#another member recruited to the NRA...

[mobiused]

[#Choerry] I went with Heejin this timeㅎㅎ My hands are all swollen, how come it's so cold ㅠ Keep your hands warm Orbits! 💗💜

#another member recruited to the NRA... #loona #choerry #heejin #(kinda) #heerry #choerry loona #loona choerry #choi yerim

[jetsetlife138]

Sick Like Me

This is a work-in-progress. I'll update the summary, tags, etc., as the story goes on. For now, just enjoy?

Summary: You come across a downtrodden man in an alley and offer him salvation. That was your first mistake.

Pairings: Michael Langdon x You

Words: 2,300

Warnings: None in this chapter, but there will be eventual smut (lots), dubious consent, religious imagery, gore, and more as we go along.

The sense of hopelessness weighed heavy on the young Antichrist. After spending four days alone in the wilderness in an unsuccessful attempt to receive direction from his absent father, he was filthy, starving, and exhausted. He felt dejected and empty - lost and without a purpose as he sat on the pavement against the chilled brick of the building in the alley that he aimlessly wandered down, alone and desperate for a sign. 

Holding his head in his hands, he leaned forward to prop his elbows on his crossed legs while he rested his eyes, trying to make sense of his existence. 

“Excuse me, sir?” The soft, feminine voice caused him to look up, squinting in the light as his eyes fought to focus on his visitor. When he didn’t verbally acknowledge your presence, you asked again, “Hey, excuse me, sir… are you okay?” “What’s it to you?” he mumbled skeptically, trying to portray himself as standoffish, but instead sounding pitiful and weak. “I just…” you began, struggling for words. “You look like you could use some food and water. Or somewhere to rest at the very least. I’m on my way somewhere that can help. Do you want to come with me?” “That’s… actually really nice of you,” he replied, his voice thick with emotion. Grinning wryly, you extended a hand to help him up. He took it gratefully, raising to his feet, suddenly towering over you. He could get a better look at you now that you weren’t standing with the sun behind you. 

He noted that you had a kind face and a welcoming smile, which was something he wasn’t accustomed to. Hanging from your arm was a basket of pamphlets with a plain black cover, not revealing the purpose of them. Still gripping his hand, you gave him a firm shake as you introduced yourself. “I’m Y/N.” He returned your gesture with as much force as he could muster, which wasn’t much. “My name is Michael. Michael Langdon.” “It’s really nice to meet you, Michael,” you replied, releasing his hand. He flexed his fingers at his side at the absence of your touch, not used to the kindness of others. A pang of grief surged through his mind at the memory of Ms. Mead, the only person to genuinely care for him, and who was now gone. “Come on,” you urged. “It’s not far at all. Just another block down the alley.” He limped beside you, his legs still recovering from kneeling on the hard ground for four days straight. As you walked, he took notice of the way that you had walked with a purposely slow pace so that he could easily keep up. Only a few minutes later, the two of you had reached an opening in the alley, leading you to the back of an industrial building. Michael paused, hesitating when he noticed an a Satanic emblem in the form of an upside-down cross painted on the corner. 

“Michael?” you called out when you noticed his delay. “You okay?” He nodded, dismissing the symbol and following you towards a back door leading into the building with a gruff-looking man sitting on a stool next to it. “Hey, Mo,” you greeted happily. 

The man looked to be in his early 50’s, with a disgruntled expression, adorned with a worn leather jacket to add to the intimidating appearance. Though he appeared threatening, his demeanor was friendly. “Hiya, Y/N. What brings you here?” 

“I brought these for Aunt Madelyn,” you answered, raising your arm holding the basket of pamphlets. “Hannah had asked her to order these for the potluck on Wednesday, but she didn’t have time to pick them up from the store, so I told her I’d bring them by.”

He nodded, grumbling in acknowledgment while his eyes darted between you and Michael. “Y/N, you know you have to actually be a member in order to have guest privileges, right?”

