Thoughts Aloud

Archive for April, 2009

I reckon it is about time again:

RE-DECLARATION OF INDEPENDENCE:
PETITION TO PROTECT U.S. SOVEREIGNTY

To: Congress of the United States, President of the United States

Whereas, the Declaration of Independence remains just that – a declaration of our founders’ intent to be an independent nation, unencumbered by permanent alliances and foreign entanglements;

Whereas, our founders risked their lives, their fortunes and their sacred honor to fight a war for that independence so that their posterity could live in a sovereign republic governed by the rule of law and the will of the people;

Whereas, the United States of America has been governed for 220 years by a Constitution that has helped to maintain the nation’s sovereignty and independence;

Whereas, the undersigned insist we will submit to be governed only by those whom we elect;

Whereas, for Americans, supra-national government means far less accountability to the Constitution and to the will of the people;

Whereas, President Barack Obama has called for the establishment of “a stronger global regime” to solve world crises;

Whereas, officials of the United States government have explored regional governance ties under names such as “North American Union” and “Trans-Atlantic Union”;

Whereas, officials of the United States government have actively explored and discussed publicly the need for a new regional or global currency to replace the U.S. dollar;

Whereas, officials of the United States government have worked for the implementation of new binding international limits on the production of carbon dioxide;

Whereas, officials of the United States government have already forged permanent international economic and trade agreements and associations unaccountable to the people and contrary to the Constitution – pacts that have represented a material setback to America and its strategic manufacturing base;

Whereas, officials of the United States government are currently planning a new international treaty to place the oceans and seas under the global authority of the United Nations:

We, the undersigned, assert our rights as sovereign citizens of the United States of America in preserving our nation’s sovereignty and independence.

We reject all efforts at regional governments, new permanent treaties and alliances, global economic unions and new international or regional currencies.

We oppose yielding any new authority to global institutions such as the United Nations.

We reject all calls for a “New World Order,” “Global Regime” or global governance by any other name.

We recognize that the United States is the greatest nation in history, but that to remain great, it must stay fiercely independent and true to its divinely blessed Constitution. To do less would be to ignore and dishonor the heroic sacrifices of millions of Americans who fought and died to preserve this free and independent nation.

If you are ready to sign it, go here. They should be getting real signatures for it at the upcoming Tea Parties. ◄Dave►

What the hell has happened to my country? Am I dreaming? This can’t be for real. Why is Thomas Jefferson crying?

A few ragtag terrorists, armed with nothing more than AK47s, in a drifting lifeboat several hundred miles from land, is ignoring the demands of a US Naval destroyer, after an act of piracy against a US flagged ship in international waters; and they have to call the FBI for assistance? You are kidding, right?

These monkeys can board a freighter from a skiff, and our Navy can’t board a lifeboat from a destroyer? Then sink it for the love of Pete! Just run over the damn thing. Surely, the hostage can swim for a couple of minutes. Fly in a seal team, maybe; but stop looking so feckless in the face of a few Islamic pirates. What the hell is the FBI doing, bringing them a public defender, or someone who can read these cretins their Miranda Rights in Swahili?

The press is calling this a “distraction” for Obama. A distraction? Piracy, a mere distraction? Somebody needs to read a history book, and check with Thomas Jefferson on how to put a stop to Islamic piracy against American ships. But Obama is too busy talking about granting amnesty to 20 million illegal aliens today, to be bothered to comment on the stolen lifeboat vs. US Naval destroyer standoff drama happening on the high seas. I can’t take much more of this nonsense. ◄Dave►

As I have shared before, I have been spending considerable time of late on Glenn Beck’s 9/12 Project website, discussing how to take our country back and return it to a constitutional republic. Far too much time and effort is being wasted debating religious issues, which I reckon have nothing to do with good governance. While I have freely acknowledge that I am godless, for the most part I have avoided those discussions for the distraction they are. My mission has been more to help them understand that those on the Secular Right are not card carrying members of the ACLU, and actually share most of their principles and values.

