“Virtually every individual who has committed or supported evil has had a clear conscience,” Prager said. “Peoples’ feelings and behavior produce their conscience — their conscience doesn’t produce their feelings and behavior.”
“Everyone has heard the expression: let your conscience be your guide,” Dennis Prager, founder of PragerU, noted. But Prager argues that accepting that aphorism does more harm than good.
Prager argued that throughout most of Western history, the consensus view was that the conscience was not a sufficient guide and that God and instruction in a system of religious values were required for people to behave morally. Prager said that the idea that the conscience is all people need to act morally is a peculiarity and product of modern secular society.
Prager compared this notion to the idea that gender is a social construct, as well as the notion that all cultures are of equal value and that equal treatment for all people was a form of racism.
“None of these beliefs is more irrational than that the conscience is all you need, that it can replace God, the Bible, and Judeo-Christian values as a producer of moral behavior.”
Prager noted that people are exceptionally good at rationalizing their own actions and intuitions and have been known to justify everything from murder to torture to genocide on moral grounds.
McCaul says war over Taiwan will be about controlling microchips — err, I mean, democracy and freedom.
Nearly as funny as McCaul’s hasty self-correction was Todd’s suggestion that US militarism and wars for oil in the middle east was something that was limited to “the sixties, seventies and eighties.”
Too much interesting stuff happening in the life of the empire to cover in just one article today, so we’re doing a three-in-one wrap-up.
McCaul says war over Taiwan will be about controlling microchips — err, I mean, democracy and freedom.
Republican congressman Michael McCaul made a very interesting admission during a Sunday interview on MSNBC, which he hastily had to walk back after the host pointed out the implications of what he was saying.
MSNBC’s Chuck Todd asked the virulent China hawk McCaul to “make the basic case” for why Americans should be willing to go to war over Taiwan, and McCaul responded by saying it was about controlling the manufacturing of microchips. When Todd pointed out that this sounded a lot like justifications that have been made for US wars and militarism to control global oil supplies, McCaul hastily corrected himself and said that protecting Taiwan is actually about “democracy and freedom”.
“Make the basic case for why Americans not only should care about what happens in Taiwan but should be willing to spill American blood and treasure to defend Taiwan,” Todd said.
McCaul responded by talking about deterrence and protecting international trade, then said, “I think more important is that TSMC [Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company] manufactures 90 percent of the global supply of advanced semiconductor chips. If China invades and either owns or breaks up, we’re in a world of hurt globally.”
“Congressman, that almost sounds like the case that would be made in the sixties, seventies and eighties for why America was spending so much money and military resources in the middle east,” Todd responded. “Oil was so important for the economy. Is this sort of the 21st century version of that?”
“You know, I personally think it is about democracy and freedom. And we need to stand up for that, like we’re doing in Ukraine,” said McCaul, visibly uncomfortable.
Thomas Sowell said it best when he averred: “It is hard to imagine a more stupid or dangerous way of making decisions that by putting those decisions in the hands of people who pay no penalty for being wrong.” He, too, is herein channeling the invisible hand.
Hint: don’t bet against the invisible hand. It is a losing proposition.
Adam Smith’s “invisible hand” is certainly the most wondrous, astounding and marvelous concept in all of economics, and there are quite a few doozies in the dismal science. I go further than that. The invisible hand ranks as high or higher, in terms of pure beauty, than even the smile of a baby, the music of Mozart or the most beautiful sunset that ever took place. In terms of what it means for our potential prosperity, it has no upper bounds whatsoever.
Bastiat perched himself on the top of the Eifel Tower, looked down at the people scurrying around far down below him, and marveled at the fact that Paris got fed, without any central direction at all. This was in invisible hand (that is, free enterprise) at work; you can’t see this “hand,” but you can discern its effects.