“Mo, come on,” you pleaded. “He just needs some water, and I know you guys are hoarding donuts in there. Just this once?” 

Michael appeared baffled at the way you easily manipulated the man with your sweet voice and batting eyelashes, turning him into putty in your hands. 

With an eye roll, Mo sighed heavily before standing from the stool and opening the door. “You owe me one.” 

“You’re seriously the best,” you praised, beaming at him before the two of you slipped inside. 

“Mhm,” he muttered before closing the door behind you. 

Leading Michael down the stairs into the below ground chambers, you thought it best to warn him before descending to the wolves. “So, um… this is probably going to be a little weird for you, but just keep to yourself and don’t judge too harshly. Everyone here is off their rocker, but they’re harmless. Mostly.” 

“What do you mean?”

“You’ll see,” you warned, reaching the entry into the chamber. 

Entering the grand room, you gauged Michael’s reaction to the church hall, which was adorned in red and black with pews of people facing the upside-down cross at the front. He seemed completely in awe and at a loss for words as he took in his surroundings. 

“She’s almost done,” you informed him, nodding towards Hannah, the High Priestess dressed in a bright red robe preaching to the congregation. “Let’s take a seat and as soon as she’s done, we’ll get you some food and water, okay?”

He nodded gratefully, following as you walked toward the pews. You had noticed your aunt in the back row and quietly sat next to her, motioning for Michael to join you. Hannah was ranting, berating the congregation for not being sinful enough and insisting that they should be ashamed of failing Satan in hopes of helping to bring about the end times. Resisting the urge to roll your eyes, you kept your focus on Michael, wondering when this would be too weird for him and he’d go running for the door. Much to your surprise, he didn’t. He was hooked on every word she spoke, though you noticed that he seemed somewhat… disappointed? Odd.

You thought for sure that when Hannah had confessed to robbing a nursing home and donating the money to the NRA that he would bail, but instead, tears trailed down his face as he lifted his hand to mask his sadness. It was hard not to offer words of encouragement, but you thought it best to leave him be. 

Your Aunt Madelyn pulled your focus when she handed you the collection plate, to which you replied with a glare. “Not happening.” You were all for freedom of religion, but if they thought for one minute that you would monetarily contribute to their absurdity, they were even more insane than they appeared. 

“Well, what about your friend?” she asked, motioning to Michael. 

His eyes flickered to the collection plate before he addressed her pathetically, “I don’t have any money.” She offered him a sympathetic glance before passing the plate to the row in front of her. “Or any food from the looks of it. How long has it been since you ate, kid?” “That’s why I brought him here,” you informed her. 

“To offer him stale donuts?” she inquired, narrowing her eyes at you, which you met with an annoyed glance. Ignoring your stare, she looked past you to Michael. “I live just a couple of blocks up the street. I can offer you a hot meal if you’d like.” 

With tears in his eyes, he nodded gratefully. Leaning in closer to your aunt, you whispered in her ear, “Are you seriously going to let a strange homeless man in your house? Not that I don’t condone kindness, especially from a Satanist, but don’t you think that’s a little dangerous?” 

“Well, nobody’s perfect. Besides, he seems harmless,” she gestured, looking him over. “Honestly, we could use all of the new members we can get.” “I didn’t bring him here so that you could recruit him to your freaky sinners anonymous group,” you hissed under your breath. 

“No one’s recruiting anyone, dear. If he’s here, it’s because our Dark Lord led him here. He’s right where he’s supposed to be.” Rolling your eyes, you sighed heavily, knowing that arguing with her over this kind of thing was a lost cause. A simple gesture of thoughtfulness was quickly spiraling into a homeless housing situation, which made you nervous. Not that Michael had creepy vibes or anything like that, but he was clearly going through something that was devastating enough to leave him in this state, and you weren’t sure you wanted your family caught up in whatever he had going on. 

