Silly Mizzou!

My apologies, everyone. It has come to my attention that my previous post was chock full of punctuation errors, due largely to my terrible, terrible formatting. Oh well. If I were not being lazy right now, I'd go back and fix it. Now, on to other business.

Last month, the Missouri Information Analysis Center released a report on how to identify domestic terrorists involved in militia movements. The report contained a controversial passage that stated that such people usually identify with third party political candidates, and mentioned Libertarian Bob Barr, Constitution Party candidate Chuck Baldwin, and Republican Ron Paul.

Obviously, many libertarian-minded people took offense with being lumped in with the Tim McVeighs of the world. The whole thing caused a bit of an uproar among conservative commentators, and after pressure from the public and Missouri state officials, the report was recently retracted, with apologies issued to the candidates mentioned.

I mention this, obviously, for its ridiculousness and for the fact that I'm a little insulted (only a little though). I also mention it for the fact that a staff member of the Campaign for Liberty, the organization that grew out of the Ron Paul campaign, was recently detained at security checkpoint for carrying a large amount of cash. He had the cash because he was returning from an event they had where merchandise was sold and donations were accepted. They wanted to know why he had the cash, and he was reluctant to tell them. The key to all this is that he was flying out of St. Louis, MISSOURI. The great thing is that the sly little fellow covertly recorded the entire confrontation with his cell phone.

PART ONE

PART TWO

PART THREE

Honestly, I don't think any of them handled the situation all that well. I can understand Mr. Bierfeldt's hesitation to reveal his employment, and I can understand the cops' frustration with the situation, but seriously, you've got to let people know their rights. This reminds me of Alex's traffic stop. But that's a story for another day, from somebody else!

Seriously though, Missouri:
...and, I just checked, still not a terrorist!