Forward Observer: 2020 Is Going to Be Lit

In 2020 Is Going to Be Lit, the intelligence analysts at Forward Observer briefly touch on some possibilities for civil violence in 2020 in the USA.

To get a sense of where 2020 is headed, I’m going to let you know about five stories and trends I’ve seen in the past couple of weeks…

1. A Muslim Community Patrol and mosque in Brooklyn are trading threats with a chapter of the Bloods gang, after a community patrol member roughed up the son of the local gang leader for making “disrespectful” remarks to a Muslim woman. The Bloods designated the mosque and its members as “food” for the gang’s “dogs” to eat, a reference to violence.

2. Following this weekend’s machete attack at a Hanukah party, some Orthodox Jews are encouraging each other to join/revive the Jewish Defense League, a group known for planning and committing acts of terrorism against Muslims in the 1980s. The JDL was previously described by the FBI as a “Jewish extremist organization.”

3. We continue to follow numerous socialist and pro-gun Leftist groups who are purchasing firearms and combat gear. Many of these groups have regular training days at the range and are preparing for armed “self-defense.”

4. The Boogaloo, a reference to a second civil war, is still a popular topic among counter-culture conservatives and libertarians.

5. Second Amendment activists in Virginia are fomenting support for popular resistance to the state’s proposed gun laws.

These are just five situations that could lead to armed violence between competing factions in the United States. There are likely dozens more across the country.

Your New Year’s Resolutions should include identifying your own local fault lines…

Related:

Wilder Wealthy and Wise: The Biggest Story of 2019 – Society Unravelling

James Kunstler: Forecast 2020

In this somewhat lengthy article, author James Howard Kunstler makes some predictions for 2020 — political, economic and other. Kunstler’s main works have been on peak-oil and what that means to society and also urban and suburban development issues. It may or may not be of relevance, but Kunstler is a Democrat, though he has been described as “an angry, disaffected one.” That is mentioned here only because some read his acidic commentary on the impeachment charade and think that he is conservative, Republican, or pro-Trump — of which he is none.

…These diseases of mind and culture are synergized by an aroused political ethos that says the ends justify the means, so that bad faith and knowing dishonesty become the main tools of political endeavor. Hence, a venerable institution such as The New York Times can turn from its mission of strictly pursuing news and be enlisted as the public relations service for rogue government agencies seeking to overthrow a president under false pretenses. The overall effect is of a march into a new totalitarianism, garnished with epic mendacity and malevolence. Since when in the USA was it okay for political “radicals” to team up with government surveillance jocks to persecute their political enemies?

This naturally leads to the question: what drove the American thinking class insane? I maintain that it comes from the massive anxiety generated by the long emergency we’ve entered — the free-floating fear that we’ve run out the clock on our current way of life, that the systems we depend on for our high standard of living have entered the failure zone; specifically, the fears over our energy supply, dwindling natural resources, broken resource supply lines, runaway debt, population overshoot, the collapsing middle-class, the closing of horizons and prospects for young people, the stolen autonomy of people crushed by out-of-scale organizations (government, WalMart, ConAgra), the corrosion of relations between men and women (and of family life especially), the frequent mass murders in schools, churches, and public places, the destruction of ecosystems and species, the uncertainty about climate change, and the pervasive, entropic ugliness of the suburban human habitat that drives so much social dysfunction. You get it? There’s a lot to worry about, much of it quite existential. The more strenuously we fail to confront and engage with these problems, the crazier we get…

There’s an excellent chance that the Democratic Party will be in such disarray by summertime, that it may break apart into a radical-Wokester faction and a rump “moderate” faction. That would make the election somewhat like the 1860 contest on the eve of the first Civil War. The current crop of leading candidates — Biden, Sanders, Warren, Buttigieg — all look to me like horses that ain’t gonna finish. Michael Bloomberg could end up leader of the rump moderates, propelled by his inexhaustible bank account, but I doubt his appeal to the racial minorities and the new millennial voters Democrats depend on. I’m not sure he’s left with much else.

I’m convinced that Joe Biden is in still in the contest solely to avoid investigation. He’s already obviously not wholly sound of mind, and he’s not even in the White House yet…

the attempts at impeachment have a peevish Lilliputian flavor. Keeping it up —bringing a threatened second or third bill of impeachment with extra charges — will only reinforce Mr. Trump’s anti-fragility. Second to the economic issues is the question whether the firm of Barr & Durham will manage to pin some criminal responsibility on the people who undertook the RussiaGate coup against Mr. Trump — a ghastly mis-use of government power now celebrated by Democrats, who, you might recall, used to be against police states. A series of perp walks by the likes of Brennan, Comey, Clapper, and others could finally burst the bubble of credulity that the Mueller face-plant and the damning Horowitz report failed to achieve among the True Believers of Rachel Maddow…

Max Velocity: Virginia – Let’s Get Down to the Heart of the Issue

Max Velocity Tactical is located in Culpeper, VA. They sent out this missive a week ago, laying out the outreach they are doing in their area and the severity of the situation in Virginia and elsewhere.

As we sit here on Christmas Eve, we can reflect on the overwhelming groundswell response across Virginia, to the threats of tyranny from Richmond. The MSM is carefully not mentioning any of it. Yet the vast majority of counties and towns have declared themselves as either 2A Sanctuaries, or Constitutional Counties. This has resulted in more rhetoric from Richmond, including threats of violence against the citizens of Virginia.

None of this is complicated. You do not need to be an attorney to understand the Constitution. In regards to the 2A, it says right there:

“The right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed…..”

