Gun Owners of America: Action Alert

Gun Owners of America The Battle Will Take Longer than We’d Hoped But there’s still a very good chance we can win! “Gun Owners of America [has] been pressing lawmakers who may have wavered on this emotional issue of background checks.” - CNN’s Wolf Blitzer, April 10, 2013 We've been fighting these gun control battles for almost 40 years now. And we almost always win. But it's almost always a nail-biter.  And so it is on Obama's gun control agenda. We'd hoped that we could stop the gun control bribe-o-thon early (and risk-free) by blocking the motion to proceed to the package. But thanks to sell-outs like Pennsylvania's one-term senator, Pat Toomey, we're going to have to take a different battle position and defeat the package at a later stage. The Senate today overcame the Paul-Cruz-Lee filibuster and voted to move to proceed to Harry Reid’s gun control bill (S. 649). Where Reid needed 60 votes, the tally was 68-31. Click here to see if your Senator sold you out by voting to “move to proceed” to the bill. Republican defectors who voted anti-gun were: Alexander (TN), Ayotte (NH), Burr (NC), Chambliss (GA), Collins (ME), Corker (TN), Coburn (OK), Flake (AZ), Isakson (GA), McCain (AZ), Heller (NV), Hoeven (ND), Kirk (IL), Graham (SC), Toomey (PA) and Wicker (MS). So, here's where we are. Right after the Senate proceeded to the gun control bill, Harry Reid used his privileged recognition to put a bunch of amendments in place. In Senate parlance, they are referred to as an "amendment tree;" and they contain the universal registry bill, the Feinstein gun ban, and the magazine ban. These will be voted on in upcoming days. As for the Toomey-Manchin-Schumer universal registry bill, don't believe the press' efforts to sugar-coat it. If you have ever had an "Internet ... posting" on (or related to) your gun, you can sell it only by going to a dealer and filling out a 4473 and getting the government's approval. Only a cave man would be exempt. And once you have a 4473? Well, the ATF is going from dealer to dealer, copying the information on these forms, and feeding it into a database. But, says Toomey, he's against universal registries. This is where it would have helped if Toomey had consulted someone who knew something about guns. Registration and violation of privacy. First of all, Toomey’s anti-registry language prohibits photocopying the 4473's, but it doesn't prohibit going into the FFL with a laptop and copying all the information. Second, ATF takes the position that the data it's accumulating in a database is not a "registry," so Toomey's ban does no good. Third, guess what the sanction is for violation of Toomey's anti-registry language? Answer: Eric Holder has to choose to prosecute himself and his own department. But this isn't the only bad thing about Toomey-Manchin-Schumer. Section 107 of the sell-out also waives any federal privacy prohibitions under HIPAA to sending the names of Americans with PTSD, ADHD, and post partem depression to the gun ban database. But that’s not all. Believe in Jesus, hand in your guns? Because private shrinks will be able to add patients names into a federal database of the mentally ill - without due process - you will be at their mercy. As Red State editor, Erick Erickson says, “Activist mental health providers will probably be overly aggressive in adding people to the list. Give it five years in liberal areas and people who believe in the physical resurrection of Christ will probably get automatic entry onto the list.” And as for veterans? Toomey-Manchin-Schumer reinforces the proposition that bureaucrats in the Department of Veterans Affairs can take away veterans' rights without any due process. If a veteran has $30,000 to spend getting back the rights Toomey-Manchin-Schumer wrongly took from him, the sell-out creates yet another redundant money-trap for restoration of rights that shouldn't have been taken away in the first place. Repealing gun owner protections. What if you want to travel across the country? McClure-Volkmer allowed you to do that with an unloaded gun in the trunk (18 U.S.C. 926A). But, under the Toomey-Manchin-Schumer sell-out, unless you can "demonstrate," to the satisfaction of the New York police (1) where you came from, (2) where you're going, (3) that you're legally entitled to possess the gun in the place you can from, and (4) that you're legally entitled to possess the gun in the place you're going, they will arrest you in New York. The Toomey-Manchin-Schumer sell-out creates a Biden-like commission to insure that the cries for gun control continue. Like sprinkles on a pile of dung, Toomey and Schumer steal some of the proposals we drafted and try to use them to get us to buy onto gun control. But it won't work. The gun movement is united against this disgusting pile of gun control. Here is the new battlefield. Because of the Senate rules, many of the upcoming gun control votes will need 60 (out of 100 votes) to move forward. That will almost certainly be the case with the Toomey-Manchin-Schumer proposal. And because the entire Second amendment movement - GOA, NRA, etc. - is against the Toomey language, it virtually ensures his amendment will fail. And if Toomey-Manchin-Schumer doesn't pass, then Reid probably won’t have enough votes to overcome a second filibuster on the bill - as it would contain the original anti-gun language sponsored by Reid and Schumer. This all but guarantees that the legislation would die, as Republicans and a half-a-dozen Democrat Senators would then team up to keep the bill from getting the required 60 votes. One last question or thought: Did we waste our time supporting the Paul-Cruz-Lee filibuster and fighting the motion to proceed? No, because we forced Obama to fire most of his ammunition, as he dragged his human props around Washington in an effort to exploit them for political gain. If Obama had been able to wait to play this card until Toomey-Manchin-Schumer came up for a vote, that vote would be a lot harder for us to win. But Obama has already played this card for his "they deserve a vote" theme. Okay, they're getting their vote. But by the time we reach the vote on cloture on Toomey-Manchin-Schumer, Obama's exploitation of the victims of Newtown will begin to be realized for the cynical exploitative political ploy that it is. And he will be less able to shift gears and use the victims for the theme “They deserve a ‘yes’ vote.” ACTION: Click here to contact your Senators. Tell them to vote against cloture on the Toomey-Manchin-Schumer sell-out.

