90 Miles From Tyranny

Sunday, July 25, 2021

Losing Our Liberty All at Once?

Once upon a time, and it was not so long ago, an American could recognize totalitarianism and say “Thank God we’ve escaped that.” Can we still say that?

Friedrich Hayek took one of the two epigraphs for The Road to Serfdom from David Hume (the other, like Hayek’s title, came from Tocqueville). “It is seldom,” Hume wrote, “that liberty of any kind is lost all at once.”

Much as I admire Hume, I wonder whether he got this quite right. Sometimes, I would argue, liberty is erased almost instantaneously.

I’d be willing to wager that Joseph Hackett, confronted with Hume’s observation, would express similar doubts.

I would be happy to ask Hackett myself, but he is inaccessible. If the ironically titled “Department of Justice” has its way, he will be inaccessible for a long, long time. Perhaps as long as 20 years.

Joseph Hackett, you see, is a 51-year-old Trump supporter and member of an organization called the “Oath Keepers,” a group whose members have pledged to “defend the Constitution against all enemies foreign and domestic.” (You can see how this ends already, can’t you?) The FBI does not like the Oath Keepers. They arrested its leader in January and have picked up many other members in the months since. Hackett came from his home in Florida to join the Trump “Stop the Steal” rally that took place on January 6. According to court documents, he entered the Capitol at 2:45 that afternoon. He left some ten minutes later, at 2:54. The next day, he went home. On May 28, he was apprehended by the FBI and indicted on a long list of charges, including conspiracy, obstruction of an official proceeding, destruction of government property, and illegally entering a restricted building.

As far as I have been able to determine, no evidence of his destroying property has been made public. According to his wife, it is not even clear that he entered the Capitol. But he certainly was in the environs. He was a member of the Oath Keepers. He was a supporter of Donald Trump. Therefore, he must be neutralized. What about the Antifa and Black Lives Matter “peaceful protestors” who destroyed some $2 billion of property, killed or injured scores, and toppled countless public monuments? Take your time.

The scary and disgusting story of what the police power of the state is doing to those who went to Washington on January 6 to exercise their supposedly constitutionally protected right to protest is being told as it unfolds in American Greatness by Julie Kelly. For her relentless and indefatigable reporting, Kelly deserves whatever the conservative version is of the Pulitzer Prize (I know, it does not yet exist). Joseph Hackett is only one of scores of ordinary citizens who have been branded as “domestic terrorists” trying to “overthrow the government” and who are now languishing, in appalling conditions, jailed as political prisoners of an angry...

Traveling the Quiet Road to Tyranny

Could we be traveling a quiet road to tyranny?

Steve McCann’s recent summary of what we now know about the events on Capitol Hill on Jan. 6, 2021, indicates why we should all be very worried about the US, leader of the free world, sliding ever closer towards tyranny.

But it’s a slow journey on a quiet road, with the final destination not yet in sight.

J.B. Shurk has set out how far we’ve already come on this quiet road to tyranny

How do tyrannical despots attain absolute power without a violent revolution? They do it by stealth. It’s happened before. Eighty-eight years ago, to be precise.

On Jan. 30, 1933, Adolf Hitler was awarded the chancellorship of Germany by the ailing President Hindenberg. Although the Nazis were losing electoral support, they remained the largest party in the Reichstag, but without anything near a working majority. Hitler seized the chance to take control of all the reins of power. His pretext for the assumption of dictatorial powers was the Reichstag fire of Feb. 27, 1933.

Somehow a man managed to get into the Reichstag and -- supposedly undetected -- started a fire which turned into a conflagration. Where was the security?

Compare this with what happened on Jan. 6: the videos show the door-security officials at the Congress building inviting the participants in. Unfortunately for the Democrats’ agenda, there was very little disruption or destruction (although the shooting of Ashli Babbitt has yet to be the subject of a public investigation).

Back in 1933, Germany's parliament building was totally destroyed and with it went any pretense of democratic government. The man arrested at the scene was a simple-minded Dutch communist. How did such a man evade the building's security officers and start a fire undetected? Why did he then stick around to watch? Why did he not attempt to flee when the police approached him? He docilely accepted arrest as if acting the part.

Compare this with the behavior of the participants in the ‘armed insurrection’ on Capitol Hill on Jan. 6: the videos show them mostly wandering the corridors of the Congress building as if on a tourist tour. When apprehended they didn’t resist arrest or attempt to flee (although some had left the scene early).

These similarities with the Reichstag fire of 1933 are chilling, and we know the Reichstag fire was a set-up. The practical steps towards installing Hitler's tyranny started with a fabricated national security ‘emergency.’

