Political Crime is it a Crime?

John A. Rosado

Political Crime is it a Crime?

August 30, 2010

Political Crime is it a Crime?

Outline

Introduction

What is Crime

Conservative pastors fear new hate crime law

THE Maricopa Courthouse WAR

Crimes against the State

Social Crimes

Interpretations

Conclusion

What is a Crime?

This Paper, “Political Crime is it a Crime” is about, as the name implies, crime. We are going to limit our discussion to answering the question of what is a crime and should it be a crime to prosecute or not prosecute a crime, specifically political crime. Political crime is a crime committed by politicians who believe they have raised themselves above the common people. This paper will discuss whether a person who wins a political office has more rights than the common man. I will use examples from today’s headlines. We will discuss whether it is a crime to enforce all laws or is it a crime to enforce only the current politically “in vogue” crimes and ignore other crimes, that only hurt the little people. We are going to discuss crimes against the state, crimes against people by the state, and what we can do about them.

We are having quite an interesting campaign for the U.S. Senate seat currently held by John McCain and for state attorney general, currently held by Terry Goddard, who is running for Governor of Arizona. John McCain cannot run on the issues that he has stood for, because he would not be electable, so he is running ads that talk about J.D. Hayworth and the Abramoth scandal, that J.D. has been totally exonerated from, by the FBI. Thom Horn is running against Andrew Thomas for the state attorney general. Again, Thom Horn is having a difficult time running against Andrew Thomas, so he is running character assignation adds against Andrew Thomas. Throughout this paper I will come back to these two races. The races will be decided in the primary on August 24, therefore I will be able to draw conclusions about these races.

First let’s discuss what a crime is. (Davenport) A crime is a wrong against society or the public interest. This definition is very good and does not need to be changed in any way. We will describe a situation, and then determine if it fits this definition of a crime. Suppose a candidate “A” for public office runs ads against his opponent “B” in which “A” says “B” took $150,000 from an man named Abramoth to influence legislation, then says that the candidate never gave it back. “B” loses the election because of the charge. The FBI then investigates and finds out the number was $1,500 and the money was given to charity. The date of the alleged infraction took place before Abramoth became a scandal in about 1997. The FBI then found that there was no crime committed. Candidate “B” loses the election and because of this allegation. Did candidate “A” commit a crime here or was it just good campaigning to make up a story, then pass it off as fact. If no crime was committed by either, then does this become a civil matter where preponderance of the evidence is king? According to sources close to the candidate “B” campaign, “B” did win a sizable judgment against “A” in court, not verified. Later, candidate “C” comes along and decides run for a position and B also runs for the same seat. “C” then makes the same allegation about the $150,000 as candidate A did earlier. Is this now a crime committed by “C”, because “C” knowingly advertised falsehoods about candidate “B”? There certainly is lying here on the part of “C”, and was there perjury by “C”? Since no politician will ever go under oath during a campaign they are not subject to perjury. This is exactly what happened here in Arizona. Candidate “A” was Harry Mitchell, candidate “B” was JD Hayworth, and Candidate “C” was John McCain. This is one of the problems with American politics and elections, the candidates are not held to a high enough standard. The electorate is not informed, nor do they expect any candidate to do what they say they will do. The final vote in the primary has John McCain winning with 333,045 and JD Hayworth at 189803 votes. John McCain spent $63 to buy each vote, while JD spent $10 for each vote. McCain had a lot of money left over from his failed presidential campaign, money does by elections.

Hate crime seems to be a relatively new item in the American lexicon. This has a close adherence to the thought police of George Orwell’s book, 1984. (Townsend) In June, 60 conservative Christian leaders signed a letter delivered to Congress members warning that passage of the bill would "silence the moral voice of the church, punish principled dissent from the homosexual agenda and be a savage and perhaps fatal blow to First Amendment freedom of expression."

