Judging Freedom - Q&A with You! Answering Your Questions - "Ask the Judge" LIVE!

Episode Date: September 29, 2023

Q&A with You! Answering Your Questions - "Ask the Judge" LIVE!See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Thank you. Hi, everyone. Judge Andrew Napolitano here for Judging Freedom. Today is Friday, September 29th, 2023. It's Friday afternoon. It's sort of still summertime, although we have a cold, wet, rainy, fall-like weather here in the Northeast. A lot of rain in New York City, as a matter of fact, a lot of flooding in the city, but it's time for our Ask the Judge. So I see a lot of questions lined up already, and I'll start to go through them. Here's one that intrigued me from the beginning, from Patrick Jean-Claude. Judge, as a Roman Catholic, what do you think about Pope Francis lecturing everyone on open borders and migrants? I doubt Vatican City wants 10 million migrants. Keep up the good work and Godspeed.

Thank you for your well wishes, Patrick. I'm a traditionalist Roman Catholic, so I don't appreciate the Pope lecturing the world on anything other than how to get into heaven. I don't appreciate the Pope getting involved in politics. On open borders, libertarians look at this two ways. One group of libertarians believes that the right to travel is a natural right and you have the right to travel wherever you want, and the government can't interfere with it. If your cousins from Florence or Jerusalem or Paris or London want to live in a spare room in your house, it's none of the government's business. The other group of libertarians recognize that the government can decide who can use government property, like the streets and the sidewalks.

And because we are a welfare state here in the United States, and as soon as somebody gets here, they're entitled to food, shelter and clothing at the expense of the rest of us. We have the right to exclude them. So those are the two views on this. But the Pope getting involved, lecturing countries, I don't approve of it, and I have been critical of him for it. I've been critical of Pope Francis for a lot of things. I think he's the worst Pope in history with respect to theology, what the Church teaches, and with respect to liturgy, how the Church worships. But that's probably another topic for another time. All right. Where is Patrick so that I can take it down, Gary? Now I can't find it to remove it. Let me see if I can go over it. Okay. Judge, what is the difference in international law between soviet and warsaw pact

assistance to north vietnam 66 through 73 and u.s and nato assistance uh to ukraine i mean really there there's no there's no difference in international law. Countries just aid whoever they want to aid. International law sometimes puts them in a position where they have to aid, like if they enter into a treaty. Obviously, the Soviet Union and China helped the North Vietnamese to defeat us in Vietnam, where we had no business fighting. Although at the time, I was a college student, and I had a crew cut, and I wore a t-shirt that said, bomb Hanoi. I was very, very much in favor of the war, because I bought the false narrative that if Vietnam falls, the world is going to fall, a false narrative that I now condemn. I'm glad that my thinking

matured on that. In terms of U.S., the United States and NATO, I'm of the view that NATO and the United States want to use Ukraine as a battering ram and will continue to aid Ukraine for as long as it is popular in their countries. It is beginning to get unpopular here in the United States. We'll see where it goes. All right, I'll answer this one. Papa Ganoush, judge, what made you want to start doing your YouTube and do you enjoy it more than your time on TV? I loved, loved my 24 years at Fox. I was there for 24 years. They put me in front of a camera 14,500 times. So I've had Judging Freedom for 23 months. Next month will be the second anniversary of it. And we've done 2,000 products, 2,000 broadcasts, 2,000 pieces of content are posted there. So I'm actually

ahead of the game. It's hard for me to say which I enjoy more. I loved being at Fox. I love what I'm doing now. Thank you for asking. From D, why did Canada honor a Nazi? Canada has a long history, D, going back to right after World War II, where many, many Nazi leaders, Nazi intelligence community leaders, fled Germany so that they wouldn't be arrested and punished for what they did during World War II, and they went to Canada. Some of them came here. Some of the nuclear scientists came to the U.S., and we embraced them. Many fled to Canada. Many fled to Latin America. Some of the worst Nazis fled to Latin America, but Canada has had a tradition of welcoming Nazis. It obviously was a catastrophic PR blunder that Prime Minister Trudeau foolishly and without credibility

attempted to distance himself from. Nobody believes that he had nothing to do with it. They forced the Speaker of the Canadian Parliament to resign as the Speaker. I believe he's still a member of the Parliament. Trudeau is a left-wing authoritarian who thought he could gain popularity by embracing Nazis, and it quite frankly blew up in his face. Looking for another one here. Judge, from D, what can be done about the deadly drug trafficking? That is a very, very serious issue if people are coming into the country, not because they are looking for freebies, not because they want to have babies here who will become citizens and then their parents will have to stay because the public policy of the country is not to split families up, but in order to harm us by spreading these deadly drugs, fentanyl, among the public. That's a very serious problem.

