Striking a major blow:
he Connecticut state senate approved a bill Thursday that would allow citizens to sue police officers who arrest them for recording in public, apparently the first of its kind in the nation.
As it is now, cops act with reckless immunity knowing the worst that can happen is their municipalties (read: taxpayers) would be responsible for shelling out lawsuits.
I want to see laws like this in every state and municipality.
I’d like it extended to -every- issue that involves a Right.
A loss of sovereign immunity for overstepping in any area that is an encroachment.
Aw crap. When I saw the heading, I thought you were going to talk about film (real photography) vs digital (fauxtography) cameras.
But alas, it is not to be! Today anyway.
On Topic now,
I think it’s only fair to let the citizens photograph the cops, most of the police departments want Stop Light cams, street cams, parking deck cams, etc. My understanding, from their argument, is that the cameras will make us all safer by deterring crime!
Following that, won’t it keep US safer if WE can photograph THEM arresting, detaining, surrounding even the guiltiest suspects?
What’s good for the goose…
I’d like to see a more general law stripping public officials of soverign immunity whenever they violate the rights of the populus. As it is now, about the worst that can happen is that the taxpayers get stuck with the bill. Make them personally liable and you’ll see a lot of the abuses go away very quickly.
Ditto for judges for no-knock warrants. If they make a mistake they need to pay, and maybe the three strikes rule should go both ways–three erroneous no-knocks and they’re off the bench.
Strike the Root: end the perpetual War on Some Drugs.
War on Some drugs is a mouthful Titus.
We are currently living under exactly the same kinds silly laws and with the same “bootlegger” types of criminal organizations fighting over and killing for territory. Same kinds of laws, same kinds of outcomes.
I don’t think we would have a bunch more people getting hooked on “H” if ALL the now illegal drugs were legalized. Nor would people get hooked on coke, nor speed, nor anything else. People that aren’t doing the drugs now, are just as unlikely to do legal drugs later. But I’ve had smart people argue it the other way also.
The people that say that, sound to me like the people who fought both Liquor by the Drink, and the Lottery here in NC.
The reasoning on liquor flowing more ‘freely’, would mean children would be getting run over by ALL the people who would become alcoholics.
Likewise, we were all supposed to become gambling addicts and we would “…spend the baby’s milk and diaper money, for a quick fix that ‘hardly’ anyone would ever win!”.
Needless to say, the roads did not fill up with drunks, and most of us didn’t spend the milk and diaper money. I see legalizing ALL the drugs on the DEA lists and selling them with gub’ment tax stamp, like tobacco and liquor already get.
Just closing the DEA saves a billion dollars.
It’s not a budget plugger IMHO. But if you save a billion here and a billion there, pretty soon you’re talking real money. And my example doesn’t include the revenue from the tax stamps.
The closest year for which I can find statistics, 2008, the DEA says they capture only about 10% of the pot that is grown or sold in the country. They also say the caught and took off the street, $7B worth of weed. So that means total sales in 2008 were $70B.
A 10% tax just on marijuana is $7B in the coffers. Added to the savings from shutting down the DEA it’s a bump up on the Federal Budget of $8B. And God only knows how much street crime will go down if the gangs, mob, biker clubs aren’t IN the game anymore.
If we add the rest of the illegal drugs in, who knows how many BILLIONS of dollars we not only don’t spend, but we would make money.
And before anyone asks, I think everybody should be able to brew as much liquor as they want, right down in the basement. And if you get good enough to sell it, you can pay the Federal Tax, just like the big distilleries do.
How many guys build bird houses in the basement, and then sells them at the Swap Meet or Flea Market? A hobby is a hobby. Just because it happens to home made potato Vokda and not a bird house, oh well.
The tax on a 750 mL bottle of liquor is just about $2.15, BTW.