massive that its (DNI) James R. Clapper, who oversees 16 effectiveness is impossible to determine. spy agencies, including the National SeSome 1,271 government organiza- curity Agency and the CIA. The Senators tions and 1,931 private companies work inquired about legal safeguards to protect on counterterrorism, homeland security, the privacy of the electronic communicaand intelligence in about 10,000 loca- tions of law-abiding Americans. A letter of

cia headquarters in Langley, Virginia, is seen in this aerial photo. The company had at least two of its agents working full time for the New York Police Department while remaining on the CIA payroll.
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Law
camera to a telephone pole across from his house. As extensive and expensive as these Its just a big farce that operations are, the New York City Council the governments created such paper tigers, Crow exercises little to no oversight over a unit told the Times. Al Qaeda that last year had a $62 million budget. and real terrorists are hard to find. Were easy to find. The city comptrollers office has audited Well, not necessarily. other units within the NYPD since 9/11, but Chances are most Americans wouldnt know where to find not the intelligence unit. a vegan potluck supper. But the FBI does. Months before reply from Kathleen Turner, DNI Director delegates would gather in St. Paul, Minof Legislative Affairs, informed the Sena- nesota, for the 2008 Republican National tors that it is not reasonably possible to Convention, the FBI was looking to recruit identify the number of people located in moles to attend vegan potlucks in the the United States whose communications Twin Cities area and report on any plans to disrupt the convention, according to the may have been reviewed. The numbers may be beyond calculating, Minneapolis weekly City Pages. The projbut a single case may demonstrate some- ect was one of the activities undertaken thing of the extent to which the federal by the FBIs Joint Terrorism Task Force, a government has broadened the scope of its partnership uniting federal agencies with investigations into the lives of the American state and local law enforcement. Federal investigators keep their wellpeople. Scott Crow, 44, of Austin, Texas, is a self-described anarchist and a frequent organizer and participant in anti-corporate demonstrations. Though he has been arrested dozens of times, he has never been convicted of anything more serious than trespassing, the New York Times reported. Yet John Dillinger himself might have been jealous of the amount of attention Crow has received from the nations top criminal investigation agency. Through a Freedom of Information Act request, Crow obtained a copy of his FBI file and found it was 440 pages long, with much of it heavily redacted. The agency apparently spared no effort in watching over Crow. Agents watched his home from cars parked across the street. They went through his trash and identified his bank and mortgage companies. They tracked his phone calls and e-mails and visited gun stores where he shopped for a rifle. They asked the IRS to examine his tax returns. They infiltrated meetings Crow attended with other political activists. For added security and 24-hour coverage, they attached a video
an nyPd surveillance camera (upper left) keeps watch at a Brooklyn mosque. Police used undercover agents and informants to watch places where Muslims gather and produced intelligence reports on every mosque within 100 miles of the city.
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trained eyes on meat-eaters as well, especially those who shop for military surplus equipment. A flyer headlined Communities Against Terrorism and bearing the letterheads of the FBI and the Bureau of Justice Assistance was circulated among storeowners in the Denver, Colorado, area earlier this year warning of Potential Indicators of Terrorist Activities Related to Military Surplus Stores. Under the heading, What should I consider suspicious? is a list that includes bulk purchases of high-capacity magazines and bipods or tripods for rifles, gas masks, meals ready to eat, weatherproofed ammunition or match containers, night vision devices, and night flashlights. (Day flashlights are apparently not an indicator of terrorist activities.) But the list doesnt end there. In fact, it begins with, People or groups who: Provide identification that is inconsistent suspect or demands identity privacy and goes on to warn of those who Insist on paying with cash or uses credit card(s) in different names. The watchful storeowner

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or clerk should also be on the lookout for anyone who significantly alters appearance from visit to visit (shaving beard, changing hair color, style of dress, etc.). So someone who has shaved his beard and changed his clothes and wishes to pay with cash has given three indicators of terrorist activities. The alert citizen should also keep his or her ears open for racist or extreme statements coupled with comments that are violent or appear to condone violence or suspicious comments regarding anti-U.S. radical theology, vague or cryptic warnings that suggest or endorse the use of violence in support of a cause. And a customer who doesnt offer any vague or cryptic warnings might be drawn out with a little questioning. Talk to the customer, ask questions and listen to and observe the responses, is one of the suggestions under What Should I Do? Watch for people and actions that are out of place. Make note of suspicious statements, people and/or vehicles. If something seems wrong notify law enforcement authorities. But categories of suspicious activities are remarkably flexible. A 2009 report from the Department of Homeland Security on Right-Wing Extremism warned of hate-oriented people and organizations that are mainly anti-government, rejecting federal authority in favor of state or local authority [Janet Napolitano, meet Thomas Jefferson] or rejecting government authority entirely (like the infamous terrorist Henry David Thoreau). Rightwing extremism may include groups and individuals that are dedicated to a single issue, such as opposition to abortion or immigration.

are you a terrorist suspect? Do you engage in suspicious activities? How about insisting on paying in cash? Thats one of the suspicious activities listed in a BJA/FBI flyer entitled Communities Against Terrorism (left). A Department of Homeland Security assessment (right) warns that rightwing extremism may include groups and individuals that are dedicated to a single issue, such as opposition to abortion or immigration.

dont Bother Big Brother While the government that theoretically works for us is spending untold dollars and manpower watching over us, our ability to watch over our government is severely limited. What the government is doing in our name, both here and around the world, is so secret that a judge who recently sentenced a defendant to prison for leaking a classified document to a blogger had no idea what the man had stolen. All I know is that its a serious case, Judge Alexander Williams, Jr. of the United States District Court in Maryland said when he sentenced FBI translator Shamai
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K. Leibowitz to 20 months in prison. I dont know what was divulged other than some documents, and how it compromised things, I have no idea. Leibowitz, a Hebrew translator, passed on classified transcripts of conversations picked up by FBI wiretaps of the Israeli embassy in Washington, the recipient, a blogger named Richard Silverstein, told the New York Times. Far more damaging and embarrassing to officials in Washington are the more than 260,000 diplomatic cables, 90,000 intelligence reports, and a video of a helicopter attack in Iraq that Private First Class Bradley Manning, an Army intelligence analyst, allegedly copied and released. Much of it went to WikiLeaks, a website dedicated to exposing government secrets. Manning was arrested after the video of the helicopter attack in Baghdad was published by WikiLeaks and reappeared on numerous websites under the title Collateral Murder. Two children were injured in the shooting and several adults, including two Reuters journalists, were killed. The U.S. military said the firing occurred after a gun battle between insurgents and U.S. and Iraqi security forces. Manning faces numerous charges relating to theft of public records, transmitting defense information, and computer fraud. He has also been charged with aiding the enemy. The charge

sheet did not say what enemy in which undeclared war Manning is accused of aiding, and it is not clear whether it refers to WikiLeaks or insurgents in Iraq or Afghanistan. Though aiding the enemy could be a capital offense, military prosecutors have said they will not seek the death penalty. Manning likely faces life in prison if convicted. He was held in solitary confinement at a Marine Corps brig in Quantico, Virginia, from June of 2010 until April of this year, when he was transferred to a medium-security prison at Fort Leavenworth, Kansas. A date for his court-martial has not been set. Recalling Mannings 10 months of pre-trial solitary confinement, secret CIA overseas prisons, torture of suspected terrorists, and other government abuses, civil rights lawyer and Salon.com columnist Glenn Greenwald offered the following observation: The objective to all this behavior is to send a message to anyone who would dare impede the will of the United States government or to prospective would-be whistleblowers who would discover corruption, deceit and illegality and think about exposing it to the world that there are no limits to what we can do to you and what we will do to you if you try and impede us in any meaningful way.... What this climate of fear really does
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is change the relationship between the populace and the government. Its a campaign of intimidation of thuggish intimidation to create this climate of fear. And its worked. What this climate of fear really does is change the relationship between the populace and the government. Because when the population fears the government fear grounded in the knowledge that this government can transgress any limits without consequence its no longer necessary to take away rights formally. Joan Airoldi, director of the library district in Whatcom County, Washington, reached a similar conclusion in an op-ed piece in USA Today, in which she recalled a 2004 subpoena served by the FBI at one of the library branches, demanding a list of all the people who had borrowed a biography of Osama bin Laden since November 2001. After the trustees voted unanimously to go to court to quash the indictment, the FBI withdrew the request. Under the Patriot Act, however, the agency could have gone to the secret Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court, which meets in secret in a federal courthouse in Washington, D.C., and obtained, unchallenged, a warrant demanding the records. If the government can easily obtain records of the books that our patrons are borrowing, they will not feel free to request the books they want, Airoldi wrote. Who would check out a biography of bin Laden knowing that this might attract the attention of the FBI? The attention of the FBI and other agencies of the nations security apparatus is attracted to a great many things, including some that have a doubtful connection to any real security threat. The Department of Homeland Security, libertarian author and TV host John Stossel wrote in a recent column, spent billions on things like special boats to protect a lake in Nebraska, all-terrain vehicles for a small town in Tennessee and 70 security cameras for a remote village in Alaska. The color-coded alerts are gone, but in the decade since September 11, 2001, the governments message has been consistent, Stossel noted: Give us more money and power. And we do. When will we learn? n
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The Rights of

