Posts Tagged ‘violence’

Levin Condemns Violence; Prompts Critical Question

Wednesday, January 6th, 2021

Is there no answer?

This evening, my favorite talk-show host took to the airwaves and condemned the violence that occurred today on Capitol Hill. As I’ve pointed out earlier, this looks like a set-up job by the DC UniParty, and while Levin(and others including particularly the President,) is right to  condemn the violence, and while I make no excuse for those who launched this assault, such actions being repugnant in a constitutional, representative republic, I nevertheless have serious misgivings about the focus on this incident for several reasons. Levin rightly points out that we have no room to condemn Antifa and BLM if this sort of thing goes on with alleged conservative actors.  I agree.  On its face, this was egregious behavior, and it appears that at least one young woman paid with her life.  The other point Levin made is that those who carried this out must be identified and prosecuted. Again, I agree. There is substantial evidence that the people who instigated violence at the Capitol today were in fact camouflaged members of Antifa and other various anarchists. I am not here suggesting that absolutely no Trump supporters took part, but I have serious doubts about the contention that is widely the case. More than all this, however, the problem comes in when Mark Levin argues that we must never violate the law. Never?  Not even unjust law?  Would violations of the law be impermissible even in a growing tyranny? You see, I believe we’re in a sucker’s trap.  I think this is the problem for which Levin and others, myself included, have offered no solution.  We are in a constitutional crisis, but I think even Levin, for all his wisdom can’t quite see it: Once the power of the state is perverted to the extent that official actors now participate in the fraud against the people, how then do the people ever correct it without resort to violence?

I do not say this lightly. We now find ourselves in the situation in which a large proportion of the country now believes the election was rigged and stolen, and not merely by private actors, which would be abominable enough, but with the assistance and collusion of actors in the offices of local, state, and federal governments.  Once you cross that particular line, it seems to me there is no going back, and no way in which to resolve it peaceably. Again, I do not make this argument lightly, and I also do not contend that my evaluation is perfect, or infallible, but again, I must insist that those who argue we must never resort to violence must now step forward to explain how it is we’re to logically, rationally, and legally overcome all that’s been arrayed against us.

Let us suppose for a moment that those of us who believe this election was wholly fraudulent are correct. What then?  How do we undo it?  As Levin himself pointed out in rightful criticism of Senator Rand Paul’s(R-KY) suggestion that this is a states’ issue, essentially, Paul laid down the notion that this isn’t something to be addressed at the federal level, and that the remedy lies within the individual states. As Levin contends rightly, what good is state law if it’s going to be ignored by states’ office-holders? You see, it’s a farce to suggest that if the legislature of Georgia wants to fix the election issues, all it needs to do is pass some laws, if immediately thereafter, their Secretary of State enters into a consent agreement with agitators for the opposition that effectively nullify the very laws they’ve enacted.  What good then is law?

Levin would rightly argue that we should be able to rely upon the courts as a backstop to enforce and uphold the law. Will they? All evidence from this election cycle suggests that the courts either have no stomach or are ideologically inclined to justify these transgressions of law.  You see, this becomes the inescapable and gaping hole in Levin’s argument. Of course, it’s not only Levin who makes this argument. I would, in ordinary times, make the same basic argument, but look at the scale of what’s been done, and what actually confronts us.  This is not an insignificant one-off in a single small jurisdiction that can be remedied by a single population of an isolated locale.  This issue is much broader, involving all three branches of government, and at all levels of governance. All of it is further buttressed by media institutions only too happy for the current course of things, since they are almost entirely corrupt too.

Like so many of my readers, I’ve raised my hand and recited the words of an oath to uphold and defend the constitution of the United States. To suggest, however, that we’re not in a constitutional crisis merely because we still maintain the façade of law and constitutional order is preposterous. It is quite clear that what we are seeing at present is a complete devolution of the constitutional order, or what Levin terms a “post-constitutional” disorder. While in the classical definition of the term, we’re not in a constitutional crisis, we nevertheless find ourselves in some sort of crisis, whatever adjective you might prefer to define it. This is an untenable circumstance, whatever particular label we may choose to affix to it. The simple fact is that we men and women who comprise the bulk of the population that holds up this country, whose children before themselves fight this nation’s wars, spilling their blood all across the globe, find ourselves in the position that we cannot rely upon law.

My questions for those wiser than I, can be only that which others around me find themselves asking of our thought leaders:

What now? What are we to do? What am I to do? I’ve voted. Over and over. I’ve elected people, and they betray us, or find themselves betrayed. We appoint what we think are good judges, yet they fail and abandon our constitution when the going gets tough. We follow all of the rules. We play fair. We volunteer and participate in public affairs in various ways. We man the polling places, but find ourselves ejected so we cannot even view the process. We do everything we can reasonably do. We short our own lives by contributing grocery money to these politicians. What more are we expected to do before we turn aside from the law? How can I overcome an enemy who will not obey the law? How can I get recourse when all the modes are ineffective or subversive?

