hilker:

Pastor beaten and tasered by Border Patrol agents at an ‘Internal US Checkpoint’ for refusing a search - i’m not going to say this guy was the coolest cucumber around and that he couldn’t have just answered the questions. but then again, he was in no way obligated to answer his questions. looks like a trend is developing. i’m sure this kind of thing has happened before and that we’re only now hearing about it, but that doesn’t make it any less disturbing.

Few thoughts:

1.  It’s tempting to respond, “Don’t be a jerk, just let them search your car.”  But isn’t this sad, that we view people who want to exercise their constitutional rights as jerks?  If it weren’t for jerks, we wouldn’t have any constitutional rights.

2.  For my liberal friends:  If this were done to a peace activist during the Bush administration, wouldn’t some on the left argue that the activist was being singled out because of his political views.  Couldn’t someone on the right just as plausibly suggest that this pastor was singled out by the Obama administration because of his religious views?   And isn’t either argument pretty dumb?  People are oppressed no matter who is in power, and it’s not because there is an enemy list at the White House—it’s because we’ve declared war on drugs and on illegal immigration, and that makes the entire country a battlefield and everyone a suspect.

3.  I don’t know whether the agents were actually laughing as he bled, but it seems plausible, doesn’t it?  And the fact that it seems plausible says much about the regular exercise of government power.

4.  He’ll lose his case, I suspect, because dogs can’t talk.  I wish they could, because they’d be less likely to lie than man.

Source: hilker

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