Tag: “Make ’em Mad” Dept.

Activism

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I went out to lunch today, planning on visiting a restaurant I haven’t been to in a while, Thunder Canyon Brewery. I don’t drink, but they’ve got pretty decent burgers.

I was stopped by the sign on the door informing me that handguns were not welcome inside, pursuant to the passage of a law that went into effect on Sept. 30 that allows CCW permit holders to carry their firearms into restaurants that serve alcohol, as long as said restaurant does not prohibit such, and as long as the carrier does not consume alcohol.

I started to turn away, but thought better of it. As I’ve noted previously, I carry in my wallet some cards just for incidents of this type:


I went inside and asked for the manager. When he arrived, I introduced myself and handed him a card. “I appreciate your right to put up your sign, but I just wanted you to know that you wouldn’t be getting my business, and I’ll do what I can to make sure others will avoid your business as well,” I said. We exchanged a few more words (pleasantly), and I went on my way.

While waiting for the manager, I noted that there were business cards at the hostess’ desk, so I’d picked one up. His name and email address were on it, so after I got back from lunch – having eaten elsewhere – I dropped him this note:

My name is Kevin Baker. We met this morning when I gave you a small “business card” protesting the posting of a “no guns” sign on the front door of your establishment. Thank you for your time.

If you have an additional moment, I’d like to expand a bit on the short discussion we had before I left. You noted that several of managers of (I assume) other facilities were gun owners, many were CCW permit holders, and “about half” were NRA members, but that you all shared a belief that “guns and alcohol don’t mix.” We agree on that point. I noted that those people who jump through the necessary hoops to get a CCW permit are not the kind of people who are likely to violate the law by drinking while armed. This is one of the points I’d like to expand on.

Can I assume that you are a gun owner? Possibly even the possessor of a CCW permit?

Would you drink while carrying?

Here is my problem with denying me (and others) the ability to carry in your restaurant: I carry a firearm for the protection of myself and (if necessary) others. Like you, I believe that guns and alcohol don’t mix. In order for me to eat in your restaurant, you oblige me to remove my firearm and leave it in my vehicle, not only disarming me but making my firearm vulnerable to being stolen. And you do this because you fear that I might violate the law by drinking alcohol – while armed – in your establishment.

This doesn’t strike you as illogical? It’s OK for me to enter your establishment disarmed, drink, and then go climb into my 3,000lb pickup truck and drive? I’m to be trusted to operate a motor vehicle safely after drinking, but I’m not to be trusted to carry a firearm and not drink?

As I noted this morning, people who are willing to carry a firearm and drink aren’t going to be dissuaded by your sign, they’re going to break the law anyway. But you’ve decided it’s better to disarm me, require me to leave my firearm in my vehicle while I have a burger and fries with friends because, well, I won’t break the law by carrying in a restaurant that has the proper signs displayed.

The argument is ludicrous on its face.

What your sign says is “WE DON’T TRUST YOU, OUR CUSTOMERS.” And it says it to the tiny fraction of the population – those of us with CCW permits – who have been proven to be the most trustworthy.

And for that reason, I won’t give you my business and I’ll encourage others not to either.

Thank you for your attention.

Kevin Baker
Tucson, AZ
http://smallestminority.blogspot.com

We’ll see if he gives me any response.

UPDATE 10/30: I did get a reply.

Kevin,

Thanks for your input, but really it’s a moot point. What I wish I would have said to you is this….The entire Foothills Mall property has not allowed firearms for quite sometime, so this new gun law hasn’t really changed anything as far as Thunder Canyon Brewery is concerned.

We’ve had a couple complaints from gun owners like yourself. We’ve also had people tell us they really appreciate the sign being there.

The reason I put the sign up in the first place was because some guy called me on the phone pissed off that we were even thinking about putting a sign up. He sounded out of his mind and promised me he was going to rush over for lunch, armed, and exercise his right because he wasn’t breaking any laws. Honestly, he sounded nuts. I put the sign up. If he did come in for lunch that day, before I put the sign up, he DID break the law. The Foothills Mall doesn’t allow firmarms(sic) on their property. We’ve decided to leave the signs up for the time being so there would not be confusion or contradiction between the Foothills Mall policy and our own.

