A National Lock-down is Un-Constitutional

By

       M. Richard Maxson

      During the world’s current crisis there are calls from one side of the political spectrum for the federal government to “do something.” The are constant criticisms of the national plan or lack thereof from the executive branch. The Left seems to forget that this nation is a federal republic, a federation of states with a republican form of government. The Constitution’s articles, and the subsequent Amendments, specify the prerogatives of the Federal government. They are listed in Article I, Sec. 8; Articles II-V; Amendments XIII-XVI, XIX-XX, XXIII-XXVI. These prerogatives belong to one of the following categories:

1) Defense, war prosecution, peace, foreign relations, foreign commerce, and interstate commerce;

2) The protection of citizens’ constitutional rights and ensuring that slavery remains illegal;

3) Establishing federal courts inferior to the Supreme Court;

4) Copyright protection;

5) Coining money;

6) Establishing post offices and post roads;

7) Establishing a national set of universal weights and measures;

8 ) Taxation needed to raise revenue to perform these essential functions.

      Those are the only prerogatives of the Federal government. The Tenth Amendment states that all prerogatives not explicitly given to the Federal Government, nor prohibited of the states, are reserved to the states or to the people. “Reserved to the states” is the key phrase here. The Federal government is not allowed to handle any issues not explicitly listed in the Constitution; their prerogatives are limited to what the Constitution explicitly states. The Constitution gives the federal government (i.e. the President and the Congress) very few powers, and they are specifically enumerated. The states are required to be republics (Article IV, Section 4) and were independent of the federal government except for the powers given it listed in Article I, Section 8, Clauses 1-18.

      On the whole, the Constitution is a marvel of principles and restraint, a unique compass designed to keep the nation both pointed in the right direction and stable in the face of unknowable change in the future. The Constitution was so well designed, as written, in solving controversies or problems. Reading and understanding it you quickly discovered that there were no issues that could not be resolved. The overall principle of free government and the Constitution as written is to never elevate to a higher level that which can be resolved at a lesser level. Problem solving should begin with the individual and proceed in sequence from him to the family, city, county, and state and elevated only if a lower level of government could not do it. This is why the President, during this crisis, has been encouraging more state involvement. Federal involvement in our lives is supposed to be minimal. During this crisis, under the Constitution, he is just about at the limits of his powers.

      Federalism is a cornerstone of our constitutional system. Every violation of state sovereignty by federal officials is not merely a transgression of one unit of government against another; it is an assault on the liberties of individual Americans. The advantages of federalism are enormous. States serve as laboratories of experimentation. States look to sister states for models and borrow from them in refining their own programs. These places of experimentation benefit everyone.

      In the case of the coronavirus, the federal government, led by President Trump, controls the border under common defense—those coming in. He used his authority almost immediately as the threat appeared on the horizon. Regardless of what many may want, President Trump is not constitutionally empowered to mandate national behavior. Constitutionally states have borders and manage themselves. Taxing powers enable them to fund anything they wish and governors have broad powers to experiment, or not, on different solutions.

      Under Federalism, states individually have the responsibility to be prepared for emergencies and have in place their own programs of assistance and funding. Ronald Reagan said it best during his First Inaugural Address: “We are a nation that has a government, not the other way around.”

A Democrat Finds True Patriotism

by

       Zeno Potas*

      I think those of us on the left need to take a long look in the mirror and have an honest conversation about what’s going on. I was active part of the Democratic Party apparatus during the first decade of this century. I was one of those Democrats who considered anyone who voted for Trump a racist. I thought they were horrible (yes, even deplorable) and worked very hard to eliminate their voices from my social media by unfriending or blocking people who spoke about their support of him, however minor their comments. I was too influenced by the news media and the books and articles I had read over the years. I watched a lot of MSNBC, was convinced that everything he had done was horrible, that he hated anyone who wasn’t a straight white man, and that he had no redeeming qualities.