Once the service wrapped up, you and your aunt escorted Michael to her home where she had prepared a hot beef stew. You watched Michael carefully as he sat in silence, not meeting your eyes unless you addressed him with a direct question. 

While Madelyn was putting the finishing touches on the stew, you sat with Michael at the dinner table, twiddling your thumbs in the awkward silence until you couldn’t help but try to make conversation. 

“So,” you began, causing his eyes to flicker to you from his lap. “Do you want to talk about what happened to you?” 

Shrugging his shoulders, it appeared that he was too emotionally drained to talk about whatever had led him here, so you changed the subject. “Look, don’t let Aunt Madelyn scare you off with her rants about worshiping the devil. She’s a little nuts, but she doesn’t mean any harm” 

“You believe that she’s mentally impaired because she has dedicated her life to Satan?” 

His question made you hesitate for a moment as you tried to determine the amount of sarcasm attached to it. It didn’t seem he had any malicious intent, but was simply curious.

“I think that everyone has their own way of trying to find their purpose in life. Worshiping something mythical like Satan and trying to bring about the end times if my aunt’s messed up way of coping.”

“You’re convinced that Satan is a myth?” he pressed further, carefully gauging your reaction. 

Giving him a wry smile, you replied, “I don’t know what I believe. If you asked my aunt, she’d tell you that Satan has blessed her with riches beyond her wildest dreams.” For dramatic affect, you gestured around the run-down house to emphasize your sarcasm. “But I don’t think that I could ever get behind something that encourages such evil and hatred towards others. It just doesn’t feel right.” 

Pursing his lips slightly, he continued to look you up and down, making you squirm in your seat as his heated gaze started to become uncomfortable. The corner of his mouth lifted slightly into a smirk as he seemed to realize the affect his intense gaze had on you. “How noble of you,” he finally commented, keeping his voice even so that you couldn’t determine if he was being genuine or sarcastic. 

You didn’t have the chance to ask him to clarify before your aunt came in with the food, talking about how inspiring the service was today and how she wished you’d give it a chance. 

Too caught up in observing your new guest, you didn’t bother to argue with her. Instead, you were focused the way Michael listened intently to her every word in fascination as he ate. Though he must have been starving, he took his time eating, savoring the meal as if he weren’t sure when he would get another. It was endearing in a weird way. When she started on the morbid subject of selling her soul at a Black Mass, you cut her off, intent on changing the subject. Though you had heard of what selling your soul at a Black Mass entailed, you never truly believed that your aunt was capable of taking someone’s life. You had figured that it was more a fable than anything else. Regardless, it wasn’t something that you would encourage her to proudly confess to a stranger. 

Michael, ever the curious one, pressed further with a hint of facetiousness, “Did you sign a contact in blood?” 

You couldn’t stop the laugh that escaped you at the absurdity of it all, which your aunt didn’t appreciate. “Y/N, this isn’t a joke. Look at what the Dark Lord has blessed me with!”

You exchanged a telling glance with Michael, recalling your previous conversation. He smirked again as he chewed on a mouthful of bread while she continued to list all of the material items that she received as a gift for her dedication.

Oblivious to your silent exchange, she continued, “Every Wednesday night, Brad Pitt comes over and fucks me till the sun comes up. On Friday nights I get Ryan Reynolds.”

Slapping your hand over your face in embarrassment, you couldn’t find the words to excuse your aunt’s delusions, so you remained quiet, allowing Michael to be entertained. However, when you looked at him, he didn’t seem amused. Instead, he appeared dejected as he commented, “So that's all it is then. Satan is carnal pleasure.”

Shaking her head in denial, Madelyn continued, “Hell no! We've got a greater purpose. We are moving towards the beginning of the end. Our Savior is coming! A spawn of Satan will lead us off of a cliff and into the end times! We just have to make things terrible enough for him to rise. We are the rancid, contaminated soil from which he will bloom and then plunge us in eternal darkness so that we can walk with Satan in eternal hellfire!”

