Where Do We Go from Here?

Mob rules

Posted on March 21, 2024March 21, 2024 by Mike

Kill them. Kill them all, every last man Jack of the scumbag sonsabitches.

‘Get Him! Get Him!’ The Angry Mob Comes for Kyle Rittenhouse Again
After spending days on social media churning up hatred toward Kyle Rittenhouse, an organized and planned mob of angry protesters intimidated, chased, and charged at people who attended an event at the University of Memphis where he was speaking.

The mob chanting, “no justice, no peace,” an implicit call for violence, charged and screeched at people who attended the Turning Point USA-sponsored event for Rittenhouse. The mob followed people who left the event to their cars. Thankfully, police intervened and prevented a riot — or worse.

Rittenhouse brought his service dogs to the event. They help with his PTSD, he has said in interviews.

He began, “On August 25th of 2020, I was violently attacked by a mob of rioters,” and was quickly jeered and shouted down, according to News3 in Memphis. The speech was abandoned, and Rittenhouse immediately went into a question-and-answer mode.

As the mob gathered outside, “Rittenhouse was abruptly rushed off the stage after only about 30 minutes as protestors inside booed him, yelled and disrupted him,” the news station reported.

As people left, they were “chased” by the mob. Some shouted “Get him! Get him!” as they advanced on the crowd.

If you’re Kyle Rittenhouse, this is a PTSD-triggering event.

Protesters met people going into the speaking event by chanting, “Black Lives Matter!” and holding signs calling Rittenhouse a “murderer,” “little s**t,” and referring to “Christo-Fascism,” the left’s latest verbal attempt to cast Christians as fascists and therefore targets.

One held a sign reading, “Say their names.”

OK, here are their names, and we’ll do you one better by including their rap sheets.

Which they then do, not that the violent Leftist mob will care a whit. As I’ve said a blue million times, for the rest of his life Kyle Rittenhouse will never again know a moment’s peace for having dared to commit several heinous crimes against the shitlib catechism, among them:

White? Check
Male? Check
Successfully deployed a fully-semi-automatic assault-weapon rifle-gun with extreme-high-capacity standard magazine clip—loaded with deadly high-explosive, armor-piercing cop-killer bullets, no doubt—in defense of his very life against a frothing, hate-fueled Leftist mob intent on killing him, armed and in hot pursuit of their intended victim? Check

There’s a few more I could tack on, but the above covers it well enough, I think.

Any of y’all remember a fine organization called the Patriot Guard Riders some years back? I rode on several of the local PG chapter’s escort missions myself, even posted on one of those runs here (with pictures, no less); unfortunately, said post was lost in the devastating Russian hack several years ago that sent twenty years’ worth of CF archives up in a puff of Cyrillic smoke.

And yes, it WAS Russians behind the attack, as confirmed and re-confirmed beyond any possible doubt by both the Hosting Matters crew and my own self. Who the hell knows what might’ve brought them to my humble doorstep to wreak their mischief? I blame Trump, myself. Or Putin. Or, possibly, both. As every shitlib knows, where one goes you usually find the other skulking about in the shadows.

No matter, though, my point being: stout biker-type dudes out in young Kyle Rittenhouse’s locality really ought to consider setting up the Kyle’s Guard Riders along PGR-like lines, for purposes of providing this courageous, indomitable American hero a protective escort to and from his speaking gigs—an escort congenitally disinclined to just sitting idly back and putting up with the usual bullshit from Leftard goon squads bent on intimidation at best, outright physical mayhem in actuality.

Just let a goodly number of vicious Lefty fuckwits get their empty skulls bashed in, their tires slashed, and their scraggly asses kicked up between their shoulder blades by a no-nonsense posse of burly One Percenters each and every time they show up to dog a Rittenhouse speaking engagement. Show them that their halcyon days of suppressing an entirely guiltless young American’s right to freedom of speech without swift retribution are over—that henceforth, such patently un-American thuggishness comes with a hefty price tag attached.

Tit for fucking tat, motherfuckers. Don’t start none, won’t be none, most assuredly. On the other hand, if you want a fight you’re damned sure gonna get yourselves one, most ricky-tick—all the fight you can stomach, plus some. Let’s all see how that works out for you in the end, shall we?

Meanwhile, I’ll content myself with a rerun of this lovingly hand-crafted meme I cobbled together in the immediate aftermath of the Wisconsin brouhaha in which the valiant Kyle Rittenhouse first made his American Patriot bones.

‘Nuff said.

The losing tradition

Posted on March 21, 2024March 21, 2024 by Mike

David Solway examines some evidence that Real Americans are mired up to the axles in one.

Why Do We Almost Always Lose?
One of the besetting vices of the conservative disposition is the tendency to regard potential or likely victories in contested situations as inevitable. The conservative mind is not happy with the reality principle. It prefers not to see that menacing and intractable elements often lie beneath the cover of apparent failure. Such tranced insensibility is always quick to snatch fantasy from reality, proof that conservative analysis is often unreliable and prone to underestimating the cleverness and determination of the Left. This seems to be one reason (there are others) that conservatives have trouble winning.

Let’s consider three current examples of this unfortunate tropism.

1) Arizona candidate for governor Kari Lake’s case against Katie Hobbs on grounds of electoral impropriety and mismanagement, citing compelling evidence that had many commentators confident of courtroom success, was predictably tossed by the presiding judge, Peter A. Thompson. I say “predictably” by which I mean “utterly obvious to anyone with eyes to see.” As I wrote in a earlier article for PJM, the belief that Kari Lake’s evidence-based lawsuit against electoral fraud would bear fruit — “Kari Lake Just Ended Katie Hobbs” is the title of one conservative video — is another indication of wishful thinking rather than sober insight. The evidence of electoral malfeasance was dispositive but, given the state of the judiciary in a heavily left-oriented county, there was never any possibility of a fair judgment. Kari Lake had truth and justice on her side, which, in the ideological universe of the Left, meant she didn’t have a chance. Any astute observer would have seen that.

2) Among conservative sites like Turley Talks, The Five, and others, the general jubilating consensus in the Fani Willis travesty was that Willis would surely be cited for various forms of obvious misconduct, possibly disbarred, and certainly would not be permitted to proceed with her election interference prosecution of Donald Trump. The list of misdemeanors was so absurdly extensive as to read like a plot by the ancient Greek playwright Aristophanes, that is, like a comedy trying hard not to be a tragedy. Watching these programs and interviews, my wife and I were struck by the debilitating naivety of the various commentators. We knew well before the fact, and for a fact, that the presiding Fulton County Superior Court Judge Scott McAfee would effectively punt the case, despite the overwhelming evidence that there was an actual conflict of interest, violation of ethical rules, perjury, and unprofessional conduct on the part of Willis. Alan Dershowitz and Victoria Taft have eviscerated the judge’s ruling, but it should have been plain from the get-go that the verdict was pre-ordained. We note also that McAfee will be facing a black primary challenger in in a Democrat-run, largely black county. Just saying.

3) Most significantly, many commentators have wondered why the Democrat Party would run an obviously senile, incompetent, corrupt, and half-demented failed president as a candidate for re-election against a hale and vigorous challenger. Following his clearly medically amped-up State of the Union Address, writes Matt Margolis, “we’ve seen Biden return to his usual low-energy, gaffe-prone self,” which does not augur well for his electoral prospects. Indeed, many of the pundits and talking heads representing the Republican side of the political divide are exulting in a sure victory, a decisive sweep of the electoral college, a favorable march of battleground states, and are perhaps even more exuberant than they were in 2020 and 2022 when victory was also presumably assured. They did not allow for a massive game of three-card monte then and, while acknowledging that the Democrats are up to their old tricks now, believe that Trump is sufficiently popular to effortlessly clear the margin of fraud.