I am not suggesting that I want an easy answer, but I must insist on a plausible answer.  Mark Levin famously wrote a tremendous book called “The Liberty Amendments.” I have one copy I read, and another autographed copy put away as a valued keepsake.  What good is it?  I’m being quite serious. What good is such an amazing idea? Yes, there’s a very slow movement of people toiling to get a convention of states together, and they’re making very slow progress, but it’s slowly waning because such a project takes decades, and most people can’t engage and maintain attention for the length of a two-page article. By the time a project of that sort bears fruit, America, as we have known it, will be gone. That is not intended to disparage the effort, but it offers no relief for the crisis in which we now find ourselves. Let me list the broad categories of problems, on the assumption that you’ve lost count:

  • The media is completely corrupt and is indeed an enemy of the people
  • Big Tech is dominated by leftists who are in league with or indeed comprise a portion of the subversives
  • The administrative state or bureaucracy now effectively makes, enforces, and judges law, combining all the powers of government into an unelected branch
  • The Congress is bought and compromised by people who do not share our interests
  • The Congress is run by unelected staff and consultants who feather their own nests
  • The Congress is completely out of control and we have no means by which to directly remove them when they transgress the constitution
  • The executive branch is out of control because it relies too heavily on executive orders, in part due to the intransigence of Congress and the courts
  • The courts are useless, concocting law when convenient, or ignoring law when its not

That’s just the start, of course, but you get the point. Then, in the last twenty minutes of his show, Levin received a call from a gentleman who raised essentially the same question, analogizing the situation to a football game in which the game is rigged, the opponent cheats, the referees collude with the opponent, and the commissioner offers no relief.  To his credit, Levin said in response that there are no easy answers.

But he will not advocate violence. He will not call for a civil war. He will not call for lawlessness.

Fine. How then, captured by at least the laundry list of deficiencies only briefly outlined above, are we ever to overcome it?

No answer.

You see, this is the point at which I have begun to part ways from Mr. Levin. I am not a violent man. I abhor violence, and I truly revile senseless destruction of any sort. I came of age in a world where two global powers constantly contemplated wiping one another from the face of the globe, with me as the forward-stationed cannon-fodder. I saw men injured, maimed, and killed, just in training for that war that never came, at least not in that form, so I know too well the costs of violence.

That said, Levin mentioned that all of this is coming to a head. Indeed. What then? You see, I believe in self-defense, and I also believe in the defense of my nation. At what point do we, as individuals, make the decision that we’ve done all that we can peaceably do, but that action is now required that must risk more than peaceful protest and public political activism? Levin closed the show by stating bluntly that he will never advocate violence.

Never? Under no circumstance? Inconceivable?

You see, this is where I do part company from Levin. George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, John Adams, Benjamin Franklin and all those other men of that period also parted company from Levin.  I think part of the problem, and it’s much broader than just Levin, is that if you’ve had your business closed by a lockdown in one of these deep blue hellholes, or had your vote stolen/nullified in one of these compromised states, you may have a different view. If you’ve watched your country systematically demolished, but haven’t the means to make an escape to safer shores, you may view this differently. If your children have been propagandized right under your nose in the college or primary schools for which you’ve paid through the nose, only to see them turned against you, I suspect you may feel differently.

Mark Levin doesn’t know me. I have some reason to think he may be slightly aware of me. Over the years, when I’ve been able, I’ve contributed to many of the causes and candidates he has recommended, but that doesn’t mean he owes me anything. What I do think he owes his audience, me included, if it’s anything at all, is some sort of explanation of what we are to do. Most of my readers are regular listeners to his show. I’d wager that at least half my readers have subscriptions to BlazeTV and have had subscriptions all the way back to the start when it was LevinTV. There isn’t a book he’s written of which I don’t have at least two copies, all in hardback(usually one dog-eared and marked-up as a study tool, and one in pristine condition, often autographed and kept as a collectible) save for “Men in Black” and “Rescuing Sprite” which were available new in paperback only by the time I became aware of them. I receive mailings from Landmark Legal Foundation to which I am a contributor when I find a few spare dollars to send. My point is that like so many of my readers, I’ve availed myself of Mark’s work and supported it frequently. I don’t religiously purchase from his advertisers, but if I am purchasing an item in the same category as one advertised on his show, I always choose it and make sure the seller knows where I heard about their offerings. Like most conservatives, I am loyal to those who serve our nation while entertaining, educating and edifying me and those around me.

I don’t know if Mr. Levin will ever see this piece, but if he does, I suspect it will pain him a bit, as it does me to write it. I love his show, and I love his sense of humor, and I enjoy his taste in bumper-music. He adds value to my life, every day, but I’m afraid that on this day, I need a little more. Given all that confronts us, to say that I’ve been demoralized is to understate the scope and the intensity of the issue. It’s not that the fight has gone out of me, because I love my country, and I’ve done more on behalf of my country and countrymen than most by a fair piece, and maybe that’s why the demoralization now feels so intense: You can’t know how much you love a thing until you’ve risked your neck for it, toiled for it, shed blood, sweat and tears for it, and sworn your allegiance to it, all to see it collapsing around you. I know Mark doesn’t have all the answers, but the answer cannot be just to lie here, supine, and take whatever it is that they dish out.

Now the leftists will, it seems, control all of the federal government. Top to bottom. Side to side. They are already planning all the mischief they intend. They have legislative packages ready to go, to send to the desk of…President Biden, the imposter, who will happily sign what they send him into law. Levin says he will never advocate violence.  It sounds great, until you realize what it means in full. They will come for our second amendment and all the implements of its exercise. They will not amend the constitution. They will simply shove it down our throats with a packed court and a stolen Presidency and Senate. I will not be made defenseless. If the disposition of the Polish Jews in Warsaw taught no other lesson to posterity, it must be that one. I also will not be reduced to a rat, left to shelter in my nest, clutching my implements, while waiting to be “evacuated.” In New York, the legislators now introduce a bill to detain and take into custody any people who might carry or pass any disease.

What answer is there to such things — to prevent the execution of such things? If the law is no further impediment to tyranny and abuse, what remains? I don’t revel in the asking of this question. I detest the fact that I find myself in this position. But wishes are not reality. There is a reason that civilized nations consider violence as the last resort. The question is rapidly advancing to the forefront: Have we arrived at a time of last resort?

What, concretely, am I to do?

