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Sipsey Street Irregulars

September 09, 2010
7:12
Sportsman's Guide has "wooly pullys" for twenty bucks.
» ‎ Sipsey Street Irregulars

With colder weather approaching, from the Trainer comes this tip on "Wooly Pully" availability at Sportsman's Guide. I always liked the reinforced elbows.

WX2-173035 - Used British Military Wool Sweater, Olive Drab Compare at $50.00 $19.97 Club Price $17.97
6:53
How Obama Thinks. -- "Incredibly, the U.S. is being ruled according to the dreams of a Luo tribesman of the 1950s."
» ‎ Sipsey Street Irregulars

"America today is governed by a ghost."

Colonialism today is a dead issue. No one cares about it except the man in the White House. He is the last anticolonial. Emerging market economies such as China, India, Chile and Indonesia have solved the problem of backwardness; they are exploiting their labor advantage and growing much faster than the U.S. If America is going to remain on top, we have to compete in an increasingly tough environment.
But instead of readying us for the challenge, our President is trapped in his father's time machine. Incredibly, the U.S. is being ruled according to the dreams of a Luo tribesman of the 1950s. This philandering, inebriated African socialist, who raged against the world for denying him the realization of his anticolonial ambitions, is now setting the nation's agenda through the reincarnation of his dreams in his son. The son makes it happen, but he candidly admits he is only living out his father's dream. The invisible father provides the inspiration, and the son dutifully gets the job done. America today is governed by a ghost.
September 08, 2010
14:54
Here's what the hearing is likely about -- No Dem witness list has yet been posted -- and why I just might attend.
» ‎ Sipsey Street Irregulars

NRA "watch dog" and his squeak toy reward.

The Washington Post whines "The NRA is working to gut the latest federal gun bill." Of course the prospect of the NRA "defending" our firearm rights is pretty suspect given their past history of compromise. The original bill language, introduced by a GOP senator, can be found here.

Of course, if the Democrats who control the committee are going to get serious about this, it is hardly likely to reduce the ATF's power or ability to engage in Olofson or Red's Trading Post style railroad jobs. They are likely to throw a small rubber bone squeak toy to the NRA to try and get this done before the mid-term elections, with the Cracker Jack surprise of what they really want to be discovered afterward. This is, of course, how they always work.

I spoke with Senator Sessions' office (I am, after all, a constituent of his) as well as with his folks on the Judiciary Committee and the Dems have not yet submitted to them a witness list.

I was also informed that no passes are necessary for this hearing, although I was warned to arrive early.

I think I just might drop in on the "world's greatest deliberative body." If for no other reason than to watch the NRA sellout dogs play with their squeak toys.
14:09
Well, well. ATF getting in an oversight hearing before the chairmen change. Perhaps they will ask "Where's Waldo?" under oath.
» ‎ Sipsey Street Irregulars

James "Waco Jim" Cavanaugh, ATF's most successful serial perjurer, has retired so he won't be available for this one.

“Firearms in Commerce: Assessing the Need for Reform in the Federal Regulatory Process”

OFFICIAL HEARING NOTICE / WITNESS LIST:

September 7, 2010 NOTICE OF COMMITTEE HEARING The Senate Committee on the Judiciary has scheduled a hearing entitled "Firearms in Commerce: Assessing the Need for Reform in the Federal Regulatory Process" for Tuesday, September 14, 2010 at 10:00 a.m. in Room 226 of the Dirksen Senate Office Building.
6:50
The Mean Tribe
» ‎ Sipsey Street Irregulars

Global Guerrillas provides this link which argues that the "Ultra-Rich in Finance Are Meaner Than Rest of Us."
6:27
Obama as Pee Wee Herman. The symbiotics are calling each other names and not talking to one another and the System is worried about it.
» ‎ Sipsey Street Irregulars

"I know you are, but what am I? . . . Infinity."
Symbiosis is an interaction between two organisms living together in intimate association, -- Wikipedia.
Symbiosis indeed.

Becoming speaker is Boehner’s lifetime goal, the apex of his 20-year congressional career, but to achieve anything in that post, he will need Obama in order to get anything enacted into law,
And Obama would need Boehner if he is turn around the sputtering U.S. economy, blunt the rise of the tea party movement and get his presidency back on track.
September 07, 2010
21:06
Praxis: A Reminder When Buying Military Surplus.
» ‎ Sipsey Street Irregulars

Stay away from property book items -- especially if they are offered for sale online.
20:58
Professional politician overthrown by Tea Party-backed candidate in GOP primary turns to Libertarians.
» ‎ Sipsey Street Irregulars

It is all about the appetite for power. Some folks just can't give it up. More interesting is how the professional pols sneer at the Libertarians at the same time they are courting them.

Reports on Tuesday did not indicate whether the Libertarians may have reconsidered, but Bitney alluded to the possibility that a deal might still be struck.
"They could want everything from a lunch at the Capitol to who knows what," Bitney said. "I think these guys are a little bit star struck, and they're getting more attention than they've probably ever gotten in their whole lives, and it's got to be intriguing and exciting all at once."
10:03
Obama complains people "talk about me like I'm a dog."
» ‎ Sipsey Street Irregulars

Honest dogs object. Canine Anti-Defamation League to sue President?

"Hey, watch who yer callin' a dog. We got feelins' too, ya know."
9:05
"The patriotic requirement of hanging a loyalist." What happens when things get civil-war-style messy: The fate of David Redding
» ‎ Sipsey Street Irregulars

In an incident more like a lynching than a legal procedure, New Yorker David Redding was the first person to be tried and hanged in the state of Vermont. Redding had been a Loyalist with Burgoyne's army at Saratoga, stolen horses, shot and powder in New York, and eluded arrest there by riding into Vermont, where he was caught and tried in Bennington for theft and treason and convicted. When it appeared that Redding would go free because of an improperly empaneled jury, Ethan Allen, back in Vermont only a few days after nearly three years as a British prisoner, arranged with Governor Thomas Chittenden to serve as prosecutor in a new trial on June 6, 1778. Allen ignored the threshold issue of jurisdiction, which the Bennington court lacked for crimes committed in New York. Moreover, as Vermont was independent of the thirteen states, the United States' cause against Redding was also not in the court's jurisdiction. Nonetheless, Allen's impassioned anti-Loyalist rhetoric swung the jury away from the legal question to the patriotic requirement of hanging a loyalist, and Redding was hanged in the afternoon of the trial before a large crowd on Bennington green. -- The Vermont Encyclopedia, John J. Duffy, et. al.
My thanks and a tip of the boonie hat to Amish Tom for sending me the image above of David Redding's tombstone in Bennington.

The Catamount Tavern, Bennington, Vermont, in a photo taken a few years before it burned in 1871.

Redding was tried in the Catamount Tavern (originally known as Fay's House) in Old Bennington. Built in 1769 and burned in 1871, the tavern was the site of many important events in Vermont's colonial and revolutionary history. The name Catamount Tavern came about when grantees from New Hampshire posted a stuffed catamount on the tavern's signpost to scare away New Yorkers who claimed their land. The Catamount served as headquarters for the Green Mountain Boys. Ethan Allen planned the capture of Fort Ticonderoga there and Johnny Stark used it as a headquarters while helping defeat General Burgoyne. It was also the meeting place of Vermont's only form of government, the Vermont Council of Safety.
Thus it was to The Catamount Tavern that David Redding, a member of the Queen's Loyal Rangers and a Loyalist spy, was brought when re-arrested after escaping while being transported to Albany, New York on the charge of horse thievery.

At Redding's first trial, he was quickly found guilty and sentenced to be hanged in a field next to the tavern, but John Burnham, a local merchant and loyalist sympathizer, delayed the execution by pointing out that Redding had been tried by six rather than twelve men. This caused an uproar among local Rebels and Redding would have been hung immediately had not Ethan Allen promised "you shall see somebody hung, for if Redding is not hung, I will be hung myself."
After the second trial and execution, his body was not buried but rather his bones were kept in a drawer and used for medical research. They were not finally interred until 200 years later in the Old First Church Cemetery, in Bennington. The image at the top marks this belated burial.
Food for thought for present-day "loyalists" of the regime.
September 06, 2010
20:21
Sorry, I took today off.
» ‎ Sipsey Street Irregulars

More tomorrow.
September 05, 2010
19:35
Praxis: Calling Dr. D -- A new comment on an old field telephone post seeks your help. Plus, information on the TP-6N Norwegian field phone.
» ‎ Sipsey Street Irregulars

The TP-6N is a Norwegian-built felttelefon (field telephone) produced for the Norwegian and Dutch armed forces. The Dutch designation for this is veldtelefoon TA4881. It was designed in the early 1970's by Elektrisk Bureau in Billingstad, Norway, and won an Award for Design Excellence in 1973. It earned the nickname "cricket phone" presumably because of the tone generated by the electronic ringer.
In 2008, a surplus store in the US acquired a limited quantity of TP-6N phones and resold them to the public. We obtained some to evaluate, with the intention of interfacing with and/or replacing older field phones already being used for search and rescue communication. These TP-6N phones have since proved very useful, particularly in harsh cave environments. Additional phones have now been acquired from Europe, and this page is provided as an informational source for owners, users and other interested persons.