accused terrorists

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George W. Bushs and Barack Obamas treatment of accused terrorists in the War on Terror has often fallen outside constitutional boundaries and thats bad for Americans.
by Thomas R. Eddlem

residents Bush and Obama have created a vigorous public debate since the September 11 attacks over whether suspects in the war on terror are entitled to a regular criminal trial, court-martial (the regular military justice system), or a military commission trial, or whether they are entitled to a trial at all. A military commission is traditionally an executive branch (or Article II) court, created to try war criminals in a time and place where there are no criminal or ordinary military courts to try suspects. But Congress has explicitly authorized them twice since the September 11 attacks. Bushs and Obamas actions since 2001 raise a number of fundamental constitu-

tional questions: Can the President as Bush tried to do detain an American citizen indefinitely without trial? Can the President as Obama claims kill American citizens without trial? Are Bushs and Obamas efforts to detain foreigners indefinitely without trial constitutional? When, if ever, is a military commission constitutional? Can U.S. citizens be subject to a military commission? How about foreigners? Do the Bush/Obama military commissions follow the Constitution? And finally, putting aside constitutional principles, are military commissions more effective on a practical level in punishing suspected terrorists? The following are 11 constitutional principles about the trial rights of Americans and foreigners during the war on terror.
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1. The U.S. Constitution, laws, and treaties signed by the United States guarantee everyone even foreign terror suspects detained abroad a trial. The Bush administration argued in the 2004 Supreme Court case Rasul v. Bush that foreigners detained abroad have no right to a hearing and can be detained indefinitely without any trial whatsoever. The claim goes against the traditional Anglo-American tradition of habeas corpus, which says that no one may be detained without a court hearing justifying the detention. The Bush administration argued that U.S. courts lack jurisdiction over [habeas corpus] claims. But the Supreme Court ruled against the Bush administration, 6-3, in the Rasul decision, granting Rasul habeas corpus relief and a trial. And the Supreme Court was not exercising judicial activism; rather, it was following the clear dictates of the law. The Fifth and Sixth Amendments to the U.S. Constitution explicitly require a trial and full due process for any person the government arrests. The Fifth Amendment reads, No person 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. The Sixth Amendment defines due process as follows: In all criminal prosecutions, the accused shall enjoy the right to a speedy and public trial, by an impartial jury of the State and district wherein the crime shall have been committed, which district shall have been previously ascertained by law, and to be informed of the nature and cause of the accusation; to be confronted with the witnesses against him; to have compulsory process for obtaining witnesses in his favor, and to have the Assistance of Counsel for his defence. In short, while the Fifth and Sixth Amendments do not explicitly require a detainee to be read his rights (i.e., Miranda rights, which the Supreme Court invented in the 1960s as an add-on to the Fifth Amendment), all detainees are still persons within the meaning of the
Guantanamo, the worst of the worst? Bush administration officials first said that Guantanamo detainees should never be tried, then that they should be tried by military commission. But they released a majority without charges.
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amendments and are entitled to all the due-process rights Criminal suspects of any kind, foreign or of American defendants. citizen, are not given trials as a gift for The U.S. government is also a signatory of treaties something they merit. If they are guilty, that guarantee that foreign they never earned them, and if they are military fighters be given a trial. Article 43 of the Fourth innocent, they should never have been Geneva Convention (1949), arrested. The purpose of trials is to sort of which the United States is a signatory, bans the passthe guilty from the innocent. ing of sentences and the carrying out of executions without previous judgment pronounced of the Africans had come ashore on Long by a regularly constituted court, afford- Island to buy food, American sailors sailed ing all the judicial guarantees which are out to the ship and seized it. In the Amisrecognized as indispensable by civilized tad case, the Spanish government argued that foreigners captured in international peoples. The U.S. government is bound to re- waters (though in U.S. custody) have no spect the Geneva Conventions under Ar- rights in U.S. courts. The Spanish Minister ticle VI of the Constitution, which guaran- to the United States, Chevalier dArgaiz, tees, This Constitution, and the Laws of argued: They are morally and legally not the United States which shall be made in in the United States.... They are under the Pursuance thereof; and all Treaties made, cover of the Spanish flag; and, in that case, or which shall be made, under the Author- they are physically under the protection ity of the United States, shall be the su- of a friendly government, but morally and legally out of the territory and jurisdicpreme Law of the Land. The rights of foreigners abroad to trial tion of the United States; and, so long as a in U.S. courts was most clearly established doubt remains on this subject, no judge can by the Supreme Court in the 1841 Amistad admit the complaint. The slaves-turnedcase. In the Amistad case, a number of Af- liberators of the Amistad were charged ricans who had been kidnapped in Africa with piracy on the high seas and threatenand traded to Spanish sailors revolted, tak- ing a massive slave rebellion across the ing over the ship La Amistad. They drifted hemisphere, a contemporary equivalent to near U.S. waters after the revolt. After some modern terrorism. The court ruled that the

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our soil. I dont want them in our prisons. I want them Prisoners of war are deemed not to have there. Some people have said committed any moral offenses; i.e., we ought to close Guantanamo. My view is we ought to they are not criminals. POWs are simply double Guantanamo. presumed to be people who are patriotic More recently, in an August 11, 2011 presidential citizens of the country they were born debate, Representative Miin (or emigrated to). In short, they are chele Bachmann (R-Minn.) suggested that military tribupresumed to be innocent of wrongdoing. nals would be better for terror suspects: Terrorists who slaves had a right to a trial and that there is commit acts against United States citizens, no pretence to say the negroes of the Amis- people who come from foreign countries tad are pirates and robbers; as they were to do that, do not have any right under our kidnapped Africans, who, by the laws of Constitution to Miranda rights. Spain itself were entitled to their freedom, Implicit in both statements is that forand set the Africans free. eign terrorists have not earned the right 2. Trials are not given to defendants to a trial. But the question of whether alwho deserve them; they are admin- leged terrorists have not in some sense istered to everyone in order to sort the earned or deserve a trial is a fundaguilty from the innocent. mental misunderstanding of the purpose GOP presidential frontrunner Mitt of trials. Criminal suspects of any kind, Romney told a South Carolina debate au- foreign or citizen, are not given trials as a dience back on May 15, 2007 of terror de- gift for something they merit. If they are tainees: Im glad theyre at Guantanamo. guilty, they never earned them, and if they I dont want them on our soil. I want them are innocent, they should never have been on Guantanamo where they dont get the arrested. The purpose of trials is to sort the access to lawyers they get when theyre on guilty from the innocent. Indeed, the guilty like Oklahoma City bomber Timothy McVeigh, who was tried, found guilty, and put to death can hardly claim to benefit from a trial. Without a trial, however, the whim of the executive branch becomes law and the innocent get punished along with the guilty. 3. The Presidents war powers during wartime do not allow him to abolish trials. The Fifth and Sixth Amendments limit even the prosecution of war decisionmaking by the President, as these categorical guarantees contain no exceptions for wartime: As amendments to the Presidents powers under Article II of the U.S. Constitution, they must amend (which means change, and in this case limit) the Presidents war powers or the entire purpose of amending the Constitution is pointless. Even alleged enemy combatants who have not been charged with a crime are entitled to due process under the amendments. As the American Bar Association wrote in a memorandum about Bush-era detentions: While the Sixth Amendment does not technically attach to uncharged enemy combatants, there is no dispute that individuals who have been criminally charged do have a Sixth Amendment right to counsel, and it is both paradoxical and unsatisfactory that uncharged U.S. citizen detainees have fewer rights and protections than those who have been charged with serious criminal offenses. 4. Everyone detained under the law of war is entitled to the presumption of innocence. The President is bound to follow the law of war, which includes following the Geneva Convention treaties that the U.S. government has signed and ratified. Prisoners of war are protected persons under the Geneva Convention and are entitled to special protections and a presumption of innocence. They are not to be forcefully interrogated (beyond name, rank, and serial number). They have a right to retain their personal property, a right to exercise, socialize, and receive Red Cross/Red Crescent packages, and many other privileges. This is because prisoners of war are deemed not to have committed any moral offenses; i.e., they are not criminals. POWs are simply presumed to be people who are patriotic
THE NEW AMERICAN OCTObER 10, 2011