This is really a struggle about rights, although focused at this time on the Second Amendment. It is about the rights of the citizens in opposition to the increasing tyranny of the leftists. However, the mindset of those tyrants in Richmond is fascinating: They do not appear to see the predicament they have put themselves in. They are doubling down. You see, they believe their own propaganda. It is clear to any sensible citizen that they are preparing to enact a huge tyranny across Virginia. But the left does not see it that way; they twist the meaning of ‘Constitutional’ and believe that they can pass ‘laws’ that are in fact repugnant to the Constitution, and have them validated by black-robed leftists in a corrupt court system. There have already been statements that any law enforcement officer, not enforcing these proposed new laws, will be fired. Even threats of raising the National Guard for employment in violence against the Citizens of the State. I won’t bore with a full summary, most of you know what is going on.

However, the real reason I decided to sit down and write this article was something I am tracking in comments across the board. It is fear. What do I mean by that? Essentially, it is your normalcy bias not registering the seriousness of our situation. This forces you to act in what you see as a ‘rational’ way, but that in fact is an advantage to the leftists in Richmond.

You see, you are in fear of ‘the authorities.’ You are in fear of saying something that may get you in trouble. You don’t want to cause a fuss. You are a ‘law abiding citizen.’ The usual response to these sort of gun ‘laws’ coming down the pike, as seen in other States, is for people to scuttle and run, and look to ways they can ‘sort of’ get around the ‘laws.’ But God Bless Virginia! Things have gone differently here, and we have a chance. We have a chance to push back on this tyranny, and maybe even create a wave going back into other lost States where they may be able to stand and reclaim their Liberty. Because make no mistake, the leftists are playing for keeps, and if We (The People) lose this now, we will lose it forever, for our kids and grand kids, forever.

The whole Virginia thing has been great so far. However, it may seem to you to be a political / Facebook struggle right now. Making some noise to hope to avoid the promised plans from the Democrat majority in the 2020 session. Posting a meme is fairly low effort, low risk. But make no mistake, this is EXACTLY the kind of tyranny that the 2A is there to prevent. Do not sit in denial. Thus, it is possible that on July 1st 2020, you may become a felon, for standing by your natural and enumerated right to self-defense. It is your duty as a free citizen to NOT ALLOW THE 2A TO BE INFRINGED.

We mostly don’t want to think about it, but there may come a time, and it may be soon, where we face an armed struggle for our rights. If this happens, it will be absolutely because Richmond tried to enact tyranny and force it down our throats. Don’t be duped by the way they talk about ‘laws’ and having them obeyed. Any Virginia Citizen knows their Constitution, and knows what is right and what is wrong. Be absolutely clear in your mind that if this comes to violence, it will be the fault of Richmond. This is why I am writing this article – because I don’t think many of you are there yet. You need to get your mindset right. You need to have your kit packed and ready to go, in case Richmond sends armed men against us.

We are not here making threats. Chest beating is pointless. I’m not one for spurious rhetoric. We are standing by as free citizens, and you need to get your head in the game in terms of what it may mean depending on what comes down the pike from Richmond. To me, there is no course of action other than to ensure that YOUR RIGHTS are not infringed. As such, you will very likely need to be prepared to ACT in SELF-DEFENSE should Richmond send armed men against you. That this may happen is totally un-American, and seems almost impossible in our times of peace and prosperity. But it appears we are there, on the very cusp of that tyranny. If we do not stand, then we lose it for all that come after us. It is a civic duty as free American citizens.

Reminder: If a right is not defended, then it is not a right, and is lost.

Here in Culpeper, we are doing all that we can to avoid such a situation. Through the Culpeper County 2A movement (and Facebook page) we succeeded in having Culpeper voted as a Constitutional County by the Board of Supervisors. We are working on the Culpeper Town Council. We are working on campaigns and rallies, because becoming a Sanctuary is just the beginning.

I have created, as a subsection of Culpeper County 2A, a Facebook Group called Culpeper Volunteers. No, it isn’t a militia, but a pro-bono community outreach of Max Velocity Tactical, where will put on some free training. Nothing we are planning involves violence, or terrorism, or civil disorder of any kind: we simply want to lawfully improve the readiness of County residents to protect their family and community should the need arise. As part of this, I am creating specific threads on the MVT Forum, posted to the Culpeper Volunteers group, in order to address specific issues such as equipping the Patriot etc.

But despite all this, what happens if you, as a law abiding citizen, become a felon in 2020? Because it seems these leftists in Richmond are hell bent on passing these laws, they have the majority, and they think they are in the right. I would not even be surprised, if due to the possible attendance at Lobby Day on January 20th 2020, that something (false flag?) happens to create a situation. It may even go hot. What happens then? That does not give us the six months to campaign that we currently think we have. What if, at some point, a state of Insurrection is declared in Virginia?

It may even be that once the laws are enacted, nothing specifically happens. However, as I stated above, what you need to do is not scuttle and hide. You need to stand up as a responsible Citizen. What could this mean? Perhaps business as usual with going to the range, wherever that is, even in your backyard? Do not acknowledge that any ‘laws’ have even been enacted. Carry on as normal. Particularly if your County has already declared itself a Sanctuary. It may be the case that raids are conducted by armed men in the employ of the State in order to create an example – I would suggest the creation of mutual support groups in your area, in order to make that impossible.