 

Editor’s note: I’ve had a question from a reader asking “what is the classical definition of constitutional crisis,” mentioned above. Generally, a constitutional crisis is any of a number of possible situations in which the constitution provides no answer to some sort of underlying contradiction. It’s essentially a sort of structural problem, and it can have many types of causes. In this way, one might consider our current circumstance to be a constitutional crisis, because the constitution certainly offers no clear remedy when it’s apparent that some or all branches may have essentially discarded its provisions, restrictions, or prohibitions. Still, I think the term intends to countenance those sorts of issues that can arise out of parties exercising their powers, privileges, rights and so on and what happens when those come into clear conflict. I understand why legal and political theorists might not consider our current situation to fit within the loose definition of a “constitutional crisis,” as they might define it, but we’re certainly in a crisis, inasmuch as it’s difficult to find anybody in Washington DC willing to live within its bounds. Maybe a better term here would be “constitutional catastrophe,” because whatever you call it, this situation is likely to result in the dissolution of the republic. Most consider the attempted secession of the Southern states in 1861 to have been a constitutional crisis, because, among other reasons, the constitution is silent on how or if states may leave the union, having previously entered it. I have always thought that among the flurry of amendments after the Civil War, Congress ought to have passed one describing a legal procedure for secession. (I don’t think parties should be forced to remain married once their differences have become irreconcilable, or partners compelled to remain in a business partnership once they’ve become irreconcilably averse to said relationship, but that’s another story for another day.)

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Why Mass Shootings Continue

Monday, February 26th, 2018

school_shooter_ft

In the wake of the Parkland, Florida shooting of February 14th, many people have offered their own assessments of why these sorts of incidents continue to happen.  They appear in media to tell us that “something must be done,” or that “something has to change.”  Few of them offer any but superficial remedies, but sadly, many people fall for this nonsense, uncritically believing their passion rather than questioning either the concrete concepts involved,  or because they conceptually don’t bother and just wish the human suffering they’ve witnessed to end.  In part, this is understandable, and I could forgive the general lack of detailed understanding, but because this blind spot is exploited to strip law-abiding Americans of their liberty, I simply won’t tolerate these senseless exclamations to go unanswered any longer. On this site, I’ve gone to great pains to explain the technical aspects of the firearms, and the philosophical aspects of the foundations of our law, including what constitutes a right.  I realize this site is not the most highly trafficked destination on the Internet, but for all the howling lunatics who insist that we can “fix this” by banning guns, or by background checks, or by any other simple solution, let me state it succinctly: We will never eliminate the phenomenon of mass shooting entirely, but neither will we significantly reduce it if we ignore the question: “Whose job is it to protect our children?”

Let us start with a few facts that most people seem to disregard on their way to blaming all the wrong things, and permitting all the wrong things to continue.  Let’s focus on the shooting of Parkland, Florida as the exemplar of this type of event.  In the lead-up to this event, the FBI had at least two leads, one called in by a bail-bondsman, that was a little less specific, but also somebody closer to the shooter called in a solid tip on this shooter in January, contending he was going to “explode.”  A PDF of the full transcript of this call was posted by the NYTimes.  It’s astonishing how specific the information was, and more astonishing that the FBI didn’t act.

Local police had dealt with him in at least thirty-nine documented calls for service(mostly 9-1-1 calls.) The school had continuously wrestled with this kid in an ever-escalating series of incidents including assaults, fights, and terroristic threats, culminating in his eventual expulsion.  There were countless “red flags” about this wayward soul.  His classmates even half-joked about him becoming a school shooter, and ironically, they may have even unintentionally implanted in him the idea.  It should have been clear by the time he entered high school that he did not belong in the mainstream school population, but today’s education fads make it difficult to remove a troubled youngster.  All of the aggregated incompetence of individuals in the system, and the oppressive bureaucracy itself could not avoid producing the result of February 14th.  It’s baked into the cake.

Given all the failures in advance of the event, it was almost inevitable that this event was going to happen.  All that could now change would be the number of dead, and the result was dominated again by the incompetence of individuals as well as the bureaucracies involved.  Let us start with Deputy Scot Peterson, the sole School Resource Officer on the campus at the time the shooting commenced.  Peterson had been with the Broward Sheriffs Office going back to 1985, and thirty-three years later, and apart from the shooter himself, he would come to be the person most instrumental in the final body count.  He arrived outside the building less than a minute after the shooting had commenced, and there he waited, effectively seeking cover, but taking no remedial actions of any kind.  Even as he was joined by additional deputies, Peterson did not rally them to make entry and confront the shooter.  They simply waited for the shooting to stop. How many were shot and killed or bled out for lack of medical attention or simple first aid while Deputy Peterson did nothing?  A time-syncronized analysis of the various surveillance tapes might provide that answer, or at least a reasonable approximation of it, but Sheriff Scott Israel, the highly political head of the Broward Sheriffs Office, will likely do all in his power to prevent the disclosure or obfuscate any analysis that may ever be done.  You can’t be permitted to know, but most importantly, the people who lost loved-ones in this shooting must never be permitted to know lest there erupt some sort of popular lynching of the Sheriff and his deputies.  While the word “disgrace” doesn’t cover it, it is nevertheless disgraceful. The bulk of the media is covering for him, of course, and this is why the underlying dereliction was mostly covered-up until the end of the week and the gun control narrative had been thoroughly seeded. Imagine the complete arrogance it takes to make the statement Sheriff Israel offers in the video clip below:

https://twitter.com/twitter/statuses/967811615419707394

In for a penny, in for a pound.

It is at this point that something of an outrage erupts over the conduct of Deputy Peterson and his fellow officers, as well as the attempt to cover this up by Sheriff Israel, including his public attempts to deflect criticism onto the NRA.  The problem is that when all the outrage dies down, Israel and his deputies will have gotten away with it, as will the incompetent school, the incompetent FBI.  Their defenses will be their incompetence.  You can already hear it from their shills. “We’re too few, we have too little money, we have to few people, we didn’t know, and it’s the guns!”  What they won’t highlight, but I’m going to tell you, is the thing they don’t dare say in plain language to the ears of a listening world:

“It isn’t our job!”