So let me get this straight

 

So let me get this straight . . .

 

I am to relinquish my unalienable rights to self defense supposedly for the greater good of the United States, because of the recommendation of an administration that doesn't know the first rule of gun safety is to treat every gun as though it is loaded (because they don't have to know firearm safety and protect themselves, they have paid ARMED guards unlike the rest of us common folk) . 

And as the picture of Dianne Feinstein so incorrectly demonstrates above, the first rule of gun safety leads to the next rule: KEEP YOUR FINGER OFF THE TRIGGER UNTIL YOU ARE READY TO FIRE YOUR WEAPON!

(Oh, I keep forgeting, this recommendation also comes from an administration that was caught running guns to criminals) .

Sarcasm On: Hmmm yeah, I'll take Feinstein's thoughts to heart . . . . I'm sure she know the first thing about responsible gun ownership. Sarcasm Off.

Feinstein and her ilk are trying to put the final nail in the coffin of American Liberty.  As though the recent consumer sell out of ammo, mags and firearms is not response enough . . . maybe we should write our Congressmen and Senators and tell them what we think.  



Guns, Guns, Guns

Another excellent perspective on the out cry for gun control in the wake tragic shootings last week.


http://sultanknish.blogspot.com/2012/12/guns-guns-guns.html

Saturday, December 15, 2012

Guns, Guns, Guns

Posted by Daniel Greenfield @ the Sultan Knish blog

If you're the biblically minded sort, then the trouble began when a jealous Cain clubbed Abel to death, but if you're evolutionarily minded, then it's a 'chicken and egg' question. Violence had no beginning, except perhaps in the Big Bang, it was always here, coded into the DNA. If people are just grown-up animals, more articulate versions of the creatures who eat each other's young, and sometimes their own young, there is as much use in wondering about the nature of evil as there is in trying to understand why a killer whale kills.

But debating how many devils can dance on the head of a pinhead is largely useless. We are not a particularly violent society. We are a society sheltered from violence. No one in Rwanda spends a great deal of time wondering what kind of man would murder children. They probably live next door to him. For that matter, if your neighborhood is diverse enough, you might be unfortunate enough to live next door to any number of war criminals, all the way from Eastern Europe to Asia to Africa.

The issue isn't really guns. Guns are how we misspell evil. Guns are how we avoid talking about the ugly realities of human nature while building sandcastles on the shores of utopia.

The obsession with guns, rather than machetes, stone clubs, crossbows or that impressive weapon of mass death, the longbow (just ask anyone on the French side of the Battle of Agincourt) is really the obsession with human agency. It's not about the fear of what one motivated maniac can do in a crowded place, but about the precariousness of social control that the killing sprees imply.

Mass death isn't the issue. After September 11, the same righteous folks calling for the immediate necessity of gun control were not talking about banning planes or Saudis, they were quoting statistics about how many more people die of car accidents each year than are killed by terrorists. As Stalin said, one death is a tragedy; three thousand deaths can always be minimized by comparing them to some even larger statistic.

The gun issue is the narrative. It's not about death or children; it's about control. It's about confusing object and subject. It's about guns that shoot people and people that are irrevocably tugged into pulling the trigger because society failed them, corporations programmed them and not enough kindly souls told them that they loved them.

Mostly it's about people who are sheltered from the realities of human nature trying to build a shelter big enough for everyone. A Gun Free Zone where everyone is a target and tries to live under the illusion that they aren't. A society where everyone is drawing unicorns on colored notepaper while waiting under their desks for the bomb to fall.