I personally am sick and tired of the laws in this Country being corrupted in the name of tyranny, so we now have a situation where even writing what I have written today is something that will be avoided, for fear of consequences. I would like to see some Federal support for Virginia from the Trump Presidency, perhaps even stopping Governor Northam’s proposed raising of the National Guard to enforce his tyranny. But this is where we have the essential issue – we have a Deep State and elites who are forcing this upon us, and a corrupted government security apparatus. Anyone working for the sort of Agency that will read this, should have sworn an oath to the Constitution. To act against normal American citizens who are only standing for their Constitutional rights is criminal. This has got to stop. There are many things that standing up to this tyranny from Richmond may achieve – and throwing off the yoke of Tyranny is perhaps the most noble. This may be our one and only chance. Put the middle finger up to Richmond!

I advise you to work on your preparations. Physical fitness, equipment, and training. You have to understand that what is happening in Virginia is not the normal way of things. It has not gone this way in other States; normally, the tyranny is simply enacted. In Virginia, the people are reacting and saying NO. This is unique. However, in that unique way, it may lead to places not normally contemplated in our affluent and lazy society. When the Regulars marched to Lexington, they were faced by people who were certainly terrified of the consequences of defying the tyranny of the Crown. And recall, at that time they DID NOT EVEN HAVE the Constitution and the Bill of Rights to hang their hats on; simply an idea of Liberty that must be defended. Whoever fired that shot, it was certainly heard around the world. In our case, we must not fire any shots first, but we must be prepared to act in self-defense should the State act in tyranny and send armed men against us.

1859. Tick-Tock.

Backdoor Survival: Going Stealth When Using a Generator

Going Stealth When Using Generators: Lessons From Venezuela comes from Jose Martinez in an article at Backdoor Survival. Jose Martinez was able to flee Venezuela and make a life elsewhere, but shares what he learned in the chaos in various articles.

…This long introduction is only meant to open your eyes so you can understand the attitude and behavior of the people who very likely will be roaming in the streets after or while the collapse is occurring. There will be some pockets where the situation won’t be that bad, but won’t be too many, and perhaps far away from each other. More about that in the next articles.

Not all of your neighbors may be good.

Let´s go on topic now. I´m sure there is plenty of preppers around there with generators and a huge fuel tank. Many of us even with a propane system as a backup. Great. We all agree that, under some type of threat, and the power grid is shut down in our nearby area, we´ll turn on our generator, and start to count how many hours it´s on, and check the fuel level every few hours.

Hopefully, you´ll have a battery rack large enough to have some lights and heating on for a while, when the generator is off to save fuel. It should be possible to replenish the tank, after all. This will depend, of course, on every different situation. I know something for real: we can´t prep for everything.

But we can prepare for some general situations that are going to generate some type of scarcity. The difficult part here, and I speak from my own experience, is the calculation of how much time that contingency is going to last.

We were more or less prepared for civilian turmoil and general disorder that could make us bugging in. Time proved us wrong. Dangerously wrong. I´ve mentioned this in other articles, though. Let´s keep going with this…

It´s astonishing to learn how silence can rule over the land when there is no electricity. When we were still living in Venezuela, the worst of the blackouts (even for me, a lover of peace and quiet) was the silence. It was good for some purpose, though, because sometimes it would allow to detect early presence of undesirable or threatening individuals, like those running in small Chinese motorbikes all over the place, with two guys, the one in the backseat generally armed with a 9mm or a .38 revolver. Those would rob everyone within their reach.

Once a small engine motorcycle is detected, everyone looks for getting out the way in Venezuela. If your generator is too loud, you won´t hear inside your home what can be happening outside, and we can’t be monitoring our CCTV surveillance cameras (and if you don´t have them, get them. Now, when they´re on the cheap, and PLEASE conceal them. Don´t be a smart a$$ and leave them in the open as a “deterrent” to someone knocks them down with a silenced .22 and blind your eyes outside). If you are nearby the sound source it´s very likely you won´t be able to hear anything going on around. This is a very powerful reason to think carefully about where we put money in. There are quite expensive generators, liquid-cooled, where the coolant act as a soundproof layer, and with specially designed casings to quieten the sound. Of course, you can imagine how expensive these machines are. They worth it, though, for those who can´t or won´t bug out to a secluded location and prefer to stay put in their place. I can accept that…

OH8STN: Radio Preparedness vs Emergency Communications

This information comes from Radio Prepper by way of introduction from Julian – OH8STN.

Hello Operators.

Today I’m sharing another video from Gil F4WBY, the Radio Prepper. The topic is disaster Communications. More specifically preparedness communications vs traditional amateur radio emergency communications. Gil does a very good job of going over the mission differences between Communications for preparedness, versus emergency communications for disaster relief. This is something we’ve all talked about on the grid down Communications for preparedness series.

It’s important to remember it’s not a competition. There isn’t (or at least shouldn’t be), a one or the other mentality here. Radio operator should be quite Versed in the guerrilla nature of preparedness Communications, in addition to the more structured and traditional emergency communications, as laid out by organizations like ARES. It’s a good discussion and one I think all of us should be watching.

James Howard Kunstler: No Consequences for Crimes

James Howard Kunstler has written a good article about how the last twelve years of consequence-less national crimes and the failure of the federal government to prosecute them (or its complicity with the crimes) is eroding/has destroyed the people’s faith in institutions. This is an invitation to civil violence, he says. We can’t call ourselves a “government of laws, and not of men” when people of high enough stature are not subject to the law.

Evidence of Absence

What is most perilous for our country now, would be to journey through a second epic crisis of authority in recent times without anybody facing the consequences of crimes they might have committed. The result will be a people turned utterly cynical, with no faith in their institutions or the rule of law, and no way to imagine a restoration of their lost faith within the bounds of law. It will be a deadly divorce between truth and reality. It will be an invitation to civil violence, a broken social contract, and the end of the framework for American life that was set up in 1788.