We all marvel at the teamwork of the championship basketball team, the winner of the eight-person shell in the regatta, a 100-member orchestra playing 64th notes without a hair’s breath of discord. But this pales into total insignificance compared to the teamwork made at least potentially possible by the invisible hand; all eight billion of us cooperating producing goods and services and thus fighting poverty. These other accomplishments have a coach, a coxswain or a conductor; in contrast, when the human race bans protectionism and regulation, the invisible hand will take over without any central direction at all. If that is not a miracle, then nothing is (Adam Smith thought that the invisible hand was God’s hand). If that does not at least slightly shake up the atheists of the world, then nothing will.
The “crimes” under the RICO statute are essentially fictitious, created to enable federal authorities to avoid the state courts in which accused “mobsters” traditionally had been prosecuted. Because reputed “mob” figures were being acquitted in state courts—often in the face of overwhelming evidence of guilt—the government created a new set of “derivative crimes,” a class of offenses that by definition are derived from other criminal acts.
One unique aspect of Trump’s case is that state prosecutors are deriving their charges from federal criminal statutes instead of the other way around, but the particulars of this case are especially troubling, given the politics involved and the fact that Trump was never charged with breaking federal campaign law, much less convicted of it. In order for Bragg to gain a conviction, jurors will have to conclude that Trump broke federal law, something that they are not legally entitled to do, given that lawbreaking never was demonstrated in federal court. To put it another way, New York jurors are being asked to declare Trump guilty of a crime for which he never was charged.
When Rudy Giuliani was pursuing his infamous Wall Street prosecutions in the 1980s, his aides admitted that they were indicting people on “novel legal theories” that had not been used before. A Giuliani lieutenant bragged to a group of law students that prosecutors in his office:
were guilty of criminalizing technical offenses…Many of the prosecution theories we used were novel. Many of the statutes that we charged under…hadn’t been charged as crimes before…We’re looking to find the next areas of conduct that meets any sort of statutory definition of what criminal conduct is.
At that time, federal prosecutors were going after people like investment banker Michael Milken, but even they would have stopped at indicting a former president. That day is gone, however, and today we have Manhattan district attorney Alvin Bragg following what John Cassidy of The New Yorker calls a “novel effort” to combine both state and federal laws to create what clearly is a bill of attainder to convict Donald Trump of a crime. Even if the courts rule against Trump and permit the charges to stand—and it is certain that Trump and Bragg will litigate the charges all the way to the Supreme Court themselves—that does not change the fact that Bragg has cobbled a number of statutes together to create something the U.S. Constitution forbids: a bill of attainder.
Although the indictment is still sealed at this writing, the gist of the charges is as follows: (A) Donald Trump, who was running for president, authorized payment of $130,000 to a woman known as Stormy Daniels to keep her quiet about an affair between them, with Trump’s lawyer Michael Cohen making the payments; (B) he listed the payments as a campaign finance expense and Cohen pleaded guilty to federal campaign fraud; (C) the Trump Company reimbursed Cohen for the payments and claimed them as a legal expense.
Bragg is alleging that Trump approved these payments while breaking federal campaign law, which makes them a felony (under New York law, simply falsifying business records is a misdemeanor). Writes attorney and New York Times columnist David French:
So how can Trump be prosecuted? If Bragg can prove that, contrary to New York State law, Trump falsified records when the “intent to defraud includes an intent to commit another crime or to aid or conceal the commission thereof,” he can prove that Trump committed a felony, and a felony not only carries stiffer penalties; it has a five-year statute of limitations.
He continues:
But what is the other crime that can convert a charge of records falsification to a felony? Most likely prosecutors will rely on an allegation of violating federal campaign finance law, specifically the claim that the hush money payments to Daniels were illegal campaign contributions. But this is also not a simple case to make: The prosecution may claim that state campaign finance laws apply to Trump, and his payments thus violated New York law, but remember we’re talking about a presidential election. A federal statute expressly states that the relevant campaign finance laws “supersede and pre-empt any provision of state law with respect to election to federal office.” This law represents a formidable barrier to prosecuting Trump under state campaign finance laws, and there is no obvious path around it.
This is a problem because during the infamous “Russiagate” investigations, special prosecutors looked at this situation and concluded that the facts were too sketchy to charge Trump with breaking federal campaign laws. However, Bragg will be calling for a state jury to conclude that Trump actually did break federal law—something a state jury should not be doing. Because Trump was never charged with breaking campaign laws, there is now no legal way to claim he broke them.