He wasn't fazed at all by her rantings. In fact, he seemed somewhat guilty. You couldn't understand his expression, but it made you feel uneasy. “I hate to break it to you... but you’re waiting in vain.”

Taken aback by his statement, you turned to Madelyn quick enough to see her snatch the food from Michael’s reach, her expression livid as she got up from the table to put the food away without another word. "What are you talking about?" she hissed, refusing to look at him.

Sighing heavily, Michael met your eyes before he followed his previous statement in a melancholic tone, “I’m the one you’re waiting for.”

#michael langdon #cody fern #american horror story #ahs #ahs apocalypse #apocalypse #fanfiction #slow burn #multi-chapter

[fleakins101]

Is One or the Other Actually More Harmful?

*THIS BLOG GOT RIDICULOUS WITH ALL THE DIRECTIONS I WENT. I ADVISE TO NOT READ SOBER. OR AT ALL* First, I am going to pick apart the prompt a little. I do realize my blog posts tend to ask questions more than answer them, let alone even fully address them, but this week's chapters and last weeks discussion had my mind going in several directions. 

“...others argue a difference is based on the ethics of persuading someone to do something that is either in line with or against their own self-interests.” I think how we weigh the debate between propaganda and persuasion -- and how we define our perspectives on the matter -- should start with how we define or think if ‘self interest’ The basic definition of self-interest is: 1

: a concern for one's own advantage and well-being

acted out of self-interest and fear

2

: one's own interest or advantage

self-interest requires that we be generous in foreign aid

But why? I spent perhaps far too much time on the Merriam Webster dictionary rabbit holes and I am quite stumped as to how *we* define or think of self-interest. I then took a more theoretical approach to self interest and...that was a strange rabbit hole and finally, centered my thoughts from a religious angle [being I am a member of an organized religion] The dictionary links and “see also”’s seem to suggest that self-interest is not inherently defined as personal --but as the wellbeing and benefit of others -- but naturally “self” interest in our very individualist US society, we identify our personal selves with the definition. This has me thinking, would collective societies identify “self-interest” for the benefit of others outside of themselves? Perhaps this is why charity is so emphasized in western societies, the US for example. I am going to pick on my own religion and research I have done for muse: Just for reference/context & not terribly important as far as the point of the post* *I am a practicing Mormon who researches  gender constructs in the church and  I focus on post WWII North American Mormon culture, policy and “teachings”. The “natural man” concept is something I have a difficult time agreeing with or seeing eye to eye with. But I disagree with a lot of what religion “says” on quite a few things. But, to highlight my own hypocrisy and bias, the Mormon view of “the natural man” is a lot less annoying and problematic. As a side note, I think Islam has it “right” with the concept of “natural man” and I lean more toward that area of thought. As “pseudo Buddhist” as I like to think I am and aspire to be, I feel even Buddhist theology on the state of the natural man a little empty sometimes. I’m also kind of a combative asshole who can find a problem with just about anything* My three younger children just came racing in from school so I completely lost my train of thought Perhaps my point of “natural man” was to highlight how individualistic our society can be. The one universalist teaching of al Christian denominations is in Jesus Christ, His divinity and Saviorhood. This is the utmost core of Mormon theology as well, but -- like everything else -- we have to get weird with that too and it still differs from other mainstream Christian religions. Because the natural state of man is [supposedly] self interested with pleasure and only in it for ones own gain is why the concept of charity is so emphasized; it’s good to do for others, as Christ does for *us* and helps us be closer to Him -- kinda thing. Charity for others saves us. And the resulting benefit of charity is our own personal gain. But even the concept of charity and good works is riddled with self interest and personal gain. Charity gets YOU into “heaven” and what goes around, comes around kind of thing. In western society -- even in religious -- the concept of do unto others emphasises personal benefit. This is something I leaned is quite unique within wester culture and is a direct result of our individualist society. I spent some time backpacking Italy as a teenager and this was my first experience with this sort of thing. Charity being heroized in my youth until I left home (to be fair, my mother is crazy and took things really far…) and emphasis on charity and good works