The first crisis of the era was the Great Financial Crash of 2008 based on widespread malfeasance in the banking world, an unprecedented suspension of rules, norms, and laws. GFC poster-boy Angelo Mozilo, CEO and chairman of Countrywide Financial, a sub-prime mortgage racketeering outfit, sucked at least half a billion dollars out of his operation before it blew up, and finally was nicked for $67 million in fines by the SEC — partly paid by Countrywide’s indemnity insurer — with criminal charges of securities fraud eventually dropped in the janky “settlement.” In other words, the cost of doing business. Scores of other fraudsters and swindlers in that orgy of banking malfeasance were never marched into a courtroom, never had to answer for their depredations, and remained at their desks in the C-suites collecting extravagant bonuses. The problems they caused were papered over with trillions of dollars that all of us are still on-the-hook for. And, contrary to appearances, the banking system never actually recovered. It is permanently demoralized.

How it was that Barack Obama came on-duty in January of 2009 and got away with doing absolutely nothing about all that for eight years remains one of the abiding mysteries of life on earth. Perhaps getting the first black president into the White House was such an intoxicating triumph of righteousness that nothing else seemed to matter anymore. Perhaps Mr. Obama was just a cat’s paw for banksterdom. (Sure kinda seems like it, when your first two hires are Robert Rubin and Larry Summers.) The failure to assign penalties for massive bad behavior has set up the nation for another financial fiasco, surely of greater magnitude than the blow-up of 2008, considering the current debt landscape. Not a few astute observers say they feel the hot breath of that monster on the back of their necks lately, with all the strange action in the RePo market — $500 billion “liquidity” injections in six weeks.

But now we are a year into Attorney General Bill Barr coming on the scene  — the crime scene of RussiaGate and all its deceitful spin-offs. The Mueller investigation revealed itself as not just a thumping failure, but part of a broader exercise in bad faith and sedition to first prevent Mr. Trump from winning the 2016 election and then to harass, obstruct, disable, and eject him from office. And six months after Mr. Mueller’s face-plant, out comes the Horowitz Report tracing in spectacular detail further and deeper criminal irregularities in the US Justice agencies. What’s more, tremendous amounts of evidence for all this already sits on-the-record in public documents. The timelines are well understood.

And so, an anxious nausea creeps over the land that Mr. Barr and Mr. Durham are dawdling toward a goal of deflecting justice from the sick institutions behind the three-year coup — that our polity is so saturated in corruption nothing will be allowed to clean it up. Personally, I don’t subscribe to that hopelessness, and I will say why. But I must also say that if Barr & Durham fail to deliver a bale of indictments, they will be putting a bullet in the head of this republic. There will be no hope of restoring trust in the system and the hopelessness will inspire serious civil violence…

Click here to read the entire article at Kunstler.com

Fr. John Peck: Why Sexual Morality May be Far More Important than You Ever Thought

Why Sexual Morality May be Far More Important than You Ever Thought by Kirk Durston over at Fr. John Peck website is somewhat of a review or condensation/distillation of the book Sex and Culture. That book is a six hundred page summary of research by social anthropologist J.D. Unwin.

One winter afternoon I was relaxing with a half-dozen fellow graduate philosophy students discussing theories of law and punishment. About an hour into the discussion, it occurred to me that some moral laws are necessary because, although they might limit pleasure and enjoyment in the short term, they actually minimize suffering and maximize human fulfillment in the long term.

A few days ago I finished studying Sex and Culture for the second time. It is a remarkable book summarizing a lifetime of research by Oxford social anthropologist J.D. Unwin.[1] The 600+ page book is, in Unwin’s words, only a “summary” of his research—seven volumes would be required to lay it all out.[2] His writings suggest he was a rationalist, believing that science is our ultimate tool of inquiry (it appears he was not a religious man). As I went through what he found, I was repeatedly reminded of the thought I had as a philosophy student: some moral laws may be designed to minimize human suffering and maximize human flourishing long term.

Unwin examines the data from 86 societies and civilizations to see if there is a relationship between sexual freedom and the flourishing of cultures. What makes the book especially interesting is that we in the West underwent a sexual revolution in the late 1960’s, 70’s, and 80’s and are now in a position to test the conclusions he arrived at more than 40 years earlier…

I have prepared a 26-page collection of quotes from his book that summarize his findings; but even that would leave you with a significant under-appreciation of the rigour and fascinating details revealed in data from 86 cultures. Here are a few of his most significant findings:

  1. Effect of sexual constraints: Increased sexual constraints, either pre or post-nuptial, always led to increased flourishing of a culture. Conversely, increased sexual freedom always led to the collapse of a culture three generations later.
  2. Single most influential factor: Surprisingly, the data revealed that the single most important correlation with the flourishing of a culture was whether pre-nuptial chastity was required or not. It had a very significant effect either way…

Unwin found that when strict prenuptial chastity was abandoned, absolute monogamy, deism, and rational thinking disappeared within three generations of the change in sexual freedom…

For the first part of the 1900’s, mainstream Western culture was rationalist and experienced enormous technological advances — from horse-and-buggy to cars; from hot air balloons to supersonic flight and spacecraft landing people on the moon; from slide rules to computers. Unwin’s three main predictions — the abandonment of rationalism, deism, and absolute monogamy — are all well underway, which makes the ultimate prediction appear to be credible … the collapse of Western civilization in the third generation, somewhere in the last third of this century…

Click here to read the entire article at Fr. John Peck.

