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Category Archives: Freedom

A Friend Comes Out… Again

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First, you can find out in much the same way as many found out from Gay Cynic on Wednesday.

I initially found out the previous Friday.  So when I found out what was happening in Olympia Tuesday and Wednesday and I was advised my help would be appreciated I was more than happy to come along.  It was an opportunity to spend more time and chat with Ray.

Wednesday on the drive down he mentioned that he’d like to rip the emotional crutch out from under people who are abusing it down there.  He felt this was a fitting way and I had to agree.  It had his sense of humor all over it.  If you get handed the short straw, you might as well enjoy it.  As he put it to me afterward, “I’ve come out now three times in my life.  First that I was gay, then as a gun owner, now as a person fighting cancer.”

I couldn’t help but be in awe with the way he is approaching the problem.  It is merely a bump in the road and he’s already gone through and fought a lot worse.

GC has posted the details of the beginning of this journey.  My only request, more of a reminder, is if you call up/email to voice you’re support don’t focus on the topic.  Be an upper not a downer.  Remember he’s fielding lots of questions from a lot of people and if everyone calls up asking about it, well that’s all he’ll be able to think about.  You can ask but limit your time on the topic.

Ultimately though Ray’s going to go all Cave Johnson on this with even more epic results.

Here is what he had planned for his full testimony:

My name is Gay Cynic.  I was recently diagnosed with cancer with an initial prognosis of 6-12 months.  This gives me an unusual level of objectivity regarding I-594 as, barring treatment success I am unlikely to have any personal stake in the game.

As legislators you are called to be objective. To weigh the facts and likely effects – intended and otherwise – of a piece of legislation.

You should not care about my cancer status.

You also should not consider I-594 proponents tragic stories in your deliberations, even if they are cunningly wrapped around carefully crafted Madison Avenue sound bites.

You are called to be objective – to set aside emotionalism, melodrama, spin and the urge to “Do Something, Anything” about the crisis du jour. After all, to an activist *everything* is a crisis.

If passed, I-594 will put Washington law in conflict with Federal law. It will require law abiding gun dealers to choose whether to become federal felons, state felons or simply go out of business. I-594 will eliminate firearms safety training in the state of Washington and entrap thousands of law abiding gun owners into felonies and misdemeanors for things as simple as handing a rifle to a friend at an informal range.

I594 creates no safety benefit. A background check will not save school children from a person that kills a parent and steals their guns to commit an atrocity.

I-594 does not propose an improved background check, it purports to expand the same background check that Jared Loughner passed before he shot Congresswoman Gabby Gifford, killed six and injured 12 others.

It is not enough to “do something.” To claim otherwise is the argument of fools and frauds, and is generally counterproductive to achieving any worthwhile goal.

We must do something worth doing – I-594 is not it.

I ask you to fulfill your responsibilities as committee members and bring I-594 to a vote, and hope that you will vote it down – clearing the table for measures that are actually constructive and not an elaborate scheme to whittle away firearms rights through the death of a thousand cuts.

Thank you.

Trust and Integrity…

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Integrity once lost can never be regained.

Yesterday I made the following comment on Facebook.

Cops will shoot anyone for any reason even if they create or aggravate the situation.

They have been trained at this point to exercise and only use one tool in their tool box.

With how heavily qualified immunity protects them I’ve lost all faith and trust in law enforcement. When a cop can create a dangerous situation unnecessarily, shoot someone, have it declared unjustified in the review and not face a single punishment other than being fired after committing homicide the system is broken.

The article that sparked my mini rant, was this:

Two North Carolina parents are in shock after local police shot and killed their 18-year-old son in their own home, while they watched helplessly.

Now this is not the first time I’ve seen or heard of something like this and it is merely another added to the list.  Not to mention incidents like the Seattle PD incident where the officer didn’t like someone carving some wood, proceeded to close the distance to someone he, as he stated was “armed”, and when the person finally turned around to see who was yelling at him the officer shot him.  The officer claimed the knife was open and that’s why he shot, it was determined however it was in fact closed.

Ultimately that shooting was ruled unjustified however the officer was not charged with any crime because “he was acting in a public capacity” at the time.

One of my friends then posted the following comment on my wall:

“Cops will shoot anyone for any reason…”. Every cop? You knew me as a safe fellow gun owner in college who stood along side you with an empty holster on the campus open carry awareness days. I’d like to think that I haven’t turned into a mindless killer now that I choose to put on a badge and serve the public

Initially the response was just going to be there except this is a serious problem and it’s a matter of trust and integrity, and I’m not going to go completely Kevin Baker this isn’t going to be short.