A new comment below from Ken on a post from June about field telephones. I post it here at the top so it won't get overlooked. Also, for those of you who are unfamiliar with the Norwegian TP6N field telephones, be sure and go to the link cited above.

Mike
III

This is for DR.D

You stated, "I've been contemplating designing a simple switch board that could be assembled from commercial parts. It's wouldn't be as rugged as a SB22 but it would be a lot smaller and lighter.

If any one needs help with field phones and switch boards and repairs/parts for the same let me know."

We are a Search and Rescue group in Minnesota that uses the TA-312 and TP-6N phones for cave operations. I recently received a SB-22 but have been talking with a fellow communications persion with the National Cave Rescue Commission on the need for as you said a smaller, simpler unit.

I would enjoy discussing the idea with you if you have time.

Thank you.

Ken A.
esssar@comcast.net
19:35
Praxis: Calling Dr. D -- A new comment on an old field telephone post seeks your help. Plus, information on the TP-6N Norwegian field phone.
» ‎ Sipsey Street Irregulars

The TP-6N is a Norwegian-built felttelefon (field telephone) produced for the Norwegian and Dutch armed forces. The Dutch designation for this is veldtelefoon TA4881. It was designed in the early 1970's by Elektrisk Bureau in Billingstad, Norway, and won an Award for Design Excellence in 1973. It earned the nickname "cricket phone" presumably because of the tone generated by the electronic ringer.
In 2008, a surplus store in the US acquired a limited quantity of TP-6N phones and resold them to the public. We obtained some to evaluate, with the intention of interfacing with and/or replacing older field phones already being used for search and rescue communication. These TP-6N phones have since proved very useful, particularly in harsh cave environments. Additional phones have now been acquired from Europe, and this page is provided as an informational source for owners, users and other interested persons.

A new comment below from Ken on a post from June about field telephones. I post it here at the top so it won't get overlooked. Also, for those of you who are unfamiliar with the Norwegian TP6N field telephones, be sure and go to the link cited above.

Mike
III

This is for DR.D

You stated, "I've been contemplating designing a simple switch board that could be assembled from commercial parts. It's wouldn't be as rugged as a SB22 but it would be a lot smaller and lighter.

If any one needs help with field phones and switch boards and repairs/parts for the same let me know."

We are a Search and Rescue group in Minnesota that uses the TA-312 and TP-6N phones for cave operations. I recently received a SB-22 but have been talking with a fellow communications persion with the National Cave Rescue Commission on the need for as you said a smaller, simpler unit.

I would enjoy discussing the idea with you if you have time.

Thank you.

Ken A.
esssar@comcast.net
5:18
"My country, my ass."
» ‎ Sipsey Street Irregulars

Pete offers us a new anthem.

Be sure and go to all the links and consider doing the action items.
4:51
A moment to clarify what I mean by "moke"
» ‎ Sipsey Street Irregulars

An overloaded moke (who appears to be smarter than his owner).
"Moke" is indeed a disparaging term used by Hawaiians, meaning somebody big and dumb. However, as near as I can tell its usage preceeds that by many centuries in English-speaking countries. It is an archaic British, Australian, and United States slang term meaning donkey. I cannot tell you where I first heard it, but it was long ago in my youth, which was divided between Michigan and Ohio, far away from Hawaii. There are no racial overtones, intended or unintended, to the term as I understand it.
4:34
What a Lone Voice in the Wilderness Sounds Like: The Old Guide versus Leviathan's Environmental Collective.
» ‎ Sipsey Street Irregulars

The Maine North Woods is the northern geographic area of the state of Maine in the United States.

It covers more than 3.5 million acres (14,000 km²) of top forest land in north-western Maine. It includes western Aroostook and northern Somerset, Penobscot, and Piscataquis counties. Much of the woods is currently owned by the timber corporations, including Seven Islands Land Company, Plum Creek, Maibec, Orion Timberlands and Irving timber corporations. Ownership changes hands quite frequently and is often difficult to determine.

Its main products are timber for pulp and lumber, as well as a thriving hunting and outdoor recreation economy.

Included within its boundaries are two of the most famous wild rivers of the Northeastern United States: the St. John and the Allagash. The North Maine Woods completely surrounds thr Allagash Wilderness Waterway.

Wildlife

The Maine North Woods are predominantly forestland consisting of mixed northern hardwoods and conifers, much of it artificially planted after harvesting by the various landowners. The major tree species are sugar maple, American beech. balsam fir, quaking aspen, Northern white cedar, red spruce, white spruce, black spruce, yellow birch, paper birch, and Eastern white pine. The area is also home to white-tailed dear, moose, black bears, bobcat, coyotes, red fox, fisher, otter, mink, marten, weasel, beavers, porcupine, muskrat, red squirrel, Snowshoe Hare, ruffed grouse, Spruce Grouse, loons and gray jays. There are official hunting seasons for the grouse, deer and bears, with a state-run lottery system for awarding moose-hunting licences. Char including squaretail, togue, and isolated populations of blueback trout are the best known fish of the rivers and lakes. Black fly, mosquito, deer fly and midge populations can be significant from late spring through early autumn. The Maine North Woods are also home to the endangered Canada lynx, bald eagle and the Furbish lousewort, a rare plant that is found only in the St. John river valley. Animals which have disappeared from the woods during European settlement include caribou and gray wolf. Status of the cougar is uncertain.

Folklore

Early 19th century logging of the Maine north woods employed native Maliseet, English settlers from the Atlantic coast, French Canadians from the Saint Lawrence River valley, and some unskilled laborers recruited from large eastern cities. Unique mythology evolved in the remote logging camps from hazing new employees or attempts by competing groups to dominate the resource extraction labor market. Two birds held special significance. The relatively tame gray jays would follow loggers through the woods in the hope of stealing unwatched food, but were not harmed because they were believed to be the spirits of deceased woodsmen. Some French Canadians would quit work if a white owl was seen flying from a tree they were felling, for they believed it was a ghost who would haunt them unless they left that part of the woods.

Mythical creatures of the north woods:

* Razor-shins was an immortal humanoid with sharp shin bones and a thirst for liquor in the prohibition state of Maine. New employees were encouraged to leave a jug of Nagor whiskey outside of the camp door on the night of the full moon. If razor-shins emptied the jug by morning, he might use his razor-sharp shinbones to fell a tree for the new man. But there were tales of new employees caught in the woods by razor-shins and scalped or otherwise mutilated after failing to offer the customary tribute.

* Will-am-alones were squirrel-like creatures said to roll poisonous lichen into small balls and drop them onto the eyelids or into the ears of sleeping men. The lichen balls were reputed to cause headaches and visual hallucinations the following day. The effects seemed most evident among men who had consumed illegal liquor.

* Windigo (or "Indian devil") was described as a huge, shadowy humanoid with a voice like the moaning of the wind through the pine boughs, but known only by his tracks through the snow. Each footprint was 24 inches (60 cm) long and resembled a snowshoe imprint with a red spot in the center where blood had oozed through a hole in his moccasin. Some feared to cross his tracks and claimed looking upon Windigo would seal their doom.

* Ding-ball was a cougar whose last tail joint was ball-shaped and bare of hair and flesh. Ding-ball was fond of human flesh and would sing with a human voice to lure the incautious out of their cabins at night where it waited in the darkness to crack their skulls with its tail.

Americans for a Maine Woods National Park, an interest group that includes scientists, educators, environmentalists and celebrities, is pushing to turn a as much as 3.2 million acres (13,000 km²), an area larger than Yellowstone and Yosemite combined, into a national park.

The proposed park is very controversial among residents within or adjacent to the park's proposed borders. Many fear the dislocation of traditional industries and recreational activities as a result of a park's creation. The County Commissions from Aroostook, Piscataquis, and Somerset have voted to oppose efforts to create a park. They are joined by Maine's Congressional delegation, its governor and legislature. A local group, the Maine Woods Coalition, was organized to oppose the effort. -- Wikipedia.
Folks,

I received the description below from the Old Guide a recent National Park Service "listening" conclave about a proposed federal takeover of northern Maine.

The Feds came to Maine to "listen". They want to take over much of Maine for a new North Woods National Park. They lined up a whole bunch of environmental groups to testify in favor of it. A few of we property rights advocates infiltrated the session and were actually scheduled to testify.