KrisAnne Hall: Virginia & The Battle for the Right of Self-Preservation

Constitutional attorney KrisAnne Hall in episode 1015 of her show discussed the recent anti-rights legislation in Virginia and resultant battle for the right of self-preservation.

Below is an audio-only link.

Charles Carroll Society: Rep. Matt Shea Did Nothing Wrong

This article was written by Idaho State Senate candidate Alex Barron over at the Charles Carroll Society – Matt Shea Did Nothing Wrong.

Alex Barron candidate Idaho State Senate D3

Washington State Representative and Army veteran Matt Shea is a Republican from the Spokane Valley (Eastern Washington) area. Matt Shea is not a racist. Matt Shea is not a terrorist. Representative Matt Shea is a liberty-leaning conservative Christian that actually believes in the Republican platform.  He is more conservative than many. He angers progressives in and out of the Republican Party because he takes a no-holds-bar approach to promoting a society based upon Christian moral norms and the Bill of Rights; thus, he has become popular in the “patriot” movement and the enemy of the far-left antifa.

The patriot movement, in general, are conservative Christians who lean libertarian.  We have a strong attachment to the Bill of Rights and especially the 2nd Amendment. We are often modern-day anti-federalist or extremely distrustful of the corrupt over-powerful federal government and unaccountable administrative Deep State.  Yet the same men would often fight tooth and nail for their local governor. The attitude of the Sage Brush rebellion is nothing new out here in the West.

Recently a Seattle-based retired FBI agent named Kathy Leodler, who founded a firm called The Rampart Group, delivered a “report” to the Washington State far-left Democrats. Yes, there are Democrats in Washington State that wear communist black shirt (antifa) political pins as they perform their official duties in the State capital. In this report, retired-FBI agent Kathy Leodler accused Representative Matt Shea of being a domestic terrorist. The story has been picked up by a lot of lying, liberal and legacy mainstream media.

There are similarities between what violent communist black shirts (antifa) is trying to do to Republican Washington State Representative Matt Shea and what the congressional Democrats and their far-left aligned groups and the lying, legacy, liberal mainstream media tried to do to Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh and President Donald Trump. In all three cases, some questionable people make allegations, then a partisan investigation and then “cancel culture” or attempting to remove someone from public life you politically disagree with.

In Brett Kavanaugh’s case, it was Christine Blasey Ford; in Trump’s impeachment trial, it was initially started by Democratic-aligned opposition firm Fusion GPS, paid for by Hillary Clinton and the Democratic National Committee (DNC), who hired a retired British spy Christopher Steele. In Matt Shea’s example, it was a Republican turned progressive turncoat Jay Pounder, retired FBI agent Kathy Leodler and far-left Democrats in Washington State…

Click here to read the entire article at Charles Carroll Society.

VCDL and GOA Respond to VA AG Opinion on Second Amendment Sanctuaries

Virginia Attorney General Herring issued his formal legal opinion on Second Amendment Sanctuaries on Dec. 20th. On Dec. 26th, The Virginia Citizens Defense League and Gun Owners of America published their response. Click here to download a pdf file of the response. The summary appears below. It is humorous that some legislators are saying that law enforcement officers are bound by their oaths to enforce these unconstitutional laws while they themselves are bound by their own oath of office not to pass any unconstitutional laws (both the federal Constitution and the VA state constitution). By their own reckoning, legislators who want to enact laws that infringe upon the right to keep and bear arms are duty bound to resign their positions.

Virginia Attorney General (“AG”) Mark Herring was asked to issue a formal legal opinion regarding Second Amendment Sanctuary Resolutions being adopted by counties, cities, and towns across Virginia. AG Herring’s official advisory opinion (“Herring AO”) was issued on December 20, 2019. In it, AG Herring argues that Second Amendment sanctuary resolutions (i) have “no legal effect,” (ii) local government officials “must comply with gun violence prevention measures that the General Assembly may enact,” and (iii) “neither local governments nor local constitutional officers have the authority to declare state statutes unconstitutional or decline to follow them on that basis.” Each of these contentions is untrue.

Based on the Herring AO, and various statements reported in the press, it is apparent that AG Herring and Governor Ralph Northam believe that Virginia localities have a duty to actively assist the Commonwealth in the enforcement of any law enacted by the General Assembly. These officials appear to believe that such blind obedience is required irrespective of whether a law violates the U.S. Constitution, the Virginia Constitution, or is manifestly destructive of the pre-existing rights of the People of Virginia. This radical view is demonstrably false, and ignores the significance of the fact that local officials are required by law to take an oath to support the federal and state constitutions above the laws enacted by the General Assembly.

Moreover, neither Attorney General Herring nor Governor Northam can credibly demand that local governments must implement every Act of the General Assembly, because that view directly contradicts the positions they have taken in the past. Indeed, on three recent occasions, AG Herring and Governor Northam have taken exactly the opposite legal position, with respect to: (i) the defense of the Virginia Marriage Amendment to the Virginia Constitution; (ii) the General Assembly’s refusal to assist the federal government with the arrest and detention of civilians as authorized by the National Defense Appropriations Act of 2012; and (iii) the right of localities in Virginia to become sanctuary cities with respect to the enforcement of federal immigration laws.

