One of the ways you know you live in a police state is when the police exempt themselves from the law and enforce made-up laws on the populace without any repercussions.
For instance, legal tender laws.
They define as legal tender “United States coins and currency” for “all debts, public charges, taxes and dues” (Federal Coinage Act of 1965).
It says so, right on the money.
Billy Spaulding of Manchester, NH discovered that this law can be ignored by the same police who issued him a ticket for violating another law.
One they approved of and so enforce.
Spaulding received a parking ticket for parking too near a fire hydrant. It is against the law.
But when he showed up at the county clerk’s office to pay the $75 fine, as per the law, the clerk would not accept payment. Which Spaulding attempted to make using pennies.
Which may be inconvenient for the clerk. But legal tender, nonetheless. The law is the law. Except when it isn’t.
“You’re not paying it like this,” the irritated clerk told Spaulding. And proceeded to call in a squadron of cops to enforce this violation of the law.
The cops showed up and instead of correcting the clerk as to the law, informing him that while it might be a hassle to count out $75 in pennies, the law is that pennies are money and just as valid under the law as paper money.
The clerk’s refusal to accept lawful money absolves Spaulding of any further obligation to pay.
Or should have.
He made the attempt; his payment was refused.
But that’s not the way it goes, no matter what the law is.
How about if Spaulding had reached into the clerk’s till and snatched a handful of pennies? Wouldn’t that be theft as much as if he’d grabbed a handful of dollar bills? Are we to believe the cops would not have arrested him on the spot for stealing pennies? Would the charges have been less serious? Would the judge, at sentencing, have said: Oh, he only took pennies; no big deal. You are free to go . . . ?
So why is using pennies to pay a debt any less valid under the law?
The answer is, it isn’t.
But that doesn’t matter when you haven’t got the gun and the badge. When you do, the law is whatever you want it to be.
So the cops – rather than ensuring that Spaulding’s legal right to pay his fine using legal tender was respected – began to harass Spaulding, who had committed no crime. “You don’t have a bank account?” one of them asks. His partner says something about the clerk not having a coin counter.
Which is immaterial.
Pennies, like dimes and quarters, are are “coins” – money – duly issued by the U.S. Mint and per the law are legal tender for “all debts, public charged, taxes and dues.”
Like it or not.
Except when the enforcers of the law – and puckish government bureaucrats – decide they do not like the law.
Including the law that it’s legal to film public servants in public.
The Manchester cops sicced on Spaulding by the annoyed county clerk did not like that Spaulding’s friend was video recording the encounter and ordered him to shut off the camera based on the non-law that “you have to advise us” if you’re recording. Which is not the law. Indeed, is contrary to the law – which states that there is no expectation of privacy in a public area and it is absolutely legal to video record government workers – this includes cops and clerks – out in public performing their “official duties.” The courts – including the Supreme Court – have affirmed this, repeatedly.
Nonetheless, the cops shut down the video – using threats and intimidation, which is assault under the law.
Were they arrested?
No, of course not. Notwithstanding that their assault is on video and not debatable. Yet if a citizen committed exactly the same legal offense, he’d have been arrested. Try it yourself and see. Go up to a cop and insist that he turn off his camera – and back that up with a clear threat that you will take it if he does not.
Tell a cop writing you a ticket that what he’s doing isn’t legal (even though it is) and refuse to accept the ticket, as the clerk refused to accept Spaulding’s money. Everyone knows what will happen because everyone knows there is a double standard. The law isn’t even the law. It is whatever those who enforce it decide they think it is.
Law enforcement isn’t expected to know the law – and self-exempts itself from the law. We, on the other hand, are expected to obey whatever they say, regardless of the law.
One of the ironies of this particular encounter is that Spaulding is a former Marine, who (ostensibly) was “fighting for our freedoms.” He received a stern lesson about what he actually fought for.
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Oink , oink , there is the “Law ” and there is the ” La ” unfortunately the ” La ” is what most precincts practice. The “La ” has a lot of latitude if you are well connected or the CA or Judge has a grudge against.you, your ass is grass if they don’t like you . The trouble with coins is, they are not fiat money
AHhhhh, freedom! (As long as you have the time and money to fight for every little nugget of it through the courts for 12 years, every one of the multiple times per day your “freedom” is abridged….)