I was one of the first to arrive about 1:45 and one of the last to leave. At the end I was surrounded by three top officials from the Obama administration who wanted to hear what I had to say because there were so few landowner advocates in Bangor. I was able to expand on what I said in my prepared remarks. There were five break-out sessions. (Divide and conquer.) I was in the "grey room" as determined by the color of our folders when we checked in. There were 35 people in the room to testify and five feds up front. I was the ONLY advocate for private landowners in the room! Years ago we called that a target rich environment. I did not seek to lead off with my presentation. I waited until the guy from RESTORE gave his presentation. When I gave mine I thought the RESTORE guy and Ted Koffman of Maine Audubon were going to bust a blood vessel.

Old Guide's presentation:

Federal "Listening Session"
September 2, 2010
Bangor, Maine

The Old Guide

Welcome to Maine. Your announcement said you come to listen. Thank you for your time.

• What Works? – Please share your thoughts and ideas on effective strategies for conservation, recreation, and reconnecting people to the outdoors?

You ask what works. Private ownership works. The reason the environmental industry likes Maine so much is that we private landowners have taken such good care of it for the last four centuries. We are still taking good care of it. However, in my lifetime we have lost great amounts of freedom. We used to be able to build a boathouse IN the lake. Boathouses didn't hurt the lakes at all and the fishing was better. We had a spruce budworm epidemic a quarter century ago. We needed to salvage large amounts of dead and dying trees. The environmental industry used that as an opportunity to attack Maine's landowners, large and small. A photo appeared in our newspapers showing a vast clear cut. The photo was taken in Siberia. It leads penthouse environmentalists in Boston to think our forests are gone.

In 1940 Maine had about 6,250,000 acres of pasture and cultivated ground. Today we have just over a million. In my lifetime Maine has gained an average of 77,000 acres a year of forest. Yes, gained. That is over three townships every year. Our forests are not gone. Those who say we are losing our forests simply lie or are ignorant of the truth. Our forests are not "fragmented". We don't need "wolf routes" to reconnect our forests. The addition of three townships of forest each year has created a huge contiguous forest and the greatest new carbon sequestration in the world. We private landowners did that.

• Challenges – What obstacles exist to achieve your goals for conservation, recreation, or reconnecting people to the outdoors?

The obstacles are many, but the biggest obstacle we face is LURC and the rules they invent. No other state has over half its land governed by an unelected bunch of state functionaries, accountable to no-one. We don't get to vote on these people or the rules they dream up to control us. They just impose them.

You folks are all high enough in the administration to realize there are preparations and contingency plans being made in the event of civil strife in our country. Just last Sunday your boss, President Obama spoke to the people of New Orleans and honored them for their perseverance. We too have persevered. We have been under a regime of discrimination, oppression and rural cleansing for four decades. Just prior to April 19,1775 the Crown imposed such rules on Americans. Those rules were called "The Intolerable Acts". Our forefathers fought a war over them. Now, 235 years later, we have new intolerable acts. At a state level listening session an employee of LURC asked if I thought we could experience civil strife in our country. He was too young to remember Detroit, South Watts and Atlanta in 1968. I answered him with a question; If we did have civil strife in Maine, where would the members of LURC go? I say these things because I was born before WWII and actually remember freedom. We want it back. We are Americans. WILL persevere.

• Tools – What additional tools and resources would help your efforts be even more successful?

Everybody likes clean air and clean water. Those are not issues. The real issue in Maine is a vicious agenda of rural cleansing. The tools and resources we could use are a state government that encourages economic growth instead of stifling growth. Economic growth brings prosperity. The environmental industry calls growth something else. They call it sprawl. They don't like growth or prosperity.

• Federal Government Role – How can the federal government be a more effective partner in helping to achieve conservation, recreation and reconnecting people to the outdoors?

We don't need to be reconnected to the outdoors. We are an outdoor people and have been connected to the outdoors all our lives - for many generations. We could, however, use a little help building more recreational trails for snowmobiles and ATVs. They are an important part of our economy since so much manufacturing has left and the recreational sector could use a little stimulus money. It's our money after all. Aside from that we don't need any federal involvement. Oh, and we'd like the piece of the White Mountain National Forest in Maine back. You could auction it off and use the proceeds for snowmobile and ATV trails.

Remember who we are. We are freedom loving Americans. Many of us have fought for freedom in several countries. As Lord Percy said in his report back to England after the battles of Lexington and Concord, "They are wise in the ways of the woods and they know what they are about." We still know what we are about today. We know who you are. Remember who we are, freedom loving Americans. It is in your best interest.

- - -

We have been led down the road by the environmental industry for years and following Chairman Mao's tenets of two steps forward, one step back. We are supposed to be thankful when they don't take as much from us as they first threatened. That is the behavior of a childish fraternity pledge. not a freedom-loving American.

I don't buy into that. You should have seen the shock when I advocated building boathouses in the lakes and when I said we wanted that portion of the White Mountain National Forest in Maine back. Those comments were what made the administration leaders want to talk with me in the lobby when it was all over. I guess the small bunch at the New Hampshire session ten days ago was more docile.

I tell you, there were 15 people on the opposite side of the large round table across from my side and I made eye contact with most. Their mouths were so wide open in astonishment they looked like a bunch of guppies at feeding time. They had never heard such ideas.

No name calling. No histrionics, just facts.

The Old Guide
September 04, 2010
10:43
What is it about these Jihadi mokes and beheading?
» ‎ Sipsey Street Irregulars

I mean, really?

A well-known Australian Muslim cleric has called for the beheading of Dutch anti-Islamic politician Geert Wilders, a newspaper said on Friday.
Wilders' Freedom Party scored the biggest gains in June 9 polls and is currently negotiating to form a new minority government with the Liberals and Christian Democrats. Polls show Wilders would win a new election if one were called now.

Wilders demanded to know why he had learnt about the threat from the newspaper and not from Dutch authorities who are guarding him after a film and remarks he made angered Muslims around the world.

De Telegraaf, the Netherlands' largest newspaper, led its front page on Friday with a story on the speech by Feiz Muhammad.

The Sydney-born Muhammad has gained notoriety for, among other things, calling on young children to be radicalized and blaming rape victims for their own attacks.
What if somebody cuts HIS head off and buries it wrapped in a pigskin, a la Black Jack Pershing in the Philippines? Hey, I know, Crocodile Dundee is currently stuck in Australia by order of the tax cops. And he DOES have a very big knife.
10:09
Now this is about as funny as it gets.
» ‎ Sipsey Street Irregulars

Really.

A snippet:

Add Jesse Jackson’s ride to prominent vehicles being stripped in Detroit.
Following the embarrassing news that Mayor Dave Bing’s GMC Yukon was hijacked by criminals this week, Detroit’s Channel 7 reports that the Reverend’s Caddy Escalade SUV was stolen and stripped of its wheels while he was in town last weekend with the UAW’s militant President Bob King leading the “Jobs, Justice, and Peace” march promoting government-funded green jobs.
Read that again: Jackson’s Caddy SUV was stripped while he was in town promoting green jobs.
9:56
"It's the end of the world as we know it."
» ‎ Sipsey Street Irregulars

A tip of the boonie hat to Irregular Stan for this link: Société Générale tells clients how to prepare for potential 'global collapse.'

Got militia?
9:52
Just another ATF outrage.
» ‎ Sipsey Street Irregulars

The one thing I know about incidents like this is that one day, there WILL be a reckoning.
September 03, 2010
10:18
Well, I did manage to muster up this one email.
» ‎ Sipsey Street Irregulars

From: georgemason1776@aol.com
To: (REDACTED SHORT LIST OF ATF MALEFACTORS)
Sent: Fri, Sep 3, 2010 11:17 am
Subject: Just a personal note to all my ATF friends.

Everybody needs to take a day off once in a while for rest and reflection and today is one of mine. Collecting my thoughts about what the last year of shadow boxing has brought us, I was struck by the following truths:

1. The fly always experiences a momentary sense of triumph when he has just conquered the flypaper.

2. Whatever has happened, is happening now and will happen between now and January will be the subject of oversight hearings by the reinvigorated GOP-owned House and (probably) Senate shortly afterward. Your strategic air cover will be a bit uncovered without Chucky Schumer and the Citizen Disarmament Caucus in absolute power in those vital committee chairmanships to protect you. You might want to compare notes now with James "Waco Jim" Cavanaugh. Now THERE was a guy who could perjure himself and get away with it.

Have a nice day.