      During the early years of the Obama administration I saw firsthand how the optimism and hope that brought Obama to office soon began to turn to resentful hatred of conservatives and worsened as time went on. Nowadays this new visceral hostility has led many on the left to paint even the most mundane policy action by Republicans as “racist” or “killing people.” This was a standard liberal talking point. I’ve seen almost every Democratic candidate in person and noticed that their messages were almost universally one of doom and gloom, not only focusing on the obvious disagreements with Donald Trump, but also making sure to emphasize that the country is a horribly racist place.

      When I stopped to take note of the sheer magnitude of hate coming from the left, I started to question everything. I started making a proactive effort to break my echo chamber by listening to voices I thought I would disagree with. I wanted to understand their perspective, believing it would confirm that they were filled with hate for anyone who wasn’t like them. That turned out not to be the case. The more voices outside the left that I listened to, the more I realized that these were not bad people. They were not racists, nazis, or white supremacists. We had differences of opinions on social and economic issues, but a difference of opinion does not make your opponent inherently evil. And they could justify their opinions using arguments, rather than the shouting and ranting I saw coming from my side of the aisle.

      I started to question everything. How many stories had I been sold that weren’t true? I had heard about #WalkAway movement but MSNBC told me it was fake and a bunch of Russian bots. What if my perception of the other side is wrong? I started to meet real people who had been Democrats and made the decision to leave because they could not stand the way the left was behaving.

      How is it possible that half the country is overtly racist? I watched town halls they held with different minority communities and I saw sane, rational discussion from people of all different races, backgrounds, orientations, and experiences. I joined the Facebook group for the community and saw stories popping up daily of people sharing why they are leaving the Democratic Party. This wasn’t fake. These people are not Russian bots. Moreover, it felt like a breath of fresh air. There was not universal agreement in this group — some were Trump supporters, some weren’t — but they talked and shared their perspective without shouting or rage or trying to cancel each other.

      So, I had to ask myself the biggest question of all and it was this: Was it possible that Trump derangement syndrome is a real thing, and had I been suffering from it for the past three years? Did I hate Trump so much that I wanted to see my country fail just to spite him and everyone who voted for him?

      I have gotten away from the pablum of the party and it's supporting media. I have opened my eyes to critical/analytical thinking and have come to a rational conclusion. The Democratic Party I see today is very different from the one I knew and worked for in my younger years. It is not the party of hope, it is the party of negativity. Instead of seeking support from the center of the political spectrum it has moved ever leftward, embracing positions that leave millions of Americans feeling left out.

      I no longer want to be as negative, support rioting and violence, be disrespectful, pretend to be patriotic while subverting the laws of the land, protect illegal criminal immigrants, and support Democrats, who I helped elect to Congress, who are not working for the people but are working for their own personal gains. If they really cared about the people, they would try to work with the Republicans and help make America great again. I am not surprised by the negative response President Trump has received when he asks for unity for the American people - it is expected from the Democrats as they continue to destroy themselves.

       It took 36 years for me to see through the Democratic mystique of what the Republican Party is. As the late Democrat Daniel Patrick Moynihan famously said, "Everyone is entitled to his own opinion, but not his own facts."

*As told to the American Constitutionalist

Be Alert to the Attacks on the Constitution

by

       M. Richard Maxson

      The reason why President Trump was elected is because the American public, who believe in the Constitution, who believe in the Rule of Law, saw it under attack from so many places. As the media has been busy foaming at the mouth over the impeaching of a president, and hyperventilating over the corona-virus, and watching the Democratic front-runner trying to put understandable sentences together, we must not ignore what's really continuing to go on here, which is the attempt to change the Constitution though legislation, not law.

