“Tin soldiers and Nixon coming,
We’re finally on our own.
This summer I hear the drumming,
Four dead in Ohio.
“Gotta get down to it
Soldiers are cutting us down
Should have been done long ago.
What if you knew her
And found her dead on the ground
How can you run when you know?”
On May 4, 1970, four students were killed and eleven others wounded when National Guardsmen opened fire on a group of students at Kent State University. The students were protesting President Richard Nixon’s April 30 announcement that U.S. forces would move into Cambodia to destroy North Vietnamese bases there.
On May 4, 1886, a riot broke out in Haymarket Square in Chicago, Illinois, as a labor protest turned into a riot, leaving more than 100 wounded and 8 police officers dead. In the aftermath, Chicago authorities charged eight men, who were either speakers in or organizers of the protest, with murder. Seven of the eight defendants received death sentences. Four of the defendants were hanged. One man scheduled for execution killed himself the day before. The governor pardoned the remaining three defendants in 1893, after they had served seven years in prison.
On May 4, 1776, Rhode Island became the first North American colony to renounce its allegiance to King George III. Ironically, Rhode Island would be the last state to ratify the U.S. Constitution more than 14 years later on May 29, 1790.
“Down through the centuries, this trick has been tried by various establishments throughout the world. They force people to get involved in the kind of examination that has only one aim and that is to stamp out dissent.”
On May 3, 1469, Italian philosopher and writer Niccolo Machiavelli was born. Machiavelli became one of the fathers of modern political theory, writing “The Prince” in 1532.
On May 3, 1940, David Koch, a billionaire businessman, who ran for Vice-President in 1980 as the Libertarian Party candidate, was born in Wichita, Kansas. Koch continues to fund numerous groups working toward libertarian goals.
On May 3, 1942, the Battle of the Coral Sea, the first modern air-naval battle, began. Though Imperial Japan won the battle and went on to occupy all of the Solomon Islands, it was a Pyrrhic victory. Japan lost 70 planes to 66 lost by the U.S., but unlike the U.S., the Japanese could not replace their lost pilots, forcing them to pull back other attack plans in the Pacific.
When former New Mexico Gov. Gary Johnson sought the Republican nomination for president, he was unequivocally told “NO” — not by voters, who had little chance to consider his candidacy, but by media outlets refusing to give him a place on their debate stages.
Mr. Johnson didn’t garner enough support in public opinion polls, debate organizers said. But his name didn’t even appear in many of those media-designed polls. Catch-2012.
But his campaign continues. He’s in Las Vegas this weekend, seeking the nomination of the Libertarian Party. Most observers expect Johnson to become the minor party’s presidential nominee . . . and to wind up on as many as 49 state ballots this fall.
Meanwhile, Ron Paul — who is also still in the race, betting long odds on a brokered Republican convention — polls 17 percent in a hypothetical three-way race with Obama and Romney. Admittedly, Johnson doesn’t have Congressman Paul’s following, but given the commitment of Paul’s supporters to civil liberties, a non-interventionist foreign policy and ending the drug war, they are far more likely to opt for Johnson than Romney . . . or Obama.
Moreover, on the biggest issue facing the country, out-of-control federal spending, Johnson has the best resumé of any candidate. He pledges to submit a balanced budget and to veto any congressional spending that we can’t afford without more borrowing.
Believe him. Johnson issued 750 vetoes in his eight years as New Mexico’s governor — more than the other 49 governors combined.
So, in all likelihood, it’s a choice between Romney or Obama . . . or a guy who would veto Washington.
This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.
I think I like Mitt Romney, the man. I have defended some of what he has said. But I doubt I will support him for the presidency — and if he gets elected, I’d likely spend as much time criticizing him as I did George W. Bush and as I do Barack H. Obama.
Shikha Dalmia, at reason.com, offers five reasons why conservatives should root for a Romney defeat. They are:
All good reasons to blanch at supporting Mr. Romney. But I have another reason, a sixth: It’s highly likely that in the next four years we’re going to hit a major crisis that will make the current “recession” look like a weekend vacation. Romney will flub the response, as would nearly any mainstream politician — perhaps any politician. But because Romney pretends to be “for” free markets and such, “free market capitalism” would almost certainly take the blame for the debacle to come, even though its actual parentage will be the government.
I’d rather blame — and have others blame — Obama, who almost personifies government as we now know it.
This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.
“It had long since come to my attention that people of accomplishment rarely sat back and let things happen to them. They went out and happened to things.”
On May 2, 1903, Benjamin Spock, the American pediatrician whose book, “Baby and Child Care,” published in 1946, was one of the best-sellers of all time, was born in New Haven, Connecticut. In 1968, Dr. Spock was charged with conspiracy to counsel, aid, and abet resistance to the draft, along with four others (William Sloane Coffin, Marcus Raskin, Mitchell Goodman, and Michael Ferber). Spock was convicted and given a two-year prison sentence, but in 1969 a federal court set aside his conviction.
On May 2, 2011, U.S. special forces killed Osama bin Laden, the suspected mastermind of the September 11 attacks and the FBI’s most wanted man, in Abbottabad, Pakistan.
Thanks to the September 11, 2001, atrocities, some Americans began to accept a practice previously considered barbaric; thanks to John Yoo and the Bush administration, that practice became something American military and “intelligence” organizations did. Torture.
The moral aspects of the issue convince me that good people do not use torture. But, apart from concerns of justice and principle, there’s a big hurdle: unreliability. Torturers rarely retrieve good information.
Under torture, victims will say almost anything; even the innocent fabricate confessions to stop the pain.
Economist David D. Friedman recently discussed one “ingenious, if imperfect, solution to the problem in what is apparently the oldest surviving Germanic law code,” that of the Visigoths: The judge compels the accuser to describe the crime in detail and in writing, and makes sure this information is not told to the person about to be tortured. If, under torture, the victim confesses with the appropriate detail, then he’s considered guilty. But if he confesses without the appropriate detail, then the accuser is himself tortured.
What’s good for the goose. . . .
On Sunday, viewers of CBS’s 60 Minutes took a gander at Jose Rodriguez, the CIA official who says he’s proud of the “enhanced interrogation techniques” he oversaw, and not ashamed of his destruction of the 92 tapes of those interrogations. It was a bizarre interview, at the very least not “enhanced.”
Amy Davidson, writing for The New Yorker’s online site, argues, “There is much evidence to suggest that Rodriguez and others are simply lying when they claim that the torture produced reliable intelligence.”
I’m no expert, but I’d bet a solidus she’s right.
The solidus, in case you were wondering, was a coin used by the Visigoths.
This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.
On May 1, 1885, the original Chicago Board of Trade Building opened for business.
On May 1, 1915, the RMS Lusitania left New York City on her 202nd, and final, crossing of the North Atlantic. Six days later, the ship was torpedoed off the coast of Ireland with the loss of 1,198 lives, including 128 Americans, rousing American public sentiment against Germany.
On May 1, 1991, Oakland Athletics outfielder Rickey Henderson stole his 939th base to break Lou Brock’s record for career stolen bases. Henderson ended his major league career stealing a total of 1,406 bases, almost 500 more than Brock, the next closest player.