Mike Vanderboegh
The alleged leader of a merry band of Three Percenters

PS: Waldo and R.A. Bear both say "Hi!"
9:54
Taking a day off for rest, reflection and gettin' stuff done around the house.
» ‎ Sipsey Street Irregulars

Frankly, my heart ain't in it just now. Be back tomorrow, I'm sure.
September 02, 2010
18:37
Gang vs. Gang: Unofficial gangs complain about treatment from the Official Dailey Gang.
» ‎ Sipsey Street Irregulars

Ironic as all get out.
18:32
Wanted Poster.
» ‎ Sipsey Street Irregulars

Of course this isn't an official agency poster, but the FBI certainly is in "dire need." Especially in dire need of ethics, morals and a constitutional purpose.
13:00
Well, that was interesting.
» ‎ Sipsey Street Irregulars

After what may have been a contrived incident of road rage on someone else's part, I was arrested by the Jefferson County Sheriff's Department this morning for possessing a loaded handgun in my vehicle without a permit. The other guy (the one exhibiting the road rage) was, as far as I know, not ticketed for anything. In fact, the Deputy, one nasty piece of work named Cornelius, told me loudly to "shut my . . . hole" when I asked about it. At no time was I impolite or contemptuous.

I was cuffed, arrested, and taken downtown by another far more professional, even kindly, deputy and booked on a $1000 bail, but then let go a couple hours later on a signature bond. The worst part of it is that our only car was impounded, towed, and we are still awaiting word on where, when and how much it will be to pick it up. At the time I was on the way back home from my doctor's appointment by way of the route I always take.

The stint in the jail holding cell was interesting. The wall and ceiling art made of carvings (how did THEY get a knife in there?), excremental scrawlings (swastikas, of course), paint peelings (the head of the devil was particularly well done) and toilet paper papier mache were quite inventive.

As I said, they let me go after getting my photo, fingerprints and signature.

Boy, is Rosey going to be pissed. Strike that. She's already pissed. I may live this down in another five or ten years. Upon expert friendly advice, I will have nothing more to say in this venue about the facts of the case.

-- Mike
III

PS: My pistol will be returned tomorrow. . . without the rounds. (Seized ammunition is used by the Jefferson County Sheriff's Department for practice -- and if not it almost always goes home with a well-connected deputy -- and it is almost never returned. Even if the charges are dropped. Even if we're talking about cases of ammo in the same situation.)
7:18
Saw no one on lame-stream media making the Al Gore connection to this moke this morning.
» ‎ Sipsey Street Irregulars

Lee said at the time that he experienced an ‘‘awakening” when he watched former Vice President Al Gore’s environmental documentary ‘‘An Inconvenient Truth.”

Calling Rachel Madcow.
7:10
Praxis: Load Bearing Equipment
» ‎ Sipsey Street Irregulars

Go here for info on USGI load bearing equipment from ALICE onward. For those of you who are unfamiliar with the newer MOLLE II gear, they have a copy of the Care and Use Manual you can download and print out.
September 01, 2010
18:25
Wanted: Volunteers with an airplane to smuggle Crocodile Dundee out of Australia.
» ‎ Sipsey Street Irregulars

I ain't makin' it up.

"I can't pay 10 percent of what they're asking.... bugger 'em!"
18:20
Intelligence test.
» ‎ Sipsey Street Irregulars

Photo and commentary found at The Cliffs of Insanity.
15:05
Obviously another reason why the Department of Homeland Security is right to be worried about "right-wing terrorists": The Lee Manifesto.
» ‎ Sipsey Street Irregulars

"Focus must be given on how people can live WITHOUT giving birth to more filthy human children since those new additions continue pollution and are pollution. A game show format contest would be in order."

Just in case you wondered why some folks in a citizen disarmament zone in Silver Springs, Maryland are being held hostage by a left-collectivist nutbag. But, wait! This doesn't fit the SPLC/MSNBC meme! Whatever will Rachel Madcow do?
2:33
Restoration and a Coalition of the Willing versus the People's Front of Judea and the silly sods of the Judean People's Front Crack Suicide Squad.
» ‎ Sipsey Street Irregulars

Folks,

Reading some of the comments at Pete's site on the subject of "Restoring the Constitution" and others insulting Bob Wright here reminded me of nothing so much as this scene from the Monty Python movie Life of Brian:

The core of Pete's post:

To me, there are three important reasons to use the phrase "restore the constitution":

1) Lawfare Ambush KZ: I dare that SOB Holder to use the DOJ mechanism against anybody working or talking to restore the Constitution. I double-dog-dare that MF to do so.

2) PsyOps: When the .mil is sent by the NCA against their fellow citizens, I want each troopie to have to put their reticle on a fellow American standing for the same Constitution that the troopie is oathbound to protect and defend.

3) Paradigm Inflexibility: Many good and honorable people who will stand simply cannot bend their heads around a "return to the Articles" endstate at this time. They will evolve in their thinking, just as I have (hell, I was a freaking drug war prosecutor fifteen years ago -- talk about evolution!), and I can't ask them to both die and give up their core preconceptions right now.
If you have to put labels on belief, I am a Christian anti-federalist libertarian. In terms of crafting a coalition of the willing to defeat the armed onslaught of tyrannical federal collectivism, that is a small philosophical boat in a very large sea. It is a larger craft than some of these anarchist and New Confederate dinghies bobbing around, but small enough.

Thus, if I want to secure my liberty, I'm going to have to find a whole lot of people who agree with me on the big things and set aside for now the small things (and some not-so-small-things) that we disagree on. (Mind you, collectivism, especially racial collectivism, is definitely not one of those.)

Two comments to Pete's RTC post reflect my thoughts:

Atlas Shrug said...
Restore The Constitution = Horse

Refine The Constitution = Cart

Right now we are still trying to get the Horse calm and bridled, let alone hitched. Let's get him pulling the Cart before getting too side tracked on what's in the Cart, OK?

The Horse is the vehicle that we ride into Liberty on, the Cart is the vehicle that follows it.

Let's not get the Cart before the Horse.

Keep your powder dry,

Atlas Shrug

August 31, 2010 11:04 AM

daniel said...
I'm partial to the RTC message because, boiled down, it's simply a call for a group of people to adhere to what they already agreed to. It's easier to do that than the other alternatives (explain libertarianism, economics, philosophy, history through a megaphone or on a flyer or banner).

The RTC rallies obvious inclusion of 2A needing restoration is a good starting point, something that's easily understood and difficult to BS around.

We're here. We're armed. The document you swore to uphold says we can do this. If you try to disarm us, you are going against what you agreed to.

That being said, a list of usurpations, like Eric Stinnet's speed read at Gravelly, would work best to quickly articulate what exactly it is that we want.

And this one from Anonymous directed to Pat H. in response to his comments on Bob Wright:
There is no perfect governmental plan. There is no Heaven on earth. Humans will always be far from perfect therefore so shall be their best of plans. That includes yours.

The best we can do is try to get back to where things were most tolerable, most acceptable, least offensive to human liberty and freedom. That is where Mr. Wright is going with his words. I personally find everything right with that.

We know the Constitution wasn't perfect. It was written by imperfect men. Now let's get on with restoring all that was good about it and flush what isn't down the drain. I don't think we need a new imperfect plan to accomplish that.

More importantly, if some folks insist that they must fight for the Articles of Confederation (or some other view consistent with their own variety of anarchism, New Confederacy, whatever) or not at all -- that we all must agree with them on an end state before they take up arms -- then they will either not fight or if they do they will resemble nothing so much as this other scene from Life of Brian:

Of course such folks will complain that I am reducing their principled insistence down to farcical comedy. But given the grim reality, is that so unfair?

Folks, look at the bloody collectivist beast that is upon us -- the Leviathan that we will likely be called upon to fight in the near future. Is it "principled" to insist that everyone agree with you before you will resist? Is it "principled" to sneer at other folks such as Bob Wright who have been fighting this fight for 20 years at considerable personal cost? Or are such "principled" people merely seeking another reason NOT to resist?

The concept of restoring the Constitution and the Founders' Republic is the ONE idea -- and the ONLY idea -- that a successful fighting coalition to resist collectivism can be assembled around. Forget that the Constitution and the Bill of Rights (put in there at the insistence of the anti-federalist) was at the time both a compromise and the greatest light-years leap forward in liberty ever codified. Did the Founders screw up in adopting it as it was, in part or in whole? I'll tell you there's things I wish had been in there.

So what?

We will have a chance to fix things AFTER WE WIN AND ONLY AFTER WE WIN. And at this point, it is by no means certain that we will win.

This is not glossing over anything, it is reality. If folks cannot exercise enough common sense to see that, then they will die alone or be enslaved because the rest of us anti-collectivists did not measure up to their high standards. They are, of course, free to do so -- leaving the rest of us to fight and to win against the same folks who would gladly see us all on boxcars, in camps or in a mass grave covered with lime.

For those of us who intend to win, we must redouble our efforts to get ready. And don't get side-tracked into these "How many Lysander Spooners can dance on the head of an Articles of Confederation pin?" discussions. It is time wasting and self defeating, perhaps intentionally so.

Of course there are apparently some who prefer to be ultra-principled even if they are defeated.

I'm not one of them.

How about you?