Wrong again. The Democrats can run a doddering and decrepit excuse for a functioning politician and a demonstrably nasty human being because they are convinced that they will win again. We recall that Katie Hobbs did not bother to debate her immensely popular gubernatorial opponent Kari Lake, no doubt because she knew beforehand that, as Secretary of State presiding over the official certification, and with a compliant judiciary, friendly media sumpters, and biddable tabulators, she had the election won. Similarly, the federal Democrats are supremely confident that they have the election already in their pocket via a strategy of relentless lawfare and financial extortion against Trump, weaponized justice and policing agencies, a suborned media apparatus, digital collaborators, a degenerate university system, ballot harvesting tactics, a crew of vote counters, an army of mules to carry out their instructions, and, as Ben Bartee at PJM points out, the very real possibility of unleashing a COVID 2.0 pandemic “if and when they believe it will be politically expedient, potentially even existential, for them.” The Democrats are not to be underestimated. They could run a mummified cadaver and still win handily.

As Jeffrey Tucker points out, “this president is plunging us straight into lawlessness and dictatorship,” his dimwitted and narcoleptic condition notwithstanding. But enough of the dictatorial machine is already in place to plausibly guarantee a resounding triumph, since most of the votes will be Monopoly votes, no doubt deposited under cover of darkness as in 2020.

A-yup—as we shall soon see yet again, then refuse to learn from…yet again. One of my biggest gripes about Rush Limbaugh over the years was his mulish insistence that the FUSA was “a conservative-majority nation,” when that manifestly was, and is, NOT the case.

It’s doubtful in the extreme that seriously liberty-minded individuals have ever constituted more than a tiny minority in ANY nation, throughout human history. In this one, where even among self-proclaimed “staunch conservatives” the instantaneous reaction to any problem, conundrum, or conflict is always to tub-thump for more government involvement as the “solution”? Gedouddaheah, ya makin’ me laugh wid dat shit /end Brooklyn accent.

Notes from the Goolag

Posted on March 21, 2024March 21, 2024 by Mike

The straight skinny from newly-minted FederalGovCo dissident/political prisoner Peter Navarro.

Navarro’s message from federal prison
Democrats have turned lawfare into a coarse art

As you read this, I have entered a federal prison. I am the first senior White House adviser ever to go to jail for a “crime” never before considered to be a crime, yet there are really two bigger stories for the American people to ponder.

The first story is about the death of the constitutional separation of powers and the demise of executive privilege that, since the days of George Washington, has helped facilitate effective presidential decision-making. The second is about the alarming success of lawfare and the partisan weaponization of our now dual system of justice.

Regarding story one, during a dispute over the Jay Treaty, President George Washington stood before Congress and said that to preserve the constitutional separation of powers, he could not command congressmen to come to the White House. Nor could Congress compel him to go before Congress. Thus, the doctrine of executive privilege was born.

Over the decades, through legal decisions and opinions, both the Supreme Court and the Department of Justice would zealously defend executive privilege as a bulwark of effective presidential decision-making. Without the insurance of confidentiality among and between the president and his advisers, he would not receive the best advice possible.

With my imprisonment, the constitutional separation of powers has been severely damaged while the doctrine of executive privilege lies smoldering on the ground. The only hope for a resurrection will be success on my appeal, which is now traveling through the Federal Appeals Court in the District of Columbia and then, inevitably, to the Supreme Court.

To be clear, U.S. v. Peter K. Navarro is a landmark case in constitutional law that raises significant “open questions” of “first impression” that cry out for the settling of good law by the higher courts.

I find your naive, child-like faith in Amerika v2.0’s courts…touching, Mr Navarro.

Navarro, to his credit, doesn’t seem to be quite as naive as all that, though. Emphasis on QUITE.

While it is true that Chief Justice John Roberts had the last word in denying my appeal, my search engines say that he votes with the liberal judges about 40% of the time and in recent years, he has moved further left.

The one lesson I’ve learned from Chief Justice Roberts’ coup de grace is that it is dangerous for one man alone to be allowed to decide another man’s fate, particularly when the stench of politics is in the air. Justice here would have been far better served if the chief justice had referred this issue to the whole court, which was clearly in his power to do.

And yet. Navarro goes on from there to sprinkle some fairy-dust regarding Congressional subpoenas, “elections,” and other such too-hopeful folderol. Myself, I can only say that I strongly suspect poor Mr Navarro is going to be stuck in the Greybar Hotel for a lot longer than he seems to imagine.

(Via Ace)

Days that will live in infamy

Posted on March 17, 2024March 17, 2024 by Mike

Both of these bitter anniversaries tremendous losses for America That Was and all who loved her and now lament her death—murder, actually. First up, probably the most outrageous, destructive trampling of liberty in all of US history.

15 Days to Slow the Spread
This story first appeared in 1600 Daily, the White House’s evening newsletter. Subscribe now to get breaking news from President Trump before anyone else.

This afternoon, President Trump and the White House Coronavirus Task Force issued new guidelines to help protect Americans during the global Coronavirus outbreak.

The new recommendations are simple to follow but will have a resounding impact on public health. While the President leads a nationwide response, bringing together government resources and private-sector ingenuity, every American can help slow the virus’ spread and keep our most high-risk populations safe.

Leslie Eastman offers a few salient points.

This is the vital point: The announcement and associated policies were suppose to be about slowing the spread…not stopping it cold. The idea was that the virus’ effects on the respiratory system were so bad, that slowing the spread was imperative to get the medical resources into position so the healthcare system could handle (it).

I would like to note that two weeks earlier, I was growing concerned about the nature of the Trump administration’s response to the virus. I urged the implementation of the severe flu protocol that had been successfully used in years previously. I also highlighted risk factors for severe infection that could only be addressed on an individual basis.

Subsequently, “15 days to Slow the Spread” morphed into a liberty-crushing horror with impacts that we are still feeling across the nation (and in many other parts of the world).

Now, the nation is facing the choice between the two top candidates:

Trump, who foisted Dr. Anthony Fauci and Dr. Deborah Birx on this country.

Biden: The senile occupant of the Oval Office who mandated the vaccines and prolonged the pandemic response.

Personally, one part of my decision-making will be based on which candidate will not repeat the mistakes in the covid response…and avoid entangling this nation with the World Health Organization’s “Pandemic Treaty“.

I will never forget March 16, 2020.

Nor should you, nor should any of the truly liberty-oriented among us. Next, another costly loss, one which, in its own small way, might almost be considered as badly damaging to Real American prospects as the ScamDemic stampede has been.

Hushed Limbaugh
How did this nation ever get to the point where a man once considered nothing more than a tacky, loud, nouveau-riche liberal NYC real estate mogul/celebrity, with an orange complexion and a crazy pompadour/combover, would be transmogrified into the ultimate scapegoat for the failings, crimes, and corruption that have plagued our government and society since at least the end of the Second World War; the locus and symbol of the most unbridled hatred by the very same global elite that, in point of fact, are guilty of those sins and that he once perhaps was a part of? If I had to venture a guess, I’d say in nearly the same manner as “just some guy in golf pants” (as he once described how the elites tagged him) who at one time happened to have the largest sustained radio audience in history.

Last week marked the third anniversary of Rush Limbaugh passing away after a yearlong battle with terminal lung cancer. In a career that spanned nearly a third of a century, Limbaugh become far and away the most listened-to talk radio host in broadcast history. The conventional wisdom, which is something that Limbaugh defied on a daily basis, was that he had some sort of Svengali-like appeal over masses of mostly white, male, Bible-thumping bumpkins from flyover country by telling them what to think. In point of fact, it was just the opposite. Limbaugh’s success was being able to articulate what a vast swathe of the nation felt—a well-founded angst about the direction of the country especially since the beginning of the Clinton years and for sure with everything in the wake of the 9/11/01 attacks.

