The Militia Right
I don’t want to suggest that the attitudes reflected by the sort of people who are handing out pamphlets on “Hot to Start and Train a Militia Unit” over at your local gun show are typical of the modern American right.
But it is true that totally mainstream figures like Rep Michele Bachmann have been flirting with this kind of rhetoric, saying they want the public “armed and dangerous” in the face of Obama administration environmental policy, while prominent media conservatives such as Glenn Beck and Jonah Goldberg are saying that Barack Obama’s policies are tantamount to fascism.
What’s interesting in particular about the militia mindset, however, is that its narrative sources are very different from those of left-wing radicalism. People who believe in violent revolution and the murder of American soldiers and policemen generally, if on the left, appeal to basically anti-patriotic attitudes. Which is about what you would expect from advocates of the violent overthrow of the established political order. But the militia crowd exhibits much more the attitudes one would expect from a coup leader—a Franco or a Pinochet who’s actually appealing to the concepts of patriotism and nationalism as justification for violent revolution.
I suppose there are some different ways of characterizing the asymmetry, but the underlying issue seems to be that rule by conservatives is integral to the right’s conception of the United States of America. This is part of the rhetoric of the “heartland” and “real America”—a period of political victory by a coalition grounded in the coasts and Greater Chicago is a period in which America has ceased to be herself. Thus Michael Barone:
[T]he Republican Party is the party of people who are considered, by themselves and by others, as normal Americans — Northern white Protestants in the 19th century, married white Christians more recently — while the Democratic Party is the party of the out groups who are in some sense seen, by themselves and by others, as not normal — white Southerners and Catholic immigrants in the 19th century, blacks and white seculars more recently.
Now Barone’s not about to go join a militia. But I think this is the basic mentality. The people on the outs are “normal” and the people running the show are “abnormal.” And while I wouldn’t use that language to describe the difference in the coalition, the basic description is right—most Americans are white and most Americans are Christian, and the Republican Party is overwhelmingly the party of white Christian America while the Democratic Party draws its support from a diverse array of non-white and non-Christian ethnic and sectarian groups. But the authentic America is seen as the white & Christian American, an entity in whose defense one can claim to rebel against the actual United States of America.
133 Responses to “The Militia Right”
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April 7th, 2009 at 2:36 pm
The Confederate battle flag wavers have been engaged in this kind of hypocrisy for years: worshipping an actual enemy of the United States while claiming to be patriots.
April 7th, 2009 at 2:37 pm
Evidently Barone either can’t spell, or can’t bring himself to spell, untermenschen.
April 7th, 2009 at 2:40 pm
David Neiwart (http://dneiwert.blogspot.com/) has done a lot of work showing how this basic mentality has provided cover in the mainstream for the militia right (or radical right or Eliminationists, the title of Neiwart’s new book). The reason people like Bachmann and Beck are so dangerous is because of the signals it sends not only to the militias but throughout the conservative movement and its institutions that this type of thing is okay. And then conservatives can take advantage of political support from these types of radicals while maintaining plausible deniability.
The parallels between this type of infiltration and rhetoric from the same people over how ‘moderate’ Muslims aren’t doing enough to deny the radical Muslim world are ironic and would be somewhat comical if it wasn’t so tragic.
April 7th, 2009 at 2:40 pm
People are going to rebel because Obama is giving the people what they want? I’m not worried about the people.
As we’ve seen recently, though, SOME people are going to continue to cause trouble.
April 7th, 2009 at 2:46 pm
But the authentic America is seen as the white & Christian American, an entity in whose defense one can claim to rebel against the actual United States of America.
When it’s put that plainly, it’s self-refuting: the idea that “the authentic America is the white & Christian America” is itself an anti-American idea. And yet these people actually don’t understand that their position is profoundly anti-American …
April 7th, 2009 at 2:49 pm
This, remember, was one reason why the 2003 anti-Iraq War protests didn’t matter. They were a bunch of city-dwellers, not real Americans! This is a reason why the “Tea Parties” will matter – these are real heartland Americans in the tradition of Andrew Jackson etc!
I think during the primaries Matt pointed out that Obama’s coalition of voters was defined as not including anyone in the “working class,” even though he was winning hundreds of thousands of working class blacks. Same thing was going on, there.
April 7th, 2009 at 2:52 pm
A friend and I were once talking about starting a liberal militia. Hell, we already had the guns. But then we got stoned and forgot about it. Oh well.
April 7th, 2009 at 2:54 pm
Of course, what MattY fails to understand is that the GOP isn’t “overwhelmingly the party of white Christian America” by intent; it’s open to all as any national leader would take (oftentimes great Gramscian) pain to point out.
Meanwhile, the Dems aren’t quite like that. Their philosophy involves segregating people along racial lines into small, easily-controlled groups with racial leaders who represent the thoughts of all others of their race right down to the DNA level. That even extends to EthnicAmericans. It’s all quite Balkans.
But, it goes even further, with anti-white ideology being more than welcome in the Dem party.
Consider, this quote:
At first you might think the person who said that would be an extremist college professor or something. In fact, the person who said that was Art Torres, someone who is or was until recently still the chairman of the CA Democratic Party.
April 7th, 2009 at 2:54 pm
But the militia crowd exhibits much more the attitudes one would expect from a coup leader—a Franco or a Pinochet who’s actually appealing to the concepts of patriotism and nationalism as justification for violent revolution.
The country fights over two different conceptions of the nation, the North wins, and its heirs cede the right to define patriotism to the fucking Southern conservatives. Of course they think they’re supposed to be in charge: no one on our side seemed willing to say otherwise until quite recently.
April 7th, 2009 at 2:57 pm
the basic description is right—most Americans are white and most Americans are Christian, and the Republican Party is overwhelmingly the party of white Christian America while the Democratic Party draws its support from a diverse array of non-white and non-Christian ethnic and sectarian groups
Choice of axes matter and aren’t neutral, Yglesias. They bitch about us winning the cultural war because, well, we did. It’s not clear why those aren’t the relevant axes.
April 7th, 2009 at 2:58 pm
Their philosophy involves segregating people along racial lines into small, easily-controlled groups with racial leaders who represent the thoughts of all others of their race right down to the DNA level.
You really are a delusional loon, aren’t you.
April 7th, 2009 at 3:00 pm
Dave Weigel takes time out from writing for a Soros/Rockefeller-funded pseudo paper to opine: This, remember, was one reason why the 2003 anti-Iraq War protests didn’t matter.
I was taking pictures at those protests when Weigel was still in high school. They didn’t matter because they were organized by (literal) Stalinists and the like. The Free Mumia And The Cuban Five Drum Circles didn’t help.
Obama’s coalition of voters was defined as not including anyone in the “working class,” even though he was winning hundreds of thousands of working class blacks.
That’s a completely bogus charge. Every news report I saw indicated that BHO’s coalition included blacks as a group. Specifying that many were “working class” is unnecessary when referring to all in a group.
April 7th, 2009 at 3:01 pm
And as long as you toe the line you can stay in. Go off message though and it’s RINO time.
April 7th, 2009 at 3:06 pm
Yup. And both Franco and Pinochet in their day were heroes to significant segments of the American Right. You’ll still find them defending Pinochet’s noble action against a government that had the temerity to win an election.
Add in defense of the “heartland,” obsession over racial purity and the untermenschen (as Davis X. Machina points out), contempt for “intellectuals,” and a militant distortion of Christianity, and I think we can all agree that yes, it’s the modern Democratic Party that’s embracing fascism. Why, just look at the Mercury dime!
April 7th, 2009 at 3:09 pm
If you want to see something scary. Read Conservapedia’s page on Franco, the Fascist Dictator of Spain.
No mention of the Fascist murdering thousands upon thousands of their countrymen. Or his links to NAZI Germany and Fascist Italy.
April 7th, 2009 at 3:09 pm
I think, as other imply, that we should add the word rural to Matt’s description of what the right sees as “normal” America–white, Christian, and rural. And when defined that way, this group is clearly a minority.
24ahead (not promoting his blog for once, says:
Of course, what MattY fails to understand is that the GOP isn’t “overwhelmingly the party of white Christian America” by intent . . .
[snark]Sure, anyone who shares the vision of white Christian hegemony is welcome to join the movement![/snark]
More seriously, the intent of the Republican Party (in spite of what certain leaders might say) is clear when you have prominent Republican figures stating, repeatedly, that certain parts of the country are “real” America and certain parts are not.
Sure, maybe one Dem state party chair might have said something stupid once. But, unlike in the case of Michelle Bachman, you don’t see major forces in the party rallying around the most outrageous statements individual Democrats make.
April 7th, 2009 at 3:10 pm
Is “Soros/Rockefeller” an insult? This is a problem with the fringe right – the language has gotten so specific and obscure that it doesn’t make sense to anyone else.
April 7th, 2009 at 3:11 pm
“Hot to Start and Train a Militia Unit”
is a description, not a pamphlet title!
April 7th, 2009 at 3:12 pm
And, as is common is such mythologies, “white” doesn’t really mean anything and “Christian” doesn’t tell you anything about their actual values. They call themselves “white” because they don’t know their ancestry, and they don’t know much about their supposed religion.
Thus: it’s an identity that appeals to stupid and shallow people.
April 7th, 2009 at 3:12 pm
Sorry, my mistake. I didn’t mouse over the links. 24ahead is, of course, promoting his own blog, as usual.
April 7th, 2009 at 3:14 pm
Our lovable troll said:
“the GOP isn’t “overwhelmingly the party of white Christian America” by intent; it’s open to all as any national leader would take (oftentimes great Gramscian) pain to point out.”
It isn’t by intent? Well, they have actively pursued policies that disproportionately hurt minorities for a long time now. You can’t run on throwing all immigrants out of the country and expect Hispanics to vote you. And you can’t run on “no abortions under any circumstance” and no gay rights and expect people who aren’t religious to vote for you. Nor can you run on tax cuts for the rich and nothing for anyone else and expect poor people to vote for you. And as I’m sure you well know, minorities are disproportionately poor.
So, while maybe not their intent to throw everyone except white married Christians out of their party, that’s exactly what the policies they favor have done. And in fact they’ve done that for a long time. It’s just that white married Christians used to be a majority of the country, and now they’re a shrinking minority. That must be a terrifying thought for someone such as yourself.
April 7th, 2009 at 3:15 pm
If I can address this one thing, though: “Every news report I saw indicated that BHO’s coalition included blacks as a group.”
Indeed, the media reported that blacks had voted for Obama. But Obama’s inability to win white working class voters was reported as a really embarrassing weakness. He can’t bowl very well! He had orange juice in a diner! Whether or not Obama could convince white union members in Beaver County, Pennsylvania was seen as a real problem, while Hillary Clinton’s inability to win black union members in Philadelphia was seen as no big whup. Indeed, there were conservatives who argued that Obama’s black support was hurting him. Why? Because everyone knew that we were still living in 1988 and there was a big secret bloc of white voters who resented blacks.
There was weird, insulting projection going on, and coverage that made racial diversity seem like a weakness while support among a certain cohort of white voters became a strength.
April 7th, 2009 at 3:16 pm
They also live in an alternate reality in which FDR caused the Great Depression, the New Deal didn’t do anything, Yalta was a mistake, the Democrats created the Khmer Rouge, the press snatched defeat from the jaws of victory in Iraq, the Russians smuggled WMD from Iraq to Syria, etc.