The problem is the police have no trust or integrity left.  I may trust my friend because I know him and don’t have to worry about him just shooting me because I know him and his character.  The problem is I don’t have that kind of rapport with most police officers, in fact most of them are a blank sheet that I know nothing about.

Just the same when an officer approaches me they know nothing about me, unless they pull me over.  Then they see that I have a concealed weapons permit when they run my license plate.  Fun little thing there is then the officer knows I am generally most likely an upstanding citizen.  Except some officers treat concealed permit holders as criminals because they dare exercise their rights and an immediate threat to the officers safety and everyone else.

But we’re not talking about their perspective, which is interesting since officer fatalities are at an all time low:

The annual report from the nonprofit National Law Enforcement Officers Memorial Fund also found that deaths in the line of duty generally fell by 8 percent and were the fewest since 1959. 

According to the report, 111 federal, state, local, tribal and territorial officers were killed in the line of duty nationwide this past year, compared to 121 in 2012. 

Forty-six officers were killed in traffic related accidents, and 33 were killed by firearms. The number of firearms deaths fell 33 percent in 2013 and was the lowest since 1887.

Yes you read that right, officer friendly is more likely to die in an a traffic accident than be shot by Sumdood.  Interestingly the number of justifiable homicides committed by officers far outpaces that rate, but what is disturbing is the burden of proof for their justification is far less than a citizen who may be found in similar circumstances.  But this is ultimately neither here nor there it’s just an interesting piece of information when viewed in the additional context of the following incidents raises serious concern.

Because what this subject is really about is my perception of officer friendly.  Can I trust him?

All that I have to go on is the fact he’s been issued a badge and a gun by the state.  Neither of which vouches for his character, mental health, competence, or respect for others.  Approximately 1% of police officers will be found to have committed misconduct,  this doesn’t include unreported incidents or incidents where misconduct was likely but could not be proven or the officer was protected through judicial fiat.

Let’s look at the Canton PD incident, because honestly it is a fantastic example of why integrity and trust is being lost and why just because it’s only 1% doesn’t inspire confidence in them.

Officer Harless, while operating as a law enforcement officer and protected as such by qualified immunity,  threatened and harassed people on more than one occasion.  Watching the video that made him famous there is something even more disturbing, the complete inaction of his partner to do anything to protect the victim.  Instead of reigning the out of control officer Roid-Rage in he just sits off to the side and does nothing, silently complacent in the actions of his partner.

It gets better though because lets now investigate the fallout from that incident.  First we had a city council member justifying Harless’s actions and defending him.  That’s right, the out of control behavior was defended by a man elected to represent the public (victim) at large.  He was only brought in for a disciplinary hearing and no charges were filed due to his threats and actions, of which there was a history of misconduct.  He was eventually fired and a minor amount of faith restored as he was at least fired.

Except now the fun begins.  All of his fellow officers banded together to support him and the police union forced the city to hire him back.  This is about that, all those officers were OK with that behavior and the obvious pattern of it.  So much so they forced the government to hire him back and put that man who destroy the trust back in a position of power.  That is how you destroy integrity.

Let’s look back on the whole of the state sponsored criminal count.  There were a lot of very screwed up instances, that the story was darn near always the same.

Nonetheless, she says: “In violation of NISD police department procedures, Alvarado drew his weapon immediately after exiting the patrol car. With his gun drawn, he rushed through the gate and into the back yard. Within seconds from arriving at the residence, Alvarado shot and killed the unarmed boy hiding in the shed.”

Hell, I had created a special tag, “hiding in plain sight“, because I was finding so many school resource officers who were screwing girls in the school.

This boils down to a matter of trust and integrity and honestly the police have lost it.  Due to their job and position they should be striving for excellence and be dealing immediately and harshly with any misconduct.  Instead many officers are intimidated into not reporting misconduct.  This is a problem within the system.  I don’t know how to fix it but it is a problem and it’s destroying the trust and tarnishing any integrity that people see left.

Why should I not be afraid of someone I don’t know who’s been given a badge and a gun by the state and have a free pass to shoot someone one, even unlawfully?  You want to fix this problem, bring the police and the people back into line at the same bar.  The public are the police and the police are the public.  Between the laws and behavior that is no longer true.

If there honestly isn’t a problem, why is there such a high domestic violence rate among police officers?  Is it because many of them are so heavily trained on relying on their use of force to get their way they forget the other tools at their disposal?

I am more fearful of the police than I am of criminals.  I can at least fight back against a criminal.  The police however can kick down my door in the middle of the night, shoot my dog, shoot me, shoot my wife, and then say oops wrong house and they all get a pass.  Why didn’t they just !@#$ing knock on my door and show me the warrant?

