skip to main |
skip to sidebar
OK, so now I'm getting so lazy I'm copying and pasting from the comments on my own blog. My friend Ioannes replied to my post of Glenn Becks "Pledge of Nonviolence" with the comments below. I'm putting this up because I've been thinking about this a lot over the last few weeks; the question of what the proper response to the coming violence should be.
Because there will be violence. We are dealing with evil now in our country and evil will have its way. We've seen the beat downs from SEIU here in St. Louis and elsewhere. These are just the beginning. The forces aligned with the administration have waited for this moment for years and they aren't going to let it slip from their hands.
I've been, for most of my life, of the mindset that force should be met with overwhelming force. If my family or I am threatened then I wouldn't wait to be hit first but would attack with as much power as I could muster to destroy the threat before it harms us. Just like a fist fight; they don't remember how you won, just that you did.
But this fight for the soul of our country and the fate of our people is different. It's not a fistfight, personal and dirty. We're not just trying to come out on top, to survive to fight another day. We are working for something much greater. We are trying to restore our country to the ideals established by our Founders. To do this we must act as our Founders acted; slow to anger and deliberate in our actions. We must make the case, not only to the people of America and the world of today, but to future generations, that we have done all we can to find a peaceful resolution to our circumstances. Because we will be judged by history for the decision we make.
If somehow, by the grace of God, we are able to restore our Republic to what it was intended to be we need future generations to know we fought with honor, that we worked for peace and if we take up our guns that we only took them up after all other options had been exhausted. We must fight on the side of God, looking to him and Him alone for guidance. We have to act humbly and prayerfully or we will be destroyed.
Anyway, you can read Ioannes' comment below and my response below that. I'd be real interested to get the input of others on this subject so please leave your comments.
(Follow up: Ioannes has posted a follow up on his site. Please hop over and read it.
Every American needs to, no, absolutely must begin to think about this issue. Much will be asked of us in the coming days. We have to know where we stand and be ready to take the action we deem appropriate. When the time comes for action there won't be time for thinking.)
"I pledge to always place the individual right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness first, and to never initiate force against another.
I cannot pledge never to use force. Hitler could never have been stopped by the type of resistance showed by Ghandi to the British, and the only thing that dissuaded the Soviets was the threat of the use of overwhelming nuclear force on the part of the United States if we were to be attacked.
Evil respects one and only one thing: overwhelming and unremitting force to engulf and conquer it. Pacifism does NOT work. It never has. And it never will. Our freedom will once again require the shedding of blood not by martyrs in the cause of pacifism, but by men willing to be soldiers in the defense of hearth and home. If attacked, then we have to fight NOT because we hate liberalism (though that may be true), BUT because we love our families, our churches and our freedom.
No, I won't sign Glenn Beck's pledge. I won't be a mere martyr. If I have to go to my death because I oppose the onslaught of tyranny, then once attacked (and "they" will attack, rest assured), let me go defending what is most precious and noble: my family (such as it is), my church and my freedom to worship God.
I do pledge however to NEVER EVER bend my knee to the Obamination of Desolation and his demonic legions of putrid liberalism and rancid wicked progressivism from very depths of satan's hell."
____________________________________________________________________________________________
"You go boy!
Look, I agree that the attack will come and in the end we will have to fight, if a nonviolent witness proves ineffective. However, I think the nonviolent witness must be tried first.
My reason is that when the attacks come they will use the media against us. They will try to paint us as the aggressors and themselves as the defenders of all that is good and holy.
If we respond to their violence with violence we will play into their hands. It will be all to easy for a skilled technician to cut and paste defensive fighting and turn it into aggression.
We must show the world that we are the sensible ones, the ones on the side of the angels. It is this peaceful approach that is causing Obama's forces trouble now.
They have tried to paint the Tea Party as a group of wild eyed revolutionaries bent on the destruction of the Republic. Boy have they tried. The full force of the government propaganda machine has been brought to bear, from Saturday Night Live to most of the major newspapers to MSNBC and CNN and even the snide and inane remarks made during sit coms.
And it's not working. Why? Because the Tea Parties haven't given them anything to work with. No arrests, no beatings, no rock throwing; nothing but peaceful assembly to ask the government for redress of our grievances.