After every shooting there are more zero tolerance policies in schools that crack down on everything from eight-year olds making POW POW gestures with their fingers to honor students bringing Tylenol and pocket knives to school. And then another shooting happens and then another one and they wouldn't happen if we just had more zero tolerance policies for everyone and everything.

But evil just can't be controlled. Not with the sort of zero tolerance policies that confuse object with subject, which ban pocket knives and finger shootings to prevent real shootings. That brand of control isn't authority, it's authority in panic mode believing that if it imposes total zero tolerance control then there will be no more school shootings. And every time the dumb paradigm is blown to bits with another shotgun, then the rush is on to reinforce it with more total zero control tolerance.

Zero tolerance for the Second Amendment makes sense. If you ban all guns, except for those in the hands of the 708,000 police officers, the 1.5 million members of the armed forces, the countless numbers of security guards, including those who protect banks and armored cars, the bodyguards of celebrities who call for gun control, not to mention park rangers, ambulance drivers in the ghetto and any of the other people who need a gun to do their job, then you're sure to stop all shootings.

So long as none of those millions of people, or their tens of millions of kids, spouses, parents, grandchildren, girlfriends, boyfriends, roommates and anyone else who has access to them and their living spaces, carries out one of those shootings.

But this isn't really about stopping shootings; it's about controlling when they happen. It's about making sure that everyone who has a gun is in some kind of chain of command. It's about the belief that the problem isn't evil, but agency, that if we make sure that everyone who has guns is following orders, then control will be asserted and the problem will stop. Or if it doesn't stop, then at least there will be someone higher up in the chain of command to blame. Either way authority is sanctified, control or the illusion of it, maintained.

We'll never know the full number of people who were killed by Fast and Furious. We'll never know how many were killed by Obama's regime change operation in Libya, with repercussions in Mali and Syria. But everyone involved in that was following orders. There was no individual agency, just agencies. No lone gunman who just decided to go up to a school and shoot kids. There were orders to run guns to Mexico and the cartel gunmen who killed people with those guns had orders to shoot. There was nothing random or unpredictable about it. Or as the Joker put it, "Nobody panics when things go according to plan. Even if the plan is horrifying."

Gun control is the assertion that the problem is not the guns; it's the lack of a controlling authority for all those guns. It's the individual. A few million people with little sleep, taut nerves and PTSD are not a problem so long as there is someone to give them orders. A hundred million people with guns and no orders is a major problem. Historically though it's millions of people with guns who follow orders who have been more of a problem than millions of people with guns who do not.

Moral agency is individual. You can't outsource it to a government and you wouldn't want to. The bundle of impulses, the codes of character, the concepts of right and wrong, take place at the level of the individual. Organizations do not sanctify this process. They do not lift it above its fallacies, nor do they even do a very good job of keeping sociopaths and murderers from rising high enough to give orders. Organizations are the biggest guns of all, and some men and women who make Lanza look like a man of modestly murderous ambitions have had their fingers on their triggers and still do.

Gun control will not really control guns, but it will give the illusion of controlling people, and even when it fails those in authority will be able to say that they did everything that they could short of giving people the ability to defend themselves.

We live under the rule of organizers, community and otherwise, whose great faith is that the power to control men and their environment will allow them to shape their perfect state into being, and the violent acts of lone madmen are a reminder that such control is fleeting, that utopia has its tigers, and that attempting to control a problem often makes it worse by removing the natural human crowdsourced responses that would otherwise come into play.

The clamor for gun control is the cry of sheltered utopians believing that evil is a substance as finite as guns, and that getting rid of one will also get rid of the other. But evil isn't finite and guns are as finite as drugs or moonshine whiskey, which is to say that they are as finite as the human interest in having them is. And unlike whiskey or heroin, the only way to stop a man with a gun is with a gun.

People do kill people and the only way to stop people from killing people is by killing them first. To a utopian this is a moral paradox that invalidates everything, but to everyone else, it's just life in a world where evil is a reality, not just a word.

Anyone who really hankers after a world without guns would do well to try the 14th Century, the 1400 years ago or the 3400 years ago variety, which was not a nicer place for lack of guns, and the same firepower that makes it possible for one homicidal maniac to kill a dozen unarmed people, also makes it that much harder to recreate a world where one man in armor can terrify hundreds of peasants in boiled leather armed with sharp sticks.

The longbow was the first weapon to truly begin to level the playing field, putting serious firepower in the hands of a single man. In the Battle of Crecy, a few thousand English and Welsh peasants with longbows slew thousands of French knights and defeated an army of 30,000. Or as the French side described it, "It is a shame that so many French noblemen fell to men of no value." Crecy, incidentally, also saw one of the first uses of cannon.