Oh the criminal is dangerous and he might destroy evidence.  Here’s a !@#$ing idea then, catch him on his drive to work or when he’s away from the house.  The majority of no-knock warrants are unnecessary and merely used to continue justifying funding.

Do police have a right to go home safe at the end of the day, sure, but they have no more of a right to that than the people they serve.  Honestly in signing on the dotted line, they sign on for the additional risk their job brings.  If they can’t handle it they need to go work someplace else.

Shooting a grandfather in the back while he’s lying on the ground isn’t acceptable, neither is shooting a little girl in the face, or shooting a child’s dog in a cage in front of the child.  The people aren’t the ones creating this attitude, it’s the actions and behavior of police officers.  If they want the support and trust of law-abiding citizens, they need to earn it.  Letting incidents like this happen on a regular basis without the uproar of other officers just makes them all complicit.

They are also consistently exempt from laws that are applied to the rest of the general public, that is not acceptable and is yet another example of Tyranny, and the police are happy enough to enjoy it.  Again, destroying trust, faith, and integrity one step at a time.

The actions and behavior of the police have created this rift and it’s going to take them changing their behavior to fix it.  Even then it will take a long period of time.  They need to collectively step up to the plate push out the corruption, embrace the suck and ensure that laws are applied equally across everyone, including themselves.  If some officer says, high capacity magazines should be outlawed, he should be planning on surrendering the ones from his patrol car, his house, and his locker as well.

A man of character will stand up and do the right thing, even if it hurts him personally.  I do not see men of character in law enforcement.  I see a group of men, some of whom are corrupt, but overall who operate as a “brotherhood” and will defend their brother even if he has done something wrong.  Brotherhood serves a purpose, but there’s a point where character should take over.

Quote of the Day – Phssthpok (1/6/2014)

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Cops take full responsibility for each bullet that leaves their gun,  the same way that Attorney general Janet Reno took ‘full responsibility’ for the Waco massacre…

Phssthpok – GBC Chat

January 6th, 2014

[It was in reference to this among other similar incidents.  I have nothing else to ad. -B]

 

Today’s hour long educational presentation…

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Even if you don’t really speak tech, watch it.  He doesn’t really go into deep details, though it does require some understanding of how networking works.

If you still don’t want to take the hour let me synopsize it into one single sentence:

Nothing is safe.

And there isn’t much of a hope for immediate improvement either because the NSA is leaning on organizations to leave a lot of this crap in place.  Not to mention they do not report security threats instead they want them left open for exploitation.

There are couple things that desperately need to change, one of the biggest is security needs to stop being an afterthought in software and systems development.  I’ve said it before folks, we’re in a cold war and one side just doesn’t want to admit the truth of the matter yet.

The Mission of the Modern Militia

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Having been a member of a militia (past tense), I was always struck with the question of, “What is our mission?” When I was a member of the Army National Guard, our mission was clear and spelled out. While we could have another discussion about the appropriateness of the current NG mission, it was at least clear. This was never the case as a member of the militia. There were ideas that were discussed, and we had the hope (some believe this to be a 4-letter word) that if there was an emergency we’d be called on, but there was never any formal aid arrangement, response plan, SOPs or defined mission.  This has made me think about what the mission should and shouldn’t be.  I’ll start with the latter…

There are those who believe the militia will be called on by the community in times of need whether this is flooding or all out TEOTWAWKI, but personally, I believe these individuals to be truly delusional in regards to how governments work.  If we’re talking WROL, all bets are off, but I still don’t think the militias will be the first people who the local communities will want to come to their “rescue”.  Those of us who’ve been involved in government know the red tape and complexities associated with it.  If there is ever a disaster, the last thing they will want is a bunch of unaffiliated people with guns running around claiming to have authority.  There are liability issues galore that would prevent the militias from helping in any formal capacity.  There may be unique communities out there where the local government may call on the militia, but at present, I’m not familiar with any of them, and I’m fairly confident they would be a rarity.

I don’t want to dwell too much on what I don’t think the militia is because all too often people tear down something without providing anything constructive in return so I’ll skip any other areas I feel are not fitting of the militia and go to what I believe the militias could be today.

Continuing Education:  Many of us are prior military/LEO in one form or another and would like to maintain some of the skills we learned while serving.  While I don’t see a need for troop leading procedures in my future, there are a lot of other skills I learned in the military that are very useful.  Although I’ve spend many hours doing land nav and map reading, it is a perishable skill and one that can serve you your entire life if you practice it.  Having the opportunity to teach, and relearn, this was of great benefit to myself and hopefully to those I taught.  Communication is another area that is of great benefit both in and out of the military environment.  I’ve recently obtained my HAM radio license and have been learning more about that craft.  There are other areas that can be taught in the militia that will help us maintain and learn skills that we might not have otherwise.

