Category Archives: Justice

Going: Attorney General Of Black America

Ethics, Justice, Law, Race, Racism

He’s going, and not a moment too soon. Attorney General Eric Holder is on the way out of the Injustice Department. Granted, Holder’s departure will make little difference. A replacement with the same twisted, tribal proclivities will almost certainly be ensconced.

Here are some of the highlights of Holder’s career of corruption and cupidity:

* Called America “a nation of cowards,” for not discussing race constantly and in an even more obsequious tone than already mandated. By his Holiness’ estimation, Americans are not having the kind of “conversation” about race he had ordered them to have. What Holder wanted was not a give-and-take, but a take, take, take ? a one-way talking-to, where brothers like him read the errant American people their rights.

* “Assertions of broad executive authority to conduct military strikes on terror targets, to use lethal drones against U.S. citizens overseas suspected of terrorism and to gather Americans’ communications records.” In all, supported and justified an “extraordinary assertion of executive power.”

* Extracted record-setting penalties from big banks.

* Went on a crusade about so-called “racial disparities in criminal sentencing and voting.”

* “… wrote a legal justification for killing American citizens overseas if it is determined they pose a threat to U.S. lives and can’t be apprehended through traditional means.” (WSJ)

* Oversaw the National Security Agency’s ever-expanding surveillance programs.

* Ran guns to Mexican drug cartels. Enabled the murders of many Mexicans and at least one American. A gang going by the acronym ATF—the US Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives—watched over and gave cover to Mexican gangsters and their local gun-runners, who later used this ATF immunity to gun down innocent Americans and Mexicans.

* Issued subpoenas for journalists’ phone records.

* Used his office to push for certain criminal justice policies. Has boasted about using “the bully pulpit that I have as attorney general to make people and public officials aware of the nature of this problem and also the consequences that flow from not fixing, not dealing with this problem.”

Most notably, “Holder [was] what we call a ‘sin eater’ inside the Beltway — high-ranking associates who shield presidents from responsibility for their actions,” wrote Professor Jonathan Turley.

Merciful Judge Masipa

Justice, Law, South-Africa

On Fox News, Megyn Kelly was screeching that Oscar Pistorius got away with murder. Kelly’s reasoning was of a piece with neoconservative chauvinism: Judge Thokozile Masipa, the presiding justice in the Pistorius case, did not render the verdict an American judge would have handed down, hence to Kelly, the verdict had to be wrong.

I can’t say the decision Judge Masipa read out was an elegant decision. It is, nevertheless, a merciful one:

Pistorius was found guilty, Friday, of culpable homicide, the South African term for unintentionally, but unlawfully, killing a person. It’s akin to negligent killing.
A day before the verdict, Judge Thokozile Masipa cleared him of murder in the killing of his girlfriend, Reeva Steenkamp.
His sentencing starts on October 13, the judge said after granting him bail.
There is no minimum sentence for culpable homicide in South African law, so it will be up to the judge to decide. … … But in grabbing his gun and heading toward the supposed threat, Pistorius “acted too hastily and used excessive force,” Masipa ruled Thursday.
“His conduct was negligent” and not what a reasonable man would do in the circumstances — not even a disabled one, she said.
Defense arguments that his upbringing “in a crime-riddled environment and in a home where the mother was paranoid and always carried a firearm” might explain his conduct that night, but “it does not excuse the conduct,” Masipa said.(CNN)

I believe Oscar Pistorius is stupid, irresponsible; an example of a bad gun-owner. But I do not believe he purposefully “murdered Reeva Steenkamp after a domestic row,” as the state endeavored to show, but, it would appear, failed to show.

“Into the Cannibal’s Pot” is dedicated to—and I quote—“my African sisters, Nomasomi Khala and Annie Dlahmini, whose lives touched mine.” In her deliberative, wise manner, Justice Mazipa reminded me of those two ladies whom I miss dearly. She seemed impervious to the racial, liberal rubbish that swirled around the case.

Questions about the Masipa verdict are raised in “Pistorius judgment: Was there no intention to kill someone behind the toilet door?”

Rand Paul Opportunistic—And Wrong—On Race

Barack Obama, Drug War, Fascism, Justice, Law, Left-Liberalism And Progressivisim, libertarianism, Race, Racism, Ron Paul

“Rand Paul Opportunistic—And Wrong—On Race” is the current column, now on WND. An excerpt:

Police brutality? Yes! Militarization of the police force? You bet! “A Government of Wolves”? Yes again! “The Rise of the Warrior Cop”? No doubt! But racism? Nonsense on stilts! So why have some libertarians applied this rhetoric to the murder-by-cop of black teenager Michael Brown, in Ferguson, Missouri? The same people who would argue against color-coded hate-crime legislation—and rightly so, for a crime is a crime, no matter the skin pigment of perp or prey—would have you believe that it is possible to differentiate a racist from a non-racist shooting or beating.

