Right Wing Cries Wolf on Interpol Order

I’ve seen the ranting on right-wing sites about Obama’s executive order granting immunities and privileges to Interpol. The line of thinking is this is just another step in subjugating the U.S. to international law, and that the “police officers” of the Interpol will be free to operate with impugnity, in the U.S. , out of the reach of our courts and will be the enforcement arm of the ICC when Obama signs the U.S. up for it.

The entire argument is wrong, meaning factually incorrect. First of all, the same privilege has been given to the International Red Cross and seventy other NGOs and international entities, so really, they should calm themselves. Second. Interpol has no police officers and doesn’t operate under the color of any law other than the country in which it is present. It’s “agents” are police officers or special agents from member countries whose only authority is that granted to them in their home jurisdictions. In other words any law enforcement activity undertaken is by law enforcement in a member country, under that countries control, jurisdiction and discretion.

It gets worse. Interpol’s mission is intelligence and record keeping, essentially operating as an interchange between countries and a clearinghouse for warrants and other criminal records and information. If you bother just going to its website, and read its charter, that’s as plain as day. Interpol does have some core competencies, including art theft and it will advise local law enforcement on cases from time to time. Oh yeah, the worse part – Interpol has never arrested anybody, so the right wing paranoids once again have taken a kernel of truth and turned it into a lie.

As a Libertarian, of course I’m concerned about U.S. sovereignty, but sadly, by continuously raising the alarm over this issue, the right is only diminishing their credibility which is needed for truly substantive issues. By ranting and raving without apparently any fact checking, or by intentionally lying, how can they expect to be taken seriously?