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The Fall of the American citizen

Posted 8 months ago|11 comments|659 views
Liberty
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It is easy to convert a citizen into a subject, just remove its right to bear arms. In medieval Europe, Saint Augustine analyzed social division and concluded that it was a result of the Fall of Man. Subjects or commoners were the third and bottom layer of Three Estates of the Realm, formalized as Nobility, Clergy and Commoners. This division was often expressed as "those who fight," "those who pray" and "those who work." Remove the rite to bear arms, and the citizen who was able to fight falls to a commoner, a subject of the Realm!

It looks that the wish of the government is to remove any possibility of citizens questioning its actions. It looks that subjects should not poke their noses in the business of the government. What's worse, the citizens forgot the famous saying by Aristotle: "To take no part in the running of the community's affairs is to be either a beast or a god!"

Benito Mussolini defined his fascist philosophy as "Everything in the State, nothing outside the State, nothing against the State." The Government is supreme, every human must submit to the government and any type of questioning the government is not to be tolerated. When government tries to control every little detail of the subject's lives, when it tries to regulate everything, when benevolent Uncle Sam starts looking more and more like harsh and abusing father... the result is not Socialism, as many seem to think.

California was an "open carry" state for a long time. Once, that meant one had right to carry loaded firearms. Due to the entire scare regarding Black Panthers, the law was changed to right to openly carry unloaded firearms. Now, there is a law on Governor Brown's desk calling for removal of the right to openly to carry an unloaded firearm. The way things look now, California will shortly forbid its subjects from openly carrying even an unloaded weapon. Concealed weapons permits in California are already nearly impossible to obtain. It is just another move in the general strategy of converting citizens into subjects.

United Kingdom has strict gun control laws but it has double the crime and intentional homicide rate of Switzerland. In 1900, when UK had no gun controls, the homicide rate was comparable to the one Switzerland has today. The Switzerland is one of the safest places on this planet and there is more per capita firepower in Switzerland than in any other place in the world (including most of the war zones).

The oldest Zürich tradition, that takes place on the second weekend in September, is "Knabenschiessen" (boy's shooting contest). It is a shooting contest at the range for 12 to 16 year-old boys/girls. The guns are readily available everywhere and the militia system requires that all males aged 20 to 42 keep automatic rifles and/or semiautomatic pistols in their homes. It is their tradition to keep their citizens well armed and free. Even Machiavelli wrote in 1532, "The Swiss are well armed and enjoy great freedom."

Monarchist philosopher Jean Bodin wrote in 1606, "The most usual way to prevent sedition is to take away the subjects arms." It is up to the Citizens of United States to decide will they meekly subject themselves to the power of the few or finally take part in the running of the country's affairs.
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BadCyborg
BadCyborg
San Antonio, TX
8 months ago: The OP is entirely correct. The difference between a citizen and a subject (or serf?) is the Right to Keep and Bear Arms (RKBA)

The Government is supreme, every human must submit to the government and any type of questioning the government is not to be tolerated. When government tries to control every little detail of the subject's lives, when it tries to regulate everything, when benevolent Uncle Sam starts looking more and more like harsh and abusing father... the result is not Socialism, as many seem to think.
The OP is also correct that "the result is not Socialism, as many seem to think". The result is more properly labeled "Statism". But Statism is close kin to Socialism, Communism and Fascism. As regards individual liberty, there is no functional difference between any of those systems. It is axiomatic that for The State to increase, the individual must decrease. A truely all-powerful state cannot abide empowered individuals. The RKBA is pretty much the ultimate empowerment. With arms, the people stand a greater chance of successfully rebelling against an all-powerful STATE, therefor The State CANNOT be all-powerful while the people retain the RKBA. Any state-centric governmental system MUST disarm its populous to have ANY chance to survive.

The Founders considered it self-evident that the sole purpose of the state is to secure or safeguard the rights of the people. In their minds that was every bit as obvious as the fact that all men are created equal and that the rights of men are endowed by their Creator at birth and are not gifts of a benevolent government.

(continued in the next reply)
BadCyborg
BadCyborg
San Antonio, TX
8 months ago: The founders considered it equally self-evident that the people have a right - NAY A DUTY - to rebel "whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, . . . when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism". Indeed, the framers considered rebellion and replacement of the existing government "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 . . . and to provide new guards for their future security" not merely a right but a DUTY.