Last week marked the third anniversary of Rush Limbaugh passing away after a yearlong battle with terminal lung cancer. In a career that spanned nearly a third of a century, Limbaugh become far and away the most listened-to talk radio host in broadcast history. The conventional wisdom, which is something that Limbaugh defied on a daily basis, was that he had some sort of Svengali-like appeal over masses of mostly white, male, Bible-thumping bumpkins from flyover country by telling them what to think. In point of fact, it was just the opposite. Limbaugh’s success was being able to articulate what a vast swathe of the nation felt—a well-founded angst about the direction of the country especially since the beginning of the Clinton years and for sure with everything in the wake of the 9/11/01 attacks.

He, more than any other political and cultural leader, held both a moral high ground and most crucially a bully pulpit that gave voice to a true silent majority. In examining the life and times of Limbaugh, as well as the gigantic sword of Damocles above Donald Trump’s head, and collectively whatever is left of the United States as we knew or imagined it, a bit of reflection on how we got here, or to coin a phrase, how we—or at least I—got “woke” to the world as it is, is in order.

Although he passed just as the three years-plus FauxVid dumpster fire was really starting to blaze, Limbaugh was astute enough to see what was coming well beforehand.

I’m watching this coronavirus thing, and even the media that you would think would be on whatever we would call “our side,” they’ve lost it too. To them, this is nothing more than a story, and they can’t wait. I mean, everybody is waiting for the next worst headline, the next worst scenario, the next worst possibility. They can’t wait for it and they can’t wait to report it, and they can’t wait to talk about it. And that’s not me.

I resent this. I could never be a journalist. And these people, they’re a pack now. And I don’t care what network you’re talking about or website—there might be some exceptions to websites. Can’t read ’em all, don’t know. But you can’t turn on TV without seeing the same thing on any network. It doesn’t matter what network it is during the news coverage portion. Not so much the opinion programs and prime time. But the news coverage portion.

I mean, it’s now conventional wisdom that the country’s gonna shut down. It’s conventional wisdom that 150 million people are gonna get infected. It’s conventional wisdom that this is deadly, it’s the worst thing that’s ever happened, oh my God. It’s horrible. It’s worse. And nobody’s ever had it as bad or worse. And everybody gets caught up in it. As I watch the media, I don’t see one doubting Thomas. I don’t know how you do that.

JJ notes well the date of this tragically prescient analysis.

That was on March 13, 2020, literally just as the ChiCom/Anthony Fauci-created COVID-19 was just starting to swamp us. Or as Limbaugh seems to have clearly understood, the artificially generated fear of it. We now know, or at least we should know, that it was all one massive lie; from its origins, to its lethality, to the at-best uselessness to at-worst lethality of the vaccines. Yet anyone who back then stepped up and claimed the mantle of a “doubting Thomas” faced destruction.

America, the land of the First Amendment, has now openly toyed with the notion of “Disinformation Governance Boards,” a fancy name for what is essentially a Ministry of Truth. Universities that were supposed to be bastions of the free exchange of diverse viewpoints now silence anyone and anything even a micrometer to the right of Leon Trotsky. Our government is working hand in hand with Big Tech to have them act as censors for ideas, opinions, and facts that run contra to the narrative that they are putting out as truth, to be accepted blindly and unquestioningly without examination or critical review.

The only reason this is happening is because they no longer have a monopoly on the dissemination of information. Lacking that, as everything they have done to this country that has utterly collapsed our economy, erased our border, endangered our citizens at home, and threatened our national security abroad nearly to the point of a global conflict, the junta has no compunction about completely ignoring even the most basic red lines of ethics, morality, and the rule of law to silence all critique and squash all political opposition.

It’s academic as to whether or not we would have come to this point without the coming of alternative media to question the narrative, or what Limbaugh described as “the daily soap opera.” If nothing else, the mere presence of Rush Limbaugh and then Donald Trump has forced the junta to reveal itself for what it is, not for what their erstwhile media gatekeepers used to be able to bamboozle the public with ease. Trump’s greatest achievement as president isn’t actually what he achieved policy-wise (and they were some of the most incredible achievements ever); it was his mere presence as an oppositional force to the hypocrisy and corruption of the past eighty years that caused the masks and illusions of an America that no longer exists to drop. And there couldn’t have been a Donald Trump without a Rush Limbaugh to pave the way.

Mega dittos owed and mega dittos given.

Indeed so, with whipped cream and a cherry on top. May Rush Limbaugh forever rest in peace, much though it must pain him to look down from Heaven upon all that’s transpired since he departed this Earthly plane. Although I admittedly had problems with him over the years—enough so that by the time he died I’d long since stopped listening to him altogether, out of sheer frustration—it’s to our incalculable detriment that we shan’t ever see his like again.

Update! The Panic, and the damage done.

Four years ago, Las Vegas’ casinos shut down for 78 days. The fallout was brutal
About a month after casinos in Macao were closed for 15 days to slow COVID’s spread, then-Gov. Steve Sisolak on March 17, 2020 ordered all casinos as well as restaurants, bars and other nonessential businesses in the state to close for 30 days.

Brendan Bussmann, a gaming industry analyst with Las Vegas-based B Global, recalled the dark start of the shutdown.

“I still remember driving the Strip the next morning and there was nobody there and it either looked like we were occupied or that a bomb had gone off,” he said.

As a result of the 78-day closure, the Nevada Gaming Control Board estimated Nevada’s 219 major casinos lost $6.2 billion, a 25.2 percent decline from revenue generated a year earlier.

An estimated 26,140 people from a workforce of 162,066 lost their jobs and the unemployment rate soared to 33.4 percent. With demand for travel to Las Vegas lost, airlines canceled hundreds of flights.

As Ed quips, the operative words here might be—should be, in fact MUST be—THEN-Governor. Or, as a Fremen oath from Frank Herbert’s sprawling sci-fi epic Dune has it: Never to forgive. Never to forget. Damned skippy.

Based America’s final stand

Posted on March 15, 2024March 16, 2024 by Mike

Knoxville attorney TJ Harker posts a truly magisterial essay.

2024: The Stand of the Based Americans
For the first time in more than twenty years, the ruling elite’s stranglehold on the nation’s power structures threatens to collapse. Simultaneously, ambitious mandarins in big tech, high finance, big law, and the administrative bureaucracy vie for supremacy in the face of a power vacuum that grows with Biden’s deteriorating mental faculties. Meanwhile, millions of ordinary Americans seek a common political principle around which to organize a coherent defense of their way of life. 2024 is shaping up to be the year in which the existing balance of power between these two groups is consolidated or upended. 2024 will be the year that the new based Americans finally join the battle against the established ruling elite and its regime mandarins.

The Ruling Elite and Its Regime
Though Ross Perot is a distant memory, his 1992 third-party presidential candidacy catalyzed the ruling elite into self-awareness. Surprised by his 19% of the vote, the ruling elite took notice of itself as an independent political force and realized it had to act to maintain its power. Quickly it consolidated control of the major party systems. Simultaneously, it developed a cadre of loyal, mandarin-like sycophants within the administrative state, most legacy media institutions, big law firms, and virtually all of high finance. Later, it welcomed big tech into its mandarin classes. Today, this organizational structure, together with a lowly class of prole-like enforcers and useful idiots, is “the regime.”

For the five consecutive presidential elections from 1996 through 2012, the ruling elite used the regime to become rich and powerful, almost entirely at the expense of ordinary Americans and the nation’s interests. But, in the absence of any serious challenge to their power, it became arrogant and increasingly incompetent.

Today, this process has culminated in a Washington D.C. clown show, in which nearly every apparatchik is incompetent in the most clinical sense of the word. Thus we see children holding senior administration positions; mediocrities with literally zero subject-matter experience appointed to cabinet level positions; caricatures of Darth Vader in positions of extreme sensitivity despite catastrophic failures; spineless shills routinely embarrassing the nation in international affairs; and milquetoasts who decide whether to enforce the nation’s laws based solely on regime-approved criteria.