And of course, the leftist media always remains silent instead of reporting the thousands of similar attrocities which are perpetrated by the pigs every day- or if they dare to report on one of them, they twist it in such a way so as to make the pigs look good and the citizen look like a nut/dangerous criminal. (Unless of course the victim is a nut or criminal, who happens to be a “minority”, like a black or a fag- as these are the only people who have rights anymore.)
I guess he fought for the freedom to be able to attempt to pay in pennies and be refused, therefore being free from the obligation!
Any cop can arrest you for anything. They don’t have to prove at the time of arrest that you did anything wrong. They can just accuse you of doing something wrong. It’s then up to the courts. That “speedy trial” and the night in the cooler is payback for not doing what they say. And if the DA wants to gin up a bunch of charges that will improve his conviction stats, well, that’s OK too. As long as you’re found guilty of something that makes it all worthwhile.
Texas law “once ” stated once the attempt had been made to pay a debt if payment was refused then the party that refused had lost it’s right for prompt payment. There was nothing in that law that distinguished civil or criminal nor any other factor.
Just one more reason I despise cops, prosecutors, judges, lawyers and their corrupt “Just Us” theft system. And that includes anyone, especially bail bondsmen.
Ditto, Eight…
I especially despise that most of them wear those “tough guy” sunglasses and never take them off. They’re not even man enough to look their victims in the eye.
eric, the hubris of the judges have become quite infamous. So many of that “judging” set are nothing more than politicians with the most, generally, corrupt backing, with no knowledge of law and no interest, just small-minded tyrants ready to do the will of the ultimate tyrants, the banksters. It was obvious the Con stitution was dead as the flat rodent on the road when the Supremes ruled a corporation was the same as an individual.
It’s rotten from the top on down.
All three branches of govt have wildly exceeded all legal bounds.
Now Trump has popped his neocon cherry and bombed Syria.
Don’s transformation from Skywalker to Vader to Palpatine begins.
Where is a good man to be found in this cardboard currency dumpster dive of wet garbage paper promises?
Tor, damned ifn you didn’t sum it up toot sweet. The thought of all the scum of mankind stealing every good thing the people of this country produce and the lies they tell so many eat up makes me want to scrub the slime off just from witnessing it…..and then sit down at the reloading bench and spare no powder.
The “Deep state” takes care of anyone who wants to change the system. I’m imagining the CIA had a security briefing with Trump (and Obama, Bush 2 (or poppy just had a little father-son chat), and maybe Clinton although he was probably on board long before the election) about how things are as the CIA sees it. And there was probably some guy in the back of the oval office, just sitting there not saying a word. At the end of the meeting, that guy walks up to the president, hands him a manila folder and walks off. Suddenly Trump gets in line and starts playing ball.
Of course this is all just speculation, but remember that everyone has something or someone they care deeply about. The CIA has no qualms about assignations, overthrowing dictators or anything else. Uncle has destroyed entire nations more than a few times (hello Native Americans), and I’m sure there are people in power who not only know how to do it, but actually get their rocks off doing it. Showing the president they have the ability to “get to” whatever he loves and cover their tracks well enough to eliminate blame is what they do. It is their job.
Well said Eric_G, JFK was the only one to actually threaten the CIA, so they took him out just to be sure everyone knew who was really in charge. Trump seemed a bit slow to get onboard so they probably took him aside for a private screening of the Zapruder film and voila, now suddenly he’s jumped with both feet into the “swamp” he promised to drain.
Hi Mike,
This Syria business reeks. Why would Assad use chemical weapons now ? Why does Trump suddenly care?
Might it have something to do with his failure to do anything about repealing Obamacare?
Hey, look! Syria! Enemies of Freedom! Forget about that Obamacare stuff…
War is a great distraction, especially for the morons that constitute the vast portion of the citizenry of the United States (present company obviously excluded).
The American people, on the whole, LOVE war and they almost always line up (at least initially) to support any president who wages it.
It really is pretty disgusting when I’ve tried to explain to people why we shouldn’t be bombing ANY foreign country and all they can come back with is how “proud” they our that our President “took action”.
(sigh)
It’s the reason I’ve pretty much given up on the Republic that was once called The United States of America.
Enjoy your pieces, Eric. Keep up the good work.
Amen and ditto!