This peaceful witness has been our best weapon and it will continue to be because the American people see it for what it is and they see the Progressives and their union thugs for what they are.
At some point the people may have to pick up their guns once again to defend our natural rights. If that time comes, and I pray it doesn't, there will be no turning back and no end until one side or the other emerges the clear victor.
Americans are a peaceful people and a peaceful approach must be our first response. We must try to remain peaceful, even in the face of violence, asking for the protection of God in our times of trouble. We must allow God the time to change hearts. If the time comes that we must take up arms, let God make the decision. By acting in peace we leave it in His hands. We will act as His instruments of justice, not our own."
All of the crying of late over global warming and man's impact on the environment and look at what one little volcano can do. We are insignificant in terms of our ability to manipulate or damage the environment. It's only our inflated sense of self that allows us to assume such visions of power.
"A volcano erupts in Iceland, and the effects ripple around the globe: A mom in Romania frets about making her son's wedding in Texas. A florist in New York worries shipments won't arrive. Patients awaiting treatment in Nigeria have to wait another week for the doctors.
The fallout from the ash cloud looming over Europe illustrates just how interconnected our world has become.
Thousands of planes fly millions of passengers and tons of cargo each day, providing the economic lifeblood of nations and businesses. The flights deliver products for sale or items as small as a specialized tool that lets a factory keep operating.
The planes also bring medicines to hospitals and food aid to earthquake or hurricane victims. And they bring war and peace. Soldiers are often transported to and from hot spots by air.
Tales of woe and inconvenience span every social level, from the Norweigian prime minister who got stuck in New York and had to govern using his iPad, to ordinary people who saved money for trips of a lifetime, then had to abandon those plans.
The eruption was a single act of nature, but it stopped the world in countless ways."
AP News
In terms of destruction, we ain't seen nothing yet. If the rest of this volcano goes our world will be changed for decades to come and in some ways forever.
Almost seems kind of Biblical, doesn't it?
"The last time Eyjafjallajökull blew its top the eruption lasted for two years, spreading smoke and ash over Iceland causing significant damage.
The last time Eyjafjallajökull erupted, it lasted 2 years stretching from 1821-1823. It also erupted in 920 and 1612.
The 1821 eruption spread fluoride across iceland, damaging livestock and human well-being. Glacial flooding also resulted from the eruption.
Eyjafjallajökull's eruption usually precedes an eruption for another Icelandic volcano called Katla, as it did in 1823. Katla's eruptions are usually more violent than Eyjafjallajökul's.
Katla is partially trapped under a glacier and its eruption would create even more flooding problems for Iceland.
The Laki volcano, which erupted in 1783, was the worst in Icelandic history. It killed a quarter of Iceland's residents, created a poisonous plume over Prague, made New Jersey's snowfall its highest ever, and had an impact on one of Egypt's worst droughts.
The Laki volcano is considered a central cause of the French Revolution, as it led to a poor harvest and public unrest in the country."
Business Insider
The author of the first article from Asia News makes the argument that there is a connection between the sudden outburst of coverage about the Catholic abuse scandal along with all of the attention suddenly being placed on the Pope, and the coming war in Iran. He believes that the media, particularly The New York Times, is helping to bury the story about Iran by pumping the story about the Church.
On the surface this seems far fetched but then when I think about the way the media in America has worked hand in hand with this administration on every other issue, like health care, why wouldn't they help in the run up to war?
The Obama administration has gone out of its way to isolate Israel over the last few weeks. Why? Is the hope that Israel will feel that it has no choice but to act on its own and thus attack Iran? And if it does, who do we side with? Would we use this as an excuse to attack our longtime ally in an attempt to ingratiate ourselves with the Muslim world?
With the current administration, nothing, no matter how crazy, is off the table.
"...The fact that that the Times applies a double standard is not a problem since few people view the paper as a good authority anymore. British hypocrisy over its own dirty secrets is also unimportant because it is expected. What is more worrisome is the fact that on the day Laurie Goodstein’s article was published, Reuters ran a story out of Jerusalem, reprinted on 26 March 2010 by the Washington Post,5 a story that eventually disappeared from the “independent” Anglo-American press and that of almost all of the rest of the world, namely the possibility that Israel might use tactical nuclear weapons in a preventive attack against Iran.