Their self-congratulatory “the grown-ups are back in charge” mantra notwithstanding, the regime is not blind to its own widespread incompetence. But it also knows that it has no quick solution. There is no standby legion of elite technocrats to which it can turn for technical competence. The “scientific government” of John Dewey and the mid twentieth century progressives is a distant memory. This leaves the regime with no choice but to lie … about everything. Thus, in a weird way, the regime’s growing mastery of political propaganda is a consequence of its technical incompetence

The Based Americans
Standing against the ruling elite and its regime are a widening circle of based Americans. Say what you will about Donald Trump, he deserves credit for at least one thing: His 2016 presidential victory pulled the wool from the eyes of many benighted Americans. For the first time, millions came to perceive, however dimly, the growing incompetence of the regime.

Today, the nascent political awakenings of 2016 have begun to sink roots. It is slowly accreting a litany of unlikely allies into an increasingly coherent political force. From homeschoolers to homesteaders, Bitcoin enthusiasts to cattle ranchers, evangelical Christians to Hasidim, secular jews mugged by reality to second-generation Hispanics, wilderness survivalists to moms for liberty, and neo-Nietzschean GigaChads to walkaway homosexuals, plus thousands of other vital human beings, first millions then tens of millions, and perhaps more than one hundred million Americans, have now awakened to the grave threat posed by the regime. Politics make strange bedfellows, and all that.

If in 2016 Trump’s supporters knew something was up, if not quite what, today this ground swell of based Americans has also realized that the regime is a threat to their liberty and property; that its unifying purpose is to subjugate them; that it uses propaganda systematically to conceal its unbelievable incompetence from them; and that it is both incredibly dangerous and grossly incompetent.

It is that combination–the awareness of the regime’s desire to subjugate, its power to do so, and its gross incompetence–that resonates with Americans more effectively than any specific political agenda. We Americans are freedom-loving and action-oriented people, deriving our wealth and success from a combination of fierce independence, self-reliance, know-how, expertise, craftsmanship, tacit knowledge, experience, and technique. As such, we are highly attuned both to threats to our liberty and to professional incompetence. We know that plumbers who can’t fix pipes aren’t plumbers. Electricians who can’t wire a house aren’t electricians. Pilots who can’t fly aren’t pilots. And tyrants who can’t do anything else will work to subjugate us.

Based Americans stand flummoxed by the regime’s fantastically childish climate agenda that erodes our national strength by prohibiting the search for, and production of, abundant energy. This is to continue until we ordinaries are cold and hungry, weak and frail, and stranded in the duplexes we rent from Blackrock. We won’t own anything and we’ll be miserable.

Based Americans now know that the CDC and the NIH fund gain-of-function research deep in the bowels of our greatest geopolitical rival, knowing that such research will be used to synthesize bio weapons of astonishing horror. Meanwhile the CDC—the Center for Disease Control—lectures us that “gun violence” is a public-health epidemic.

In short, based Americans now understand that transgender, dog-mask wearing generals aren’t warriors and won’t be able to defend us. That boy-faced small-town mayors with traffic circle design experience aren’t logistics experts and can’t unfuck the port of Los Angeles. That noble-prize winning “economists” who think war increases wealth have no idea how to enrich us. That beneficiaries of our racial-spoils system appointed to high positions in elite universities don’t know how to educate us. That medical “experts” who deny biological sex can’t be our children’s pediatricians. That public health officials who think “gun crime” is a health crisis, are not prepared to combat pandemics. That prosecutors who excuse mass violence by regime favored races while wildly overstating the frequency of so-called “hate crimes” will not protect our communities.

A rather lengthy excerpt, yes, but at 2500 words plus, there’s still plenty of great stuff to read here. Harker covers all the bases, and covers them extremely well. Great stuff it most certainly is; in fact, I’d go so far as to say the piece is nothing short of brilliant, and I urge you to read it in its entirety.

Unfortunately, Harker appears to be a victim of the same “political solutions ONLY” syndrome all too many of our best and brightest writers are afflicted by, and I won’t try y’all’s patience further by restating my views on that. Buck Throckmorton, via whom etc, shares the Harker view:

When Harker talks of the brewing rebellion, he is talking about a political rebellion. We need to win this fight at the ballot box, but part of the battle we must fight is not to politely acquiesce again to ballot fraud.

Left undiscussed is how, exactly, this proposed “non-polite acquiescence” might be accomplished—let alone why, exactly, the mere idea of violent resistance to a tyrannical regime should be taboo in a nation which was founded, established, and secured by the selfsame methods we now preemptively forswear as utterly unthinkable, even as a desperate, last-ditch measure. The logical contradiction from which this puzzling conviction proceeds is as blindingly obvious as is the piss-poor result it must inevitably yield. I can only refer you to last night’s Heinlein quote-a-palooza for the antidote to such weak-tea sob-sister-ism.

Apart from that regrettable averting of the eyes, it’s nonetheless a fantastic piece—its central thesis enheartening, its language straightforward, its examination of the hows, whys, and wheretofores that brought us to this dismal pass impeccably reasoned—of which you should read the all.

The three L’s: liberty, law, and ‘lections

Posted on March 14, 2024March 14, 2024 by Mike

Francis has an excerpt from Clarence Carson’s seminal 1970 book on the subject.

[W]e are told that there is no need to fear the concentration of power in government so long as that power is checked by the electoral process. We are urged to believe that so long as we can express our disagreement in words, we have our full rights to disagree. Now both freedom of speech and the electoral process are important to liberty, but alone they are only the desiccated remains of liberty. However vigorously we may argue against foreign aid, our substance is still drained away in never-to-be-repaid loans. Quite often, there is not even a candidate to vote for who holds views remotely like my own. To vent one’s spleen against the graduated income tax may be healthy for the psyche, but one must still yield up his freedom of choice as to how his money will be spent when he pays it to the government. The voice of electors in government is not even proportioned to the tax contribution of individuals; thus, those who contribute more lose rather than gain by the “democratic process.” A majority of voters may decide that property cannot be used in such and such ways, but the liberty of the individual is diminished just as much as in that regard as if a dictator had decreed it. Those who believe in the redistribution of wealth should be free to redistribute their own, but they are undoubtedly limiting the freedom of others when they vote to redistribute theirs.

Effective disagreement means not doing what one does not want to do as well as saying what he wants to say. What is from one angle the welfare state is from another the compulsory state. Let me submit a bill of particulars. Children are forced to go to school. Americans are forced to pay taxes to support foreign aid, forced to support the Peace Corps, forced to make loans to the United Nations, forced to contribute to the building of hospitals, forced to serve in the armed forces. Employers are forced to submit to arbitration with labor leaders. Laborers are forced to accept the majority decision. Employers are forced to pay minimum wages, or go out of business. But it is not even certain that they will be permitted by the courts to go out of business. Railroads are forced to charge established rates and to continue services which may have become uneconomical. Many Americans are forced to pay Social Security. Farmers are forced to operate according to the restrictions voted by a majority of those involved. The list could be extended, but surely the point has been made.

Porretto’s conclusion mirrors my own oft-stated one:

I could start to rant about the Deep State, whose insulation from electoral processes is a great part of the reason for the diminution of our freedom, but I’ve done it before, and I dislike to repeat myself. My actual purpose here is to remind my Gentle Readers of the essential truth about freedom:

Freedom is not granted.

It is taken:

Whether by you, or from you.

Freedom’s price is always paid in advance. It’s usually denominated in blood. How, then, should we who have paid nothing expect to retain it?

As recent FUSA history has shown, we cannot expect to—because, assuredly, we WILL not retain it. “A Republic, if you can keep it.” Well, we couldn’t, evidently. The one and only thing our tainted “elections,” at least at the national level, guarantee us is more of the same old shite.