It’s a freak-show fantasy world.
April 7th, 2009 at 3:17 pm
“I was taking pictures at those protests when Weigel was still in high school. They didn’t matter because they were organized by (literal) Stalinists and the like. The Free Mumia And The Cuban Five Drum Circles didn’t help.”
While I kinda think you were in high school at the time, you’re correct in that liberal protests tend to attract their share of nutjobs protesting Mumia and a billion other unrelated things, and thus become somewhat uneffective.
Also, feel free to find a (literal) Stalinist organizing anti-war protests. Seriously, I’d like to see one. Though nobody’s clicking on your blog if that’s the only link you have.
April 7th, 2009 at 3:19 pm
Is “Soros/Rockefeller” an insult? This is a problem with the fringe right – the language has gotten so specific and obscure that it doesn’t make sense to anyone else.
Because Soros provides so much money to lefty causes and there’s absolutely no parallel on the right. Except for Scaife. And Sheldon Adelson. And…
April 7th, 2009 at 3:19 pm
Is that the one who was talking to the nerd right before the jock knocked the papers out of his hand and the chick with the hot rack giggled?
Oh, wait. I’ve actually been to college. It doesn’t look anything like that.
April 7th, 2009 at 3:20 pm
I find it ironic that those decrying Obama’s association with Bill Ayers and Ayers’ past as a Weatherman are on the precipice of calling for an outright overthrow of the government. It’s kind of like those pictures of both the Nazi/Aryan and Obama = Hitler paraphernalia being sold at the Knob Creek Machine Gun Shoot this past weekend. The right is so apoplectic at the moment; it’s quite amusing.
April 7th, 2009 at 3:20 pm
“But Obama’s inability to win white working class voters was reported as a really embarrassing weakness.”
To be fair, this actually was an issue. I think it was assumed that blacks would vote for the Democrat no matter what since they always do, but doing worse than the usual Democrat among working class whites in a close election could have lost swing states where those are prevalent, namely OH/PA/MI. It was the way they went about the reporting that was so trivial and ridiculous, like orange juice and bowling. Whether white factory workers would vote for a black man was a legitimate issue (black factory workers have voted for plenty of white men, after all).
April 7th, 2009 at 3:21 pm
Yet another hamfisted attempted by the juicebox journolist set to re-run Clinton’s ugly ‘95 era demagoguery. The analysis here is just a placeholder, and it shows. Matt, drop the intellectual pretense–this post would be much more interesting if you weren’t pretending to be so fucking high minded. You’re not pulling it off.
April 7th, 2009 at 3:23 pm
24ahead is, of course, promoting his own blog, as usual.
To great effect, I’m sure. Last time I checked the crickets were louder than ever over there.
April 7th, 2009 at 3:24 pm
Except for Scaife. And Sheldon Adelson. And…
I vaguely know why those guys are controversial, but I don’t know why Soros and Rockefeller are. I first came to know about Soros on his drug legalization work. His funding of the Zimbabwe freedom movement is pretty damn commendable. If anything I’ve found his American political work pretty boneheaded – his 2004 speech tour was a ponderous mess and his MoveOn funding led to lots of dopey ads.
April 7th, 2009 at 3:24 pm
The US has been an urban nation since about 1920. Then again, the GOP is still trying to turn the clock back on social mores (the big, bad 60’s), the middle class (Gilded Age’s revenge on FDR), Darwin, the Voting Rights Act.
It’s not that the GOP has painted itself into a corner, it’s that they’ve declared so many people to be their enemies that they are now outnumbered. Half of American history is a horror movie to them. The wrong half.
April 7th, 2009 at 3:27 pm
Why, dammit, why, 24AheadDotLoneWackoDotCom, do you leave out spaces between words?
April 7th, 2009 at 3:33 pm
Obama’s coalition contained a very large number of white people. Many of them were women. Obama won women by a substantial amount. All women, IIRC. Obama won white youngfer people too. Obama also won a large portion of the upper middle class, most of whom are white.
I think the relevant demographic is white and rural and male and Christian and regional. The Dems are the majority party, and you can’t do that without a very subntantial number of white folks even if they (we) do live in cities/suburbs and are majority female.
April 7th, 2009 at 3:36 pm
Thomas’s comment at #30 is a classic example of that alternate reality thing. I actually have no clue what he’s talking about.
April 7th, 2009 at 3:39 pm
That makes two of you.
They’re so cute when they try to think!
April 7th, 2009 at 3:39 pm
People who believe in violent revolution and the murder of American soldiers and policemen generally, if on the left, appeal to basically anti-patriotic attitudes. Which is about what you would expect from advocates of the violent overthrow of the established political order. But the militia crowd exhibits much more the attitudes one would expect from a coup leader—a Franco or a Pinochet who’s actually appealing to the concepts of patriotism and nationalism as justification for violent revolution.
Therein is the heart of the difference between socialism and fascism that Jonah Goldberg tried to obscure.
And Barone’s description of Republican vs. Democrat as “pure American” vs. “outsider” may be true now, but it makes no sense to apply to the 19th century. The Confederate states, actually going back to Jefferson’s agragrian ideal, viewed themselves as pure and the cosmopolitan industrial and banking elits as the outsiders. That they subsequently aligned themselves with immigrants in urban Democratic machines was very much an enemy of my enemy thing rather than the result of a sense of solidarity against “mainstream” America. There is much more of an affinity between modern militia groups and, say, the Klan, than with any 19th Century Republicans.
April 7th, 2009 at 3:50 pm
“I think the relevant demographic is white and rural and male and Christian and regional.”
This is a much better way of putting it. I think all the white Democrats in Congress would find it odd that they’re supposed to be supporting the GOP. And I would guess Obama would find it weird that Christians like himself aren’t part of the Democratic coalition.
Mike
April 7th, 2009 at 3:55 pm
I’ve actually floated fostert’s idea of a “liberal militia” in a serious context. I think it’s dangerous that the skills and abilities needed to engage in organized violence and blowing shit up are currently distributed in a manner that skews severely to the political right. We haven’t fought a large-scale war with a draft since WWII (even Vietnam at its height didn’t take a large chunk of the population). Millions of people of all political persuasions served in combat WWII. When a large, politically random portion of the population shares the skills needed to engage in organized violence and blowing shit up, that’s healthy. Now, the subset of the population that has those skills is much smaller and heavily concentrated on the right side of the political spectrum. I don’t think that’s healthy, and with our professional armed forces, and the political skewing of people who engage in other activities, such as hunting, that might develop analogous skills, I sometimes think it would be good for the left side of the spectrum to join militias. Wine and cheese after muster, anyone?
April 7th, 2009 at 3:58 pm
I agree with Noel @1. These guys wave their Confederate Flags but are the first to call you anti-American if you forget your flag pin on t.v.
Also the picture of the new manual says it suprecedes PM7-94. What new things did they add? Did they delete references to Clinton and replace them with Obama?
April 7th, 2009 at 4:02 pm
Better question: Why did they have Westmoreland write on this subject?
April 7th, 2009 at 4:08 pm
so um, is it BAD to be facist, like Obama, or good to be facist, like Hitler?
This is confusing.
April 7th, 2009 at 4:17 pm
I think one aspect not being accounted for is the local need. I Know locally (medium southern city) that there has been talk of creating a militia amongst the gun owning crowd. The ideas behind this did not seem to be politically based, even though most tend to be right leaning.
Unemployment has been continually moving up, and with it so has crime, violent and non-violent. At the moment the local law enforcement has been able to somewhat handle it. But there is a concern that it may move beyond their scope soon. Especially since it seems that some level of crime is gaining societal acceptance as peoples situations get worse off. The core of the concern for those discussing a local militia crowd seems to be a joint effort in protecting personal property. There is no sentiment of over-throwing any government.
April 7th, 2009 at 4:19 pm
Forty days and forty nights
It rained and rained like cats and dogs
Drowning humans just like rats
It’s a parable for an angry mob
Joined a group for a militant peace
But violence as an issue was purely mute
Laid around drinking tea
Waiting for god to tell us who to shoot
–DtB
April 7th, 2009 at 5:03 pm
This is it. This is the key. However, I think the loudmouth self-righteous Southern and Western righties who think they’re going to be playing all their noxious and dangerous treason games again like they did all through the 1990s are going to get their asses kicked this time.
They aren’t the winners, they aren’t the majority, and nobody but nobody but them wants to see these right wing ass-hats restored to power.
If they think they’re tough enough, maybe they should bring it. Maybe what they need is to once again get their asses kicked to remind them what happens when the Southern militia right starts challenging the Union authority.
April 7th, 2009 at 5:10 pm
Rob Mac Says: Sure, maybe one Dem state party chair might have said something stupid once.
Today’s great question: is Rob Mac and idiot or just disingenuous? There are plenty more examples I could provide; there are several at the link. And, I’m pretty sure Malkin or others have written books containing endless “liberal” quotes. And, the issue is also that the only reason we know about what that chairman said was because someone taped the event. Despite that, the MSM never reported on it and, needless to say, the Dem party not only didn’t take action against him they made him chairman of their party in CA. The Dem party fully supports racist statements, just as long as they’re anti-white.
Dave Weigel comes back with: Is “Soros/Rockefeller” an insult? This is a problem with the fringe right – the language has gotten so specific and obscure that it doesn’t make sense to anyone else.
Why should anyone be surprised that Dave Weigel can’t figure things out? Click the link to see a comment he didn’t want his readers to see on an entry he wrote about poor ol’ me.
Adam Says: You can’t run on throwing all immigrants out of the country and expect Hispanics to vote you.
Don’t think much, do you? There has never been any GOP leader I’m aware of saying anything remotely similar to that. No national GOP leader supports even MassDeportations for IllegalAliens.
Why not be man enough to include some identifying information so that we know not to trust what you say in the future?
As for the Stalinists, see this:
capmag.com/article.asp?ID=2592
Guess who pointed out who was behind the protests.
April 7th, 2009 at 5:12 pm
Re: People who believe in violent revolution and the murder of American soldiers and policemen generally, if on the left, appeal to basically anti-patriotic attitudes.
Which is precisely why the American far-left has never gotten anywhere. The far left-wing revolutionaries that were actually successful- Castro in Cuba, the Sandinistas, Ho Chi Minh in Vietnam, Mao in China, and so forth- all knew how to make skilful use of nationalist and patriotic sentiments. That goes double, of course, for the ‘revolutions from above’ that came out of left-wing military cliques in places like Egypt, Peru and Portugal (and abortively, in Venezuela in 1992).
April 7th, 2009 at 5:22 pm
1) Bush and the Republicans stole $3 Trillion out of Social Security accounts — a fair number of which belong to these rural Southerners — and what did these gun-waving militias do?
Nothing.
2) Bush then scrapped several long-standing Constitutional rights, created the Department of Homeland Security and undertook a massive unconstitutional surveillance program. What did these gun-waving militias do?
Nothing
3) Bush and the Republicans then opened up the back door of the US Treasury and let some of the wealthiest fuckers in the country haul off $Trillions. What did these gun-waving militias do?
Nothing.
Maybe –after the fourth Scotch — Glenn Beck thinks he can make revolutionaries out of these clowns. But I don’t see much to work with.
April 7th, 2009 at 6:08 pm
We note Lonewacko’s continued refusal to disclose the funding of his nativist smear campaign.