 for others was embarrassing for Italians. It was “just what you do”. Italy may not be the greatest example of a collective society , since it has its classic overall traits of individualistic values, but the betterment of others for the sake of those others left a distinct impression on me as a 17 year old. I am not trying to suggest we lack individuals in the states with those kind of qualities. From a religious person's perspective who has almost no strong relationships with other religious people, atheists tend to have the most honorable notions of self-interest on others behalf because they have nothing to gain, other than just doing the right thing. So, all my rambling, gets to my point -- how does propaganda and persuasion encourage self interest and gain? Both Propaganda and Persuasion are centered on communicating a message to an audience. But, it depends on how you look at it: I think the difference between persuasion and propaganda lies within who receives the benefit in the end. And I also think the lines are too blurred and detailed gray to fully distinguish  persuasion from propaganda if we were going by definitions alone. With of course, the exception of distinguishing between two extremes, IE - we can determine by definition the difference between Al Qaeda recruitment videos and Sarah Mcllaughlin ASPCA commercials (though both are almost equally miserable to behold) I would think the knowledge of distinguishing the two would lie most on experience. But, don’t quote me on that latter comment. I’m sure that could be torn apart in five seconds. 

Propaganda: The benefit of peddled propaganda is for the ultimate gain of those who created the propaganda message and their targeted agenda. Persuasion: The benefit lies on behalf of the individual or individuals who are on the receiving end of the persuasive message. With that in mind, is perhaps not the definitions between the two terms that are problematic and up for debate, but what *we* consider to be propaganda or persuasive messages. Nazi Germany is the all too perfect example of direct propaganda and personal gain (albeit, a bit cliche for me to bring up, given I am giving such a surgaced synopsis) being the goal was for Hitler (amongst so many other things) to create an elite class of Aryian genetics and assume power of all of Eastern and Western Europe. What is taught less than the mainstream genocidal politics of the Third Reich, was how extremely gendered it was. Women had progressional and educational rights stripped rom them under Hitlers rule and propaganda centered on the role of wife and mother was heavily thrown at women and young girls. You can’t create a master race without birth. And men cannot tend to their duties if they are distracted by a problematic home life, of course. 

The NRA is another classic case of propagandist messages. The NRA has donor and investment ties to right wing and “conservative” media outlets, politicians and donors. Back when I was in International Relations, I had to watch hours of Taliban and Al-Qaeda recruitment videos and the scare tactics and enactments of fear centered language are nearly identical to the methods of NRA messages. The benefactors for the aforementioned were the ones propagating the message: the NRA get’s more money and political influence by membership numbers and political affiliations, Nazi Germany was dangerously close to eradicating the Jewish population and the systematic propoganda ensured his place of power until outside forces destroyed his carefully constructed regime. Where does it blurry? I think religion is the perfect example of the blurred lines between propaganda and influence. Behold, the The Proclamation of the Family. A Mormon document that has had a resoundingly strong presence in my religion since 1995, when it was first printed and presented to *us* Mormons, VIA the Salt Lake City pulpit. 