Summing up the position

Posted on March 4, 2024March 4, 2024 by Mike

In the course of putting together tonight’s Eyrie meme post I ran across an oldie-but-goodie sitting in my voluminous “Memes” folder that I felt would be made best use of in its very own CF main-page spot.

Hopefully that’s big enough for older eyes like mine to read; not sure if the old “click to embiggen” wheeze will do the trick or not, honestly. If not, give me a shout in the comments and I’ll see if I can work out how to fix that.

The final nail

Posted on February 29, 2024February 29, 2024 by Mike

If nominated, he will not be permitted to run. If “elected,” he will not be permitted to serve.

Democrats Signal They Might Not Certify A Trump Win In 2024
Numerous House Democrats have signaled that they would not certify a 2024 presidential election win from Donald Trump, relying on the 14th Amendment to claim Trump is an insurrectionist and thus ineligible from holding office.

Democrats including Reps. James Clyburn (SC), Jamie Raskin (MD), Adam Schiff (CA), Eric Swalwell (CA), and even House Minority Leader Hakeem Jefferies refused to say that they would confirm Trump to office if he won the 2024 election.

As Dan McLaughlin explained at National Review, Democrats could have the votes to sustain an objection to a Trump win if they take control of the House. “Only a simple majority is required, and unlike when the House chooses a president under the Twelfth Amendment, they don’t vote by states,” he wrote. “Unlike in 2016 or 2004, when they were in the minority, House Democrats could be playing with live ammunition.”

Still, a majority of senators would have to object to a Trump win, too. This would likely take 51 senators, and as McLaughlin pointed out, this would be a tough task for Democrats: They “either have to hold every seat they currently occupy (good luck in West Virginia), or take a Republican-held seat (the bluest of which is either Ted Cruz’s in Texas or Rick Scott’s in Florida),” he said.

Or, y’know, peel off a couple of numerous phonus-balonus Vichy GOPe RINOs in the ranks to go along with it. And if you think for one micro-millisecond that the Uniparty combine would hesitate to go to such extreme lengths to maintain their iron grip on power, then you’re as obstinately, willfully blind to the current realities of political life in Amerika v2.0 as Trump himself appears to be. Statements/promises/threats like these make it painfully clear that our leaders Masters no longer deem it necessary to bother themselves with even paying lip service to “the consent of the governed” anymore.

Update! Still think they’re not serious, just joking around here? Better think again.

Poll: If Donald John Trump is granted immunity by the Supreme Court of the United States, should Joe Biden remain seated and become Americas first dictator to prevent Trump from doing the same?

YES / NO / Comment:

— Lara reads banned books in Florida (@MadeInTheUSANJ)

February 28, 2024

As Divemedic suggests, scan a few of the unanimously-enthusiastic responses before you dismiss it all with a wave of the hand as just more unhinged online ranting from the extremist fringe. These people are real-life True Believers, as real as real gets; there are one hell of a lot of them who would dearly love to see it happen, and they are way, way more numerous than most on Our Side begins to imagine. At the risk of sounding like a broken record: They will not stop. They will never stop. They will have to BE stopped.

Of weakness, strength, fear, and traps

Posted on February 24, 2024February 24, 2024 by Mike

KT helpfully unrolls a thread that puts paid to the self-evidently false notion that they’re “weak,” that for various reasons they’re “afraid of us!” What you’re seeing, rather, is neither weakness nor fear but the usual Mark-1 Mod-0 battlespace preparation.

Christian Nationalism is 10000% an op. Since I’m incredibly accused of not backing up this assertion, let’s have a thread, not of arguments but just to show off some of the ways the media sees it.

What we’re looking at here is easy to dismiss as the ravings of the Leftist press or even to characterize as a sales pitch for Christian Nationalism, since we know their “democracy” means their tyranny (Communism, frankly), but we need to understand what it is.

What you are looking at here, and why I did this thread, is called Operational Preparation of the Environment in political warfare talk. If you think this is ridiculous and worth ignoring, that’s because you’re not in the target audience of its psychological active measure.

The objective in saturating a media narrative from multiple kinds of outlets (Vertically Integrated Messaging Apparatus) is to psychologically prime the target audience to believe there’s a lurking or looming threat out there that will become an emergency later at the right time…

There are two primary target audiences with this issue. First, there’s the center-left, whom they want to have believe in a lurking threat with an identifiable name that’s already associated with things they don’t trust. They’re linking that name to “bad” things they know.

The objective with the center-left is to create a vague sense that Christian Nationalism is real, on the rise, and dangerous, and more importantly that it’s associated in various ways with the worst things they know: Covid, Boebert and Greene, J6, racism, fascism, violence…

The other target audience is the red-pilled Right, or at least the dumber among them, who are Christians leaning toward the Christian Nationalism movement. They want them to think the Regime sees it as a threat (it doesn’t) so they think it’s “based” to get involved.

The Regime doesn’t see Christian Nationalism as a threat, you guys. It’s a trap they’re setting. They’re showing weakness because they know they’re immeasurably strong. Walk into it if you want, but I recommend you don’t. I don’t care that much about you if you do, tbf, but don’t

My own approach, whenever the fascist Left accuses Our Side of anything at all, has always been to embrace their terminology just out of contrariness, defiance, and simple spite. Christian, misogynist, Nazi, H8RRR, Islamophobe, racist, backasswards redneck, violent revolutionary, what the hell ever? HELL YEAH I AM! Proud of it, too.

Wanna dredge up some tired old terminology from the hippie-dippie days to throw at me, like “warmonger,” “flag-waver,” “running dog imperialist,” anything you can think of? Sure, that’s me to a tee! I’m all of those, and much, much worse besides. NOW what, fuckface? Got anything else? I will continue to hark back to Captain Mal for my response.

This strategery seems to have worked fairly well for blaques who started using the dread “nigger” their own selves, not as an epithet or insult but as an innocuous descriptor, thereby robbing the word of its supposed power to wound, or so the theory goes. Personally, I don’t care so much about whether or not it really works that way; I just enjoy pissing off Leftards, which I find satisfying enough in and of itself. Any conceivable thing that gets on their nerves, I’m all for it.

Clobberin’ time

Posted on February 22, 2024 by Mike

Evil, pure evil through and through, and nothing but.

Medical Staff Ordered to Euthanize ‘Covid’ Patients: Leaked Docs
Explosive leaked documents have emerged that show medical staff were ordered to euthanize patients who had been admitted to hospital and tested positive for COVID-19.

The official documents were leaked from the UK’s state-funded National Health Service (NHS).

The docs further confirm the previous reporting from Slay News that revealed patients were euthanized in order to boost the numbers for “Covid deaths.”

As Slay News reported, smoking gun evidence revealed that tens of thousands of elderly people were murdered to boost the mortality rates.

The data produced for the report indicated that people were being euthanized using a fatal injection of Midazolam.

The cause of their deaths was then listed as “Covid,” indicating that the virus was killing far more elderly people than it was.

The explosive data from the report was made public by Australian politician Craig Kelly, the national director of the United Australia Party.

The report obtained official UK government data on death rates and causes.

While alerting the public about the data, Kelly declared that it exposes “the crime of the century.”

I keep having to repeat this, which gives me no pleasure at all, but: Just when you think we’ve hit Peak Evil©, the filthy barstids go and raise the bar again. Or, y’know, lower it, more like.

Granted, this revelation, sensational as it is, may or may not hold up when all’s said and done. I know nothing about Slay News, Craig Kelly, or his United Australia Party, and therefore can’t speak to their credibility, if any. Documents can be fraudulent; data can be manufactured and/or manipulated; some “smoking guns” can turn out to be firing blanks. As such, could very well be this is all horseshit of the purest ray serene; it is to be hoped so, certainly.

But if I were a betting man, which I am not, I wouldn’t put one thin dime on it. After all we’ve seen these past few years, would you? Famed FauxVid hoax/Vaxx skeptic Dr Robert Malone addresses the larger issue here.