one more year for murder: Canadian/Pakistani Omar Khadr was arrested at 16 years old and convicted by a military commission (because of a guilty plea for murder) in 2010. He will be released soon, as the plea deal stipulated only one more year of detention at Guantanamo.
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citizens of the country they were born in (or emigrated to). In short, they are presumed to be innocent of wrongdoing. The Bush/Obama position is to give terror detainees neither rights as military personnel nor rights as ordinary criminals. The Bush (now Obama) circular argument to detain terror suspects indefinitely can be summed up this way: Terror suspects are under military law, even though they are not military and we will not give them the legal protections of soldiers. We will treat them like criminals, but they are more than just criminals, so they wont get the protections of criminals either. In short, they wont have any rights because legally, theyre non-persons. The U.S. Supreme Court called such a view inconsistent with the U.S. Constitution in the 1866 case Ex Parte Milligan. Milligan was an Indiana resident accused of trying to steal arms and liberate Confederate prisoner-of-war camps during the Civil War (and condemned to death by a military commission). The Milligan court observed that the President cannot take away a mans rights and deny him both the rights as a soldier and as a criminal. The court concluded: If he cannot enjoy the immunities attaching to the character of a [lawful combatant] prisoner of war, how can he be subject to their pains and penalties? 5. The Presidents war powers during a time of conflict do not allow him to create military commissions to try terror suspects when real courts are available. Military tribunals have traditionally been Article II courts, set up by the executive branch in cases where there is no functioning civilian or military court system. But nothing in the U.S. Constitution presumes that the President by himself can create a court within the executive branch effectively making the President judge, jury, and executioner if Article III (judicial branch) courts are available. To the contrary, under the Constitution only Congress has the power under Article I, Section 8 of the Constitution to create a court: The Congress shall have Power To constitute Tribunals inferior to the supreme Court. Article III, Section 2 of the Constitution also specifies, The Trial of all Crimes, except in Cases of Impeachment, shall
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Landmark case, light sentence: Salim Hamdan, a driver for Osama bin Ladin, was set free in January 2009 after a military commission plea deal. But Hamdan had already invalidated the 2006 military commission law in the Supreme Court case Hamdan v. Rumsfeld.

be by Jury; and such Trial shall be held in the State where the said Crimes shall have been committed; but when not committed within any State, the Trial shall be at such Place or Places as the Congress may by Law have directed. The U.S. Supreme Court also denied in Ex Parte Milligan that a President had the constitutional authority to create a military commission and usurp Congress power to create courts at a time when ordinary courts were holding trials: By the protection of the law human rights are secured; withdraw that protection, and they are at the mercy of wicked rulers, or the clamor of an excited people. If there was law to justify this military trial, it is not our province to interfere; if there was not, it is our duty to declare the nullity of the whole proceedings. Thus, Milligan was set free by the court. 6. Congress power to set up military commissions is limited by the Bill of Rights. Congress has the power to set up courts under the Constitutions Article I, Section 8, and theres nothing in theory that says they cant set up a military court to try foreign terrorists who have taken up arms in a military capacity against the United States and call it a military commission. In recent years, Congress has passed two such laws, the Military Commissions Acts of 2006 and 2009. But this power of Congress is lim-

ited by the Fifth and Sixth Amendments, which prohibit these trials from including forced confessions (be compelled in any criminal case to be a witness against himself) and which guarantee due process of law (Fifth Amendment). Again, the Sixth Amendment guarantees that due process consists of a jury trial, a defense attorney with subpoena power, and other procedural protections. 7. Military commissions established under Bush and Obama are neither fair nor constitutional. President Bush initially set up military commissions solely under executive branch authority. This attempt was struck down by the U.S. Supreme Court in the 2006 decision of Hamdan v. Rumsfeld. Congress responded to this decision by passing the Military Commissions Act (MCA) of 2006, but the Supreme Court struck down the law as unconstitutional. The second-generation Bush military commissions constructed under the MCA were struck down in the 2008 Boumediene v. Bush decision because the law did not conform with the requirements of the Fifth and Sixth Amendments. After he was elected, President Obama, who opposed military commissions as a candidate, came out for new commissions that were designed to lower the evidentiary bar for obtaining convictions lower than would be the case in a normal trial. Its very hard to piece together a chain
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of evidence that would meet some of the evidentiary standards that would be required in an Article III court, Obama stated at a September 10, 2010 press conference announcing the reasoning behind his military commissions. Though the MCA of 2009 provided more protections for detainees than did the 2006 MCA, not surprisingly, the Obamaera military commissions still have substantial constitutional shortcomings, such as admission of secret evidence, admission of hearsay evidence, and the fact that the courts were set up after the supposed offenses had taken place specifically to win convictions of specific prisoners. What is particularly disappointing is the fact that the government is now openly stating the reason that it is reviving this commissions process is because it is going to be hard to obtain convictions in traditional courts, Lt. Commander Brian Mizer, a defense attorney at Guantanamo Bay, told the Associated Press after Obamas decision to revive military commissions. This would be the first time in our republic that we have created a court system in order to obtain convictions, and thats more than disappointing. The Obama military commissions have yet to be appealed. 8. Military commissions have been less successful in convicting and punishing terror suspects. Recent decisions of military commissions have been regularly overturned by appellate bodies, and the handful of convictions that have not been overturned were not overturned simply because they were not appealed. Salim Hamdan, Osama bin Ladens driver, was sentenced only to time served and was set free. So he didnt appeal the verdict. The two remaining military commission guilty verdicts were also not overturned solely because the defendants havent challenged their verdicts. Ali Hamza al Bahlul refused to mount a defense during his military commission, and has not appealed his verdict. And Australian David Hicks accepted a plea bargain that allowed him to get out of prison and move back to Australia On the other hand, hundreds of terrorists have been convicted in regular criminal courts and are serving long sentences or have received the death penalty. Let me put this in perspective, Vice President Joseph Biden told CBS Face the Nation
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Presidential backslider: Barack Obama pledged as a candidate to support the rule of law for terrorism suspects, but as President he has revived the flawed military commission process and continues to detain suspects without charges or trial.

February 14, 2010. There have been three people tried and convicted by the last administration in military courts. Two are walking the street right now. There have been over 300 tried in federal courts by the last administration and by us. Theyre all in jail now. None of them are out seeing the light of day. 9. President Bush detained Americans as well as foreigners without trial. Many Americans take solace in the belief that detentions without trial were conducted only against foreigners, and not against American citizens, during the Bush administration unfounded solace. Presidents dont make such distinctions. U.S. Navy veteran Donald Vance and fellow American Nathan Ertel were detained without trial and subjected to enhanced interrogation torture by Bush administration officials for months in 2006. The torture they endured included denial of food for days at a time, beatings called walling, and (alternately) sensory deprivation and sensory overload. The innocent Vance and Ertel were detained because they had become whistleblowers FBI informants against the private contractor for which they worked. (People in the company were

selling government guns in exchange for liquor.) At least one other American citizen was also detained without trial and tortured, and is now suing the U.S. government anonymously. Moreover, the Bush administration tried its best to detain two other American citizens without trial indefinitely, taking their cases all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court. Native-born U.S. citizen Jose Padilla was held without trial for three and a half years. He was only given a military commission trial because the Bush administration was about to lose Padilla v. Rumsfeld in the U.S. Supreme Court, a case in which lawyers for Padilla challenged his detention without trial. Likewise, naturalized U.S. citizen Yaser al-Hamdi was detained without trial until the Bush administration faced losing in the Supreme Court. The Bush administration subsequently cut a plea deal with Hamdi. 10. President Obama doesnt respect the trial rights of foreigners. Candidate Obama campaigned on behalf of due process for foreign terror detainees, arguing: The right of habeas corpus allows
THE NEW AMERICAN OCTObER 10, 2011