      

       The Constitution endured leftist attacks during most of the 20th century, starting with Woodrow Wilson, and still, it held strong. Toward the end of last century, we started hearing treacherous statements like "The Constitution is a living document." If that were even remotely true, it would render it useless because what good is a malleable contract? Recently, and especially in Virginia, both the 1st and 2nd Amendments are being pounded. Constitutional Patriots are grateful to the Virginians who are standing up to the onslaught. The 3rd Amendment — one that prohibits the stationing of soldiers in the homes of private citizens — received a glancing blow when Portland, Oregon, proposed a law requiring new businesses to include in their buildings room to house the homeless — far worse than soldiers.

      The New York Attorney General has stated that he wants to able able to prosecute people twice for the same crime, a violation the Constitutional prohibition on double jeopardy. The NY Attorney General is now explicitly calling for jailing people they don’t like politically.

   

       House Democrats had completely ignored the 4th, 5th, and 6th Amendments during the so-called “impeachment.” The rights allotted the common criminal were denied the President during the entire "investigation" in the House. The President never had the opportunity to face down his accusers, yet he was never charged with an actual crime. His accusers won't even accept the acquittal. We now know that his campaign was spied on, that foreign governments were brought in, by the Democratic party, to conspire against him. The fact is that the Left has not only broken actual laws, but ignored Constitutional prohibitions as well and nothing is being done about it.

 

      The assault on our political system continues with constant irregularities when it comes to elections:

• Voter fraud is rampant. With every election we see evidence of fraudulent voting — states and municipalities carrying thousands of dead people on their voter registration rolls. Fictitious names of nonexistent folk are also registered. They "harvest" votes; ballots turn up in car trunks; absentee ballots fail to arrive on time. And voter ID is not required in most states, so anyone can show up to cast a ballot.

• This brings up illegal immigration, which is totally an effort to erase the American vote. The more illegal votes, the less the American vote matters. The more illegals counted in the Census, the more seats a state gets in the House, thereby skewing the vote. Democrats are thoroughly aware of that and thoroughly aware how vulnerable these shadow-people are and how cheaply they can buy those votes. Because of this, some citizens are choosing not to vote, not realizing that choosing not to vote is still choosing.

• New methods of casting our votes are suspect as well. We know that computerized voting machines can be programmed to change votes. We all remember the "hanging chad" fiasco of the 2000 election. In Oregon, they no longer go to the polls, they mail in their ballots. Seattle is considering a vote-by–cell phone scheme. It's hard to imagine that no one sees the potential problems there.

• Ever since 2000 and especially since 2016, we've been hearing the whining of the Democrats about the Electoral College. A purely popular vote would make the process of stealing an election — especially with electronic voting — as easy as riding a bicycle. It would also disenfranchise completely anyone living in flyover states — Los Angeles and New York would run the country. This has gone so far that some states have declared that their electoral delegates will go entirely to whoever wins the majority vote.

• Another attack is happening as we vote people into office while counting on them to carry out their promises to voters, only to have them turn around and do whatever they want. We saw it being tried in Virginia over gun control. We see it in Congress as well. The people were not interested in impeachment, but the House held up all other issues in order to carry it out.

• Just look at the mess the DNC made out of the Iowa caucuses. We still don't know what happened, but we do know that the votes of those participating were thoroughly disrespected, and if we've reached a stage of chaotic dissolution so bad that we can't even count a handful of votes in a fairly small state, how in the world are we going to hold a presidential election?
• And now we've watched the DNC maneuver candidate bailouts so that Biden is now on top — Biden, who doesn't even know where he is. We're supposed to believe this is what the average Democrat wants?

      Federalism is a cornerstone of our constitutional system. Every violation of elected state or federal officials is not merely a transgression of one unit of government against another; it is an assault on the liberties of individual Americans. These are changing times that require rational attitudes to reality and close scrutiny on unlawful changes put forward by unscrupulous persons bent on slipping their agenda into American society. America was built on a rock and that rock is the Constitution.