Putting miniature cannons in the hands of every peasant made the American Revolution possible. The ideals of the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution would have meant very little without an army of ordinary men armed with weapons that made them a match for the superior organization and numbers of a world power.

At the Battle of Bunker Hill, 2,400 American rebels faced down superior numbers and lost the hill, but inflicted over a 1,000 casualties, including 100 British commissioned officers killed or wounded, leading to General Clinton's observation, "A few more such victories would have shortly put an end to British dominion in America."

This was done with muskets, the weapon that gun control advocates assure us was responsible for the Second Amendment because the Founders couldn't imagine all the "truly dangerous" weapons that we have today.

And yet would Thomas Jefferson, the abiding figurehead of the Democratic Party, who famously wrote, "The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants", really have shuddered at the idea of peasants with assault rifles, or would he have grinned at the playing field being leveled some more?

The question is the old elemental one about government control and individual agency. And tragedies like the one that just happened take us back to the equally old question of whether individual liberty is a better defense against human evil than the entrenched organizations of government.

Do we want a society run by the flower of chivalry, who commit atrocities according to a plan for a better society, or by peasants with machine guns? The flower of chivalry can promise us a utopian world without evil, but the peasant with a machine gun promises us that we can protect ourselves from evil when it comes calling.

It isn't really guns that the gun controllers are afraid of, it's a country where individual agency is still superior to organized control, where things are unpredictable because the trains don't run on time and orders don't mean anything. But chivalry is dead. The longbow and the cannon killed it and no charge of the light brigade can bring it back. And we're better for it.

Evil may find heavy firepower appealing, but the firepower works both ways. A world where the peasants have assault rifles is a world where peasant no longer means a man without any rights. And while it may also mean the occasional brutal shooting spree, those sprees tend to happen in the outposts of utopia, the gun-free zones with zero tolerance for firearms. An occasional peasant may go on a killing spree, but a society where the peasants are all armed is also far more able to stop such a thing without waiting for the men-at-arms to be dispatched from the castle.

An armed society spends more time stopping evil than contemplating it. It is the disarmed society that is always contemplating it as a thing beyond its control. Helpless people must find something to think about while waiting for their lords to do something about the killing. Instead of doing something about it themselves, they blame the agency of the killer in being free to kill, rather than their own lack of agency for being unable to stop him.

Milk Confiscation? Part Two . . .



If there is one thing that needs to be taught a bit better in the education system . . .

It's called  J U R Y  -  N U L L I F I C A T I O N .  That's right people, you have the power as a juror to acquit citizens brought to trial by unconstitutional laws.  Simple as that.  Your one vote as a juror has power.  It's a heck of a responsibility.

Raw Milk Co-Op Farmer Acquitted Through Jury Nullification

By JG Vibes
theintelhub.com
September 29, 2012

Last week a Minnesota man charged with violating the state’s restrictions on raw milk sales was acquitted in what he and his supporters called a victory for consumer freedom.
Alvin Schlangen is a peaceful farmer who connects people with the food sources that meet their high standards for health by providing private access under lawful ownership of farm animals.
The member owners pay the Amish farm family for labor to milk the leased 100% grass-fed cows, manage the pasture, store the feed, etc.

This co op is a sustainable farming effort where the value of food supports the cost incurred, without government subsidies or harm to the environment. The balance of food options are purchased by the club, for the members.

The group has multiple farm sources providing real food to member families- very efficiently, with lots of volunteer effort.

Over the past two years, the Minnesota Department of Agriculture has illegally raided Alvin’s van, warehouse, and farm resulting in the multiple charges that were decided upon in court last week.

Technically, Alvin was guilty of breaking the laws in question, even though the laws are totally ridiculous and unjust. Luckily this jury was informed about the process of jury nullification, and their legal right to rule in favor of the accused for breaking unjust laws.

According to Iloilo Jones, director of the Fully Informed Jury Association “Minnesota has long had highly visible FIJA Activists volunteering their time and efforts to educate every potential juror in Minnesota about the right of the people to veto bad laws through the use of the Juror Veto, or, as it is commonly called, Jury Nullification.

As laws become more and more invasive, punitive, and draconian, prison populations become more and more peopled by harmless, productive people, who have harmed no other person.

Jurors can stop the enforcement of bad laws. Jurors have stopped bad laws since freedom of religion was defended by jurors, and by later jurors who refused to enforce slavery.

