John Whitehead

Constitutional attorney and author John W. Whitehead is founder and president of The Rutherford Institute. His new book Battlefield America: The War on the American People  (SelectBooks, 2015) is available online at www.amazon.com. Whitehead can be contacted at [email protected].

Fear Of The Walking Dead: The American Police State Takes Aim

While zombies may be the personification of our darkest fears, they embody the government’s paranoia about the citizenry as potential threats that need to be monitored, tracked, surveilled, sequestered, deterred, vanquished and rendered impotent.

John Whitehead
بواسطة John Whitehead
A member of the St. Louis County Police Department points his weapon in the direction of a group of protesters in Ferguson, Mo. on Wednesday, Aug. 13, 2014.

“Fear is a primitive impulse, brainless as hunger, and because the aim of horror fiction is the production of the deepest kinds of fears, the genre tends to reinforce some remarkably uncivilized ideas about self-protection. In the current crop of zombie stories, the prevailing value for the beleaguered survivors is a sort of siege mentality, a

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Don’t Be Fooled By The Political Game: The Illusion Of Freedom In America

“Being a citizen in the American corporate state is much like playing against a stacked deck: you’re always going to lose.”

John Whitehead
بواسطة John Whitehead
Americans Don’t Think for Themselves

“The shaping of the will of Congress and the choosing of the American president has become a privilege reserved to the country’s equestrian classes, a.k.a. the 20% of the population that holds 93% of the wealth, the happy few who run the corporations and the banks, own and operate the news and entertainment media, compose the laws and govern the

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Keeping Government Bureaucrats Off the Backs Of The Citizenry: The Supreme Court Responds

“No man in the wrong can stand up against a fellow that’s in the right and keeps on a-comin’.”—Texas Rangers

John Whitehead
بواسطة John Whitehead

In one swoop, on June 22, 2015, a divided U.S. Supreme Court handed down three consecutive rulings affirming the right of raisin farmers, hotel owners and prison inmates. However, this push back against government abuse, government snooping and government theft only came about because some determined citizens stood up and took a stand against

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Free Speech, Facebook and the NSA: The Good, the Bad and the Ugly

Suddenly the NSA’s telephone metadata program seems like child’s play compared to what’s coming down the pike.

John Whitehead
بواسطة John Whitehead
NSA, Free speech, Facebook

“A person under surveillance is no longer free; a society under surveillance is no longer a democracy.”—Writers Against Mass Surveillance THE GOOD NEWS: Americans have a right to freely express themselves on the Internet, including making threatening—even violent—statements on Facebook, provided that they don’t intend to actually inflict

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In a Cop Culture, The Bill Of Rights Doesn’t Amount To Much

Police officers are more likely to be struck by lightning than be held financially accountable for their actions.—Law professor Joanna C. Schwartz (paraphrased)

John Whitehead
بواسطة John Whitehead

Missouri National Guard line up behind police officers monitoring protesters in front of the Ferguson Police Department Tuesday, Nov. 25, 2014, in Ferguson, Mo. “In a democratic society,” observed Oakland police chief Sean Whent, “people have a say in how they are policed.” Unfortunately, if you can be kicked, punched, tasered, shot,

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Kick Open The Doorway To Liberty: What Are We Waiting For?

“Why should we Americans have to put up with the government listening in on our phone calls, spying on our emails, subjecting us to roadside strip searches, and generally holding our freedoms hostage in exchange for some phantom promises of security?”

John Whitehead
بواسطة John Whitehead
A Duplin County Sheriff’s Office special response team prepares to shatter a door, and presumably it's owners 4th Amendment rights, during a training exercise.

A Duplin County Sheriff’s Office special response team prepares to shatter a  door, and presumably it's owners 4th Amendment rights, during a training exercise. “The greatness of America lies in the right to protest for right.”—Martin Luther King Jr. Everything this nation once stood for is being turned on its head. Free speech,

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Forced Blood Draws, DNA Collection And Biometric Scans: What Country Is This?

Our freedoms—especially the Fourth Amendment—are being choked out by a prevailing view among government bureaucrats that they have the right to search, seize, strip, scan, spy on, probe, pat down, taser, and arrest any individual at any time and for the slightest provocation.

John Whitehead
بواسطة John Whitehead
The operate a checkpoint for vehicles entering Los Angeles International Airport in Los Angeles, Saturday, Dec. 26, 2009.

A frustrated resident that tried to drive around a police checkpoint is stopped at gunpoint by one police officer, right, while another tries to break his window to extract him in Cedar Rapids, Iowa. “The Fourth Amendment was designed to stand between us and arbitrary governmental authority. For all practical purposes, that shield has been

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