Reaffirming the Constitution

by

       M. Richard Maxson

      On Mar. 4, 1801, Thomas Jefferson gave his first inaugural address after winning a bitter campaign for President of these United States. The outcome of the election of 1800 had been in doubt until late February

because Thomas Jefferson and Aaron Burr, the two leading candidates, each had received 73 electoral votes. Consequently, the House of Representatives met in a special session to resolve the impasse, pursuant to the terms spelled out in the Constitution. After 30 hours of debate and balloting, on the thirty-sixth ballot, Mr. Jefferson emerged as the President and Mr. Burr the Vice President. With such division, Jefferson knew he had his work cut out for him. During the campaign, he noted that the nation's newspapers were "teaming with every falsehood they can invent for defamation." John Adams, who was seeking re-election on the Federalist ticket, was labeled a monarchist; Vice President Jefferson was called an atheist; both candidates were declared enemies of the Constitution. Sounds familiar, doesn't it?

      After the election of 1796, the press went from praising President Washington to attacking President Adams. At the insistence of his wife, the president signed a series of acts put forth by his party including the Sedition Act, which made it a crime to publish "false, scandalous, and malicious writing" against the government or its officials. Under the Sedition Act, the Federalist Administration of John Adams had jailed more than a dozen Democratic-Republican political opponents for their speech or writing. Jefferson his party were outraged. They felt that this was a clear violation of the first amendment of the new Constitution. A serious disagreement on government for the new nation. The national debate raged into the election of 1800. In large part as a result of this political repression, Jefferson prevailed in the election and the Federalist Party began its spiral into oblivion. The Sedition Act and the Alien Friends Act were allowed to expire in 1800 and 1801, respectively.

      Chief Justice John Marshall administered the first executive oath of office ever taken in the new federal city in the new Senate Chamber (now the Old Supreme Court Chamber) of the partially built Capitol building. President John Adams, who had run unsuccessfully for a second term, left Washington on the day of the inauguration without attending the ceremony. Jefferson wisely delivered a conciliatory address. He stated that difference of opinion “is not a difference of principle.” All Americans were united—“we are all republicans: we are all federalists.” And freedom of expression should protect all, even those who preferred dissolution of the country—“let them stand undisturbed as monuments of the safety with which error of opinion may be tolerated, where reason is left free to combat it.”

       So he started his Inaugural with a great deal of humility - noting that he would do his best to fulfill the duties of the monumental task at hand, but find all his guidance in the Constitution, which he would rely on "under all difficulties." From there, he said, "it is proper you should understand what I deem the essential principles of our government, and consequently those which ought to shape its administration."

       He laid out his principles for the nation going forward. There are 13 of them, which you can read below. It is also interesting to note that he mentioned the word "PEACE" seven times in his short speech, and even suggested that government should exist only to enforce the non-aggression principle.

1. Equal and exact justice to all - whatever state of persuasion, religious or political
2. Peace commerce and honest friendship with all nations, entangling alliances with none
3. Support of state governments as the most competent administration for domestic concerns - and surest bulwarks against anti-republican tendencies
4. preservation of the General government in its whole constitutional vigor, as the sheet anchor of our peace at home, and safety abroad
5. Republican majoritarianism instead of an appeal to force
6. A well disciplined militia, our best reliance in peace, and for the first moments of war, till regulars may relieve them
7. The supremacy of the civil over the military authority
8. Economy in the public expense
9. Honest payment of our debts and sacred preservation of the public faith
10. Encouragement of agriculture, and of commerce as its handmaid
11. The diffusion of information
12. Freedom of religion; freedom of the press; and freedom of person
13. Trial by juries impartially selected

      In his speech he reaffirmed and clarified those principles of that very Constitution that he had helped craft. His point was that the law of the land is to be used as written as it was written in that manner for a purpose. It was a rebuke to the previous President Adams whose Sedition Act and the Alien Friends Act were signed into law on the insistence of his wife because feelings were hurt. Yes, it does sound familiar.