Finally, the assertion that lesser magistrates owe slavish obedience to abusive higher
authorities was never the view of the Founding Fathers, particularly those from the
Commonwealth of Virginia. Had the English barons embraced this view, there might never have been a confrontation with King John at Runnymede, leading to the protections provided by Magna Carta. Had our nation’s founders embraced this view, Virginia might still be a colony of England. Truly, this view is contrary to the most basic principles which underlay our form of government, is anti-Biblical, and is profoundly abusive of the pre-existing and inalienable rights of the People of Virginia.

FFF: The Perils and Pitfalls of Political Paternalism

The Perils and Pitfalls of Political Paternalism was written by Professor Richard Ebeling at the Future of Freedom Foundation about the dangers and costs of nanny statism.

Across the spectrum of differing political views, whether “progressive,” “nationalist,” “populist,” or “conservative,” there is a common presumption in all of their policy positions and programs. That common dominator is the premise that government is to be the guiding hand in directing and remaking society in some chosen form, to which and within which all in that society are to be confined and made to conform.

The “progressives” herald a new dawn of democratic egalitarianism based on the identity politics of race, gender, and “social class.” The nationalists hark back to a restoration of national identity in which the state defines and determines a nation’s historic qualities and characteristics, for the protection and preservation of which government regulations and restrictions are to be employed.

“Populists” demand a redistribution of governmental power and favoritism more into the hands of those who they say have been taken advantage of in the existing “establishment” system of things. And American conservatives, who once declared at least a rhetorical allegiance to the country’s founding limited government principles, seem to want nothing more than retaining or regaining political power, and are willing to be as regulatory and redistributive in their practical policy decisions as the progressives they rail against.

Lost in this ideological and political policy warfare among them for the governmental reins of plunder and privilege is the idea and ideal of classical, or limited government, liberalism, with its defense of individual liberty, free market economics, civil liberties under an impartial rule of law, and an ethics of non-interventionism at home and abroad.

In the face of these competing, yet philosophically complementary, demands for retention and expansion of “Big Brother” over even more of our lives in a growing number of directions, it is worthwhile to remind ourselves of the premises behind and the realities of the political paternalism that they jointly represent.

First and foremost, the guiding idea behind political paternalism is that the individual cannot be trusted to be a free and responsible human being. Those who wish to socially engineer our lives consider us too ignorant, too irresponsible, and too narrow in our own personal planning horizons to intelligently and reasonably take care of our own health care, our own retirement, our own family’s education, or our own spending and consumption choices…

All of these factors, and others that could be listed, show the perils of political paternalism and power-lusting. The interventionist-welfare state has been and will continue to lead us down a dangerous new “road to serfdom” in which our lives are more and more controlled, managed, and manipulated by those in political power who claim the right to dictate how we are to live and work.

It encapsulates an evil immorality in which political force continues to claim the authority to deny us our individual rights to life, liberty, and honestly acquired property. The interventionist-welfare state has been creating a new feudalism with political and special interest elites who serve as the “lords” who rule over and ruin the rest of us, the modern serfs who are expected to toil for their benefit under strangling regulations, burdensome taxes, and intrusive social controls in the name of political correctness and identity politics now and in the future.

All of us who prefer to be free men in a free society with a free market need to do all in our intellectual power to stop and reverse this reactionary counterrevolution against the ideal of human liberty. Otherwise, our civilization may be heading for a terrible collapse that will leave nothing but tyranny and poverty for too many for generations to come.

Click here to read the entire article at FFF.org.

FEMA Reg. 10 Seeks High School Youths for Preparedness Camp 2020

From FEMA (the Overview link below appears to be broken on the FEMA page) for youths aged 14-17 from WA, OR, ID and AK. CERT training will be provided. Transportation, lodging and meal costs provided.:

FEMA Region 10 is seeking forty (40) high-school aged youth representing Alaska, Idaho, Oregon, and Washington to attend a Youth Preparedness Camp near Anchorage, Alaska in July 2020. This will be an engaging and empowering way for teens to learn about and practice emergency preparedness. There will also be a variety of exciting leadership opportunities, team building, and of course, traditional camp activities to ensure a fun week for all. You can find additional information about camp here:

Developed under a youth engagement concept, this six-day, five-night camp, hosted and staffed by camp employees, contract staff, and FEMA personnel will teach students how to safely assist in the immediate aftermath of a disaster when the professional response may be delayed or limited. Subject matter experts and local emergency responders will support the curriculum delivery and introduce campers to various emergency response professions. As part of the camp program, youth participants will identify, develop, and present a concept for a give-back project where they will utilize their skills to improve preparedness in their communities.

The deadline to apply is 11:59pm PST on January 19, 2020. See below for application details.

Imprimis: Freedom and Obligation

The excerpt below comes from a commencement address given by Associate Justice Clarence Thomas at Hillsdale College back in 2016. In order to have liberty our freedom must be tempered by the duties and responsibilities that we have.

…In my youth, we had a small farm. I am convinced that the time I spent there had much to do with my firm resolve never to farm again. Work seemed to spring eternal, like the weeds that consumed so much of our time and efforts. One of the messages constantly conveyed in those days was our obligation to take care of the land and to use it to produce food for ourselves and for others. If there was to be independence, self-sufficiency, or freedom, then we first had to understand, accept, and discharge our responsibilities. The latter were the necessary (but not always sufficient) antecedents or precursors of the former. The only guarantee was that if you did not discharge your responsibilities, there could be no independence, no self-sufficiency, and no freedom.

