Fourth Amendment gets reamed up the popo

As of today, if cops enter your home without being invited, and without a warrant, there’s nothing you can do. You have to let them in. At least in Indiana you do. Not India — Indiana. I thought Indiana was part of the United States of America. I also thought U.S. residents were protected from such unchecked police powers by the Fourth Amendment of the Bill of Rights. Not so, says the state’s Supreme Court.

Overturning a common law dating back to the English Magna Carta of 1215, the Indiana Supreme Court ruled Thursday that Hoosiers have no right to resist unlawful police entry into their homes. In a 3-2 decision, Justice Steven David writing for the court said if a police officer wants to enter a home for any reason or no reason at all, a homeowner cannot do anything to block the officer’s entry.

“We believe … a right to resist an unlawful police entry into a home is against public policy and is incompatible with modern Fourth Amendment jurisprudence,” David said. “We also find that allowing resistance unnecessarily escalates the level of violence and therefore the risk of injuries to all parties involved without preventing the arrest.”

David said a person arrested following an unlawful entry by police still can be released on bail and has plenty of opportunities to protest the illegal entry through the court system.

You too, chief Wiggum.

I have to believe, if only for my sanity, that higher courts will make absolute mincemeat of this foul decision.

Or it could go the other way, of course, and we’ll eventually have jurisprudence saying that we must make any badged trespassers a nice cup of cocoa and a turkey sandwich.

Explaining things, Part 2 – Force and Freedom

Over at the Agitator, guest blogger Peter Moskos wants libertarians to explain a few things to him. The Agitatortots have been answering him in the comments, but I thought it would be a good exercise to answer him here. A few days ago, I talked about why calling libertarianism an ideology isn’t helpful. Today, I want to focus on why libertarians so often think less government is the solution.

Here’s what Moskos said:

I don’t like it when people have answers before they know the question. …Perhaps less government is the solution to many specific problems. But I refuse to believe anything is the solution to all problems.

That seems like a sensible position.  I don’t think he’d get an argument from any libertarian, because libertarians are not the ones who believe that less government is the solution to all problems. Those would be anarchists.

(There’s a lot of overlap, but there’s a difference.)

However, once you begin to think about government like a libertarian, it’s amazing how often less government looks like a really good idea. It all starts here:

Government is not reason, it is not eloquence — it is force! Like fire, it is a dangerous servant and a fearful master.

— usually attributed to George Washington

Whether or not George Washington ever said those words, they are a summary of the libertarian concept of government: Government consists of the power to force people to do things against their will.

If pirates seize an American ship off the coast of Africa, the U.S. Navy might be called upon to take the ship back by force. If someone is breaking into your home, the police can force him to stop and take him (forcibly) to jail. If you’ve got a few ounces of marijuana in your car, the police can (under the right circumstances) force you to stop your car, force you to let them search, and force you into the back seat of their cruiser. Later, other agents of the government will force you to stand trial, and then force you to spend some time in a cage.

Even the most trivial of offenses is ultimately backed up by force. If you cover your house with a type of roofing tile that is not approved by the zoning board, they will tell you to change it. If you don’t, they will fine you. And if you refuse to pay the fines, armed police officers will come and take you away. And if you resist those officers, they will take you by force. Maybe even lethal force.

(Things rarely get that far, but sometimes they go a lot farther than you’d think, as in the case of the woman who was arrested for not watering her lawn.)

It is important to remember that every time we propose new crimes or new regulations, we are also proposing that these new crimes and regulations will be enforced by the threat of violence. From federal regulations on the volume of a toilet flush to a city’s ban on foie gras, it’s all backed up by the power to send men with guns to put people in a cage and take all their stuff. Every time we give the government more power over people, we’re giving it the power to take away someone’s freedom.

Consider even a seemingly altruistic law, such as the Americans with Disabilities Act. Some supporters of this law will tell you that the ADA has created new freedoms and opportunities for people with disabilities. That’s not really true. Except for a some small tax incentives, the ADA does not provide funding for improving accessibility, so all of the new freedoms and opportunities for people with disabilities have come from the businesses that were forced to provided them in order to comply with the ADA.