Indeed, Sheriff Israel tells us that it’s his job to hire, train, and arm his deputies, but once they’re in the field, it isn’t his responsibility with respect to what they do as individuals.

Technically, they’re right: It isn’t their job to protect anybody.  It isn’t the school’s job, and it isn’t the job of police. It isn’t the job of the FBI or social workers or any other person even tangentially-related to this even, except: All the adults who were themselves the victims, or whose children were victims.

I know I will immediately face the angry roar of the crowd for having said this, but let me assure you that it is one-hundred percent accurate.  In more cases than can be listed here, time after time, courts have held that the only person with an affirmative duty to protect any person from harm is that person.  This duty cannot ultimately be delegated for a myriad of logical reasons. I learned this lesson the hard way back in the 1990s, when our own daughter entered Middle School.  It has always been my admonishment to her that she must never threaten violence, nor enact any, except in direct and immediate response to a physical attack upon her person.  On that point, I further explained that she had a duty to defend herself if she were ever to come under attack.  It goes almost without saying that she eventually crossed paths with a bully, older, and much larger, who attacked her in the hallway of the school, and when she rose in her own defense, perhaps feebly to scale of the task before her, by the rules of the school, which had adopted a “Zero Tolerance Policy” on school violence, she was as guilty as her attacker, and issued the same suspension. This is done by school districts so as to indemnify themselves against civil claims, but it provides no effective protection to anybody.

After several arguments, often heated, with faculty and administrators of the school and the district, we withdrew our daughter from that school in order to home-school her, because the school would not admit that she had a right to defend herself against physical attack, and because they would not assume liability for any future attacks.  In essence, they said that protecting our child against physical violence “isn’t our job.”  The question they refused to answer in light of that assertion was: “Who is liable to protect my child from physical violence?”  No affirmative answer, but only: “Not us.”

One might read that and think that perhaps the school isn’t liable in any legal or financial sense, but that they must have some moral obligation to protect our children.  The courts are concerned solely with the law.  The subjective notions of morality we may hold are not their affair.  The same is true of the police.  Yes, they are supposed to stop criminals, detain and arrest criminals, thereby preventing them from committing further crimes.  What they do not have is a duty to protect you. On this matter, the Supreme Court has repeatedly held this to be the case.  Logically, it makes sense on even the most simplified basis: In order to carry out a theoretical duty to protect all people at all times, there would need to be a policeman standing guard over each of us twenty-four hours per day.  The most economical way to do this would be a prison, for all of us, including the police, who would need guards of their own.  The point is that there can be no affirmative duty to protect you or your children against every or even any conceivable harm.  It’s not possible.  This is why we withdrew our daughter from school.  We ultimately moved out of that district to a home in a vastly different district where we felt the level of risk, while still higher than we would like, was much reduced.  The school still could not (and would not) guarantee to protect our child, but the general environment was more conducive to her average condition of safety.

What does this have to do with Parkland, Florida?  Nearly every parent knows this, but pretends not to know it.  Ask any parent “whose job is to protect your children?” You would think the answer to the question would be self-evident and immediately proclaimed, but it isn’t. This same thing is true when you ask parents: “Who is responsible to educate your child?”  Or: “Whose has a duty to feed(or cloth or house or treat) your child?” Ask these questions and watch the expression on parents’ faces as they try to explain how somebody other than themselves is obligated to do all of these things.  Only honest parents will answer in all these cases: “It’s my job.”  That’s right, and it’s the only answer to any such question.

The truth is that only parents have the responsibility to protect their children against all comers. The schools know this.  The police know it.  Every department of government knows it.  The well-worn motto “…to protect and serve…” is merely a public relations pitch.  Once you understand that only you have responsibility to protect yourself and your children, we can begin to think about these mass shootings in a different light, and it immediately calls into question the whole notion of “gun free zones.”

In a “gun free zone,” under punishment of law, you are forbidden from bearing arms for any reason.  Put in other terms, what this really means is that in a “gun free zone,” you are prohibited from effective self-defense.  Much like my daughter in the school with a “zero tolerance policy,” to provide for your own defense is a crime.  When you deposit your child into one of these “gun free zones,” you have sent them into an environment where only the predators will be armed, because the predators do not regard the law as any obstruction, and they view the obstruction to law-abiding folks as an invitation to the mayhem they intend.

One of the reasons we have such large schools is for the apparent economies of scale, but such concentrations of people are inviting targets for the sort who intend massive carnage. This has always concerned me with respect to our schools, because any madman, intent on devastation, could exploit this large aggregation of our children, who we profess to be the most valuable extensions of our lives.  The truth is that the only way to stop people with guns is to confront them with guns.  All of the rest is nonsense, and as I have explained, the next school shooter is already out there.

The most pressing reason we won’t likely stop the next mass shooter is because we refuse to assign blame.  Everybody is happy to point at the killer, but people generally look for some larger reason.  The scale of the tragedy and the enormity of the human loss and suffering begs us to empathize with the victims and their loved-ones, and well we should, but we must not lose sight of the totality of this problem, requiring of us a clear-eyed assessments to come to the truth.  Let’s list them:

Let’s think of all the ways in which this shooting might have been avoided:

  • The FBI might have followed up on one or both of the tips they received
  • The school might have sought to press charges on Cruz when he committed previous acts of violence on their campus
  • The local Law Enforcement might have sought to press charges

Let’s be plain-spoken about this: If any of these entities had acted appropriately, Cruz would have been charged with felonies on multiple previous occasions, including assault with a deadly weapon(or whatever equivalent charge exists in Florida) and this would have prohibited him from purchasing a weapon.  The NICS system doesn’t magically know that some people shouldn’t have weapons.  That information has to be placed into the database.  As we saw with the shooter at Sutherland Springs, Texas church shooter, the Air Force failed to put information into the system about the shooter, permitting him to purchase firearms.  In the Parkland, Florida case, neither the school nor the law enforcement agencies ever created the paper trail that would have been entered into the database to prohibit Cruz from obtaining firearms.