We Are Off Course

By

       M. Richard Maxson

      In that hot summer of 1787 in Philadelphia, the framers set down their vision of a self-governing Republic. A country where citizens would no longer be ruled but to live life and find happiness in their own way, not though a government or ruler but though their own states, their own communities, their own families. Realizing the reality of our human condition they knew that some form of limited government was necessary.

James Madison played an important role in the writing of our Constitution. "I am not aware of a single example of any of the founders of America believing that man was basically good. This is not cynical. It’s just the reality and has led to the most prosperous forms of government—and economics too." They took care to limit the powers of the government and to keep them true with a series of checks and balances. Like the other founders, Thomas Jefferson said that power should be divided for everybody’s sake: “The way to have good and safe government is not to trust it all to one, but to divide it among the many…” The notion of a democracy was dismissed a faux freedom form of government. During the ratification debates, one critic prophesied that if citizens ratified the constitution, the forms of republican governments would soon exist "in appearance only" in America, as had occurred in ancient Rome which started out as a republic, became a democracy, then a de-facto dictatorship. They decided that a bi-camel representative government was the purest form of freedom.

      However American republicanism would indeed eventually decline, but the declined took a century to began and unfold with much less malice than it did at the end of the Roman Republic. It was not due to some defect in the Constitution, but rather to repeated to undermining by the Supreme Court, the president, and the Congress. They have abrogated their duties under the Constitution.

      The Congress, under the Constitution, is where all laws are made. Yet, in the last eighty or so years, through legislation, laws are being made unconstitutionally by agencies of the federal government such as the FTC, SEC, FDA, etc. Congress spends much of it’s time on investigations which should be done from the Justice Department. Nowhere in the Constitution does it say that Congress should do possible criminal investigations.

      The Supreme Court, under the Constitution, is to interpret legislation for it’s constitutionality in the way it was written with the guarantee of liberty annexed expectation of self reliance. What has happened is that some justices have taken it upon themselves to “fix” the constitution without amendments as required by law. They make their own law, a "living constitution," that they believe empowers the Supreme Court to sit as a permanent constitutional convention, issuing decrees that keep our government evolving with the modern era’s ever changing conditions. This “living constitution” also permits countless supposedly expert administrative agencies, like the SEC and the EPA, to make rules like a legislature, administer them like an executive, and educate and punish infractions of them like a judiciary.

      The President, under the Constitution, should propose legislation, deal with foreign governments, command the military as Commander-in-Chief, among other duties. Making legislation by executive decree is NOT what the Framers intended and NOT what the Constitution states. Current presidents have done this because they feel that not enough good legislation has been forthcoming from Congress and that is because THEY are not doing their job.

      The result today is a crisis of legitimacy, with the accelerant of the agenda driven corporate news media fueling the anger with which Americans now glare at one another.

Truman's Speech Warning of an Out of Control Deep State

by

       M. Richard Maxson

      In our series from 2018 on the origins of the Deep State we used excerpts from an op-ed that former President Truman penned expressing his grave concern over it’s operations one month after John Kennedy was killed. He stated, “the original reason why I thought it necessary to organize this Agency … and what I expected it to do would be charged with the collection of all intelligence reports from every available source, and to have those reports reach me as President without Department ‘treatment’ or interpretations.” He wrote “the most important thing was to guard against the chance of intelligence being used to influence or to lead the President into unwise decisions. I never had any thought that when I set up the CIA that it would be injected into peacetime cloak and dagger operations. … It has become an operational and at times a policy-making arm of the government. Not only shaping policy through its control of intelligence, but also “cloak and dagger” operations, presumably including assassinations.”