Alexander Hamilton wrote in Federalist Paper #51,
If men were angels, no government would be necessary. If angels were to govern men, neither external nor internal controls on government would be necessary. In framing a government which is to be administered by men over men, the great difficulty lies in this: you must first enable the government to control the governed; and in the next place oblige it to control itself.
The constitution was written to control the power of the central government. It was created to provide a fence to contain government; to provide a boundary to define "thus far you may go AND NO FURTHER!"

The Legislature was created and intended to MAKE the laws. The Executive was created solely to ENFORCE the laws. The Judiciary was created solely to INTERPRET the laws. The Legislature, according to Hamilton must perforce be supreme. For that reason the framers included sections 8 and 9 in Article I of the Constitution.

(continued in the next and final reply)
BadCyborg
BadCyborg
San Antonio, TX
8 months ago: In keeping with their vision of the Constitution providing a boundary to contain the central government, the framers of the Constitution included sections 8 and 9 of Article I. Section 8 is an explicit list of where and upon what areas the legislature may pass laws. It is a fairly large but far from infinite list. To drive the point home, the framers included section 9 of Article I which consists of a list of areas from which the Legislature is SPECIFICALLY PROHIBITED in passing any law.

The problems in the U.S. today are threefold. 1) The Legislature is passing legislation in areas not explicitly covered in Article I, section 8; 2) The Executive is legislating by means of executive orders and regulations; 3) the Judiciary is legislating from the bench - something a current SCOTUS Associate Justice evidently considers to be a proper function of appellate courts. In all three cases the branches are operating entirely outside their lawful authority. It would appear that Hamilton's and the framers' efforts to oblige the government to control itself have failed.

I do not believe that the current trend can long continue. Many thousands (probably millions) believe that our current government well and truly "evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism". WHETHER THAT BE THE CASE OR NO such is the perception of many folks all of whom are armed - many HEAVILY. Such people are also those who consider liberty precious and duty sacred. I would remind anyone reading this that no one operates on the basis of reality but upon the basis of their PERCEPTION of reality.

For no one lives in the "real" world
But the world that they each percieve.
It matters not what others might think
But only what such men believe.
If they believe that freedom can be bought by their death
Then they'll fight for their loved ones to their very last breath.
And a man with nothing left to lose is a most unassailable weapon.
8 months ago: You made a lot of valid points here and the conclusion that a lot of people might act on their perception of reality is really scary!

The elected government should sometimes remember to read at least the preamble of the constitution.

"We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty..."

There is a very interesting table at http://jpfo.org/filegen-a-m/deathgc.htm that nicely list the dates when various governments instituted total gun control and dates when the Genocide over their own subjects started!
BadCyborg
BadCyborg
San Antonio, TX
8 months ago:
conclusion that a lot of people might act on their perception of reality is really scary!
As it should be. But remember that NO ONE - not you, not me, not ANYONE - acts on reality but upon their PERCEPTION. I don't know how long you've been coming here but I would suggest you look up my post "When Men Become Truly Free A Poem by Colin Ryan" posted at this forum here: http://rantrave.com/Rant/When-Men-Become...

Look especially at the comments by the leftists here. THAT should scare you.

Look. My own brother thinks I am crazy - paranoid he calls me. And perhaps I am even though I have asked mental health professionals whether I am insane and they uniformly answer in the negative. But assume for a moment that I am crazy. That I am seriously deluded. OK. But there are a lot of people - pretty much ALL the ones with whom I interact on a regular basis - who AGREE with me; i.e. they SHARE my delusion (if, indeed delusion it be). And pretty much all of THEM are gun owners and strong constitutionalists.

Me, you don't have to worry about. I can hit a sliver dollar at 100 yards but but there are people out there that can hit a silver dollar at FIVE HUNDRED yards who are just as "deluded" as I am. And a lot of them are in well organized and trained (what "well regulated" meant in 1787) militias. THEY are the ones of whom the powers that be should afraid.

Heck! I know a bunch of people who DON'T own guns who believe the world as we know it probably won't outlive ME and I'm 60 years old with type II diabetes and a funky ticker.

Remember this maxim. Burying your head in the sand only makes your a** a better target.
8 months ago: It's incredible what kind of reactions a little poem provoked.

Being prepared isn't paranoid. Like Ben Franklin said "By failing to prepare, you are preparing to fail. " And unfortunately, what scares me the most is the fact that I have started believing that current US Government is not going to let itself be removed from power as peacefully as the Soviet Communists did.