Actually, even that is overstating the benefits. The ADA does not force people to operate facilities that are easily accessible to disabled people. What it really does is forcibly prevent people from operating facilities that are not easily accessible to disabled people. It’s an important distinction, because the cost of retrofitting facilities (or meeting ADA operational requirements) can sometimes be so high that a firm has to cease business. Thus, rather than opening up the world to disabled people, the ADA sometimes closes the world to everybody.

Finally, and hardest for many people to accept as reality, even government programs that provide services or cash benefits — small-business assistance, aid to poor families, the national weather service, farm subsidies — ultimately depend on government force for the simple reason the everything the government does is paid for by taxes, and those taxes are collected under a threat of force.

Simply put, nearly every single government activity involves, either directly or indirectly, forcing people to do something they don’t want to do. Therefore nearly every single government activity takes away someone’s freedom.

That’s not always a bad thing, of course. Not even a libertarian would object to the government taking away the freedom of muggers to mug, rapists to rape, or murderers to murder. Many libertarians don’t even object to social programs that help the truly needy. Sometimes it’s worth trading off a little freedom to accomplish great social good, but only if there’s really and truly a great social good that will result.  That may not be the case, depending on the details of the situation.  However, when you give the government power, it there’s always a real true infringement of freedom.

The reverse must also be true. When you shrink the size of government, it might have a real cost, depending on the details, but it always, always has the built-in advantage of increasing somebody’s freedom.

Update: Part 3 is up.

Texas: Telling fish tales equals jail time

Texas legislators, who, like all politicians, despise fibbing, are coming down on a weighty issue: cheating in bass-fishing contests.

Telling tall tales may be a matter of pride in Texas. But it may soon be against state law to tell one about a fish. A bill that would make it a misdemeanor — and in some cases a felony — to misrepresent the size, weight or provenance of a fish in a fishing tournament arrived on Gov. Rick Perry’s desk on Wednesday, after passing the State Senate in a unanimous vote on Monday.

Lying about a fish could draw a serious sentence under the new law: two to ten years in prison, plus a fine of $10,000.

Less enlightened minds would probably say that it’s up to organizers and judges to enforce the rules of what are after all private (non-governmental) affairs — no special law needed. Tournament officials could simply disqualify a cheater, for instance, and perhaps kick him out for life if his fish tales were egregious enough.

But here at Nobody’s Business, we’re just glad — glad that the Lone Star State’s problems are so slight that dozens of elected officials were able to give fish-cheating their full legislative attention.

BONUS LINK: Meanwhile, children across Texas are waiting with bated breath for another pulse-quickening Senate accomplishment: kids’ trading cards of the 82nd Legislature.

Finding the balance

When I made my introductory post here at Nobody’s Business, I titled it “An Uncertain Libertarian.” The reason for my uncertainty was only briefly mentioned, largely implied, and had to do with the fear of an “overly” large government. As I wrote then, the question for my mind — and what caused me to call myself an “uncertain” libertarian — was “what does ‘overly’ mean?”

This is, after all, the burning question that all libertarians citizens have to face.

This is because the larger government becomes, the more power it has over our lives. And, as many have heard and anyone who pays attention even to their own selves will recognize, power has a tendency to corrupt. It’s probably hyperbole to state that in every case “absolute power corrupts absolutely.” Some of you may think, “Power wouldn’t corrupt me. I would use power for good and not for bad. I’m just not built to desire power for power’s sake.”

You might be right. There are no doubt rare individuals who could be benevolent dictators, exercising power responsibly. After all, there are all kinds of people in the world.

But that’s not the norm.

Even if we had a benevolent dictator, though, who set up an all-powerful government apparatus which she intended would only help her people, she would have to fill the positions in that government with other people. Keeping in mind “the norm” and given the odds, some of those people would find themselves corrupted by the power they were given to wield.

No matter how benevolent the aims of government, when government has too much power, freedom suffers. Which means that people who yearn to be free suffer. Actual people. One of them could be you, I don’t know.

So freedom-loving people, people who wish to make their own choices for their lives, have an interest in making sure that governmental power is limited. For those who wish to live self-directed lives, government must be kept as small as possible.

I am not at all convinced that anarchism — which I take to be the situation where there is no government — is a workable system, particularly for large populations of humans. This is because, speaking of “defects,” there are too many of us who are defective. Biological beings being what they are, some number of us are born with brains that are incapable of functioning correctly, let alone intelligently. Others, through no fault of their own, are exposed to horrific early life experiences which warp their personalities and make them dangerous to others.

