By Dave Albin

I have written before about people interacting with city government/regulations, which have ranged from downright oppression1 to arbitrary rule making2. With the former, the absolute authority of local government, with a little mercy thrown in for good measure, can be observed; with the latter, the local government seems to exist simply to make random rules that permit trampling on private-property rights. Part of the reason I have done this is that praise of local3 or state4 government is as common as complaints5 against federal government power. Another reason is that I find no shortage of material.
The recent situation of Antonio Sosa is a good example. Mr. Sosa runs an auto parts store in Columbus Junction, IA, and applied for a liquor license, along with plans for his proposed expansion of either a new store, or one to replace his current store in the downtown area - the first news article6 about his ordeal is relatively short, but I believe, very telling.

By Congressman Ron Paul, TX

Amid much fanfare last week, the last supposed “combat” troops left Iraq as the administration touted the beginning of the end of the Iraq War and a change in the role of the United States in that country. Considering the continued public frustration with the war effort, and with the growing laundry list of broken promises, this was merely another one of the administration’s operations in political maneuvering and semantics in order to convince an increasingly war-weary public that the Iraq War is at last ending. However, military officials confirm that we are committed to intervention in that country for years to come, and our operations have in fact, changed minimally, if really at all.

By Rich Angell

The Awakening
A boy is born in an America hospital in the 1960s. He’s taken from the loving arms of his mother, taken to an operating room behind doors out of sight and sound of his mother, strapped down to a cold plastic board, and then (without anesthetic) has the most erogenous part of his penis ripped, crushed and cut away. He has no sense of time, so he has no way of knowing that this terrifying, unspeakable torture is only temporary...if you don’t count the lifelong detrimental effects of this procedure.

The latest issue of the New Hampshire Free Press is now online. http://www.newhampshirefreepress.com/PDFs/nhfp0810.pdf

In this issue:
Poison in the Tap Water
Reader Letters
Comics
Put Healthcare back in the Hands of Patients and Doctors
Circumcision
Psychiatric Meds 101
Buying Liquor from an Auto Parts Store
Live Free or Die Rally
Free Town Grafton

by William L. Anderson

As one who often writes about courts and prosecutorial misconduct, I must admit to having no confidence anymore in American judges having any integrity at all. One of the defining moments for me came in the Tonya Craft case in North Georgia when the judge, Brian House, literally took cues from the prosecutors during the trial, as they gave him hand signals and other indications of what he needed to do in certain situations.

by Bretigne Shaffer

So now the cheerleaders for war would have us believe that they are more concerned for the welfare of Afghan civilians than are those who wish to end the US occupation.

First we have White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs sanctimoniously imploring the editors of Wikileaks not to post more information that the administration believes might endanger the lives of local Afghan informants:

"You have Taliban spokesmen in the region today saying they're combing through those documents to find people that are cooperating with American and international forces," said Gibbs. "They're looking through those for names, they said they know how to punish those people."

By Felipe Franco

by William Grigg

Johnny Gaskins of Raleigh, North Carolina faces a 30-year prison term -- an effective life sentence -- for the supposed crime of depositing $450,000 in his own bank account. The corporate leaders of Wachovia Bank, a criminal syndicate once headquartered in the same state, won't face prosecution despite admissions that the laundered hundreds of billions of dollars on behalf of Mexican narcotics cartels.

Wachovia was deemed "too big to fail," and thus too important to prosecute. In our system, mercy is reserved exclusively for the powerful and corrupt, and Johnny Gaskins -- a criminal defense attorney -- was neither.

The June/July issue of the New Hampshire Free Press is now online.
http://www.newhampshirefreepress.com/PDFs/nhfp0610.pdf

In this issue:
War to Peace, Anger to Laughter, Hatred to Apathy
Who Killed Phoebe Prince?
Reader Letters
Comics
Authoritarianism is Bad for your Health
Jason Osborne's Tea Party Speech
Free Keene Press
Think for Yourself
Regulating Cavemen
Recovery of Stolen Roads
Manchester News
Free Town Grafton News

Defiance, OH

I'd like to talk to you today about government. Government is force. Government is coercion. Government is institutionalized violence. It is the apparatus by which the counterproductive and the unproductive engage in predation upon the productive. Whereas in the marketplace individuals create value and wealth for themselves by voluntarily trading goods and services with one another, the state pits groups of individuals against one another in a costly game of tug-o-war for theft and control: black against white, male against female, old against young, native against immigrants, religion against religion, the established against the unestablished.