      The Washington Post published the op-ed titled “Limit CIA Role to Intelligence.” The first sentence of that op-ed on Dec. 22, 1963, read, “I think it has become necessary to take another look at the purpose and operations of our Central Intelligence Agency.” The Washington Post had published the op-ed in its early edition on Dec. 22, 1963, but immediately excised it from later editions, proving Truman’s point. Other media ignored it. Here it is in it’s entirety:

INDEPENDENCE, MO., Dec. 21 1963— 

      "I think it has become necessary to take another look at the purpose and operations of our Central Intelligence Agency—CIA. At least, I would like to submit here the original reason why I thought it necessary to organize this Agency during my Administration, what I expected it to do and how it was to operate as an arm of the President."

      "I think it is fairly obvious that by and large a President's performance in office is as effective as the information he has and the information he gets. That is to say, that assuming the President himself possesses a knowledge of our history, a sensitive understanding of our institutions, and an insight into the needs and aspirations of the people, he needs to have available to him the most accurate and up-to-the-minute information on what is going on everywhere in the world, and particularly of the trends and developments in all the danger spots in the contest between East and West. This is an immense task and requires a special kind of an intelligence facility."

      "Of course, every President has available to him all the information gathered by the many intelligence agencies already in existence. The Departments of State, Defense, Commerce, Interior and others are constantly engaged in extensive information gathering and have done excellent work."

      "But their collective information reached the President all too frequently in conflicting conclusions. At times, the intelligence reports tended to be slanted to conform to established positions of a given department. This becomes confusing and what's worse, such intelligence is of little use to a President in reaching the right decisions."

      "Therefore, I decided to set up a special organization charged with the collection of all intelligence reports from every available source, and to have those reports reach me as President without department "treatment" or interpretations."

      "I wanted and needed the information in its "natural raw" state and in as comprehensive a volume as it was practical for me to make full use of it. But the most important thing about this move was to guard against the chance of intelligence being used to influence or to lead the President into unwise decisions—and I thought it was necessary that the President do his own thinking and evaluating. '

      "Since the responsibility for decision making was his—then he had to be sure that no information is kept from him for whatever reason at the discretion of any one department or agency, or that unpleasant facts be kept from him. There are always those who would want to shield a President from bad news or misjudgments to spare him from being upset?"

      "For some time I have been disturbed by the way CIA has been diverted from its original assignment. It has become an operational and at times a policy-making arm of the Government. This has led to trouble and may have compounded our difficulties in several explosive areas."

      "I never had any thought that when I set up the CIA that it would be injected into peacetime cloak and dagger operations. Some of the complications and embarrassment I think we have experienced are in part attributable to the fact that this quiet intelligence arm of the President has been so removed from its intended role that it is being interpreted as a symbol of sinister and mysterious foreign intrigue—and a subject for cold war enemy propaganda."

      "With all the nonsense put out by Communist propaganda about "Yankee imperialism," "exploitive capitalism," "war-mongering," "monopolists," in their name-calling assault on the West, the last thing we needed was for the CIA to be seized upon as something akin to a subverting influence in the affairs of other people."

      "I well knew the first temporary director of the CIA, Adm. Souers, and the later permanent directors of the CIA, Gen. Hoyt Vandenberg and Allen Dulles. These were men of the highest character, patriotism and integrity—and I assume this is true of all those who continue in charge."

     "But there are now some searching questions that need to be answered. I, therefore, would like to see the CIA be restored to its original assignment as the intelligence arm of the President, and that whatever else it can properly perform in that special field—and that its operational duties be terminated or properly used elsewhere."

      "We have grown up as a nation, respected for our free institutions and for our ability to maintain a free and open society. There is something about the way the CIA has been functioning that is casting a shadow over our historic position and I feel that we need to correct it."

      It was never corrected. As we are well aware of today that the Deep State, anchored by the CIA and their collaborators, control practically everything in media in this country and it continues to reek havoc and death around the world. Can this ever be corrected?