I actually think that you and I agree on most things regarding all the issues being brought up. There are a couple of points I would disagree with however, the first being the “jumping through the necessary hoops to get a CCW”. There aren’t really many hoops. Take a class (the test is easy), hit a target 7 out of 10 times (hopefully easy if you’re a gun owner), and pass a backround(sic) check (should be easy). Everyone I’ve ever talked to has said there were people in their CCW class that they felt shouldn’t get a CCW based soley on the weird(sic) questions and situations they brought up. To say that EVERYONE who has a CCW “has proven to be the most trustworthy” is a little optimistic at least.

But it is statistically proven that CCW carriers are more law-abiding as a group than (*gasp!*) police officers.

Next, I’d like you to put yourself in my situation. I’ll give you some backround(sic). TCB is an independent business. We’re not corperate(sic). We lose a lawsuit, we’re through. 75 people lose there(sic) jobs. Let’s say someone is sitting at the bar. They have their CCW and are carrying a firearm, not drinking. A dangerous situation arises and they feel that someone elses(sic) life is in danger so they draw there(sic) weapon. A number of things could happen:

1. They shoot and kill the suspect…..they’re a hero
2. They shoot and kill the suspect but the bullet exits the suspect and hits someone else (if we don’t have a “No Firearms Sign” up, we get sued)
3. They miss the suspect and hit someone else (we get sued)
4. The suspect sees the CCW owner draw his weapon and begins shooting (we get sued)

5. The suspect starts shooting up your (unarmed) clientele. You get sued for disarming them and not providing other security.

It’s a no-win situation.

You see where I’m going? Sure, I’d love to have plain clothes police officers (we actually quite often do, a number of them are regulars) in the restaurant all the time protecting me, our employees, and our guests from dangerous situations. Do I want civilians playing the same role? The simple answer is no.

Ah, yes. Somehow drawing a .gov paycheck imbues the recipient with magical powers far beyond those of mere mortals! (Actually, it does – it’s called sovereign immunity.)

And as far as you needing to be armed while you dine at TCB? I’ve been there 12 years and never felt un-safe. If you feel it’s so un-safe that you can’t dine there unarmed, then don’t dine there. I wouldn’t dine anywhere (or work for that matter) I felt unsafe either.

You feel safe walking to your car at the end of the day? Possibly carrying the day’s receipts for night deposit? Can you tell me, honestly, where I will never need to carry? It would make my life easier. It’s far simpler just to carry everywhere than it is to put it on, take it off, put it on, take it off . . . .

And, a Breda puts it, “Carry your gun. It’s a lot lighter burden than regret.”

I won’t be carrying it to your restaurant.

Backlash?

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Backlash?

In Part II of the “Dangerous Victims” trilogy I quoted something I found over at Samizdata:

Discourage self-help, and loyal subjects become the slaves of ruffians. Over-stimulate self-assertion, and for the arbitrament of the Courts you substitute the decision of the sword or the revolver. – The Law of the Constitution, by A.V. Dicey (MacMillan, London 1885).

Yesterday I found this story (sorry, I don’t remember where I found the link that took me there) from Saturday’s Daily Express:

TIME TO TACKLE AN ACUTE CRISIS IN BRITISH POLICING

REPORTS of the law-abiding being serially neglected by the police when their property comes under attack are proliferating. Every day brings new stories about people who have been let down by constabularies that always seem to have higher priorities than protecting the public.

It appears that far from being an occasional aberration, such neglect is the norm in many parts of the country.

Too many forces have fallen under the command of politically correct top brass who think officers should be at best neutral when they intervene in altercations between harassed householders and gangs of thugs.

The latest examples are all too typical. In Lincolnshire, Ted Nottingham has felt compelled to advertise a reward for the capture of yobs who have vandalised his car more than 40 times and have now wrecked his neighbour’s vehicle.

In Stourbridge, disabled widow Brenda Hill has been forced to put up notices in her car, begging vandals to stop smashing it up after five attacks in the past year.

She knows who the culprits are and so do the police but nothing has been done to stop them.

We cannot go on like this. The current public outcry must be the catalyst for fundamental change. There is no more important task facing the police and the courts than reclaiming the streets from young hoodlums.

There must come a point when offering understanding and support to the fractured families of the underclass is not enough.

The time has come for the police to get tough and give decent people their neighbourhoods back.

I’d like to think the unspoken next sentence reads “Or we’ll take them back ourselves,” but I’m not sure there are enough dangerous victims left in (formerly) Great Britain.

But I can hope.