Mike
III
2:33
Restoration and a Coalition of the Willing versus the People's Front of Judea and the silly sods of the Judean People's Front Crack Suicide Squad.
» ‎ Sipsey Street Irregulars

Folks,

Reading some of the comments at Pete's site on the subject of "Restoring the Constitution" and others insulting Bob Wright here reminded me of nothing so much as this scene from the Monty Python movie Life of Brian:

The core of Pete's post:

To me, there are three important reasons to use the phrase "restore the constitution":

1) Lawfare Ambush KZ: I dare that SOB Holder to use the DOJ mechanism against anybody working or talking to restore the Constitution. I double-dog-dare that MF to do so.

2) PsyOps: When the .mil is sent by the NCA against their fellow citizens, I want each troopie to have to put their reticle on a fellow American standing for the same Constitution that the troopie is oathbound to protect and defend.

3) Paradigm Inflexibility: Many good and honorable people who will stand simply cannot bend their heads around a "return to the Articles" endstate at this time. They will evolve in their thinking, just as I have (hell, I was a freaking drug war prosecutor fifteen years ago -- talk about evolution!), and I can't ask them to both die and give up their core preconceptions right now.
If you have to put labels on belief, I am a Christian anti-federalist libertarian. In terms of crafting a coalition of the willing to defeat the armed onslaught of tyrannical federal collectivism, that is a small philosophical boat in a very large sea. It is a larger craft than some of these anarchist and New Confederate dinghies bobbing around, but small enough.

Thus, if I want to secure my liberty, I'm going to have to find a whole lot of people who agree with me on the big things and set aside for now the small things (and some not-so-small-things) that we disagree on. (Mind you, collectivism, especially racial collectivism, is definitely not one of those.)

Two comments to Pete's RTC post reflect my thoughts:

Atlas Shrug said...
Restore The Constitution = Horse

Refine The Constitution = Cart

Right now we are still trying to get the Horse calm and bridled, let alone hitched. Let's get him pulling the Cart before getting too side tracked on what's in the Cart, OK?

The Horse is the vehicle that we ride into Liberty on, the Cart is the vehicle that follows it.

Let's not get the Cart before the Horse.

Keep your powder dry,

Atlas Shrug

August 31, 2010 11:04 AM

daniel said...
I'm partial to the RTC message because, boiled down, it's simply a call for a group of people to adhere to what they already agreed to. It's easier to do that than the other alternatives (explain libertarianism, economics, philosophy, history through a megaphone or on a flyer or banner).

The RTC rallies obvious inclusion of 2A needing restoration is a good starting point, something that's easily understood and difficult to BS around.

We're here. We're armed. The document you swore to uphold says we can do this. If you try to disarm us, you are going against what you agreed to.

That being said, a list of usurpations, like Eric Stinnet's speed read at Gravelly, would work best to quickly articulate what exactly it is that we want.

And this one from Anonymous directed to Pat H. in response to his comments on Bob Wright:
There is no perfect governmental plan. There is no Heaven on earth. Humans will always be far from perfect therefore so shall be their best of plans. That includes yours.

The best we can do is try to get back to where things were most tolerable, most acceptable, least offensive to human liberty and freedom. That is where Mr. Wright is going with his words. I personally find everything right with that.

We know the Constitution wasn't perfect. It was written by imperfect men. Now let's get on with restoring all that was good about it and flush what isn't down the drain. I don't think we need a new imperfect plan to accomplish that.

More importantly, if some folks insist that they must fight for the Articles of Confederation (or some other view consistent with their own variety of anarchism, New Confederacy, whatever) or not at all -- that we all must agree with them on an end state before they take up arms -- then they will either not fight or if they do they will resemble nothing so much as this other scene from Life of Brian:

Of course such folks will complain that I am reducing their principled insistence down to farcical comedy. But given the grim reality, is that so unfair?

Folks, look at the bloody collectivist beast that is upon us -- the Leviathan that we will likely be called upon to fight in the near future. Is it "principled" to insist that everyone agree with you before you will resist? Is it "principled" to sneer at other folks such as Bob Wright who have been fighting this fight for 20 years at considerable personal cost? Or are such "principled" people merely seeking another reason NOT to resist?

The concept of restoring the Constitution and the Founders' Republic is the ONE idea -- and the ONLY idea -- that a successful fighting coalition to resist collectivism can be assembled around. Forget that the Constitution and the Bill of Rights (put in there at the insistence of the anti-federalist) was at the time both a compromise and the greatest light-years leap forward in liberty ever codified. Did the Founders screw up in adopting it as it was, in part or in whole? I'll tell you there's things I wish had been in there.

So what?

We will have a chance to fix things AFTER WE WIN AND ONLY AFTER WE WIN. And at this point, it is by no means certain that we will win.

This is not glossing over anything, it is reality. If folks cannot exercise enough common sense to see that, then they will die alone or be enslaved because the rest of us anti-collectivists did not measure up to their high standards. They are, of course, free to do so -- leaving the rest of us to fight and to win against the same folks who would gladly see us all on boxcars, in camps or in a mass grave covered with lime.

For those of us who intend to win, we must redouble our efforts to get ready. And don't get side-tracked into these "How many Lysander Spooners can dance on the head of an Articles of Confederation pin?" discussions. It is time wasting and self defeating, perhaps intentionally so.

Of course there are apparently some who prefer to be ultra-principled even if they are defeated.

I'm not one of them.

How about you?

Mike
III
August 31, 2010
7:20
Uh, like, are they going to use camps to do that "re-education."
» ‎ Sipsey Street Irregulars

For "re-education" is what they say we need.
6:58
Praxis: A new comment from a Designated Marksman in Afghanistan on an old post but worthy of greater notice.
» ‎ Sipsey Street Irregulars

A new comment on this old post.

americansldr11b said... For those of you that feel the need to throw your comments out there and have yet to set your boots to the sands, grape fields, or mountains of the country that I currently sit... Yes, the training of the DM is not that of the sniper and is not that way by purpose... The sniper is valuable in his own right but few units or commanders have the experience or the training to employ snipers as they should be.

At this time in our country's fight, few commanders trust the sniper to manuever on his own or in a shooter/spotter team and to that affect even make the call on taking a shot. There are far too many rules and things to consider in the way our country fights in these times of political BS.

The DM on the other time is designed by nature to do no more than bridge the gap between the grunts and the snipers. A simple soldier looking to his DM as an asset, of trust, as eyes and ears of his fellow soldiers. To look from the streets of no mans land and see your DM watching, waiting, controlling the surroundings. The DM is by design the best marksman "within" his unit.

It isnt the (one shot, one kill) the DM looks for but a chance to meet the enemy at extended distance as to create time and space between the enemy and the boots on the ground. The DM fills a role that has in the past been void. For the soldiers within the unit that have a DM within them, he is an asset that in "this" country can turn the tides of an often suprise encounter with the enemy.

I have yet to meet an enemy in this country that would tell you the site of a "long gun" within a unit on the ground is not an unnerving one. (Best regards to the fighters on the couch back home) Signed..... DM 10th mountain Division, Afghanistan. (M14EBR) (118 Special Ball, Match Grade)
August 30, 2010
18:56
Never, ever, eat a ballpark hotdog in Starkville, Mississippi.
» ‎ Sipsey Street Irregulars

Death warmed over lurks beneath the surface in Starkville, Mississippi

I did yesterday at the Mississippi State versus Southern Miss women's soccer game and it knocked me for a loop. I'll be back posting tomorrow.
August 29, 2010
6:55
Somebody thinks there's a Middle East war coming.
» ‎ Sipsey Street Irregulars

Either that or they want to lay in as much as possible before Obama puts an embargo on them.

NOTE: I am uninterested in stale arguments over Zionism here. I post this as a bit of military intel to prod your own preparations for when gasoline goes to $15.00 a gallon and Hezbollah and Iranian sleeper cells become active in the continental U.S.
6:41
Outstanding mini-RTC in Atlanta.
» ‎ Sipsey Street Irregulars

Excellent.
August 28, 2010
19:20
Jeers from the Peanut Gallery: International Brotherhood of Willful Simpletons strikes back.
» ‎ Sipsey Street Irregulars

Well, we have these charming rejoinders from the brave but anonymous International Brotherhood of Willful Simpletons:
Anonymous said...
You've done more to hurt freedom than to adovocate (sic) it.

"No Fort Sumters"-----

You're afraid, Mike....

August 28, 2010 3:53 PM

Anonymous said...
Ever toss a brick personally, Mike?

August 28, 2010 4:43 PM

Anonymous said...
No worries on the firing line.

Mike won't be there....

August 28, 2010 4:03 PM

You know, the anonymous moke is probably right about that. I'll be long dead before he ever works up enough grit to join a firing line.
14:24
"Community Crisis Planning for Societal Collapse"
» ‎ Sipsey Street Irregulars

Interesting piece from Rawles.
10:47
Oikophobia.
» ‎ Sipsey Street Irregulars

Mr. Tweedy: [being attacked by the chickens] MRS. TWEEDY! The chickens are revolting!