This leads us to a very uncomfortable place, which is the reason guns are being blamed and the National Rifle Association is being blamed.  You see, all of the institutions named above have made quite sure they cannot be blamed, and that none among them will be held culpable, in any respect whatever.  We might become angry and claim they had “a moral responsibility to…” act or intervene or otherwise mitigated this circumstance, but the truth is that our outrage doesn’t constitute an enforceable legal claim.

I’m going to say the thing that will be most unpopular, and will cause many to heap disdain upon me, but it’s nevertheless true:  Every parent of every child enrolled in Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School (and indeed in every public school anywhere) knew or ought to have known all the facts outlined above long before the attack of February 14th. If they found these facts unacceptable, (and I certainly would have,) they had a responsibility to get their children out of that environment.  You might say that they had no choice but to enroll their kids in that school.  While I understand the practical arguments, I thoroughly disagree in an absolute sense, inasmuch as they are the parents, and they could move to another district, act to change that district, home-school their children, or enroll their children in other schools at their own expense.  Contextually, the tax-payers of any school district are held at gun-point to pay for that school system and in this case, for that worthless Sheriffs Office, and that is as much an indictment of our entire system as anything else.  It is said that we “get the government we deserve,” and this is equally true of schools and sheriffs.

What I would say to parents who truly wish to protect their children is to familiarize themselves with the facts variously described above.  They should inform themselves of the policies at their schools, and make their choices accordingly.  What I can say without reservation on this date is that I am unaware of a single public school in any jurisdiction, anywhere in the country, to which I would entrust the safety of my children.  To my knowledge, none of them can be trusted to provide for student safety, and none of them really want that responsibility.  You will naturally find a number of teachers who would accept that responsibility, but they are hamstrung by worthless bureaucracies, foolish unions and professional associations, and in many jurisdictions, the law.

If a teacher tells you that they are unwilling to be armed in defense of their students, what they are really saying to you is that they are not to be trusted with your children, because they don’t wish to take on the responsibility of protecting the lives of your children.

Period. End. Fin!

Everything they might say after that is merely a load of excuse-making, and largely ideologically driven.  Besides, apart from contraindicating physical disabilities, how competent is any adult who cannot(or will not) be trained to proficiency with a concealable firearm?  Should any person lacking that basic competence be permitted access to your children for any purpose?  I say “No.”

Where do we start?  We need people to answer honestly the simple question: “Who is responsible for the safety of my children?” Once you reduce that question to its irreducible constituents, the answer is all too plain.  “Something must change!”  Indeed, and what that something is must be that parents must reassert their responsibility for the lives and safety of their children.  When they do that, nearly all the school shootings will cease, and even when they do occur, there will be provisions in place to effectively defend against them.

 

 

 

 

 

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My Disgust with GOP Politicians

Sunday, March 13th, 2016

princess wedding dressesOn Friday evening, as the staged riot at the UIC Trump event was in full swing, Ted Cruz came out to make a statement, that was carried live in several media outlets.  That statement began by briefly blaming the protesters, but then shifted immediately into blaming Donald Trump for the violence, asserting that he had created an environment ripe for violence, by effectively inciting it. First, let’s listen to Senator Cruz’s statement Friday evening:

I can’t describe how disappointed I am at this “blame the victim” meme being advanced in this video by Ted Cruz.  Naturally, both Rubio and Kasich made similar remarks to media, and it frankly disgusts me that they reverted purely to opportunists seizing on a chance to attack Donald Trump.  While it is true that it would seem at least superficially factual that Trump may have encouraged some violence with the “punch him in the face” remark during one of his rallies, the truth is that the statement “punch him in the face” is being considered here out of context.  What do I mean by “out of context?”

Consider that you’re throwing a party, or hosting an event, and ne’er-do-wells invade your event with the express purpose of causing trouble, or of creating mayhem.  As they’re being escorted out, or frequently as they’re being apprehended, they become a whirligig of flailing fists to either combat their removal, or to slow their removal or otherwise cause harm to others.  In this sort of context, some of these people would deserve, and would have earned a “punch in the face.” It’s not an aggressive use of force that Trump seems to have been advocating, but something of a response or defense against some of these very nasty folk who are stirring up trouble, intentionally, and by design of their attendance at the event of a person they obviously do not support.

If I support a cause, for instance, the Tea Party, and I attend the rally of a Tea Party group, I’m there to honestly support the cause and otherwise participate honestly in an event.  If I go to a rally of Planned Parenthood supporters, knowing I truly detest everything for which Planned Parenthood stands, secreting myself by disguise of clothing or signage, but then interrupt the program, and become violent as I am forcibly removed from the premises, I’m not a “peaceful protester” nor am I anything but what Trump has termed “disrupters.” I have used deception to gain entrance, and then by force of my active presence and demonstration against the purpose of the rally, I have placed the other rally attendees, security teams, and the host(s) of the rally in the position of having to use physical force or its implicit threat to remove me in order to continue the event for which they have every right to carry out as scheduled.

The people actually creating the “atmosphere” or “environment” of violence are not, in such a scenario, the host(s) of the event, the security staff, nor even other attendees who may wish to confront me or assist in my removal.  In such a scenario, the sole responsibility for violence lies with the person who instigated the incident, in my example above.  This is not really a logical controversy, and Ted Cruz is a smart enough fellow to have known better.  So are Marco Rubio and John Kasich.  Instead, they leaped opportunistically into the situation without regard for the truth.  In Chicago, at the scheduled UIC Trump rally that was ultimately canceled on Friday night, the responsibility for all of it, every bit of any violence, the rampage, and the canceling of the event, every stitch of it, lies solely with those who organized and participated in the riot for the purposes of interrupting, interfering, or otherwise diminishing the event for all those who were attending in good faith.