A frequently recurring theme there is for Christians to question the notion that morality can exist without a source, which they posit is their god. In Paglia’s latest column, she does a superb job of answering this challenge in the following exchange with a reader:

I’m confused. You say you are an atheist. It seems to me that if there is no God, then we are all simply pieces of animated dirt. To pieces of animated dirt, on what basis can something be considered right or wrong, ethical or unethical? Of what value is life except that which animated pieces of dirt place on it? What would it matter if some place absolutely no value on life?

Abortion is “murder”? That has moral connotations. What is wrong with the “murder of a child”? All pieces of animated dirt eventually become lifeless. What does it matter when or how? Morality is just an invention of animated dirt. What if humans managed to destroy all life on earth? What would it matter? Surely, some other form of animated dirt would evolve to replace us. I certainly don’t know there is a God, but I choose to believe there is, because, for one, I don’t want to believe that I am just animated dirt.

The ancient Greeks, whose art and thought deeply influenced me in my youth, created ethics as a branch of secular philosophy, detached from religion and its moral imperatives. Like artworks, codes of law and ethics are uniquely human constructs — conceptual environments that separate us from animals, who are governed by biological instinct. It is rational to debate and define the rules by which any society exists. As a cultural relativist and atheist, I believe that values change over time and that there is no transcendent God who generates and enforces them. But societies have a right to require reasonable compliance from those who enjoy their material benefits.

Your vast panorama of “animated dirt” rising and sinking is actually closer to the Buddhist view of the cosmos — which I also find inspiring for its contemplative acceptance of things as they are. The operations of the life force have inherent majesty. Human consciousness, when fully expanded, is for me the ultimate value. As Heracleitus said, “All things flow.” To demand permanence or personal survival beyond death seems to me a tragically doomed quest. But by power of imagination, we each have the right to live in our own universe. All gods exist — because thinking makes it so.

Wow! I have seen this challenge answered a thousand different ways, but never so eloquently.

BTW, the rest of her column is worth the read as usual. She has become my favorite Lefty, because she will not swallow all their Kool-Aid, and calls them like she sees them. Obama won’t enjoy this one as much as I did. ◄Dave►

Glenn Beck has been speaking disparagingly of Citizen Militias of late and incorrectly equating them with Timothy McVeigh. I posted the following on his 9/12 Project website recently:

Glenn needs to stop demonizing the “Militia.” I am an old man and don’t own a single item of camo or attend any meetings; but I consider myself a militia member. By that, I mean that as a veteran sworn to protect and defend our Constitution, against all enemies foreign and domestic, if duty calls again I will turn out and fall in with my Patriot brethren to battle the forces of tyranny. That is what the Citizens’ Militia really is, and we can’t help that a few angry wannabe warriors and/or skinheads give the term a bad connotation.

Glenn champions the 2nd Amendment, and seems to agree that we must never allow the government to disarm us. Well, what does that mean? Is it just hollow rhetoric, or do we mean it when we say it? If we mean it, then why in the world is it somehow unacceptable for anyone to make contingency plans for what we will do if they try? He just said on the radio that they will be working toward disarming us and demonizing us over these murder sprees until the sheeple beg them to disarm us. Does he think we can “talk” them out of their agenda?

Perhaps we can; but the only way I can think of is to make it damn clear that any attempt to do so will result in civil war. He seems to think that anyone who considers themselves a member of the militia actually wants a revolution; I vehemently disagree. Nothing would please me more than to be left alone by these Progressive fools to live my life as I choose to live it. I don’t want to fight them, I just want them to get the hell out of my life. They can have their rotting cities full of useless ghetto dwelling barbarians mired in their victimhood; just stay out of Flyover Country and allow us to live our lives our way without their incessant meddling.