Mrs. Tweedy: [not paying attention] Finally, something we agree on.

Chickens ain't the only critters who the ruling class finds revolting.
7:40
Casus Belli: Of Tripwires and Simpletons Who Risk Nothing Wanting to See Them Tripped.
» ‎ Sipsey Street Irregulars

The Old Powder House in Somerville, Massachusetts as it stood in 1935.
Casus belli is a Latin expression meaning the justification for acts of war. Casus means "incident", "rupture" or indeed "case", while belli means "of war". . . The term came into wide usage in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries with the writings of Hugo Grotius (1625), Cornelius van Bynkershoek (1737), and Jean-Jacques Burlamaqui (1748), among others, and the rise of the political doctrine of jus ad bellum or "just war theory". Informal usage varies beyond its technical definition to refer to any "just cause" a nation may claim for entering into a conflict. As such, it has been used both retroactively to describe situations in history before the term came into wide usage and in the present day when describing situations when war has not been formally declared. -- Wikipedia.
Forgive me for all of those who are not simpletons, but it appears I must insult your intelligence with basic definitions and rudimentary common sense in order to attempt to reach a few hardheads who continue to foam at the mouth, eager to plunge their country into civil war under circumstances which will guarantee defeat of the cause which they claim to espouse.

"Informal usage varies beyond its technical definition to refer to any "just cause" a nation may claim for entering into a conflict."
When I use the term casus belli in posts, it is merely pointing out that the particular trend or incident is adding to the just cause by which the civil war, when it breaks out, will be justified.

The cumulative effect of such individual reasons, stacked one upon the other, will later be seen as background, the fuel, the dry grass if you will, of the conflagration.

The prairie fire will be started by a single spark, or series of sparks -- incidents so compelling that no one, given the common understanding of the explosive tinder building up, will be surprised that it happened, only when it happened.

The Founders experienced such a rising series of casus belli, each new outrage of the King's ministerial government piling upon the one before, causing reactions among the liberty-loving populace COMMENSURATE WITH THE THREAT.

The Stamp Act caused the colonists -- WHO DID NOT YET THINK OF THEMSELVES AS REVOLUTIONARIES but merely English citizens whose rights under the English Constitution were being abrogated -- to react with violent demonstrations, assaults on royal lackeys and their property, tar and feathering, etc. The resistance was sufficient to get the Crown to back down.

The Boston Massacre was not the tripwire for general war. Why? Because neither the general public nor the men who were increasingly viewing themselves as revolutionaries were ready for such a step. Indeed, John Adams and other Founders acted as DEFENSE attorneys for the British soldiers at the subsequent trial. Yet the propaganda that the Founders made of this incident was absolutely brilliant, and essential to laying the groundwork for independence.

The tax on tea was not the tripwire for general war, again because no one was ready. The political pretext for resorting to defensive violence had not yet been made. There was no thought that the officers of the King should be targeted, but the tea itself? A brilliant choice of targets and an impeccably executed plan of vandalism. It was Sam Adam's finest hour.

Then came the Intolerable Acts and the continuing battle of the Crown forces with smugglers. Revenue cutters were burned, customs men harassed (NOTE: NOT KILLED), and as British troops flowed into to overawe the malefactors, the liberty-minded colonists began to take over the militia system or create their own units independent of the colonial structure.

Then came the British attempt to seize militia arms and powder. The militias responded to several of these raids by mobilizing around and in front of the British columns, culminating in The Powder Alarm of 1774.

The Powder Alarm was a massive popular reaction to the removal of gunpowder from a magazine by British soldiers under orders from General Thomas Gage, royal governor of the Province of Massachusetts Bay, on September 1, 1774. In response to this action, amid rumors that blood had been shed, alarm spread through the countryside as far as Connecticut, and American Patriots sprang into action, fearing that war was at hand.

Although it proved to be a false alarm, the Powder Alarm caused political and military leaders to proceed more carefully in the days ahead, and essentially provided a "dress rehearsal" for the Battle of Lexington and Concord seven months later. Furthermore, actions on both sides to control weaponry, gunpowder, and other military supplies became more contentious, as the British sought to bring military stores more directly under their control, and the Patriot colonists sought to acquire them for their own use. -- Wikipedia.
The Powder Alarm caused smuggling of war supplies to increase and militias to redouble to their training. No one went to war, because neither side was ready.

When the war did start -- the tripwire if you will -- was thanks to a miscalculation by the British that they could march out of Boston, seize or destroy the arms and powder and get back to town before the militia could react. Even the mustering of the Lexington militia on the green was in the spirit of the Powder Alarm. Captain Parker actually backed his little force up, away from the road, so as not to block the ministerial troops path, but yet to make a demonstration that they had better not get out of hand in the village.

But the actual tripwire, the "shot heard 'round the world," could itself have been a negligent discharge by a nervous regular or militiaman. The Brits of course blamed the militia and vice versa. But the conduct of Parker's formation and the lop-sided odds, made it seem likely to the rest of the colonials that the "bloody lobsters" had started it. And remember, about a third of those colonials thought that the "armed rabble" had it coming, and that it was about time the King's men did something.

In 1861, the tripwire was the Confederate bombardment of Fort Sumter, South Carolina. Prior to that incident, Lincoln was faced with a huge political problem. A majority of the people of the North wanted to avoid a civil war. So Lincoln contrived to get the Confederates to cede the moral high ground.

By April 4, President Lincoln . . . ordered merchant vessels escorted by the United States Navy to Charleston. On April 6, 1861, Lincoln notified South Carolina Governor Francis W. Pickens that "an attempt will be made to supply Fort Sumter with provisions only, and that if such attempt be not resisted, no effort to throw in men, arms, or ammunition will be made without further notice, [except] in case of an attack on the fort."
In response, the Confederate cabinet, meeting in Montgomery, decided on April 9 to open fire on Fort Sumter in an attempt to force its surrender before the relief fleet arrived. Only Secretary of State Robert Toombs opposed this decision: he reportedly told Jefferson Davis the attack "will lose us every friend at the North. You will only strike a hornet's nest. ... Legions now quiet will swarm out and sting us to death. It is unnecessary. It puts us in the wrong. It is fatal."

Toombs, as we know now with 20-20 hindsight, was absolutely correct. Lincoln's gambit worked and the Confederacy took the bait to it's peoples' eternal sorrow. Imagine the Federal rout of the First Battle of Bull Run WITHOUT the justification of Fort Sumter. The pressure on Lincoln to stop the war and negotiate would have become immense. Arrogance and stupidity killed the Confederacy at the very first. That it took four years for the Federals to subdue the South in cruel war was a testament to the Southrons' courage and tenacity. BUT THE CONFEDERATES GAVE THE FEDERALS THE FIRST, AND ARGUABLY MOST IMPORTANT, STICK WITH WHICH TO BEAT THEM.

Fast forward to today.

First, one of the arguments most often heard in simpleton quarters is "THEY" (whoever they are) are "too smart to start a war" and will simply gradually increase oppressive measures until they achieve our absolute slavery.

This assigns some sort of god-like power of restraint to the largest, most inefficient, ponderous, corrupt and mistake-prone bureaucracy ever created in this country: the federal government of the 21st Century. Only an ignorant simpleton would believe such a tall tale.

For the better part of two years, one agency of that government, the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives has been chasing a phantom opponent simply because one of their favorite snitches told them he was a confederate of a law-abiding man that they wished to see squashed. ATF lawyers have demanded to know from expert witnesses in depositions if they knew this man, always eliciting the answer, "I know of no such person." ATF agents have been dispatched to run down every lead, every rumor, searching for this nemesis of the Chief Counsel's Office WHO NEVER EXISTED. Millions of taxpayer dollars have certainly been wasted in the search.

This is hardly evidence of federal omniscience or omnipotence.

Secondly, the argument that "they" will be patient enough to play the long game of gradual tyranny reckons without our own ability, LIKE THE FOUNDERS SHOWED US, to resist with lesser measures and gradually make our would-be oppressors so frustrated and crazy with our resistance that they attack us with deadly force, by accident or design.

The tools available to us to accomplish that are the same as were in the liberty toolbag of the Founders: strikes, shunning, petty yet strategic vandalism, street theater, demonstrations, smuggling, etc. The fact that we haven't fully employed these tools is an argument AGAINST the preemptive use of deadly force on our part, not FOR it.

Recall Michael Collins:

“They can jail us. They can shoot us. . . BUT . . . we have a weapon more powerful than any in the whole arsenal of the British Empire! That weapon is our refusal! Our refusal to bow to any order but our own! Any institution but our own!”
That refusal, if we practice it diligently, adamantly, will force the frustrated leviathan to use deadly force.