Ted Cruz had the opportunity to say that.  He had the chance to step in front of the cameras and microphones and be a champion of free speech, and to absolutely castigate the parties who were involved in this mob-oriented treachery.  Instead, what Senator Cruz did was to attack the victim(s).  Instead, what Senator Cruz did was to lend cover and excuse culpability of all these ne’er-do-wells who intentionally attended the event, using disguise and deception, for the explicit purpose of stifling the free speech of Mr. Trump, along with any other speakers scheduled, and naturally the crowd that was gathering to listen to him.  It excuses the damage done to attendees’ vehicles by the rampaging hordes of ne’er-do-wells and provides them with an out for their actions.

This is extremely disappointing to me.  Senator Cruz is an attorney, a man who proclaims his thorough-going support of the US Constitution, and yet I am to believe that he does not see this distinction?  It’s not as though Trump supporters were or are parading through the streets of Chicago looking for a fight, or that Trump himself were leading such a parade, aggressively seeking out protesters to confront and attack as a matter of aggression.  These supposed “incitements” to violence that Ted Cruz and the others have been citing all occurred within the confines of venues reserved by the host of the event in question, and solely for the participation of the invited, sincere participants.

This is no different from the very nasty habit of current public schools and their widespread “zero-tolerance” policy on violence, in which they make no moral or logical distinction whatsoever between the attacker and the victim who defends his or her person from the attack.  Trump never said “go out in the streets, find those protesters, beat the hell out of them, and punch them in the face.”  That would be an actual incitement to violence.  That would be an aggressive appeal for an “atmosphere” or “environment” of violence, and that would be disclaimed by every sane and rational person. I am fairly certain that if Mr. Trump ever exhorted his crowds to such behavior, he would in short order find his crowds dwindling in size, but that’s not what he’s done, and Ted Cruz knows it, and so do all the other people who’ve been attacking him on this front over the last week or more.

Good and decent people know that they should not go into somebody’s birthday party, wedding reception dress, public meeting, church service, or any other sort of event and create disturbances of any sort.  They also know that if they would undertake to do such things, they risk making of themselves targets for a highly emotional and direct response that may become physical in the attempt to remove them. This is not rocket science.  This is common decency, and I think it speaks volumes about the character of candidates Cruz, Rubio, and Kasich, all who made similar statements on Friday evening, that the opportunity to attack their party’s front-runner “trumped” all other considerations in the formulation of their statements.  It’s utterly despicable, and I can’t support people who displace blame onto the victims while letting the perpetrators off the hook in any way. Period.

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Posted in Donald Trump, Election 2016, Featured, Ted Cruz | 5 Comments »

As Islamists Take Control Of Egypt, Where Is Bill Kristol?

Monday, December 19th, 2011

Look Who's Not Laughing Now

Earlier this year, William Kristol over at the Weekly Standard couldn’t wait to mock conservatives who were watching the developments in Egypt’s Tahrir Square with trepidation, knowing how this revolution would ultimately end: In a tyrannical Islamic state not unlike Iran.  Kristol drew stunningly wrong-headed conclusions from the erupting “Arab Spring,” and he and his pal Rich Lowry over at the Nation Review enjoyed a good laugh at the expense of concerned conservatives who wondered about the possibilities of a growing Islamic hegemony in the region.  The laughter has ceased, and if Kristol was honest, he’d write an essay explaining all the ways in which he had been wrong, and apologize to all of those who he had earlier mocked.  Of course, don’t expect that from Kristol, because he’s a true DC insider, and he won’t have bothered to note that in Egypt, the Islamists are now coming to power, precisely as more wary and rational conservatives predicted.

What should have been apparent to Mr. Kristol is that there can be no ‘Arab Spring’ under the control of Islam, and it was clear to most rational observers from the outset that an Islamic Republic of some sort would be the result.  Kristol thought otherwise, but like all good establishment writers, he hedged his bets a little when it became apparent things were not going so wonderfully as he had supposed, but that didn’t stop him from making the most absurd statement:

No more. The Arab winter is over. The men and women of the Greater Middle East are no longer satisfied by “a little life.”

This is the sort of delusional hyperbole that characterized much of Kristol’s writing on the subject at the time, and it’s one more instance in which what he wishes to be true leads him to write as though it had been true.   Now that Islamist groups are winning the elections, and will clearly come to dominate the government of Egypt, and as protests again turn violent, one might reasonably ask what Mr. Kristol now says about all of this, having earlier declared the “Arab Spring” in full bloom.  The answer:  He hasn’t offered anything more on a subject that has turned into a rough spot given his early judgments on the matter.

Meanwhile, on the ground in Egypt, the facts are making a strong case in the form of violence that Mr. Kristol’s hopeful wishes for the future have been superseded by the evidence of the “false spring” with which he covered his bases.  This situation remains fluid, but the outcome seems less in doubt as the Islamist factions are clearly sweeping aside any pro-Democracy factions in the elections.  What this will likely mean is that before all is said and done, we’re going to be faced with an increasingly radicalized Arab world, with terrible consequences for Israel, and indeed, the entire region.  This is one of the reasons Kristol’s wishful thinking was irresponsible and dangerous: Too many took to heart a false sense of security about the state of things in the region, and too many came to believe there was nothing about which Americans should worry.  As is now clear, that’s an unmistakable falsehood, and as it stands, we’re likely to see a growing movement in Egypt that will be more openly hostile to Israel, and more apt to discard its treaty commitments.  What Bill Kristol’s shameful mocking of conservative doubters of the “Arab Spring” had accomplished was to cause Americans to avert their eyes from the danger, but we won’t be able to remain willfully blind to it much longer.  The question thus becomes:  When will Kristol finally open his?