Sooner or later we are going to have to draw a line in the sand, and have a contingency plan for what we are going to do if these rabid Progressives cross it. By my lights, if we ever passively allow them to disarm us, it will be too late to do anything else. A few months ago, I wrote a very provocative essay entitled, “Gun Collecting Can Be Treason.” Read it if you have the time, ponder what our reaction should be, and tell me if I am a “crazy militia type” as Glenn keeps calling some very loyal Patriots.

Many of us have understood for years what he is just awakening to – regarding our founding principles and what the Progressives have been doing for the past hundred years to undermine them – and are thinking ahead and planning for something we hope beyond hope never comes. We welcome Glenn to the party, and I have nothing but admiration for him in his efforts to awaken more Americans; but it is time for him to stop throwing honorable vigilant Patriots, who are way ahead of him, under the bus. ◄Dave►

I have been saying from the beginning that this issue will not go away, and in fact if growing worse. I also introduced Dr. Orly Taitz as “Obama’s Russian Nightmare.” I stumbled across this post she made at the Defend our Freedoms Foundation. “FBI InfraGard warns of a crescendo of public concern about Obama’s eligibility“:

Tasked by the FBI to provide “informational analysis” on conditions which could be construed as potentially harmful to civil order and national security, InfraGard, of the FBI’s National Infrastructure Protection Center (NIPC), issued an unclassified Protective Intelligence Communication report in March 2009 regarding the “crescendo” of public concern about Obama’s presidential eligibility.

Authored by Dr. Lyle J. Rapacki, Protective Intelligence Specialist and Agent, the report summarizes the substance of legal challenges to Obama on the question of his constitutional eligibility and concludes that if it “should be discovered Mr. Obama is ineligible, a constitutional crisis would ensue attempting to determine which of his executive branch orders should be valid.” It goes on to warn that “if…Mr. Obama fights revealing his documentation, there is growing concern of civil unrest, or worse, being unleashed in the streets of our nation. The economic crisis coupled with this type of a constitutional crisis could prove to be a flashpoint that would test conventional law enforcement and elements of homeland security.”
[...]
Upon the recommendation of the Army’s Strategic Studies Institute, The Army Times reported that a somewhat euphemistically dubbed “Consequence Management Response Force (CCMRF),” currently the role of the 3rd Infantry Division’s 1st Brigade Combat Team, but which, reportedly, might eventually comprise upwards of 80,000 troops, is being trained and readied to deal with what could be widespread civil disorder resulting from an “unforeseen economic collapse” or “loss of a functional political and legal order.”

Symptomatic of festering civil unrest are the many “tea parties” springing up around the country, growing fears of economic disintegration and of both crippling terrorist attacks and even of perceived federal overreaching. Add to this the very real threat of a rogue nuclear EMP (electro-magnetic pulse) attack on the homeland which could instantaneously reduce the country to a paralytic pre-industrial condition, plus the unrest on our southern border, and there appears to be ample and justifiable cause for concern and appropriate contingency planning at every level of government.

I had never even heard of InfraGard. Apparently it is a civilian organization tasked to provide speculation on ways in which the government could fail and civil rest ensue. At least somebody in government is getting unvarnished updates on the mood of the country. ◄Dave►

Now somebody is hacking the Supreme Court’s website:

A lawyer investigating the eligibility of Barack Obama to be president under the U.S. Constitution’s requirement that the office be occupied only by a “natural born” citizen is asking the U.S. Supreme Court to cooperate with an FBI investigation into alleged cyber crimes connected to her work.
[...]
Taitz is one of several lawyers who have brought emergency motions to the U.S. Supreme Court over the cases, only to have them dropped without a hearing.

While her effort was pending at the court, its references suddenly were scrubbed from the public website just two days before a conference among justices on the case was to be heard.

She filed a complaint with the FBI, which promised a review, but the investigative agency noted that in that situation, technically the Supreme Court was the “victim” of having its website hacked, and officials there would need to cooperate for the effort to move forward.

That circumstance generated Taitz’ letter requesting cooperation.