We, the owners of all government, retain the peaceful, lawful right to refuse to enforce bad laws made by some judge or politician. Courageous jurors have always stood firm—for the human rights of their families and neighbors—by refusing to sanction bad laws.

The right of the People to drink the milk of their choice, and to feed their children healthy foods, is a human right.”

This news comes just weeks after a jury in New Hampshire dropped felony marijuana cultivation charges against a Rastafarian man because they believed that punishing him for the offense would be unjust.

Hopefully what we are seeing is a trend, and as more people become informed about jury nullification there will be less nonviolent people put in cages for breaking unjust laws.

______________________________

 

 

On a side note, the article mentioned that little thing called "human right".  It's not defined enough what exactly human rights are . . .

 

We like to call them what the American Founding Fathers called them: Unalienable Rights.  Meaning . . . you as a human are born with these rights and no one can legislate them away from you so as long as you are not interfering with another's Unalienable Rights.  Easily defined as the right to Life, Liberty and Property.  (Sarcasm On: Apparently, drinking milk processed however you like, doesn't seem to fall into that category. Sarcasm Off)

 

Jury Nullification was an important check and balance placed on the government by the founders of our government, so that even if the Executive, Judiciary or Legislative branches of government failed to properly check and balance each other, individuals brought to trail by unjust laws, could still be acquitted by their fellow citizens.

 

Just something to think about . . .

 

Thanks for reading,

 

- The GLSC Team

Another Check and Balance Gone

House Passes Bill Eliminating Senate Approval of Presidential Appointments         

Written by Joe Wolverton, II

By a vote of 261-116, the House of Representatives passed a bill rewriting Article II of the Constitution and divesting the Senate of the power to accept or reject the appointment of many presidential nominees.

Last year, the Senate passed the measure by a vote of 79-20, so it now goes to the desk of President Obama for his signature.

"Important positions will be filled faster, government agencies will be more capable of offering valuable services to their constituents, and the overall confirmation process will be more efficient,” said Senator Joseph Lieberman (I-Conn.), chairman of the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee.

Dozens of key management positions in the Departments of Agriculture, Defense, Commerce, and Homeland Security (including the treasurer of the United States, the deputy administrator of the Federal Aviation Administration, the director of the Office for Domestic Preparedness, and the assistant administrator of FEMA) will now be filled by presidential edict, without the need of the “advice and consent” of the Senate, a phrase specifically removed from the process in the text of the bill.

Although the House vote occurred on Tuesday, the Senate voted to surrender its constitutional check on the executive over a year ago on June 29, 2011.

Despite a last-minute attempt by some House leaders to put the measure to a voice vote, thus allowing members to vote in favor of the legislation without being listed on the record, a roll call vote was taken, and the name of every congressman who voted to unconstitutionally neuter the legislative branch is listed.

The process began last March when Senator Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) and 15 cosponsors, including Republicans Lamar Alexander (Tenn.); Scott Brown (Mass.); and Mitch McConnell (Ky.), introduced S. 679, the “Presidential Appointment Efficiency and Streamlining Act.” The measure struck from many current laws the “advice and consent” requirement for many executive branch appointments, giving the president unchecked power to fill key administration positions.

In a memo sent to Capitol Hill in advance of Tuesday’s vote in the House, Thomas McClusky of the Family Research Council reminded lawmakers, “The United States Constitution does not bestow kingly powers on the President to appoint the senior officers of the government with no process.”

Although McClusky’s reading of the Constitution is accurate, as of Tuesday it is no longer the law of the land. According to proponents of the measure, the bill benefitted from such strong bipartisan support (95 Republicans joined 166 Democrats voting in favor of passage) because its sole purpose is to relieve the backlog of unconfirmed appointees by eliminating the confirmation requirement for about 200 offices.

The process by which heads of executive branch departments are appointed and confirmed is set forth by Article II, Section 2 of the U.S. Constitution. The “Appointments Clause” provides that the president:

shall nominate, and by and with the Advice and Consent of the Senate, shall appoint Ambassadors, other public Ministers and Consuls, Judges of the supreme Court, and all other Officers of the United States, whose Appointments are not herein otherwise provided for, and which shall be established by Law: but the Congress may by Law vest the Appointment of such inferior Officers, as they think proper, in the President alone, in the Courts of Law, or in the Heads of Departments.

Now, as soon as President Obama adds his signature to the bill, the checks and balances established by our Founding Fathers as a protection against tyranny will be eliminated, as well as the concept of enumerated powers.

This history of the delicate system created by our Founders was synopsized in an article published by the Heritage Foundation:

When the delegates of the states gathered in Philadelphia in the summer of 1787 and wrote the Constitution, they distributed the powers of the federal government among two Houses of Congress, a President, and a judiciary, and required in many cases that two of them work together to exercise a particular constitutional power. That separation of powers protects the liberties of the American people by preventing any one officer of the government from aggregating too much power.