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Posted in Arab Spring, Global Revolution, Media, News, Politics | 5 Comments »

Occupiers Threaten Shutdown

Thursday, November 17th, 2011

He Prefers Molotov Cocktails

Brace yourselves: Today is the day the Occupy Wall Street movement intends to shut down New York.  They plan to shut down Wall Street, and they plan to shut down the subways.   While they claim to be non-violent, yesterday an Occupier was arrested after threatening violence using Molotov cocktails against Macy’s, and saying that they would burn the city down. This man proclaimed: “We’re gonna burn New York City to the [expletive] ground.”  The video below actually led to the man’s arrest yesterday evening.  This gives some indication of what at least some of the protesters intend, but organizers still insist they are non-violent.  This video strongly suggests otherwise:

This isn’t a joke.  These misguided people are being used as a base for socialist agitation, and they’re putting up the anarchist front to carry out the violence.  New Yorkers should be prepared to seek refuge against violence, and find alternate means of transportation.  Also, with all of this chaos, it’s the perfect opportunity for terrorists of another sort to strike.  People really should remain vigilant in this environment, because there will be any number of participants who wish to incite a riot, and there will be any number of other elements who will wish to use such riots as cover.

All of this demonstrates clearly why Mayor Michael Bloomberg should be tossed by the electorate.  Anybody who has the reins of power in such a vast city, and yet fails to responsibly confront this sort of anarchical movement for most of two months really has no business in that position.  Of course, Bloomberg is a billionaire tool, so it’s really not surprising.  Let’s just hope that this doesn’t get out of hand, and the violence that some protesters are threatening never materializes.

One must wonder if their intention to block access to subways isn’t an attempt to incite violence.  I could easily understand how somebody blocking my path to my timely arrival at my job, particularly in these woeful economic conditions, could easily cause me to lose my composure if somebody were preventing me from access to transportation.  There will be those who see this as a threat to their jobs, and thus their families and their financial lives.  That’s the intention of the Occupiers with this move, and it’s almost certain to cause serious trouble.

As I said, they claim “non-violence,” but their actions are designed to provoke it.  It’s been clear what would happen when these poor fools outlived their usefulness to their masters as a mostly peaceful camp-in.  It’s that time.  Be careful out there.

 

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Posted in Anti-Capitalists, Global Revolution, Occupy Wall Street, Politics, Public Service Announcement | 6 Comments »

Barack Obama Led Occupation in Chicago in 1988?

Saturday, October 29th, 2011

 

Obama: Community Occupier

According to Joel Pollak, at BigGovernment.com, Barack Obama’s roots as a community organizer lead back to a time when he would have been leading the Occupy movement, and indeed took part in Occupation-style protests against banks.  Ladies and gentlemen, we must come to understand not only what is driving the Occupy movement but who is controlling the wheel. Back in 1988, Obama was part of the organizing force behind such protests in Chicago, but now, more than two decades later, he’s the President of the United States, and others are now fulfilling that role.  As Pollak reports in a separate article, it is now people like Lisa Fithian who act in the role once played by Barack Obama.  It seems that while organizers have changed, the  tactics in use are much the same.

This shouldn’t be particularly stunning to the readers of this blog, but what should shock you  is the unrelenting dishonesty inherent in the coverage that seems so incomplete among the so-called mainstream media.  There is a tendency to cover all of this up, and as Breitbart reported earlier in the week, there are elements within the Occupy movement who are simultaneously covering the event(s) while helping to organize them, putting a whole new meaning to the term “embedded journalists.”

There is nothing organic or “grass-roots” about this movement. It’s almost entirely a top-down endeavor being organized and led by people who have long and well-documented ties to the worst elements of Anti-American  and Anti-Capitalist sentiments, with delusions of revolutionary grandeur.  As Biggovernment.com further reports, the leftists directing this thing have a media strategy too, particularly for when dealing with news reports of violence among protesters. In a posting titled “What to do When the Media Says a Protester Attacked a  Cop,” the following advice is given:

  • 1) Challenge the assumption that the violent protester(s) are actually Occupy Wall Street protesters.
    The media move fast, they don’t believe it is their job to know who started the violence, just that it started. If someone looks like an Occupy Wall Street protester, they are an OWS protester, even if they are an editor from the Right Wing publication American Spectator who is at the protest specifically to discredit the movement.
  • 2) Scour all the footage and photos you can find of the instigators of the violence at the protest.
  • 3) Crowd-source the images and ask for help identifying them.
  • 4) Write a post about it on a blog with info on the person(s) and their background. 
  • 5) Contact the media and point out who that protest was started by.

Of course, this is an after-the-fact strategy, and says nothing of their role in any violence, and in fact attempts to disclaim it.  Any such mob action is going to have dire consequences, and these organizers know it.  Are there provocateurs?  Almost certainly.  The problem is that the provocateurs merely represent another faction of the operation at large.

Lastly, in what seems to be a good way to cap off this article, with more amazing coverage from Joel Pollak, it seems that some elements in the occupy movement are now taking to using human shields, just like Hamas.  In the same manner that other terrorist groups use the young, the old, and the infirm as human shields, apparently, this practice is picking up steam among the violent segment of the Occupy movement.

Honestly, I think those who have unwittingly been sucked into going along with this movement on the basis of an anti-crony-capitalism stance should reconsider.  They’re being used by radical and dangerous elements that do not intend any sort of reform, but instead are attempting to foment actual revolution. I’ve said it before, and I will say it again: It’s time for the rank-and-file Occupy Wall Street folks to realize they’re being used, but worse, they’re being set up.  When this gets ugly, and it’s growing increasingly unstable daily, they’re likely to find themselves hung out to dry.