April 7th, 2009 at 6:14 pm
i suggest liberals start purchasing firearms
April 7th, 2009 at 6:17 pm
Parts of the right view liberals, nonwhites, coastal urbanites, non-Christians, etc., as not part of the nation, even as against the nation. They equivocate as to whether the relevant nationality concept is defined civically or racially, religiously, etc.
April 7th, 2009 at 6:20 pm
Let me be the first to say it: The militia movement, then and now, consists of an assembly of the nations trailer trash retards, daughter molesting, dog shooting, gun worshipping, cowardly, unemployed, overweight, uneducated, lazy, feckless, tough talking, dips. You couldn’t find one whole complete set of teeth in the whole bunch. Although you could get a pretty good selection of pubic lice across America. They fall into two categories – cheetos eating morons who ain’t never going to do anything but blindly follow the leader and fork out their families dollars, and assorted lonely nutbars like McVeigh, Koresh and Randy Weaver… guys just smart enough to get themselves and other people killed, but of no particular significance.
These people are best ignored and left to their inbreeding, both intellectual and sexual. The pack of them haven’t contributed a dime to America, and they never will. My only advice is to throw their crummy asses in jail whenever they actually get up the nerve to commit a crime, and spend the rest of the time pretending they don’t exist.
April 7th, 2009 at 6:24 pm
No particular disrespect intended to Hector or 24aheaddotcom.
April 7th, 2009 at 6:38 pm
Re Skeptic’s comment “They fall into two categories – cheetos eating morons who ain’t never going to do anything but blindly follow the leader and fork out their families dollars, and assorted lonely nutbars like McVeigh, Koresh and Randy Weaver… guys just smart enough to get themselves and other people killed, but of no particular significance. ”
—————-
Er..Randy Weaver was a Special Forces veteran who served his country and was entrapped on a bogus weapons charge.
That particular piece of “trailer trash” managed to not only go free on a charge of murdering a federal marshal — he also managed to get $2 Million from the Justice Department for his daughters as settlement of a lawsuit over the wrongful death of their mother. As well as $100,000 for himself.
PLus the FEDERAL Judiciary allowed the county prosecutor in Idaho to indict the FBI sniper for manslaughter.
Even the nutbars have real enemies sometimes. Ask Senator Stevens.
April 7th, 2009 at 6:51 pm
I’m sorry, Don, what part of “Randy weaver was a lonely nutbar like McVeigh and Koresh…, a guy just smart enough to get himself and other people killed, but of no particular significance.” did you not get?
So he was a veteran? Big f*cking deal. Lots of people serve their country. Most of them don’t retreat into their own little lunatic kingdom based on delusional legal theories. Forget it.
Yeah, tell us all about what a great hero Randy Weaver was, with his lunatic dippy, diddly cult. So his big accomplishment was sticking his hand out and moaning about how he got hard done by. Yeah, right. What Randy Weaver was and always will be is a snivelling arselick.
April 7th, 2009 at 6:51 pm
Ha,Ha,Ha,Ha,HA! You niether have a clue nor wish to properly represent what is going on with the people in this country and the massive growth of the militia across the whole of the country.I have worked for a living all of my life. Socialists don’t. They expect to pull their living out of the pockets of all of us who work all the while giving lip service to supporting the working man. In reality the idea is that my time is their time to divide up and thieve as they wish on what ever spending whim drops into their pea brains. The militia effort is made up of a wide range of individuals from all walks of life contrary to the lies of those with their own soviet agenda.(and the soviets are alive and well on college campus as we all know don’t we? LOL)I’ve worked with the Demicans and the Republicrats and found that both groups are one and the same.Dems will run Reps and vise versa if a non CFR member tries to run for any post.Been there, seen that atthe highest levels over and over again. Enough on the racket. The manual shown is only one of hundreds that cover every aspect of militia operations and organization. All are generated to provide concept guidelines for growth. Buy more ammo if you can find it and arms to get the job done. Food production is another priority. Do what you can. Ne Copula Nobiscum!
Mark Gregory,, Koernke GDW!
April 7th, 2009 at 6:54 pm
RE Skeptic’s comment “with his lunatic dippy, diddly cult. ”
———–
Er.. is that what you call Randy Weaver’s two daughters, jos dead wife and his dead son? Because that was all Randy Weaver had with him up on Ruby Ridge. Plus a close friend.
I think you have Randy Weaver confused with the guys at Waco.
April 7th, 2009 at 7:00 pm
Re Mark at 58:
—————
I thought that post was SLC in drag but there does seem to be a link.
No offense, Mark, but in my judgment former felons are more likely to be federal snitchs/agent provocateurs than real ..er.. activists.
April 7th, 2009 at 7:00 pm
massive growth of the militia across the whole of the country.
Same number of trailer trash tards, but twice as much lard. The only danger they pose is too many getting on the same elevator at once.
The militia effort is made up of a wide range of individuals from all walks of life
All walks of life being the lazy, the shiftless, the useless, the stupid, the overweight, the toothless, and the inbred.
contrary to the lies of those with their own soviet agenda.(and the soviets are alive and well on college campus as we all know don’t we? LOL)
And we’re under your bed too. And we’re beaming enemy pornography despite the tinfoil hat.
The manual shown is only one of hundreds that cover every aspect of militia operations and organization. All are generated to provide concept guidelines for growth. Buy more ammo if you can find it and arms to get the job done.
Not that they need anything more than the phone numbers for pizza delivery.
April 7th, 2009 at 7:13 pm
Uh.. in defense of the trailer trash, they at least realize they’re being fucked and that someday they might need to fight. I’m skeptical whether they will ever actually put down their beer and turn off the NFL game to do so, but at least the concept’s there.
In contrast to leftists who –after being buttfucked to the tune of $16 TRILLION dollars in just the last 8 years — think they can deal with the situation by a few sternly-worded letters to their throughly corrupt Member of Congress. Now THAT’s delusional stupidity.
Well, they did do more, of course. Mounted a heroic effort to elect a progressive to the Presidency. Who promptly appointed LARRY SUMMERS to advise him on what to do.
ha ha ha ha ha ha ha
And your guys call the Fox News watching trailer trash Stupid.
Good thing you intellectual giants have Judith Miller’s New York Times to keep you informed.
April 7th, 2009 at 7:29 pm
And just whose interests do the militia idiots usually serve?
You think the red-shirted, proto-Klan, cowardly arsonists and murderers and pitchfork brigades in the post-Reconstruction South understood that they were terrorizing blacks and destroying elected democracy for the planter class that hated and mocked them? That by their harsh defiance of Union Constitutional oppression that they were assigning themselves to impoverished sharecropper class status for several generations, and to being millworkers incapable of earning enough income to literally feed both themselves and their children?
If there really were some instability in the nation, the Wall Street types would be more than happy to call on the idiot Freikorps to shoot at ‘leftists’ and then laugh all the way to their next big gubmit bailout.
Please, don’t make me laugh trying to defend these paranoid shitburgers as some sort of nativist proto-revolutionaries acting out in caveman fashion some instinctual revolt against Wall Street theft.
April 7th, 2009 at 7:31 pm
I rarely agree with Don Williams, but he’s right about Randy Weaver, who was persecuted for no good reason in a pretty shocking abuse of federal power. Weaver simply was not hurting or threatening anyone. The ACLU defended him*, if that carries any water with you.
*in the sense of making public statements on his behalf; I don’t know if they defended him legally.
April 7th, 2009 at 7:39 pm
Re El Cid’s comment “the Wall Street types would be more than happy to call on the idiot Freikorps to shoot at ‘leftists’”
———-
Hey, i agree the right wing base are uninformed and ignorant. But when has the DEMOCRATIC leadership ever tried to enlighten them?
Or enlighten the rest of us, for that matter. Or Did you get a spate of emails from Chris Dodd back in 2005 warning that we needed to rein in Wall Street and regulate Derivatives?
Instead of denouncing Rupert Murdoch and his Fox News Propaganda machine for destroying this countries with a daily tsunami of lies — our Democratic leaders seem more inclined to suck on ole Rupert’s dick and jostle for interviews on the Bill O’Reilly show.
People who have children to raise don’t always have time to sort through the heavily financed bullshit on our airwaves. And I argue much of the left is just as ignorant — we simply believe a different set of lies.
April 7th, 2009 at 7:57 pm
You’re not going to score any points on me by pointing out the obvious yet unstateable fact that the U.S. still is and has been overwhelmingly dominated by its uppermost classes.
This reality, however, in no way is challenged by the present of a bunch of moron shitbag racists and paranoids who dress up in survivalist cosplay and usually end up shooting their family or retreating to compound cults but occasionally murdering some innocent black guy or getting in a shootout with an armored car driver or worse, firebombing some family’s house or blowing up a government building.
How exactly was the deregulation of derivatives slowed by Tim McVeigh’s blowing up of the Okalahoma federal building ’cause he thought it would provoke the marshalllawcrackdown he and his types feared?
And why do these shitbags all vanish when the government is completely run by the most hostile right wing pro-upper class government we may have ever had? Oh, right, because they’re not proto-revolutionaries, they’re authoritarian shitbags who march to the idiot orders of whatever right wing siren they latch onto.
April 7th, 2009 at 8:13 pm
I love when usually staid comments sections devolve into utter crazytown.
This is awesome, although I can’t figure out (and don’t care) who’s on which side here. I just hope some of the militia types work up the gumption to actually try something, and thereby remove themselves from the gene pool.
That would be a great benefit to our country.
April 7th, 2009 at 8:24 pm
Spare me, Don. A while back, I was minding my own business when a couple of cops busted into my house on a drug warrant. Turned out that they had the wrong house, big clerical error.
Now, I could have pulled a Randy Weaver, gotten family members killed because I was too dumb to know shit from shinola, and defended myself the way a raccoon defends itself from an oncoming car on the highway. I could have gone for a four star media circus, standoff, played the martyr, sacrificed my family.
Instead, I had priorities, which was to act sanely, get through the situation alive, get my people through the situation alive, and settle these dipshits properly on ground where I stood a chance.
Say what you will in defense of Randy Weaver, but he was the author of his own goddammed fortune. It’s his own goddammed fault that his son is dead and his daughter is dead. He was just another goddammed raccoon who figured that he had a constitutional right to the road and he was going to kick some SUV ass.
Y’see Don, I grew up with this sort of shit eating morons. I have no respect for these shined up tards cause I got to know them all up close and personal. I was there for every job they screwed up, whether it was digging a ditch or building a house, I listened to them make speeches and rant and complain, and do the stupidest goddammed things at every turn and drag it all down for everyone.
The fact that Randy Weaver got screwed over by the evil gubmint didn’t mean he didn’t have a big heavy hand in his own screw job. And the fact that the system works and it corrected itself to recognize and compensate him for injustice don’t mean that the man was worth a cup of warm spit.
And Don… I’ve seen from personal experience that trailer trash don’t got the sense to get out of the rain.
April 7th, 2009 at 8:24 pm
“[T]he Republican Party is the party of people who are considered, by themselves and by others, as normal Americans — Northern white Protestants in the 19th century, married white Christians more recently”
Barone probably hasn’t forgotten, but other commentators seem to have forgotten – the identity of the “normal” Americans has constantly shifted and been the core of political battle since, well, forever. The Republican party tried to stay Northern White Protestants for roughly thirty years (1932-1965) – which meant that the Democrats could collect the votes of the Catholic Whites in overwhelming fashion. Which meant that the Democrats controlled the cores of power (the industrialized urban centers at the heart of then economy) and Republicans didn’t. It was merely that, demographically, there were a lot of Catholic whites living in urban centers as compared with the numbers of Protestants.