This is linked to other news that appeared two weeks earlier, which also disappeared from the “independent” press, namely that US President Obama had special “bunker-buster” bombs, originally destined for Israel, diverted to the US base in Diego Garcia, in the Indian Ocean, for possible use in an attack on Iran.6 Located about a thousand miles south of India, between Mauritius and the Persian Gulf, the island is ideally placed to launch an air strike against Iran. According to an expert, US bombers are already capable of hitting 10,000 objectives in Iran in just a few hours, and totally destroy the country.7 Once the weapons are deployed (presumably in one or two months), the disposition for attack will be in place and a military operation could be ordered at any time. In other words, the United States wants to have all options available, whilst Israel wants to press the accelerator and threatens to use tactical nuclear weapons if the US decides not to do what Israel wants.
On 9 April 2010, Russia and the United States signed an agreement in which the two parties agree not to use atomic weapons against countries that have signed the non-proliferation treaty (leaving out Iran and North Korea as well as Israel, although this is not said). Recently, Obama and Sarkozy have worked together to get an international consensus on new sanctions against Iran. This might be achieved in a few weeks, or even a few days. It is thus clear that sanctions could be followed by a catastrophic attack against Iran."
Asia News
"From the Sunday Herald in Scotland: “Hundreds of powerful US bunker-buster bombs are being shipped from California to the British island of Diego Garcia in the Indian Ocean in preparation for a possible attack on Iran. The Sunday Herald can reveal that the US government signed a contract in January to transport 10 ammunition containers to the island. According to a cargo manifest from the US navy, this included 387 Blu bombs used for blasting hardened or underground structures.”
Hmm.
How did a newspaper in Scotland of all places learn of this? From the story: “Contract details for the shipment to Diego Garcia were posted on an international tenders’ website by the US navy. A shipping company based in Florida, Superior Maritime Services, will be paid $699,500 to carry many thousands of military items from Concord, California, to Diego Garcia. Crucially, the cargo includes 195 smart, guided, Blu-110 bombs and 192 massive 2000lb Blu-117 bombs.”
Daily Mail
"Deeply concerned as it is by the risk of a nuclear-armed Iran, Israel has never even hinted at using atomic weapons to forestall the perceived threat.
But now a respected Washington think tank has said that low-radioactive yield "tactical" nuclear warheads would be one way for the Israelis to destroy Iranian uranium- enrichment plants in remote, dug-in fortifications.
Despite the 65-year-old taboo against carrying out - or, for that matter, mooting - nuclear strikes, the Centre for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) says in a new report that "some believe that nuclear weapons are the only weapons that can destroy targets deep underground or in tunnels."
Montreal Gazette
"Frustrated by recent political setbacks, tea party leaders and some conservative members of the Oklahoma Legislature say they would like to create a new volunteer militia to help defend against what they believe are improper federal infringements on state sovereignty.
Tea party movement leaders say they've discussed the idea with several supportive lawmakers and hope to get legislation next year to recognize a new volunteer force. They say the unit would not resemble militia groups that have been raided for allegedly plotting attacks on law enforcement officers.
"Is it scary? It sure is," said tea party leader Al Gerhart of Oklahoma City, who heads an umbrella group of tea party factions called the Oklahoma Constitutional Alliance. "But when do the states stop rolling over for the federal government?"
Yahoo
This is the next and most logical step for those that support the intent and clear meaning of the Tenth Amendment to the Constitution. I've written about this many times before in an attempt to help people understand exactly what state sovereignty entails.
The Bill of Rights was written to calm the fears of the Anti-Federalists (Jefferson, Madison, Monroe, et al) that the Constitution, in replacing the Articles of Confederation, was going to grant too much power to the Federal Government, reducing the people and the states to subjects. The Second Amendment and the Tenth are inextricably linked in their purpose and intent to defend the sovereignty of the people and the states from a coercive and overbearing central government.
As we see more and more states begin to attempt to exercise their Constitutional powers under the Tenth Amendment they must either prepare to defend those powers with the means allowed for by our founders or abandon their efforts. Because, if the states think that the federal government is going to allow them to reestablish their sovereign authority over it may I remind you of the last time they tried this? Yesterday was the 149th anniversary of the firing on Fort Sumter after the U.S. government refused to recognize the sovereignty of South Carolina and attempted to resupply the fort, forcing South Carolina to defend it's border and plunging the nation into war.