Is Julian Assange Any Different Than Daniel Ellsberg?

by

       Phillip Todd

 

      Today, secrecy, via slanted information or outright propaganda, is out of hand. It is the engine that drives the un-just, immoral, and inhumane actions taken by not only the Deep State, but by powerful global elitists as well. We are living in an ‘Orwellian’ type of time, where they back up their mis-information by use of a sort of ‘ministry of truth’ that claims to be ‘fact checking’ information when really, these organizations simply ridicule credible information that is full of evidence and legitimate sources, simply for the purposes of, again, threatening powerful people.

      National Security has become an umbrella term to keep information ‘classified’ not truly for national security purposes, but rather to conceal information that threatens elitist agenda’s, be it corporate, political, or financial. Usually, they’re all intertwined. President Eisenhower warned us about the “military industrial complex” and the dangers it poses, after him John F. Kennedy warned us that “there is a very grave danger than an announced need for an increased need for security, will be seized upon by those anxious to expand its meaning to the very limits of censorship and concealment.”

      Julian Assange truly believed in what our past presidents and others have said and his quest was to right that wrong. To tell the world the truth and for that, the men in the shadows have him sitting in a British prison awaiting extradition hearings that will send him to the United States on charges of espionage.

      If this sounds familiar to some of our older citizens – it is. In February 1971, Ellsberg discussed what was to come to be known as “The Pentagon Papers” with The New York Times reporter Neil Sheehan, and gave 43 of the volumes to him in March. Before publication, The New York Times sought legal advice. The paper's regular outside counsel, Lord Day & Lord, advised against publication, but in-house counsel James Goodale prevailed with his argument that the press had a First Amendment right to publish information significant to the people's understanding of their government's policy. The “Papers” consisted of 4,000 pages of original government documents in 47 volumes, and was classified as "Top Secret – Sensitive". For his disclosure of the Pentagon Papers, Ellsberg was initially charged with conspiracy, espionage, and theft of government property, but the charges were later dismissed after prosecutors investigating the Watergate scandal discovered that the staff members in the Nixon White House had ordered the so-called White House Plumbers to engage in unlawful efforts to discredit Ellsberg. 

      So here we are today. Assange has been indicted in the U.S. on 18 charges over the publication of classified documents. Prosecutors say he conspired with U.S. army intelligence analyst Chelsea Manning to hack into a Pentagon computer and release hundreds of thousands of secret diplomatic cables and military files on the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. U.S. authorities say WikiLeaks’ activities put American lives in danger. Assange argues he was acting as a journalist entitled to First Amendment protection, and says the leaked documents exposed U.S. military wrongdoing. Among the files published by WikiLeaks was video of a 2007 Apache helicopter attack by American forces in Baghdad that killed 11 people, including two Reuters journalists.

      His extradition hearing follows years of subterfuge, diplomatic dispute and legal drama that have led the 48-year-old Australian from fame as an international secret-spiller through self-imposed exile inside the Ecuadorian Embassy in London to incarceration in a maximum-security British prison. Supporters say the ordeal has harmed Assange’s physical and mental health, leaving him with depression, dental problems and a serious shoulder ailment.

      Our previous article, “The Slow Murder of Julian Assange,” stated the facts surrounding his incarceration. Now new evidence to back-up out facts have emerged. To stop him from ever again speaking publicly the deep state hatched a plot to kidnap or even poison Julian Assange using shady Spanish private detectives right after he leaked the 250,000 top secret documents online, his extradition hearing was told this week. The WikiLeaks founder's human rights lawyer, Edward Fitzgerald, said an attack inside London's Ecuadorean embassy would have looked like an 'accident'. Mr Fitzgerald said: 'There were conversations about whether there should be more extreme measures contemplated, such as kidnapping or poisoning Julian Assange in the embassy.'

      To help accomplish this a private security group from a Spanish company, acting on behalf of the US authorities, were involved in 'intrusive and sophisticated' surveillance of his client, but were outed by a whistleblower known only as 'witness two'. Visitors, including lawyers for the 48-year-old, who is facing extradition to America, are said to have been targeted by live-stream audio and video devices placed inside the embassy and laser microphones from outside.