In my view, it is the duty of the states, not of the federal government, to arrest that problem. I think if you left this up to Governor Abbott in Texas, he'd do a far better job than the federal government is doing. But the federal government has big-footed the states and has taken over it and has done a terrible, terrible job. Judge Prasobiak, that's my friend Jack Prasobiak, said the State Department won't help Gonzalo Lira, who's being held in a Ukrainian prison, free speech. Ukraine does not believe in free speech. For that matter, D, neither does the United States in wartime. I just finished reading a great book by Adam Hochschild, and I highly commend it to anybody that wants to read it, called American Midnight.

And it's about the suppression of freedom during World War I. It's a rarely told story. It isn't even studied in high school social studies or even in college history unless you're focusing on that era. Edgar Hoover in a very, very bad light, an accurate light, in my opinion, as monsters who suppressed free speech during World War I and continued to suppress it after the war was over. Probably the most useless, the least useful war we ever entered on a large scale. Gonzalo Lira. Libertarians are on both sides of this fellow. Some people think he's a snake. Other people think he says what he thinks and he has the right to speak freely. But it is clear that if you speak freely and make arguments that Russia has a legitimate claim on Ukraine, on Crimea and Eastern Ukraine, arguments like those that are made here on judging freedom,

you're going to get locked up in Ukraine. I wish Gonzalo Lira were free. I wish he could come on my show. I wish he could resume his own show. But I don't think that's going to happen as long as President Zelensky and the Nazis and the hardliners are in control of Ukraine, which, of course, at the moment, they still are. Judge, this is from Reckless Abandon, and there's a picture of Mr. Abandon. Have you heard from your friend since he joined the Ukrainian army? All right. Well, I am friends with Matt Van Dyke only because he's a regular on the show. We've never met each other in person, and we have not heard from him.

He does communicate with my producer, Gary, on a regular basis, And when he's able to come on, we put him on. And Matt, if you're watching, we'll put you on whenever you want, even if it's a weird time of day. I'll get out of bed and get in front of this camera and do it for you. I think what you're doing is insane. But I wish you well. I hope you stay safe. And you've been a great source of information for us about what's going on in the war. Right to travel. Do we have to register our property with the state and get licensed to take our property, our car, from point A to point B from someone named Belcio Gilpet? Mr. or Ms. Gilpet, unfortunately, we do, because the government in the United States does not respect fundamental liberties. I'm of the view that among the natural rights is the right to leave the government, to leave the country, to enter the country if you want. But the government wants to know everything about us.

You've got to register the car. And if it's a car that is less than five years old, it's got a computer chip in there onto which the government and its surveillance agencies can latch. And if you have a car that doesn't have that computer chip, but you have your mobile device with you, they can latch onto the mobile device. So the government knows illegally and unconstitutionally, where we go, where we travel, and where we end up. It is, in my view, reprehensible, immoral, and unconstitutional. From MC, judge, are our leaders crazy enough to put the U.S. and NATO forces on the ground to fight the Russians and

risk the possibility of a nuclear war? Short answer, yes. Yes, they are, because they will be humiliated when the Russians succeed in recapturing the Russian portions of Ukraine, the portions to which they have a legitimate moral and legal claim, and Ukraine is no longer able to resist. Joe Biden will be humiliated, whether he's running for re-election, whether he's not running for re-election, whether he's won re-election, whether he's lost re-election, whether he's on the beach in Rehoboth, Delaware, whatever the case may be, his and he and those people around him will be utterly and totally humiliated. And in order to avoid that humiliation, they will send troops. Troops are already there out of uniform, which, of course, means they are not protected by the Geneva Convention.