 

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Posted in Anti-Capitalists, Barack Obama, Breaking News, Crony Capitalism, Global Revolution, Media, Occupy Wall Street, Politics, Squatters Occupying Wall Street | 5 Comments »

Coming to America?

Wednesday, August 10th, 2011

As the World Burns?

Is it possible that the United States is immune to this sort of violence?  As the world economy teeters on the brink of utter collapse, with Europe on the leading edge, its failed welfare states going bankrupt in an effort to put good money after bad, it’s a sobering reminder of what can happen when politicians are allowed to trade their citizens’ wealth for the votes of other citizens exempt from the tax collector’s grasp.  As the welfare state in our own country has begun to grow out of all previous bounds, it’s important to examine our own vulnerabilities to this sort of change.  Our own economy is again on the ropes, largely due to the increasing burden of the welfare state upon the wealth producers in our nation.

This sort of devolution sets up a feedback loop that tends to guarantee a worsening of economic results, which will in its turn undoubtedly spawn more civil and social unrest.  Of course, we’ve been through economic hardships before, notably the Great Depression of the 1930s, but never have we seen a confluence of events combined with the sort of outright radicalism we’re now watching on the streets of London.  In the US, we have had a number of riots, famously in the era of the great struggle for civil rights for African-Americans, but we’ve not seen a potential tinderbox growing like this since the days immediately on either side of our own civil war.  Before we dismiss this threat out of hand, let’s examine what’s driving it, and how it aims to attack our exposed flanks.

One thing that can be said without any controversy is that the riots erupting in Europe have a distinctly socialist, or at least anti-capitalist flavor.  While the anarchists involved seem to hate everything except the hand-outs they receive from government, it is clear that these are ultimately the children of the entrenched and growing welfare state.  It is in such movements that great tragedies have been birthed throughout human history, and they nearly always blossom from the same deadly seed:  These are predominately young people who have been educated by the welfare state to expect to have all their wants and desires met by the welfare state, as though it had been a perpetual parent, and they could remain indefinitely as spoiled children returning endlessly to the nest in which they were raised.

What of our own country?  Are we vulnerable to this same phenomenon here at home?  Ask yourself if we have created a similar welfare state, with a similarly bankrupt public education system in which children are passed through, without much effort, being spoon-fed a steady diet of propaganda based on a  litany of leftist causes that teach the students to expect to be provided their every need or even desire without much effort.  Consider our own welfare system that now provides free food, rent, housing, medical treatment, education, birth control, automobiles, utilities assistance, cable TV, internet, and more recently, cellular phone minutes.  What exactly is it that anybody would go to work to get?  This creates an entitlement mindset that forms into a slavish army of drones who will eventually rise up and destroy the people who so generously subsidized their existence.

You might wonder what would lead people who’ve been handed every material necessity to bite the hand that feeds it, but if you know the intellectually frail sort of mind that willingly subsists in this way, you ought to know that there is no necessary linkage between cause and effect in their thinking or in the formulation of their desires and demands.  As the economy worsens, there will be fewer jobs and therefore fewer opportunities upon which to build a work ethic and a healthy respect for private property or the laws that serve to protect it. What all of this has created is a generation of savages, whose first reflex is to loot, pillage and plunder.  Don’t wonder who has created this growing army of brigands and thugs.  You have.  Your labor and your taxes has been taken to support the birth, growth, and moral depravity of an army that will be turned against you.

Are We Next?

All of this makes clear the endless fallacies of the leftists’ welfare state.  One cannot print prosperity.  One cannot inflate it on the back of the efforts of a few.  One cannot redistribute it, and one cannot nurture into existence those who would create it by teaching the young that they deserve anything they want irrespective of what they have earned.  In the same way that we have collectively indoctrinated our young with a false self-esteem over the last two decades, so too have we indoctrinated them with the notion that they are owed all the prosperity they see in the wealth of others.

We’ve made the dangerous error of neglecting to explain to them that such prosperity is the product of hard work and thorough preparation with a necessarily diligent attitude toward one’s life and prospects.  In short, we have created an army of people who aren’t merely amoral, as some have suggested, but instead thoroughly immoral, who see the world through the cracked and skewed lenses of their own immediate, range-of-the-moment self interests, without respect to their long-term well-being.  “What pleases me right now?”  This is the standard of their moral belief.  They have no reliance on any religion excepting only a belief in the myth of their own entitlement.  If we permit them to go further, we are signing our own death warrants, as there will certainly come the day when they no longer see our value even as those who provide their loot.

In a hopeful moment, the Mayor of Philadelphia, Michael Nutter,  admonished particularly the black youth in his own city who have been igniting their own first embers of a similar fire with the new phenomenon of flash-mobs and the mob violence they have been increasingly spawning.  There will be those who view this as no big deal, and a problem without wider implications because we’ve seen riots in our large urban centers before, but any who would dismiss this as more of the same are making a grave error.  This isn’t a problem confined to urban or African-American areas, but instead a strong tide running through the core of most of the country’s young.  This is a widening of the war against capitalism, and these mobs are the first foot-soldiers.  Make no mistake about it: We are facing a global catastrophe unlike any in our history since at least the civil war, and if we don’t stand to oppose it, we’ll become its victims.  Some of you will be crushed to find that the young people you’ve raised, under your own roof, and of your own flesh and blood may be in the process of joining this wave.  These are the opening shots in a war to determine the course of the world’s future, and it’s time for the real adults among us to begin confronting this now, on the front end, before we inherit a true disaster in violence on the back end.

Our time is running short.

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Posted in Business, Economics, Politics | 4 Comments »