In a broader context, we were obligated in our neighborhood to be good neighbors so that the neighborhood would thrive. Whether there was to be a clean, thriving neighborhood was directly connected to our efforts. So there was always, to our way of thinking, a connection between the things we valued most and our personal obligations or efforts. There could be no freedom without each of us discharging our responsibilities. When we heard the words duty, honor, and country, no more needed to be said. But that is a bygone era. Today, we rarely hear of our personal responsibilities in discussions of broad notions such as freedom or liberty. It is as though freedom and liberty exist wholly independent of anything we do, as if they are predestined…

America’s Founders and many successive generations believed in natural rights. To establish a government based on the consent of the governed, as the Declaration of Independence makes clear, they gave up only that portion of their rights necessary to create a limited government of the kind needed to secure all of their rights. The Founders then structured that government so that it could not jeopardize the liberty that flowed from natural rights. Even though this liberty is inherent, it is not guaranteed. Indeed, the founding documents of our country are an assertion of this liberty against the King of England—arguably the most powerful man in the world at the time—at the risk of the Founders’ lives, fortunes, and sacred honor. Over the lifespan of our great country, many occasions have arisen that required this liberty, and the form of government that ensures it, to be defended if it was to survive.

At the risk of understating what is necessary to preserve liberty and our form of government, I think more and more that it depends on good citizens discharging their daily duties and obligations…

Today, when it seems that grievance rather than responsibility is the main means of elevation, my grandfather’s beliefs may sound odd or discordant. But he and others like him at the time resolved to conduct themselves in a way consistent with America’s ideals. They were law-abiding, hardworking, and disciplined. They discharged their responsibilities to their families and neighbors as best they could. They taught us that despite unfair treatment, we were to be good citizens and good people. If we were to have a functioning neighborhood, we first had to be good neighbors. If we were to have a good city, state, and country, we first had to be good citizens. The same went for our school and our church. We were to keep in mind the corporal works of mercy and the great commandment: “Love thy neighbor as thyself.” Being wronged by others did not justify reciprocal conduct. Right was right, and two wrongs did not make a right. What we wanted to do did not define what was right—nor, I might add, did our capacious litany of wants define liberty. Rather, what was right defined what we were required to do and what we were permitted to do. It defined our duties and our responsibilities. Whether those duties meant cutting our neighbor’s lawn, visiting the sick, feeding the hungry, or going off to war as my brother did, we were to discharge them honorably…

if we continue to consume the benefits of a free society without replenishing or nourishing that society, we will eventually deplete that as well.  If we are content to let others do the  work of replenishing and defending liberty while we consume the benefits, we will someday run out of other people’s willingness to sacrifice—or even out of courageous people willing to make the sacrifice…

Click here to read the entire article at Imprimis.

Medium.com: YouTube Is Censoring Crypto Videos

Vincent Zandri has written an article over on Medium.com about how YouTube is censoring various crypto-currency videos and/or threatening to shut down the accounts of those who post them. Governments and banking systems are against cryptocurrencies outside of their control. If you control the money (which they currently do), then you can control just about everything else – including people’s behavior.

The first threat to government of an independent and opaque currency is how do they control taxation or government revenue. Our current system of government graft, masquerading as democracy, is dependent on the reliable extraction (some would say theft) of money from the populace on an ongoing basis. When people are receiving payments and making purchases in an encrypted medium, how does the government collect its cut?

Second, control of the money/banking system allows the government to control people’s behavior. As an extreme example, how many people will join an uprising against the government, knowing that their bank account will be frozen or seized so that they cannot pay their mortgage, or rent, or buy food? Or if their retirement fund/children’s college fund, etc. is seized? People already worry about making certain entirely legal banking transactions because the know or worry that the government or banking system will have information about them that either invades a person’s privacy or flags them for criminal investigation.

Altcoin Daily, a popular Bitcoin and crypto education video channel is alleging that YouTube is not only censoring theirs and many other crypto channel’s online content, they are threatening to shut them down altogether. The popular, Google owned, video-sharing platform is slapping many sites like Altcoin Daily with an accusation of “sale of regulated goods,” which is akin to selling alcohol or drugs to the general public and/or minors. As far as I can tell, Altcoin Daily doesn’t sell so much as a stick of gum to anyone. The two twin brothers who run the channel don’t offer financial advice, rather, they describe themselves as “crypto enthusiasts” who offer crypto news with a heavy focus on Bitcoin.

Fellow affected crypto YouTube Channel content creators are making their voices heard about the censoring via social media…

Click here to read the entire article at Medium.com.

Mises Institute: The American Empire

A republic if you can keep it

This rather long article is actually a condensation of a longer piece by Garet Garrett called The Rise of Empire, which was published in 1952. The American Empire appears in Mises Wire. It’s a bit of a contrast with AG Barr’s article about how the executive branch is too weak, but there is overlap. Part of the difference between the two lies in the administrative agencies and whether they are truly under the control of the President or under the control or influence of other political interests. Constitutionally, administrative agencies as law-making bodies should not exist at all, but as part of the executive should be entirely under the direction of the office of the President. In practice, they have been unaccountable, extra-Constitutional legislative bodies only marginally under the power of the executive branch. When the occupant of the Presidential office is able to appeal to the appetites and desires of the various administrative agency heads, he will be much more powerful than a President at odds with those same agencies.

We have crossed the boundary that lies between Republic and Empire. If you ask when, the answer is that you cannot make a single stroke between day and night; the precise moment does not matter. There was no painted sign to say: “You now are entering Imperium.” Yet it was a very old road and the voice of history was saying: “Whether you know it or not, the act of crossing may be irreversible.”

That a Republic may vanish is an elementary schoolbook fact.

