Desert Snow encouraged state and local patrol officers to post seizure data along with photos of themselves with stacks of currency and drugs

Law enforcement doing their job — and bragging about it — is fine. All professions do that, it is normal.

I don't even mind them seizing the (illegal) drugs, but possession of cash is not against the law. Unfortunately, a loophole in the American legal thinking (as well as the British, which we inherited) does not provide much protection to a person's property . Nowhere near as much as to the person himself.

The Executive can seize cash, vehicles, and even real estate without Judiciary oversight or approval — and that ought to stop. Their justification — that what they are seizing things was used for "criminal activity" — comes into play, before anyone is convicted in any criminality.

That must stop. A judge may impose limitations on using of the suspect property (and fund-transfer) — the same way movement limitations are imposed on a person, while investigation is ongoing or a trial is pending. But no seizures ought to be permitted until a "Guilty" verdict is pronounced and the sentencing enumerates, what's to be seized as a punishment.

Would you extend this line of thinking to the price at the pump. Let's say, hypothetically, that the end result of this is a ten cent rise in a gallon of gas, should BP be forced to make up the difference? What if the price of diesel jumps up and thus the price of fresh veggies and other consumer products jumps? Should BP also be on the hook for that? Just how much should the market and the wider society have to pay for BP's massive error? And what if BP cannot in fact entirely clean up the Gulf coast? What if the fishery is ruined for decades? Should BP be forced to pay an annual wage that averages out to be what fishermen would have received if they had been able to fish? Should BP be forced to pay for higher fish prices at restaurants and fish markets?