      The covert monitoring allegedly began after UC Global's David Morales returned from a Las Vegas security trade fair in around July 2016. Reading from a witness statement, Mr Fitzgerald stated: 'David (Morales) said the Americans were desperate and had even suggested more extreme measures could be applied against the guest to put an end to the situation.' He said there was a suggestion the embassy door could be left open to make a kidnapping look like it could have been 'an accident', adding 'even the possibility of poisoning had been discussed'. At this point in time it does not appear that these plots have been activated. It appears that they have gone to 'plan B' - extradition.

      The extradition may take years but it is a prearranged affair. A show trial is to be used to make an example of Julian Assange. He will not receive a trial consistent with the rule of law. That’s another reason why his extradition shouldn’t be allowed. Assange will receive a trial-by-jury in Alexandria, Virginia in the notorious Espionage Court where the U.S. tries all national security cases. The choice of location is not by coincidence, because the jury members must be chosen in proportion to the local population, and 85 percent of Alexandria residents work in the national security community – at the CIA, the NSA, the Defense Department and the State Department. When people are tried for harming national security in front of a jury like that, the verdict is clear from the very beginning. The cases are always tried in front of the same judge behind closed doors and on the strength of classified evidence. Nobody has ever been acquitted there in a case like that. The result being that most defendants reach a settlement, in which they admit to partial guilt so as to receive a milder sentence.

      The point is to intimidate other journalists. The message to all is: This is what will happen to you if you emulate the Wikileaks model. It is a model that is so dangerous because it is so simple: People who obtain sensitive information from their governments or companies transfer that information to Wikileaks, but the whistleblower remains anonymous. The reaction shows how great the threat is perceived to be: Four democratic countries joined forces – the U.S., Ecuador, Sweden and the UK – to leverage their power to portray one man as a monster so that he could later be burned at the stake without any outcry. The case is a huge scandal and represents the failure of Western rule of law. If Julian Assange is convicted, it will be a death sentence for freedom of the press.

      Journalism organizations and civil liberties groups including Amnesty International and Reporters Without Borders say the charges against Assange set a chilling precedent for freedom of the press. On a practical level, it means that you, as a journalist, must now defend yourself. Because if investigative journalism is classified as espionage and can be incriminated around the world, then censorship and tyranny will follow. A murderous system is being created before our very eyes. War crimes and torture are not being prosecuted. YouTube videos are circulating in which American soldiers brag about driving Iraqi women to suicide with systematic rape. Nobody is investigating it. At the same time, a person who exposes such things is being threatened with 175 years in prison.

      If Julian Assange is found guilty he could face a 175-year prison sentence Assange's supporters have held a 24/7 vigil outside the top security jail since last September - and up to 500 were outside court for the case, with their chanting clearly heard in the courtroom. “What we have is an assault on journalism,” left-wing Greek lawmaker Yanis Varoufakis said at an Assange support march in London on Saturday. “The only charge against Julian, hiding behind the nonsense of espionage, is a charge of journalism.” He also decried that "despite the complexity of the proceedings against him led by the world's most powerful Government, Mr. Assange's access to legal counsel and documents has been severely obstructed."

      An end to this could still be years away. After a week of opening arguments, the extradition case is due to break until May, when the two sides will lay out their evidence. The judge is not expected to rule until several months after that, with the losing side likely to appeal. Anand Doobay, an extradition lawyer at the firm Boutique Law, said the Assange trial was an unusual, hard-to-predict case. “Very few cases raise this range of issues, where there are likely to be arguments about the actual offenses he’s accused of committing and whether they amount to a crime in both countries,” he said. “There are arguments about his treatment in terms of the fairness of his trial, the conditions he’s going to be detained in, the reasons why he is being prosecuted, his activities as a journalist.” Until then, Julian Assange will remain in solitary, his mind and body slowly slipping away.