And I fucking hate this document so fucking much and so should you! Though it has never been presented as doctrine, revelation or ever considered canon -- it has never even been submitted to the quorum of the 12 and First Presidency for vote to be considered doctrine, revelation or official church canon. And THAT'S because it’s NOT! It’s a homophobic and patriarchal document that details the divinity of the family order by affirming romanticist, heteronormative gender roles. I mean preside? What is this, the 12th century? The ideal family structure is centered on a man and woman in the home? Oh WHAT.EV.ER. Furthermore, the FP was originally filed as an amicus brief in solidarity with Hawaii’s rejection of its first same sex marriage suit in 199(3?2?) one of those years. I always get them mixed up. Chieko N. Okazaki , the church’s then General Relief Society President (and one of the most badass women, ever) was always open with her disagreements with its wording, its place in the church’s narrative and how it was presented to the church’s worldwide membership. This stupid document is so prominent in my religions culture and practice, people have no idea it’s complete and utter lack of theological and doctrinal weight and how contradictory it is to Mormonism’s core religious tenets. I know people who can quote this bullshit better than they can Christ’s sermon on the mount! Ya know, teaching that actually does some good in this universe. But...is it propaganda or influence? Well...it could be argued as both, on the surface anyway. The church is famous for not even having to excommunicate members because it is hemorrhaging members in the US who remove their names from the church’s records or fall through the cracks of inactivity because of the church’s exclusionary views on heteronormative family structure and sexist, patriarchal centered gender roles. And by reinforcing the traditional unit of family theoretically, it has its hold on more membership numbers. But oddly...or not so oddly, if you’re a Mormon who is actually on the inside of this institution and not a complete idiot...the church is losing members in countries that are more conservative. Countries that are more liberal with less negative emphasis and stereotypes centered on matters such as LGBTQ, gender, “modesty” and nudity, interfaith marriages, abortion etc, the church performs far better, though membership numbers pale in comparison to the states and Central and South America, retention rate and activity is statistically higher than its North American counterpart. With the exception of particular countries were colonialist rule and tribal relations still HEAVILY influence culture and local politics. Nigeria, for instance, falls in that line but the church outshines the states as far as retention rate of members. I don’t think this all points to positive reasons, but that’s another Oprah show. IE, the church doesn’t actually get much benefit from the Family Proclamation. Aside from it’s image...which I mean, lets face it, isn’t that great. At best, it is vastly short sided, damaging,  yet wellmeaning persuasian. And you have to look at the church’s theology as a whole to understand the initiative behind the FP. The church’s theology is actually, quite collective and centered on social unity and family harmony. Family is important for societal and individualistic reasons that are too numerous to count. It is a religion that --theoretically anyway, not always in local practice and a quick google search on court settlements is proof-- holds accountability to those who mistreat their spouses and children. But the church has refused to not live in a romanticist gender role bubble since the first World War and is only now acknowledging LGBTQIA members that shouldn’t be driven from the flock (telling someone they can and should change their fundamental authentic selves because Christ loves them IS driving from the flock) and the Family Proclamation is losing weight for so many reasons. Except in places it’s not. Mormons in Migrant communities in Asia, North Africa and the Middle East hardly ever noticed its presence because local ward and branch membership (that’s “congregation” in Mormon language) is up to 80% women. The fuck do they need a document telling them about the importance of a man presiding in the home, when the run the show at church and at home anyway? Paaaaasssssss….. But in more patriarchal and tribal centered countries, the Family Proclamation is actually considered to be quite progressive because it is the first actually printed document that outlines notions of equality and presiding with love and women’s “roles” being declared equally important. While Googling, I found a rather humorous “redacted” version of the Family Proclamation and I just love it on so many levels. But to highlight, I think this redacted version highlights the true intent of the family proclamation’s message at time and what the church would have said if it wasn’t on some legal, anti gay marriage agenda. This is what I take from Mormon theology concerning family unity. This is what I feel the ultimate goal of persuasion is meant to have in a religious organization. Mormon Obsessions with Media Campaigns and Those STUPID Lesson Video Tapes To stay on the Mormon train (I know you're all sick of it, I apologize) The church has had its share of actual propaganda, in form of something called Mormonads that ran from the 90′s through early 2000′s. And its benefit was strictly directed at the church’s carefully constructed obsession with image and to keep all those little Mormon kids in their place. Why? Mormon kids who keep their place go on missions (I did not, I was off fucking around and following bands which will remain unnamed before I got married -- in the temple -- and started having children)  Mormon kids who go on missions recruit others for baptism and strong membership keeps the church’s credibility over its members. But what makes its media campaigns so distinct propagandist in nature, is the scare and shame tactics it uses in order to keep young adults on the Mormon path. Scare tactics that are born not from religious theology, but conservative and political cultural origins. *I’m not even going to detail any of it. I feel I have been a broken record about colonialism, hierarchy, supremacy and patriarchy but so much of the churches structure in the US are built on those things. It’s so annoying. I’m making myself annoyed.* Some of course would argue on the same grounds as the FP, that the Mormonad campaign  was centered on persuasion -- meant to keep kids from falling into dangerous activities and lifestyles...absolutely no one benefited. Or did they? Fear can be a persuasive and effective tactic and I have spent hundreds of hours interviewing ex Mormons who have mixed feelings about the church’s ad campaigns of the 80’s and 90’s. “It kept me from doing things I would have probably regretted had I not had that influence”. But there is still an element of begroaning and regret for having felt controlled concerning individual decision making. As someone who left the church in my teenage years -- due to circumstances, not so much disagreement with the church -- this does hold an element of weight when it comes to persuasion for the sake of safety and straight and narrow. I was not someone who paid any mind to the Mormonad campaigns, even when I was a gung-ho active youth and there is room for argument that I am still paying consequences of bad decisions made in my youth and early twenties. But I also had so much fun and valuable life lessons. So would that not be just “real life”? Had I not learned all the “lessons” of progressions and “bettering myself” that the Mormonads tried to hammer into Mormon youth by practicing my own agency? So, are these Mormonads truly propaganda or persuasion? And where on the richter scale would it all fall more fittingly under? I had labeled the Mormonads as strictly propaganda earlier, but now I am not so sure, now I am asking different questions and making different distinctions. Which is difficult to do, considering the “gray areas” I fee this all falls under. Is propaganda inherently good, and propaganda inherently negative? Who actually benefits the most from either, and do most companies or organizations actually benefit as well as they hope with release of their message campaigns? Can targeted persuasion be as harmful as propaganda campaigns? These are the things I am considering.