The Framers of the Constitution did not give the President the kingly power to appoint the senior officers of the government by himself. Instead, they allowed the President to name an individual for a senior office, but then required the President to obtain the Senate’s consent before appointing the individual to office. Thus, they required the cooperation of the President and the Senate to put someone in high office.

Many of the Framers had practical experience with government and recognized that not every office would be of sufficient authority and consequence as to merit the attention of both the President and the Senate to an appointment to the office. Therefore, they provided a means by which the Congress by law could decide which of the lesser offices of government could be filled by the President alone, a court, or a department head.

The Presidential Appointment Efficiency and Streamlining Act removes these barriers between the branches and shifts the powers of appointment in such a way that the very foundation of our Republic is weakened under the crushing weight of a powerful executive branch.
In light of this impending imbalance, it must be inquired as to what could compel Congress to legislate away its own power? Why would so many representatives in the Senate and the House willingly abolish their role as bulwark against executive despotism?
Arguably, the answer is a desire to reduce its workload and improve the efficiency of government.
To the minds of many, however, the trade of rightful power for a more streamlined appointment process is a ripoff. As the Heritage Foundation says:

The Congress should not reduce the number of Senate-confirmed appointments as a means of dealing with its cumbersome and inefficient internal process for considering nominations. Doing so gives away Senate influence over a number of significant appointments, does nothing to improve the Senate process, and still leaves nominees whose offices require nominations mired in the Senate process. The proper solution to the problem of a slow Senate is to speed up the Senate rather than to diminish the role of the Senate. The Senate should look inward and streamline its internal procedures for considering all nominations. The proper solution also is the faster one, as the Senate can accomplish the solution by acting on its own in the exercise of its power to make Senate rules, while S. 679 requires approval by both Houses of Congress.

Assuming for the sake of argument that there is a bottleneck in the nomination and confirmation pipeline, one solution is for the executive and legislative branches to work within the framework of the Constitution’s separation of powers to remove the blockage.
Alternatively, however, the Congress could eliminate the problem altogether by reducing the size of the bureaucracy by absolutely refusing to sign off on the creation or continuation of any department, program, or agency that isn’t specifically authorized by the powers granted by the states to the federal government in the Constitution. Such a commitment to be bound by the Constitution would significantly reduce the number of executive branch offices for which appointments would be necessary, thereby dissolving the confirmation clog.

Republicans and Democrats

http://www.newswithviews.com/baldwin/baldwin709.htm

Chuck Baldwin has written another great article.  Who's to blame for current infringements on American Liberty?  Republicans or Democrats?  You decide.

A LOOK AT HOW DEMOCRATS AND REPUBLICANS DIFFER

By Chuck Baldwin
July 12, 2012NewsWithViews.com

It is an absolute fact that no matter which of the two major parties in Washington, D.C., is in power, the freedoms and liberties of the American people continue to be eroded. However, this does NOT mean that there are not basic differences between the two parties. The two parties differ greatly on HOW government will take our liberties. Where they are similar is in the fact that neither of them has any interest in preserving liberty. Until the American people awaken to this reality, whatever freedoms we have left in this country are doomed.

Let me ask you a question: does it really matter whether a free man is enslaved by a socialist state or a fascist state? Are the prisons any more accommodating? Are the lashes from the whip any less painful? Is the agony of losing a loved one any less grievous? Is the persecution any less revolting? What difference does it make to a free man if his liberties are stolen by an Adolf Hitler or by a Joseph Stalin?

Do you want a quick reference to the difference between how the Democrats and Republicans in Washington, D.C., are stealing our liberties? When the Democrats control things, America gets more socialism; when the Republicans control things, America gets more corporatism, which is a polite word for fascism. Socialism requires government to own everything, while fascism requires government to control everything. And remember, too, fascists and socialists have always hated each other. Big deal! Fascists and socialists alike hate freedomists, which is why inside-the-beltway Repubs and Dems can’t stand people like Ron Paul, Bob Barr, and yours truly. (Remember the MIAC report identifying the three of us, and our supporters, as being potential “dangerous militia” members?) So who cares which of these two parties happens to be in power? Our freedoms continue to be under siege. That’s why the battle in Washington politics has nothing to do with preserving freedom, but everything to do with HOW government will take freedom. Will they take it by ownership or by control? And, unfortunately, what we have right now is the worst of both worlds: government is using a combination of both ownership and control to steal our liberties. Why? Because except for a very precious few elected civil magistrates (like Congressman Ron Paul), there is no one on Capitol Hill or the White House who remotely understands--or fights for--the principles of liberty.