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prisoners to ask a court to determine whether they are being lawfully imprisoned. Recently, this right has been denied to those deemed enemy combatants. Barack Obama strongly supports bipartisan efforts to restore habeas rights. But President Obama issued an executive order March 7, 2011 that allowed for the executive branchs continued, discretionary exercise of existing detention authority in individual cases on an indefinite basis without a trial. Those facing detention without trial include some 50 detainees at the Guantanamo Bay prison that candidate Obama pledged to close, as well as several thousand detainees at bases in Afghanistan (such as at Bagram Air Base near Kabul) and Iraq. 11. President Obama doesnt respect the trial rights of American citizens and thinks Americans may be killed without trial. President Obama rode into office criticizing the Bush administrations practices for handling suspected terrorists, but in many ways has actually become even more autocratic than Bush. President Bush claimed for himself the power to detain terror suspects indefinitely without trial, even Americans. But according to the Washington Post, President Obama now believes he can kill without trial U.S. citizens he suspects are aiding terrorism. Obamas assassination list supposedly contains dozens of U.S. citizens living abroad. Obama administration officials have publicly defended the assassination list. To me, terrorists should not be able to hide behind their passports and their citizenship, and that includes U.S. citizens, whether they are overseas or whether they are here in the United States, Obamas Deputy National Security Advisor for Homeland Security and Counterterrorism John O. Brennan told the Washington Times in June 2010. Brennan said at that time that dozens of American citizens were on Obamas assassination list. New Mexico native Anwar al-Awlaki is reportedly on the assassination list, but the list itself remains classified. Anwar al-Awlaki is thought to be hiding out from the United States in Yemen, and his chief alleged crime is the making of propaganda videos for al-Qaeda. n
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THE GOODNESS OF AMERICA

Private and Peaceful

Despite the fact that the official September 11 memorial in New York City has been the subject of a decade-long point of controversy, residents in Brooklyn, New York, have taken the act of memorializing the 9/11 heroes in their own hands and quietly erected a memorial. Brooklyn Daily reports, For the past eight years, a memorial in Brooklyn has offered us a serene sanctuary to reflect upon our shattering losses. Its free, no reservations or special admission is needed, and its illuminated every evening year around until 11 pm. The Brooklyn Wall of Remembrance is located on Coney Island. It is there in honor of the heroes who sacrificed their lives on that fateful day in New York on September 11. It is approximately the size of a JumboTron screen, and includes the names of all the killed emergency workers from the five boroughs of New York City, of which there were 346 firefighters, 37 Port Authority officers, 23 cops, three state court officers, one state trooper, a Secret Service agent, two FBI agents, and a lawenforcement dog. In addition to the wall is a six-foot sculpture of a group of firefighters holding the helmet of a lost smoke-eater. What is even more spectacular about the Brooklyn Wall of Remembrance is that it is the culmination of private funds and private volunteer efforts: The wall exists only because of the determination of ordinary Americans, who parted with their time and cash to deliver us a timely tribute its $500,000 tab paid in full by private donors. Even celebrities provided generous donations to the effort, including Gary Sinese, Jon Voight, and Jackie Mason. The man behind the memorial is Sol Moglen, a 72-year-old Brooklyn resident who is also the vice president of a recycling company. I began to wonder how many firefighters from Brooklyn had been lost, said Moglen. He indicates that he was shocked to learn that more than one-third of those firefighters who perished were from Brooklyn, and that 122 of the 137 Brooklyn firefighters who responded were never found. Hav34

ing learned that, Moglen wanted to do something to memorialize those heroes. Raymond Goffio, a former owner of the Brooklyn Egg Cream Company, approached Moglen immediately, and he put Moglen in touch with the elected officials who helped to lobby the citys Art Commission on their behalf. Once Id seen the photos and the plans, I had to get involved, said Goffio. Moglen has also published The Fallen Heroes of September 11th to mark the 10year anniversary of the tragedy.

Likewise, customers have frequently provided donations to the store by significantly overpaying for items they have purchased from the store. To date, Rays Candy Store remains in business, and Ray was one of the few store owners to stay open in spite of warnings related to Hurricane Irene.

a Grizzly Situation
Earlier this year when Idaho resident Jeremy Hill shot and killed a grizzly bear that came into his yard and threatened his own life as well as the lives of his children, he faced charges from federal authorities for killing an endangered species. A number of reputable people came to Hills defense. Idaho Governor Butch Otter submitted a letter to the Obama administration asking the Secretary of the Interior to reconsider the charges, and Senator Shawn Keough appeared at Hills hearing to show his support of the Idaho man. However, the most impressive display of support came from Hills local community. Sympathetic to Hills legal plight, the community managed to raise $19,558 for the Hill familys defense fund on August 20 at a 4-H animal sale in Bonners Ferry. At the 4-H sale, Jeremy Hills 14-yearold daughter Jasmine was selling a pig she had raised. The pig ended up being auctioned off again and again a grand total of 15 different times with all of the funds raised via the sales going to the Hill family. And at the end of the day, the pig was returned to Jasmine, since all previous sales of the pig were intended solely for fundraising. There are a lot of people who stand behind Jeremy and his family, Rob Pluid, who was present at the event, told the News Bonners Ferry. Were all in the same boat. Fortunately, after the 4-H sale, and as a result of the public outcry against the federal authorities for the case against the Hill family, the federal government has elected to drop the charges against Hill. n rAveN clAbough
THE NEW AMERICAN OCTObER 10, 2011

rallying for ray

New Yorkers have garnered an unfortunate reputation for being rude and selfabsorbed. Their reputation has been rebutted by their behavior in a number of disasters wherein they have exhibited how good they truly are. However, it does not require a significant historic event to provoke the goodness of New Yorkers, as was demonstrated in the case of Rays Candy Store in Brooklyn. The New York Times reports, Rays Candy Store has been open 24 hours a day for nearly 40 years a beacon of stability in a part of New York that has gone through various stages of upheaval. But the proprietor, Ray Alvarez, 76, is two months behind on the rent, and the landlords agent has issued a few ultimatums. Ray began facing rent problems when his landlord moved him to a month-tomonth lease and raised his monthly rent from $800 to $3,500. According to Alvarez, losing the store would be devastating, as he loves to be around people and relies on his business for income. Rays customers are also perturbed by the idea of the store closing, asserting that Ray makes his customers feel like members of the community instead of just mere customers. As a result, local residents have come together to try and help the struggling proprietor. Residents of a tenement house on Avenue C raised $500, while a young musician named Lilly ODonnell organized a musical fundraiser at a local bar, which raised an additional $350.

HistorY Past and PErsPEctivE

Military Commissions
Throughout U.S. History
Military commissions have a long and irregular history of being created by federal authorities, and U.S. courts have been just as inconsistent in rulings on their constitutionality.

scribed. The universal common-law prohibition against the admission of hearsay, even multiple hearsay, and un-sworn evidence is not honored. Most critically, the structural independence enjoyed by Article III courts and even state jurists is wholly absent. Military commissions are inquisitorial in nature. Military judges and even the commission members themselves fall within the direct chain of command of the President and his proxies and ultimately depend on favorable reviews from these superiors for promotion and career advancement. Congress has twice authorized the President to create military commissions, passing laws in 2006 and 2009, but the bodies have come under increasing criticism from civil libertarians for alleged lack of legal safeguards. Some have even claimed that military commissions are unconstitutional on their face, but the truth is almost as complex as the history of military commissions in America. Military commissions in the United States began before the colonies became a nation, drawing heavily from British common law and Parliaments Mutiny Acts in the late 1600s, which traditionally authorized military commissions for the trial of uniformed soldiers for crimes.

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American War for Independence

Jacksons attack on the law: Andrew Jackson set up the first military commissions after adoption of the Constitution, but the Secretary of War rebuked and fined him for arresting a state legislator who wanted freedom of the press and a judge who granted a habeas corpus writ. by Thomas R. Eddlem

ilitary commissions have always been controversial in U.S. history, and no more so than in the past 10 years. Military commissions have traditionally been defined as executive branch courts, created by necessity under a system where ordinary courts are not functioning, such as during a rebellion or military occupation of a foreign country. They are distinct from ordinary criminal trials and the regular military system of justice, the courts-martial, the latter being generally required to apply the principles of law and the rules of evidence generally

recognized in the trial of criminal cases in the United States district courts under the Uniform Code of Military Justice. Constitutional problems with the Bush (and now Obama) military commissions were accurately explained by Chad DeVeaux of Western State University Law School: Such commissions, which may most accurately be categorized as Article II courts, deviate widely from civilian courts. Ordinarily inviolate procedural protections are disregarded. Juries are denied. The right of appellate review is circum-

Military commissions during the American war for independence werent called military commissions, but they took place nonetheless. American patriot and spy Nathan Hale was hanged without a trial by British General William Howe in 1776, as spies caught in the act needed no trial under British law at the time (though the British signed the 1899 Hague convention guaranteeing spies trials). But George Washington sometimes gave accused spies the benefit of a proper trial and sometimes not. Upon capturing Benedict Arnolds British handler Major John Andr out of uniform, Washington condemned him to death after a Board of General Officers, following the rules of military courts-martial, had recommended death by hanging. Washingtons Board of General Officers was an advisory board only, as international law of war at that
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HistorY Past and PErsPEctivE