Predictably, BBC News had taken a more analytical look at the “unrest in Ferguson,” pointing out that liberal outrage had centered on what the left sees as racial injustice. Libertarian anger, conversely, connected “the perceived overreaction by militarized local law enforcement to a critique of the heavy-handed power of government.”

As its libertarian stand-bearers, the BBC chose from the ranks of establishment, libertarian-leaning conservatives. Still, the ideological bifurcation applied was sound. With some exceptions, libertarians have consistently warned about a police state rising; the left has played at identity politics, appealing to its unappeasable base.

As refreshingly clever as its commentators are, BBC is inexact. The very embodiment of political opportunism, Sen. Rand Paul has managed to straddle liberal and libertarian narratives, vaporizing as follows:

“… Anyone who thinks that race does not still, even if inadvertently, skew the application of criminal justice in this country is just not paying close enough attention. …”

The senator from Kentucky is considered “one of the leading figures in today’s libertarian movement.” Even so, on matters libertarian, Rand Paul is a political pragmatist; not the purist his father is. Alas, Rand has imbibed at home some unfortunate, crowd-pleasing habits—the leftist penchant for accusing law enforcement of racism. In 2012, in particular, during the debate between Republican presidential front-runners, in Manchester, New Hampshire, Ron Paul lurched to the left, implicating racism in the unequal outcomes meted by American justice:

“How many times have you seen the white rich person get the electric chair?” he asked. “If we really want to be concerned with racism … we ought to look at the drug laws.”

Laws prohibiting the individual from purchasing, selling, ingesting, inhaling and injecting drugs ought to be repudiated and repealed on the grounds that they are wrong, not racist. But statism is not necessarily racism. Drug laws ensnare more blacks, because blacks are more likely to violate them by dealing in drugs or engaging in violence around commerce in drugs, not necessarily because cops are racists. …

Read the rest of the column. “Rand Paul Opportunistic—And Wrong—On Race” is now on WND.

An American Rabbi Who Can Reason: The Ten Commandments, Killing, and Murder

Christianity, GUNS, Hebrew Testament, Judaism & Jews, Justice, Law, Reason, Religion

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“American Rabbis For Israel First” wiped the floor with two feeble-minded rabbis. Admittedly—and by virtue of being publicity hounds—the rabbis had already self-selected into a pretty odious social-group sample.

Thus, when I retired (to bed), a few nights back, with the commentary of Rabbi Dovid Bendory, rabbinic director of Jews for the Preservation of Firearms Ownership—I expected little by way of intellectual fare, given the mostly liberal rabbis we’re accustomed to enduring in the public eye. Their impetus is invariably emotional, not intellectual.

Indeed, Jews, who’re usually an analytical lot, have also been infected with the contempt for reason running throughout society. “Curricula in schools emphasize the non-analytical. The media convey emotionalism. Religious institutions junk doctrine for feel-goodism, and what goes for compassion is really sappy sentimentality.” (From “Why Read Return To Reason.”)

Understanding liberty, of course, demands reason (again, from “Why Read Return To Reason”):

In the introduction to F.A. Hayek’s “The Road to Serfdom,” economist Milton Friedman puts his finger on the backdrop to the growth of collectivism: “The argument for collectivism is simple if false; it is an immediate emotional argument. The argument for individualism is subtle and sophisticated; it is an indirect rational argument.”

In his biblically based argument against pacifism, and in defense of a “righteous killing,” Rabbi Bendory demonstrates a command of Hebrew grammar as well as impressive deductive, analytical thinking. In particular was I intrigued by Rabbi Bendory’s distinction, bolstered by references or the absence thereof in scripture, between retzach (murder) and hariga (killing).

Essentially, JPFO’s rabbinic director argues that the Sixth Commandment enjoins against murder, not necessarily against killing, and that, translated, the Hebrew Lo tirtzach! “has a clear and unequivocal meaning:

“Do not murder,” and not do not kill.

Read “The Ten Commandments, Killing, and Murder”: A Detailed Commentary by Rabbi Dovid Bendory, Rabbinic Director, Jews for the Preservation of Firearms Ownership.