Even worse is that when the Donkeys and the Elephants do agree, it almost always is in an effort to point the bayonets at the American citizenry. What does it matter whether government owns it or controls it? What does it matter whether it more resembles socialism of corporatism? What it doesn’t look anything like, is FREEDOM!

Take the Democrat/Republican debate over Obamacare. Even if Mitt Romney and the GOP prevail in the November elections, Obamacare will be replaced with Romneycare. And Romneycare will be 85% Obamacare, with a slight shift toward government control and a slight shift away from government ownership. Again, I say, BIG DEAL! What neither party is talking about is that the federal government has no business being in health care. Period! Just like the federal government has no business being in over 90% of everything it is involved in today. But who do you hear saying that in Washington, D.C., except Ron Paul?

Take the issue of the burgeoning surveillance society. What does it matter which major party is in power in Washington, D.C.? The TSA gets more and more obnoxiously tyrannical; abuses of civil liberties under the guise of fighting a “war on drugs” continues unabated; abuses of the Bill of Rights under the guise of fighting a “war on terror” continues unabated; the federal police state continues to grow exponentially; unconstitutional foreign entanglements continue to proliferate; ad infinitum, ad nauseam.

In a book that I have recommended numerous times, “Hitler’s Cross,” Erwin Lutzer writes on page 72, “Through surveillance, wiretaps, spying, and rewarding those who betrayed their friends, Hitler tried to control the citizens of Germany.” On page 73, Lutzer continues the thought saying, “But Hitler did not have the technology to bring every subject of his realm into line.” So, given the technology that is available today, what would Hitler do differently if he were running things in Washington, D.C.? I ask readers to think seriously about that question. What would Hitler do differently?

Today, the federal government monitors virtually every piece of electronic communication. The federal government monitors virtually every major banking transaction. It has spies infiltrated in even harmless organizations all over the country. It threatens people with the loss of their jobs or freedom (or both) to betray their friends. It spies on us with satellites; it spies on us with drones. On July 6, 2012, President Obama signed an Executive Order authorizing the federal government to take control of America’s entire communications industry. In 2006, under President George W. Bush, the US military began planning armed confrontation against the American citizenry. (I have the document in my possession.) And, of course, we must not overlook the Patriot Act which has been authorized and reauthorized under both Republicans and Democrats; the Military Commission Act which was signed by G.W. Bush; NDAA 2012 and 2013 which was signed by President Barack Obama, and which was passed by both Republicans and Democrats. And let’s not forget the federal attack against the Branch Davidians under Democrats Bill Clinton and Janet Reno, and the assault against the Randy Weaver household under Republican President George Herbert Walker Bush.

So, again, pick your poison. Both the socialist-leaning Democrats and the corporatist-leaning Republicans in Washington, D.C., meet together in pointing the bayonet against the American citizenry. And you really wonder why nothing significant changes in this country?

And in this regard, the platforms of the two major parties are completely meaningless! I dare say that Barack Obama has never read the Democrat platform and doesn’t care one iota what it says. I also guarantee you that Mitt Romney hasn’t read the Republican platform and doesn’t care one iota what it says either. Can anyone remember when Republican Presidential candidate, Bob Dole, in a rare moment of candor, publicly admitted that he had not read his party’s platform and didn’t care what it said? Party platforms are for the benefit of rank and file party members to make them feel like their ideas count for something to the party leadership. They don’t!

So, do the Democrats and Republicans in Washington, D.C., differ? Yes! They differ on how our freedoms will be taken from us. They differ on the degree of government ownership and control. They differ on the nuances of political tyranny. Where they are twins is in their lust and ambition for power, in their approval of stripping more and more freedoms from the American people, and in their absolute and total disregard for constitutional government.

Without some sort of “Great Awakening” both politically and spiritually, whatever is left of our liberties is doomed--and both major parties in Washington, D.C., are equally culpable.

Milk Confiscation?

Are you serious? Raw milk confiscation . . .

Read this article from Natural News >

(NaturalNews) In a bombshell revelation of the depth of the food police state that now exists in LA County, California, NaturalNews has learned that the LA County health department has unleashed door-to-door raw milk confiscation teams to threaten and intimidate raw dairy customers into surrendering raw milk products they legally purchased and own.

According to Mark McAfee (see quotes below), both LA County and San Diego county have attempted to acquire customer names and addresses from Organic Pastures (www.OrganicPastures.com) for the sole purpose of sending "food confiscation teams" to customers' homes to remove the raw milk from customers' refrigerators. Using both phone calls and home visits, these teams intimidate customers and try to force them to give up their milk.