Third, there is an argument offered by some (many more than actually have it as a valid reason) that to engage in lesser acts of resistance than shooting -- breaking political party windows or vandalism of ARRA signs for example -- will compromise their "operational security" for the big event when shooting starts.

Perhaps. But only if they're stupid in carrying out such operations. We are not talking about carrying out operations against defended targets, for crying out loud. Nothing is more vulnerable than the easy pickings of an ARRA sign on a deserted road at two o'clock in the morning. Besides, engaging in the process of operational planning and execution exercises the tactical muscles for when the shooting DOES start. Each who makes this argument must look into his or her own heart for the answer to whether or not this is simple reluctance to do ANYTHING rather than an exercise in proper prudence.

But in any case, unless sanity breaks out among our would-be tyrannizers, at some point there will be an initiating event of deadly violence by Leviathan against a man or woman who simply wishes to be left alone.

Let us then look at what the Three Percenters have staked out as tripwires:

Any more restrictive firearms laws, is a big one. Katrina-like confiscation obviously would be resisted by force at out doorsteps first, and then taken to the enemy in maneuver warfare style. But what of lesser moves? A "gun show loophole" bill would be resisted first by hosting our own Fed-free gunshows, provoking a response. Any ammunition restrictions would be resisted first by rolling our own, smuggling, theft, etc. Again, provoking a response, and then, a spasm of targeted counter-violence.

Enforcing "health-care" would be met by refusal to pay the fines, refusal to go willingly to jail, and eventually, at the point of a gun. Again, a PROCESS OF RESISTANCE only ending in deadly violence if Leviathan chooses to do so. And they will, if we do our part right.

Federal election tampering, or outright theft, is another. Here I can think of an excellent use of tar and feathering of local and state election officials, breaking of windows, and other vandalism as a first response. If the election is certified despite these moves, then the situation will rapidly move to violence without doubt.

But why, in any of these cases, should we cede the moral high ground and shoot first? Just because some of us are tired of waiting? Or because they're too scared to use lesser measures? Or because they risk nothing nothing in urging US to take the first shot? Such people are urging us to the trip the wire without consequence to themselves. For if they lack the guts to start acting like free people and engage in lesser forms of resistance, what evidence is there that they will go to the extreme when it is called for?

I mean besides their own hot air reduced to keystrokes.

I agree that not all of us are public figures like myself, with names and addresses well known to the PTB. Nor should we be. My JOB is to be a living, breathing gambit -- daring the Power to take a shot at me, and gradually defeating them with every passing day that they do not make an example of me -- exposing the lie of the man behind the curtain that the Wizard is all knowing and all powerful, encouraging others to resist by simply existing as a symbol of the federal government's true vacillation and impotence.

But if YOU are urging us IN AN EASILY TRACEABLE COMMUNICATION to engage in deadly violence against the PTB, then you are not a "grey man" anyway. You trade that when you speak out on the Net. Only a simpleton thinks otherwise. So, telling me that you are not willing to risk lesser violence in order to preserve the operational security that you just threw away by telling me in this venue is hardly persuasive of anything except to reasonably doubt your intelligence or courage or both. Likewise, people who urge others to begin shooting in such a venue have to be asked: who are they really serving? And what are they risking by doing so?

Finally, I ask again, who among us on that final day the wire is tripped will not desperately wish that we had ONE MORE DAY, ONE MORE HOUR, to train, to recruit, and see to our own logistics for the killing time?

If present events play out into a likely future, that wire WILL be tripped. But until it is, it is your responsibility to do everything you can using lesser measures to avoid it and, failing that, to prepare for that day to fight and to win.

No Fort Sumters. No OKC bombings. Let the enemies of the Founders' Republic make those mistakes, not us.

Mike
III
August 27, 2010
20:57
He was looking for ghosts and now he are one.
» ‎ Sipsey Street Irregulars

This would be funny if it weren't so tragic.
20:31
Casus wimpy. EPA blinks on lead ammo ban.
» ‎ Sipsey Street Irregulars

NRA gets credit.
16:48
A short but sweet challenge to all of you mokes who keep shouting, "If not now, when?!?"
» ‎ Sipsey Street Irregulars

Have you broken any windows yet?

Vandalized any ARRA signs?

So why are you so eager to jump to guns?

If you don't have the cojones to do the one, why are you screaming to the rest of us to do the other?

Here's a suggestion: Shut the hell up about the last step until you do some intermediate steps.
16:05
So, where's MSNBC's outrage over this?
» ‎ Sipsey Street Irregulars

Calling Rachel Madcow. . .
9:56
Restore the Constitution: Round Three.
» ‎ Sipsey Street Irregulars

As Pete says, very interesting timing. I'd be interested in hearing from volunteers from Birmingham area.
9:34
Well, OK, then. . . "Massive solar storm to hit Earth in 2012 with 'force of 100 million hydrogen bombs'"
» ‎ Sipsey Street Irregulars

Got militia?
8:58
Remember who we are: Liberty, love and leadership.
» ‎ Sipsey Street Irregulars

"Triumph of faith over idolatry" by Jean Baptiste Theodon,French Baroque Era Sculptor, 1645-1713.
General Robert E. Lee stated that an effective commander must love his men, but he must also be prepared to order the destruction of the very thin that he loves. That is not just prose. This paradox captures the essence of combat leadership. It is the heart of the art of command. On a conscious level, most commanders comprehend that burden, but the question remains: Are we mentally and emotionally prepared for such demands? Before the first shot is fired, the leader must look squarely in the mirror and gather the moral strength necessary to order his men into harm's way, to see them killed and maimed, to look into the eyes of the wounded and upon the faces of the dead, yet not lose his fighting spirit. Moreover, the true test is to look oneself in the mirror AFTER young men who trusted their commander are killed and maimed, and do it all over again without losing the will to violently close with the enemy. Such force of will requires supreme mental toughness and strong "emotional shock absorbers" to rebound from these devastating blows while maintaining one's convictions. It requires enormous grit to weather such anguish and not detach oneself from the deep feelings of affinity and love for one's men. The commander who severs that link forfeits the vital buttress of brotherhood formed in shared danger and sacrifice that binds him to his men and makes war bearable. He will soon find himself alone, increasingly drawing from his "well of fortitude" until the bucket comes up dry and his will shatters. Once this happens, the commander ceases to inspire and lead; his unit becomes a formless mass of souls bereft of the sense of shame that enables men to bear war's horror yet persevere with honor. He becomes a mere spectator to the slaughter of his men. In short, the art of command is about winning the love of one's men, and then some day having to use that love to have them willingly risk terrible injury or death and violently take the lives of others. The skill and respect necessary to apply this art must be nurtured in peacetime through study of the human psyche both in combat and through vicarious experience. The passion to command is embodied in the commander's willpower, his love for his men, and personal aggressiveness in battle. The love for his men is what allows a commander to apply and maintain his will power, and the conviction and aggressiveness to close with the enemy. He must be able to literally and figuratively look himself in the mirror each day of combat and know he has earnestly applied himself and had nurtured a passion for command. With a melancholy rigor he must apply himself in the serious study of warfare, its affects on those who fight, and earn the moral authority that grows from leading in the "zone of aimed fire." I will always harbor doubts over my efforts prior to and during combat, whether or not my personal preparation and leadership was all it could be. For the rest of my life -- each time I look in the mirror I will be acutely reminded of my shortcomings, and a piece of my heart will chip away, for in the shadows of my eyes I will see their faces, staring back at me -- for the rest of my life. -- COL B.P. McCoy, USMC, The Passion of Command: The Moral Imperative of Leadership, pp. 77-78.
We stand today upon a precipice, staring at a ghastly possible future rushing at us from across a deep chasm -- angry portents and dark clouds, behind which may gallop the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse -- the grim reapers of civil war. The liberty, lives and futures of our children and grandchildren likely rest upon how we conduct ourselves NOW. We must prepare ourselves to stand the coming storm without losing sight of why we are so determined, as the Founders were -- to risk everything to be free. In doing so we must not become the very monster we purport to fight. We must remain human in an inhuman time. We must remember who we are. We must love.

Wikipedia defines love thusly:

Love is the emotion of strong affection and personal attachment. In philosophical context, love is a virtue representing all of human kindness, compassion, and affection. In religious context, love is not just a virtue, but the basis for all being ("God is love"), and the foundation for all divine law (Golden Rule).
In his magnificent novel of the Spartans at Thermopylae, Gates of Fire, Steven Pressfield, through the character of Dienekes -- considered by his fellow soldiers to be the bravest of them all -- explores the question, "What is the antithesis of fear?"

