Once upon a time, and it was not so long ago, an American could
recognize totalitarianism and say “Thank God we’ve escaped that.” Can we
still say that?
By Friedrich Hayek took one of the two epigraphs for The Road to Serfdom from David Hume (the other, like Hayek’s title, came from Tocqueville). “It is seldom,” Hume wrote, “that liberty of any kind is lost all at once.” Much as I admire Hume, I wonder whether he got this quite right. Sometimes, I would argue, liberty is erased almost instantaneously. I’d be willing to wager that Joseph Hackett, confronted with Hume’s observation, would express similar doubts. I would be happy to ask Hackett myself, but he is inaccessible. If the ironically titled “Department of Justice” has its way, he will be inaccessible for a long, long time. Perhaps as long as 20 years.
Joseph Hackett, you see, is a
51-year-old Trump supporter and member of an organization called the
“Oath Keepers,” a group whose members have pledged to “defend the
Constitution against all enemies foreign and domestic.” (You can see how
this ends already, can’t you?) The FBI does not like the Oath Keepers.
They arrested its leader in January
and have picked up many other members in the months since. Hackett came
from his home in Florida to join the Trump “Stop the Steal” rally that
took place on January 6. According to court documents,
he entered the Capitol at 2:45 that afternoon. He left some ten minutes
later, at 2:54. The next day, he went home. On May 28, he was
apprehended by the FBI and indicted on a long list of charges, including
conspiracy, obstruction of an official proceeding, destruction of
government property, and illegally entering a restricted building. ........To Read More.....
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