Can we reclaim liberty? Is it even possible, so far down the road? John Adams said, “Liberty, once lost, is lost forever.” We must act as though he were wrong.
What can we do? Clearly voting does not matter. Even with Congress’ abysmal approval rating, the same derelicts are re-elected time after time. While we were sleeping, they changed the rules to favor themselves. We can’t stop them at the voting booth unless we all rise as one and they know it.
Why would they stop on their own? They have all the power and access to all the money. They either stole individual liberty by introducing bills that undermined the Constitution, or they allowed it to be stolen by not reading the bills and not objecting if they did.
Today, legislators allow liberty to stay stolen by not righting the ship!
There are a few liberty Congressmen (KY being responsible for two of them). Sen. Rand Paul (although some say he has a toe over the liberty line), Rep. Thomas Massie, Rep. Justin Amash and Sen. Mike Lee all stand with liberty.
Who else? Who, if any, of the other 531 are liberty legislators? Sen. Ted Cruz leans constitutional for the most part. Cruz’ stance on the IRS is delicious. He’s just a little more GOP-TEA than Liber-TEA… well, nobody’s perfect.
Dear Congress, we didn’t elect you to lead. We elected you to represent within the confines of the Constitution. If what a constituent wants is unconstitutional, we expect you to side with the Constitution. Period.
Liberty in Kentucky
As far as the Kentucky General Assembly goes, we are on an identical sinking ship. Other than a few brave souls, we mostly have legislators who are ignorant of the facts, haven’t read the bills (and never will), vote only along party lines to ensure re-election, are ignorant of the Constitution (both of them) and/or think that their opinion (often based on their religious beliefs) matters.
Dear State Legislators: your opinion matters not at all. Zero. Here’s what matters: your willingness to buck the status quo, to demand adherence to the Kentucky Constitution, to stop ignoring the debt, to cut government spending, to turn down your immoral pension, to be disliked by your fellows until they see the light. These would be a good start.
Once in office, politicians are infected with the arrogance of power. With few exceptions, even well-meaning, well-intentioned legislators succumb.
“They like me,” they think. “And, darn it, I’m going to take care of them.” That translates to keeping us safe, particularly from ourselves, which is where the real trouble begins.
They keep us safe by passing laws: seat belt laws, smoking bans, upholding and introducing permit laws, business licensing laws, regulations, emission laws. They keep us safe by allowing agencies control over our bodies, families and property. Like allowing the EPA to jail property owners and close down mines. Like allowing the FDA to forbid alternative treatments for disease and spread lies about raw milk.
“Don’t worry,” they say. “We don’t like it either, but it’s all for your own good. If you lost your job, you can go on welfare and get SNAP and we’ll feed your children nutrition-free food at school. It’s going to be fine. Hey, look — an immigrant!”
There are states that have it worse than Kentucky, no question.
- Florida arrests pastors who feed the homeless.
- Michigan wants to keep everyone but Big Ag from growing and selling veggies.
- In Iowa and Utah, it’s a crime to photograph conditions in CAFOs (Caged Animal Feeding Operations).
- Tennessee allows cops to draw blood if you are suspected of DUI. Talk about unreasonable search.
- Connecticut suspends parental rights when it deems it knows best for a child.
- If you are a parent in Maryland, don’t let your kids out of your sight or you could lose them.
- In Arizona, don’t let one of your kids die because the state takes the others.
Those things could happen here. In fact, we can count on it. We can count on it because the powerful do not relinquish power. They want more. The fact that all those tyrannies happened successfully in other states simply means “precedent” to politicians and unelected bureaucrats in our state.
This is why liberty activists need to step up NOW.
Can we reclaim liberty peacefully?
Frederick Douglass warned that, “Power concedes nothing without a demand. It never did and it never will.”
Liberty is suppressed at gunpoint. Drive without wearing a seat belt and an armed enforcer pulls you over. Take a picture of the inside of a courtroom and an armed enforcer takes your camera. Set up a lemonade stand without a permit. Sell a home-made pie to a neighbor. Smoke a harmless medicinal herb in the privacy of your living room. Don’t pay your taxes.