President Lincoln had General Ambrose Burnside issue General Order #38 on April 13, 1863, which ordered the trial by military commission of anyone who had the habit of declaring sympathies for the enemy, followed by death.
time did not guarantee spies a trial. Washington also sent about 20 spies to formal courts-martial for trial, so his record on the matter is not consistent even though it was consistent with British common law that preceded the U.S. Constitution. found out Louailliers identity and had him arrested and held without trial. When U.S. District Court Judge Dominick Hall ordered Louaillier released on habeas corpus grounds, Jackson had the federal judge arrested too. Though Jacksons second in command, Brigadier General Edmund Gaines, doubted Jacksons authority to create the military commissions, for some reason Jackson put him in charge of the commissions. The commission acquitted Louaillier, a verdict Jackson protested; and Jacksons dictatorial actions subsequently earned a sharp rebuke from President James Madisons Secretary of War, Alexander J. Dallas, who wrote to Jackson: In the United States there is no authority to declare and impose Martial law, beyond the positive sanction of the Acts of Congress. To enforce the discipline and to ensure the safety, of his garrison, or his camp, an American Commander possesses indeed, high and necessary powers; but all his powers are compatible with the rights of the citizens, and the independence of the judicial authority. If, therefore, he undertakes to suspend the writ of Habeas Corpus, to restrain the liberty of the Press, to inflict military punishments, upon citizens who are not military men, and generally to supercede the functions of the civil magistrate, he may be justified by the law of necessity, while he has the merit of saving of his country, but he cannot resort to the established law of the land, for the means of vindication. Jackson was fined $1,000 for insubordination, but the popular general later lobbied Congress to reimburse him, which it did, earning Jackson his vindication. When Jackson invaded Spanish Florida with a militia in 1818 pursuing Creek and Seminole tribes, he summarily executed two Creek leaders and held a military commission trying British soldiers who were accused of stirring up the native tribes against American settlers. The bloodthirsty Jackson confirmed the advisory death sentence of one commission and overruled another (which had recommended a whipping) to condemn the second British officer to death. Many in Washington were outraged over the act, but Jackson was too popular for Congress to formally condemn him.

War of 1812 and Seminole War (1819)

During the War of 1812, the U.S. government ordered no formal military commissions. But under his own volition, Andrew Jackson, after taking control of New Orleans in 1814, declared martial law, suspended habeas corpus, and censored the press. Jackson repelled the British in the most lopsided battle of the war, achieving almost 100-1 casualty rates in the Battle of New Orleans. The battle began two weeks after the war formally ended, but news of the peace treaty from Ghent, Belgium, had not reached New Orleans by the time of the battle. After the battle and the British withdrawal, State Legislator Louis Louaillier wrote anonymously in a newsletter that martial law should be lifted. Jackson

Mexican-American War

The term military commissions was first coined in the United States during the aftermath of the Mexican-American War as General Winfield Scott, the American commander in occupied Mexico, struggled to stop rampant crime and looting in Mexico, where he had eliminated the only government in place. Scott set up military commissions to settle criminal issues

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the first official military commissions: After the Mexican-American war, Gen. Winfield Scott set up military commissions to stop looting and violent crimes that followed the destruction of the Mexican governments legal system.
36 THE NEW AMERICAN OCTObER 10, 2011

among both American soldiers and militiamen, who were plundering Mexicans, and among Mexican civilians, who were plundering each other. He also convened councils of war to adjudicate more serious war crimes. The military commissions tried more than 400 individuals, about three-quarters of whom were Americans, and the councils of war tried 21 men, mostly Mexicans. Scott ordered the military commissions to mirror the procedures set up by the congressionally enacted military courts-martial used to judge U.S. military personnel stateside. The commanding general pleaded military necessity as the rationale for creating the bodies, as Congress had not passed any law respecting enforcement of law in an occupied country. Without the commissions, Scott argued, anarchy would ensue. The U.S. Supreme Court unanimously condemned Gen. Winfield Scotts 1847 military commissions in Mexico a couple of years later in the case of Jecker v. Montgomery (1851), proclaiming that neither the President nor any military officer can establish a court in a conquered country, and authorize it to administer the laws of nations. The Jecker court went on to characterize the military tribunals as bodies of military necessity rather than judicial bodies: The courts established or sanctioned in Mexico during the war by the commanders of the American forces were nothing more than the agents of the military power, to assist it in preserving order in the conquered territory and to protect the inhabitants in their persons and property while it was occupied by the American arms. They were subject to the military power and their decisions under its control whenever the commanding officer thought proper to interfere. They were not courts of the United States, and had no right to adjudicate.

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dictator abe: Abraham Lincoln arrested state legislators, judges, and even Congressmen for speaking out against the war, trying them in military commissions until the Supreme Court got the courage to overturn the policy in Ex Parte Milligan after Lincolns death.

Civil War

Soon after the Civil War began, President Abraham Lincoln unconstitutionally suspended habeas corpus (later made constitutional by the acquiescence of Congress, which is authorized by the Constitution to suspend habeas corpus in times of war or rebellion). Lincoln also suspended freedom of the press, closing down some 300 newspapers in the North that had either
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expressed sympathy for Southern independence or had criticized Lincolns harsh suppression of the Bill of Rights. In addition to Lincolns crimes against the Constitution, the war against secession also produced a cash crunch for the federal government, and it delayed gold payments to the Dakota Indians as part of a treaty to purchase 90 percent of the current state of Minnesota from the Dakotas. Facing starvation and bankruptcy from loss of both their lands and income, the Dakotas rebelled in 1862 and claimed their land back in a violent rampage. American military officials put down the justifiable Dakota rebellion and held sham military commission trials. The Dakota military commissions convicted 323 Dakota Indians, handing the death sentence to 303. The judicial process included the trial and sentencing of as many as 42 in a single day. Lincoln ordered a review of many of the sentences and, in the face of the massive and obvious injustice, demanded that no death penalty be carried out without his explicit approval. Lincolns suspension of the freedom of the press did not prevent everyone in the North from speaking out against the war, so the President had General Ambrose Burnside issue General Order #38 on April 13, 1863, which ordered the trial by military commission of anyone who had the habit of declaring sympathies

for the enemy, followed by death. Within weeks of the implementation of General Order #38, retiring Ohio Congressman Clement Vallandigham was arrested and put on trial. The Ohio Democrat, who had lost a reelection attempt in 1862, bitterly criticized Lincolns suppression of rights clearly enumerated in the Constitution, but he hadnt elicited any specific sympathy for Southern independence. Lincolns military commission, which unlike Scotts Mexican commissions contained none of the ordinary civilian protections, sentenced Vallandigham to two years imprisonment for uttering disloyal statements. Vallandighams sentence was later commuted to banishment to the Confederacy by Lincoln. Vallandigham appealed his case to the U.S. Supreme Court, but the court demurred in 1864 on technical grounds. The court ruled that because military commissions could not be considered courts or judicial bodies, they were in fact Article II courts, and the judicial power of the United States under Article III of the U.S. Constitution could not hear an appeal from a military commission. Likewise, a military commission in 1865 convicted Maryland Congressman Benjamin G. Harris for harboring two paroled Confederate soldiers in his home. Harris denied the charges, but was convicted anyway and sentenced to three years in prison and given a lifetime ban on serving
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HistorY Past and PErsPEctivE

sion in 1864, but execution was delayed until after the war while The Supreme Court finally issued a Milligan a civilian appealed his case to the U.S. Suclear ruling on military commissions in preme Court on habeas corpus the case of Ex Parte Milligan in 1866, grounds. The Supreme Court which was a full-blown rebuke of the ruled that with a functioning civil court system in Indiana, pretended authority of the President to the federal government could deny Americans a trial by jury during a not create a new court and infringe on the judicial power of time of conflict. the United States under Article III of the U.S. Constitution. The in public office. But shortly after his con- court ruled in Ex Parte Milligan that marviction by the military commission, Presi- tial rule can never exist where the courts dent Andrew Johnson found that evidence are open, and in the proper and unobstructhad tended to vindicate Harris and com- ed exercise of their jurisdiction. muted the sentence. Harris subsequently But even the clear ruling of the Supreme returned to Congress, and no court appeal Court in the Milligan case was muddied by was needed in his case. a Congress insistent upon imposing miliThe Supreme Court finally issued a tary rule in the South after the Civil War. clear ruling on military commissions in Congress responded to Milligan with the the case of Ex Parte Milligan in 1866, Reconstruction Act of 1867, which prowhich was a full-blown rebuke of the pre- hibited the Supreme Court from deciding tended authority of the President to deny cases on military commissions, based on Americans a trial by jury during a time of the congressional power to limit the apconflict. In that case, Lambdin P. Milligan pellate jurisdiction of the Supreme Court and four co-conspirators were accused in (Article III, Section 2). The Supreme 1863 of plotting to steal guns from a fed- Court ruled in the case of Ex Parte Mceral armory and to liberate Confederates in Cardle that, because of the Reconstruction Indiana prisoner-of-war camps. Milligan Act, it had no jurisdiction to free William and his compatriots were convicted and McCardle. McCardle was a Mississippi sentenced to death by a military commis- newspaper editor and former confederate
court-packing, courtintimidating President: Franklin Delano Roosevelt created a military commission to try German saboteurs during World War II, and told the Supreme Court that he would ignore them if they challenged his commissions. The cowardly court acquiesced.

sergeant who had used his newspaper to agitate against federal reconstruction legislation, and had been sentenced to prison by a military commission.