While Oklahoma may be the first to consider the use of citizen militias to defend its sovereignty, if this push for Tenth Amendment rights continues, it won't be the last. I fully support the states in their attempt to reestablish their sovereignty and through this to protect the rights of their citizens. I just hope they have considered the outcome and what will be asked of them to carry this out.
"U.S. naval forces said Thursday they've captured five pirates after exchanging fire with them, sinking their skiff and confiscating a mother ship.
The USS Nicholas was just west of the Seychelles in international waters Thursday when crew began taking fire from a suspected pirate skiff, NBC News reported. The Nicholas returned fire and disabled the pirate boat, then pursued the skiff until it finally broke down.
...Experts say piracy will continue to be a problem until an effective government is established on Somalia's lawless shores. The country has not had a functioning government for 19 years."
MSNBC
It's that last paragraph that bothers me.
Let's go back to the beginning of this story. Now, I'm not a pirate and I'm certainly not some poor kid from Somalia, impressed into piracy by a warlord. I don't know how they think or what their world view is.
But I do know this; a U.S. Naval ship, bristling with arms and the latest war technology, looks nothing like a freighter, tanker or yacht. There is no way in the world pirates would fire on one. Pirates are the ultimate capitalists, engaging in their occupation purely for profit. Where is the profit in losing ships and men?
Maybe the skiff was loaded with inexperienced pirates that couldn't tell the difference. While this may be true, my guess is that, since profit is the motive, no skiff would shove off without an experienced commander on board. Again, why risk their profit by sending out a raiding party that couldn't get the job done?
Profit, or at least the promise of it, has been the only thing protecting those taken prisoner by the pirates. The warlords that control the pirates have threatened retaliation if governments begin to go after their ships; retaliation in the form of the deaths of hostages. I suspect they're being honest in this regard because it's the only real leverage they have. If we've taken their guys prisoner you can expect to hear demands for their safe return or hostages will be executed.
And that's why that last paragraph in the story caught my eye. War has always been used as a means of bringing countries out of depressions. We've gotten ourselves involved in plenty of them of late but maybe another would be just the thing. Also, I suspect that our President may have a warm spot in his heart for Africa and Indonesia in general which may prompt him to believe we need to help the people of Somalia; help them to establish a "functioning government". Contrary to what groups such as Code Pink would have you believe, nation building is not a conceit purely of the right.
So I say that we need to watch this story carefully. I think that there is more here than has been reported. Something just doesn't seem right about a skiff attacking a frigate.
"Obamacare may be the last straw. It strips away fundamental economic liberties, empowering the federal government to de facto nationalize everyone's body by controlling our health. Americans are compelled - upon pain of penalty and eventual imprisonment - to purchase insurance.
Moreover, the law codifies the federal funding of abortion. Taxpayer dollars will be used to subsidize the murder of innocent life. Hence, Mr. Obama has violated the social compact: He has abrogated the conscience of pro-lifers, making them tacitly complicit in the slaughter of the unborn. Obamacare is a radical assault upon fundamental religious freedoms.
The Obama revolution threatens to tear America apart. This has happened before. Slavery eventually triggered the Civil War between the industrial North and the agrarian South. Abortion is the slavery of our time - the denying of basic human rights to an entire category of people.
Washington Times
It is becoming increasingly clear to me that we are entering times so similar to those that preceded the War Between the States that I have to believe the future will end with the same results. America is splintering. Compare the news of today to what was happening just prior to the outbreak of war in 1861.
We have a large segment of our society that are not recognized as persons. In the 19th century it was the blacks that were denied their personhood in the Dred Scott decision. Today it is the unborn child. In both cases the judicially defined lack of personhood denied both groups the rights enshrined in the Declaration of Independence; life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.
We have political deals being made today that are designed to benefit certain business groups, deals such as health care, TARP and cap and trade. All of these deals exceed the powers granted the Congress in the Constitution. In the 1850's we had the Kansas-Nebraska Act, a piece of legislation designed to allow expansion of the railroads. While the transcontinental railroad did eventually lead to massive profits for politicians and businesses (not to mention nearly bringing down the Presidency of U.S. Grant through the corruption of the Credit Mobilier), because of its connection to the question of slavery it sparked the war along the Missouri-Kansas border in 1854, the first shots fired in the War Between the States. Health care is tied to the question of abortion in nearly the same way.
The question of state sovereignty was at the heart of all of this. The question of who held the power in this country, Washington or the states, was the root cause of a war that took the lives over a half million Americans. Taxation and Washington's power to use it to force individual states and their citizens to support programs that benefited one group while damaging another were at the center of the debate. Today, as state Attorney General's file suit and state legislatures create laws to enforce the Tenth Amendment to the constitution their arguments and reasons are the same as those put forth by the Southern states as they tried to stand against tyranny.
And just as it was 150 years ago, all of the underlying anger, the political strife and the public arousal just needs a reason, something to rally around, some spark to set it off. Something has to be seen as the moral justification to set the country aflame. In 1861 it was slavery; today it is abortion.
Some states (Thank God) have laws that are far more restrictive in regards to abortion than federal law. The citizens of those states may very well, by citing the Tenth Amendment, declare their intention to opt out of a system that is morally indefensible. Those of us that understand that we are participating in the murder of children now just by paying our taxes will look to our states for protection. It is our only possible recourse and defense. If a state decides that it has the authority under the Tenth Amendment to opt out, just as it did at Ft. Sumter the federal government will do something to provoke war. You see, South Carolina didn't fire on the fort because it wanted war, it fired because a foreign government (the United States) refused to vacate ground owned by a sovereign state, and further was attempting to resupply it. Lincoln provoked South Carolina to start a war. Today's government is more than capable of the same sort of thing.
And before I wrap this up, there is one more similarity between then and now; Lincoln and Obama both hail from Illinois.
History just continues to spin in circles.
If the healthcare bill passes, which I'm sure it will, what is the next step? The courts? And then what?
We're crossing uncharted waters.
"...The Slaughter Solution is a poisoned chalice. By drinking from it, the Democrats would not only commit political suicide. They would guarantee that any bill signed by Mr. Obama is illegitimate, illegal and blatantly unconstitutional. It would be worse than a strategic blunder; it would be a crime - a moral crime against the American people and a direct abrogation of the Constitution and our very democracy.
It would open Mr. Obama, as well as key congressional leaders such as Mrs. Pelosi, to impeachment. The Slaughter Solution would replace the rule of law with arbitrary one-party rule. It violates the entire basis of our constitutional government - meeting the threshold of "high crimes and misdemeanors." If it's enacted, Republicans should campaign for the November elections not only on repealing Obamacare, but on removing Mr. Obama and his gang of leftist thugs from office.
It is time Americans drew a line in the sand. Mr. Obama crosses it at his peril."
Washington Times
"That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security."
Declaration of Independence
Just in case the nuclear threat excuse falls by the side we can always use the Al-Qaeda excuse. For all of you on the left that have screamed about the way the Bush administration "lied" us into war in Iraq, it's your guy's turn now.
Will we hear all the screaming this time?
"Iran is assisting al Qaeda by facilitating links between senior terrorist leaders and affiliate groups, the commander of U.S. forces in the Middle East told Congress on Tuesday.
Army Gen. David H. Petraeus, commander of the U.S. Central Command, also said Iran's nuclear program is facing problems, and as a result, Tehran is not expected to emerge with a nuclear weapon this year.
The exact details of when U.S. intelligence agencies estimate Iran will have a nuclear bomb are classified, but the timeline for developing a nuclear device has "thankfully slid to the right a bit," he said."
Washington Times
So maybe we will start a war to get ourselves out of the depression. I would have put my money on China going first. Of course, if we start a war with Iran, and China supplies them with arms and munitions (probably based on the blueprints Clinton sold to them while he was in office) maybe both countries can murder their way out of economic Armageddon. The only problem is, we might find ourselves involved in the real thing.
"Hundreds of powerful US “bunker-buster” bombs are being shipped from California to the British island of Diego Garcia in the Indian Ocean in preparation for a possible attack on Iran.
The Sunday Herald can reveal that the US government signed a contract in January to transport 10 ammunition containers to the island. According to a cargo manifest from the US navy, this included 387 “Blu” bombs used for blasting hardened or underground structures.