“This is particularly important in light of the fact that there is a common denominator in a number of cyber crimes committed,” Taitz wrote. She cited a hacking into her PayPal account where donations to her foundation allegedly could have been diverted, sabotage on her website and the creation of an “imposter site” for one of the plaintiffs in one of her cases.

“All of these cyber crimes, together with all the other crimes that are handled separately, have one common denominator – a concerted effort to put Obama in the White House and keep him there by virtue of fraud and concealment of all of his records,” she wrote.

The president also has been named in an indictment turned in by a peoples’ grand jury in Georgia, and one other man has sought a criminal complaint against the president.
[...]
“The main reason doubts persist regarding Obama’s birth certificate is this question: If an original Hawaii-doctor-generated and Hawaii-hospital-released Obama birth certificate exists, why wouldn’t the senator and his campaign simply order the document released and end the controversy?

“That Obama has not ordered Hawaii officials to release the document,” Corsi writes, “leaves doubts as to whether an authentic Hawaii birth certificate exists for Obama.”

We know so little about this guy, we don’t even know what we don’t know; but one hell of a lot of effort is being expended to make sure we never do. With so much else on our plate, this seems trivial; but it is not. It is a symptom of how little regard politicians and the press have for our Constitution that this subject is not to be mentioned in polite company. I wonder if that would be true were he a Republican? ◄Dave►

I came across this 15-year-old assessment while surfing. I tried unsuccessfully to track it to its original source; but it is repeated in its entirety on many sites, so I might as well do the same. I retrieved my copy from LizMichael.com :

ARMED REVOLUTION POSSIBLE AND NOT SO DIFFICULT
By Bill Bridgewater

The only “newsies” that I have ever met that I didn’t believe wasted oxygen by breathing were Dickey Chappell and Bernie Fall, both of whom were killed in Viet Nam because they believed that you couldn’t report battles in the field from a bar in Saigon.

It is not easy to admit that a newsie stopped me cold the other day in the middle of one of their silly interviews. He had asked me to enumerate the reasons that I believed to be valid to support the private ownership of firearms.

We did not disagree over personal protection; he even admitted that hunting is legal in every state. But, when I stated that I believed that the founding fathers intended that we be armed against the possibility of our own central government overstepping its bounds, he quite bluntly asked me if I thought that an armed American citizenry had a snowball’s chance in hell in an uprising against our own federal government.

Now, when was the last time you put some really serious thought into that proposition? Not counting the slaughter of the American Indians, we have not seen a serious effort to pit Americans against Americans since the end of the War Between the States that ended 130 years ago.

Is there even a shred of possibility that an armed citizenry could succeed against the strongest military power on Earth today?

Perhaps we should review the years 1960-1975 again. The United States blindly stuck its oar in the muddied waters of Viet Nam very shortly after the French got their heads handed to them on a platter and were invited not to be a colonial power in Viet Nam any more.

Finally, we found ourselves in the position of guaranteeing the survival of an independent South Viet Nam when the Northern part of the country made it clear that they were interested in reuniting the country under their particular brand of socialism.

For a decade and a half, we changed the leadership of South Viet Nam quite regularly; increased the pressure on the Johnson thumbscrews; bombed, quit, bombed, quit, ad infinitum; quantified the war; and finally turned it into an electronic war. At home we kept telling the citizens that we were just about to win decisively and elected another president to drive crazy with this goofy little war.

Finally the president declared that all was over and the troops could come home.

But they did not return home in triumph with the bugles blaring. They came home with their tails between their legs just like every other defeated army in the history of the world. And the reason that they did so, my friends, was that the world’s most powerful nation got its backside severely whipped by a small, backward, agrarian nation who started the war against us with an assortment of ancient bolt-action rifles, no lines of support, no manufacturing base, and no infrastructure that the country absolutely depended upon.

It is not a joke that they made sandals from cut-up truck tires – it’s the truth. They fought the only kind of war they could hope to fight and win successfully – a guerrilla war.