Liberty can certainly be reclaimed at gunpoint. That’s how the framers did it. If we can’t reclaim it peacefully, the fight will likely turn violent.
How to Right the Ship sans Violence
It can be done IF we start right now. Here’s how:
- Question authority. All of it all the time. Out loud.
- Stop fully complying with the IRS. You can do this without risking jail or fines. All you do is stop using their forms, write letters and ask questions. You risk nasty return letters and phone calls (until you inform them that you record all calls, after which they won’t call again). As long as your taxes are fully pre-paid, hassle is all you risk. (How-to on this coming soon.)
- Don’t obey ANY laws you can get away with not obeying, like jaywalking, buying food from your neighbor, drinking raw milk.
- Don’t obey ANY laws you can stand being fined or arrested for, like wearing a seat belt, opening a lemonade stand, selling raw milk.
- Vote with your wallet every chance you get.
- Don’t sign up for Obamacare. Yes, pay the fine.
- Ditto encrypted email. Startmail is $60/year and makes encryption easy. There are other services coming online now as well. (Don’t use Hushmail.)
- Trade and barter privately.
- Don’t use mainstream medical doctors. HINT: if you take care of yourself, eat real food, don’t drink soda or eat junk food, exercise a little bit, detox occasionally, take a few supplements and get plenty of sleep, you won’t need a doctor unless you break your leg.
- Take care of yourself so you have your wits about you when peaceful non-compliance opportunities pop up.
- Don’t take pharmaceuticals unless you are absolutely certain your life depends on it. “Certain” means you did your own research and know as much about your ailment and possible cures as your doctor. (If your doctor says there is no cure for your ailment, only treatments, find another doctor.)
- Don’t eat GMO foods. (If you are unsure about GMOs, watch this.) Tell your grocer that you don’t buy any foods containing GMOs and you’d like as many food choices as possible that carry the Non-GMO label.
- Buy only organic and/or local-farm produce. Tell your Ag Commissioner, governor and state reps that you expect them to protect your right to choose the foods you eat.
- Support the Farm to Consumer Legal Defense Fund for $50/year in case your Ag Commissioner, governor and state reps don’t protect your food rights. The good attorneys at F2C will.
- Home school. Liberty kids are the hope for the future.
- Grow your own food. Even if it’s only herbs in a pot on your windowsill, grow some of your own food.
- Activist Post offers 50 Ways to Starve the Beast. What can you do on that list?
Do as many of these as you can. If you are already doing some of these, then choose a couple more and do those. Keep adding till the Beast relinquishes.
Share this article with your friends, family and neighbors. If even one of them joins in the fun, that is a huge victory. If anyone whines, remind them of Frederick Douglass’ entire quote:
“If there is no struggle, there is no progress. Those who profess to favor freedom, and yet depreciate agitation, are men who want crops without plowing up the ground. They want rain without thunder and lightning. They want the ocean without the awful roar of its many waters. This struggle may be a moral one; or it may be a physical one; or it may be both moral and physical; but it must be a struggle. Power concedes nothing without a demand. It never did and it never will.”
Frederick Douglass was a freed slave.
Now’s your chance to be one, too.
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Brilliant – the nuclear waste problem nags at me, too… I am sending this suggestion to Ted Cruz TODAY. And Rand and Thomas, of course.
At first blush, Ted Cruz’ suggestion to abolish the IRS and send the IRS workers to secure the southern border sounds like a good idea, but when I think about this plan, I imagine long lines at the border, immigrants waiting on hold for hours on the phone before their calls are dropped or they’re transferred to the person who put them on hold hours before, lost immigration forms, and political favoritism allowing easy entrance to those who favor big government and draconian and abusive treatment for those who oppose big government. In short, the IRS could mess up something that’s already as messed up as our southern border. Maybe the surplussed IRS workers could serve a useful purpose as slow neuron absorbing shielding if we layered them between barrels of nuclear waste deep underground in a big Nevada salt mine.