Oklahoma Attorney General Drew Edmondson’s unlawful indictment of Paul Jacob, Susan Johnson, and Rick Carpenter for their roles in organizing a citizen initiative drive in Oklahoma is basically simple in motive and hoped-for result.

It’s a vindictive attack by the Oklahoma political establishment on those who would help Oklahoma’s citizens wrest greater control over their government. The purpose is to intimidate any who might try this sort of thing in the future; i.e., any who might try to help people participate in direct democracy. The message is: “We’re stomping on these guys for getting involved in a citizen initiative that might limit our power, so don’t you try the same thing or we’ll stomp on you too.”

Not very subtle. It’s so not-subtle that the only persons who don’t get it after reviewing the facts of this case are the persons bound and determined not to get it. Pretty simple—in essence. Nevertheless, there are layers and twists that can perplex even the most sophisticated observers.

For example, after Ed Morrissey of the Captain’s Quarters blog ran his first report on Edmondson v. the Oklahoma Three, that same day he conducted an interview with Paul Jacob. And Morrissey’s follow-up comments at his blog have the tone of one who has stumbled even further down the rabbit hole. He writes:

Earlier today, I wrote about the prosecution of Paul Jacob by Oklahoma for his involvement in circulating petitions for a ballot initiative. The law in question forbids anyone except Oklahoma residents from seeking signatures on political petitions. Because Jacob, as a backer of tax reform, helped organize the Taxpayer Bill of Rights initiative in Oklahoma and the petition circulators didn’t meet the residency requirements (more on that in a moment), the Oklahoma AG charged Jacob and two others with a single count of conspiracy to break that law — which carries a potential 10-year sentence.

We knew that from this morning. What we didn’t know, and what we found out during our interview with Jacob, is that none of the circulators have been charged with a crime. Why? It seems that residency requirements are so nebulous as to be unprosecutable. People can register to vote in Oklahoma with no requirement to establish a lengthy residency first, and they can get drivers’ licenses immediately.

In other words, the state of Oklahoma will prosecute Jacob for conspiring to commit supposed crimes for which they cannot and/or will not prosecute the actual alleged criminals. It’s absurd, and Jacob’s case needs much more visibility.

Yes, absurd (though, to forestall a possibly misleading implication, extending the prosecution to encompass the petition circulators would not be any less absurd and unjust). “So nebulous as to be unprosecutable.” But–

Being unprosecutable in justice and reason and being unprosecutable in terms of the exigencies of hell-bent political blunderbussery are two different things, clearly. We all know that democratic engagement and economic and other once relatively unfettered activities are often burdened these days by complex skeins of arbitrary regulation. The nebulousness or contradictoriness of many extant bureaucratic commandments would certainly preclude filing of criminal charges in response to inadvertent lapses by businessmen, political activists and others just trying to get stuff done…if reason, justice, objectivity and so forth were the principles guiding those charged with upholding the law. Such is not invariably the case, however.

A politician or prosecutor can’t amend reality so that two plus two now equal five. But he and his collaborators can certainly pretend that two plus two equal five for the sake of railroading political opponents. And they do.