A very long time ago, I messed up in my life, badly. I ultimately had to serve three years in federal prison.
I won't go into the details of the crime itself. It was pretty bad. Needless to say, I deserved those three years. I was guilty as hell, and I knew it. My lawyers knew it, the prosecutor knew it, and the judge knew it.
But here's the thing, I went through the system, and the system was fair to me. At no point, from going through the courts to being released from the BOP, can I honestly say that I was mistreated or abused.
I had my day in court. I said my piece. I made my case. The judge considered everything and ultimately sentenced me to three years instead of the eight years that had been on the table at the beginning.
The point I'm trying to make is that we really do have a functional judicial system. It is capable of prosecuting people who commit crimes while still providing them with due process and a fair opportunity to defend themselves.
If someone breaks the law in the United States, they should be prosecuted according to the law, fairly and consistently.
What we're doing now, using the power of the state in ways that disregard those principles, is Draconian, totalitarian-state nonsense, and it needs to stop immediately.