A shadow now haunts my mind. I am deeply troubled in confronting the reality that the world and version of political truths that I have been propagandized to believe over my entire life is merely smoke and mirrors. A vague uneasiness has been lurking around me over these last four years; a sense that I have not only been censored, defamed, and lied to during the time of COVID, but over my entire life. A deeply disturbing specter that the United States government is not the knighted champion of Camelot so frequently and pervasively portrayed in media and literature. Rather its actions since WW II have been those of an immature, petulant and narcissistic adolescent that feels entitled to exploit geopolitics and war to advance short term power and economic objectives that benefit a small elite, rather than more broadly advancing “democracy”, global economic development, and those ephemeral aspirations of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. Not only have I been propagandized and lied to, but I also sense that the window of time where this behavior by a monolithic Imperial state has been tolerated is coming to an end, winding and grinding down into mundane corruption, bickering self-interest and bureaucratic dysfunctionalism. And that there is no way to stop this accelerating funhouse carousel of painted ponies and mirrors before an abrupt catastrophic failure of the hidden gears throws all into revolutionary chaos.

Maybe something like this has been bothering you also?

Whether fortunate or not, we live in a time of both disruption and deception. A period when change has become an inevitable norm, and yet objective reality is considered an obsolete anachronism. An anachronism that cannot be tolerated, and must be twisted or expunged to serve the interests of those most powerful who will always act to maintain their privilege. Poised in transition between the relatively stable legacy “Pax Americana” bequeathed to us by American military and political victories over twentieth century totalitarian regimes, and fragmentation into an increasingly multilateral rough and tumble world characterized by shifting transitory alliances based on short term interests and opportunity. We all now confront a surrealist intellectual and psychological landscape where truthiness becomes just another product to be marketed. Or propagandized. Or censored. Marketing, propaganda and censorship each being subtle linguistic variations on a single theme of methods to exert external control over the thought and behavior of what otherwise would be autonomous, independent and sovereign individuals.

For many, including myself, the fabric of the widely shared belief in the benevolence of the American Imperial state has been irreparably rendered by the grossly dysfunctional national and transnational mismanagement of the COVIDcrisis. Others were better able than I to see through the cloud of propaganda and lies long before SARS-CoV-2 was constructed. A virus developed and assembled by a bizarre and improbable collusion between US-dominated “biodefense” intelligence interests, the Chinese CCP/PLA (and its dual function Wuhan Institute of Virology), and an international network of entitled biomedical researchers.

But now the gloves are off, and as the underlying truths of this global tragedy are gradually being revealed, the American Imperial state and its allies (governments and corporations) are increasingly resorting to raw power to avoid the consequences of their actions. And with this, it is becoming easier to see the fist. A fist that takes the form of the most aggressive and pervasive global suppression of thought and speech ever witnessed in recorded history. One that is rapidly becoming normalized as an industrial/academic censorship and propaganda complex.

Questions, questions: Just how deep does this rot go, anyhow? Would a global cabal of developed-world governments actually resort to out-and-out murder most foul in the course of pimping their Absolute Power & Control agenda? Have we really tumbled so far as that down the slippery slope to bare-knuckled tyranny?

Most dismaying of all: At this point, dare we assume that they wouldn’t?

Q: Is Mark Robinson the last REAL Republican left?

Posted on February 15, 2024February 15, 2024 by Mike

A: Yes. Yes, he is. So naturally, NC’s Vichy GOPe swine are working just as hard as they can to take him down.

North Carolina Republicans Attack Republican Lt. Governor For Defending Women’s Bathrooms
Mark Robinson passed stage one of the transgender insanity litmus test with flying colors. His governor primary competitors did not.

For vowing to defend women in North Carolina from men who infiltrate female-designated spaces, something a majority of voters support, North Carolina Lt. Gov. Mark Robinson was criticized by two Republican gubernatorial candidates in his state. Robinson is also campaigning for governor.

Robinson told attendees at a campaign event in the beginning of February that he is committed to keeping men out of women’s sports and bathrooms.

“We’ve already passed a law,” Robinson said, alluding to the Republican General Assembly’s overrides of several vetoes in 2023, “and if we need to pass another one, we will. We’re going to defend women’s sports in this state, period.”

The 55-year-old Republican said his commitment to “defend women in this state” extends to protecting their bathrooms from anyone of the opposite sex who tries to use them.

“That means if you’re a man on Friday night and all of the sudden on Saturday, you feel like a woman and you want to go in the women’s bathroom in the mall, you will be arrested — or whatever we got to do to you,” Robinson said. His pledge was met with a round of cheers.

That same day, at a rally in Greenville, Robinson repeated his belief that men should not be using women’s restrooms.

“If you are confused, find a corner outside somewhere to go,” Robinson quipped. “We’re not tearing society down because of this.”

Robinson’s opposition to the male takeover of protected female spaces like locker rooms and bathrooms resonates with most Americans. Yet it earned him the ire of two Republican candidates for governor in his state.

With the help of NBC News, which was happy to amplify complaints against the lieutenant governor, North Carolina gubernatorial candidates state Treasurer Dale Folwell and attorney Bill Graham accused Robinson of hampering the GOP’s chances. Robinson is leading both in the primary, according to polling in the race.

“Mark Robinson is history’s latest example of someone rising to power through hate,” Folwell told NBC. “If he really cared about NC or the Republican Party, he would resign now.”

And if RINO scum like yourself really cared about conservatism or the specific political stances most Republicans have traditionally assumed their party to be all about—correctly or incorrectly—and would much prefer to see it advocate and (hopefully) advance, YOU would, asswipe.

Bottom line: Mark Robinson is way, WAY more of a “Real Republican” than Folwell, Graham, and their sorry Decepticon ilk will ever be.

“Baseless”

Posted on February 13, 2024February 13, 2024 by Mike

Well, well, well, well, well, well, WELL.

Mail-In Ballot Fraud Study Finds Trump ‘Almost Certainly’ Won In 2020
A new study examining the likely impact that fraudulent mail-in ballots had in the 2020 election concludes that the outcome would “almost certainly” have been different without the massive expansion of voting by mail.

The Heartland Institute study tried to gauge the probable impact that fraudulent mail-in ballots cast for both then-candidate Joe Biden and his opponent, President Donald Trump, would have had on the overall 2020 election results.

The study was based on data obtained from a Heartland/Rasmussen survey in December that revealed that roughly one in five mail-in voters admitted to potentially fraudulent actions in the presidential election.

After the researchers carried out additional analyses of the data, they concluded that mail-in ballot fraud “significantly” impacted the 2020 presidential election.

They also found that, absent the huge expansion of mail-in ballots during the pandemic, which was often done without legislative approval, President Trump would most likely have won.

“Had the 2020 election been conducted like every national election has been over the past two centuries, wherein the vast majority of voters cast ballots in-person rather than by mail, Donald Trump would have almost certainly been re-elected,” the report’s authors wrote.

Over 43 percent of 2020 votes were cast by mail, the highest percentage in U.S. history.

The new study examined raw data from the December survey carried out jointly between Heartland Institute and Rasmussen Reports, which tried to assess the level of fraudulent voting that took place in 2020.

The December survey, which President Trump called “the biggest story of the year,” suggested that roughly 20 percent of mail-in voters engaged in at least one potentially fraudulent action in the 2020 election, such as voting in a state where they’re no longer permanent residents.

In the new study, Heartland analysts say that, after reviewing the raw survey data, subjecting it to additional statistical treatment and more thorough analysis, they now believe they can conclude that 28.2 percent of respondents who voted by mail committed at least one type of behavior that is “under most circumstances, illegal” and so potentially amounts to voter fraud.

“This means that more than one-in-four ballots cast by mail in 2020 were likely cast fraudulently, and thus should not have been counted,” the researchers wrote.