Experts say that they are being put in place for an assault on Iran’s controversial nuclear facilities. There has long been speculation that the US military is preparing for such an attack, should diplomacy fail to persuade Iran not to make nuclear weapons.
Although Diego Garcia is part of the British Indian Ocean Territory, it is used by the US as a military base under an agreement made in 1971. The agreement led to 2,000 native islanders being forcibly evicted to the Seychelles and Mauritius.
The Sunday Herald reported in 2007 that stealth bomber hangers on the island were being equipped to take bunker-buster bombs."
Herald Scotland
We are in a depression. It was caused by the bursting of bubbles and the creation of new bubbles to offset the effects of the last bubble's burst. Each bubble in succession has burst ratcheting our debt to unsustainable levels. We cannot pay down our debt so we have to make a choice; inflate our way out or collapse. To this point we have increased the money supply to affect Keynesian economic policies in the hopes that we could stimulate the economy back to life. It hasn't worked and will have the effect of causing massive inflation, ratcheting up the cost of goods as the deflationary pressures of a depression drive wages down.
A war would be just the thing to take our minds off the problem, wouldn't it? It would also be a dandy way to wash the excess capital out of the system while creating high paying manufacturing jobs. The only thing holding us back is that we are a Christian nation and the immorality of war started for economic reasons (most are anyway) still rubs us the wrong way.
I wonder if China would have the same qualms?
"While communist China’s growing hostility toward the free world (as represented by the United States) is becoming more and more difficult to conceal, the trade and financial ties between the two countries are nevertheless stronger than ever.
Some wonder why China, as resentful as it is toward the U.S., has spent so much on purchasing U.S. treasury bonds.
The question remains whether and when China will dump American bonds as an extreme financial weapon. Chinese military officers once threatened to do so in the aftermath of earlier threats to fire 200 nuclear bombs at the U.S.
Beijing’s think-tank and pro-communist overseas media believe that dumping a small portion of the $800 billion in American bonds would cause economic turmoil in the U.S.—a blow almost as great as a nuclear bomb. Should that happen, they have speculated that the U.S. would be brought to its knees."
Epoch Times
"China retained its spot as the biggest foreign holder of U.S. Treasury debt in January even as it trimmed its holdings for a third straight month. The string of declines underscored worries that the U.S. government could face much higher interest rates to finance soaring budget deficits."
AP News
"China has succumbed to hubris. It has mistaken the soft diplomacy of Barack Obama for weakness, mistaken the US credit crisis for decline, and mistaken its own mercantilist bubble for ascendancy. There are echoes of Anglo-German spats before the First World War, when Wilhelmine Berlin so badly misjudged the strategic balance of power and over-played its hand."
Telegraph
"Nervousness is growing in the financial markets about China, which might seem odd when there are so many other places to worry about.
There’s still Greece, for example, which is likely to be the focus of this week’s meetings of European finance ministers. There’s Germany, and its trade surplus. And there’s the U.S., the U.K. and all the other places with triple-A-rated debt that may not be rated triple-A for much longer.
So why the focus on China, where shares closed Monday at their lowest in five weeks, with the benchmark Shanghai Composite ending below 3000 at its weakest since Feb. 9? Well, as one bank put it on Monday: “Are we facing a ‘growth miracle’ or will China be the next bubble to burst?”
So far, it’s been widely assumed that the strength of the Chinese economy is a plus for the global economy as a whole. But fears of over-heating are growing and, after China’s failure to raise interest rates over the weekend, there’s inevitable concern that it might wait too long before tightening the screws.
What’s more, the rhetoric from China seems increasingly confrontational. Premier Wen Jiabao warned other countries not to pressure China over its exchange-rate policy during his news conference at the end of the country’s annual legislative session Sunday."
Wall Street Journal
"In China's zeal to keep their economy going, the government injected about 4 trillion yuan since 2008 (14 percent of GDP) as fiscal stimulus. It expects to have deficit spending equal to 1.5 trillion yuan this year. Since they believe in Keynesian stimulus, and since they still have a quasi-centrally planned economy (the ultimate Keynesian technocrats), they will keep doing this until the crisis passes. You see, there is one thing the Central Politburo fears: their own people. If the economy collapsed, you would see massive unrest, and I believe they fear for their lives."
