Our own government!
By John W, Whitehead
The Rutherford Institute (8/30/18)
WASHINGTON, DC — “What’s the greatest threat we face today? Our own government!” warned constitutional attorney John W. Whitehead, president of The Rutherford Institute, in a chilling message delivered at the third annual Ron Paul Institute’s Peace and Prosperity Conference. Whitehead spoke on the far-reaching ramifications of domestic militarization and the transformation of America into a war zone.
Whitehead’s speech can be viewed at www.rutherford.org.
“Our founding fathers warned us not to have a standing army on American soil. We did not heed that warning. We now have a standing army on American soil. It is composed of local police across the country, federal agents armed to the teeth, SWAT teams carrying out 80,000 raids a year. There is a battlefield here in America,” said Whitehead, author of Battlefield America: The War on the American People.
“What does this mean for the American people? Well, in a war zone, you have no rights. When you are staring down the end of a police rifle, there can be no free speech. When you’re being held at bay by a militarized, weaponized mine-resistant tank, there can be no freedom of assembly. When you’re being surveilled with thermal imaging devices, facial recognition software and full-body scanners and the like, there can be no privacy. When you’re charged with disorderly conduct simply for daring to question or photograph or document the injustices you see, with the blessing of the courts no less, there can be no freedom to petition the government for a redress of grievances. And when you’re a prisoner in your own town, unable to move freely, kept off the streets, issued a curfew at night, there can be no mistaking the prison walls closing in,” Whitehead explained. “This is happening and will happen anywhere and everywhere else in this country where law enforcement officials are given carte blanche to do what they like, when they like, how they like, with immunity from their superiors, the legislatures, and the courts.”
John W. Whitehead is an attorney and author who has written, debated and practiced widely in the area of constitutional law and human rights. Whitehead’s concern for the persecuted and oppressed led him, in 1982, to establish The Rutherford Institute, a nonprofit civil liberties organization. The Rutherford Institute is one of the nation’s leading advocates of civil liberties and human rights, litigating in the courts and educating the public on a wide spectrum of issues affecting individual freedom. The Institute’s mission is twofold: to provide legal services in the defense of civil liberties and to educate the public on important issues affecting their constitutional freedoms. The Institute provides its legal services at no charge to those whose constitutional and human rights have been threatened or violated. Whitehead serves as the Institute’s president and spokesperson, in addition to writing a weekly commentary that is distributed nationwide. Whitehead’s aggressive, pioneering approach to civil liberties issues has earned him numerous accolades. The Rutherford Institute is a 501(c)(3) organization, gifts to which are deductible as charitable contributions for Federal income tax purposes.
Here’s an example of what John Whitehead is talking about…
Women & Minors Subjected To Invasive & Brutal Body Searches By U.S. Customs Officers
By Susan Ferriss / Center for Public Integrity
The Washington Post (8/19/18)
Tameika Lovell was retrieving luggage at New York’s John F. Kennedy International Airport when Customs and Border Protection officers detained her for a random search. It was Nov. 27, 2016, the Sunday after Thanksgiving, and the school counselor from Long Island had just returned from a short Jamaica vacation. Lovell, who is black, had been stopped before, but this time a CBP supervisor began asking questions she hadn’t heard previously.
“Don’t you think you’re spending too much money traveling?” Lovell, 34, recalls a CBP supervisor asking.
What happened next is the subject of a harrowing lawsuit pending in U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of New York. Inside a secure room, Lovell’s litigation alleges, a female CBP officer searched Lovell’s belongings, presumably for illegal drugs, and asked if she was using a tampon or sanitary pad. The question upset her, but Lovell replied “no” and complied when told to remove her shoes, lift her arms and spread her legs. … read more
My Daughter Molested by TSA; Me Nearly Arrested For Objecting — As I begin writing this, my innocent 13 year old little girl is in tears sitting in the terminal at Reagan International Airport. Somewhere back at the TSA checkpoint there is a middle aged woman who has just, in clear view of law enforcement, committed a sexual crime against her, a minor child. I have it all on film. I nearly went to jail. The TSA agent continues her crime spree. … Read the Rest