Color me shocked—SHOCKED! Quelle surprise, non? Calls for one of them funny-pitchers-with-words I’ve been saving up for other purposes, I do believe.

S’truth. Ahh, but seeing as how it worked out so perfectly for them last time around—they got away 110% scot-free, without suffering one (1) solitary thing by way of repercussion, recrimination, or even minor inconvenience afterwards, and almost certainly never will—there’s just NO FRIGGIN’ WAY they’ll try the same thing again this year, right? I mean, they wouldn’t DARE, right?

RIGHT?!?

“Are we on the doorstep of another civil war?”

Posted on February 7, 2024February 7, 2024 by Mike

A: Probably so, yeah. A better question: Ought we to be? Do our current circumstances require such a terrible, desperate endeavor of us? A: Well, according to the Founders at any rate, indubitably so.

Before I get into my analysis, I want to make it clear I believe that anyone who wants a civil war to happen in the U.S. is dangerously naïve, insane, or working for one of America’s enemies. Imagine a Russia-Ukraine-type conflict in the U.S.

Thanks to Hollywood, most Americans believe that rebellions can be started and won by small ragtag groups of patriots, freedom fighters, insurrectionists, or everyday common folk. All you need are pistols, assault weapons, bows and arrows, and maybe a few Molotov cocktails. Blow up the Death Star, and the problem is solved.

But that is not how it usually works. Revolutions require armaments, soldiers, money, something worth fighting for, and popular support. Unless lives are at stake, few people are angry or committed enough to leave jobs or families to risk going to jail or dying needlessly.

The most daunting task is overcoming the opposition. The weaponry and manpower available to peacekeepers in our country is formidable. This includes the local sheriff’s departments, city police, state police, National Guard, and various federal agencies, most notably the FBI. Plus, in a crisis, these organizations will usually work together. An uprising of twenty, fifty, or even a hundred-plus armed citizens would quickly fail.

Follows, a capsule review of American history, from the Revolution to the Whiskey Rebellion to CW1, even the Weather Undeground, of all things. Then:

You might notice a pattern here. First, important issues divide our country, like independence versus obedience to the king or slavery versus freedom. Then, either a military skirmish occurs before sides get chosen or sides get chosen before the military gets involved. Both the Revolution and the Civil War were started by state military organizations, not by groups of armed radicals.

We are at a similar junction in history right now. Politics has divided the country, and the pivotal issue is unlimited illegal immigration. Few wanted it. No one expected it when he voted for Biden. And now almost no one is willing to pay the price socially or financially to support it.

The White House may have believed that its open border policy would get someone, anyone, to pick up a gun to stop the madness. It would give Biden an excuse to impose martial law, ban assault weapons or handguns, or both. But the horde of right-wing extremists the far-left fantasizes about does not exist.

It seems the administration may have gone too far too fast. The whole country is aware of this issue, and opposition is rising, leading the states to get directly involved.

The Texas National Guard has been sent to the border to stop the flow of migrants. Roughly half of the states have declared their support for Texas.

If Democrats want to continue unlimited illegal immigration, Biden could nationalize the Texas National Guard, take control, and send it home. But what happens if Texas says no? Would Biden order the armed forces to disarm or attack the Texas Guard? Would the use of the armed forces be legal? Do Democrats care?

History tells us that civil wars happen when our country is divided and the states believe they must get involved. That time may be at hand.

Pray that sanity prevails.

Fair enough. On the other hand, though, it suggests another important Q: If “sanity” necessarily means acceptance of the Superstate status quo, should Real Americans who are seriously dedicated to the Founding principles of ordered liberty, self-determination, and limited government really be praying for it? Viewed in that light, can praying for such a thing even be considered truly sane at all? Or ought it to be thought of instead as what it truly amounts to: surrender?

As I’ve said all too many times over the past cpl-three years, I have no good answers. In fact, I strongly suspect there aren’t any, quite frankly. At this late date, things have gone much too far for any practical, effective answer that any sane soul would think of as “good.” Seems to me that no matter which route we choose, we’re in for some serious trouble, turmoil, tragedy, and loss. Best-case scenario is that I’m so full of shit my eyes are brown, which I do admit is eminently possible. Last I checked, they were still hazel, alas.

Update! The more I think about this sad, sorry situation, the more thoroughly I understand what the old phrase “between a rock and a hard place” means. Verily, it’s a real Hobson’s Choice we’re up against here.

Just a guy in a lawnchair with a pen and a notebook

Posted on February 6, 2024February 6, 2024 by Mike

Is the evolution of the Surveillance State more or less a naturally-occurring phenomenon, or is it an insidious encroachment being intentionally foisted on us as part of a long-range plan hatched by shadowy FederalGovCo malefactors? Is there any realistic way to slow, halt, or reverse its growth, or to do away with it altogether once it’s fully implemented? Interesting questions, and with every passing day, more urgent ones.

When you think about what our emerging surveillance state will look like, you think 1984. You imagine East Germany powered by Google and Amazon. You recall your favorite dystopian sci-fi film – or maybe horror stories of China’s social credit system. Thoughts of a frustrated middle-aged police chief from a mid-sized Midwestern town attempting to procure security cameras with innovative new features probably don’t come to mind. You definitely don’t think of a guy in a lawn chair jotting down the license plate numbers of passing vehicles in a notebook. And that’s partly how the surveillance state is going to emerge as it creeps its way into one small town at a time.

Whether a surveillance state is the end goal is hard to say. The police chief of Pawnee, Indiana probably isn’t plotting the development of his own mini-Oceania. But, 18,000-plus mini-Oceanias operating across multiple platforms with varying degrees of integration, both locally and nationally, is undoubtedly the direction in which we are heading as salespeople peddle shiny new surveillance gadgets to cities big and small, making often unverified but intuitively appealing claims of how their devices will decrease crime or prove to be useful investigative tools.

Automatic license plate readers, or ALPRs, can be used to log a person’s movements through the license plates of their vehicles. Given the exponential increase in their use over the past few years and the ease with which data from the cameras of some vendors are integrated, they also pose a threat to privacy on par with facial recognition and cell site simulators.

Often positioned on street lights, traffic lights, independent structures, or police vehicles, ALPRs are a type of camera that captures the license plate and other identifying information of passing vehicles before comparing the information in real time to “hot lists” of vehicles actively being sought by law enforcement and transmitting the information to a searchable database. ALPRs sold by some companies are even said to be able to assess a car’s driving patterns to determine whether the person behind the wheel is “driving like a criminal.”

You have nothing to worry about, you’re told. The town down the road brought them in six months back. Chief Jones over there said they helped solve that murder from the news. And, by the way, they’re not really that much different from a concerned citizen just keeping an eye on things.

At the town hall in Urbana, for example, then-police chief, Bryant Seraphin, worked to dismiss the notion that ALPRs actually pose a threat to privacy or even constitute a surveillance tool.

Repeatedly, he emphasized that ALPRs do not capture any information about the person driving a car or automatically link to information about the person to whom a vehicle is registered. Their ubiquity in the area was accentuated. Supposed success stories were shared.

To allay any remaining notion that there might be something scary about ALPRs, Seraphin described them with a folksy metaphor: “One of the things that I’ve talked about with these things is that if you pictured somebody sitting in a lawn chair writing down every plate that went by, the date, and the time when they wrote ‘red Toyota ABC123’, and then they would make a phone call and check the databases and then hang up and then go on to the next one – that’s what [an ALPR] does automatically and it can do it over and over again…with incredible speed.”

Yet, when Anita Chan, the director of the University of Illinois Community Data Clinic, proceeded to raise concerns regarding “the potential violation of civil liberties” and how a license plate alone is sufficient for the police to not just find out “where you live and where you work but also…who potentially your friends are, what religious affiliation you might have, essentially where you get medical services…[and] suss out essentially who’s traveling and where,” Seraphin acknowledged all this is possible. However, he assured her with a frustrated chuckle, ALPRs simply provide a notebook that would only be referenced when investigating serious crimes.