Nixon’s brilliant and successful play to bring all white Christians together was invented precisely to outflank that core of Democratic power (McCarthy, of course, prefigured Nixon in this, as McCarthy prefigured Nixon in so much else). If you examine the Right’s iconography during that critical period (1965-1990 or so), the archetypal “normal” American was often portrayed as a Catholic houseowner in the suburbs (a demographic that either simply didn’t exist in substantial numbers in 1932 and / or would have been anathema to Republican iconography in 1932).
April 7th, 2009 at 8:34 pm
With all due respect, Ethan, I’ll happily sign up for a parking spot in crazy town.
But my underlying point remains: The mentality of the irredemptist South and West, based on equal portions of self pity and grandiose mythology is not to be respected. Not least of all because it refuses to respect any other identity or value as American. But also because, it has repeatedly proven itself to be utterly bankrupt and worthless. For too long, such puerile ideas have polluted the national dialogue, and I discern no benefit whatsoever.
The truth of the matter is that America is the coasts and chicago/great lakes. This is the part of the country that is actually productive, that produces wealth, advances science, the contributes culture.
The American west is a thinly populated backwater, fattened on its own frontier mythology, dependent for support and sustenance, unable to sustain itself on its own resources, a series of pretend communities doing little more than taking up space.
The American south is a toxic society which has never forgiven the rest of the country for dragging it out of race based feudalism. It’s great cultural contributions are a handful of decent writers – Faulkner, Williams, etc., and lynching.
The extremist edges of these failed and failing societies are not to be regarded as anything more significant than random flecks of foam on the muzzle of a vicious but decrepit dog.
April 7th, 2009 at 8:55 pm
I think you’re forgetting that “the American South” is more than just its conservative white members. The American South also gave the nation basic legal racial equality, and jazz, and its food — that is, if you also count black Southerners too.
Although, yeah, a lot of the South fits that description. Just, not all of it.
April 7th, 2009 at 9:06 pm
Skeptic: So apparently being paranoid, or stubborn, or unwise, is now a capital crime? Weaver was entrapped on a bullshit gun charge because he wouldn’t agree to be an informant. Then he and his family were shot at while they posed no threat to anyone. You don’t like Weaver or his kind, fine, I get it; but your commitment to defending what is frankly murder reveals you as a very sick person.
By the way, your view that the FBI was in the right flies in the face of a report issued by, guess who, the Department of Justice. From Wikipedia:
And here’s how justice was dealt to the reprehensible Randy Weaver and the cops who bravely gave him (well, his innocent family) what was coming to him:
So yeah, I guess no one got the memo about Weaver deserving it. How weird, since obviously your account of events is reliable and sane.
April 7th, 2009 at 9:13 pm
Oh man, I missed this in Skeptic’s comment:
the system works and it corrected itself to recognize and compensate him for injustice…
That’s right: if your innocent family members get gunned down by your own government, we promise you big cash prizes! Use the money to buy your wife and kid back to life, or just outfit your surviving family members in style! America: the country that works®!
April 7th, 2009 at 9:22 pm
Well, the major problem this nation is facing is not tyrannical Rule by the Many — it is corrupt Rule by the Few.
And I agree with Howard Dean that we need all the help we can get from all 50 states –including the boys in the pickup trucks with the Confederate Flags –if we are to overthrow the current regime. Not racists or the Klan, mind you. But those who are reasonably loyal to this country and its people– which is not the same as being loyal to Washington DC.
Because the way our elites conduct class warfare is divide and conquer. And they’ve figured out that the votes of trailer trash are just as good as the votes of urban metromales.
It also disturbs me that not only is Obama paying off the gambling debts of the Rich for no good reason, he is also not taking issue with many of Cheney’s abuses. Certainly not investigating them, not establishing checks and balances, and not undoing them.
First they came for the Islamofascists. And I did nothing –for I was not an Islamofascist.
Then they came for the redneck trailer trash. And I did nothing –for I was not redneck trailer trash.
Then they came for me.
April 7th, 2009 at 9:22 pm
I was glad Bush won in `04 and I am glad now. It was necessary. The country needed eight full years to understand who these people really are and to wake the fuck up.
There are no excuses now. If the sane and rational segment of country can’t defeat, and dare I say, utterly destroy, the nutbags that seek to reprise the antebellum South we deserve to go down in flames.
April 7th, 2009 at 9:31 pm
Re Tomemos at 72:
I don’t totally blame the FBI HRT Team — fear and stress affects judgment.
The people I think should have had their nuts cut off were the FBI Managers back in Washington who wrote the unconstitutional and murderous Rules of Engagement.
I am also kinda bothered by the deceitful stories put out at that time to con the public. FBI and Marshall excesses were justified by claiming Randy Weaver was some kind of super Rambo gliding like a ghost through the primeval forest.
But that is bullshit. My understanding is that Weaver never served in Vietnam or in combat of any kind. He was kept in a training job at Fort Bragg –which is why he got out after his 3 year hitch. The government managers must have known that from his file — yet they conned us.
April 7th, 2009 at 9:38 pm
Re Max424 at 75: “If the sane and rational segment of country can’t defeat, and dare I say, utterly destroy, the nutbags that seek to reprise the antebellum South we deserve to go down in flames.”
————-
I agree. Except that I think you will find those plantation owners in the upper tiers of Bank of America, Citigroup and Wall Street as well as in the Deep South. In the guys who fund the DSCC as much as those who write the big checks to the RNC.
One of the smartest things Jesse Jackson ever said was when he looked at a crowd of white Appalachian trailer trash in the 1980s and told them he should get their vote. Because in the eyes of the elites, the rest of us are all niggers. Regardless of what color our skin is.
April 7th, 2009 at 9:43 pm
The most important element of the ongoing militia effort is that it is across the whole of the nation and very well organized. The present effort is focusing in the developement of deep logistical supply and support to include manufacturing at the local level. In phase one the shifting of existing stocks and inventories of arms and ammunition from the warehouses to the general populations hands has taken place.(reference Militia-Killing the “Borg” myth with numbers on youtube)which is a short info piece on low end numbers of arms and ammunition purchased.The numbers are actually much higher. Phase two is an overlapping process of expanding reloading capabilities to reuse existing inventories and phase three is now dealing with component production across the whole of the country. Skilled
Militia growth has continued to include the NBF War college and the CMM Engineer Group Facilities. A free standing american mfg base is the key to independence and overall victory. Socialists believe that the people are the property of the state. The question of who owns my time is the key to understanding the parasitic nature of all socialist agendas.
labor assets provide the cutting edge needed to complete the processes. Signal communications have been and are constantly being upgraded. The HAM radio nets are doing a great job of providing expanded strategic links and they in turn are helping to expand the local grid free and independent of rest of the system. This includes our new solutions to the internet question and its being shut down. The idea is to be an inovator, not just a user.
All of the factions of the Osamabamadingdong and the chipmunks crew or the Neocon Bushites are one and the same.The same old bag of stale potato chips and they didn’t even use a different wrapper. The many scolars in the partiot effort have worked in the courts, the GUBERMINT and the (LOL) two party system and know all too well what is really going on. The problem is we are now down to only two options with regard to what is going on. They are either very stupid or very criminal for all of the parties involved knew what was going on and have tried to cover it up and claim that this “emergency” just poped out of no where. Either way the basic question is “why is anyone following them at all?” The problem is that everyone knows that the globalist parasite CFR is both of the above and CFR members in our system intentionally created the failure. It is not by acident but intent. For this reason we must now be prepared to protect ourselves from the slavers that think our time is their time. The militia is the sword and shield of our liberty. Not a mercenary parasite working for the Globalist agenda. Ne Copula Nobiscum! Mark Gregory,, Koernke
GDW!
April 7th, 2009 at 9:45 pm
Don, that’s a good point; it’s not just a few bad apples.
Here’s another way of thinking about it. Randy Weaver did something unwise. But all of us do unwise things and they are rarely fatal. Sometimes they are, when they’re intrinsically dangerous—if I drive drunk, I don’t get to complain about the consequences. But sometimes someone does something basically harmless, if unwise, and the power structure fucks them up for it. In a case like that, it makes no sense to say that the victim “brought it on themselves”—even if it’s true that their actions precipitated the fatal response, the reason the consequences were so disproportionate has nothing to do with what they did and everything to do with who they were and who they pissed off.
Rodney King shouldn’t have fled from the cops, Emmett Till shouldn’t have (allegedly) hit on a married woman. That doesn’t mean that they were the “authors of their own goddamned fortune.” They were beaten and (in Till’s case) killed because of who they were and because they transgressed against the power structure, just as Weaver was. I don’t see how there can be any possible defense of that.
April 7th, 2009 at 10:03 pm
Yeah, actually, they were. Rodney King had a right not to be beaten by the cops. And Randy Weaver had a right not to be piled on.
But here’s the thing: You walk into the woods, you turn around a corner and there’s a grizzly bear. Now, operating by your principle, you can just walk up to that grizzly inform him of your constitutional rights and innate superiority, and proceed to provoke and escalate a confrontation. Let me know how that works out for you.
Truth of the matter about cops is that on the whole, they’re not smart, they’re usually not well trained, they’re often incompetent, sometimes corrupt, they are authoritarian personalities, usually inflicted with groupthink and herd behavior and they’re inclined to meet any resistance with escalation… cause at the end of the day, they got lots more guns.
You want to get into an armed standoff with the cops? Fine with me. But I figure it won’t turn out any different than screwing with the grizzly.
You want to fight the cops, you see to your safety, you pick your ground, and you protect your own. Randy Weaver ultimately chose to fight it out in Court, after he screwed it up. He won in Court. He could have won in Court all along. But that wasn’t good enough for him. He had to fight the grizzly on the grizzly’s own terms. Idiot.
Yes, the situation was out of control. The cops were out of control. The justice system was screwing up. But this was stuff Weaver believed all along. He knew it was a grizzly. He just didn’t think that the rules applied to him. He had some idea that the grizzly wouldn’t act like a grizzly, or he had some kind of super-anti-grizzly repellent.
More the fool him.
Like I said, I’ve been in situations where cops were putting guns in my face. I won in the end. And nobody got killed.
April 7th, 2009 at 10:07 pm
Yes, Tomemos, drive drunk and get into an accident, what do you have to complain about? Exercise bad judgement with paramilitaries, what do you have to complain about?
Oh, and Don, nice of you to give a pass to all the lunatic screw ups in the field. Sure, they were handling the situation and making the decisions and putting out the bullshit. But somehow, it was the guys far away who were to blame. Riiiiiiiiigggghht.