UPDATE: Reader “teqjack” links in comments to the latest bit of insanity from across the pond:

You can’t expect the police to be heroes: Public want too much, says health and safety report

The public have ‘ unrealistic expectations’ that police will put themselves in danger to protect ordinary people, according to new safety guidelines for officers.

The Health and Safety Executive caused outrage by declaring that officers confronted with dangerous situations-while fighting crime or trying to guard the public ‘may choose not to put themselves at unreasonable risk’.

Its guidance published yesterday firmly plays down the need for officers to show bravery in the course of their duty if they make a ‘personal choice’ not to.

It states: ‘There is often an unrealistic public expectation that officers and staff will put themselves at risk to protect the public.’

The document concedes that ‘very occasionally in extreme cases’, police may be justified in putting themselves in jeopardy – in which case they may be let off without being prosecuted under health and safety laws.

The report – which has the backing of senior police chiefs – prompted anger and astonishment last night.

Paul Beshenivsky, whose police officer wife Sharon was shot dead by armed robbers in 2005, condemned the HSE as ‘meddling do-gooders’, saying: ‘At the end of the day a police officer’s job does involve putting your life on the line. Sharon knew that, and she got killed.’

He told the Mail: ‘The public are not allowed to take the law into their own hands, and now the crazy health and safety brigade want to stop the police dealing with criminals as well.

“Where would you draw the line? Would you say, “That shoplifter that looks on drugs, he might have a knife, I’ll walk away from that one?” The whole thing is madness.’

Police forces have been subject to health and safety legislation since 1998.

But it is the latest document’s advice on risk-taking by individual officers that has caused anger.

The report says police officers ‘may, very occasionally in extreme cases, decide to put themselves at risk in acts of true heroism’.

In these ‘rare circumstances’, the HSE adds, ‘it would not be in the public interest to take action against the individual’.

But it adds: ‘Equally HSE, like the Police Service, recognises that in such extreme cases everyone has the right to make personal choices and that individuals may choose not to put themselves at unreasonable risk.’

The guidelines have been backed by the Association of Chief Police Officers and the rank-and-file Police Federation.

But Sid Mackay, a retired Met Police Chief Superintendent whose daughter, PC Nina Mackay, was stabbed to death on duty in 1997, said: ‘They claim it is “unrealistic” for the public to expect the police to face danger, but that’s what the public believe the police are for, and rightly so.

‘The HSE will never understand, because they are completely risk-averse, but they have got their fingers into operational policing and they think they’re the experts.

‘The police are choking on paperwork, carrying out endless risk assessments for every operation, and then we wonder why they have become so cautious.’

Anthony Ganderton, the stepfather of ten-year- old Jordon Lyon who drowned in Wigan in 2007 after he jumped into a pond to save his stepsister, also attacked the guidelines.

Two police community service officers who arrived at the scene stood on the bank and radioed for help instead of jumping in to rescue the children, because they were not appropriately trained so risked breaking health and safety rules.

He told the Mail: ‘The point is they should do whatever they can to help people in trouble, especially when there are children involved.’

HSE chairman Judith Hackitt said yesterday: ‘This statement will assist senior police officers in balancing the risks involved in their duties to fight crime with meeting their health and safety obligations to their own employees and the public.’

The Home Office said: ‘Health and safety laws are there to protect the police as well as the public, but they must never hinder officers in the execution of their duty.’

They’ve gone completely batshit fucking insane over there.

Get out. Get out now.

Mask? Who Needs a Mask?

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Mask? Who Needs a Mask?

Dr. Sanity posted a particularly impassioned piece today, Glory to Postmodernism Science!, a piece inspired by an article published in The New Scientist by one Michael Brooks. That article was a review of Randy Olson’s book, Don’t Be Such a Scientist: Talking Substance in an Age of Style. The part that drew Dr. Sanity’s ire?

If you want to get a message across to the public, don’t obsess about facts. Just look at Al Gore’s climate change documentary An Inconvenient Truth, Olson says. The film contained more than a few factual errors, but it also had a profound influence on the world’s attitude to climate change. Perhaps compromising on accuracy is a necessary evil…is this really the right way for scientists to go? With climate change, perhaps the end justifies the means… given Gore’s success and the prevalence of scientific illiteracy, it remains an interesting path to consider.

She expands:

In other words: truth is irrelevant, lying is perfectly ok, and “compromising on accuracy is a necessary evil” –particularly when it is some important issue like climate change…or any other issue deemed important for social policy by the political left. It is, after all, for our own good! A “greater good” !

