Recently, 51 State Department employees signed a memo urging the president to change his focus in Syria from fighting ISIS to fighting the secular Assad government. They argued that targeting Assad would weaken Assad’s enemy, ISIS. The logic is not immediately apparent. They also dismissed any danger that a US attack on Russia’s ally in Syria might annoy the Russians, who spent more than six months bombing ISIS and al-Qaeda in Syria. Although these 51 represent a very small faction within the Department, the neocon war propaganda immediately latched on to it. It made front page news in the New York Times. This is likely a preview of a Hillary presidency. More on this important development in today’s Liberty Report:

Donald Tusk, a former Polish politician who now is the (unelected) President of the European Council, has warned that if the UK votes to leave the European Union it would be the “end of western political civilization.” Others warn that taxes would increase for British citizens if they leave the EU. Still others worry about the future of NATO if other multinational entities like the EU begin unraveling. Polls suggest a surge in support for “Brexit” from the EU, but even if the people vote to leave, will the politicians bother to take their views into consideration? Looking at the future of Europe and “western political civilization” today in the Liberty Report:

Opponents of gun rights, including President Obama and Hillary Clinton, are using yesterday’s tragic Orlando shooting to push their agenda, even though the nightclub was a “gun free zone.” Meanwhile Republican politicians like House Speaker Paul Ryan are using the shooting to blame it all on “radical Islam.” The federal government will likely use the tragedy to demand more resources, and the media will concentrate on the most salacious details of the attack on a 24/7 basis. Will all these special interests served by the killings, will anyone pause to ponder what was really behind them? What really motivated the shooter? We look into this today in the Liberty Report:

Some years ago, Rep. Walter Jones (R-NC) did the unthinkable in Washington: he admitted he was wrong and he determined to make amends for what he viewed as a great mistake. He believed the neocon lies about the danger Iraq posed to the US and he voted for the war back in 2002. Very soon he realized how he had been lied to and he dedicated himself to the cause of peace. He has since personally written more than 11,000 letters to the families of those killed or wounded in the wars. This year the neocons targeted him in his primary race, supporting a Republican challenger who would do as the neocons wished. Jones demolished the neocon last week and he already has big plans for the next Congress. The Liberty Report sits down with Rep. Jones on this very special edition to discuss what’s next for the antiwar Republican (and Ron Paul Institute Board Member):

A new episode of Five Minutes Five Issues posted on Thursday. You can listen to it, and read a transcript, below. You can also find previous episodes of the show at Stitcher, iTunes, YouTube, and SoundCloud.

Listen to the new episode here:

Read a transcript of the new episode, including links to further information regarding the topics discussed, here:

The Ron Paul Institute for Peace and Prosperity welcomes you to Five Minutes Five Issues.

Starting in five four three two one.

Hello, I am Adam Dick, a Ron Paul Institute senior fellow.

Let’s start.

Issue one.

In 1986, the death of basketball player Len Bias from a drug overdose was used to propel forward imposing long mandatory minimum sentences for people convicted for having small amounts of crack. It took nearly 25 years until those crack mandatory minimums were rolled back partway toward the powder cocaine levels.

By the way, it turns out Bias likely overdosed on powder cocaine instead of crack.

Jeremy Haile and Michael Collins warn at The Marshall Project on Monday that reports the drug fentanyl may have played a role in musician Prince’s death could be used to support creating new long mandatory minimums. Will the urge to “do something” about a hyped-up drug epidemic again condemn many people to long sentences in prison?

Issue two.

On Fox News this week, Ron Paul Institute Advisory Board Member Andrew Napolitano called a provision being considered in the United States Congress “the deepest and most profound assault” on the Constitution’s Fourth Amendment. The Fourth Amendment prohibits searches and seizures without probable cause and a warrant. Napolitano explains that the provision would allow the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) to, without a search warrant from a judge, obtain Americans’ internet browsing records. As Napolitano elaborates, the proposed legal change threatens the privacy of people’s medical, legal, religious, and personal information.

Napolitano notes the provision would also makes it a crime for internet service providers to tell people the FBI has demanded the turnover of private information.

Issue three.

Ron Paul Institute Chairman Ron Paul has long admired boxer Muhammad Ali’s resistance to being drafted into the US military during the Vietnam War. This week, Paul dedicated the Monday episode of his Ron Paul Liberty Report to commemorating Ali’s resistance.

Paul wrote in his book Swords into Plowshares the following regarding Ali: “One thing is for sure, Muhammad Ali stood his ground and refused to go thousands of miles from home to kill people who never did him any harm — a heroic stand.”

Issue four.

Forty-Five years ago this month, on June 17, 1971, President Richard Nixon, in a White House speech, announced the escalation of anti-drug efforts. Nixon helped popularize the term “war on drugs” in the process. Nixon declared:

America’s public enemy number one in the United States is drug abuse. In order to fight and defeat this enemy, it is necessary to wage a new, all-out offensive.

The same day, Nixon sent a message to Congress in which he said he was “initiating a worldwide escalation in our existing programs for the control of narcotics traffic.”

The drug war has brought over a trillion dollars in spending, a very high incarceration rate, gang violence, the erosion of respect for constitutional rights protections, foreign military interventions, and other disastrous consequences. Hopefully, the US government will end this war soon.