Spanish-American War

After the war against Spain, the United States was left with new colonial possessions, especially Puerto Rico and the Philippines. The United States faced a bloody guerrilla war for independence (partly by a Muslim minority) in the Philippines between 1899 and 1902, where terrible atrocities were committed by both sides (including waterboarding by the Americans, then called the water cure). The U.S. government instituted many military commission trials during the insurgency, both for U.S. personnel and for rebels, but the United States used regular rules of evidence in civilian trials almost exclusively. Then, as now, military courts-martial that is, the ordinary military legal system used virtually identical rules of evidence as the civilian system.

World War II

AP Images

World War II marked the first time since the Civil War when a President created a military commission that would remove most of the civil-liberties protections guaranteed by the U.S. Constitution from those accused of war crimes. And like Lincoln, President Roosevelt made no exemption for U.S. citizens. Eight Nazi spies and saboteurs came ashore on Long Island, New York, and Ponte Vedra Beach, Florida, in early 1942, four at each location. All eight had lived in the United States and been trained as saboteurs by the Nazis. One of the eight, Herbert Hans Haupt, was a U.S. citizen. One man in each landing had second thoughts and went to the FBI, foiling both plots. President Roosevelt created a military commission out of thin air, appointing the military judges, banning appeals (other than to himself), changing the rules of evidence, and making a two-thirds vote (rather than unanimity required in courts-martial and civilian courts) necessary for a death sentence. When an appeal to the Supreme Court was made known to Roosevelt a flagrant challenge to his executive order Roosevelt made it clear he would ignore the law and any ruling by the courts. I want one thing clearly understood,
THE NEW AMERICAN OCTObER 10, 2011

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Francis, Roosevelt told Attorney General Francis Biddle, according to Biddles memoirs. I wont hand them over to any United States marshal armed with a writ of habeas corpus. Justice Harlan Stone was apparently visibly shaken when Roosevelts intentions were revealed to the court. The Supreme Court faced with a choice of making a moral stand for the U.S. Constitution and becoming politically irrelevant or agreeing with executive dictatorship during war and keeping the mere appearance of remaining relevant chose the latter. The court ruled 8-0 in the case of Ex Parte Quirin that the President had the authority to create a military commission under Congress declaration of war and that lawful combatants are subject to capture and detention as prisoners of war by opposing military forces. Unlawful combatants are likewise subject to capture and detention, but in addition they are subject to trial and punishment by military tribunals for acts which render their belligerency unlawful. The justices delayed publishing their decision until months after the executions of six of the defendants had already taken place. (The two informants had received prison sentences). Several Supreme Court justices including Felix Frankfurter and Robert Jackson later expressed regret that they had participated in the decision. But the Quirin case remains the most-cited case as a precedent for the Bush and Obama military commissions. After the war, the Supreme Court heard several cases about international war crimes tribunals, such as Eisentranger v. Johnson and In re Yamashima, but as with the Nuremberg trials, the court denied it possessed jurisdiction because the U.S. government did not technically have custody of the accused. All of the defendants were being held by a four-nation coalition that included the militaries of the United States, the U.K., France, and the Soviet Union.

feld. When Congress went to Bushs aid and passed the Military Commissions Act of 2006, the Supreme Court struck down that law as unconstitutional in the 2008 decision Boumediene v. Bush because the law did not conform with the procedural requirements of the U.S. Constitutions Fifth and Sixth Amendments. The court did not uphold the military commissions ban on habeas corpus appeals to civilian courts (and lack of an adequate substitute). Implied (but not stated) in the 5-4 decision was that military tribunals must have rules of evidence (and an appeals process) similar to ordinary criminal courts and courtsmartial to be constitutional. President Obama had voted against the Military Commissions Act of 2006 as a Senator and intimated during the 2008 election cycle that he opposed military commission trials for defendants accused of terrorism. But Obama publicly favored military commissions in 2009. Congress responded to Obamas about-face by passing the Military Commissions Act of 2009 into law. The Military Commissions Act of 2009 offers a few more procedural protections than the Bush courts, but all of the major objections outlined by DeVeaux at the beginning of this survey apply to the Obama military commissions, except for judicial review, which is allowed on appeal to the Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia and Supreme Court. Obamas military commissions continue to allow secret evidence where the defense counsel is not allowed to see where the prosecution has obtained evidence hearsay evidence, denial of juries, and judges whose promotions are based upon decisions the President and military brass favor. As DeVeaux explains, the historic case for military tribunals (with the exception of Quirin) was based upon the total absence of civilian and ordinary military courts-martial: The principle underlying all these tribunals is the need to convene local courts to try local offenses. The Constitution does not compel authorities in remote locales to transport defendants, witnesses, and evidence across distant seas to the United States for trial whenever a crime has been committed. This principle is particularly

compelling in the case of military commissions, at least as traditionally organized. Historically, military officers empaneled commissions to conduct trials in the theatre of war itself where the very witnesses, usually soldiers, might be called upon at any moment to restore the peace or repel invaders. Thats not the case today, however. DeVeaux points out that where, as in the case of Guantanamo, the Government has voluntarily chosen to transport accused offenders thousands of miles from the war zone, the strictures of the separation of powers should apply in full force. U.S. history demonstrates that the military commission may sometimes be necessary in a situation of prolonged anarchy and looting, but that theres no constitutional justification for creating military commissions in todays war on terrorism. Indeed, arguments for military commissions in todays political climate are flat-out attacks against the U.S. Constitution. n

TC RaCing

Bush and Obama Administrations

After the September 11 attacks, President George W. Bush sought to impose military commissions of his own to punish alleged terrorist accomplices. His efforts were struck down by the U.S. Supreme Court in the 2006 decision of Hamdan v. Rumswww.TheNewAmerican.com

T C Racing, LLC
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... the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.

EXERCISING THE RIGHT

ton Daily Mail reported that B&B Loans has sold 28 handguns and put 44 guns on layaway in the short time since the shooting. Muncy told the news that there have been more ladies in, looking at them, and buying them.... People are scared. Muncy is also a big supporter of Canul and provided the cash required to make up the balance of the bond that the Bryants house did not cover. And I was happy to do it.... Hes never hurt anybody. When asked about the charges brought against Canul, Muncy bluntly said, I think theyre bulls***.... I think they ought to turn him loose and give him a parade. Pointing out the Free Jesus Canul sign in his window, Muncy proudly proclaimed, I was the first one that printed a sign. n pATrick krey