Stephen Hicks in his book quotes Frank Lentricchia, a noted Duke University literary critic. Postmodernism, says Lentricchia, “seeks not to find the foundation or conditions of truth but to exercise power for the purpose of social change.”

Apparently, it’s not what is true, it’s what you can convince others to believe that matters.

Which reminded me of something I posted some time back about how engineers (and, I’d hope, scientists) see the world. It was a quote from The Purple Avenger‘s blog and his post Engineers versus everyone else:

My best friend is a lawyer, bright, gifted, … PhD in law; bored with his job, he decided to study engineering. After his first quarter, he came to me and said that the two “C”s he’d achieved in Engineering Calculus 101 and Engineering Physics 101 were the first two non-A grades he’d ever gotten in college, and that he had had to study harder for them than for any other dozen classes he’d had. “I now understand”, he said, “why engineers and their like are so hard to examine, whether on the stand or in a deposition. When they say a thing is possible, they KNOW it is possible, and when they say a thing is not possible, they KNOW it is not. Most people don’t understand ‘know’ in that way; what they know is what we can persuade them to believe. You engineers live in the same world as the rest of us, but you understand that world in a way we never will.”

(Emphasis in bold is original. Emphasis in red is mine.)

Dr. Sanity continues:

Postmodernism deliberately eschews truth and reason and reality. It insists that our minds are not capable of even knowing reality. Under such conditions, what good is science, you may ask?

As I’ve noted, despite the source of the title of this blog, I am not an Objectivist, nor am I particularly enamored of Ayn Rand, though I will call her one of the clearest thinkers I’ve ever read. I’ve excerpted from her essays and speeches on several occasions because I believe she was right a whole lot more often than she was wrong, and on this topic she was dead-nuts on. In her 1974 speech to the graduating class of West Point on the topic of philosophy, she said this:

You might claim – as most people do – that you have never been influenced by philosophy. I will ask you to check that claim. Have you ever thought or said the following? “Don’t be so sure – nobody can be certain of anything.” You got that notion from David Hume (and many, many others), even though you might never have heard of him. Or: “This may be good in theory, but it doesn’t work in practice.” You got that from Plato. Or: “That was a rotten thing to do, but it’s only human, nobody is perfect in this world.” You got that from Augustine. Or: “It may be true for you, but it’s not true for me.” You got it from William James. Or: “I couldn’t help it! Nobody can help anything he does.” You got it from Hegel. Or: “I can’t prove it, but I feel it’s true.” You got it from Kant. Or: “It’s logical, but logic has nothing to do with reality.” You got it from Kant. Or: “It’s evil because it’s selfish.” You got it from Kant.

Rand hated Kant, calling him “the most evil man in history.” Re-read two concepts she attributes to him: “I can’t prove it, but I feel it’s true,” and “It’s logical, but logic has nothing to do with reality.” She blames Kantian philosophy for, well read it yourself:

Suppose you met a twisted, tormented young man and, trying to understand his behavior, discovered that he was brought up by a man-hating monster who worked systematically to paralyze his mind, destroy his self-confidence, obliterate his capacity for enjoyment and undercut his every attempt to escape. You would realize that nothing could be done with or for that young man and nothing could be expected of him until he was removed from the monster’s influence.

Western civilization is in that young man’s position. The monster is Immanuel Kant.

I have mentioned in many articles that Kant is the chief destroyer of the modern world. My primary concern, however, was not to engage in polemics, but to present a rational approach to philosophy, untainted by any Kantian influence, and to indicate the connection of philosophy to man’s life here, on earth–a connection which Kant had severed. It is useless to be against anything, unless one knows what one is for. A merely negative stand is always futile- as, for instance, the stand of the conservatives, who are against communism, but not for capitalism. One cannot start with or build on a negative; it is only by establishing what is the good that one can know what is evil and why.

Kant was opposed in his time and thereafter, but his opponents adopted a kind of Republican Party method: they conceded all his basic premises and fought him on inconsequential details. He won–by default and with their help. The result was the progressive shrinking of philosophy’s stature in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. All the irrational twistings of contemporary philosophy are Kantian in origin. The ultimate result is the present state of the world.

If, on the positive basis of my philosophy, I may be permitted to express a negative consideration, as a consequence and a side issue, I would like to say, paraphrasing Ragnar Danneskjold in Atlas Shrugged: “I’ve chosen a special mission of my own. I’m after a man whom I want to destroy. He died 167 years ago, but until the last trace of him is wiped out of men’s minds, we will not have a decent world to live in. (What man?) Immanuel Kant.”

