\u201cRights aren\u2019t rights if someone can take them away. They\u2019re privileges.\u201d<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n – George Carlin<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n You think you\u2019ve got rights? Think again.<\/p>\n All of those freedoms we cherish\u2014the ones enshrined in the Constitution, the ones that affirm our right to free speech and assembly, due process, privacy, bodily integrity, the right to not have police seize our property without a warrant, or search and detain us without probable cause\u2014amount to nothing when the government and its agents are allowed to disregard those prohibitions on government overreach at will.<\/strong><\/p>\n This is the grim reality of life in the American police state.<\/strong><\/p>\n In fact, in the face of the government\u2019s ongoing power grabs, our so-called rights have been reduced to mere technicalities, privileges that can be granted and taken away, all with the general blessing of the courts.<\/p>\n This is what one would call\u00a0a slow death by a thousand cuts,<\/strong>\u00a0only it\u2019s the Constitution being inexorably bled to death by the very institution (the judicial branch of government) that is supposed to be protecting it (and us) from government abuse.<\/p>\n Court pundits,\u00a0fixated on a handful of politically charged cases<\/a>\u00a0before the U.S. Supreme Court this term dealing with abortion, gun rights and COVID-19 mandates, have failed to recognize that the Supreme Court\u2014and the courts in general\u2014sold us out long ago.<\/p>\n With each passing day, it becomes increasingly clear that Americans can no longer rely on the courts to \u201ctake the government off the backs of the people,\u201d in the words of Supreme Court Justice William O. Douglas. When presented with an opportunity to loosen the government\u2019s noose that keeps getting cinched tighter and tighter around the necks of the American people, what does our current Supreme Court usually do?<\/strong><\/p>\n It ducks. Prevaricates. Remains\u00a0silent<\/a>. Speaks to the narrowest possible concern.<\/p>\n More often than not, it gives the government and its corporate sponsors the benefit of the doubt, seemingly more concerned with establishing order and protecting government interests than with upholding the rights of the people enshrined in the U.S. Constitution.<\/p>\n Rarely do the concerns of the populace prevail.<\/strong><\/p>\n Every so often, the justices toss a bone to those who fear they have abdicated their allegiance to the Constitution. Too often, however, the Supreme Court tends to march in lockstep with the police state.<\/p>\n As a result, the police and other government agents have been generally empowered to probe, poke, pinch, taser, search, seize, strip and generally manhandle anyone they see fit in almost any circumstance.<\/strong><\/p>\n In\u00a0recent years<\/a>, for example, the Court has ruled that police officers can use lethal force in car chases without fear of lawsuits; police officers can stop cars based only on \u201canonymous\u201d tips; Secret Service agents are not accountable for their actions, as long as they\u2019re done in the name of \u201csecurity\u201d; citizens only have a right to remain silent if they assert it; police have free reign to use drug-sniffing dogs as \u201csearch warrants on leashes,\u201d justifying any and all police searches of vehicles stopped on the roadside; police can forcibly take your DNA, whether or not you\u2019ve been convicted of a crime; police can stop, search, question and profile citizens and non-citizens alike; police can subject Americans to virtual strip searches, no matter the \u201coffense\u201d; police can break into homes without a warrant, even if it\u2019s the wrong home; and it\u2019s a crime to not identify yourself when a policeman asks your name.<\/p>\n Moreover, it was a\u00a0unanimous<\/em>\u00a0Supreme Court which determined that police officers may use drug-sniffing dogs to conduct warrantless searches of cars<\/a>\u00a0during routine traffic stops. That same Court gave police the green light to taser defenseless motorists, strip search non-violent suspects arrested for minor incidents, and break down people\u2019s front doors without evidence that they have done anything wrong.<\/p>\n The cases the Supreme Court\u00a0refuses to hear<\/a>, allowing lower court judgments to stand, are almost as critical as the ones they rule on. Some of these cases have delivered devastating blows to the rights enshrined in the Constitution.<\/p>\n By remaining silent, the Court has affirmed that: legally owning a firearm is enough to justify a no-knock raid by police; the military can arrest and detain American citizens; students can be subjected to random lockdowns and mass searches at school; police officers who don\u2019t know their actions violate the law aren\u2019t guilty of breaking the law;\u00a0trouble understanding police orders constitutes resistance<\/a>\u00a0that justifies the use of excessive force; and the areas immediately adjacent to one\u2019s apartment can be\u00a0subjected to warrantless police surveillance<\/a>\u00a0and arrests.<\/p>\n Make no mistake about it: when such instances of abuse are continually validated by a judicial system that kowtows to every police demand, no matter how unjust, no matter how in opposition to the Constitution, one can only conclude that the system is rigged.<\/p>\n By\u00a0refusing to accept any of the eight or so qualified immunity cases before it last<\/a>\u00a0year that strove to hold police accountable for official misconduct, the Supreme Court delivered a chilling reminder that in the American police state, \u201cwe the people\u201d are at the mercy of law enforcement officers who have almost absolute discretion to decide who is a threat, what constitutes resistance, and how harshly they can deal with the citizens they were appointed to \u2018serve and protect.