They had two good models: the American colonies against the British in our war for independence, and the American Indian wars, where the value of slash-and-run against a superior foe was escalated to a fine art by the world’s finest light cavalry.

Twice the North Vietnamese allowed themselves to be suckered into main force set-piece battles, and they got cut into ribbons for doing it. Otherwise, they stuck to General Giap’s plan of guerrilla warfare to the finish.

The North finally *did* get to mass their troops and tanks during their final sweep to victory into Saigon.

Why did this happen? Why did the world’s most powerful nation get its teeth kicked in and sent home in disgrace? Because we forgot our very own origins! We forgot that we were the ones who hid behind logs, berms, and bushes and shot British troops and their mercenaries as *targets of opportunity* while denying our opponents a target of any kind.

We used the skills of the mountain and plains Indians against an Army that was trained in only one form of combat. We refused to engage in the British methods of combat until we had superior forces and the odds were highly in our favor.

General Vo Nuyen Giap did exactly the same thing against us in the 1960s and 1970s while we used our superior firepower and technology to create ten million deaf monkeys and water buffalo. We defoliated tens of thousands of acres of jungle forest to prove that Giap’s troops weren’t there. We constructed every kind of trap known to mankind to capture and destroy divisions of enemy troops where there weren’t any.

We very patiently fought a European theater-type of warfare against a steadfast foe who fought a completely different kind of war that simply made our complex weapons systems useless. By inflexibly insisting on doing it our way, we lost the whole shooting match to a man who played it his way and won.

Meanwhile, on the exact opposite side of the globe, another shooting match was gearing up that pitted the second most powerful nation in the world against an enemy whose armament consisted of ancient bolt-action rifles, who had no lines of support, no manufacturing base and no infrastructure that the nation depended upon.

Though the Russians were determined that *they* would not be sent home with their tails between their legs, the Afghans were paying particular attention to those tactics that had worked so well for General Giap against the American forces. Even with the advantage of being able to totally ignore world opinion and to essentially ignore the opinions of its own citizens, Russia followed us down the long winding trail to disgrace by doing exactly what we had done in Viet Nam.

High-ranking politicians (some of them in uniform), with absolutely no idea what was going on in the day-to-day conduct of both wars, made stupid decisions and then stuck by them despite advice to the contrary from both American and Russian on-scene commanders.

The Russian methods of combat – mass maneuver and firepower – that were developed against Napoleon and Hitler proved no more successful than our methods against an aggressively waged guerrilla war.

Both major enemies failed to fight the enemy that they faced. Both, in fact, fought an historical enemy who was not present on the field of battle. Both of these superior armies truly believed that superior strength and technical abilities would win the day. Both major armies believed that time was on their side and was working against their foe. Both were totally wrong because they underestimated the growing dislike of the supposedly neutral or “friendly” indigenous forces whose cities, villages, towns and homes were being destroyed by the ongoing flow of large-scale battles by the two major armies.

Whatever the levels of dispute between the Vietnamese, the American forces eventually became the common enemy simply because of the massive damage they were doing in behalf of the south. Exactly the same thing transpired in Afghanistan. The Russians became the common enemy and went home in defeat.

Our armed forces used everything in our weapons inventory in our effort to win except nuclear devices. So did the Russians. They even used some chemical weapons that we didn’t try.

What does all this have to do with the question the newsy asked me? Everything.

A revolution could be waged against the current American government far easier than you might imagine without careful examination. Consider:

* The sheer numbers of firearms of all kinds in the hands of the American public would have made the American commanders in Viet Nam quake in their boots. We’re not talking junk equipment here, either. The average deer hunter with a .270 or .308 could give a platoon of regular troops more grief than they want. There was a special on the tube recently about military armaments on sale in the black market (including Stingers).

* The population base from which revolutionaries could be recruited is *massive* – 250 million.

* There are literally millions of well-trained men who served as officers and NCOs who learned face-to-face how guerrilla warfare works. They haven’t forgotten it, either.