Geneva Convention requires a uniform with an identifiable arm patch indicating what government you work for and to which military you are a part. If you don't have that recognizable uniform with the recognizable arm patch, you do not have the protections of the Geneva Convention. You can be shot as a spy. Can American CIA, can British SEALs out of uniform, can American SEALs out of uniform, can British MI6 be shot as spies? Yes. Have any of them been killed? We don't know. They won't tell us. They don't want us to know. Joe Biden will say we don't have troops on the ground. That's his code word for we don't have troops on the ground in uniform. But we know they're there. We just don't know what they're doing. When they start to come home in body bags, then you'll see a big brouhaha about that here in the United States. great question. To elaborate on the question from Think for Yourself, ICC, is this why Bush and Cheney do not travel to the USA?

Okay, I didn't see the question from the viewer who calls him International Criminal Court for war crimes, for murder of civilians in Iraq and in Ukraine. And that's why they don't travel to foreign countries. There's an EU, they've also been indicted by a judge in Spain. So there's an EU wide, and it's more than just the European Union, warrant for their arrest. So even though they get, Cheney doesn't, but George W. Bush does, get Secret Service protection, they can't travel to foreign countries because the military and the security forces of the foreign countries would overpower the Secret Service and arrest George W. Bush and Dick Cheney and prosecute them for war crimes. And they should be arrested and prosecuted for war crimes.

They lied us into Afghanistan. They lied us into Iraq. They killed hundreds of thousands of innocents, all because, I'm now quoting George W., Saddam tried to kill my daddy. One of the most reprehensible statements ever made by a president, one of the worst presidencies in the history of the country. I know this upsets my Republican friends. I actually voted for George W. Bush when he ran against Al Gore, something I regret. But of course, it was just one vote, and I wasn't in Florida, so it wasn't the handful of votes that pushed Bush over the top. But I condemn his presidency. He should have known that 9-11 was coming. The Patriot Act was prepared before 9-11. We don't even have to go there. He simply became a monster for limited

government, personal liberty, and peace. From Optro, question for Judge Napolitano. Do you believe the U.S. is a true democracy? Do you believe in the U.S. there is equal justice for all? Do you believe there is true free speech, right? Well, the U.S. is not a true democracy. The closest country to a true democracy is Switzerland, where the citizens actually vote on legislation, literally go to a meeting and raise their hands and vote on legislation, sort of like the old New England town meeting, where New England towns had a mayor, but it was just for the purpose of presiding over the town meeting. The town meeting hired cops, fired cops, set speed limits, and set the rules. I don't know if they still have that.

That's a true democracy. What we have here purports to be a representative democracy where everybody can vote, but not on legislation. You vote for a person or persons to represent you in the government. That's called a Republican, lowercase r, a form of government. It is not a true democracy. It's not even a Republican form of government because of the deep state, the parts of the government that stay in power no matter who the representatives are. Do I believe there is equal justice for all? There isn't. I can tell you that from my years as a lawyer and from my years as a judge. Bad people get away with horrible things in this country.

Good people are prosecuted for thought crimes. The prosecutors prosecute whom they hate and whom they fear. I'm not talking about a bank robber who should be prosecuted, but I am talking about people that get away with things because of the friends that they have. Do you believe there is true free speech? There is not. Question, in the Constitution, in the First Amendment, you all know this language, Congress shall make no law abridging the freedom of speech. Does no law really mean no law? It doesn't, because there is speech that can get you in trouble. Just ask anybody who was at January 6th who used free speech, whether it was expressions with their hands, whether it was words that came out of their mouths, whether it

was a placard that they carried. The government will continue to punish and suppress speech that it hates and fears. These are great questions, and I'm sorry that the answers are not satisfying. I remember quite well when you spoke of a case where an officer of the law repeatedly lied under oath. Is that not perjury? And speaking with a judge, a federal judge, I asked him the same question. Well, lying under oath obviously is perjury. I could tell you many stories of government agents lying under oath. I mean, and lying under oath happens a lot. The group that lies under oath second most frequently are the police, including federal agents as well. Of course, the group that lies most under oath are defendants in criminal cases. They try and persuade the jury that they didn't do