Bragg’s entire case hinges upon this point, which is why French—who clearly despises Trump and would rejoice if he were convicted of something—advised against bringing state criminal charges in the first place. He writes:
It’s no wonder that even Bragg’s aggressive former prosecutor Mark Pomerantz was concerned that the Daniels case was, as The New York Times reported, “too risky under New York law.” A Reuters article described the legal theories supporting a prosecution for the Daniels payments as “untested.” A January New York Times story also accurately called the theories “largely untested.”
While one can condemn Trump for the reckless behavior that brought about this situation in the first place, I would argue that Bragg’s behavior is much more reckless, given that he is cobbling state and federal statutes together to target a political figure roundly hated by the Democrats. Bragg is using criminal law for political purposes, and while such actions have a sorry history going back to the Franklin D. Roosevelt administration’s hounding of critics of the New Deal, including former Treasury Secretary Andrew Mellon, they have no place under the rule of law.
The Wall Street Journal editorial board (unlike The New York Times editorial board, which prattled on about Trump “not being above the law”) recognized the greater danger of unleashing what it called a “Pandora’s box” that has “political ramifications that are unpredictable and probably destructive.” This indictment, unfortunately, is politically popular with Democrats (and some never-Trump Republicans), and the usual brakes that accompany political processes have been discarded in the hopes that the Great Orange Whale will see the inside of a prison cell.
While Trump and his supporters will rightly argue that Bragg is manipulating the law in a special way to go after one person, this case highlights greater abuses of the law attributable to what Candice E. Jackson and I labeled almost twenty years ago as “derivative crimes.” Under a “derivative crime” regime, which makes up the bulk of federal criminal statutes, a “crime” such as “racketeering” is not defined as a specific act, but rather is derived from other actions that may either be actual crimes or acts that someone might call criminal but do not break any laws.
For example, Jackson and I described the RICO statutes in our 2004 Independent Review paper:
The “crimes” under the RICO statute are essentially fictitious, created to enable federal authorities to avoid the state courts in which accused “mobsters” traditionally had been prosecuted. Because reputed “mob” figures were being acquitted in state courts—often in the face of overwhelming evidence of guilt—the government created a new set of “derivative crimes,” a class of offenses that by definition are derived from other criminal acts.
One does not “racketeer” anyone. Instead, the government permits federal prosecutors to present evidence of lawbreaking elsewhere, but the defendants are not charged with those crimes (such as extortion, murder, and robbery). Instead, they are charged with racketeering, which is derived from those other alleged actions. With derivative crimes, federal prosecutors were able to win cases against alleged organized crime figures such as John Gotti, who was convicted in federal court of…racketeering.
While the U.S. Constitution forbids passage of bills of attainder, clever prosecutors find other ways of implementing them by piecing together various statutes to form criminal charges that are specifically aimed at one person.
A bill of attainder is a piece of legislation that declares a party is guilty of a crime. Bills of attainder allow the government to punish a party for a perceived crime without first going through the trial process.
In the United States, bills of attainder are unconstitutional as stated in Article 1 Section 9 and Article 1 Section 10 of the U.S. Constitution. Article 9 prohibits federal bills of attainder and Article 10 prohibits bills of attainder by the states. The constitutional ban on bills of attainder works to uphold separation of powers principles by preventing Congress from assuming the functions of the judicial branch…
A growing number of prominent Republicans are rallying around the idea that to solve the fentanyl crisis, America must bomb it away.
In recent weeks, Donald Trump has discussed sending “special forces” and using “cyber warfare” to target cartel leaders if he’s reelected president and, per Rolling Stone, asked for “battle plans” to strike Mexico. Reps. Dan Crenshaw (R-Texas) and Mike Waltz (R-Fla.) introduced a bill seeking authorization for the use of military force to “put us at war with the cartels.” Sen. Tom Cotton (R-Ark.) said he is open to sending U.S. troops into Mexico to target drug lords even without that nation’s permission. And lawmakers in both chambers have filed legislation to label some cartels as foreign terrorist organizations, a move supported by GOP presidential aspirants.
