Freedom v. The Pentagon in the U.S. Supreme Court by Jacob G. Hornberger February 27, 2004 Last week, a federal judge in Virginia, Leonie M. Brinkema (the same judge presiding in the Zacarias Moussaoui case) acquitted a man whom the feds were prosecuting for terrorism. The judge dismissed the case after the feds had presented all of their evidence in a court of a law against a person they were absolutely convinced was a terrorist. The reason for the judge’s decision? Insufficient evidence of guilt. The acquittal comes on the heels of a terrorism case brought in federal district court in Detroit, where the feds were again convinced that the people they were prosecuting were terrorists. After hearing all the government’s evidence presented in the case, however, a Detroit jury acquitted two of the defendants. Federal prosecutors in that case are now being charged with wrongdoing for intentionally ...
Private: Commentaries – 2004 by Future of Freedom Foundation January 1, 2004 December 2004 Our Collective Goodness in the Tsunami Disaster by Jacob G. Hornberger Buy American Hurts Americans by Sheldon Richman The Federal Attack on the Dollar by Jacob G. Hornberger Limits on Chinese Imports Harm Low-Income Americans by Sheldon Richman Brady Wrong on Automatic Weapons by Ben LaRosa The Longest-Running War by Doug Bandow Think Globally, Act Absurdly by Scott McPherson Republicans Have Family under Attack by Sheldon Richman Why No Indictment for Bernard Kerik? by Jacob G. Hornberger States Should End the Drug War by Sheldon Richman Licensure: A Lawyer Protection Racket by Jacob G. Hornberger November 2004 U.S. Regime Change, Torture, and Murder in Chile by Jacob G. Hornberger A Good Way to Spend Thanksgiving? by Sheldon Richman What Did We Do to Deserve Condoleezza Rice? ...
There Is No Freedom in Iraq, Part 3 by Jacob G. Hornberger September 1, 2003 Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 Unfortunately, all too many Americans have swallowed — hook, line, and sinker — the Bush administration’s claim that the Iraqi people are now free. The U.S. invasion of Iraq has indeed ousted the brutal dictatorial regime that ruled the country, but that doesn’t necessarily mean that life under the regime that has replaced it constitutes freedom. The Iraqi people are now living under direct military rule and will continue to do so for the indefinite future. Is military rule freedom? You might have a difficult time convincing people in Burma and Pakistan of that. The fact is that life under military rule — even U.S. military rule — is not freedom. American and British military rulers might be more benign than foreign military officials but that does not convert life under their rule to freedom; it simply means that the tyranny is less tyrannical. In fact, military rule is the perfect embodiment of ...
Our Lives and Liberty Turn on Moussaoui by Jacob G. Hornberger June 11, 2003 There is little difficulty, and there is often very little gain, in declaring the existence of a right to personal freedom. The true difficulty is to secure its enforcement. The Habeas Corpus Acts have achieved this end, and have done for the liberty of Englishmen more than could have been achieved by any declaration of ...
Joining the Ranks of Aggressor Nations by Jacob G. Hornberger May 2, 2003 It really doesn’t matter whether U.S. military forces now find weapons of mass destruction in Iraq or not. From a moral standpoint, it’s too late for that. As everyone knows, in the run-up to the invasion of Iraq, President Bush provided several justifications for the invasion, and people were ...
Obedience to Orders, Part 2 by Jacob G. Hornberger April 2, 2003 Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Reader Responses | Jacob Hornberger vs. the Brass | Jacob Hornberger’s VMI Valedictory Addresss Last week we posted my article Obedience to Orders, Part 1, which has generated a load of reader responses, including many from cadets and officers from both West Point and ...
War Logic by Scott McPherson March 17, 2003 The rhetorical case favoring an invasion of Iraq has gone on for so long that no one is really thinking about the reasons any more. We’ve moved on to more important things, like when the tanks will start rolling. Though it might be far too late, it couldn’t hurt to do ...
Bush to Chavez: Just Ignore Your Constitution by Jacob G. Hornberger January 22, 2003 President Bush’s recent advice to embattled Venezuelan president Hugo Chavez reflects Bush’s cavalier attitude toward constitutional restraints. In the midst of all the political turmoil in Venezuela, Bush, who apparently despises Chavez, aligned himself with his political opponents and called for early presidential elections, with the aim ...
Leave Iraq Alone by Jacob G. Hornberger January 6, 2003 Despite the fact that he is amassing an impressive display of military armament in the areas near Iraq, President Bush says that he still hasn’t made up his mind on whether to order an invasion of Iraq. That would imply that despite the array of intelligence and information that ...
Why Submit to Blackmail When Bribery Is Available? by Jacob G. Hornberger January 2, 2003 President Bush says he’s not going to submit to blackmail by North Korea, but apparently he has nothing against bribery because he’s now offering North Korea fuel, food, and an easing of U.S. sanctions in return for North Korea’s promise not to produce nuclear weapons. Unfortunately, the president and other members of the federal government, including ...
With Friends Like These by Jacob G. Hornberger December 2, 2002 Without any shame whatsoever, President Bush has returned John Poindexter, Elliott Abrams, and Henry Kissinger to the federal government. Poindexter is in charge of “Total Information Awareness,” a government information-gathering operation straight out of George Orwell’s Nineteen Eighty-Four. Abrams has been appointed as top National Security Council envoy to the Middle East. And ...
Can We Call It an Empire Yet? by Sheldon Richman August 1, 2002 Once upon a time people who favored an aggressive global military policy for the United States avoided the word “empire.” They instinctively sensed the anti-American ring to it, so they found euphemisms and dismissed charges of U.S. imperialism as delusions from the fevered imaginations of unpatriotic agitators. Now that has begun to change. First the new imperialists approached the issue ...