By the same logic, facial recognition simply provides a notebook as well. As do cell site simulators. As do any surveillance device. Yet, there is a fundamental question of whether such a notebook should exist. Does the chief of police in Urbana or the sheriff in Pawnee need a notebook containing your approximate location three Thursdays ago at 8:15pm, as well as a record of who attended last week’s political rally, in order to solve a murder? Should he be allowed to keep such a notebook if it might help solve an extra murder in his town each year? If the answer is yes, then what are the limits to the tools he and his department should be afforded?

Furthermore, there is also something a little off about the disarming metaphor of a guy who spends his days sitting around in a lawn chair jotting down the license plate numbers of passing vehicles. Something a little insidious. Something that perhaps Anita Chan was picking up on.

Although they’re not mentioned in the article, it brings to mind the strident denunciations of smartphones, social media, and even the internet itself currently prevalent among many on Our Side of the political aisle, all of which devices are apparently tools of the Devil Himself: a spy in your pocket or on your desk, devouring your liberty and eliminating your personal privacy and security whether you foolish, unwitting Sheeples realize it or not.

This is an old, old debate, going back at least to the early days of television itself if not even farther. While I am certainly not one to dismiss legitimate concerns of broad Snooperstate infringement on the citizenry’s right to privacy and essential liberty, to me it seems that what we’re witnessing is an inevitable byproduct of the ongoing march of technological advancement and innovation.

What we have here might be thought of as a clock that cannot be turned back to the semi-mythical Golden Days of yore, which exist now only in our collective cultural memory. T’was ever thus, I think; as wondrous new technologies become available and affordable—therefore ubiquitous, eventually—the convenience, assistance, and entertainment they provide are also accompanied by some less salutary and desirable secondary aspects as well. To imagine nefarious, skulking Bad Actors might not exploit those secondary aspects to the fullest possible extent is nothing but a fool’s hope. Such a fantasy ignores the very nature of government itself, even after the Founders explicitly forewarned us in their Declaration, Constitution, and Federalist Papers.

That being so, the remedy ought to be damned obvious to every right-thinking American: we do not ban the devices and technologies, thereby denying ourselves the myriad positive aspects they bring to the world. Instead, the right way to go about it is to keep the Bad Actors firmly and securely leashed, and severely punish any of them who dares to exceed his proper Constitutional remit at the very first hint he’s even considering such a thing.

Don’t like being surveilled, tracked, and/or put into a database by your smartphone? Don’t blame the smartphone, then; blame the assholes who use it not for its original intended purpose, but as a spy’s tool and a dictator’s security blanket. THEY’RE the problem, not technological progress and the near-magical, undreamed-of devices that enhance life for Normals. Blame the warped assholes and their villainous schemes, and make sure they pay a high price for their perverse authoritarian impulses—each and every time, always and forever, no exceptions. As the Founders knew, it really is the only way.

(Via WRSA)

Texit facts ‘n’ figures

Posted on January 30, 2024January 30, 2024 by Mike

Also via WRSA: Could the Republic of Texas stand alone, on its own, as an independent nation? Martin Armstrong crunches the numbers.

The severity of the migrant crisis may be new to those who do not live on a bordering state. Yet Texas has been grappling with this issue for years, resulting in countless calls for a secession from the United States or “Texit.” How would Texas manage as an independent nation?

Size and Population
Texas would be the 39th largest nation by land mass. Texas encompasses 268,596 sq. miles, roughly the size of France, and is larger than many developed nations including the United Kingdom. Texas had an estimated population of 30,503,301 as of July 2023, making it the second-most populous state in the United States after California. Texas would be the 50st most populous country in the world.

Economy
Texas has the second-largest economy in the United States behind California. In 2023, the Texas economy exhibited a mix of trends. While the state’s economic growth slowed in Q4, with job growth falling sharply in October and business activity contracting slightly in November, the real GDP for Texas grew at an annual rate of 4.9% in Q2, outpacing the U.S. growth rate of 2.1%. Its real GDP stood at $2.5 trillion in Q3 of 2023. Therefore, Texas is the world’s 8th largest economy.

For context, Russia’s economy was valued at $1.862 trillion in nominal terms and $5.056 trillion in PPP. Texas has a larger economy than Australia, Spain, Italy, and Mexico, to name a few.

Pretty encouraging so far; from there, Armstrong takes a likewise-brief look at military power and infrastructure, to arrive at this conclusion.

Texas could survive as an independent nation. Naturally, the United States would fight tooth and nail to preserve its second-largest economy. Based on the data, Texas has the resources to be an independent nation if permitted to operate independently.

WELL, then. We’re all rooting for ya out here, cowboy.

Update! “Soft” secession? Not a fucking chance.

In this year’s public blog two-part extravaganza I went over my predictions for 2024 (here and here). In them I brought up the idea that ‘soft secession’ would make it’s way into the public conversation in both the US and Canada. It wasn’t really a tough call to make but it was something that needed to be discussed in the public sphere.

We saw the beginnings of this last year with Alberta Premier Danielle Smith declaring she would not be collecting carbon taxes to send to Ottawa to fund Chrystia Freeland’s dreams of destroying the country.

Smith is in the news again with her pledge to further defy Ottawa by announcing Alberta would be looking to double oil and gas production. She did so at an event with Tucker Carlson in Edmonton. I’m not sure how Smith is going to go about this, since I do not explicitly understand the legal limits she can defy Ottawa on this.

But this is a big deal. Smith isn’t the only one here. Saskatchewan’s Scott Moe is following her lead on carbon taxes. This is a classic example of why we don’t need a majority of attack dogs to take on Davos and the rest of the globalists.

Not everyone is a leader, like Smith clearly is. Some are simply followers. They only make their move when someone else sticks their neck out first to find out whether it’ll get chopped off.

Many, including myself, admire Russian President Vladimir Putin for this exact reason. Donald Trump, in many ways, owes his popularity to this effect as well. It doesn’t matter if they make mistakes, are imperfect, or even fail to achieve ‘flawless victory.’ What matters is that they go first and lead on behalf of the people they are supposed to represent.

Back in 2019 Tucker Carlson made this exact point in one of his most important opening monologues…

By doing so they inspire others to take their first steps and what starts as a disgruntled handful of people bitching about the government around a campfire turns into a mass movement against tyranny.

This is exactly how the American Revolution started, in the pubs and meeting halls. It was the businessmen turned into smugglers and the farmers turned into sharecroppers that eventually put a critical mass of them into the same room hatching a plan to overthrow an absentee landlord of a king.

We’re seeing this all across the West. And if I have to give credit where credit is more than due then that credit goes to the ‘Gilet Jaunes’ or Yellow Vests of France. Remember them?

While they left the headlines quickly, because of the embarrassment, they never really went away. France has been in a state of rolling protests against the Macron government since then.

Emphasis either Durden’s or Luongo’s, not mine—except for the italicized ‘graphs, which basically make the exact same point I was attempting to in my various posts on the Texas brouhaha these past several days, albeit worded differently.

I like the piece generally, although I still maintain that anybody thinking Amerika v2.0’s tyrannous government will just sit blithely, idly back and allow any “soft” secession to take place without immediate resort to swift and blinding violence is fucking dreaming. Didn’t happen the first time around in 1860, ain’t gonna happen today, tomorrow, next week, next year, or, y’know, ever. Not without war —and, as the greatest cavalry officer of all time told us, war means fighting, and fighting means killing.

FACT: America That Was is gone, finito, dead as coffin nails, and cannot be brought back. Dear as she surely was to those of us who were fortunate enough to have grown up here in better days, it cannot be “restored” or “repaired” or “refreshed” or “rejuvenated”; things have gone much too far for that, I’m afraid. It can only be replaced, and that’s flat. And even that is chancy at best, with no guarantees as to what it might be replaced with.

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