Breaking Rad -- Federalism For Real

 I WAS REFLECTING THE OTHER DAY on the underlying assumptions of principle involved in federal prosecutions of what are really non-federal offenses (however much the feds have invented a selection of “civil rights” violations in order to get in and make political points on stuff that is really purely local). You know the sort of thing I mean -- like the “civil rights” prosecutions of the California cops involved in the Rodney King beating (the virtues of which I am not challenging here -- though I was not present at any of the related trials, it seemed to me that crimes were indeed committed that evening).
   I found my mind traveling around to the other side of that coin. Why, I wondered, do we seldom (if ever) hear of the states prosecuting the crimes committed by federales?
   Think about nominal federal actors (by which is meant actors purporting to act in the capacity of federal agents exercising federal authority) who violate one or more laws of the state in which they act. At first blush it will be imagined that the “supremacy clause” of the US Constitution shields these actors from the state’s laws, but I’m speaking of actors NOT acting pursuant to any legitimate federal statutory authorization. 
   For instance, in every state of the union there are criminals violating state eavesdropping laws day in and day out, and they are NOT doing so pursuant to any feder ...