Legalize Freedom

"There's no way to rule innocent men. The only power any government has is the power to crack down on criminals. Well, when there aren't enough criminals, one makes them. One declares so many things to be a crime that it becomes impossible to live without breaking laws."
-- Ayn Rand

I know: the title of this blog post is stupid. Legalize freedom? Freedom is freedom, right? Now that I have your brain working, let me get to my point.

It is common practice in this day and age that if enough powerful people are against something, they can get it prohibited. Anything. An obvious example the illegality of a plant, but there are so many examples that I won't bore you with a list.

Any power the Government has comes from the barrel of a gun. Once they ban something, all who partake have the gun scoped on them. Even in your own house. We all know the myriad of stories that back this up, but let me share one from my own life.

Is was around August of 2008. My girlfriend and I were living in a two floor house with her daughter and her daughter's girlfriend (yes, lesbians, let's keep moving guys). We had the first floor, and they had the upstairs.

One day there was a knock on the door. It was the U.S. Marshalls, looking for someone we had never met; this person used to live where we did and used our address. So far, no problem. "You mind if we come in and look around?" they ask, as the lead Marshall goes ahead and pushes his way in past my 5'3 girlfriend. Problems begin.

My girlfriend's daughter and I were sitting in the living room on the first floor. My marijuana tools of the trade were put away, but no one was upstairs. The Marshalls, now joined by Kenton County Sheriffs and coming in the back door as well, proceeded to search the house; anywhere a human could be "stashed."

The lead Marshall...I'll call him Dick #1...came downstairs holding a bong in his hand. Dick #1 proceeded to give me a lecture on the illegality of marijuana, and his powers to cart us all off to jail. He said it's not what I came for, but I'll take drugs if I can get it.

So he asks for all our ID's to run them through the system, all the while telling me how "lucky" I am I'm not going to jail, and if he comes back and finds even a seed, we all go. All in all, they found a bong, three pipes, my scale, and a crapload of seeds. Another Marshall, Dick #2, asked me if I sold weed; I said no, I weigh the weed I buy.

As all this is happening, my girlfriend's daughter is sitting on the couch with a notebook in her lap; a notebook with a folded up piece of paper in it, containing weed. They didn't find the weed.

But it gets even better. Apparently my girlfriend had bounced a $73 check about a year back. She was never informed, no letter, bank didn't say squat because she had closed her account soon after anyway. So we didn't know she had a warrant for her arrest. On slap the cuffs, and there goes my baby, paraded down the street like a drug lord.

Of course bouncing checks is against the law; it's a form of robbery. But follow me for a second: they come looking for someone else, so they have a legal warrant to search the house, but not run our names. They find a bong, and since weed is illegal, as well as all paraphernalia, they can now legally run or names. So my girlfriend, who doesn't even smoke weed, goes to jail for a bounced check, having been discovered by United States Marhalls looking for someone else. Because it's illegal for me to smoke weed in the privacy of my own home.

Legalize Freedom.

"That government is best which governs the least, because its people discipline themselves."
-- Thomas Jefferson

"The evils of tyranny are rarely seen but by him who resists it."
-- John Hay, (1872)

"Every decent man is ashamed of the government he lives under."
-- H.L. Mencken