What Dr. Sanity is appalled by is the application of Kantian philosophy to what is supposed to be SCIENCE. She writes:

Well, those who adhere to postmodern ideas prefer to exercise power to force social change. They live in a world of contradiction and emotion. Their strategy is not to persuade people to accept their ideas, but to confuse them; to distort the truth, propagate lies and smears; and to use whatever rhetoric is necessary to accomplish their purposes. Science is particularly useful if it can be manipulated to make those who oppose your ideas to STFU.

The politically useful concept of “social justice” is far more important than reality or truth; and the way that you can expedite the acceptance of unpalatable social policies is to use science to demonize your enemies or to pronounce that there is a “scientific consensus” on a contentious issue.

This is what your typical leftist postmodern progressives has in mind for the future of science. Instead of a dedication to reality and truth, science will be used to foist leftist ideology down the throats of the populace.

By all means, read her whole piece.

Kant is still alive and well, even flourishing, and his ideas are being used by the Left every day. In fact, they’ve become so pervasive that the Left no longer seems to be concerned about concealing their sleight-of-hand: Emotion over fact? Check. “Fake but accurate”? Check. The ends justify the means? Check. I know what I know, don’t confuse me with the facts? Checkeroo.

She’s right to be appalled. But the public education system has done its job well. The majority doesn’t notice it’s being manipulated, or even if it does, it doesn’t care. Masks? Who needs masks anymore? The rubes don’t care that they’re being played!

Well, some still do.


No wonder they’re worried.

Quote of the Day – Meet the New Boss Edition

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Quote of the Day – Meet the New Boss Edition

In his scathing Wall Street Journal column on The Post articles last week, Thomas Frank crystallized the gap between Obama’s pledge and this reality. “There is something uniquely depressing about the fact that the National Portrait Gallery’s version of the Barack Obama ‘Hope’ poster previously belonged to a pair of lobbyists.” That’s no joke: It was donated by Tony and Heather Podesta.

— Frank Rich, The New York Times – The Rabbit Ragu Democrats

“We the people are coming.”

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An open letter to our elected representatives from Arizona resident Janet Contreras, sent to Glenn Beck which he apparently read aloud yesterday. (I don’t listen to Glenn, this was recommended to me.)

I’m a home grown American citizen, 53, registered Democrat all my life. Before the last presidential election I registered as a Republican because I no longer felt the Democratic Party represents my views or works to pursue issues important to me. Now I no longer feel the Republican Party represents my views or works to pursue issues important to me. The fact is I no longer feel any political party or representative in Washington represents my views or works to pursue the issues important to me. There must be someone. Please tell me who you are. Please stand up and tell me that you are there and that you’re willing to fight for our Constitution as it was written. Please stand up now. You might ask yourself what my views and issues are that I would horribly feel so disenfranchised by both major political parties. What kind of nut job am I? Will you please tell me?

Well, these are briefly my views and issues for which I seek representation:

One, illegal immigration. I want you to stop coddling illegal immigrants and secure our borders. Close the underground tunnels. Stop the violence and the trafficking in drugs and people. No amnesty, not again. Been there, done that, no resolution. P.S., I’m not a racist. This isn’t to be confused with legal immigration.

Two, the TARP bill, I want it repealed and I want no further funding supplied to it. We told you no, but you did it anyway. I want the remaining unfunded 95% repealed. Freeze, repeal.

Three: Czars, I want the circumvention of our checks and balances stopped immediately. Fire the czars. No more czars. Government officials answer to the process, not to the president. Stop trampling on our Constitution and honor it.

Four, cap and trade. The debate on global warming is not over. There is more to say.

Five, universal healthcare. I will not be rushed into another expensive decision. Don’t you dare try to pass this in the middle of the night and then go on break. Slow down!

Six, growing government control. I want states rights and sovereignty fully restored. I want less government in my life, not more. Shrink it down. Mind your own business. You have enough to take care of with your real obligations. Why don’t you start there.

Seven, ACORN. I do not want ACORN and its affiliates in charge of our 2010 census. I want them investigated. I also do not want mandatory escrow fees contributed to them every time on every real estate deal that closes. Stop the funding to ACORN and its affiliates pending impartial audits and investigations. I do not trust them with taking the census over with our taxpayer money. I don’t trust them with our taxpayer money. Face up to the allegations against them and get it resolved before taxpayers get any more involved with them. If it walks like a duck and talks like a duck, hello. Stop protecting your political buddies. You work for us, the people. Investigate.

