Originally Posted by wow

wibbly,

there's the whole innocent til proven guilty concept that "used" to be enshrined as a pillar of american justice.
Being innocent depends upon the defendant's skin color, gender, sexual orientation and wealth. The same goes for the jury or Judge now days!

Whether or not the jury is impartial or not is another issue, certainly not unimportant, but a bit tangent to this discussion. The fact is, their confiscation of your property before you've had your time in court is a violation of your rights, punishment without your day in court is unconstitutional. Especially considering that if you're guilty, you face punishment, if you're innocent, you have to fight to get your property back.. it's almost, could it be.. double jeopardy.

police dept's ability to confiscate (all) your property, one of the cornerstones of what the founders of america fought against britain to gain has gone the way of the dodo.
If the cops find drugs, they will do these things.

Funny thing, something that harms very few people.. why don't they do this to people who commit stock fraud, for example the Enron folks (oh wait they were rich and white). All it takes is a simple differentiating concept, oh, terrorist, oh druggy, oh (___ insert pejorative terms) and all of a sudden people conveniently forget that the constituion applies to everyone.


Criminals don't deserve a break, but they do deserve, like any other person accused of a crime, their turn in court, in front of a jury of their peers.
A jury of your peers with the same skin color, gender, sexual orientation and wealth

What the hell those this have to do with anything, the important part is that they get their day in court.


An often quoted Samuel Johnson said "patriotism is the last refuge of a scoundrel", and he also said "He that wishes to see his country robbed of its rights cannot be a patriot. "
Sam is correct. The people that support Affirmative Action (loss of civil rights) can not be a Patriot, just like Obama has proven.

I'd say the people that support the war on drugs and terror (unconditionally in the second case) are much worse. They're robbing the country of many more important rights.