April 7th, 2009 at 10:20 pm
The strawman scam is one of the many examples of the socialist slaver process used to finance the destruction of liberty in the ongoing war against the Constitution, Bill of rights and the Declaration of Independence. Although this indentured servitude mechanism has been in place in other countries for many years it was not implimented here until the attack by FDR on the people(for the bankers/socialists) in 1933. The american people were monitized through a declaration of war against them based upon the original “Trading with the enemy act” of 1918. The German gov and the austrioHungarian emp were scrtched out and “we the people” of the united states(note lower case) were written in. From that point forward all births were listed as mfg certificates and monitized by the secretary of the Treasury through the IMF and other institutions. All other instruments generated by the Corporation of the United States with the same corporate names were also monitized. A simple example of the structure of the corporation is to go to United States Code (USC) and look at the FOUR(4) branches of government listed there.(hmmm,everyone is told that there are three)The Sub-corporations are ATF DEA FBI IRS etc… and are not registered in these united states. The strawman is manipulated through these outside corps as yet other banking instruments. All of these instruments are worth millions to tens of millions of fictional dollars each. They are traded by all nations and all of the banking and bussiness system. Example is that I have tracked these bonds and recovered them from Merle-Lynch, Chase, Rothchild Bank and many many other sites. We have also recovered them from Holland, England, and every other nation on the planet. They are traded and sold by all. These are slaver bonds based upon fictional numbers and administrative debt that the people whose names they are attached to have no working knowledge of. That is a fraud on a massive scale. But then again look at the insane debt numbers now being printed in the public papers and with the many institutions. These numbers cross by intent. At a given point the globalist mask will come off and the true nature of such a fraud willl be obvious. The colateral will be foreclosed upon and declared property. each of you reading this have the same latches upon your name in the corporate sense. A fiction that will be used to close the debt and indenture the nation. The lattest wiork army crap pushed by the socialists and Osamabamadingdong and the chipmunks is based on the idea that our time is the states time.(SLAVERY) The 8th plank of the Communist(Soviet Socialist) manifesto is what is being implimented. It is the slavers creed. such chains are something the power freaks have wanted for a long time. We will put it down for the slaver action that it is.
Mark Gregory,, Koernke GDW!
April 7th, 2009 at 10:34 pm
Great, more nitwits who think anyone wants to hear their idiot ravings about socialism coming to get ‘em from every corner and from under their bed and from behind that tree in the dark corner of the yard not well lit by the floodlights.
April 7th, 2009 at 10:40 pm
But, just in case, you militia nitwits keep it up, because I can’t wait to see your asses thoroughly whooped. America’s tired of your shit.
You all strutted around like you were hot stuff in the anti-Clintonoid 1990s, raving about Hillary and the black helicopters and the Russia-UN invasion and colloidal silver and the ZOG, and then you all put your bullshit, fake ‘anti- government’ tail between your legs all nice & tight while you prayed for Daddy Bush and Unka Cheney to save your idiot, scared asses from the evil brown Mooozlims about to touch you in your special places. But, though I may be wrong, I think you idiot loudmouths are about to get a lesson taught to you. Keep it up.
April 7th, 2009 at 10:45 pm
When you make Sailer feel welcome, eventually all of his shithead friends show up, and they’re not as subtle in expressing their beliefs.
April 7th, 2009 at 10:48 pm
Sigh
1) I give up. It is one thing to make a reasoned defense of the Second Amendment. Harvard Professor Lawrence Tribe does that.
2) But it is something else to try to excuse the fevered hallucinations of out and out loons. And Mark Gregory; Koernke
is a loon. Commitable.
I’ll bet he’ll have his own TV show in the near future –right before Glenn Beck’s. To given Glenn Beck that “voice of reason” glow.
3) Although there is something hilarious about Matthew attracting a tsunami of spam from this guy by criticizing him. Somewhere out there Marty Peretz is wetting his pants laughing.
April 7th, 2009 at 11:16 pm
Have you ever sat down and interviewed any of the Survivors of the Attack by the Gubermint on the Branch Dividians? Have you ever sat down and talked to, face to face, Randy Weaver? Niether are some notation in a politically correct college text made to fit the needs of a specific politically motivated agenda but are very real people.Very accessable people. I have sat down for hours and talked to the survivors of both of those actions AND to the many Police Officers, Sheriffs Deputies and others who witnessed the abuses in both actions. The Attack on the Weavers took place under the Bush Regime while the Attack on Waco was planned under the Bushite Regime and carried out by the Clintonistas.
In the attack on the Weavers Marshal Degan was shoot from behind by one or more of his own people at close range. This came out in the trial and was openly available to the comntroled press which made no effort to report it while the trial was going on or after the Weavers were awarded compensation. Nylon webgear prints much in the same way that metal does when a bullet passes through it. The feds tried to poke rods through the gear to alter the evidence and the tampering was confirmed during the trial. Note: the controled press were some of the only people allowed in the court room so they had first hand knowledge of the information but “forgot” how to put it in the Time and Newsweek articles,HMMMMMM. All of the action with the Weaver siege was the first large scale test of FEMA deployment in a regional setting. This is documented elsewhere. All of the field reports on the subject were accessed through court action in the 90’s. I was part of those actions as they developed. The data base is vast. The attack at Waco was the next step in escalating military action against the american people. It was planned to compensate for the negative feedback generated by the many ATF and FBI abuses going on during the Bushite Regime actions that started in 1988. Under Bush one tghe ATF had been given marching orders to attack firearms owners on a massive scale. These actions took place all through the 1988 to 1992. The Weaver Siege was just the action given the most notable press though the other actions numbered in the thousands. Waco was a staged action with full MJTF and JTF cooperation along with DOD deployment on a large scale. A simulation of the Davidian church and home was constructed at Ft. Hood under Bush and even though there was a claim that there was a regime change (LOL) the action was not only continued but stepped up and given additional assets. The attack was designed to create confrontation against a target that it was felt would be a push over and yet could be pumped up to serve to increase police state assets once completed. A good foundation for understanding the action is to watch the video “Waco Rules of Engagement” by McNulty. This video was financed by Robert Redford for use at the Sundance Film Festival. It was financed as a hit piece to do damage control for the regime. The facts showed a very different image of what the controled press and the regime wanted. It should be remembered that the majority of the video footage was captured by the patriot movement before it could be destroyed to include many videos taken by the BATF as home movies while on site. The only “surviving” footage of the first days attack was from a private news crew. ALL of the “Official” videos disappeared with the exception of a few of the pre attack preparation tapes. FOUR(4) seperate ATF cameras were running during the attack and ran nonstop changing video tape many times. ALL of the tapes were made to disappear.the private news crew taped all of the four cameramen/women operating their cameras during the first day attack. All of the tapes from all of the ATF cameras was made to disappear to include the 2 tapes from the two
cameras that recorded the feds firing first. The survivors all help to get a much better picture of the events as they transpired inside. Anyway, the front doors were steel and showed the obvious effect of incoming fire but no outgoing fire. They were video taped by the lawyers that were sent in during the siege. The doors were grabbed and carried away by the feds even while the ashes were still smoldering on the last day. Local police and Public Safety officers from texas photogrphed and video taped that action. We have the pictures of the cube van that carried the doors away along with certain bodies. The witnesses have all come forward with the evidence. The work continues and there is so much more to pass on. Mark Gregory,, Koernnke GDW!
April 7th, 2009 at 11:40 pm
Why don’t racists understand things like paragraph breaks or putting spaces between words? Why can’t white militia paranoids learn to speak English?
April 8th, 2009 at 12:20 am
tomemos, I would have a lot more sympathy for the Randy Weavers of the world if they felt any solidarity with the poor urban blacks who are killed by the dozens every year by unjustifiable police violence.
Instead, they generally view those unfortunate people as subhuman and deserving of their deaths.
Fuck the Randy Weavers of the world.
Or, what Skeptic said.
April 8th, 2009 at 12:35 am
In relation to that, I recall MOVE and the ‘Africa’ commune in Philadelphia. Ran afoul of the law. Armed standoff. Cops dropped an incendiary device on the house, fried everyone, and torched an entire city block. But for some reason, they’re not martyrs to the trailer trash cause.
April 8th, 2009 at 12:50 am
George Carlin summed up the militia movement perfectly when he said the following:
“Attention, all camouflaged males: In the American Revolution, the militias broke and ran from battle. They ran home. Only the regular army stood fast.”
Wouldn’t you know, that’s exactly what happened in modern times as well. When a genuine threat to civil liberties assumed the presidency, the militia types either shrugged their shoulders or actively cheered him on. It’s pretty clear that the Mark Gregory,, Koernnkes of the world don’t give a damn about freedom or the Constitution. They’re tribalist thugs who adopt whatever position ensures rural white Christian supremacy at any given time. When Bush is running roughshod over the Bill of Rights, they’re as authoritarian as anyone. But when a Democrat is in the White House, it’s Tea Party time.
April 8th, 2009 at 2:33 am
Re: Mark Gregory,, Koernke:
If you want to know why he has commas after his middle name, it probably has something to do with some of the stranger conspiracy/legal theories believed by the militia and tax-resistor crowd. Behold:
http://evans-legal.com/dan/tpfaq.html#punctuation
Evans has catalogued just about every strange thing these guys believe…
April 8th, 2009 at 4:53 am
Skeptic: You actually don’t have a constitutional right not to be attacked by a grizzly bear, which neither represents the power of the state nor has self-control. You do have a constitutional right not to be gunned down by the state for no good reason. Comparing a conflict with the state with a conflict with a grizzly bear is saying that the state can be expected to kill any of us (or at least those of us which it has decided it doesn’t care for) for no good reason. In which case Randy Weaver did a good thing bringing that fact to light, even though he paid a terrible price for it.
Your position would lead you to say that Rodney King got what was coming to him. In fact, it sounds to me that that’s what you are saying, directly, in comment #80; to which I say: try that out in a few more message boards and see what kind of response you get.
Civil rights progressed because of the violence inflicted on Emmett Till and Rodney King, just as gay rights progressed because of the violence inflicted on Matthew Shepard, another uppity individual who did something inadvisable. I commend you for not getting your ass shot, but to say that everyone’s prerogative should be to do whatever they can, degrade themselves however they need to, in order to avoid unjustified violence strikes me as a craven position.
****
And then brewmn and Skeptic say that, because many militia members/survivalists are racists, they have no human rights and deserve to be gunned down like dogs. I think that’s what you’re saying, right? I can’t find another gloss on it. A comparable position would be that, since MLK’s church or the SCLC would necessarily be anti-gay rights in the 50’s and 60’s, their cause is despicable and the violence inflicted on them is justified. Understand that I don’t think that militia members and survivalists are necessarily doing anything valuable—I just don’t think that their lives are forfeit just because they like Ron Paul more than Barack Obama.
April 8th, 2009 at 8:20 am
Anthony: That is a precious, precious resource, which I’ll print and read when I can afford printer ink again.
Someone show this to the Mark,,,,;;;;gREgory,,,,, !~`::”, Kerning Master.
April 8th, 2009 at 9:05 am
Anthony, great link.
April 8th, 2009 at 9:09 am
Tomemos, you are almost there. In fact, we do have a constitutional right not to be attacked by Grizzly Bears. “Life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.” All of which are heavily impacted by angry grizzlys. Also a Grizzly seriously impacts Amendments one through ten.
You still have this infantile view that when confronted with a state misuse of force, you and Randy Weaver have the constitutional right to go ‘la la la la.’ All I’m asking is: How did that work out for you?
The actual advances in civil rights have come, not in the form of childish and futile acts of defiance and escalation, but rather through planned acts of civil disobedience, court and legislative action. ie – through choosing wisely the ground on which to battle.