Issue five.

This week the 2016 Bilderberg meeting is taking place in Germany. The highly-secretive meeting of select elite government, business, foundation, academic, and media people, predominantly from America and Europe, occurs yearly.

You might worry that the attendees will concoct plans to enrich and empower themselves at the expense of the rest of us. But, don’t worry about that. Right up top of the Bilderberg FAQ it states: “The meeting has one main goal: to foster discussion and dialogue. There is no desired outcome, there is no closing statement, there are no resolutions proposed or votes taken.”

Come on, who can be against some people coming together to talk?

Anyway, the FAQ also explains that the Bilderbergers have “a diverse mix of backgrounds, views, generations and genders.” I guess I will check the mailbox next year for my invitation to Bilderberg 2017.

—–

That’s a wrap.

Transcripts of Five Minutes Five Issues episodes, including links to related information, are at the Ron Paul Institute blog.

Five four three two one.

Bill Kristol of Neocon Central thought he had Rep. Walter Jones (R-NC) in his sights. He backed a Republican primary challenger to the North Carolina antiwar Republican (and RPI Board Member) and brought on board the likes of Haley Barbour, Karl Rove, Ari Fleischer, and Sarah Palin. They huffed and they puffed but they could not blow the principled Walter Jones down. He not only beat their candidate, but he beat him by over 50 percentage points! More on what Jones’ victory means in today’s Liberty Report. (Note: the Liberty Report will post an extensive interview with Rep. Jones over the weekend).

Some 31,000 troops and thousands of military vehicles are taking part in NATO’s “Operation Anakonda 2016” in Poland this week. It is the largest NATO operation since the end of the Cold War and it is taking place not far from Poland’s border with Russia’s Kaliningrad. US generals swear it is just a “defensive” exercise and there is nothing for Russia to be concerned over. How would the US feel about a similar Russian/Chinese military exercise in Mexico? We ponder this and more in today’s Liberty Report:

At the height of his popularity, in a move that destroyed his fame and fortune, Muhammad Ali refused to step up to the white line when his name was called. In so doing he was making it clear that he would not go to Vietnam to fight Washington’s war. He refused to be drafted. What have the Viet Cong ever done to me, he asked. It was one of the greatest acts of defiance to Washington’s war machine — and ever since then the war-promoters have made sure it could not be repeated. Media coverage of war has been sanitized, billions are spent by the Pentagon to propagandize the American people, the “enemy” is relentlessly demonized. History has already shown that Ali’s battle against this unholy murder machine is the most important fight of his life. More today on his legacy in today’s Liberty Report:

The neoconservative, Democrat-heavy Center for a New American Security (CNAS) has created a foreign policy blueprint for what they hope is a future Hillary Clinton presidency. Unsurprisingly, it is heavy on the “need” for the US military to much more aggressively dominate the globe. The Obama Administration was far too dovish, according to CNAS “experts.” No one should be shocked that yet another militaristic Beltway “think tank” is funded predominantly by the military-industrial complex. Will Americans continue to be fooled by those who line their pockets with cash while making the rest of less safe and more poor? We give it our two cents in today’s Liberty Report:

President Obama has suggested that he would like to admit 100,000 refugees from Middle East wars to the United States in 2017. According to one study, the total cost of such a policy to the US taxpayer would be more than six billion dollars over the next five years. Additional refugees would raise that cost significantly. Anyone who objects to such a massively expensive program is accused of being heartless. But what about those who objected to US interventionist “regime change” policies that created the refugee crisis in the first place? Are we who would have left them alone to live their lives really heartless? And what would be the best solution to the crisis? Tune in to the Liberty Report to find out:

Harvard law professor and former Obama Administration official Cass Sunstein has written approvingly recently about a recent Supreme Court decision which affirms a 1997 case that determined that Executive Branch agencies have the authority to interpret the meaning of the regulations they write. What this means is that the Legislative Branch and the Judicial Branch of government will have no role in either writing or interpreting what are de facto laws (anyone who does not believe that should try breaking an IRS regulation and see what happens) written by the Executive Branch. It represents a huge agglomeration of power in the hands of the bureaucrats who in most cases answer to no elected authority. This is the real “deep state,” where the elites rule over us under the approving gazes of ideologues like Sunstein. What does this mean for liberty? Tune in to today’s Liberty Report:

For the “privilege” of being groped and radiated before being allowed to travel, passengers are now facing the additional TSA abuse of being forced to miss their flights due to unimaginably long security check lines. Thousands are missing their flights, and much of the problem is that the agency has thrown a hissy-fit over a slight reduction in the number of screeners. Some 4,600 screeners were cut in hopes that more people would sign up for “TSA-PRE” (they didn’t) and thus fewer screeners would be necessary. They now want not only all of those back — they want an additional 6,000 screeners, which would far exceed the limit set by Congress! To top it off, a recent Homeland Security investigation of TSA performance at the Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport found that nine out of twelve times TSA screeners missed simulated explosive material passing through checkpoints. What to do about an inefficient government agency that abuses our civil liberties? We have some ideas in today’s Liberty Report: