Archive for the 'Politics' Category

Daniel Barger:

“This would fall under the ‘self fulfilling prophecy’ description. People comment about how abusive, invasive and criminalistics government employees and the judiciary are and those same people
engage in conduct that PROVES THE POINT.”

ARSTechnica:

Federal prosecutors got Ross Ulbricht thrown in prison for life for running the Silk Road online drug marketplace. Now, they’re going after people who made comments online about the judge who sentenced him.

The Department of Justice is seeking the identities of commenters at Reason.com, a libertarian website that has covered Silk Road extensively. The hunt for commenters was revealed yesterday, when the legal blog Popehat published a grand jury subpoena (PDF) that DOJ investigators gave to Reason.

“Why is the government using its vast power to identify these obnoxious asshats, and not the other tens of thousands who plague the internet?” wrote Popehat blogger Ken White. “Because these twerps mouthed off about a judge.”

On May 31, two days after Ross Ulbricht was sentenced, Reason published a blog post looking back at his plea for leniency. The post is sympathetic to Ulbricht and Silk Road, which it calls “a revolutionary website that made it easier and safer to buy and sell illegal drugs.”

There are more than 100 comments on the short Reason article, and a quick scan suggests they are universally negative. US District Judge Katherine Forrest threw the book at Ulbricht, giving him life without the possibility of parole—more than prosecutors asked for. Her sentencing speech was a full-throated defense of the drug war.

Prosecutors want “any and all identifying information” related to the following eight comments, all published shortly after the May 31 blog post went up:

• Agammamon: Its judges like these that should be taken out back and shot.
• Alan: It’s judges like this that will be taken out and short. FTFY.
• croaker: Why waste ammunition? Wood chippers get the message across clearly. Especially if you feed them in feet first.
• Cloudbuster: Why do it out back? Shoot them out front, on the steps of the courthouse.
• Rhywun: I hope there is a special place in hell reserved for that horrible woman.
• Alan: There is.
• Product Placement: I’d prefer a hellish place on Earth be reserved for her as well.
• croaker: Fuck that. I don’t want to oay [sic] for that cunt’s food, housing, and medical. Send her through the wood chipper.

In the subpoena to Reason, the government requests that the company “voluntarily refrain from disclosing the existence of the subpoena to any third party,” but makes it clear they have no legal obligation to do so. The Popehat blog post does not identify the source of the subpoena.

Also see this important article at Popehat.com who does a good analysis.  Their conclusion?  Regrettably, The Government Can Probably Abuse the Grand Jury Subpoena Power This Way.

What you see here is incestuous law at its worst.  The prosecutors – who are part of the system and “officers of the court – want to find anonymous commenters in order to keep the system firmly ensconced.  They will get their way or send out the LEOs – who are themselves part of the system and officers of the court.  It will all eventually be heard or adjudicated by judges, who are officers of the court.

I firmly believe that even more troubling times are headed for our country.  An economy based entirely on fiat money, debt and fractional reserve banking cannot long last.  Furthermore, as “European American” correctly observes, “Armed, Law Abiding Citizens, and a Militarized Fascist Police State cannot coexist.”  Hard times are coming, and they cannot be stopped or held in abatement.

In the mean time, though, be careful what you you say and where you say it, even anonymously.

Entries in the annals of wickedness.  I also hear that in England you can’t go anywhere in the major cities without being recorded by a camera.  Perhaps some government authority is getting their groove on watching all of this play out.  No OC spray, no clubs, no batons, no sticks, and I would surmise no slapping either.

You wouldn’t want to harm your attackers, ladies.  So blow the whistle and spread your legs, girls.  It’s groove time.

Mike Vanderboegh:

But we are here, now. We ARE acting. Look around you. You know in your heart that for every one here today, there are tens, hundreds, even thousands just like us. People who will not comply. And do you hear that? Listen. Do you hear that? That’s the sound of all those who are not here but who are convinced that this time the tyrannical wolves are indeed coming to our doors. Do you hear it? That’s the sound of cleaning rods moving ceaselessly in thousands of rifle barrels as they are scrubbed to get ready for the coming fight.

The video of Mike’s speech is here.  I honestly don’t see how Mike keeps going.  Traveling exhausts me.  Read Mike’s entire speech, and watch the video.

David Codrea first reported on Michael Bloomberg’s next move in cyberspace:

Anti-gun billionaire Michael Bloomberg will be expanding his influence over managed information about guns the public is exposed to when he launches a propaganda effort masked as news in June, a Friday Capital report notes. The announcement of two principals setting the tone and cranking out the propaganda is instructive on what we can expect.

James Burnett, formerly of The New Republic and New York Magazine will be bringing his established “progressive” flair to the helm as editorial director. Jennifer Mascia, who worked on the strictly one-sided Gun Report for The New York Times, is also “attached prominently to the Everytown news project.”

Ah.  The truth comes out about Jennifer.  Recall I had said the following about her credentials.

Tommy Gnosis is someone named Jennifer Mascia, who has her own web site.  In fact, she was one of the authors of the now defunct “The Gun Report” for the New York Times.  Recall that report?  That awful, hideous, dreary rundown of shootings every day?  As if all we have to do is remove those awful guns from society and sin goes away because evil is located in things rather than the heart of man (a noted neo-Platonic and stoic view).

Anyway, I did an IP trace and found that the address was owned by Bloomberg.  It makes sense, since I also found out that she works for Bloomberg via Everytown For Gun Safety.  Her Disqus account is active, and features snark, misdirects, sarcasm, insults, and most of all, prose designed to demoralize and demonstrate the complete impotence of whatever group she is berating at the moment.  The prose is designed to cause depression and dejection.

Here is the lesson.  Bloomberg is paying her to visit web sites – particularly gun rights web sites – and spread discontent and dejection.

Nope, said she in the comments.

Hi Herschel,

I am not paid to comment here, or anywhere, nor have I ever been. There is no “tactic.” I have never worked for a political organization or a nonprofit, only media companies, and before that, restaurants. No one at Everytown knows I comment here. I actually don’t work with the advocacy arm of Everytown. The news site will be staffed with journalists, not lobbyists. We have zero to do with elections or phone banks. We won’t be working with Everytown staffers.

Her Disqus account was by “Tommy Gnosis.”  I outed her and she posted as “Guest.”  She responded that she isn’t paid to comment anywhere.  There is no “tactic.”  She claimed no relationship at all to Bloomberg.  Now we find out that her use of an IP address that pointed back to Bloomberg was no coincidence.  She is indeed trafficking in propaganda, and she is in the employ of Bloomberg.  Let’s continue with Codrea’s second article on Bloomberg’s next move.

“Tommy Gnosis is someone named Jennifer Mascia,” Herschel Smith at The Captain’s Journal posted in March. He was describing someone who, under cover of anonymity, “visits web sites — particularly gun rights web sites — and spreads discontent and dejection.”

That’s consistent with the “elaborate subterfuge” technique for “infiltrating and disrupting alternative media online” used by those with an agenda. Per Canadian research, such “Internet trolls aren’t just mean — they’re sadists and psychopaths.”

That would also seem consistent with the control-all megalomaniac who hired her, in a company-he-keeps kind of way. Mascia is one of two paid flacks “attached prominently to the Everytown news project,” an experiment in virtual Astroturf that billionaire Michael Bloomberg will be rolling out this summer.

David then goes on to explore her past as daughter of a mob hit man.

What drives Mascia is anybody’s guess, but chances are her father having been an underworld killer with multiple hits under his belt had an influence. That probably comes as a surprise to many gun rights advocates, unaware that Al Jazeera told its readers “America’s best hope for tracking gun deaths is a mob enforcer’s daughter,” and Bloomberg’s Moms Demand Action gushed on social media that her story was “Amazing.”

Readers who have been with me a while may recall that commenters pushed Jennifer around a bit when she visited this web site.  In fact, my readers drove her completely off of Disqus, as my oldest son Josh remarked to me.  But don’t feel sorry for her.  David notes that:

At this point, though, good people would still feel a degree of sympathy. After all, Mascia had no control over who her parents were or what they did. Their defects and failings were not her fault.

The problem is, she’s chosen to become part of an effort to make the rest of us defenseless against sociopath predators like her father, and enablers who help them kill, like her mother. She knows full well no “law” proposed by her billionaire patron would have any effect on stopping diseased animals like John Mascia from working his sick will on more victims.

David is right on target.  I said to Josh that “You absolutely must remember that she is the kind of person who would send the SWAT team to forcibly take your guns.”  And that’s the point after all.  Despite any sympathetic feelings you might have for such people, it isn’t that they want peace for all men.  Jennifer knows that we will never voluntarily give up our guns.  She knows that it will take a bloody civil war to try to disarm us.  She doesn’t care.  She supports violence if it is perpetrated by the state.  Just like Bloomberg, if it’s her folks with the guns, she’s okay.  She is only in favor of disarming certain people, and readers should realize that you are among that group of “certain people.”

As for pushing Jennifer around, I’ve made clear that if you want to come in this back yard and run with the big dogs, you’d better be prepared for some rough business.  And as for Jennifer herself, you weren’t entirely honest with us, were you?

David Codrea’s First Article

David Codrea’s Second Article

David Codrea:

The National Rifle Association last week called a U.S. Court of Appeals ruling, in favor of the American Civil Liberties Union and against Director of National Intelligence James Clapper, “a significant victory” and “a big loss for Big Brother.” The lawsuit challenged the National Security Agency’s position that collection of telephone “metadata” was authorized by the so-called “Patriot Act.”

“Your NRA had participated in the case by filing friend of the court briefs at different stages of the proceedings,” the Institute for Legislative Action report advised. “We have also supported legislation to curtail the NSA’s dragnet surveillance of American citizens.”

Why?

Aren’t we told NRA is a “single issue” organization, focused solely on promotion and protection of the Second Amendment?

Yea, I’ve heard that claptrap for years now, especially from the progressives over at reddit/guns.  It annoys me because it’s so hypocritical.  The NRA and their advocates get to say that when it’s convenient.  When it comes to something like immigration and what it portends for gun control, well, that’s entirely another story.

From Seymour Hersh, the real story of the UBL raid.  Or not.  And really not (via Mike Vanderboegh).  Listen folks.  Seymour Hersh has a reputation for padding his stories with anonymous sources and things that cannot be verified.  And no one ever comes forward later to exonerate Sy Hersh.  Take everything you hear, see and read with a grain of salt.

Trans-Pacific Parnership: Stupid Party Cedes Working Class To Democrats – Setting Up Next Defeat.  See also this.  The GOP is so in-the-pocket of corporate America they can’t see straight.  They are whores, every one of them.  And both parties are completely corrupt.

News from New York:

UNION SQUARE, N.Y. (PIX11) — Police are searching for a man wanted for bashing two women with a hammer in Union Square and who may be connected to two other attacks in Manhattan.

A photo of the alleged attacker was released midday Tuesday. Earlier in the day, police sent out a sketch of a possible culprit but later said to disregard that image, replacing it with a grainy surveillance photo.

NYPD said the man began his rampage about 7:30 p.m. Monday when he took out a hammer from inside a bag and hit a 28-year-old woman on the head. The victim was sitting on a bench in Union Square Park.

About 10 minutes later, he slammed a hammer on a 33-year-old woman, attacking her from behind near 44 West 18th St. and leaving her with a scalp wound, police said.

I don’t want to hear another damn word about how dangerous guns are until someone makes a law that controls these implements of death with universal background checks and bans all assault hammers.

World Net Daily:

In government, secrecy is the enemy of honesty and righteous rule.  That’s why this administration has been so loath to tell anyone anything about what it’s doing.

But I’ve come to the conclusion that this administration has actually been a good thing for America, albeit painful.  Heretofore, we only thought of the democrats as the gun grabbers, collectivists and advocates of socialized medicine, and big government control freaks.

But this administration has forced the GOP to tell the world what it’s all about.  So for instance, Senators like John Thune (and many others) who voted to confirm Loretta Lynch have told us that they think just like the democrats.  Anyone who enables this president to press his ill-conceived ideas on America is a traitor, and that includes GOP and democrats alike.  And they deserve to be treated as traitors.

David Codrea:

Admitting that legislation it passed Monday will not stop violent crime, Cleveland politicians instead came up with excuses for imposing it on citizens anyway, Northeast Ohio Media Group reported. All but one Council member, Zack Reed, voted in favor of the new edicts, which in many areas duplicate state law, but supposedly will allow the city to keep resulting fines.

Whether any such coveted revenues will outweigh further legal costs the city will face is a question taxpayers should be asking their representatives who insisted on reopening an issue presumably already settled in the courts.

Yea, duplication of laws came immediately to mind when I read about this legislation.  Take note that there is a nexus between this sort of thing and the requirement to get CLEOs to approve of gun permits, even in “shall-issue” states like my own of North Carolina, where the permitting process costs a non-trivial amount of money.  A source of revenue, it is.

Mike Vanderboegh has returned safely home.  Good.  Here is his speech.

TREASON TO A GOVERNMENT BASED UPON TREASON TO ITS OWN FOUNDING DOCUMENT IS NO TREASON AT ALL! It is merely obedience to God and the truest expression of the inalienable and natural rights to life, liberty and property that HE gave us. It is also an act of fidelity to the rule of law and the Founders’ constitutional republic. Anyone who tells you differently is selling something.

Read it all here.

Via WRSA, this from Spiegel:

The spies were to find out as much as possible about the target towns: Who lived there, who was in charge, which families were religious, which Islamic school of religious jurisprudence they belonged to, how many mosques there were, who the imam was, how many wives and children he had and how old they were. Other details included what the imam’s sermons were like, whether he was more open to the Sufi, or mystical variant of Islam, whether he sided with the opposition or the regime, and what his position was on jihad. Bakr also wanted answers to questions like: Does the imam earn a salary? If so, who pays it? Who appoints him? Finally: How many people in the village are champions of democracy?

The agents were supposed to function as seismic signal waves, sent out to track down the tiniest cracks, as well as age-old faults within the deep layers of society — in short, any information that could be used to divide and subjugate the local population. The informants included former intelligence spies, but also regime opponents who had quarreled with one of the rebel groups. Some were also young men and adolescents who needed money or found the work exciting. Most of the men on Bakr’s list of informants, such as those from Tal Rifaat, were in their early twenties, but some were as young as 16 or 17.

The plans also include areas like finance, schools, daycare, the media and transportation. But there is a constantly recurring, core theme, which is meticulously addressed in organizational charts and lists of responsibilities and reporting requirements: surveillance, espionage, murder and kidnapping.

You listen to me very carefully.  This is coming to America.  In addition to the flood of illegals across the Southern border for whom we will have to provide SNAP and medical care, along with an increasingly totalitarian government who wants to control every aspect of our lives, we will soon face totalitarian Islam unlike anything we have ever seen up close.  Be prepared.  Listen to me.  Be prepared.  If you’re not prepared now, then get prepared – immediately.

David Codrea:

As for the first part of his statement, it’s funny he prefaced it with “But I’ll be honest with you,” and then failed to mention who has done comparison shopping in such neighborhoods and then reported which purchase offered more quantity and variety selections, was quicker, easier, less expensive and scary, and carried fewer inherent risks. It’s also funny he failed to mention why that was the fault of gun owners, and where he got the talking point from.

Barry is a liar, and he’s not very creative either.  He has to use the lies created by other people in order to have talking points.  It’s a far cry from his lofty rhetoric and prediction of the cessation of the “rising of the tides” with his advent.  David has written a good article and vetted Obama’s sources on this one.  I find it amusing when we know their tricks.  Similarly, their astroturfing has been such an abysmal failure that it does more for our side than theirs.  Read all of David’s piece.

Kurt Hofmann:

This unimaginably courageous man, “armed” only with a shopping bag, is one of CSGV’s despised “insurrectionists”? Granted, one could make the case that refusing to meekly surrender to the government’s unlimited coercive force is indeed “insurrectionist” behavior, even when unarmed, and thus doomed. The Chinese government no doubt believes it was. But isn’t that a good thing–something to be admired, even revered?

Very good catch, Kurt.  Go read what Kurt is talking about.  And no, CSGV couldn’t care less about ending totalitarianism’s rule over the people, leading to such things as the murder of children under the still-enforced one-child policy.  As long as the collective is unhindered in its aims, then the CSGV is happy.  That says all sorts of remarkably bad, ugly, obscene things about Josh Horwitz, doesn’t it?

From Glenn Reynolds, backyard grilling targeted by the EPA.  Glenn responds, I’M INCREASINGLY IN FAVOR OF BACKYARD TARRING-AND-FEATHERINGS THAT TARGET THE EPA.  David Codrea also notes this today.

Yes, tar and feathers.  It seems to me that it’s past time for disobedience and threats.  Until the federal government has a healthy fear of the people, they will continue to perpetrate this sort of obscenity.