The bombing of the Federal Building in Oklahoma City was a most shocking
and dastardly deed. It was the act of a madman and accomplished
absolutely nothing. The tragic loss of innocent life struck a chord
of fear in all thinking Americans.
At first everyone jumped to the conclusion that it was another case of
Arab terrorism like the World Trade Center bombing. Then we were all
shocked to learn the Oklahoma madness was the work of one of our own - a maverick
whose love of country had turned to hatred for the United States government because
of what it did at Waco and Ruby Ridge.
The manhunt, arrest and trial of Timothy McVeigh absorbed the nation's
interest for two years. We were horrified and concerned, and rightly
so.
However, another event occurred in Oklahoma City recently - one
which involves something even more important than the vicious snuffing-out
of scores of innocent lives. A signal event in a long, sad series
of events comprised of the gradual snuffing-out of American Freedom.
The event:
AP: Oklahoma City - Police, acting without any search warrant, raided
the public library, video stores and private residences to confiscate
videocassette copies of "The Tin Drum" which won an Oscar for best
foreign film in 1979.
"The Tin Drum" is an adaption of a Gunter Grass novel about a young
boy growing up in Nazi Germany. In the film, the boy constitutes a
metaphor for Hitler's insane greed and hate which fueled national socialism.
It includes one scene in which the boy, aged about eight, ostensibly
performs oral sex on a teen-age girl. The surrounding images of
war-time gore and degradation, if anything, snuff out any possible
prurient interest.
Police knocked on doors of private citizens who had legally rented
the film and asked them to hand over the tapes under threat of warrant.
"These are Gestapo-type tactics," Joann Bell, executive director of
the American Civil Liberties Union in Oklahoma, said Friday. "Those
individuals and the movie itself were not given due process...The film
definitely has artistic and literary value," Bell said. "It is a classic."
Bo Andersen, the former Assistant US Attorney who now serves as
General Counsel for the VSDA, further noted that, in addition to offending
First Amendment guarantees, the police seizure of the video stores'
customer-rental records also appeared to violate federal statutes
protecting the privacy of those records.
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This little episode should chill the heart of all who love freedom.
It should set off alarms all over the place - sirens should wail a warning
of impending doom! Paul Revere had no more important a message to
deliver on his midnight ride.
It is bad enough that such prudish censorship of an 18 year old film
would set literary freedom back nearly two decades. It's worse that
one brief scene is deemed so dangerous as to warrant banning the film.
But the worst is that the police invaded the sanctity of not only businesses,
and of a public library, but also of private homes - all without a warrant!
This mind-set of holier-than-thou paternalism has been used before.
So has the method of rifling private business records. And sadly, so
has the tactic of intimidation-in-lieu-of-warrant. They have been
used by the Leviathan Government to sniff out those who would claim the
freedom to make their own decisions about guns and drugs. What's
next? Some anal-retentive conservative's prejudice about hair-style?
or some equally anal-retentive liberal's idiocy about political-correctness?
Damn it! This wasn't the
way it was supposed to be! This is supposed to be the Land of Liberty -
not the Lair of Leviathan! We are like a frog placed in a pot of cool
water over a low flame. By the time it realizes something is wrong -
its goose is cooked! Will our goose of Freedom suffer the same fate?
Or will we wake up in time to smell the scorching of our own feet in the
frying pan of creeping totalitarianism? ? ? ? ?
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