Paul Manafort may be a sleazy lobbyist, but we don’t raid and arrest the armies of lobbyists in DC just for being sleazy.
Lawyer Michael Cohen may have flirted with campaign finance violations in his attempts to dissuade ‘Stormy’ Daniels from going public about a 12 year old encounter with Trump, but we don’t send in SWAT teams to lawyers’ offices over ‘donations’ or there would be a lot less Democrat lawyers….hmmmm….
We have a Constitution which limits the powers which the Federal Government may wield, and we have a series of amendments which expressly prohibit the Federal Government from trampling the rights of citizens, or carrying out raids of citizens’ homes on a personal whim. One of those amendments explicitly forbids the Federal Government from disarming citizens, because armed citizens are the last bulwark against tyranny by the “Ruling Class.” When King George III claimed the right, via his troops, to raid any home for specious violations of the Stamp Act, the colonists took up arms and chased off the representatives of “distant and tyrannical government.”
And yet, this year, it was not the so called ‘authoritarian’ Trump Administration, but Obama holdovers in the deep state who arrogated to themselves the power to conduct no-knock, pre-dawn, raids on the homes of citizens who have committed no crime in the true sense of the word, and who were actually co-operating with the FBI because they believed they had nothing to fear. The actions of sleazy operatives within the FBI and DOJ, and the the willing enactment of these raids by agents who “were just following orders,” should bring back a 1930s kind of chill, as we are perilously close to war crimes by an erstwhile honest detective agency.
Amendment, the 4th:
The right of the people to be secure in their 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.
It doesn’t take much brainpower to determine that the raid on Manafort by FBI agents, and the raid on Cohen’s office, house, and hotel room by staff of the Southern District of NY attorney’s office, with both teams “just following orders” from team Mueller, are so far in violation of the 4th amendment as to cause a Constitutional crisis all by themselves.
This is not police work. This is more like the agents of King George carrying out raids under the auspices of the stamp act, and it’s just as despicable. Police work requires probable cause, a warrant for specific persons or things, and a knock. Marauding criminals kicking down doors in the night and “cleaning out the joint,” however need to be met with bullets.
In case you think that’s a little extreme, just remember that an armed society is a polite society, and strong people are less likely to abuse weak people if they know such abuse could trigger a lethal response. These people are not polite, have no respect for the Constitution or fellow citizens, and ought to remember that “just following orders” will get them tried as war criminals….. IF they survive the war they seem determined to start!