Eight, redistribution of wealth. No, no, no. I work for my money. It is mine. I have always worked for people with more money than I have because they gave me jobs. That is the only redistribution of wealth that I will support. I never got a job from a poor person. Why do you want me to hate my employers? Why ‑‑ what do you have against shareholders making a profit?

Nine, charitable contributions. Although I never got a job from a poor person, I have helped many in need. Charity belongs in our local communities, where we know our needs best and can use our local talent and our local resources. Butt out, please. We want to do it ourselves.

Ten, corporate bailouts. Knock it off. Sink or swim like the rest of us. If there are hard times ahead, we’ll be better off just getting into it and letting the strong survive. Quick and painful. Have you ever ripped off a Band‑Aid? We will pull together. Great things happen in America under great hardship. Give us the chance to innovate. We cannot disappoint you more than you have disappointed us.

Eleven, transparency and accountability. How about it? No, really, how about it? Let’s have it. Let’s say we give the buzzwords a rest and have some straight honest talk. Please try ‑‑ please stop manipulating and trying to appease me with clever wording. I am not the idiot you obviously take me for. Stop sneaking around and meeting in back rooms making deals with your friends. It will only be a prelude to your criminal investigation. Stop hiding things from me.

Twelve, unprecedented quick spending. Stop it now.

Take a breath. Listen to the people. Let’s just slow down and get some input from some nonpoliticians on the subject. Stop making everything an emergency. Stop speed reading our bills into law. I am not an activist. I am not a community organizer. Nor am I a terrorist, a militant or a violent person. I am a parent and a grandparent. I work. I’m busy. I’m busy. I am busy, and I am tired. I thought we elected competent people to take care of the business of government so that we could work, raise our families, pay our bills, have a little recreation, complain about taxes, endure our hardships, pursue our personal goals, cut our lawn, wash our cars on the weekends and be responsible contributing members of society and teach our children to be the same all while living in the home of the free and land of the brave.

I entrusted you with upholding the Constitution. I believed in the checks and balances to keep from getting far off course. What happened? You are very far off course. Do you really think I find humor in the hiring of a speed reader to unintelligently ramble all through a bill that you signed into law without knowing what it contained? I do not. It is a mockery of the responsibility I have entrusted to you. It is a slap in the face. I am not laughing at your arrogance. Why is it that I feel as if you would not trust me to make a single decision about my own life and how I would live it but you should expect that I should trust you with the debt that you have laid on all of us and our children. We did not want the TARP bill. We said no. We would repeal it if we could. I am sure that we still cannot. There is such urgency and recklessness in all of the recent spending.

From my perspective, it seems that all of you have gone insane. I also know that I am far from alone in these feelings. Do you honestly feel that your current pursuits have merit to patriotic Americans? We want it to stop. We want to put the brakes on everything that is being rushed by us and forced upon us. We want our voice back. You have forced us to put our lives on hold to straighten out the mess that you are making. We will have to give up our vacations, our time spent with our children, any relaxation time we may have had and money we cannot afford to spend on you to bring our concerns to Washington. Our president often knows all the right buzzword is unsustainable. Well, no kidding. How many tens of thousands of dollars did the focus group cost to come up with that word? We don’t want your overpriced words. Stop treating us like we’re morons.

We want all of you to stop focusing on your reelection and do the job we want done, not the job you want done or the job your party wants done. You work for us and at this rate I guarantee you not for long because we are coming. We will be heard and we will be represented. You think we’re so busy with our lives that we will never come for you? We are the formerly silent majority, all of us who quietly work , pay taxes, obey the law, vote, save money, keep our noses to the grindstone and we are now looking up at you. You have awakened us, the patriotic spirit so strong and so powerful that it had been sleeping too long. You have pushed us too far. Our numbers are great. They may surprise you. For every one of us who will be there, there will be hundreds more that could not come. Unlike you, we have their trust. We will represent them honestly, rest assured. They will be at the polls on voting day to usher you out of office. We have cancelled vacations. We will use our last few dollars saved. We will find the representation among us and a grassroots campaign will flourish. We didn’t ask for this fight. But the gloves are coming off. We do not come in violence, but we are angry. You will represent us or you will be replaced with someone who will. There are candidates among us when hewill rise like a Phoenix from the ashes that you have made of our constitution.