* There are millions of young men out there with military training and experience with weapons of every conceivable kind, who would make top-quality guerrilla troops.

* Every one of the 100 counties in the state of North Carolina could field at least one full company that would be formidable in capability. If one assumes that North Carolina is no more capable than other states, that could amount to 180 divisions. These potential rebel troops would be fast-moving light infantry, with the capability of melting into the general population when necessary.

American military leaders would be in the position of having an inventory of high-tech weapons that they would be dependent upon your son or nephew to use against you. There would be no enemy states in which you could say that any weapon could be used against the rebels. They would be from each and every state and major city.

By the same token, there would be no sanctuary for the federal troops anywhere in the land. No matter where stationed, they would be subject to attack and harassment. The infrastructure on which the federal government depends would be rather easily disrupted by those who live there. Airfields and major lines of communications could be shut down and kept down for days at a time. Disruption of supplies to major bases and to centers of government would be simple. You don’t have to cut them off, just keep them hungry.

The federal government would be denied the use of all their major weaponry because they would still “own” the cities and villages. How do you justify bombing your own city just because there is a rebel company in it? One bombing would be the biggest recruiting drive ever for the rebel forces.

Now just how powerful do those 12 Army divisions and those three Marine divisions really look to you? Just how scary is the Air Force against America? What will the Navy do, shell all coastal cities? I don’t think so.

One of these days a truly charismatic individual is going to walk out of the heartland of America and point out that the Declaration of Independence has never been repealed and that it *requires* all citizens to rise up against an oppressive government. With the current attitude toward our government and the people who populate it, a massive groundswell of support for throwing the current crop to the dogs and starting over again might not be so difficult.

As for the *ability* of the American citizens to successfully wage a guerrilla war on their own government, the likes of which this world has never seen nor contemplated before, I am absolutely convinced that it could be done, and a lot more swiftly than many might believe possible. How many highly-capable long-range snipers can your county put together?

Reprinted in “The Bullet Trap” by permission from Bill Bridgewater, “Alliance Voice”, August 1994

If anything, we have even more guns and more awakening Patriots now. I hope the government planners have read and thought through the implications of this venerable document. ◄Dave►

California’s 10th Amendment resolution dates back to the time of the Contract With America! Who woulda thunk it?:

BILL NUMBER: SJR 44 CHAPTERED 08/29/94
BILL TEXT

RESOLUTION CHAPTER 93
FILED WITH SECRETARY OF STATE AUGUST 29, 1994
ADOPTED IN ASSEMBLY AUGUST 23, 1994
ADOPTED IN SENATE AUGUST 15, 1994
AMENDED IN SENATE AUGUST 11, 1994
AMENDED IN SENATE JULY 1, 1994

INTRODUCED BY Senators Rogers, Ayala, Bergeson, Beverly,
Boatwright, Campbell, Craven, Dills, Hill, Hurtt, Johannessen,
Kelley, Kopp, Leonard, Leslie, Lewis, Maddy, McCorquodale,
Mello, Peace, Presley, Russell, Wright, and Wyman
(Coauthors: Assembly Members Aguiar, Alby, Allen, Andal,
Baca, Boland, Bowen, Bowler, Brulte, Cannella, Conroy, Cortese,
Costa, Epple, Ferguson, Frazee, Goldsmith, Harvey, Hauser,
Haynes, Hoge, Honeycutt, Horcher, Johnson, Jones, Katz, Knight,
Knowles, McPherson, Morrow, Mountjoy, Murray, Pringle, Rainey,
Richter, Rogan, Seastrand, Statham, Takasugi, Tucker, Weggeland,
and Woodruff)

APRIL 14, 1994

Senate Joint Resolution No. 44 Relative to the 10th
Amendment.

LEGISLATIVE COUNSEL’S DIGEST

SJR 44, Rogers. 10th Amendment.
This measure would declare the state’s sovereignty under the
10th Amendment to the United States Constitution and demand that
the federal government cease and desist mandates that are
beyond the scope of constitutionally delegated powers.

