I would not expect libertarians to have much sympathy for agents of the state when they are ensnared by the same webs they help create. And yet I do have some sympathy for former Arapahoe County, Colo. Sheriff (and one-time “Sheriff of the Year”) Pat Sullivan, who was arrested Tuesday on charges of methamphetamine distribution. Investigators say Sullivan offered meth to men in exchange for sex, and that he had also been “taking care” of meth addicts, going so far as to claim he was on a drug task force and was working for the Colorado Department of Public Health’s meth treatment program, which doesn’t exist.
It’s a dramatic fall from public grace for a man whose name adorns the very detention center where he’s being held on $500,000 bail. Sullivan served nearly 20 years as Arapahoe sheriff and ironically served on a statewide meth task force in 2000. His department undoubtedly arrested thousands on drug charges during his tenure. For his work he was named “Sheriff of the Year” by his colleagues in the National Sheriffs’ Association in 2001.
So it’s hard to feel sorry for someone who’s run afoul of the same unjust laws he once enforced. But consider this: Sullivan engages in some honest, peaceful, consensual trade for once, and ends up in an orange jumpsuit and shackles on national television, shattering a decades-long legacy as a tough and ethical law enforcement officer. It’s moments like these that makes one want to appreciate cosmic practical jokes.
Last March, Anthony Gregory questioned if Barack Obama was already a worse president than George W. Bush, noting a long list of dubious accomplishments during Bush’s eight-year tenure. Prior to his election Obama was highly critical of Bush’s policy on torture and the holding of suspected terrorists indefinitely at Guantanamo Bay without trial. And one of Obama’s first acts after being sworn in as President was also one of his most dramatic: he signed an executive order banning torture and ordering the closure of Gitmo by 2010. It was hailed as a bold move to restore the country’s shattered image overseas and bring its prosecution of the war on terror in line with its values on respecting human rights.
What a difference a thousand days as Leader of the Free World makes.
During that time Obama has ordered the killing of an American citizen in Yemen, without due process, based on his alleged association with al-Qaeda. And in March he made an about-face on his promise to close Gitmo, instead reinstating the military tribunals and continuing Bush’s policy of detaining suspects without trial since they “in effect, remain at war with the United States.”
Now the Senate has granted Obama even greater discretion in arresting and indefinitely holding anyone – even U. S. citizens, despite its
supporters’ claims to the contrary – suspected of terrorist activity, in approving a defense appropriation bill for 2012 that essentially expands the battlefield for the war on terror to anywhere on the planet, including U. S. soil. (The Senate rejected an amendment sponsored by Colorado Democrat Mark Udall and Kentucky Republican Rand Paul that would have stripped out the authorization for indefinite detention of terrorism suspects.) It is an unprecedented expansion of power for a president who campaigned on a promise to restore the country’s “moral authority.” Yet Obama is simply another in a long line of politicians making promises that could never be kept: it is impossible to regain a moral authority the American empire has never possessed.
The media are in a kerfuffle about a short-term egg shortage caused by Target and other supermarket chains dropping a major supplier, Sparboe Farms, following reports that workers at its production facilities abused chickens and failed to follow the company’s animal welfare policy. The revelations were punctuated by a graphic undercover video released by animal rights group Mercy for Animals, which showed workers stuffing chickens into cramped battery cages, pulling rotting carcasses out of cages, “torturing” birds by swinging them around by their legs, and so on. No matter how you feel about animal rights, it’s not pleasant to watch.
Sparboe, for its part, has shifted its damage control into overdrive, posting updates about steps it has taken to “rectify problems” and pointing out that it is the first egg supplier to receive USDA certification. Which, given these reports, provides some insight into the worth of government certifications.
I expect a government response will be forthcoming, and Sparboe may face fines and possibly a regiment of FDA inspectors swarming over its farms in the months to come. But anything the government can do in its enforcement role pales next to the punishment which can be meted out by the market. Even if millions of consumers haven’t suddenly adopted veganism in response to the video, they still have let their displeasure be known, and the result is that Sparboe has lost significant business and is now forced to reevaluate its practices in order to regain consumer trust. Which is exactly as it should be. No amount of regulatory oversight will prevent every problem in our food supply (this year has also seen the deadliest listeria outbreak, from tainted cantaloupe, since the 1920s), but with the ease with which information disseminates online, the market will help ensure such problems do not go unnoticed by consumers, who are then free to vote their conscience. If only the market was free to punish every business, no matter how large or small, for bad decisions and unethical practices.
It’s a dramatic fall from public grace for a man whose name adorns the very detention center where he’s being held on $500,000 bail. Sullivan served nearly 20 years as Arapahoe sheriff and ironically served on a statewide meth task force in 2000. His department undoubtedly arrested thousands on drug charges during his tenure. For his work he was named “Sheriff of the Year” by his colleagues in the National Sheriffs’ Association in 2001.