What is a hate crime? Isn’t any crime by definition hate? (Davenport) Offenses motivated by hatred against a victim based on his or her race, religion, sexual orientation, handicap, ethnicity, or national origin. What does this mean to the common man? Does it mean that we cannot voice our opinions? Does it mean that we can voice our opinions and if a homosexual is physically hurt by a gang, then does the preacher who voiced his opinion become the instigator and the reason for the gay man to be hurt, therefore punishable by the “Thought Police”? Then who is liable, the person who committed the physical act or the preacher who said it was bad to be gay. Or do we sue the printer of the bible, or God, since many people believe this is the word of God? This really sounds silly doesn’t it? (Townsend) "I will contend that tone of voice says a lot," McCoy said. "When one hears that they're doing wrong from someone who cares for their soul, it's hard to call that hate speech." But since we know that all rights come from God and not from man is this hate speech law unconstitutional. Will this law make the constitution, unconstitutional? After all we have passed very few laws in the last 60 plus years have actually had any bases in the constitution.

So do we actually use the constitution. (Townsend) In May, the Missouri Baptist Convention newspaper, the Pathway, ran an editorial in which it said that under the new hate crime legislation "anyone speaking or writing against homosexuality could be charged with a federal 'hate crime and that the new law "is an attempt to silence the church's criticism of homosexuality." This begs the question, are we now past the land of laws and the freedom of religion. The constitution says in the first amendment “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech”. This law does just that, it makes the bible illegal and it makes you a criminal if you preach from the bible. Therefore, this law neuters the first amendment and if the first amendment is neutered, then our constitution is nullified.

We now have a new technology to take away our freedoms. We are aware of the backscatter x-ray in airports such as Las Vegas. Well now it is portable. (Livingston) Technology and government have taken the next logical step beyond airport scanners. American Science and Engineering, Inc., one of the manufacturers of the backscatter radiation machines now being employed at airports, has made the backscatter radiation system portable. The Z Backscatter Van™ allows law enforcement to look inside vehicles, buildings and homes just like the airport backscatter scanners allow agents from the Transportation and Security Administration to peer beneath your clothes. The first amendment is neutered by the hate crime legislation and now the fourth amendment is neutered by portable backscatter systems and the Patriot Act.

THE Maricopa Courthouse WAR has been an interesting debate and continues to make news. The Board of Supervisors had budgeted $252,503,647, now the cost has exceeded this amount a little, $340,358,953, only about $88 million. This is referred to as cost overruns or graft depending on who you listen to. Andrew Thomas who has been the attorney general for Maricopa County has made a name for himself as a no-nonsense prosecutor, has been very instrumental in lowering the crime rates here. According to the Maricopa County sheriff office 60% of all crime in Maricopa County is committed by the illegal population and most of that is committed against illegal aliens. Therefore, it has been difficult to prosecute, because the illegal population is afraid to come forward.

Thomas sought the lead over federal authorities in immigration enforcement within the county, and Arizona legislators gave him the tools, including a human smuggling statute known as the "coyote law" that targets those who charge fees to transport undocumented foreigners, (illegal aliens), across the U.S. border. (Carter) Thomas also pursued his crusade against illegal immigration on another, even more controversial track. The federal government has been unwilling to obey the constitution Article IV section 4 “The United States shall guarantee to every state in this union a republican form of government, and shall protect each of them against invasion;” Make no mistake about it Obama is not the beginning here, it has been going on for a long time, with Reagan signing the first immigration amnesty bill. (Carter) "Thomas really did want to create his own little INS," says Phoenix public defender Robert McWhirter, immediate-past president of the Arizona Attorneys for Criminal Justice and the author of two books on immigration law published by the ABA. Since the federal was unwilling Arizona took the lead.