what the government says they did. I remember trying a terrible case where a baby, a two-year-old baby was beaten to death. And the police showed up at the house. They looked at the wife, skinny little lady. They looked at the husband, a big, big bruising bodybuilder. And they said, you must have done it. No evidence. Arrested the husband, gave the wife a deal. Testify against your husband. We won't go after you. Well, she testified against the husband in the murder case. It was in front of me. The jury found him not guilty. So now what do I do? A dead baby could only have been the husband or the wife. I ordered the government to prosecute the wife for perjury. In my opinion, she lied

under oath and the jury saw right through it. She was the murderer, or as Charles Lawton said in witness for the prosecution, the murderess. The appellate courts reversed me and said, you're just a trial judge. You can't tell the prosecutors who to prosecute. Same thing happens when police lie under oath. I have reported cops for lying under oath. Nothing ever came from it. I have told prosecutors to prosecute this guy. It can't possibly be true what he's saying. He said he saw a cracked taillight a half a mile away. He's not Superman. No human being can see a cracked taillight a half mile away. He told this to me under oath. He's lying. No prosecution. As far as I know, that person is still a police officer, which tells me he's probably done it again, because once you get away with this stuff, people have a way of keep doing it and doing it and doing it. that is different from what we've been talking about.

John Walters, where are the NATO US missiles located that are aimed at Russia and how many missiles are there? Okay, I can't answer that question for you except to say that there are nuclear weapons in six different locations in Italy alone. There are probably 75. You can Google this and you'll get a map, John. There are probably 75 or 80 locations starting way up by the Baltic Sea and going all the way down to the Mediterranean of NATO weapons, NATO or US, NATO and NATO and U.S., NATO is U.S., U.S. is NATO, however you want to look at it, that are aimed at Moscow. And you've heard me use this analogy before. How would we think if Chinese weapons were in Tijuana, Mexico, aimed at Dallas and Houston and Los Angeles and Chicago and Miami, we'd react the same way that President

Putin is reacting. Why do you consider him a monster? Why don't they just understand? The guy wants his country to be happy and prosperous and peaceful. But we have these neocons who run the government, who advise Joe Biden, who just can't or won't leave them leave him alone from long trout how long can we take anything that oh boy get rid of that one i didn't see the word in there sir okay What about the German leopard tank when found they were wearing German uniforms? Is that an act of war towards Germany? Okay, so if you mean a German leopard tank in Ukraine with German troops wearing uniforms, it's an act of war against Russia. Germany recently has just held up on a promised delivery of Taurus tanks because those tanks can only be operated, strike that, Taurus missiles, not a tank, it's a missile on a movable bed.

Those missiles can only be operated by German technicians, military or civilian. And the German government does not want German technicians to be in Ukraine. How many American technicians are in Ukraine? We don't know. How many American technicians, military out of uniform, we went through this a few minutes ago, will be killed in Ukraine? We don't know. Thank you for that question, the person who goes by the name of Cowboy. Judge, you personally think our elections are rigged on a dark shadow group, which is transnational, runs America. I don't. I think that our elections are basically fair. They are not perfect. I know that from having sat as an election judge. But you're entitled to a fair election, not a perfect one. I do not believe that a transnational dark group runs America. I believe that a dark

group runs the American government. This is the same mentality that killed RFK and killed JFK. It's basically the deep state. It's the intelligence community. It's the law enforcement community. It's the Federal Reserve. It's the administrative agencies. Almost all these people are on the federal level. They don't change, no matter who the president is. Even Donald Trump, who was victimized personally, I talked to him several times about this. Even Donald Trump, who was victimized and tormented personally by these people. Couldn't get them out of their jobs. We'll see if he gets elected again, if he can get them out of their jobs. That's it, my dear friends.

We've gone on for 25 minutes. I hope you've enjoyed it. It was a huge success last week. I see a few thousand of you watching. I hope you watch it over the weekend. I hope you'll like and subscribe. We're up to 203,000 subscriptions. You know what we had 23 months ago? Zero. And the first day we had 93, and some of my friends and former colleagues in the media in New York mocked us.

Now we have a huge audience, and I am deeply grateful for those of you who wrote snarky comments and those of you who wrote snarky comments and those of you who wrote legitimate comments but deeply grateful for all of you who watch Judging Freedom. We will continue to produce serious content for you without fear, without favor, and with one guidepost looking out for your liberty.