{"id":31903,"date":"2017-07-21T09:58:38","date_gmt":"2017-07-21T16:58:38","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.clairewolfe.com\/blog\/?p=31903"},"modified":"2017-07-21T10:07:55","modified_gmt":"2017-07-21T17:07:55","slug":"two-bad-things-and-one-small-bitter-laugh","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.clairewolfe.com\/blog\/2017\/07\/21\/two-bad-things-and-one-small-bitter-laugh\/","title":{"rendered":"Two bad things (and one small, bitter laugh)"},"content":{"rendered":"

You may have heard that this week Jeff Sessions’ Justice (sic) Department rolled back the Obama-era directive<\/a> that had curbed one of the worst aspects of asset forfeiture.<\/p>\n

The federal government will once again be “adopting” forfeitures made by thieving police departments in states that have attempted to curb forfeiture abuse. Cops who want more toys and higher salaries can again thumb their noses at state laws — and of course at the very concept of due process.<\/p>\n

Says C.J. Claramella at Reason<\/em>:<\/p>\n

The Justice Department, rolling back an Obama-era directive, will seize more cash and property from suspected criminals, whether or not they have been charged with a crime, Attorney General Jeff Sessions said Wednesday.<\/p>\n

At a televised meeting with law enforcement leaders from around the country, Sessions laid out a new policy directive regarding the Justice Department’s Equitable Sharing Program, which distributes hundreds of millions of dollars a year in asset forfeiture revenue to state and local police departments.<\/p>\n

“President Trump has directed this Department of Justice to reduce crime in this country, and we will use every lawful tool that we have to do that,” Sessions said. “We will continue to encourage civil asset forfeiture whenever appropriate in order to hit organized crime in the wallet.”<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

It’s s pity that a Reason writer repeats the fiction that the victims of asset forfeiture are “suspected criminals.” No doubt a few are. The rest are just marks who keep “too much” cash where roaming statist gangs can grab it and who probably don’t have the wherewithal to challenge the theft.<\/p>\n

—–<\/p>\n

Earlier, the Department of (Achtung!) Homeland Security announced that henceforth every American boarding an international flight at a U.S. airport<\/a> will be a terrorist suspect.<\/p>\n

But wait. You thought we were already<\/em> terrorist suspects? True. But now — since the TSA has never stopped a single terrorist strike and since it fails to find up to 95% of the dangerous objects it’s supposedly looking for — they’re going to get more serious about it.<\/p>\n

Says TechDirt:<\/p>\n

The DHS has decided air travel is the unsafest thing of all. In the wake of multiple fear mongering presidential directives — including a travel ban currently being contested in federal courts — the DHS has introduced several measures meant to make flying safer, but in reality would only make flying more of a pain in the ass.<\/p>\n

The government has argued in court that flying is a privilege, not a right, and the DHS seems hellbent on making fliers pay for every bit of that privilege. We’ve seen laptop bans introduced as a stick to push foreign airports to engage in more security theater and a threat to rifle through all travelers’ books and papers to ensure nobody’s reading explosive devices.<\/p>\n

Now, the DHS is going to be scanning everyone’s faces as they board\/disembark international flights.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

But it’s okay! Really! Because it’s easy as pie to get around this latest incursion of useless Big Brotherism. The DHS’s own privacy-impact statement gives you the exciting secret workaround (as quoted in a lovely piece of criticism<\/a>) (H\/T DB):<\/p>\n

\u201c\u2026(T)he only way for an individual to ensure that he or she is not subject to collection of biometric information when traveling internationally is to refrain from traveling.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

There you have it. War is Peace. Sickness is health. We have always been at war with Eastasia. And all you have to do to keep your privacy while traveling<\/em><\/strong><\/strong> … is not to travel!<\/p>\n

And if you absolutely have to<\/em> fly internationally, fear not. The DHS says the new systems should be 96% accurate, so what could go wrong? And they look you right in the eye and promise they won’t retain the scans of U.S. citizens. Really, they won’t. Honest. Cross their fingers behind their backs<\/del> hearts and hope you die.<\/p>\n

—–<\/p>\n

Now after that, you need the laugh. It’s a small and bitter one. More of a cynical chuckle, the sort of thing you could picture Humphrey Bogart doing out of one side of his mouth. But it’s what I’ve got.<\/p>\n

This is “Made In America Week.” And Our Glorious Leader’s weekend palace, the Mar-A-Lago resort, has just applied for permission<\/a> to hire 70 foreign workers because there apparently aren’t 70 cooks, waiters, and busboys in the U.S. who are willing to do seasonal work for billionaires.<\/p>\n

Oh yeah. It’s a very different world for thee and me, isn’t it?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

You may have heard that this week Jeff Sessions’ Justice (sic) Department rolled back the Obama-era directive that had curbed one of the worst aspects of asset forfeiture. The federal government will once again be “adopting” forfeitures made by thieving police departments in states that have attempted to curb forfeiture abuse. Cops who want more toys and higher salaries can again thumb their noses at state laws — and of course at the very concept of due process. Says C.J. Claramella at Reason: The Justice Department, rolling back an Obama-era directive, will seize more cash and property from suspected criminals,…<\/p>\n

Continue readingTwo bad things (and one small, bitter laugh)<\/span><\/a><\/div>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6,11,20,23],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-31903","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-computers-and-technology","category-government","category-money","category-thuggery-and-bad-law","ratio-natural","entry"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.clairewolfe.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/31903","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.clairewolfe.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.clairewolfe.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.clairewolfe.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.clairewolfe.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=31903"}],"version-history":[{"count":7,"href":"https:\/\/www.clairewolfe.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/31903\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":31910,"href":"https:\/\/www.clairewolfe.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/31903\/revisions\/31910"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.clairewolfe.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=31903"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.clairewolfe.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=31903"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.clairewolfe.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=31903"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}