“We need to start thinking about these groups more like ISIS than we do the mafia,” Waltz, a former Green Beret, said in a short interview.
Not all Republican leaders are behind this approach. John Bolton, Trump’s third national security adviser who’s weighing his own presidential run, said unilateral military operations “are not going to solve the problem.” And House Foreign Affairs Committee Chair Mike McCaul (R-Texas), for example, is “still evaluating” the AUMF proposal “but has concerns about the immigration implications and the bilateral relationship with Mexico,” per a Republican staff member on the panel.
But the eagerness of some Republicans to openly legislate or embrace the use of the military in Mexico suggests that the idea is taking firmer root inside the party. And it illustrates the ways in which frustration with immigration, drug overdose deaths and antipathy towards China are defining the GOP’s larger foreign policy.
Democrats, meanwhile, are allergic to the Republican proposals. President Joe Biden doesn’t want to launch an invasion and has rejected the terrorist label for cartels. His team argues that two issued executive orders already expanded law-enforcement authorities to target transnational organizations.
“The administration is not considering military action in Mexico,” National Security Council spokesperson Adrienne Watson said. “Designating these cartels as foreign terrorist organizations would not grant us any additional authorities that we don’t already have.” Instead, Watson said the administration hopes to work with Congress on modernizing the Customs and Border Protection’s technologies and making fentanyl a Schedule I drug, which would impose the strictest regulations on its production and distribution.
Gen. Mark Milley, the Joint Chiefs chair, told Defense One in an interview last month that invading Mexico was a bad idea. “I wouldn’t recommend anything be done without Mexico’s support,” he said, insisting that tackling the cartel-fueled drug trade is a law enforcement issue.
$5 billion taxpayer dollars invested in “next gen” vaccines.
A product that was once widely marketed as the cure to the coronavirus has become so unpopular in the sane world that neither The Washington Post nor the Biden Administration will even discuss it. It’s a tacit admission of a historic, bipartisan failure. Nonetheless, the Big Pharma-Big Government mafia continues marching forward.
The national emergency is over, but “Project Next Gen” has just begun.
On the same day the Biden Administration declared an end to the Covid hysteria era, the White House launched what amounts to Operation Warp Speed 2.0, devoting at least $5 billion dollars to develop new coronavirus injections.
It goes without saying that taxpayers are once more getting absolutely fleeced. As readers of The Dossier know all too well, Pfizer and Moderna have raked in hundreds of billions of dollars in taxpayer-funded profits over the past few years.
And given that these two events occurred on the same day, this situation stinks of a quid pro Joe – a seeming $5 billion+ Big Pharma golden parachute commitment in exchange for the money train coming to an end.
But what’s most important here, if you read between the lines in the government’s rhetoric, is the tacit admission that mRNA “vaccines” have failed.
While some Americans are half a dozen (or more?) mRNA shots deep by now, the White House coronavirus chief declared the need for “next-generation vaccines and treatments.” While some Americans decided to spend the last three years shooting up Covid shots like street junkies, the White House has bad news for these NPCs, as the piece notes that the Biden Administration intends to focus significantly on funding new nasal vaccines.
Moreover, a senior HHS official made mention of how they are “surveying the landscape out there — assessing what vaccine candidates are available, [and] moving through what exciting technologies are there” for funding. That sure doesn’t sound like a ringing endorsement of the mRNA gene serum.
Project Next Gen has bold ambition, the WaPo stenographer proclaims, as it intends to fund R&D to create a pan-coronavirus vaccine. What remains unexplained is how exactly they will create an effective universal vaccine, when they haven’t ever displayed the ability to adequately protect against a single coronavirus strain.
A product that was once widely marketed as the cure to the coronavirus has become so unpopular in the sane world that neither The Washington Post nor the Biden Administration will even discuss it.
“It is remarkable to see how quickly the men who had got rid of the Christian God began to create fictitious deities for themselves out of abstract nouns and concepts like the state.”
Herbert Butterfield, Christianity In Modern Europe 1952
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