Hi Eric, from what I’ve read online (Paul Craig Roberts especially) it was most likely a false flag attack since as you pointed out Assad has no reason to attack with chemical weapons. Trump gets to prove he’s a tough guy while John McInsane and his buttboy Lindsey Graham cheer him on. Sigh…why can’t everybody just mind their own damn business; I just hope if they piss off the Russians too much they only nuke D.C. And leave the rest of us alone.
Give ’em a reward if they nuke DC! It’d be like a two-for-one sale: Take out the scummy politicians, and get the ghetto-dwelling criminal BLM DC inhabitants too!
Man! If only!
eric, the very reason I was suspect of Trump giving a damn about people he’s never known, had any real dealings with nor has a clue as to their frustrations, hopes nor anything else about them……and why he would care. Now we see he’s just another of the predator class. If Hitlery hadn’t been such an obvious member of the same crew and almost any virtual unknown had run against him he wouldn’t have had a chance.
Something wicked this way comes.
Yep. We all suspected Donald was full of it as soon as he started picking a bunch of Neocons and Jews for his cabinet/appointees.
Surround yourself with warmongers and Jews, and it’s obvious that you intend to fight wars, and especially those for Israel.
Increase spending on the military and the pigs…. you know know the plan isn’t to pick daisies.
Whatever happened to the love for Putin?; The good relations with Russia? The dumping of NATO? The prosecution of hitlery? The repeal of Obozocare? The stopping the entry of Muslims? (They’re still flowing in unabated); The tax reform?
Not in office three months yet, and he’s porked all of his supporters up the virtual ass already!
Hitlery said she’d bomb Syria the day she got in, if elected. So ya vote for the alternative, and he does the very same freaking thing!
More lies and false flags…..
ALL of the states need to secede! The Federal government is obsolete and is doing nothing but destroying us!!!!!
This is why I don’t vote! No accountability- they can do whatever they want.
Serve the bastid right if they impeach him for doing this without Congressional approval- Yes, our last several presidents have done the same with impunity, but since “they” hate the Trumpster so much, they just might take advantage of this opportunity- not that it would make any difference one way or the other.
Disgusting!
Remember when Johnny Carson was supporting Goldwater? ‘They’ all told him “You can’t vote for him, we’ll end up bombing North Viet Nam. And he said, “But I voted for him anyway, and sure enough, we ended up bombing North Viet Nam”
Morning, Nunzio!
A big part of the problem, of course, is that many millions of Americans yearn to spill the blood of foreigners. Not themselves, of course. They just like to have it done and then beat their chests. It is like fuuuuhhhhhhhhhhhhhtttttttttttttball.
“We” won, you see.
Top O’ the mornin’ to ya, Eric! [Hey, wait…I’m not Irish!]
So true! And they can fool ’em EVERY time- without fail- just invent a cause; some supposed atrocity or phony threat, and the morons can’t sign up fast enough to “go shoot them forners”- having completely forgotten [or just not caring] about how every war in recent history was predicated upon lies- but hey, their friends, parents and neighbors will herald them as “heroes” who were “fighting for our freedom” [and if we don’t like it, we should move to N. Korea, they’ll say…], and they may even make a few more cents than working at the local factory running the machine that molds butt plugs, so what the hey?
At some point [and probably very soon] a few countries who really do have WMDs are going to get together and nuke us out of existence. I think that is the only way this will ever end.
This is why I’m glad I don’t vote, too- ’cause if I did, I’d be complicit in this BS- having giving my assent to the jerks who are perpetrating it. (And boy would feel stupid about now, seeing virtually all of the campaign promises abandoned already)
Indeed, Eight.
What are we to do?
Grab the sides of your seats. It’s going to be a rough ride…
eric, I’d say get ready to bail and go to ground. And keep in mind there’s never enough staples, as in food ,fuel, ammo and the ability to produce more of all of it.
Knights were never people to be revered, only to be feared by the masses since they only did wet work for the highest bidder. In thousands of years nothing has changed but the non-stop rhetoric of mass media trying to brainwash those who will listen that somehow the badged thugee is their superior, THE reason the thoroughly brainwashed and hypocrite crowd attempt to disarm those with the ability to produce without supervision and defend themselves and their own…..