Zerohedge
"The world’s most powerful investors have been advised to buy farmland, stock up on gold and prepare for a “dirty war” by Marc Faber, the notoriously bearish market pundit, who predicted the 1987 stock market crash.
The bleak warning of social and financial meltdown, delivered today in Tokyo at a gathering of 700 pension and sovereign wealth fund managers...
...“The next war will be a dirty war,” he told fund managers: "What are you going to do when your mobile phone gets shut down or the internet stops working or the city water supplies get poisoned?”
Times Online
I guess my question would be what good will farmland do you if everything goes to hell in the cities and you still live there?
I live in the country and I hate to break it to the money guys but just owning land does not make it productive. It takes a lot of hard work to get a piece of ground to produce enough to support you. And what about networks? You choose to live in the city and the people you know will live there, too. You can't expect to pick up and come out here and have instant friends. And believe me, you WILL need friends when things come apart. You may have money but it won't mean a thing if the system that supports it has disappeared. You can't eat gold, either.
People in the country will try to help if we can but if there is a dirty war we'll be busy just getting by out here and working with the people we know. Real skills will have a market. Playing games with other peoples money will not. So ask yourself before you escape to the country; what do you bring to the party? Your land will be fallow, your skills will be useless and no one will know who you are. We will never have seen you at church, at social functions or working on community projects. Your kids won't have gone to our schools and you won't even speak our language. All of the jokes that your sophisticated, urban friends and you have made about us poor hayseeds will come back to haunt you. You won't understand our culture and you may not be able to accept it.
If you truly believe that the world as we know it is about to come apart then you need to make significant changes to your life now, not after the event happens. If you knew that the Titanic was going to sink would you have boarded anyway, assuming that there would be room on a lifeboat?
Dr. Faber's advice to buy farmland does not go far enough. Buy farmland and move to it, now, while the gettin's good. Establish yourself in the community and show you can be trusted and that you have some useful skill. Learn to be one of us because all of us will have to work towards a common goal together if we are to survive what I believe is coming. We won't have the time or the resources to carry others that should support themselves. Those that don't work won't eat.
The thing is that if you can't see moving to the country when times are good because the rural life just doesn't appeal to you, what makes you think you'll last out here when the SHTF? Get your mind right, boy! (I suddenly feel like Strother Martin.) What is coming will require as much of a mental adjustment and toughness as it will a physical toughness. If you can't make that adjustment now you won't make it later.
So while our President is giving a speech today once again promising to ram health care through we get the stories below. Besides the obvious Constitutional problems with the government providing health care, let's just focus on the strategic problem. China just about owns us now and WILL use the power they have gained to control America as surely as if they had conquered us in war. Yet, our President and his Progressive friends in Congress intend to borrow even more money to gives us the health care we have repeatedly told them we don't want.
They aren't this stupid. America is being destroyed from within by the very people that we elected. This is being done purposely; I cannot come to any other conclusion. We are on the brink of becoming a Chinese satellite state or a hollow shell, without a single shot being fired.
If we don't get our act together now we are going to lose our country and the greatest experiment in freedom ever carried out on this earth will have failed. I'm afraid that we are going to be left with very few options; none of them good.
Somebody tell me how in the hell we're going to save ourselves. The push is on in Washington to to close the deal on health care. I heard part of Obama's speech today and he said that if the doesn't get the appointments he wants he will put them in during the Congressional recess. In the speech last week he mentioned using executive orders to implement programs the Congress refused to pass. We are seeing the Executive Branch elevated to a level of power not seen since the Lincoln Administration. Obama will surpass FDR in control of the Congress and the country. And, he will see it destroyed. No one in the government will stand up to him. It is the responsibility of the Congress to push back when the Executive Branch tries to take power it wasn't intended to have. But they won't do it. Not even the Republicans seem capable of anything more than a half-assed effort.
The Chinese are rattling their sword and the EU is starting to crumble. Central and South America are powder kegs. And Iran is threatening to do something on Thursday that they promise will amaze and frighten the West. And once again our elected leaders are focusing on health care. Is it a distraction? I don't know. Nothing makes sense anymore.
Pray, pray, pray. And prepare. We are on the verge of cataclysmic disruptions in our lives. No one can predict what, when or how but I feel confident that something is coming. Chaos cannot create order, it can only collapse into deeper and more intense chaos.
