The Daily Parker

Politics, Weather, Photography, and the Dog

Seriously, guys? Were you bored?

I have Republican friends who think Obamacare is one step along the road to living in a police state where Ayn-Randian fears of 40% taxation and free education squash private enterprise. They have been strangely quiet about events like this, which involve actual police using previously-unthinkable force in peaceful situations:

On a quiet weeknight among the stately manors of Great Falls[, Virginia], ten men sat around a table in the basement of a private home last November playing high stakes poker. Suddenly, masked and heavily armed SWAT team officers from the Fairfax County Police Department burst through the door, pointed their assault rifles at the players and ordered them to put their hands on the table. The players complied. Their cash was seized, including a reported $150,000 from the game’s host, and eight of the ten players were charged with the Class 3 misdemeanor of illegal gambling, punishable by a maximum fine of $500.

Fairfax police said they could not discuss the Great Falls case since it is still under investigation. “In general though,” police spokeswoman Lucy Caldwell said, “detectives have seen that some of the organized card games, even in private homes, may involve hundreds of thousands of dollars. At times, we’ve seen illegal activity involved in these games. Additionally, at times, illegal weapons are present. With these large amounts of cash involved, the risks are high. We’ve worked cases where there have been armed robberies.”

Great Falls is like Winnetka, Illinois or Glen Cove, N.Y.: not exactly wretched hives of scum and villainy. So, why? (For possible answers, read Radley Balko.)

I love this bit, though:

There were no guns at the table, and no resistance, [one] player said. “They could’ve sent a retired detective with a clipboard and gotten the same result,” he added.

Yeah. But they sent in paramilitary troops armed like Marines. To a card game.

Yes, Republicans, there are signs America is becoming a police state, but you might be looking at it wrong.

Comments are closed