The Roman Republic passed into the Roman Empire, and yet never could a Roman citizen have said, “That was yesterday.” Nor is the historian, with all the advantages of perspective, able to place that momentous event at an exact point on the dial of time. The Republic had a long, unhappy twilight. It is agreed that the Empire began with Augustus Caesar. What Augustus Caesar did was to demonstrate a proposition found in Aristotle’s Politics, one that he must have known by heart, namely this: “People do not easily change, but love their own ancient customs; and it is by small degrees only that one thing takes the place of another; so that the ancient laws will remain, while the power will be in the hands of those who have brought about a revolution in the state.”

Revolution within the Form

There is no comfort in history for those who put their faith in forms; who think there is safeguard in words inscribed on parchment, preserved in a glass case, reproduced in facsimile and hauled to and fro on a Freedom Train.

Let it be current history. How much does the younger half of this generation reflect upon the fact that in its own time a complete revolution has taken place in the relations between government and people?

The extent to which the original precepts and intentions of constitutional, representative, limited government, in the republican form, have been eroded away by argument and dialectic is a separate subject, long and ominous, and belongs to a treatise on political science. The one fact now to be emphasized is that when the process of erosion has gone on until there is no saying what the supreme law of the land is at a given time, then the Constitution begins to be flouted by executive will, with something like impunity. The instances may not be crucial at first and all the more dangerous for that reason. As one is condoned another follows and they become progressive.

To outsmart the Constitution and to circumvent its restraints became a popular exercise of the art of government in the Roosevelt regime. In defense of his attempt to pack the Supreme Court with social-minded judges after several of his New Deal laws had been declared unconstitutional, President Roosevelt wrote: “The reactionary members of the Court had apparently determined to remain on the bench for as long as life continued — for the sole purpose of blocking any program of reform.”

Among the millions who at the time applauded that statement of contempt there were very few, if there was indeed one, who would not have been frightened by a revelation of the logical sequel. They believed, as everyone else did, that there was one thing a President could never do. There was one sentence of the Constitution that could not fall, so long as the Republic lived.

The Constitution says: “The Congress shall have power to declare war.”

That, therefore, was the one thing no President could do. By his own will he could not declare war. Only Congress could declare war, and Congress could be trusted never to do it but by will of the people. And that was the innermost safeguard of the republic. The decision whether or not to go to war was in the hands of the people — or so they believed. No man could make it for them.

It is true that President Roosevelt got the country into World War II. That is not the same thing. For a declaration of war he went to Congress — after the Japanese had attacked Pearl Harbor. He wanted it, he had planned it, and yet the Constitution forbade him to declare war and he durst not do it.

Nine years later a much weaker President did…

The first requisite of Empire is:

The executive power of government shall be dominant. It may be dominant originally, as in the days of hereditary kingship, or it may come to be dominant by change, as when the Roman Republic passed under the rule of Caesars.

What Empire needs above all in government is an executive power that can make immediate decisions, such as a decision in the middle of the night by the President to declare war on the aggressor in Korea, or, on the opposite side, a decision in the Politburo in the Kremlin, perhaps also in the middle of the night, to move a piece on the chessboard of cold war.

The Federal income-tax law of 1914 gave the government unlimited access to wealth and, moreover, power for the first time to levy taxes not for revenue only but for social purposes, in case there should arise a popular demand for redistribution of the national wealth. World War I immediately followed. Looking backward we can see that these two events marked the beginning of a great rise in the executive power of government. Then came in rapid succession (1) the Great Depression, (2) the revolutionary Roosevelt regime, and (3) World War II, all within an arc of twenty years…

(2) By reinterpretation of the language of the Constitution. That is done by a sympathetic Supreme Court.

(3) By innovation. That is when, in this changing world, the President does things that are not specifically forbidden by the Constitution because the founders never thought of them.

(4) By the appearance in the sphere of Executive Government of what are called administrative agencies, with power to issue rules and regulations that have the force of law. These agencies have built up a large body of administrative law which people are obliged to obey. And not only do they make their own laws; they enforce their own laws, acting as prosecutor, jury and judge; and appeal from their decisions to the regular courts is difficult because the regular courts are obliged to take their findings of fact as final. Thus the constitutional separation of the three governmental powers, namely, the legislative, the executive and the judicial, is entirely lost.

(5) By usurpation. That is when the President willfully confronts Congress with what in statescraft is called the fait accompli — a thing already done — which Congress cannot repudiate without exposing the American government to the ridicule of nations…

(6) Lastly, the powers of Executive Government are bound to increase as the country becomes more and more involved in foreign affairs. This is true because, both traditionally and by the terms of the Constitution, the province of foreign affairs is one that belongs in a very special sense to the President…

Another brand mark of Empire is: “Ascendancy of the military mind, to such a point at last that the civilian mind is intimidated.”

…It was General MacArthur himself who uttered these devastating words:

Talk of imminent threat to our national security through the application of external force is pure nonsense. … Indeed, it is a part of the general pattern of misguided policy that our country is now geared to an arms economy which was bred in an artificially induced psychosis of war hysteria and nurtured upon an incessant propaganda of fear. While such an economy may produce a sense of seeming prosperity for the moment, it rests on an illusory foundation of complete unreliability and renders among our political leaders, almost a greater fear of peace than is their fear of war.

The bald interpretation of General MacArthur’s words is this. War becomes an instrument of domestic policy. Among the control mechanisms on the government’s panel board now is a dial marked War…

No doubt the people know they can have their Republic back if they want it enough to fight for it and to pay the price. The only point is that no leader has yet appeared with the courage to make them choose.

Click here to read the entire article at Mises Wire.