“The American people will never knowingly adopt Socialism. But under the name of ‘liberalism’ they will adopt every fragment of the Socialist program, until one day America will be a Socialist nation, without knowing how it happened.”

Socialist Party presidential candidate Norman Thomas


Monday, March 14, 2011

The unreasonable creep of the police state

In Australia, two men were arrested after cops observed them "behaving suspiciously", searched their suitcases, and seized the $2.5million they were carrying.

I'll bet the US police have the same "suspicious behavior" standard that the Aussies have.
Questions if this happened in the US: Why is it illegal to carry around a lot of money? What constitutes "suspicious behavior" to the point that it justifies a personal search? What evidence do the cops have that the money is illegal? Don't the cops have to show reasonable cause before they confiscate for themselves, money belonging to other people?

This is the problem that I have with the $10,000 banking transaction law. If you deposit, withdraw, or otherwise make a transaction of 10K or more, there is automatically a red flag with the IRS goons as well as law enforcement that allows them to investigate you for the possibility of you being a drug dealer. You don't have to have done anything wrong. Merely the handling or possession of a lot of cash constitutes reasonable cause in the US now. I think that's wrong.

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