Rangers in the West whose cattle have traversed rights of way over federal lands for in excess of a century, have suddenly come to realize that they are being held guilty for the first time of trespass on those federal lands and ordered to pay huge fines. A trespass is deemed to occur every time a calf, a cow, or a bull takes a step onto federal property off of the right of way. Not good about following street signs, cattle on the move rarely stay in their lanes. BLM and Park Service agents perch with binoculars from high points and aircraft, photographing every trespass, monitoring the brands on the cattle, and then circling back to impose fines on unsuspecting ranchers.
Folks who own cherry orchards come to find out from professors at the university that certain kinds of tart cherries contain high levels of antioxidants and other biochemicals that are effective in reducing the symptoms of arthritis. They give that information, including the studies, to customers who buy cherry juice. Agents of the Food and Drug Administration visit them unannounced, inspect their farms, demand their literature, and inform them that they must stop telling people of the effects of cherries and cherry juice on arthritis or their cherries will be deemed unapproved new drugs. The farmers can then be charged with selling unapproved drugs, sentenced to jail terms, and lose their farms.
Dairy farmers who harvest fresh milk from healthy cows and share it with neighbors or make it available to health food stores come to realize that several federal and state agencies, doing the bidding for large milk processors, will prosecute them because their milk is not pasteurized, without regard to the fact that the milk is healthy and contaminant free.
Parents who home school their children and elect not to obtain vaccinations for them, choosing to avoid any risk of injury from vaccines while simultaneously not exposing their children to public school environments, are surprised to learn that state health authorities insist that they vaccinate their children against their will, despite the fact that they pose no material risk of disease transmission to the general population.
Parents of a child dying of cancer are informed by attending oncologists that they can do nothing to save the child. The parents take their child to a clinic that offers an experimental drug for the cancer in question. The child takes the drug, begins to experience a reduction in tumors throughout his body. The parents are then informed that the FDA has determined that the child is ineligible to receive the experimental drug and must return to the failed regimen previously rejected by the parents and their attending oncologists.
A single mother who lives in the city and has two school age children decides after a second break-in to her home that she must arm herself. Delighted that she has maimed an intruder and stopped the break-ins, her delight turns to a feeling of helplessness when police arrest her and charge her with use of excessive force. She discovers that her successful use of her weapon to defend her home and children has resulted in a criminal prosecution for excessive force and a civil prosecution by the one she maimed for negligence, both entertained by the courts rather than dismissed. She ends up incurring huge legal bills, continues to suffer break-ins, and is sentenced to community service that forces her to leave her school age children alone at home for several hours each day.
A border patrol agent in pursuit of illegals who have crossed the border without authorization discharges his weapon and kills one in the course of that alien resisting arrest. The agent is prosecuted, convicted, fired, and given a life sentence.
These are all true examples of a bloated, all-consuming regulatory state that replaces a system of ordered justice with one of bureaucratic efficiency and that replaces respect for the rights of man and the rule of law with expansion of agency control over every aspect of enterprise.
Read Jonathan W. Emord’s whole article!
In Christ Free 