free Jesus!
Free Jesus! Thats what the sign read that was waved high in the air at an early September rally attended by dozens of people in Logan, West Virginia. Jesus Canul, known to friends as Jesse, was the object of their support. Canul is facing murder charges for shooting a man who tried to rob him, and is at the center of a news story that has consumed the small city of roughly 2,000 people. The 26-year-old dishwasher at a local restaurant had just cashed his paycheck at Walmart and was on his way home when he was confronted in the parking lot by 37-year-old David Abbott. Police say that Abbott, who has a criminal past, approached Canul from behind and held a sharp object, possibly scissors, to his throat while demanding his wallet. Eyewitness Bert Davis told local news affiliate WSAZ that Abbott wrapped him around his neck and said, Give me all your money or Im going to cut your throat. The details are sketchy at this point due to conflicting witness testimony, and the police investigation is still ongoing. But Canul, who has a concealed carry permit, grabbed his pistol. When Abbott saw that Canul was armed, the would-be robber turned to flee in the opposite direction and that is when Canul shot him at a distance of roughly 15 feet. Initially, police thought that the bullet hit Abbott in the head but it was later determined that the fatal shot hit him in the back. Since the shot was to his back at that great a distance, the local District Attorneys office viewed this not as a self-defense case but as a case of stone-cold murder. Logan Police Chief E.K. Harper told WSAZ, There are some facets of it that we dont believe self defense really carries in this. Logan County Prosecutor John Bennett explained the major reason for charging Jesus Canul with the murder of David Abbott by simply stating, The man was running away. West Virginia has a version of the Castle Doctrine that allows a person to use deadly force if he is attacked in a public place, even without a duty to retreat, but he has to be in imminent danger of death or serious bodily harm. Public opinion seems to be in favor of Canul, though, as Free Jesus! signs
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were posted on numerous businesses, and dozens of supporters took to the streets to voice their outrage over the charges. I dont care if he did walk away, Alice Miles said regarding reports that Abbott was fleeing when he was shot. She still feels very passionately that Canul still has a right to defend himself. He was abused right from the beginning when the guy attacked him, and we should remember that he is the first victim involved here, Eugene Mazzocchi said. He defended himself, Connie Cooke said as she contemplated other victims whom Abbott might have targeted. Who would he had done it to next? It could have been our children, our moms, dads. It could have been anybody. Maybe itll show the robbers, people will stand up, said Rodney Sells. The support went beyond just a public display. Two supporters went so far as to post their house to make bond for Canul. Kimberly Bryant, a personal friend of Canul, put up her home with husband Keith Bryant. Kimberly explained that she and her husband know Jesse. Were friends with Jesse. Weve known him for years. And, given the circumstances he was in, 99 percent of Americans would say theyre going to do the exact thing he did.... Hes a good humble man.... All he really wants to do is work. Hes very quiet; hes never mean to anybody and I just dont believe he was in a situation where he could do anything but what he did. Keith Bryant agreed and said that Canul has endured enough punishment from knowing he took another persons life: Thats something hes got to live with for the rest of his life. Other concealed carry holders felt sympathy for Canul but also concern about what this means for other victims of violent crime in the future. Sissy Napier voiced such concerns when she told the news, I got a permit, and I do carry a gun. That could have easily been me. And, the people of Logan County that know me, I would hope they would back me. One good thing to come out of this incident is that gun sales are up for Don Muncy, the longtime owner of B&B Loans in downtown Logan. The Charles-

from manpower to firepower: For decades, Chinas military prowess was reliant on sheer numbers of soldiers. Now through theft and purchases of technology worldwide, China is truly on the march to becoming a superpower.

Playing down the PLa

Item: The New York Times for August 26 reported that Chinese defense officials had denounced a Pentagon report that called Chinas military buildup potentially destabilizing. The paper cited a Chinese Defense Ministry spokesman saying, The report does not hold water as it severely distorted the facts. The spokesman added: China unswervingly adheres to the path of peaceful development, and its national defense policy is defensive in nature. Item: Han Dongping, a professor of history and political science at Warren Wilson College in North Carolina, writing in China Daily for August 29, blasted the United States for putting China on the defensive, requiring Beijing to make apologetic explanations about its military spending and its peaceful intentions. China, asserted the professor, is one of the most peaceful nations in world history. CorreCtIon: Peace, as it is understood by dedicated communists, is the absence of resistance to communism. Tibetans, among others, have experienced firsthand the nature of the type of peace imposed by Communist China and its Peoples Liberation Army (PLA) with estimates of those killed in Tibet ranging from 600,000 to twice that number.
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As noted by Jean-Louis Margolin in The Black Book on Communism (edited by Stphane Courtois, et al., Harvard University Press, 1999), the litany of atrocities in Tibet is hair-raising and in many cases unverifiable. But the eyewitness reports concur so precisely that the Dalai Lamas assessment of this period [in the late 1950s] seems beyond challenge: Tibetans not only were shot, but also were beaten to death, crucified, burned alive, drowned, mutilated, starved, strangled, hanged, boiled alive, buried alive, drawn and quartered, and beheaded. In 2009, on the 50th anniversary of a failed uprising in Tibet, the Dalai Lama rightfully accused the Chinese communists of turning his Himalayan homeland into a hell on earth. While the Peoples Republic of China (PRC) invariably throws public tantrums over the issuance of the annual report in Washington, which is required by law, the Pentagon has been pulling its verbal punches more each year. Many military experts, as has been pointed out in Defense News and elsewhere, criticize it for lacking substance; that publication, for example, recently remarked editorially that the annual report has been watered down so as not to offend the Chinese regime. Chinas first aircraft carrier, a former

Soviet ship, has begun sea trials. However, even that carriers progress is played down, and the potential implications it might have for, say, the Philippines in the South China Sea are ignored altogether. Meanwhile, as Defense News put it, China has laid wholesale claims to the entire South China Sea and all the wealth in and under its waters [and] made clear it will use force to assert its hegemony. Trying to appease the communists in China is a proven disaster. Consider during the Korean War, when President Harry Truman gave the Chinese what amounted to a free pass from an attack from the Nationalist Chinese on Taiwan (also known as Formosa) by having the Seventh Fleet block the sea lanes to and from Taiwan. As pointed out by Frazier Hunt in The Untold Story of Douglas MacArthur (1954), this gave the Chinese communists and their Korean war plans a tremendous impetus, because Red China could now enter the Korean war at any time she chose without fear of being attacked on her flank and rear by the Nationalist troops on Formosa. What seemed to the muddled public to be a far-sighted move by President Truman to save Free Chinese leader Chiang Kai-shek from invasion was actually nullifying all use for the present of the large Nationalist Army on Formosa as a fighting force against Red China, said Hunt. In one significant gesture, it banged the door into Chiangs face, and it opened the door into Korea for the Chinese Communists. Possibly a million Red Chinese could now be released from the mainland opposite Formosa and made available for future assignment in Manchuria. Jump ahead five-plus decades and the United States is still denying the Chinese on Taipei the advanced weaponry they need to protect themselves in a military confrontation with mainland China or to be able to stand up diplomatically to Beijing in a potential showdown. Contrary to the propaganda from Beijing and some in its echo chamber in this country, allowing Taiwan to strengthen itself is not destabilizing. Doing so would create a disincentive for aggression from Communist China. Yet, it was recently signaled by the Obama administration and widely publi41

AP Images

J-20 stealthy fighter and preparing their own aircraft carrier for launch. Denying the sale of fighter aircraft to Taipei is widely understood as a sellout move. It has, commented Defense News, sent the worst possible signal to allies across Asia. The events have reinforced perceptions of Americas decline and Chinas ascendancy. This comes at a time when Beijing is stepping up its claims over disputed territories and threatening to turn the South China Sea into a Communist Chinese lake. Once again, the report was not issued when the law calls for it by March 1 of each year a date designed to make it more useful to Congress while debating defense authorization legislation. Last year (and this year as well) the title of the report was changed from Military Power of the Peoples Republic of China to Military and Security Developments Involving the Peoples Republic of China. This, misleadingly, seems to transform China into a passive player. Yet, as Michael Mazza of the American Enterprise Institute put it last year, Chinas development of an anti-satellite (ASAT) capability, for example, is not a military development involving China, it is a decision by China to enhance its military power. The report was also stripped of every mention of grand strategy, noted Mazza, and based on perceived ambiguous trends. Despite the fact that Chinese leaders act as if they are fuming over these reports, they must be laughing among themselves. Aviation Week pointed out that there really is very little new in any category. In fact, some subjects that rated great emphasis in the past such as directed energy and laser research have been dropped. The Economist of London, hardly a hawkish publication, commented that the Pentagons report is diplomatically couched though from Chinas perspective, not nearly enough. Major advances are downplayed including the development of a missile with an estimated range of more than 940 miles that is obviously intended to keep the U.S. Navy at bay. The term aircraft carrier killer about that balTHE NEW AMERICAN OCTObER 10, 2011

U.S. Department of Defense

Ballistic missiles: China is capable of targeting its nuclear arsenal throughout the region and most of the world, including the continental United States. Newer systems, such as the DF-31, DF-31A, and JL-2, will give China a more survivable nuclear force.

