Timothy Birdnow

It's BAAACK!

Like a bad Dracula movie, the blood sucker is returning and there is little we can do to stop it.

The City of St. Louis wants to bring back traffic cameras and other passive surveillance tools to fleece the public.

The City had taken them down after a judge ruled against their use several years ago.

Mayor Tishuara Jones (whose father went to prison for corruption) is asking the Board of Alderman to sign onto this, using a couple of high profile pedestrian injuries as justification.

But the fact is the most high profile of them all - when a high school volleyball player in town for a tournament was hit and had her legs crushed in downtown St. Louis - would have happened regardless because the perp was under house arrest and had violated his incarceration multiple times - including the time he hit the girl.

In point of fact Prosecuting Attorney Kim Gardner refused to take legal action against the black youth, who was free to act as he pleased. It was a matter of a failure to enforce the law in the first place.

Cameras wouldn't have stopped this thug.

So her injury is being used to promote harassment of law-abiding citizens.

I would point out that accidents actually went up because of the red light cameras. This was especially true of rear endings because people stopped short to avoid tickets. I would add there was a dirty trick where yello lights were cut increasingly short so that more tickets would be handed out.

The companies that own the cameras get 50 cents on the dollar for every ticket so they are eager to give as many out as possible. In theory the police review the tape - but the reality is that is pretty much a rubber stamp.

The Missouri Supreme Court ruled red light cameras unconstitutional. Not only is it difficult to impossible to verify the vehicle owner is the driver but also the accused cannot confront their accuser (a camera) in a court of law.

But Tishuara Jones wants the money they will bring. She and her Democrat homies have squandered all the taxes collected and driven out the tax base and so the city is facing a serious looming budget crisis which she hopes to mend by using spy gadgets and stealing money from motorists.

Americans have become far too willing to allow cameras to watch their every move. A nation which allows government to spy on the citizenry is not a free society. And even if it is just red light runners now (and there are plenty of those and they anger me too) it will be cameras everywhere else reporting on what you do. Tyrants love surveillance. Just look at the Stasi record in East Germany.

We have an amendment against illegal search and seizure, and cameras on the road most certainly are a violation of the Fourth Amendment.

Surveillance on citizens always starts with some good goal in mind. But once you go down that slippery slope you are doomed. Broad and easy is the path that leads to damnation.

St. Louis County, and even the conservative St. Charles County are watching this develop with great interest. If St. Louis does it and finds a way to get away with it these cameras will blanket the whole area. No good will come of it.

There will be blood on Tishuara Jones' hands. And on the St. Louis Board of Alderman. People will die from accidents caused by this.

A pox upon all of their greedy mercenary tyrannical hearts!

Posted by: Timothy Birdnow at 12:56 PM | No Comments | Add Comment
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