And then, of course, there are just the natural differences of opinion which can lead to violence, both on a “domestic” level — here I’m deliberately mirroring the language of the Founders who, recognizing this same problem, attempted to form a government of limited powers to deal with these issues — and externally, from foreign powers.

Government, therefore, serves some necessary purpose. And that purpose, by itself, is not evil. Government is necessary: not a necessary evil.

But in the absence of a more complete explanation about the role of government, “as small as possible” suffers the same defect as “overly.” What, pray tell, does “as small as possible” mean?

“Dark Phoenix” left a comment to my most recent article prior to this one (“There’s a war for that”). You don’t really have to click the link if you don’t want. Here’s what Dark Phoenix said:

Maybe I’m just blind, but I only see two options: either the government regulates things, or it’s left to the free market to decide. I’d say in the case of universal health care, the latter has failed miserably.

The problem isn’t so much blindness, as a matter of setting up a kind of false dilemma (a.k.a., “false choice”). This comes about because there is an implied belief that universal health care is a necessity and, because it’s a necessity, someone or something has to regulate it. Apparently, the “free market” — which doesn’t really exist — is seen as failing miserably because universal health care doesn’t exist.

I’m willing to admit that universal health care would probably be A Good Thing™ (although this is going to create another one of those “what does ________ mean?” problems, where the _______, in this case, is “universal”). Being A Good Thing™, though, is not the same as being A Necessary Thing™, requiring government intervention, implementation, and regulation if someone or something else like, oh, let’s say the non-existent “free market,” fails to provide it.

My being a multi-billionaire without a financial care in the world is A Good Thing™, too. (Trust me on this one.) That doesn’t mean that if someone or something fails to provide it, the government should step in and ensure that I am, in fact, a multi-billionaire without a financial care in the world.

So the problem — the reason I started my Nobody’s Business blogging career with “An uncertain libertarian” — is to figure out just what it is that government should do and what it should not. My “uncertain libertarian” status comes from the fact that I — perhaps like a lot of you — have always focused my attention on the latter, while virtually ignoring the former. I have taken it for granted, as Dark Phoenix did, that government should be responsible for certain things. I still take it for granted that government should be responsible for certain things.

I am slowly realizing that we don’t really need government to be responsible for as many things as I previously thought.

For example, in California right now there is a big debate over high-speed rail. High-speed rail is one of those things that I think would be A Good Thing™, like universal health care, or my being a multi-billionaire without a financial care in the world. If high speed rail existed, I have no doubt I’d probably use it — at least once or twice, and more often if it turned out to be as cool as I think it might.

But California is also suffering a huge budgetary crisis right now, just as is the rest of the country. And high-speed rail is expensive.

Is high-speed rail necessary? Is it the sort of thing, without which, Californians would suffer greatly? I think not. We’ve managed fairly well without it for as long as California has existed. And, in fact, going back as far as there have been people in the part of the world which is now called “California,” high-speed rail has been pretty much completely unnecessary.

Moreover, as I said, if it existed, I might use it once or twice and maybe more often. So why should I be forced to pay for every run that it makes? Again, a cheeseburger is A Good Thing™ — hell, a cheeseburger is A Really Good Thing™ — but that doesn’t mean the government should make me buy you all one! (You’ll be happy to know that I’m not asking the government to force you to buy me one, either.)

This, I begin to think, provides a yardstick for measuring the responsibility of government. Government should provide that which is necessary, and nothing more. Government should have just enough power to do that which is necessary, and nothing more.

I begin to find myself feeling less uncertain about my libertarianism.

Smoking links

• “Don’t think of a giant blue baboon!”

Too late. A picture of a giant blue baboon just flashed through your mind. Likewise, reminding smokers they may not light up inevitably makes them think of smoking, and increases their craving for tobacco, a study from Oxford University suggests. Money quote:

[Researcher Brian] Earp hasn’t done a followup study yet, but he theorizes that this ironic effect might apply to a lot of public campaigns designed to discourage actions: Don’t do drugs, don’t drink and drive.

• Michael B. Siegel criticizes New York’s impending ban on outdoor smoking, and notes that

…the surgeon general’s statement conflates the temporary negative effects of secondhand smoke on the circulatory system, which have been shown to occur with short-term exposure, with heart disease, a process that requires repeated exposure and recurring damage to the coronary arteries. It also conflates one-time DNA damage, which occurs with any carcinogenic exposure, with cancer risk, which likewise generally requires repeated exposure.

Why is Siegel’s opposition to New York’s outdoor-smoking ban relevant? Because Siegel, a professor at Boston University’s School of Health, has spent the last 25 years advocating smoking bans. This one, he says, is based on misunderstandings of the science (at best) or on the propagation of outright falsehoods (at worst).  The upshot:

In trying to convince people that even transient exposure to secondhand smoke is a potentially deadly hazard, smoking opponents risk losing scientific credibility. The antismoking movement has always fought with science on its side, but New York’s ban on outdoor smoking seems to fulfill its opponents’ charge that the movement is being driven instead by an unthinking hatred of tobacco smoke.

• Via the Google Wayback machine, this random smoking-related article from 1978:

A top government scientist says smokers can consume a pack a day of some new cigarettes on the market “without apparent risk.” “We don’t want to call them safe. We don’t think there is such a thing. But some are so low (in tar and other toxic substances) as to pose no observable hazard,” says Gio Batta Gori, head of the smoking and health program at the National Institutes of Health. The tobacco industry has developed these new cigarettes with the help of millions of dollars in government research funds. [emphasis mine]

The smokes Mr. Batta Gori talked about are the mentholated kind. Up to 23 Carlton Menthol cigarettes a day, he told the Associated Press, would constitute tolerable (presumably non-damaging) levels of tar and toxins.

Today, mentholated cigarettes are on the verge of being banned, courtesy of the same government that once spent a fortune on bringing them into the world.

Porn explodes. Rape Declines. Any questions?

Help! Violent porn fiends are everywhere! Fucker all your oripices (eek, spoonerism; I meant pucker all your orifices), ’cause these pervs want to forcibly act out their disgusting fantasies on you!

Extreme sexual fantasies are being normalised because of the rise in deviant pornography on the internet, psychologists have warned. Researchers now believe there is a ‘causal link’ between the rise in explicit images available online and an increase [in] extreme illegal behaviour in real life.

That’s a claim from England’s Daily Mail newspaper, repeated pretty much verbatim in other fine publications, like the Telegraph and the Times of India.

What is this “extreme illegal behavior” that is reportedly on the increase? The Daily Mail doesn’t say, and neither do the editorial copycats elsewhere. Read the article for yourself and marvel at how insidiously and glibly it suggests that rape and other types of sexual assault are on the rise without actually stating so.

The reason it isn’t stated outright is probably that it doesn’t happen to be true. At least not in the United States. Here’s a quick overview of twenty years’ worth of crime data, 1990–2009, courtesy of the FBI. As you can see, the incidence of forcible rape decreases year after year, even though two factors might have suggested to the casual observer that it should be going up. To wit: the fact that the population increased by 23% over that period (which ought to result in proportionally more sex crimes), and the fact that the availability of both plain-vanilla and ‘deviant’ porn has absolutely exploded after the arrival of the Internet in appr. 1993.

But in an irrefutable and long-term trend, rape in fact dropped by no less than thirty percent. Which is reason for rejoicing, not panicking.

Is the picture somehow much more ambiguous or dramatic in the U.K.? It might be, but the Daily Mail isn’t saying, providing not even a glimpse of the data that lay behind the more-porn-equals-more-illegality meme. Instead, the paper quotes two psychologists, Tim Jones and David Wilson, whose research is

…based around a series of interviews with a convicted paedophile named ‘James’ who is serving a 14-year sentence for numerous sexual offences involving children.

And that’s it. Messrs. Jones and Wilson have a sample group of one porn aficionado — who would also seem to be a bit unrepresentative because he (a) committed a series of sex crimes, and (b) targeted children. On James’s apparent say-so, Dr. Jones feels qualified to opine that

‘The internet is fuelling more extreme fantasies and the danger is that they could be played out in real life.”

Which isn’t an erroneous statement, per se — sure there’s a danger that someone, somewhere, will play out extreme fantasies in real life. With or without internet porn. (In his youth, serial killer Dennis Rader dreamed about tying up and assaulting Mouseketeer Annette Funicello; maybe social scientists should look into the link between vapid Disney shows and sexual violence?)