Weaver believed and was always prepared to argue that the state was corrupt, irrational, inclined to escalation of force. Believing this, he chose to engage in a course of behaviour calculated to provoke and escalate. What did he think he was going to do? Win a firefight with 200 police and paramilitary? Make a break, fight his way out, and flee to Wyoming? It’s unfortunate for Weaver, but the truth is that to the extent that he had any control over his situation, he consistently made it worse and contributed to the escalation. He had a responsibility to look after his family, and two of them were killed because he couldn’t be bothered.
It Martin Luther King had followed Weaver’s model, he’d be lying in the ditch forgotten.
April 8th, 2009 at 9:13 am
I didn’t say militia members deserved to be gunned down like dogs.
What I said was that they were irrelevant, child molesting, wife beating, toothless, cowardly, overweight, asstards who should be ignored and dismissed from public discourse given that they have nothing to contribute but their own masturbatory malice.
If they commit a crime, then they should face the full sanction of the law.
And seriously, you aren’t equating Randy Weaver with Matthew Shephard?
April 8th, 2009 at 9:35 am
Tomemos, you are almost there. In fact, we do have a constitutional right not to be attacked by Grizzly Bears. “Life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.” All of which are heavily impacted by angry grizzlys. Also a Grizzly seriously impacts Amendments one through ten.
“Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness” aren’t in the Constitution, nor are they constitutional rights.
April 8th, 2009 at 9:36 am
Re Skeptic at 96: “Weaver believed and was always prepared to argue that the state was corrupt, irrational, inclined to escalation of force. Believing this, he chose to engage in a course of behaviour calculated to provoke and escalate.”
—————–
Bullshit. Weaver was the victim of coercive entrapment because the government wanted some spies in the militia groups in Idaho and decided to get heavyhanded with the recruitment. He didn’t confront — he retreated to his house in the wilds in the hope they would go away. The gunfight was provoked when government marshalls infiltrated his property and shot his son and dog.
Skeptic is naive –he should talk to some activists who have been involved in protest activities. The FIRST thing government agents do is play head games to mislead, intimidate, provoke and coerce. To stage “accidents” — like the wrong date being placed on the summons to the court hearing. To instill a psychological feeling of helplessness and control in the mind of the victim.
Unless you have been on the receiving end of that treatment , you are not entitled to judge Randy Weaver, my little Eichmann.
April 8th, 2009 at 9:41 am
Re Anthony at 98: ““Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness” aren’t in the Constitution, nor are they constitutional rights.”
———–
They also left out the following:
“That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, –That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness.”
April 8th, 2009 at 9:49 am
Re Skeptic at 96: “The actual advances in civil rights have come, not in the form of childish and futile acts of defiance and escalation, but rather through planned acts of civil disobedience, court and legislative action. ie – through choosing wisely the ground on which to battle. ”
—————
So how is that working out?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:United_States_Income_Distribution_1967-2003.svg
April 8th, 2009 at 10:34 am
All I can say is that thr REICH Wing Republiscum channel is a hoot, to many de-facto leaders,the party of NO and not one of them has the balls to condemn those T shirts down in Red state socialist dumb @ss hillbilly heaven were selling.Once again America is the worlds laughing stock of humanity with these Reich wing American Taliban that hate this country.
April 8th, 2009 at 10:47 am
Michele Bachmann is a “totally mainstream figure”? Mainstream of right-wing nut cases?
April 8th, 2009 at 11:08 am
During the beginning of the Waco siege the very first propaganda that was put out by the controled press was the statement that “a confrontation with the white supremacists at the Branch Davidian Compound near Waco has just taken place”. This lie was repeated for 3 days and can be found in printed form in archieve format with many news papers. It was “quietly” dropped when the pictures and video tapes of the congregation were being used in limited form and it was realized that the lie wouldn’t fit. But it was never corrected(of course not). Take the time and search for the video made by the lawyers that went in to talk to the Davidians(its on youtube,my copy). The video speaks for itself and is a classic demonstration showing the way such lies and propaganda are used. The fed didn’t allow anyone to see the tapes out of fear that people would better understand what was really going on. When in a university or college enviroment the narrow and politically motivated agenda of the instructor must be parroted in order to receive the rating and “make the grade” in any given class. What is sad is that no real research is ever done as the only data base provided is that which is “allowed” by those who determine what political correctness is for that moment in that institution. This too will change with the wind and the need of the powers that be controling the schools eviroment. Nothing happens in the college enviroment that is not wanted by the system to serve a particular purpose/agenda of industry and government. Manipulative power lust being one of the most important elements of the formula. The full story of what did transpire at Waco did eventually come out during the SEVEN (7) damage control hearings done in the House and the Senate after the fact.(Seven because they kept getting caught in their lies and had to come back to try to do more damage control when caught) The destruction of evidence and the level of criminal action by the MJTF/JTF units was demonstrated time and again.
April 8th, 2009 at 11:33 am
Thanks Mark,, Gregory; Koernke::
April 8th, 2009 at 12:01 pm
Please Anthony, a little more respect, that is Mark,;)Gregory:( Koernke:: to you. He is a “freeman.”
April 8th, 2009 at 12:03 pm
Now lets look at the reference to “trailer trash” and other such comments. Having seen and experienced extensively the animal nature of living conditions in dorm rooms and off campus apartments it is VERY comical to see some of the references to other people who own their property as opposed to the “cliff apes” in dorm rooms who pride themselves on how much waste they can collect during the lattest binge in the dorm. The low level of control and resposibility on the part of such students is such that “prison grade” fixtures are now purchased and installed to maintain services and infrastructure.(Door hinges,handles,and armored safety glass) and this at a “supposed” institution of higher learning. Out of desperation to feel surperior to others (again while claiming to be for the working man/woman) the same said persons will ridicule those who are their equals in standing as citizens while doing NO research and parroting that which they “feel comfortable with”. There is NO difference between a person who owns a trailer(looked down upon by the politically correct) and those giving away their money to another person to stay in an apartment of lesser size and quality. However this does demonstrate the political conditioning of the socialist and its hatred of any property owner no matter the social standing. What is most fasinating is the use of this referencing in light the supposed “concern” for the average guy/working man/woman. It is hard to steal from armed people who will not surrender their time to the socialists and this more than anything else is what the real issue is. There were people from all walks of life at the Knob Creek MG Shoot. From doctors to tradesmen to engineers and more. Each had no problem talking,communicating and enjoying other peoples company no matter where they came from or who they were. Regular people and a pleasure to be around. The sad and bitter nature of what we see coming off of college campus today is not the exception but rather the norm. Hatefull, as socialists, of the very people they will steal lifes time from through taxes and fees if given the chance. A very strange parasite indeed.(but nothing that we have not seen over and over again.) Mark Gregory,, Koernke GDW!
April 8th, 2009 at 12:07 pm
“Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness” aren’t in the Constitution, nor are they constitutional rights.
True. That’s a common mistake made by people who don’t know what they’re talking about.
Skeptic also says that “a Grizzly seriously impacts Amendments one through ten.” Which would be true if a grizzly bear was an agent of the state, like the police are. The constitution governs the people’s rights in relation to the government; otherwise, if your wife forbade you from bringing a gun into the house, you could sue her for infringing on the Second Amendment. Finally, a grizzly bear is not a person, subject to civil and criminal penalties. I’m embarrassed for you that you’re trying this line of argument.
Aside from your ignorance regarding the Constitution—or even the most basic tenets of law—your argument goes out of its way to be unsympathetic, cruel, and hypocritical. You say that militia members should not have a part in the public discourse, and that they should be punished when they break the law. I agree with both statements, neither of which entails getting shot at and neither of which applies to Randy Weaver. The state went out of its way to punish him for hanging out with people they didn’t like and for not playing ball—perfectly legally—when they wanted him to. And you’re accusing him of escalation?
“And seriously, you aren’t equating Randy Weaver with Matthew Shephard?”
Hey, if you’re gay in Wyoming, shouldn’t you conceal that fact? Otherwise you’re just a raccoon attacking a grizzly or whatever. No, I don’t think they’re exactly comparable; there is a difference between entering into a standoff with armed agents and simply being openly gay. My point is that both of them acted incautiously with dangerous forces, but that it makes no moral or legal sense to say that they brought it on themselves, because the consequences they received were so disproportionate, and so dependent on who they were. In fact, though, you want people like Randy Weaver to be punished for who they are, so I can see how you might not see a problem there.
You didn’t seem to blink when I equated Weaver with Emmett Till and Rodney King. In fact, you seem to be retreating further into the position that, like Weaver, they brought their fates on themselves and we should not be sorry about what happened to them. The only difference between their situations and Weaver’s is that you don’t hate black people but you do hate rural white Americans, because they remind you too much of the people you grew up with. I’d say you should be talking about this with a psychiatrist, not strangers on the internet.
April 8th, 2009 at 12:56 pm
From Army Times at http://www.armytimes.com/news/2008/10/military_aclu_northcom_102108w/
————–
“ACLU questions homeland role of active unit
By William H. McMichael – Staff writer
Posted : Thursday Oct 23, 2008 7:14:31 EDT
The American Civil Liberties Union is questioning the use of an active Army brigade as an on-call federal response force within the U.S., arguing that the military is barred from any role in civilian law enforcement and that the force could be used to help the Pentagon conduct domestic surveillance.”
———-
heh heh
“Speak not to us of laws –we carry swords”
-Pompey the Great
April 8th, 2009 at 1:31 pm
If you want to know why he has commas after his middle name, it probably has something to do with some of the stranger conspiracy/legal theories believed by the militia and tax-resistor crowd.
Since Mark has two commas in his name, does that make him twice as free as other militiamen?
Outstanding link, BTW.
April 8th, 2009 at 2:14 pm
So you’re saying that fag beating, inbred, country boy, trailer trash retards in Wyoming are agents of the state in a way that a Grizzly Bear is not?
In a perfect world, is Matthew Shephard entitled to be gay in Wyoming. Of course. Is he entitled to walk into any homophobic shitkicker bar? Of course. If he, as a gay man, walks into a homophobic shitkicker bar, do you figure its going to turn out all nice and tidy?
I have a friend who is a black transvestite. She went travelling. Her family is from the South. But there’s lots of places in the South she just could not and would not go. That’s just a fact of life.
The American south was a violent and horrific place for blacks through much of Jim Crow. There is some history of blacks showing armed resistance, and being bloodily massacred. There is a lot of history of blacks escaping and leaving the south. There is history of a civil rights movement.
Emmet Till was killed by a violent and pathological society. Did he deserve to die. No. Was his killing in any way justified. No. Does Emmet Till or Matthew Shepherd have anything to do with confronting state sanctioned violence. No. But hey, you feel free to free associate your way through.
Randy Weaver believed that the state was volatile, irrational, violent and dangerous. He also believed that he had some sort of whiteboy entitlement that rendered him immune. Or he believed that he had magic powers. Or he believed that it was only negroes that had to worry. Or maybe he was just mean, ignorant and stupid. Take your pick.
He had limited options, he chose wrong. He chose to escalate the situation. He had some idea he was going to fight off 200 armed police officers? Or maybe that if he ignored them, they were going to go away? The idiot.
There’s a long history that shows how these things turn out. MOVE in Philadelphia? The last stand of the SLA? Various attacks on Black Panthers? The Police Riot at the Democratic Convention? Rodney King?
You have some foolish idea that a group of poorly trained, poorly educated, herd-thinking, authoritarians, who are occasionally corrupt, always internally loyal, paranoid and endlessly willing to escalate a violent situation will behave in ways consistent with your naive view of the world.