Democrat, Republican, independent, libertarian. Understand this. We don’t care. Political parties are meaningless to us. Patriotic Americans are willing to do right by us and our Constitution and that is all that matters to us now. We are going to fire all of you who abuse power and seek more. It is not your power. It is ours and we want it back. We entrusted you with it and you abused it. You are dishonorable. You are dishonest. As Americans we are ashamed of you. You have brought shame to us. If you are not representing the wants and needs of your constituency loudly and consistently, in spite of the objections of your party, you will be fired. Did you hear? We no longer care about your political parties. You need to be loyal to us, not to them. Because we will get you fired and they will not save you. If you do or can represent me, my issues, my views, please stand up. Make your identity known. You need to make some noise about it. Speak up. I need to know who you are. If you do not speak up, you will be herded out with the rest of the sheep and we will replace the whole damn congress if need be one by one. We are coming. Are we coming for you? Who do you represent? What do you represent? Listen. Because we are coming. We the people are coming.

I hope Ms. Contreras represents a growing number of voters, I really do.

Please pardon me, though, if I doubt.

Glenn Beck interviewed the author today, I think. From the transcript:

May I, may I make a prediction. Your letter, in the next 72 hours, will be a letter that is circulated through a good portion of this country on the Internet. I have a feeling your letter may become a rallying cry.

Just doing my part.

We the People are coming.

An Accompanying Sea of Disinformation

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An Accompanying Sea of Disinformation

The whole quote is:

Simply put, gun control cannot survive without an accompanying sea of disinformation. – Anonymous

Here’s a perfect example. I’d make a drinking game out of it, but nobody can drink that fast, or that much:

[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rQN1u_aPgcM&hl=en&fs=1&rel=0&w=425&h=344]
“Gun Facts” my aching sphincter. You have to wonder about someone who can spew that much bullshit in that short a period. You really do.

As Mostly Cajun put it recently, “Remember, being ignorant isn’t your fault; staying ignorant is.” This isn’t ignorance, though. It’s deliberate misinformation. And it’s just one of the reasons I started this blog – to expose these people for what they are.

On that DHS “Rightwing Extremist” Report . . .

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On that DHS “Rightwing Extremist” Report . . .

The best take on it I’ve read anywhere, House of Eratosthenes posts On That Homeland Security Right-Wing Extremist Group Report.

Excerpts:

I skimmed through the left-wing blogs to find out what their reactions would be. Yglesias, ThinkProgress, Raw Story, Pandagon, Anonymous Liberal and Balloon Juice. A consistent and recurrent meme emerged: Troubling issues that arise from a government agency’s suggestion of terrorist motives on the part of free citizens “rejecting federal authority in favor of state or local authority” (p. 2) were left unexplored…even untouched. The subject matter turned, instead, to tit-for-tat, howzitfeel type of nonsense. Silly conservatives didn’t say a word when Bush was trampling on our civil liberties, why are they piping up now?

Awesome! The new administration was elected in on a glossy, glittery platform of “change.” And now it’s doing things that can only be defended by implying they’re the same as what the old crowd did. Some change.

Meet the new boss, same as . . . .

If only it were true. The argument is defeated — as left-wing arguments usually are — through an exercise known as reading things.

That oughta leave a mark.

As Malkin says:

[T]hose past reports have always been very specific in identifying the exact groups, causes, and targets of domestic terrorism, i.e., the ALF, ELF, and Stop Huntingdon wackos who have engaged in physical harassment, arson, vandalism, and worse against pharmaceutical companies, farms, labs, and university researchers.

Don’t take her word for it, or mine. The report to which the liberal bloggers point with their “the other guy did it too” defense, “Left-Wing Extremism: The Current Threat,” is here. You won’t need to study long. The difference between the 2001 report and the one that just came out, is structural. The older report gives facts…and more facts…and more facts…dates…cities…statistics…the history behind each of the more pertinent groups, who founded them, why, what their methods are, what they’ve been caught doing, some intelligence suggesting who funds them. It even does a decent job of inspecting the possible dangers posed by right-wing extremist groups.

This month’s report from DHS boils down to one thing: “Hey, we’d better be worried about this stuff! You know how those tighty-righties are when they lose their jobs, especially when black people are elected President!” Yes, I’m putting words in their mouths, but not unfairly.

That’s how I read it.