\u201d<\/p>\n This is how qualified immunity keeps the police state in power.<\/p>\n Lawyers tend to offer a lot of complicated, convoluted explanations for the doctrine of qualified immunity, which was\u00a0intended to insulate government officials from frivolous lawsuits<\/a>, but the real purpose of qualified immunity is to rig the system, ensuring that abusive agents of the government almost always win and the victims of government abuse almost always lose.<\/p>\n How else do you explain a doctrine that requires victims of police violence to prove that their abusers knew their behavior was illegal because it had been deemed so in a nearly identical case at some prior time?<\/p>\n It\u2019s a setup for failure.<\/p>\n A review of critical court rulings over the past several decades, including rulings affirming qualified immunity protections for government agents by the U.S. Supreme Court, reveals a startling and steady trend towards pro-police state rulings by an institution concerned more with establishing order, protecting the ruling class, and insulating government agents from charges of wrongdoing than with upholding the rights enshrined in the Constitution.<\/p>\n Indeed, as Reuters reports, qualified immunity \u201chas become a\u00a0nearly failsafe tool to let police brutality go unpunished<\/a>\u00a0and deny victims their constitutional rights.\u201d<\/p>\n Worse, as Reuters concluded, \u201cthe Supreme Court has built qualified immunity into an often insurmountable police defense by intervening in cases\u00a0mostly to favor the police<\/a>.\u201d<\/p>\n For those in need of a reminder of all the ways in which the Supreme Court has made us sitting ducks at the mercy of the American police state, let me offer the following.<\/p>\n As a result of court rulings in recent years, police can claim\u00a0qualified immunity for warrantless searches<\/a>. Police can claim\u00a0qualified immunity for warrantless arrests<\/a>\u00a0based on mere suspicion. Police can claim\u00a0qualified immunity for using excessive force against protesters<\/a>. Police can claim\u00a0qualified immunity for shooting a fleeing suspect in the back<\/a>. Police can claim\u00a0qualified immunity for shooting a mentally impaired person<\/a>. Police officers can\u00a0use lethal force in car chases<\/a>\u00a0without fear of lawsuits. Police can\u00a0stop, arrest and search citizens without reasonable suspicion<\/a>\u00a0or probable cause.\u00a0 Police officers can\u00a0stop cars based on \u201canonymous\u201d tips<\/a>\u00a0or for \u201csuspicious\u201d behavior such as having a reclined car seat or driving too carefully. Police\u00a0can forcibly take your DNA<\/a>, whether or not you\u2019ve been convicted of a crime.\u00a0 Police\u00a0can use the \u201cfear for my life\u201d rationale as an excuse for shooting unarmed individuals<\/a>. Police have\u00a0free reign to use drug-sniffing dogs as \u201csearch warrants on leashes.\u201d<\/a>\u00a0Not only are police largely protected by qualified immunity, but\u00a0police dogs are also off the hook for wrongdoing<\/a>.<\/p>\n Police can\u00a0subject Americans to strip searches, no matter the \u201coffense.\u201d<\/a>\u00a0Police\u00a0can break into homes without a warrant, even if it\u2019s the wrong home<\/a>. Police can\u00a0use knock-and-talk tactics as a means of sidestepping the Fourth Amendment<\/a>. Police can\u00a0carry out no-knock raids if they believe announcing themselves would be dangerous<\/a>. Police can\u00a0recklessly open fire on anyone that might be \u201carmed.\u201d<\/a>\u00a0Police can\u00a0destroy a home during a SWAT raid<\/a>, even if the owner gives their consent to enter and search it. Police can\u00a0suffocate someone, deliberately or inadvertently, in the process of subduing them<\/a>.<\/p>\n To sum it up, we are dealing with a nationwide epidemic of court-sanctioned police violence carried out with impunity against individuals posing little or no real threat.<\/strong><\/p>\n So where does that leave us?<\/p>\n For those deluded enough to believe that they\u2019re living the American dream\u2014where the government represents the people, where the people are equal in the eyes of the law, where the courts are arbiters of justice, where the police are keepers of the peace, and where the law is applied equally as a means of protecting the rights of the people\u2014it\u2019s time to wake up.<\/strong><\/p>\n We no longer have a representative government, a rule of law, or justice.<\/p>\n Liberty has fallen to legalism. Freedom has fallen to fascism.<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n Justice has become jaded, jaundiced and just plain unjust.<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n And for too many, as I make clear in my book\u00a0Battlefield America: The War on the American People<\/em><\/a>\u00a0and in its fictional counterpart\u00a0The Erik Blair Diaries<\/em><\/a>,\u00a0the American dream of freedom and justice for all has turned into a living nightmare.<\/strong><\/p>\n Given the turbulence of our age, with its government overreach, military training drills on American soil, domestic surveillance, SWAT team raids, asset forfeiture, wrongful convictions, profit-driven prisons, corporate corruption, COVID mandates, and community-wide lockdowns, the need for a guardian of the people\u2019s rights has never been greater.<\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.zerohedge.com\/s3\/files\/inline-images\/GLM0011-Police-State_3.jpg?itok=opnOevrq\")
<\/picture><\/a><\/p>\n