"All my life," Dienekes began, "one question has haunted me. What is the opposite of fear? . . . To call it aphobia, fearlessness, is without meaning. This is just a name, thesis expressed as antithesis. To call the opposite of fear fearlessness is to say nothing. I want to know its true obverse, as day of night and heaven of earth." "Expressed as a positive," Ariston ventured. "Exactly! . . . How does one conquer fear of death, that most primordial of terrors, which resides in our very blood, as in all life, beast as well as men? . . . Dogs in a pack find courage to take on a lion. Each hound knows his place. He fears the dog ranked above and feeds off the fear of the dog below. Fear conquers fear. This is how we Spartans do it, counterpoising to fear of death a greater fear: that of dishonor. Of exclusion from the pack. . . But is that courage? Is not acting out of fear of dishonor still, in essence, acting out of fear?" Alexandros asked what he was seeking. "Something nobler. A higher form of the mystery. Pure. Infallible."
Later, Dienekes answers his own question:

A messenger appeared, summoning Dienekes to Leonidas’ council. My master motioned me to accompany him. Something had changed within him; I could sense it as we picked our way among the network of trails that crisscrossed the camps of the allies. “Do you remember the night, Xeo, when we sat with Ariston and Alexandros and spoke of fear and its opposite?” I said I did. “I have the answer to my question. Our friends the merchant and the Scythian have given it to me.” His glance took in the fires of the camp, the nations of the allies clustered in their units, and their officers, whom we could see, like us approaching from all quarters the king’s fire, ready to respond to his needs and receive his instructions. “The opposite of fear,” Dienekes said, “is love.”
Another of my favorite novels, Once an Eagle by Anton Myrer, tells the story of Sam Damon, an up-from-the-ranks Army officer, and his lifelong struggle with his nemesis, a well-connected, polished careerist officer named Courtney Massengale. Damon first encounters Massengale in France in 1918 when the staff officer gets lost and on his way to a forward command post and runs into some enlisted men of Damon's company which has just come out of the line. Massengale is irritated that he is not being shown what he believes to be proper respect.

"You people come to attention!" . . . In the stillness, Raebyrne's voice cane very clearly, drawling, "Fer Crahst sake . . ." "That's enough! You people had better learn some military courtesy," the Captain said. "Discipline is entirely too lax up here. When an officer asks a question he expects to be answered in a smart and respectful manner. " . . . It's his voice, Damon thought, watching, his voice. It was incisive enough, it was pitched neither too high nor too low -- but something about it was wrong; it lacked -- it lacked human vibrancy. Faintly metallic, disembodied, it was like a field order translated into sound; it had no flaws.
Damon's career intertwines with Massengale's for forty plus years. The crisis comes when Massengale is appointed Damon's corps commander with the task of invading one of the Philippine Islands in 1944. Massengale, who has never before held a field command, has crafted a plan for the assault that is over complicated and likely to fail, with Damon's division likely to take the brunt of it. Damon writes in his personal field diary:

I have such a black feeling about this op. Can't shake it. He's trying just too damn much. Audacity, downright gambling, sure -- but in the right place, for the right reasons. . . . So why all the fancy footwork? . . . He hates my guts. There it is. He hates my very guts and I despise and fear him. Not HIM actually -- more what he will do, what he is capable of. . . There is something terrible inside him, in his soul. He talks about the big picture and command problems and knowledge of terrain but all that has nothing to do with it -- it's this other thing that slips along just under the surface. I keep coming back to that moment in the wrecked courtyard near St. Durance. He doesn't feel -- he doesn't LOVE MAN. Yes. Old homo mensura, with his prehensile claws and splayed feet, with his nobility and greed and hope and vanity and wonder, his immense possibilities. People. The gut bent over at the sink trying to work the sludge out of his knuckles with solvent, and his wife's at the stove with her hair in curlers, shushing the kids over the booming racket of the radio. Her face catches the light in a certain way, or that tender, dreamy look comes over it aa she watches the baby, and the guy at the sink straightens and moves up behind her and steals a kiss, and she laughs, fussing a little because she's still wet and soapy -- and then turns and hugs him in the middle of the kitchen floor, with the kids squabbling over the toys and the radio yammering away . . . All the men and girls with their dreaqms and derelictions, their quarrels and reconciliations, wrenched away from those intimate things now, those naked things, snatched up and flung harshly into jungles, mountains, burning desert sands for the preservation of this way of life we believe in so passionately -- and which has so many glorious things about it that the simple contemplation of it, late on a hot, still night like this one, between the jungle and the sea, 10,000 miles from home, can move you almost to tears. . . But Massengale doesn't see any of this. He can't love that guy at the sink, trying to work the grease out of his knuckles. And because he can't love him he himself is only half a man.
This is our strength, this love. It is what differentiates us in the "country class" (as we have been called by Angelo Codevilla) from the ruling class. In order to have the hubris to think that you have the right to order people around, to tyrannize them, you cannot love them, only yourself.

Yet there are those of us -- or at least those who claim to be us -- who have this same lack. This same incapacity to love, to make love the basis for our struggle to preserve our liberty and that of our posterity.

A man who fights for liberty, without being motivated by the love of others, the love of country, the love of God, is engaging in a selfish, commercial transaction. And, I might add, will likely fail in the attempt and become the beast he seeks to destroy.

He will fight only until he gets what he wants and makes the most inconstant of allies.

Such a man will not stand up into a hail of machine gun fire and suicidally close with a bunker full of screaming enemies who are busy killing his friends. He will not roll onto to a grenade to save his buddy in the same foxhole. He will be selfishly happy to watch you do it, of course. He will later say that this is intelligent pragmatism.

Likewise, such a man is unfit to lead other men, for he will fail them, he will sell them out, and his failures of judgment, made because they are not motivated by love, will be fatal to the cause of liberty.

Such men are evident today, in our movement to reclaim the Founders' Republic. How many times have you heard the call to begin firing now, the impatience with waiting until the conflict is forced upon us? Such men have neither heart nor head, for who, being motivated by love, would want to bring about ghastly civil war BEFORE it was forced him, with all the inevitable killing of and cruelty to innocents that that entails? And who, knowing how unprepared we all are for such a conflict, would not want to make use of one more day, one more hour, to organize, train and prepare? Only someone who does not, who cannot love.

For a man who loves is reluctant to war, is patient with the irritations and fears of waiting, simply because he knows its costs.

Such men without love in their hearts engender in others a feeling of despair, of inevitable defeat. Not loving enough, they take counsel of their fears and it spreads around to others like a debilitating oil slick.

Yet we can and will win, even if we wait to respond until we can wait no longer. A real leader of liberty-minded individuals, motivated by love yet wide-wake to the dangers, will lead by exuding resolve but also calmness, confidence and optimism. He must be intelligent, he must be dedicated, he must share the dangers and the sacrifice, but above all he must be motivated by love -- love of family, love of country, love of humanity and love of God.

Anyone who tells you differently is selling something, and the name of that something is defeat.

Mike
III
August 26, 2010
7:07
Just in case you were wondering . . .
» ‎ Sipsey Street Irregulars

Pete and I sat down with another fellow last night and ironed out our misunderstandings. Forward, ho.
6:24
Another one from the Casus Belli Department: Proposed ban on lead core ammunition.
» ‎ Sipsey Street Irregulars

This man is preparing to turn his lead-core ammunition back in to the EPA one round at a time.

Attack of the Green Weenies.

My comment left at the official EPA website:

Regarding the proposed ban on lead core ammunition, I think I speak on behalf of three percent of American gun owners when I say that should it be made into law, we will be happy to return it to the federal government one round at a time.

Mike Vanderboegh
PO Box 926
Pinson AL 35126
GeorgeMason1776@aol.com
http://sipseystreetirregulars.blogspot.com
Comment Tracking Number: 80b3aeca
6:19
From the Casus Belli Department: The increasingly irrelevant Paul Helmke asks "Who Could Oppose Closing Gun Show Loophole?"
» ‎ Sipsey Street Irregulars

Just me and a few million of my friends, Paul. Be careful what you wish for, you may get it.
6:10
Harry Reid has trouble grokking what the term "domestic enemies" means.
» ‎ Sipsey Street Irregulars

Harry Reid indicates his constitutional IQ.

"Second Amendment rights against members of Congress, I mean, what is that supposed to mean?" Reid said. "I believe every member of the United States Senate, and I know them very well, are all very patriotic."

Riiiight, Harry. Actually, I think he has a pretty good idea about what that means, since he are one.
5:52
More 1984 Techno-Police-State stuff.
» ‎ Sipsey Street Irregulars

The TSA Road Show.
August 25, 2010
10:54
The Trainer forwards another casus belli.
» ‎ Sipsey Street Irregulars

"The Government's New Right to Track Your Every Move With GPS"
7:11
So much for the "Master Race" -- Hitler found to have had black and Jewish ancestors. Will Stormfront dump him and Nation of Islam claim him?
» ‎ Sipsey Street Irregulars

So now we find that the Austrian homosexual male prostitute wasn't exactly as racially pure as he represented himself to be. Pretty funny.

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