What we have here is a bureaucracy that strongly follows Pournelle's Iron Law of Bureaucracy. That law states that in any bureaucratic organization there will be two kinds of people:

First, there will be those who are devoted to the goals of the organization. Examples are dedicated classroom teachers in an educational bureaucracy, many of the engineers and launch technicians and scientists at NASA, even some agricultural scientists and advisers in the former Soviet Union collective farming administration.

Secondly, there will be those dedicated to the organization itself. Examples are many of the administrators in the education system, many professors of education, many teachers union officials, much of the NASA headquarters staff, etc.

The Iron Law states that in every case the second group will gain and keep control of the organization. It will write the rules, and control promotions within the organization.

Unfortunately, that precisely describes US Government!

And they are borrowing a lot from the tactics of other total regimes.

"The National Association of Security Companies (NASCO) today endorsed the See Something, Say Something Act (H.R. 963), by Congressman Lamar Smith (R—21st District Texas), Chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, calling it sensible policy that expands protections against lawsuits for individuals who provide good faith reports of suspicious terrorist-related activity to an authorized official. The legislation will further encourage citizens to take an active role in reporting suspicious activity without fear of legal retribution."

Really... If I was certain that something suspicious was likely related to the commission of a terrorist attack, legal protection for reporting the incident would be the last thing on my mind. However, encouraging Americans to frivolously report each other to the authorities for any reason needs to have that legal protection clause since nobody likes a slander suit...

Somehow I have an eerie feeling...
8 months ago: Great post. It seems to me there is always an element of the population that is not only willing but eager to usher in these socialist, statist etc governments. I don't really understand how they can be so oblivious to historical evidence which indicates these governments which become to powerful always become controlling and abusive to its' people. Nevertheless we see today so many Americans more than willing to hand over power and control to the government. I wonder if these people do not have an innate dependancy compulsion.
8 months ago: I think that it came to be mostly through brainwashing by the tightly controlled media and damaged education system. Somehow, in people's heads, patriotism became love for the government instead of love of the country.

Watch out for incidents that will bring out what you can see in this video and once that happens, know that the end is near: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HoV7TgAXK...
8 months ago: Referendum in Switzerland to ban guns failed. However, look at the pro-gun-control supporters in this video and their arguments for disbanding an army: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gnQ2I4Nkx...
Altruist
Altruist
Eugene, OR
8 months ago: The Arab Spring has shown that guns are not needed for a revolution. Hopefully the terrorists will get the message that political change is possible, preferable and more efficiently through peaceful means than through the force of arms.

Your statistics about the UK having double the violence of Switzerland is nuts. Switzerland has 17 times as many gun related deaths than England does. The UK had .37gun related deaths/100K compared to 6.4/100K for Switzerland. The US led the pack with 10/100K. http://www.gun-control-network.org/GF01....

The right wing and the Republicans have declared war on democracy by suppressing votes and by gerrymandering. http://warisacrime.org/node/35953

The right wing has already destroyed democracy in this country by getting their activist supreme court justices to declare corporations people with the right to bribe and buy elections protected by 1st amendment rights. Then Citizen's United outlawed almost all campaign finance laws and allowed corporations to spend unlimited amounts to buy elections with no need to disclose anything.

Once they rig the elections so they can't loose, we can get a preview of what they will do in Benton Harbor Michigan, where the governor stripped the elected city council and all other elected officials, replacing them with an "Emergency Manager" appointed by the governor.

What prompted the emergency? Developers wanted to take over a park that had been deeded to the citizens to make a golf course and resort.

This month Benton Harbor wanted to celebrate the anniversary of the signing of the Constitution, but the emergency manager canceled their Constitution celebrations. I guess the Republicans don't want the common people getting any ideas about having any rights or any freedom. http://maddowblog.msnbc.msn.com/_news/20...

The citizens have far more to fear from the corporate owned media, the right wing propaganda machine (Fox and Hate Radio), and the corporate owned Republicans than they do from any nonexistant plans to control guns or take them away.
8 months ago: Wow, your source of data is really great. Maybe you might consider taking a look at a little more independent and official source like http://epp.eurostat.ec.europa.eu/cache/I... where you will see that UK is at 1.28/100,000 and Switzerland at 0.7/100,000 while at http://www2.fbi.gov/ucr/cius2009/data/ta... you can see that US stays at strong 5/100,000!

I really prefer official sources than any leftist or rightist web site!

I agree with you that people are afraid of controlled media, the government controlled media...

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