Very well and concisely said, 8! That’s pretty much a summation of human history post Patriarchal times. Since then, it’s just been eternal warfare, coercion, taxation and legalized thievery; and most media, “education” and politics are just about trying to rationalize and legitimatize those things. And now, thanks to technology, it’s all coming together under one banner on a worldwide scale. Only God can put an end to it, because throughout history, none have ever relinquished power once it has been established; it is only expanded or transfered to others. The tide of tyranny only flows one way.
Excuse me eric but this is the closest place for me to reply to Nunzio.
What has now changed and made the situation nearly impossible to change by means other than a terrible, ,horrific situation that will kill untold numbers of people if not destroy mankind is the creation of the corporation, a construct of the most greedy, evil people using the politics of the Just Us system to marry politics, religion and the fairly recent banking system able to control virtually the entire world right down to the shittiest little laws that legally make the henchmen worth more than those they rule with an iron hand, the legal placing of those henchmen in such a special category an innocent, righteous man can’t even defend himself against them without incurring punishment specially reserved for non badged populace.
It’s only getting worse as witnessed by more legislation put forth every time a badged thug is killed by a mundane. It’s already capital punishment in most states to kill a badged one by a non badged one. But every time this happens a plethora of bills are submitted for vote that will accomplish what? Will it become possible to legalize laws to make torture to death the new way? Will the public get to see ongoing torture for as long as the convicted continues to live? It was popular a millenia ago and longer. Have people really changed? I fear rivers of blood and tens or hundreds of millions of people will perish before we have an answer. …if then. Bring on the parades . Like war, individual public deaths are profitable for the populace. …with the exception of the condemned and family. Twist in the wind
Morning, Eight!
Well, a large portion of the public cheered the use of torture as official state policy under The Chimp, so I have no doubt that these same people would support torture as punishment for anyone who harms a “hero.”
I am amazed, continually, that so many do not see the parallels. When the state begins to refer to its enforcers as “heroes” and the public doesn’t react with outrage – or ridicule – then you know they’re ripe for what’s coming.
Ah, the utter irony of these times! The moronic masses approve of torture [I think it started under the Bush, actually]…and so they get tortured by armies of domestic sadists, who avoid the Constitutional prohibition against using the military on our own soil, by simply changing the label to “police”. Just like how our fathers approved of the income and Social Security taxes “on the rich” [It’s so easy to approve of something when it only harms “those other people”- the group of which you are not a member] and in so doing, ended up enslaving themselves and their children.
See a pattern here?
What the morons wish to impose on others, gets imposed on them. Unfortunately, it gets imposed on us, too.
I’ve been reading that mostly ignored by the mainstream media the Trump government has been going after pedophiles and the like. So it is my guess that the deep state is learning how to push Trump’s buttons to get what it wants.
The usual tactics didn’t work but these very simple emotional manipulations by setting a frame of dead children apparently do. I don’t think of Trump as being savvy to how these things are done and how low those in government will stoop. They won’t just make it look like children were killed, they’ll kill them to blame it on someone else to get Trump to do what they want done if they have to.
They’ll kill em? So what has happened since fire bombing Germany is in some way different?
The whole point of war since “The Big One ” has been power and mainly, profit….and always has been. Nothing’s changed in thousands of years.
The various presidents, of the entire world, have, almost to the last person, almost always been for the same reasons
Major religion has always been the sociopaths seeking power and riches
And yes, people who aren’t sociopaths will be the victims.
Ready to gun up and turn this shit around? Become a soldier, understand you’re already dead and leave your children to take on after you and change the world and pay with their lives too?
That’s what it will take. ..unfortunately. But that’s the way it’s always been. peace, b
Hi Brent,
My take: Trump is frustrated because he lost on Obamacare and very much wants to be perceived as “getting things done.” This gives him something to say he got done.
Eric, I think the Trumpster knew exactly what he was doing, as evidenced by the fact that he was surrounding himself with Neocons, Zionists and others from the military-industrial complex from the very beginning. He just had the sense during his campaign to appeal to the average joe who was tired of all the usual BS.- and he knew what they wanted to hear, and pressed all of the right buttons.
Hear hear Nunzio, Trump’s always known what he wanted and had enough sense to not say it.
Before Trump was married this last time he was asked if Hillary would come would attend. He said she would, like others would, because he gave them money, simply a matter of buying obedience.
The point about the payment in pennies here is: The pennies do not have to be accepted as payment of the debt – however, the party owed the debt can not refuse legal tender and also claim non-payment. Best of all, the refusal of the legal tender payment is on video.