These revelations have surfaced in a recorded NaturalNews interview with Mark McAfee, the founder of Organic Pastures and a food rights advocate. Here's what he told us:

LA County health enforcers go door to door, demanding your fresh milk

"I received a phone call yesterday morning from a wonderful young gal, a 36-year-old mom out of LA County. She's one of our UPS customers that we deliver overnight raw milk to her house. When the CDFA was in here the other day on our recall, they demanded to have all our delivery addresses for overnight UPS delivery. We screwed up and [inadvertently] gave it to them, they got it from one of our secretaries here. The LA County health department started calling her, six or seven times, demanding that she give up her raw milk from her own home to the health department.

She refused, then they showed up at her house and demanded that she give her raw milk to them. She was getting ready to call 911 for the Sheriff's department and have them removed from her front doorstep, and she was threatening to use her camera to take a picture of them and post it on Facebook for harassing her over her raw milk... The investigators left after she told them she was not going to give them the raw milk and to get the Hell off her property.

This is what's going on, it's like food Nazis, it's incredible what these people are doing, trying to collect food from people's houses, that have not made them ill!

Then the San Diego health department called me up and said oh we want a list of all your buyer's club members, and I said no... and they said we want all their addresses and their names, because we want to go to their homes. I said it ain't happening, we aren't going to give it to you."

Are armed raids on raw milk customers next?

LA County has already conducted armed raids on raw milk distribution centers -- are armed raids on raw milk customers next? Will LA County Health Department investigators start calling on the police to go door to door, arresting raw milk owners as if they were crack dealers?

Remember: The raw milk from Organic Pastures is legally sold, legally purchased, and greatly enjoyed by its customers. There are virtually no complaints about this product. Customers love it. Only the government wants to confiscate it and destroy it.

And even as the county is unleashing food police to confiscate raw milk that authorities say might be dangerous, they cannot find anyone actually harmed by it. Nor do they pay any attention to the fact that upwards of 70 percent of the fresh chicken meat sold at grocery stores across California is routinely contaminated with salmonella and other pathogens.

What this clearly demonstrates is yet another ratcheting up of the California police state, where county authorities reach right into your refrigerator and confiscate food that they claim might not be safe -- food that you've legally purchased and wish to consume knowing full well that it's fresh and raw!

Regulators operating as lawless, idiotic tyrants

The question on all our minds is simple: Where does this end? Having already criminalized raw milk distribution at Rawesome Foods, thrown James Stewart in jail (http://www.naturalnews.com/035208_James_Stewart_torture_county_jail.h...) and completely shuttered the Rawesome operation, California's bureaucrats seem to have too much time and money on their hands, so they target real food and local farms while ignoring the truly dangerous criminals running loose across the streets of L.A.

Such is the inevitable result of big government gone bad, which is almost an oxymoron because big government always goes bad. Eventually, the power granted to authorities at any level (county, state, federal) is turned against the People, and food, farms and freedoms are among the first targets to be threatened.

Read NaturalNews for more breaking news on this food police confiscation story. In the mean time, I also recommend reading www.TheCompletePatient.com for timely coverage of this topic, as well as "Raw Milk Freedom Riders" (http://rawmilkfreedomriders.wordpress.com).

Learn more: http://www.naturalnews.com/035895_food_police_raw_milk_confiscation.html#ixzz1v8QqstlT

Thanks for reading,

- GLSC Team

The Theme is Freedom

Survival of American Liberty is essential to any hope that our country has at returning to greatness.  With new legislation introduced daily, that expands government and regulates every aspect of daily life, it is clear that the average American needs to examine exactly what it means to be Free, and what it means to be an American.   

To understand “where” America needs to get to, we need to understand the correct history of where America came from, what principles it was built upon, and how those facts greatly differ from the liberal view of American history that we are so accustomed to hearing and reading every day.

I was turned on to this book recently.  Below is a link to a free study guide and “cliff notes”, if you will.  Get the book, you can buy it on Amazon.com and get it shipped right to your door, for about $10 to $15.

http://digitalcommons.liberty.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1096&context=gov_fac_pubs

The author of this book defines clearly that competition (something that gave this country the ability to make advances in every field of work above all other nations) is being destroyed through regulation.  Our country is clearly spending more than we’ll ever be able to pay off.  For the first time, new generations will not be able to expect to earn a standard of living better than their parents.

It no longer is about Republican or Democrats.  It’s about defining the major problem in this country.  I highly recommend looking into this read.

Thanks for reading,

- GLSC Team