by Bob Barr | Apr 4, 2022 | Daily Caller Article |
Daily Caller Recent headlines cause me to wonder seriously, where is the FBI? In the late 1980s, during my service as the top federal prosecutor in Atlanta, Georgia, I worked closely with the FBI, which had a large regional office in the city manned by top-tier special agents. Led often by the local FBI office, and in conjunction with investigators from other federal agencies, including IRS, DEA, Immigration, HUD, HHS and Labor, our office successfully prosecuted numerous corrupt public officials, drug kingpins, money launderers and all manner of white-collar criminals. In those days, the FBI was viewed widely as the country’s premier law enforcement agency. Despite the Bureau’s penchant for self-publicizing its operations, I recall no instance in which the fundamental ethical or nonpartisan nature of the Bureau’s work was called into question. I have no doubt today that the overwhelming majority of career FBI Special Agents today continue that long and honored tradition. However, a review of recent policy decisions by top-level bureaucrats and political appointees within the Bureau and its parent agency, the U.S. Department of Justice, calls into serious question whether the FBI has veered wildly off track. A major turning point certainly would be the shenanigans by top-level FBI officials to use the Bureau’s powers to thwart the 2016 election and subsequent administration of Donald Trump. This effort went from senior special agents like Peter Strzok all the way to the former Acting Director of the Bureau, Andrew McCabe. While these two collaborators eventually were fired during the Trump administration, under Trump’s successor McCabe’s full pension has been restored and his firing cleared from his...
by Bob Barr | Mar 28, 2022 | Daily Caller Article |
Daily Caller Much ado last week was made of Supreme Court nominee Ketanji Brown Jackson’s leniency as a federal trial court judge in sentencing defendants convicted of certain crimes, especially those facing prison for child sex offenses. It was, however, the nominee’s staunch unwillingness to answer questions about her knowledge of basic facts that unmasked Judge Jackson as a truly woke individual; a student of the law unwilling to state the obvious for fear of divulging details that might cause the left to doubt her bona fides as one of them. In reviewing the manner by which the nominee steadfastly refused to acknowledge that there were in fact “differences between men and women that are enduring” — as premised in a series of questions posed by Republican Tennessee Sen. Marsha Blackburn – I was reminded of an article describing what might be considered a “New Legal Order,” published even as the confirmation hearings were being televised. “The Takeover of America’s Legal System,” authored by Aaron Sibarium in Common Sense, describes the manner by which Millennial (and younger) lawyers are being taught; namely, that objectivity as a foundational underpinning of our legal system, no longer is to be considered a constant. Woke lawyers, law professors and even judges now are openly declaring that certain individuals harboring disfavored social views (e.g., those considered “racist” or misogynistic) no longer are entitled to competent legal counsel because of those views or acts. In this environment, law professors holding traditional, contrary views must “self-censor” their lectures so as not to incur the wrath of “woke” students and law school administrators. As Sibarium further describes this deeply disturbing trend (especially...
by Bob Barr | Mar 21, 2022 | Daily Caller Article |
Daily Caller Following World War II, the prevailing Allied powers agreed to convene an International Military Tribunal, commonly referred to as the “Nuremburg Trials.” The deliberations leading to this unprecedented undertaking, as well as the trial itself (which lasted nearly one year), were painstakingly comprehensive, and consequently have achieved lasting credibility. The ongoing public debate as to Russian President Vladimir Putin’s culpability as a “war criminal” because of his invasion of Ukraine has rekindled the debate about what constitutes a “war crime.” Sadly, the level of this current debate has been superficial and not worthy of its importance to the foundations of international law or of serious public policy (though likely making for good politics). The issue deserves far more serious consideration than an off-hand remark by President Joe Biden last week to a reporter that, “He [Putin] is a war criminal.” The next day, Secretary of State Antony Blinken echoed the president’s statement, stating at a news conference, that he “personally believes” the Russian president has committed war crimes in Ukraine. Has Putin committed “war crimes?” By ordering the invasion of Ukraine and then appearing to deliberately target civilian population centers, probably so. But if the United States is henceforth going to start labeling foreign leaders to be “war criminals” without amassing evidence and presenting a case beyond news videos, the credibility of such an important endeavor will diminish, and with it, the value of employing the term itself. In the decades since the Nuremburg Trials of 1945-1946, there have been a number of international judicial proceedings designed to identify, try and punish civilian and military leaders who engage...
