You may think that pirates are from a bygone age, that they’re lost to history, and that they exist only in the movies, like Errol Flynn and that other guy –

Well, all the pirates haven’t gone away.  The oldtime pirates sailed the seas in search of plunder, stealing anything they could get their hands on.  Today’s pirates are much the same, but instead of sailing the seven seas, they sail the worldwide web.  They go by many names: hacker, computer nerd, cyberpunk, ecowarrior, saboteur.  Whatever you call them, they’re criminals, who are cyberterrorists.  While it pains me to quote the bastard, Robert Mueller once observed that, “There are only two types of companies: those that have been hacked and those that will be.” Much of the hacking is carried out by or sanctioned by foreign, bad actor States.  China and Russia come quickly to mind.  The Chinese People’s Liberation Army employs “black hat” hackers to steal government and industrial secrets. (Just an aside, isn’t it remarkable that both the Chinese and U.S. governments call their agencies and laws by euphemistic names that make them sound beneficial or benign?  The Chinese PLA doesn’t exist to liberate anything.  We do the same thing.  Affordable Care Act?  Department of Justice?  But I digress).  Hacking has become commonplace.  Dennis Blair, the former director of National Intelligence, recently wrote that, “Chinese companies have stolen trade secrets from virtually every sector of the American economy.”  The cyber thieves have become even bolder, now locking up U.S. computer systems and demanding ransoms.  Government and private industry computers have been held hostage by a variety of bad actors.  On top of that, companies like Equifax, Home Depot and Uber have paid more than $100 million in fines and settlements after data hacks compromised the identities of their customers.  The latest offense, almost certainly orchestrated by pirates located in and operating with the blessing of the Russian government, shut down the 5,500 mile Colonial Pipeline, which provides gasoline to much of the east coast of the U.S.  The criminals locked Colonial’s computer controls, demanded, and eventually were paid a ransom in the neighborhood of $5 million.  Apparently having decided that it’s now o.k. to bargain with terrorists, our government encouraged Colonial to pay the ransom.  The Biden Administration did nothing, and said nothing about this obvious case of Russian interference.  In the mean time, States from Florida to Maryland had their gasoline supplies cut off.  Most gas stations had no fuel.  Fully 88% of the stations in Washington, D.C. had no gasoline.  You may not have heard this, because Corrupt Demented Imbecile Joe Biden is President.  If Donald Trump was President and millions of people were condemned to Jimmy Carter Era gas lines and inflated prices, somebody definitely would have mentioned it.  But as with all things, Biden got a pass.  The point is that cyber pirates are no different than oldtime pirates.  They just look different. And what’s more, when the piracy is directed or sanctioned by a foreign government, it’s an act of war.  How to combat it?  A recent article in The Wall Street Journal made an intriguing suggestion.  In, A Maritime Solution for Cyber Piracy, retired Major General Thomas Ayres suggested that cyber piracy could be stopped by the issuance of Letters of Marque and Reprisal.  The Constitution gives Congress the power to grant letters of Marque and Reprisal, which authorize private parties to engage in military hostilities without government funding or oversight.  This includes permission to cross an international border to conduct a reprisal, by taking action against an attack or injury.  Marque and Reprisal was used extensively to combat the Barbary Pirates, early in the 19th Century.  You remember the Barbary Pirates – these guys –

American merchant ships were authorized as “privateers” to raid pirate shipping, and to take and keep the treasures they seized.  It worked.  The last official Letter of Marque was issued in 1815, but we’ve come close since.  Just after Pearl Harbor, without the issuance of formal Letters of Marque, Goodyear blimps were enlisted to search the seas off the west coast for Japanese vessels.  After 911, letters of Marque were discussed to deal with the latest Muslim threat.  Ron Paul suggested them as a means of stopping the Somali pirates.  In 2019, a Georgia Congressman proposed the Active Cyber Defense Certainty Act, which would permit private sector cyber “hack backs,” authorizing private companies to engage in active cyber defense by hacking into an attacker’s network —hacking back.  The bill’s sponsor responded to critics of the practice, “We love it when people say, ‘This would only create the Wild West.  The Wild West currently exists!  We’re only asking for a neighborhood watch.”  The bill died in Committee, but private cyber security firms are out there trying to hack back against the pirates, while at the same time trying to avoid being charged with U.S. crimes themselves.  Why not help them?  Give them a financial incentive and protect them from prosecution and civil suits.  The Russian and Chinese governments swear they’re not behind the hacking, so why not turn our hackers loose on these thieves and give them a taste of their own medicine.  Why not?  Biden is a senile wimp.  He and the Congress would rather protect China than America.  I know another President who wouldn’t stand for this cyber hacking crap, and who would relish the idea of hitting back.

  “Avast me hearties, payback is a bitch!”  The truth is that Putin wouldn’t have had the balls to authorize the Colonial hack if Trump was President.  The Colonial Pipeline was a test.  Biden failed.  It will happen again, next time, maybe they turn off the power to large parts of America.  Our power grid is vulnerable, and Biden’s multi-trillion dollar “infrastructure” plans don’t include our most necessary infrastructure.  When the lights go out, Biden and Co. won’t be able to get away with “just be patient.”  It will get ugly fast, and the result could be a shooting war.  Let our cyber Geeks do the job, then just deny everything.  Take a page from the Israelis.  When Iran’s nuclear program became a problem, their chief scientist mysteriously got whacked.  Everybody suspected the Israelis, but they just said, “Who?  What? Us?”  The job got done and the bad guys got the message.  The world is run by computers to the point where hackers threaten not only corporate profits, but our very lives.  Old time pirates were hanged.  Newt Gingrich has called for the death penalty for cyber pirates.  String ’em up.