[Source.](https://reason.com/2023/05/08/punishing-rioters-is-wise-bogus-seditious-conspiracy-charges-are-not/) > **Politics ruin everything, including the criminal justice system.** > The problem with convicting members of the "western chauvinist" Proud Boys on seditious conspiracy charges is that it wrongly elevates a violent tantrum by a bunch of thugs to the level of an insurrection, and it lets officials who prosecute them puff themselves up as saviors of the republic. Worse, the case took liberties with a statute that is probably best forgotten to arrive at its conclusion when normal criminal law could have punished rioters without putting the criminal justice system through contortions.