The question is not, could Tim Jones’s scenario ever happen? The question is, does it happen in statistically significant numbers that can withstand five seconds of scrutiny, and that clearly point to a causal link between porn and crime?

And the answer is: Judging by the preponderance of evidence, nope, it still doesn’t.

The real harm of Kinder Eggs

One of the advantages of being a mother in Germany versus a mother in America is that my kids get to enjoy the yum-fun of the Kinder Egg. Unfortunately, the fear of being slapped with a $250 fine — or worse, getting groped by a Homeland Security agent as I smuggle them in from a trip abroad — was never worth the yum or the fun when I lived in the States.

As ridiculous as it may seem, way back when blacks were still unequal, women were more second class than today, and “organic” food on the table was the norm, the U.S. passed the Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act of 1938, which “prohibits the embedding of non-food items completely enclosed inside food items, unless the non-edible part has a functioning value. For example a lollipop or popsicle stick is not edible but is a useful handle. This law was originally put into place to prevent the addition of hazardous items to processed food and has never been changed.” [link]

Of course, since then, we’ve begun putting all kinds of processed crap into our food, masking it as necessary preservatives and additives.

According to CNN, “last year, Customs and Border Protection seized 25,000 of them [Kinder Eggs] in 1,700 incidents.” Wow, 25,000 chocolate eggs gone. We’ve got all those starving children across the globe who’d be happy with a bowl of sticky rice …. and we’re throwing away a chocolate egg with a toy inside? I just want to know what Customs does with the eggs. We know the pleasure police burn weed and then (apparently) run for cover, but 25,000 eggs is a lot of chocolate to swallow. Worse than filling landfills with empty waste, they create trenches in the development and nurture of simple childhood pleasures for a society, of opportunities for a momentary joy where a little bit of chocolate and a small toy was enough to be happy about.

As far as I’m concerned, a world without Kinder Eggs is a world to be depressed about.

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P.S.  Hmm. Maybe customs officials are cracking down on Kinder Eggs because they can apparently be used as pot-smuggling vessels.

Explaining things, Part 1 – Ideology

Over at the Agitator, guest blogger Peter Moskos wants libertarians to explain a few things to him. The Agitatortots have been answering him in the comments, but I thought it would be a good exercise to answer him here.

Despite being a fan of tax-and-spend government policies and income redistribution, I’m also sympathetic to small government (yes, I walk a narrow line).

But I’m not fond of ideologies. I don’t like it when people have answers before they know the question. So why shouldn’t libertarianism be dismissed as just another ideology.

Maybe it would help Moskos if he used a word he liked more than ideology. He should try calling it a worldview, or a set of principles. He may not be fond of ideologies, but how does he feel about people who have principles?

Really, I hate it when pundits and politicians dismiss their opponents as ideologues, as if having consistent principles was a bad thing. Consistency is not enough — your principles should meet other criteria as well — but it’s simplistic to criticize them merely for having them.

Perhaps less government is the solution to many specific problems. But I refuse to believe anything is the solution to all problems. I’m willing to accept (or at least debate) libertarian positions on any policy issue. I’m not willing to consider libertarianism as the Correct Ideology.

If Moskos doesn’t think libertarianism is the correct solution to everything, does he have anything to suggest as a replacement? Perhaps some alternatives that work better under circumstances where libertarianism fails? Or does Moskos sees himself as a practical problem solver who disdains theories and abstractions and tries to figure out the right thing to do in each specific case. Economist Paul Krugman has a name for people like that. He calls them “accidental theorists.”

The Accidental Theorist is someone who claims to understand a problem, and even proposes policies to solve it, free from the strictures of abstractions and theories, basing his thinking only on simple observation and common sense. But anyone who proposes to solve a problem, or who even claims to have a simple description of a problem, is almost certainly working from a theory of some kind. Unless the synapses of their brains are firing at random, they almost have to be engaging in some sort of repeatable mental process which leads them to propose the solutions they do.

The problem with an accidental theory is that it’s a one-off, a theory with a single advocate who barely acknowledges that he has a theory, and who therefore has not fully explored it, let alone stated it in ways that other people can understand and help to analyze. Such a poorly described and tested theory is unlikely to be superior to a more explicit theory that has been explored by many people.