"By their carelessness Congress and the Obama administration are steadily handing over control of America's economic and financial future to a handful of Chinese officials and generals in Beijing. Those who think the Chinese won't use that control if they feel they have to are ignoring history -- and the Chinese.
The ancient military strategist Sun Tzu said that the best strategy was to render an opponent's army helpless even before the battle began. America may still have the biggest and best military in the world.
But many at the Pentagon are starting to realize that, thanks to our growing fiscal irresponsibility, we may be surrendering control of America's destiny to a rival superpower -- and all without a shot being fired."
The Burning Platform
"Senior Chinese military officers have proposed that their country boost defense spending, adjust PLA deployments, and possibly sell some U.S. bonds to punish Washington for its latest round of arms sales to Taiwan.
The calls for broad retaliation over the planned U.S. weapons sales to the disputed island came from officers at China's National Defence University and Academy of Military Sciences, interviewed by Outlook Weekly, a Chinese-language magazine published by the official Xinhua news agency.
The interviews with Major Generals Zhu Chenghu and Luo Yuan and Senior Colonel Ke Chunqiao appeared in the issue published on Monday.
The People's Liberation Army (PLA) plays no role in setting policy for China's foreign exchange holdings. Officials in charge of that area have given no sign of any moves to sell U.S. Treasury bonds over the weapons sales, a move that could alarm markets and damage the value of China's own holdings.
While far from representing fixed government policy, the open demands for retaliation by the PLA officers underscored the domestic pressures on Beijing to deliver on its threats to punish the Obama administration over the arms sales.
"Our retaliation should not be restricted to merely military matters, and we should adopt a strategic package of counter-punches covering politics, military affairs, diplomacy and economics to treat both the symptoms and root cause of this disease," said Luo Yuan, a researcher at the Academy of Military Sciences."
Reuters
"A new billboard off of Interstate 70 in Missouri provides a short “citizens guide to REVOLUTION of a corrupt government” and issues a call to “PREPARE FOR WAR.”
This billboard replaces one that warned that the socialist “Obama-Nation” is “coming for you.” It’s unclear who the owner of the billboard is, but the first one was the work of a “Missouri businessman.”
While it’s unclear who owns it, the Lafayette County Republican Central Committee seems to endorse it."
EU Times
(H/T Gateway Pundit)
For those that are unfamiliar with my beloved state of Missouri I'll like to give you a bit of history. It all begins in another state, or at least a place that was soon to acquire statehood. Its name, Kansas.
Bleeding Kansas!
In 1854 Congress passed the Kansas-Nebraska act creating the territories of both Kansas and Nebraska. In the process this act nullified the Missouri Compromise and opened territories North of the 36th parallel (approx.) to slavery. Popular Sovereignty was written into the proposal in an attempt to satisfy both sides of the slavery issue. In reality, it began a war along the Kansas-Missouri border that in seven years would become the American Civil War.
The war fought in this area was nothing like the comparatively civilized warfare in the East. It was a war of retribution. Scores were settled. Families and towns, even entire regions were destroyed. Missouri was the site of the third highest number of battles during the war. It was fighting at its most personal level. Men hung in front of their children and wives raped in front of their husbands. Executions and mutilated bodies were the norm. Both sides fought under the black flag. The single greatest atrocity of the war occurred here at Centralia.
After executing 23 unarmed Union soldiers at the train depot, Bloody Bill Anderson lured a detachment of soldiers under the command of Major A.V.E. Johnson four miles from town. In a matter of minutes 123 soldiers along with their commander lay dead. Participants reported that after the battle and the complete destruction of the Union forces the mutilation of the corpses was so complete that not a head was attached to the body it started with.
I write this to try and put this billboard in context. Lafayette County is the heart of guerrilla country. Less than an hours drive East of Kansas City this area of the state saw some of the worst fighting. To see this sign here is to see a very clear signal of what is ahead. I know that this may sound like crazy talk but I know my state and the people that live in it, especially the rural areas. We are but a few generations removed from Anderson, Dave Poole, Archie Clement and the James boys. In attitude we are not far removed at all.
This billboard stands as clear and irrefutable proof that we are returning to those years that led up to the war. The nation is simmering, nearing a boil. Our political leaders and so many others are blind to this. But the signs are all around us, if you are willing to open your eyes.
Posts