I believe that they will act in ways consistent with the profile of such persons and groups in the real world.
Randy Weaver chose to engage in a pointless armed standoff that got members of his family killed. He had other options open to him – but hopped up on Quake, Shwarzenegger movies, the Turner Diaries or simple bad judgement, he chose this. He had a responsibility to his family to handle his situation effectively. But he was a natural born screw up and they died for it. End of story.
There’s better people who got treated worse, but nobody cares cause their skin is the wrong colour.
As for Waco, the minute they shot and killed police officers, it was all over. The tribe closed ranks and they didn’t stop till they got their blood. How was this a surprise. Kill a cop under any circumstance, and they all go after you.
David Koresh had a two choices: 1) He could have played it smart, not gone for a military confrontation, and wrapped ATF up in Court so long and so hard that they’d have rectal bleeding for years… as a current band of polygamists are doing. 2) He could have opted for a paramilitary confrontation that got everyone killed.
I’m supposed to respect Weaver or Koresh’s suicidal, homicidal stupidity. I think not.
The armchair lawyers are free to argue over fine points of law and ethics over the charred corpses. But I won’t shed a tear for martyrs to the cause of idiocy.
Any time you deal with a police officer, you deal with a potentially homicidal capacity for violence. I don’t see how that’s too tough to figure out.
April 8th, 2009 at 2:32 pm
As for disenfranchising these trailer trash retards, certainly.
What, you think that arguments that maybe the holocaust really didn’t happen, that zionists occupy the government, black helicopters ferry UN troops, that income tax is unconstitutional, or that ‘mud people’ aren’t actually full citizens or worthwhile contributions to the public discourse.
Forget it. Sometimes you just have to call nonsense for what it is and throw it out. Not every raving lunatic has a constitutional right to his own hourly show on Fox news.
These losers want to dress up in army fatigues and go running around the poison ivy with their paintball guns, pining away for the day when they’ll be the heroic last stand against nicaraguan islamofascists communist hordes come to take their guns away and marry first cousins of their own genders? Fine with me. But let’s not pretend its anything better or finer than what it is: Sordid losers trapped in their own delusions.
If they break the law, too bad for them. And if they, after all their endless self congratulatory masturbation over armed insurrection against a lawful government, either deliberately takes up arms, or idiotically blunders into a situation of escalating armed conflict… well, that’s just evolution taking its own natural course.
April 8th, 2009 at 2:46 pm
I’m seriously wondering if it’s time for the left to start training organized units for a Right-Wing coup attempt. If the Revolution comes, I think most of the military will side with the right or stay neutral.
We are better than they are, but we need to remain alive to show it.
April 8th, 2009 at 3:02 pm
Mr. Yglesias
How such an eloquent writer gets so many fantastical comments to his essays is beyond me.
Anyone who thinks that they could overthrow the US government using the weapons available at the best gun shows or stores around needs to check how well that theory works for Al quaida or the Sunni’s of Iraq.
So please right wingers, take your best shot. General Glenn Beck stands ready to lead you. Get your revolution on.
The US armed forces will smite you without taking one hard breath.
April 8th, 2009 at 3:19 pm
Skeptic,
First, you don’t really need to list any more insults of the people you don’t like to convince me that you don’t like them. Only teenagers think that long strings of invective make them more convincing or impressive.
I didn’t say I was just talking about state power; I said I was talking about the dominant power structure—state or otherwise—coming down hard on people it despises when they commit minor offenses or infelicities. If we believe that he did what people say he did, Emmett Till is actually the perfect analogue to Weaver in this regard, since his alleged offense—hitting on a married woman—is always a bad idea. Anyone of any race would be advised not to do it, since it carries likely negative consequences, possibly including violence. But Till’s murder was so disproportionate that to say he was at all culpable in it would be absurd. Similarly, I agree with you that Randy Weaver was unwise, and wrong, to take the actions he took, but that doesn’t make him culpable in what happened since the government’s reaction was beyond the pale.
You deny that Matthew Shepard has anything to do with this, but then use him yourself as an example of someone who should have expected the treatment he got. “That’s just a fact of life,” right? Getting upset over his murder would just be naivete.
But okay, let’s stick with state excesses only. I appreciate you confirming that, in your view, MOVE and Rodney King acted in equivalent ways to Weaver, and therefore (I presume) that they too are “idiots,” “retards,” and that what happened to them was “[their] own goddamn fault.” I don’t think you’ll find many people who agree with your judgment, however. Here’s the difference between you and me: while we both agree that behaving in a way that is harmless but that the power structure disapproves of is likely to get you badly hurt or worse, I believe that this is a bad thing and I decry it when it happens, even when I don’t agree with the victims’ beliefs or actions. You, on the other hand, refuse to say that what happened, shouldn’t have happened. In fact, you revel in Weaver’s treatment, delightedly accuse him of getting his family killed, and say that his family’s death is “just evolution taking its own natural course.” I can only conclude that you believe that the way things are is the way things should be—in other words, that you approve of state violence against the despised powerless. What’s amazing is that you probably call yourself a liberal/progressive/what have you.
“There’s better people who got treated worse, but nobody cares cause their skin is the wrong colour.”
Absolutely. Meanwhile, you’ve acknowledged that Weaver was treated appallingly, but you make a point of not caring because of his background and his beliefs. Not even Steve Sailer makes his prejudice such a point of pride.
April 8th, 2009 at 3:47 pm
Skeptic, the only reason you didn’t get shot to death in the wrong address drug raid is because you were lucky. That’s it. Instead of realizing this, and being appropriately humble, you preen and congratulate yourself for your supposedly wise decision making. What an ass.
April 8th, 2009 at 4:09 pm
Let it be noted that driving on city streets at extremely high speeds poses great threat of physical harm to wholly innocent people. The people who beat on Rodney King were criminal thugs, but that doesn’t obviate the fact that Rodney King was a criminal thug.
Randy Weaver has a lot of undesirable qualities, but, no, living in the woods with your family, until armed government agemts show up and start shooting, is not equivalent to driving around residential LA neighborhoods at 100 miles per hour. Rodney King should have been arrested in a lawful manner and put in jail for about 10 years, out of respect to the peaceful citizens (many of them no doubt African Americans) that Rodney King chose to physically endanger.
April 8th, 2009 at 4:17 pm
Mr. Koernke was a janitor for the University of Michigan – a public university.
Yes, this ‘freeman’ earned his living from taxpayer dollars for a period of time.
Make of that information what you will.
April 8th, 2009 at 4:42 pm
Interesting comment about “life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness”. The Declaration of Independence is the foundational document set fourth by “we the people” of these united states (lower case intentional) establishing the perameters for the new government being fought for at that time. The Declaration is a living element in the established developement of both the Articles of Confederation and the Limited Constitutional Republic of these united states. The corporate raiders that in 1933 constructed the Corporation of the United States set as their first mission to destroy the heritage of these united states to consolidate power by the very forms warned about in the Federalist papers and the Anti-Federalist papers respectively. The Declaration listed the very specific grievances against the people by the British Crown Mile and set them as a standard by which to judge future attempts at tyranical action. Example:”He has erected a multitude of New Offices,and sent hither swarms of Officers to harass our people, and eat out their substance.”(sound familiar) Just one of many of the issues raised in the document that today is totally relevant. The Declaration is the basis for the more detailed management contracts that came about after it and was/is the litmus by which they should be used. Corporate court action through United States Code under Admiralty law is in direct conflict with the constitution of these united states. Admiralty Law is military tribunal law or the law of the sea for the use in dealing with commerce actions between nations not people.
Those who are ignorant of the use of privateering actions by the corporation are also ignorant of the contract law and the use of words and punctuation when dealing with contract.
All forms of government are based upon contract. Tradition and contract structure are critical to understanding the present application of law in any of the forms, proper or twisted. The use of the seperation of the the house name from the family name is part of history and tradition such as the use of my name as represented Mark Gregory,, Koernke. Ignorance on the part of some based upon assumption is sad but expected when dealing with those used to screeching rather than talking. The issue of maintaining ones liberty is a matter of constant vigilance and only through understanding can such vigilance be preserved. I maintain a personal library that is numbered in the tens of thousands of books, a few of which are over 250 years old and many that are more than 180 years or more age.
April 8th, 2009 at 5:03 pm
There are lots of left wingers – like me – whose folks fought at Valley Forge. To me it seems like the right is largely made up of immigrant types of dubious lineage.
April 8th, 2009 at 5:12 pm
In my room, I have a brass… waterbed.
April 8th, 2009 at 6:41 pm
I’d just like to thank Mark Gregory Fin-tin-lim-bim-lin-busstop-f’tang-f’tang Ole Biscuitbarrel Koernke for stopping by.
April 8th, 2009 at 7:04 pm
If you want to understand why Mark! Gregory;: keeps saying “united states (lower case intentional)”, see the section on the “belief in the magic power of words” in the FAQ by Evans that I posted above. (these guys also believe that using zip codes on mail is an acceptance of federal jurisdiction, so as long as you don’t use zip codes, you’re a “free citizen” or “sovereign” or “state citizen” or related nonsense.)
“All forms of government are based on contract.” No. But this is a huge part of these guys’ alternate history and civics. They construct htis huge tendentious conspiracy-laden narrative, and it all boils down to them not really having to pay taxes.
Look, anyone can put together a pamphlet and make all sorts of claims and answer any rebuttal with “well that’s just what *they* want you to think.” Those of us who know/study history, civics, and, yes, tax law, know that your version is a distortion; it’s not because we’ve been bamboozled by colleges or something. I’ve been down this road: the more we refute your claims and offer proof, the deeper you’ll assert the conspiracy goes, to the point where judges, lawmakers, everyone is constructing layer upon layer of lies to hide the “fact” that, say, the US tax code is not a law (rather than just pass the law, which they could do in 2 minutes if this were true).
It is really sad for a deluded, naive and credulous hanger-on to crazy theories that have been disproven and rejected at every legal challenge would accuse people who actually know history and the law of just believing what they’re told.
It is, though, pretty amazing to run into a real live specimen of the culty nuts described by Evans. I knew we were in for a good time as soon as I saw those commas in your name. (And no, that’s not rooted in tradition, it’s rooted in paranoia.)
April 8th, 2009 at 8:42 pm
If you’re wondering why Mark,,Gre!gory; brings up admiralty law, it has to do with this bit of nonsense that has been, of course, laughed out of court (when the court even wastes its time to engage it):
http://evans-legal.com/dan/tpfaq.html#admiralty
April 8th, 2009 at 10:08 pm
Now we will demonstrate an example of contract and how it works with regard to the Constitution and the Bill of rights. And YES, words mean everything, PERIOD.
“Article two of the Bill of Rights”
(referred to as the 2nd ammendment)
One of the most common word games played by those trying to undermine ownership of arms in these united states will use the mantra that “people” in the body of the statement means “the state”. In doing so they will always isolate the action with no referal to the rest of the document to which the article is attached.
“A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free state, the right of the people to keep and bear arms, shall not be infringed.”
When generating any contract the vocabulary of the contract must be consistant. The definition of a word does not change from sentence to sentence or paragraph to paragraph. The meaning of the word must be consistantly used and is part of the binding element of the contract. However, lets see if we apply the argument to the “meaning” that has been miss applied intentionally for deception purposes. Example:
“The right of the state to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall be issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.”