Note that there’s a difference between an Accidental Theorist and someone who merely doesn’t have an all-purpose theory. Those of us in the latter category admit to problem areas where our theories and principles do not provide satisfying answers — we don’t have the Libertarian Theory of Everything — but by exploring those areas, we hope to improve our ideas. The Accidental Theorist, on the other hand, refuses to admit that he has a theory or that one is even necessary.

Update: Part 2 is up.

Keynes vs. Hayek, Round 2

It seems to me that since we’re calling ourselves “libertarian,” someone ought to post the sequel to last year’s Keynes vs. Hayek rap video, “Fear the Boom and Bust”. (My favorite part is when Hayak unexpectedly stumbles upon a copy of Keynes’s General Theory.)

After you’ve see the first one, check out the new one, “Fight of the Century”. It’s got better production values, including better sets, more actors and extras, and most important, better mustaches.

Professional economists might differ with the video makers on the apparent strengths of each side of the debate, but as far as I can tell, both of these videos are pretty accurate in their depictions of these alternative approaches to managing the macroeconomy (or not).

On the need to understand anti-porn morality

I don’t understand how some people can be so obsessed with with pornography. I’m not talking about people who watch it, I’m talking about people who do things like this:

Morality in Media announced today the mobilization of its War on Illegal Pornography coalition in a three-day effort to flood the U. S. Attorney General with calls asking that he enforce existing U.S. obscenity laws.

Why? Just…why?

Some people like to watch movies of other people having sex. In a free market, this naturally means that some people will get into the business of having sex on camera. We’re not talking about child pornography or sex slavery. Everyone, from the sexual performers to the producers to the distributors to the viewers, is doing it of their own free will. And some people think they deserve to go to jail for that.

Looking around the Morality in Media website, I can understand some of the things they’re concerned about. Parents want the ability to control their children’s access to online pornography. The standard libertarian response is that parents should take responsibility for supervising their children online. That’s little comfort to a busy parent, and given the increasingly ubiquitous presence of the internet in our lives, it’s not realistic to assume parents will be able to supervise every second of their children’s access to the net. I don’t think that censoring what adults have access to is a good response, but I can at least understand why these people are concerned.

But what sort of craziness makes people like Morality in Media President Robert Peters say things like this:

While there is a difference between soft-core and hard-core pornography, both are still pornography, and what pornography does is sexually arouse and enslave those who view it.

“Enslave those who view it”? WTF? I guess that’s the sort of BS you have to make yourself believe if you want to criminalize a consensual act.

In my libertarian corner of the world, these people are obviously nutcases and self-important busybodies trying to restrict other people’s freedom and impose their morality by force. Merely pointing that out to them, however, is unlikely to change their minds. Their world view is radically different from mine, and if I want to advocate my view to them, I’m going to have to understand them first.

(Hat tip: Richard Abowitz)

Pretty much the definition of ‘sobering’

Do you know who was the last President that didn’t engage in overseas warfare? Hoover. The last 13 Presidents and 44 Congresses — with every permutation of Republicans and Democrats you can imagine — have all steadily cultivated the military-industrial complex that has shed the blood of innumerable innocent individuals that we blithely refer to as “collateral damage”.

I’m hardly a MoveOn supporter or a Code Pink aficionado — and besides, protesting our foreign wars is so quaint these days. Even the enthusiastic hard-left wannabe peaceniks seem to be saving their ire and indignation for the next Republican president. [pdf] A pox on them. But: salient point. 13 Presidents. 44 Congresses. Even without the little lecture about the military-industrial complex and the blood of innocents, that fact is due some reflection. [link]

Law and lawlessness

Tommy Adams, who was the sheriff of Carter County, Missouri, for the past two years,

…rarely met with community leaders or showed up at the office, where paperwork piled high on his desk. He delegated to his chief deputy, who worried about his strange behavior. Mr. Adams began spending conspicuously, buying cars, building a cabin and paying for the in vitro fertilization that led to the birth, eight months ago, of his son. Like many people around here, he had grown up poor. He declared bankruptcy in 2005, with just $5 in cash and $300 in the bank. And even though his new $37,000 salary, on top of his wife’s pay as a nurse, represented good money in an area where the median household income is $27,000, his spending raised eyebrows.

Turns out that — according to prosecutors and witnesses — Mr. Adams was distributing crystal meth, as well as burglarizing homes and selling guns from the evidence room.

“A sheriff don’t have to answer to nobody,” claims a local resident, almost sympathetically.

We’ll see about that.