From then on his grip on power slowly tightened. For the majority of Germans, these were good years -- living standards improved and the country seemed to be doing well. They might have been disconcerted by the removal of their civil liberties and the demonizing of the Jews, but Hitler kept promising everything would turn out alright in the end.

In the U.S. right now it’s ordinary patriots and everyone on the Right who are being demonized, labeled as ‘white supremacists’ and ‘domestic terrorists’. And it seems many of those who still support the Left are in denial about the implications for their own freedom and civil rights.

Of course, political subterfuge is much more cleverly organized these days. And Biden is no Hitler -- he is a political charlatan who has spent his entire career enriching himself and his family through abusing his influence and power. He is the ideal patsy for the much more sinister people behind the scenes who are organizing all this, who know exactly what they are doing. At present they are staying out of sight and letting their proxies do the hard work. This means keeping the official narrative on course for the eventual announcement of a new national security ‘emergency’ and the repression of...

The World Has Had It With China Flu Lockdowns: Protests Rock Cities All Over the Globe

People across the globe are standing up and fighting against China flu lockdowns and vaccine mandates a mere 477 days since being told we need only “15 days to flatten the curve.”

We’re Not Gonna Take It

Anti-riot cops clashed with protestors in central Paris, using tear gas to break up angry mobs that are tired of useless lockdowns, immunity passports, and a possible forced vaccination plan for healthcare workers. Over 100,000 people took to the streets to show their disdain for the COVID restrictions, including “COVID-Free” letters allowing them to enter restaurants and theaters.

In a separate protest in western Paris, demonstrators opposed anti-virus mandates and carried banners reading “Stop the dictatorship.”

Further protests in France are also planned in other cities, including Marseille, Montpellier, Nantes, and Toulouse.
In Excess

Thousands of angry Australians swarmed the streets of Sydney and Melbourne to protest the current month-long lockdown.

Angry protestors banged heads with mounted riot police, even showering them with debris.

Roughly five million people in Greater Sydney have been locked down for four weeks over fears of the Delta variant. They can only leave their homes for four reasons: to purchase food and essential items; to secure medical help, including vaccinations; to exercise in pairs, not groups, traveling no further than 10 km (6.2 miles) from home; and to go to an essential job or study program that can’t be done at home.

Sydney Police said it recognizes and supports the rights of free speech and peaceful assembly but noted that the protest was a breach of public health orders. Health orders the public clearly opposes.
Detroit Break Down

Protesters hit the bricks all over Detroit to oppose mandatory vaccinations for all hospital workers. Rallies were held in the Motor City as well as nearby Clinton Township, West Bloomfield, and Wyandotte.

Protesters in Grand Rapids, Mich., lined up outside a hospital to express their anger over the mandate. Many carried signs, one of which said...

A majority of Americans who have not yet been vaccinated for the Chinese coronavirus indicate they will likely not get the shot, according to The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research survey released this week.

Eighty-one percent of Americans who have not received the vaccine yet say they will “probably” or “definitely” not get the shot. Of those, 45 percent say they “definitely” will not, and 35 percent say they “probably” will not. On the flip side, 16 percent say they “probably” will get the jab, while just three percent say they “definitely” will, indicating that the vast majority of those who have yet to get the vaccine are solid in their decisions.

The survey also found 64 percent of unvaccinated Americans expressing little confidence that the vaccines will work against virus variants, including the rapidly spreading Delta variant:

And overall, Republicans are far more likely than Democrats to say they have not been vaccinated and definitely or probably won’t be, 43% to 10%. Views are also divided along age and education lines: Thirty-seven percent of those under age 45 say they haven’t and likely won’t get the shots, compared with just 16% of those older. And those without college degrees are more likely than those with them to say they aren’t and won’t be vaccinated, 30% to 18%.

“We always knew some proportion of the population would be difficult to persuade no matter what the data showed, (and) a lot of people are beyond persuasion,” Dr. Amesh Adalja, an infectious disease specialist at Johns Hopkins University, said, according to ABC News.

Meanwhile, public health officials are urging all eligible Americans to get vaccinated and are warning the unvaccinated to mask up until they get the shot.

“If you are not vaccinated — as the President spoke to unvaccinated people last night and back on July 4th — you need to get vaccinated or you do not have a high degree of protection for yourself, for your friends, and for your family and your community,” coronavirus team leader Jeffery Zients said during Thursday’s White House COVID-19 Response Team’s press briefing.

“And unvaccinated people need to roll up their sleeves as soon as possible and begin their vaccination routine,” he added.

Public health officials have largely dismissed concerns over...