As can be seen the word “state” was applied where the word “people” applies. The founders understood all too well the nature of the word twisters and new that the contract would be at risk in the future. Trying to alter the definitions is as old as any tyrant written into the history books. The point is that if the word state were meant to be applied in the 2nd ammendment it would have been used as it was/is in other elements of the CONTRACT. The best example of this is Article 10 which reads.
“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.”
Using the full body of the Bill of Rights forces full demonstration of the restriction of the contract language.
Let us not forget the Article 9 which reads.
“The enumeration in the Constitution, of certain rights, shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people” (should we replace people with state here too?)
One of the other ways that the word twisters will try to alter a set contract document is by using definitions out of context with the period of the inception of the contract. The word is then used as a pretext for overturning the spirit and meaning of the contract. Words mean EVERYTHING and every one of those supporting the word twisters knows it even as they denny it for the sake of public deception.
It should be noted that several attempts were made over the last decade to use the arguement that article 2 was in itself putting at risk our rights(remeber that?). this was and is in direct conflict with article 9 which was so conveniently being ignored. Is it not interesting that the founders who fought for the implimentation of the Bill of rights knew all too well the nature of the word twisters and so set to pen and paper articles 9 and 10 in preparation for what they knew would take place. The CONTRACT was written well. it was written by men who had just come out of a long and bloody fight. They had no intention of surrendering the birth right of the people now that the table was scraped clean. The contract still stands dispite the efforts of the word twisters to throw it down.
April 8th, 2009 at 10:19 pm
contracts: nope.
Bill of Rights doesn’t have “articles”. It’s not a “bill” per se. It’s the first 10 amendments to the Constitution. Seriously, I’ve done this with better militiamen than you, comma boy.
April 8th, 2009 at 11:01 pm
Mark–actually, you’re right, there is a good example of where comma placement was very deliberate and tells us a lot about original intent–as far as that goes. It is the second amendment. Try to figure out what those commas mean, what they qualify and the implications of that. Smarter legal minds than you have wrestled with it.
I shouldn’t be glib, though. In reality, this is sad. Mark, you’ve been lied to by people–word twisters, actually–who have concocted a fantasy world of subverted constitutions and birthrights and massive conspiracies. I understand that this is very alluring–it promises greater meaning, secret knowledge, that *they* don’t want you to know. It is the same logic that underlies 9/11 truthers’ claims and cults.
Here is your homework assignement. In the FAQ I linked to above, Evans refutes everything that you guys believe, all your legalistic shell games, false premises and lies. I’d like you to find just one of his arguments that you can refute, using, as he does, Supreme Court decisions, case law, statutes, constitutional arguments.
You can use any of your tens of thousands of books, including the 180-year-old ones, but not the 250-year-old volume.
April 8th, 2009 at 11:05 pm
Hmmm, with reagard to Admiralty Law. Lets have some fun. Way out west in the great state of Nevada the BLM was having some fun at the order of the Clintonistas(The Bushites began this program but the Clintonistas continued it)with land owners. Seems they were taking a rat, that had been declared endangered by another part of the soviet corp,and were dropping it on private land. They would then wait until the little furry critter was populating the area(up to this time never seen in any part of Nevada)and then they would do an inspection of the farmers property and look to see if they could find any “murdered” rats. Well, upon inspecting the tractor of the offending “targeted farm” they found a single rat carcass. The BLM and the eco-swat team came out in force with guns drawn and arrested the tractor and did much threatening of the farmer. The property was carried away and then the farmer waited. Like many in the patriot movement the farmer had been studying the miss application of Admiralty Law. The use of the law of the sea on land for the purpose of corporate privateering. Well, as expected a big packet of documents came from the fed telling him that the tractor had been arrested. He looked at the paperwork and then did nothing. He did not answer the paper work in any way. He did not get a word twister. He did not comment at all. A second set of papers showed up after a couple of weeks and again the farmer did nothing, repeating the process. After a couple of weeks another packet came but this one was addressed to the wife of the farmer and she did the same as her husband. In another two weeks they sent the same packet to the FATHER of the farmer and he followed his sons action, he did nothing. They sent a copy to the farmers underage daughter and she did nothing. Eventually a rep from the AG’s office called and asked “aren’t you going to lay claim to the tractor?” and the farmer said “No, what are you calling me for? You arrested the tractor.That has nothing to do with me.” To which the AG rep got very quiet. The next batch of papers went to the farmer that lived next to the first farmer and he did not respond. No one answered the papers laying claim to the pirated/privateered property that had been taken at gun point. A month latter the EVIL rat killing tractor was put on trial. There was no comment made by the tractor in its defense and it did not plead(as we know it couldn’t,LOL)so in silence it was found GUILTY, GUILTY, GUILTY!(I don’t know where the tractor jails are in the fed system but I’d like to see one) Well, the pirates are done with the trial and the guilty tractor is then put up for public auction by the GSA. The farmer bid $2,000.00 and bought his own tractor back. Even though it was now an admiralty court felon the tractor still seemed to do the same job it did before being arrested. The sentence didn’t have any effect on the tractor what so ever. The tractor and the whole court story was then put on display at every county fair in California and Nevada over the next year. It was displayed with a mobile chainlink fence around it to help simulate the tractor prison that it should have gone to.(it was sold back into servitude by the pirates, those buggers!) If the Farmer had answered the Admiralty Papers then he would have been latched to the claim of action as a cargo/property owner just as with a ship claim on the high seas and most people unwittingly would have done that. The cost in lawyers fees alone would have forced the owner to sell his property and lose his livelyhood. That was the intent of the action from the beginning. That is what had happened to many other farmers attacked by the BLM in the exact same way over the past couple of years before his tractor was pirated. The cost of buying back the guilty tractor was much better than letting the lawyers and the AG scam the land off from under the owner. Most important is to look at the fiction of trying an OBJECT. However it is the best example of the corruption of law in the most blatent form.
April 8th, 2009 at 11:11 pm
Mark–yarn spinning like that distracts from the time you need for your homework that I”ve assigned you. (The whole admiralty law thing: pure fantasy.)
The best part of the FAQ:
“In this FAQ, you will read many decisions of judges who refer to the views of tax protesters as “frivolous,” “ridiculous,” “absurd,” “preposterous,” or “gibberish.” If you don’t read a lot of judicial opinions, you may not understand the full weight of what it means when a judge calls an argument “frivolous” or “ridiculous.”
….
“So, when a judge calls an argument “ridiculous” or “frivolous,” it is absolutely the worst thing the judge could say. It means that the person arguing the case has absolutely no idea of what he is doing, and has completely wasted everyone’s time. It doesn’t mean that the case wasn’t well argued, or that judge simply decided for the other side, it means that there was no other side.. The argument was absolutely, positively, incompetent. The judge is not telling you that you that you were “wrong.” The judge is telling you that you are out of your mind.”
April 9th, 2009 at 12:37 am
What percent of the training time was devoted to individual marksmanship training in pre-revolutionary American militias?
I’ll wager that 18th century American militias did not spend much time training in marksmanship. They trained in close-order drill because individual marksmanship training was largely assumed.
I could be wrong, but is there data on the training schedules and itineraries of militias from revolutionary times?
April 9th, 2009 at 12:45 am
On second thought, since militias often operated as skirmishers, I shouldn’t say “close order drill”.
Still, it occurs to me that we can get some info on how much experience the founding fathers expected people to have with firearms outside the militia by looking at how much time militias tended to devote to marksmanship and individual drill with firearms compared to maneuvers.
April 9th, 2009 at 2:16 am
pseudonymous in nc, eat shit and die.
April 9th, 2009 at 11:02 am
Will Allen, luck had a lot to do with not being shot to death by incompetent police officers. But having acknowledged that, I was careful to manage what aspects of the situation were available to me. I avoided provocations, did nothing to threaten, and stood my ground carefully. I got out of the situation alive and then dealt with the matter where I had a chance of dealing.
April 11th, 2009 at 3:58 pm
Anthony, wrong. And the most common mistake made about the Bill of Rights. They are Articles. Bill of rights was passed seperately. Take the time to look at the TIME LINE for the contruction of the Republic.
The Tractor Case is one of tens of thousnds that we have one through Pro Se or Pro Per actions. The tractor case and ther misuse of admiralty law is just one of many examples. Three years after this action the site where the BLM was breeding the rats was identified and civil action was used to curtail further BLM action when they were caught and detained trying to seed another site iin Arizona in a series of attempted land grabs there.
What does BAR stand for in BAR Association? One of the most interesting Federal Corp court decisions not “unpublished” (done to keep people from seeing the actual case as its arguements are correct but BAD FOR BUSSINESS)stated that it is the job of the BAR members to decieve, lie or alter information to protect the BUSSINESS of the court. If all else fails the Judge will ignore any and all facts to protect the BUSSINESS as the possible “ruling” would be damaging in cost to the system.(sending inocent people to jail to protect the racket)What does BAR stand for? The verbage used has to do with ignoring the argument and the facts to protect those IN the racket. PERIOD. Corruption amongst a small click of royalists reoccupying these united states. BAR.
The militia of america was not organized in the same way as Regulars because of the nature of the fighting here in the wilderness. Look at some of the events tied into the vocabulary of the militia of the period and still in our vocabulary today. “Turkey Shoot”, events where all rifleman were invited to demonstrate their skill with the arms they owned. To motivate the competitors prizes were awarded. The militia rifleman was dealing with a very different type of war in North America(although there were many variations on this type of combaat on the globe at the time) The French/Indian War was fought with very different rules and outcome if you didn’t win. The F/I War was fought mostly by militia and the Regulars were a minority on the frontier. Consider that many also knew that they may have to fight alone. Accuracy was the only option. Your survival was the issue,PERIOD. Don’t forget that the entire martial system of the militia was a combination of arms at the personal level. The rifle owned was typically superior to the British regular counter part.(rifled arms were develope by PRIVATE gun mfg’s, not GUBERMINT)All mfg’ed items had greater value than people percieve today and the greatest concern was in getting the greatest value for the money(what little there was) The founders of the militia and the patriot movement were very well read and in fact typically beat the crowns agents to the docks when books were available as new shipments.(the crowns agents complained that the people were accessing the law books and that this must not happen)Text on the theory of warfare, iron mongery and every other subject were absorbed into the population. For this reason military science here in the colonies with the developement of the militia was a matter of test, experiment and application. Example: physical developement, a subject that was addressed for a number of reason to include age of volunteers etc… The “Turkey Trot”(not a dance,LOL) was developed to move the troops more efficiently while reducing fatigue to the individual in the formation. The Regulars fighting during April 19th 1775 noted that they witnessed many militia using a here to fore never seen “gait” that allowed the militia to move at a surprising and unexpected rate. The “Turkey Trot” was a developement from the F/I war that was adopted from observation and research of the Indian combatants. All militia units trained in a broad range of formations for traveling,contact,volume fire and skirmishing.
Ne Copula Nobiscum. Mark Gregory,, Koernke GDW!
It was purely a matter of the individual units choice of application determined by the elected offices and their NCO’s. About 90 percent of the militias (and regular forces) during the war were pricately organized and constituted the majority of the fighting elements available. The most common mistake made is to say “but we had the Continentals!” and to that the simple question is asked,”where did they come from?”. We didn’t grow Continental Regulars in a special tomato patch over in the next county.They all came from the ranks of the militia. More on that as we go.
April 16th, 2009 at 10:14 pm
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