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Libertarian: Biden Agrees — Gov’t Weaponized
“The charges in his cases came about only after several of my political opponents in Congress instigated them to attack me and oppose my election,” Joe Biden wrote in pardoning son Hunter. Reason’s J.D. Tuccille observes: “It’s worth noting Biden’s admission after all this time that government agencies can be corrupted and weaponized by the powerful against their enemies.” Fine, “take a skeptical view of Biden’s claim that his own Justice Department engaged in a politicized vendetta against his son.” Still: “If Biden is serious in fretting about politicized prosecutions, maybe we can all agree that government power should be reined in and reduced to avoid such misuses of authority.”
Foreign desk: Germany’s Hate-Speech Horrors
Activist and blogger Michael Stürzenberger’s conviction in Germany “for incitement to hatred” in his criticism of Islam at a 2020 rally “shows how dangerous, intimidating and anti-democratic” Germany’s hate-speech laws are, warns Spiked’s Sabine Beppler-Spahl. The kicker: The conviction came after “a former refugee from Afghanistan” severely injured Stürzenberger in May over his comments. Germany “radically” suppresses free speech, “especially when it comes to criticising Islam.” Yet while “Stürzenberger can be offensive,” his “statements hardly warrant the harsh, legal persecution” he’s faced. “The frightening conclusion” is that “both Islamist terrorists and the German authorities” want to “silence critics of Islam.” But while “the Islamist terrorist would like to silence Stürzenberger through violence, the authorities are attempting to do so through the law.”
From the right: Reparations Aren’t Justice
Angolan President João Lourenço rejects reparations because “it is ‘impossible’ to make up for what happened in the past,” notes The Wall Street Journal’s Jason L. Riley, yet “California and New York have set up reparations task forces.” Huh? “California was never a slave state,” so why should Asians and Latinos, whose ancestors didn’t own slaves and “who themselves have been subject to discrimination, be forced to compensate black people today who were never slaves?” One Cali lawmaker talks of doing “all we can to right those wrongs.” Riley counters: “The real moral obligation is to stop discriminating by race altogether, not change who’s on the receiving end.” Those seeking “reparations need to decide whether they want justice, or payback.”
Conservative: Deportation ‘Morally’ Necessary
President-elect Donald Trump moving to conduct the largest US deportation operation ever is “welcome news,” cheers Heritage’s Kevin D. Roberts at The Federalist, since “returning illegal aliens to their home countries is the only morally acceptable response.” Fact is, “conservatives support deporting illegal aliens precisely because we love the law, our fellow citizens, and the women and children being sex-trafficked.” More than 600,000 illegal migrants with criminal records have been let in, and even those with no records undermine “the blessings of American citizenship” — taking away working-class jobs and diluting votes. Deportation will bring back “law and order,” “protect the working class,” “restore the full political rights of every American” and ensure “the political integrity of the American Republic for generations.”
Pardon beat: One Thing Joe Got Right
President Biden “got one thing right” in pardoning Hunter’s gun-related crimes, argues the Washington Examiner’s Quin Hillyer: “The federal statute at issue is poorly written and inconsistently applied. Congress should amend it.” The law, 18 USC § 922(g)(3), “forbids any person ‘who is an unlawful user of or addicted to any controlled substance from possessing a firearm.’ ” Its “obvious intent” is “to stop major violent drug running”; it “was not meant as a tool for prosecutors to put misdemeanor drug offenders in prison for years on end.” Congress should fix the “overbroad” language “to correct both the constitutional deficiency and to rein in prosecutorial abuse.” “Rather than prohibiting gun ownership or possession per se, the law should ban only the actual bearing of arms while under the influence of, or while trafficking in, illegal drugs.”
— Compiled by The Post Editorial Board