Arizona enacted a human smuggling law that enabled prosecutors to charge the illegal immigrant as well as the coyote who smuggled them. (Carter) Thomas said the illegal immigrants were as guilty as the coyotes. His novel reasoning combined the new human smuggling law with Arizona's conspiracy statute: Both the smuggler and the person being smuggled were involved in the felony. At this point sanctuary cities such as Phoenix and Tempe started to get into the action. They had a policy of requiring their officers not to ask questions about being legally in the United States even when the officer had a reasonable suspicion they were not legal. This brings us back to the election for State Attorney General. Three months after Janet Napolitano became Homeland security head she had the FBI start investigating both the Sheriff, Joe Arpio, and the county attorney Andrew Thomas. For the last 15 months the FBI has been unable to find anything wrong. Therefore, I ask who is committing a crime, is it the local county, or is it Homeland Security for political reasons. There seem to be very close political ties between Janet Napolitano and the two board members that Andrew Thomas is investigating.

Thomas responded publicly with his own open letter. (Thomas) Two county supervisors-Donald Stapley and Mary Rose Wilcox-have been indicted twice by two separate grand juries. A third grand jury heard testimony related to alleged hindering of prosecution by county officials who ordered a publicly funded sweep for electronic "bugs" immediately after Stapley was served with his first indictment, and alleged misconduct by Judge Gary Donahoe. Right after the grand jury heard the evidence, they asked for a draft indictment. Experienced prosecutors know this request almost always leads to some sort of indictment. The county wars may continue with the election of Bill Montgomery to county attorney general. We can only hope justice will be served. The votes are still being counted and at this point in the republican primary, Tom Horne is ahead of Andrew Thomas by 864 votes out of 554,529 total votes cast.

There are a plethora of laws designed to define Crimes against the State

The term “social crimes” is an interesting one to me. This seems to be a catch all term for let’s make it illegal to… because the government entity wants to control its citizens and of course make a little money as well. The text gives many examples of social crimes from sodomy to prostitution. While the text does not list speeding as a social crime, only a crime, I believe it belongs in the category of social crime. When I lived in Michigan in the 1980s, in the town of Eaton Rapids Michigan, Canel road coming down from the north was a 45 MPH road, then 100 feet after the city limit the sign says 25 MPH. There is a bush right after the sign where the local officer waits for motorists to miss the rapid change. There is no safety issue at 45, only a trap for the city to make money. Is the city guilty of a social crime against the people? Many speed traps have been eliminated around the country not because of the social crime issue but because they have proven to be effective at slowing local tourism therefore losing money for the local economy.

My real problem with social crimes is both sodomy and prostitution. Why are they, even considered crimes? Don’t we as adults have a natural right to our bodies? If two people in the privacy of their own home want to engage in sodomy, then why should the state get involved? Again, why is prostitution a social crime, for the same reason as sodomy? If we as human have a natural right to our bodies, then why should the state tell us it is wrong? This is simply a business transaction, one person has a need, the other person has a service for the need. Now this is simply two adult people agreeing to a business transaction. Where this goes very wrong is in the sale, and promotion of minors and adults, who are doing this for someone else’s benefit, then it becomes slavery and slavery is not a natural right, for anyone.

Entrapment by police for the purpose of eliminating sex on the street or in a private home, is this a social crime, and by whom? Or is it not a social crime because it is coming from a government agency. In this case it would seem that government can do no wrong only people. That then relates to my original point of the government officials becoming above the law, and then they are the rulers that our founders wanted to avoid.

What interpretations and lessons can we learn from these recent laws that our rulers have passed for our collective good? What interpretation do we get from their action? After all they do know what is best for us. Isn’t that why we elected them, so we do not have to think? The basic interpretation is that if a law is enacted by an elected ruler or by an unelected autocrat then that law overrides anything before it, even the constitution. What interpretation do we get from our own actions? While I personally do not like anything Barack Husain Obama is doing to our country, he is the best thing that could have happened to our country to restore us to our greatness, restore us to our shinning light on the hill. He has awakened a sleeping giant. I pray this sleeping giant will not just roll over and go back to sleep.

In conclusion, wschools

References

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Townsend, Tim. Conservative pastors fear new hate crime law restricts freedom of speech.'

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2010, email received from Republican Communications Maricopa County republican headquarters

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