Networking:  Getting to know other people of a similar mindset is always beneficial and usually enjoyable.  These groups can serve as a way of getting to know people who think similarly and have common goals.  This networking also allows you to meet people with different skills sets as discussed above and to learn from those people and share the skill sets you have with them.  In some ways, it’s like Facebook, except you actually have a real relationship with these people.  I think a key part of this area is involvement with other groups.  There are dozens of groups out there that share common goals with the militias, and they, unlike the militia, will actually be called on in an emergency.  Some to look into are ARES (HAM radio), CERT, and Sheriff’s Search and Rescue.  Having members in all of these different areas is a great way to cross train and will also improve communication between these groups in an emergency.  If done properly, the militia could serve as an informal way to tie together a lot of these groups together in a way that will help them be more effective.  The more people who know one another, the better they tend to work together.

The interesting thing about the good things that a militia, or similar group, can do is that none of them necessitate uniforms, patches, websites or playing in the woods with guns.  Although not as glamorous as some of the other depictions of the modern militia, I think it’s a far more practical one.  Getting together with friends (and I would suggest family) and sharing experiences, knowledge, goals, and ideas is a great way to be better prepared for whatever might happen.  And if nothing at all happens, I think you’ll still be better off.

~John

But you can have property!

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Can you?  This started as a rant I was sending to Facebook and then I decided to push it here.  You see Chris made a post on Facebook yesterday, the crux of which was this image.

Taxation

The the thread predictably devolved into people saying how taxation is not a form a slavery because you can have property.* Guess he missed all those taxes on that property where if you don’t pay they seize your property (so in reality rent). And my personal favorite, where the state can take your property under eminent domain and give you pennies on the dollar, if the state feels like spending the pennies.  (Seriously check out that link… The City of Seattle is seizing a 103 year old woman’s property, currently a parking lot, to make it a parking lot. I can’t make this crap up.)

So don’t tell me I’m not a slave when there is nothing voluntary about my relationship with my government and I live in fear of them deciding to seize my property without cause and me with no legal recourse. Remember, this is the land of the free, where the mob can vote to have the state steal your stuff to give it to them.

If everyone saw equal services from the state, then I might not call it slavery, but entitlements are horse shit. I should not be taxed to feed someone else’s kids because they squandered their money on a big screen TV.

Go ahead and say I have no heart. Know why I don’t have kids yet? Because I’m paying for someone else’s. But remember I’m the heartless asshole for merely being the responsible person and staying within my means.

I’m paying more now for my healthcare too, why? To subsidize people who didn’t want to take care of it themselves. Pardon me while I say screw all of you who support this BS.

*He also made a comment about the ballot box being involved so it wasn’t really against your will.  Uhh, so because the mob votes to steal my stuff makes it some how morally ok and just?  WTFO!?  Seriously, how does the fact a ballot box being involved make it OK for the state to take, by force, property from one person and give it to another.  If it was really that person’s property it couldn’t be taken in such a way now could it?

**As someone who’s now working as a contractor, I’m well versed in exactly how much I’m paying out in taxes and it’s far beyond most people. For every dollar I earn I see about .46 cents.  I could easily start a family with all that money being dumped into a government who spends more frivolously than a drunken sailor… But I’m not a slave since I can rent property from the state and they can seize at any time to do with as they please.

I’m going to end the rant here because I think I’ve made my point.  But seriously if you think you’re not a slave merely because they’ve provided you some illusions of freedom, you’re an idiot.  The greatest trick the government ever pulled was making the people think they’re free when they’re really slaves, they just don’t know it yet.

Quote of the Day – Lyle Keeney

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Hmm.  Goose, gander.  Tweedle Dee, Tweedle Dum?  Bevis, Butthead?

I guess if we kick out all U.S. military and militia, people will really feel safe.  If we rip the seat-belts from our vehicles, throw away all first aid kits, close down the hospitals, get rid of the fire extinguishers, then by never seeing those things we’ll never again have to be reminded that bad things happen, except when they do.

Or we could all jump off a cliff into the ocean.  Either way we’d need to be hypnotized the same.

Lyle Keeney – Email Thread
October 3, 2013

[Now it should be noted that this was in reference to an email about this incident.  The TL;DR version is as follows.  Parents go into PSH over a police officer dropping his child off in uniform, thus armed.

Ry, rightly pointed out, “What’s good for the goose is good for the gander.”  Though I must say that the stupid is going to evolve into an epic Darwinian moment. Sadly there will be collateral damage involving children outside the gene pool of the idiot suffering from Peterson Syndrome.

With regards to the idiots and their PSH, I think this line/scene from Hunt for Red October puts it best. -B

]