(Published in the Farwell TX/Texico NM State Line Tribune)
The front page article about the Farwell man arrested on "drug, weapon charges" should bother anyone who cares about doing right.
I don't know the man or anything about him. However, if you don't stand up for everyone, equally, when you see them violated, your complaints will be seen as hypocritical if you ever fall victim to the same.
Of all the charges he faces, only one has even the possibility of being an actual wrong. I'll address that in a bit.
First let me examine the other charges: possession of marijuana. Prohibition is always wrong and enforcing it always does more harm than the prohibited substances ever could. To then criminalize "drug paraphernalia" is just heaping stupidity upon insanity.
"Possession of prohibited weapons" is another non-crime. To admit you have, or enforce, a list of "prohibited weapons" is an admission that you are the one operating outside the law. "Shall not be infringed" is not a suggestion, but a warning that any government employee who does infringe upon the right to keep and bear (that means to own and to carry, in case you didn't know) arms (which means any weapon of any sort, not just firearms) is committing a serious crime.
Then you have the twin charges of "evading arrest" and "resisting arrest". If you have done nothing wrong, you have a right to try to prevent your arrest. Laws used to reflect and support this basic right, but the growing police state finds this inconvenient and has recently added these fake "crimes" to it's enforcement tool kit in order to pad the charges filed.
Finally we come to the only possible wrong in that list of charges: assault. The problem is, it isn't "assault" if you are fighting back against being kidnapped ("arrested") by those enforcing fake "laws"- in such a case you are defending yourself. Assault is what you are defending against.
I also notice that the excuse given for trespassing on this man's liberty was a suspicion that he had stolen property, and that he wasn't charged with theft. This makes me suspect the original excuse was known to be false from the start; a "fishing expedition" to find something to justify an arrest.
Sure, you can say enforcers have no say in the laws they enforce, but that's a cop-out. Everyone always has the choice to do the right thing or to do the wrong thing. Tyranny is always first made legal. As a human being, you make the choice to either enforce tyranny, or to support liberty. Make the right choice.
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