by Bob Barr | Mar 14, 2022 | Daily Caller Article |
Daily Caller When President John F. Kennedy made his bold declaration in 1961 that America would, before the end of that decade, send a man to the moon and return him safely to the Earth, there was little doubt our country would meet that lofty goal, and absolutely no doubt we would do it on our own. Now, six decades later, America’s ability to send astronauts into space, including to the International Space Station (ISS), clearly has been hobbled by a short-sighted (if not foolhardy) U.S. government decision at the turn of this century to rely on Russian-built rockets to launch heavy payloads into space. The ongoing Russian invasion of Ukraine and the resulting U.S.-led sanctions targeting Russia is proving the folly of allowing our country to have become dependent on a potential — and now demonstrably real — adversary in a key national security area. With the head of Russia’s space program late last month threatening to leave an American astronaut aboard the ISS with no way home, the stupidity of our space program becoming dependent on Russian heavy launch vehicles and space capsules has come into sharp focus, regardless of whether Putin’s government would actually follow through on such a threat. For decades, Russia and the United States have cooperated in their civilian space programs, especially in manning the ISS. This relationship has permitted both nations to reap the benefits of the space station’s breakthroughs in medicine, telecommunications and many other arenas, while sharing the expense of such dangerous and costly activities. There is, however, a pronounced difference between cooperation and dependency, and it is in the matter of...
by Bob Barr | Mar 8, 2022 | Daily Caller Article |
Daily Caller Hopes that the current Supreme Court might at long last place even the mildest of limits on the federal government’s ability to hide behind a broad, virtually impenetrable “national security” shield were dashed last week when, in a pair of decisions, the High Court refused to make even a dent in the so-called “state secrets privilege” behind which Uncle Sam has hidden for nearly seven decades. The two decisions – one unanimous and the other with one of the more “conservative” justices (Neil Gorsuch) joining with one of the most “liberal” (Sonia Sotomayor) in dissent – leave intact a legal maneuver that since 1953 has permitted Uncle Sam to block any legal action that might reveal evidence the government does not want to be made public, even if for no reason other than to avoid embarrassment or if the information sought to be disclosed has already been made public. The so-called “state secrets privilege” (or “doctrine”) is not enshrined in any law, but is simply a judge-made rule that stops cold in its tracks any lawsuit or subsequent legal action brought against the federal government alleging official wrongdoing (including violation of an individual’s constitutionally guaranteed rights). All that government lawyers need do in order to invoke its protection is to claim that disclosure of material sought by private parties would harm “national security,” and ask the federal court hearing the matter to dismiss the proceedings out-of-hand. They can do this without having to disclose precisely what the actual “harm” to national security might be. I was among those who had hoped last December that the Supreme Court would use...
by Bob Barr | Mar 2, 2022 | Daily Caller Article |
Townhall Among the bleak, often harrowing images coming to us from Ukraine as it suffers a vicious invasion by Russia, there are images of hope and strength. Pictures of civilians lining-up to receive firearms or forming makeshift assembly lines to assemble Molotov Cocktails, are examples of something that many Liberals simply fail to grasp as a moving force of human nature – acts of self-preservation against those who would take away individual liberty. “The first and strongest desire God planted in men, and wrought into the very principles of their nature, [is] that of self-preservation,” John Locke wrote in 1689. The response of Ukraine citizens (who just days before might have been planning vacations or running errands) to arm and fight against Russian invaders, is perhaps one of the best examples in modern history of what Locke meant. Survival is an instinct of humanity, and self-preservation is its natural mechanism. Government, as our Founders clearly understood (and they knew Locke’s writings well), is – should be – instituted in order to preserve freedom and human life, not limit, or restrain it, whether by force or decree. This is a principle the Left seems never to understand or accept about the Second Amendment. Although liberals want to pretend the scope of the Second Amendment is a collective right only applicable to militias, or hunting at the most as an individual right, such a position is wholly at odds with the Amendment’s philosophical and historical foundation. The Second Amendment was, and continues to this day to be, a codification of the natural right to self-preservation, and self-defense. Regardless of whether a nation...