WHEREAS, The 10th Amendment to the Constitution of the United
States reads as follows:
“The powers not delegated to the United States by the
Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved
to the States respectively, or to the people”; and
WHEREAS, The 10th Amendment defines the total scope of
federal power as being that specifically granted by the United
States Constitution and no more; and
WHEREAS, The scope of power defined by the 10th Amendment
means that the federal government was created by the states
specifically to be an agent of the states; and
WHEREAS, In the year 1994, the states are demonstrably
treated as agents of the federal government; and
WHEREAS, Numerous resolutions have been forwarded to the
federal government by the California Legislature without any
response or result from Congress or the federal government; and
WHEREAS, Many federal mandates are directly in violation of
the 10th Amendment to the Constitution of the United States; and

WHEREAS, The United States Supreme Court has ruled in New
York v. United States, 112 S. Ct. 2408 (1992), that Congress may
not simply commandeer the legislative and regulatory processes
of the states; and
WHEREAS, A number of proposals from previous administrations
and some now pending from the present administration and from
Congress may further violate the United States Constitution;
now, therefore, be it
Resolved by the Senate and Assembly of the State of
California, jointly, That the State of California hereby claims
sovereignty under the 10th Amendment to the Constitution of the
United States over all powers not otherwise enumerated and
granted to the federal government by the United States
Constitution and that this measure shall serve as notice and
demand to the federal government to cease and desist, effective
immediately, mandates that are beyond the scope of its
constitutionally delegated powers; and be it further
Resolved, That the Secretary of the Senate transmit copies of
this resolution to the President and Vice President of the
United States, the Speaker of the United States House of
Representatives, the President pro Tempore of the United States
Senate, each Senator and Representative from California in the
Congress of the United States and to the Speaker of the House
and the President of the Senate of each state legislature in the
United States of America.

Of course, it makes sense. The California legislature is quite capable of screwing up and bankrupting their State all by themselves. They don’t need any help from the Federal government. ◄Dave►

How often does one see Jefferson’s famous “Tree of Liberty” quote in full:

God forbid we should ever be twenty years without such a rebellion. The people cannot be all, and always, well informed. The part which is wrong will be discontented, in proportion to the importance of the facts they misconceive. If they remain quiet under such misconceptions, it is lethargy, the forerunner of death to the public liberty…. And what country can preserve its liberties, if its rulers are not warned from time to time, that this people preserve the spirit of resistance? Let them take arms. The remedy is to set them right as to the facts, pardon and pacify them. What signify a few lives lost in a century or two? The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time, with the blood of patriots and tyrants. It is its natural manure. -Thomas Jefferson

It has been sixteen years since the Sons of Liberty bared our teeth in a growl (Ruby Ridge / Waco), and Patriots spoke openly of the duty of the citizen’s militia to guard against tyranny. Talk of a New World Order and gun control soon subsided after that. The Progressives have been playing rope-a-dope and laying back; but they are feeling frisky again.

It doesn’t take a genius to notice the mood in the land, just a casual observer of traffic in gun stores, and the press starting to demonize the word “militia” again. The rattlesnake is already buzzing, the next growl is at hand, and the sheeple are even awakening; but I fear the warning will not be sufficient against this lot of Usurpers. They are drunk with power, giddy over their recent victory in the polls, and in a frenzy to enact the legislation necessary to finish their coup over capitalism before the complacent sheeple awaken to their true Marxist nature. I reckon the tree of Liberty is thirsty this time. Step up, and do your duty, Patriots. The future of your grandchildren is at stake. ◄Dave►

I have not belonged to the NRA for many a year, precisely because they compromise with Congress too often to save their sporting purposes for firearms. The 2nd Amendment doesn’t even mention sport shooting; but this bill is clearly unconstitutional. There is no justification for compromising on the 2nd Amendment. Ever. None! ◄Dave►