cized (though not announced officially) that Taipeis purchase request has been turned down once again for needed F-16 C/D fighters. One wouldnt want to offend the dictators on the mainland, you understand. Mainland China, for its part, is expected to have 1,800 missiles pointed at Taiwan by the end of next year. Even the diluted Pentagon report notes that Taiwan has historically relied on a number of factors to deter aggression from the mainland. These include the Chinese militarys inability to project sufficient power across the 185 km Taiwan Strait; the Taiwan militarys technological superiority; the inherent geographic advantages of island defense; and the possibility of U.S. intervention. Chinas increasingly modern weapons and platforms (over a thousand ballistic missiles, an anti-ship ballistic missile program, increasingly modern ships and submarines, combat aircraft, and improved C4ISR [Command, Control, Communications, Computers, Intelligence, Surveillance, and Reconnaissance] capabilities) threaten to negate many of those factors upon which Taiwan has depended. Unable to ignore the obvious in this case, the Pentagons latest annual report acknowledges that Chinas military is still
42

focused on Taiwan and is likely to steadily expand its military options for Taiwan, including those to deter, delay, or deny third-party intervention. When the DoD report was released, it was accompanied by a briefing from Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense Michael Schiffer. As observed by Dean Cheng of the Heritage Foundation, Schiffer went to great pains to emphasize that the report reflects the views and perspectives that are held broadly by the U.S. government. So, despite a broad view within the U.S. government that the Chinese military is modernizing across a range of capabilities, is intent upon challenging the ability of the U.S. to support friends and allies, and is focused on the use of force across the Taiwan Straits, the Administration nonetheless does not see fit to provide Taiwan with modern systems to replace obsolete ones. Of course, this is the same Administration whose Secretary of Defense had confidently predicted that the Chinese would not be fielding advanced fighter aircraft for at least a decade and had derided the need for as many U.S. aircraft carriers even as the Chinese were developing the

listic missile is widely used elsewhere, but not in this report. As observed by the Economist: Of the DF-21D missile, it says that it is still being developed. It does not repeat the claim made by Admiral Robert Willard of Americas Pacific Command in December that the missile has reached initial operational capability. The J-20, it says, is not expected to reach effective operational capability before 2018 (China, it says, has yet to master high-performance jetengine production). China is likely to build multiple aircraft-carriers with support craft over the next decade. But it will take several additional years for China to achieve a minimal level of combat capability with them, says the report. There is no mention of the fact that China is the largest foreign holder of U.S. debt, nor of the controversy over denying Taiwan F-16 C/D fighters. Omissions abound. In one section, the Pentagon says China may also be developing a new road-mobile intercontinental ballistic missile, possibly capable of carrying a multiple independently targetable reentry vehicle (MIRV). Yet, at that point, observe Defense News reporters Kate Brannen and Wendell Minnick, the report drops the issue from discussion. It does not explain the significance of a roadmobile ICBM carrying MIRVed nuclear warheads, or what that potentially could mean to the U.S. West Coast. Perhaps the biggest figurative elephant in the middle of the room that is largely ignored by the Pentagon report, or skimmed over with dated information, is how China has been arming itself with the assistance of others, including the United States. Granted, the Pentagon does cite some previous work from other government departments, as well as a 2008 Defense Security Service report, about how Beijing has acquired vital technologies with obvious military applications. But this key document placidly acknowledges that the PRCs continuing efforts to acquire
www.TheNewAmerican.com

U.S. military and dual-use technology are enabling the PRC science and technology base to diminish the U.S. technological edge in areas critical to the development of military weapons and communications systems. One telling such case was noted long ago by Bill Gertz, a reporter with the Washington Times who has written extensively on military and security matters. (Gertz, for instance, in his 1999 book Betrayal (Regnery), revealed how the Clinton administration helped mainland China develop its nuclear weapons targeting American cities.) We havent learned, it seems. In a Washington Times piece published on September 1, Gertz reported that Pentagon officials from the Defense Technology Security Administration (DTSA) were set to meet with General Electric Co. officials to discuss security concerns related to the transfer of jet avionics technology to China. The meeting was called after congressional staff pressed the Pentagon to review whether China could divert U.S. commercial jet technology to military systems, as Beijing has done with missile, jet and satellite know-how. The meeting stemmed from concerns over GEs joint venture with the state-run Aviation Industry Corp. of China (AVIC).

A statement from DTSA to Congress earlier this summer acknowledged that China traditionally has a history of cooperation between civil and military sectors. Gertz went on: The GE-AVIC deal also is raising political concerns among some in Congress about possible government favoritism toward GE: Company chief executive Jeffrey R. Immelt heads the Obama administrations jobs and competitiveness program. The Pentagon has not formally reviewed the technology transfer involved in the GE-AVIC joint venture because no formal export licenses were sought, and GE insists its safeguards are sufficient to protect any data leakage. If the Congress and the public are not given the appropriate facts about Chinas military ambitions, it is much more difficult to devise appropriate defense strategies before it is too late. As George Washington observed in his farewell address, Timely disbursements to prepare for danger frequently prevent much greater disbursements to repel it. n williAm p. hoAr
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tHE LaSt word

A Way Out of impending Economic chaos

ur nation stands at the precipice of an economic meltdown that would make the current recession seem like the best of times. The almighty dollar, once labeled good as gold, stands close to repudiation. Yet the Obama administration and congressional leaders are failing to address the reason for the dollars decline. We find ourselves mired in the it cant happen here syndrome. The experts wont tell the public what happened in Germany in the 1920s, or in Hungary and Argentina more recently, or in Zimbabwe only a few years back. But all of the agony and chaos experienced in those nations should be expected in America. The dollar has plummeted so far in value AP Images that its worth is now less than five percent of what is was when a deceived Congress voted to create the Federal Reserve in 1913. Addressing this increasingly dire situation, Congressman Ron Paul has introduced H.R. 1098, the Free Competition in Currency Act of 2011. Its main purposes are: 1) repeal the legal tender laws; and 2) bar taxation when buying or selling such commodities as gold, silver, and platinum if the intention is to use them as money. In testimony given before the House Subcommittee on Domestic Monetary Policy and Technology, Dr. Lawrence Parks stated that H.R. 1098 is perhaps the most important piece of legislation to ever come before the Congress. He claims that the measure is necessary because of the certain catastrophic collapse of our unauthorized, dishonest and unstable legal tender irredeemable paper-ticket-electronic monetary system. Dr. Parks is the founder and executive director of the Foundation for the Advancement of Monetary Education and a widely published author and video producer. Being invited to express his thoughts on our nations extremely precarious monetary situation by subcommittee chairman Congressman Ron Paul constitutes a telling endorsement of the mans knowledge and good sense. He claims that our nations monetary system is unauthorized because the Constitution never allowed the U.S. government to have anything to say about money other than granting it power to coin money and regulate the value thereof. With that authorization, our infant federal government started the U.S. Mint. There never has been any authorization for the Congress to create the Federal Reserve with its vast powers. As for the system being dishonest, Dr. Parks points out that currency formerly in use in America (United States-issued Gold or Silver Certificates) carried the promise to deliver an appropri44

DROW TSAL EHT

by JohN

F. mcmANuS

ate amount of precious metal to its bearer on demand. In other words, stored gold or silver could be claimed by anyone holding those paper notes. Federal Reserve currency now in use simply states that it is One Dollar, or Five Dollars. It is redeemable in nothing. As Dr. Parks points out, pieces of paper that are not promissory notes are now represented as being a dollar [or five dollars, etc.]. This is obvious dishonesty. A piece of paper stamped One Dollar cannot be a dollar just because the government and the Federal Reserve say it is. The dollar was defined in the Coinage Act of 1792 as 371.25 grains of silver. This has Ron never been changed and, according Paul to Dr. Parks, it cannot be changed. Moreover, there never existed a need to specify the dollars weight in gold because the market would provide the relationship between the two metals and between silver and whatever other metals might be used as currency. The reality is that government has passed a legal tender law that gives a monopoly to dishonest paper bills. Why cant a real commodity (gold or silver) be legal tender? Or, an even better question, why is there any need for a legal tender law in the first place? H.R. 1098 would properly address this situation by abolishing the legal tender laws currently in place. The existence of alternative types of money would quickly lead to an end of printing-press fiat (unbacked) money to cover deficits. The infusion of new unbacked dollars into the economy waters down the value of all existing Federal Reserve Notes. This is why it takes more of these dollars than before to purchase anything. Goods and services dont cost more; dollars are worth less. H.R. 1098 would allow for competing currencies and for buyers and sellers to be able to use sound money whose value cannot be weakened through wild creation of more of it. Competition in the field of money would lead to excellence in that field, as competition does in any field. The measure also seeks to abolish the practice of imposing taxes on the sale of any monetary instrument. If you buy gold or silver coins, you wont have to pay a sales tax or any other tax. As the value of the current fiat dollar continues to decline, the possibility of catastrophic collapse should not be ignored. The sensible way to prepare for such a calamity begins by allowing competing currencies. H.R 1098 would do that. Tell your Congressman his endorsement is needed. And tell your two Senators that a companion measure ought to be introduced in their branch of Congress. n
THE NEW AMERICAN OCTObER 10, 2011

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