[karingudino]

A More Extreme Gun Rights Movement Is Emerging in the NRA’s Wake – Mother Jones

Mom Jones illustration; Getty, Wikipedia

Let our journalists aid you make sense of the noise: Subscribe to the Mother Jones Daily publication and get a recap of reports that issues.

On a frigid Martin Luther King Jr. Day earlier this 12 months, Philip Van Cleave introduced out the massive weapons to Richmond. As he stood on the steps of the Virginia State Capitol, Van Cleave—a 68-year-old balding and mustachioed software program programmer—delivered a stern warning to the Democrats who had recently gained management of the state authorities: “We’re right here right this moment to remind Governor [Ralph] Northam and the final meeting that the final election was not a referendum on gun management.” In entrance of him, an ocean of pro-gun protesters whooped in solidarity. Almost all had been armed, many gripping AR-15-style rifles or different assault weapons. An excellent quantity had been decked out in paramilitary outfits and tactical gear. Accomplice and Gadsden flags waved excessive and huge.

It was a scene that when would have been credited to the Nationwide Rifle Affiliation—the nation’s oldest gun rights group, which, over the previous a number of a long time, has infected and radicalized a broad coalition of conservative gun house owners by way of alarmist messaging, particularly in the course of the Obama administration, and cemented itself as a formidable political pressure. However the NRA has since dwindled in energy, and the rally was the work of Van Cleave’s Virginia Residents Protection League, a no-compromise, far-right gun rights group that he as soon as boasted was “proud” to have been labeled an “extremist” group.

Over the previous 19 years, VCDL’s Foyer Day protests in Richmond—an annual occasion on MLK Day when particular curiosity teams, predominantly ones with conservative ties, advocate to the Basic Meeting—had been comparatively delicate affairs, with about 600 to 800 attendees. However this 12 months it attracted greater than 20,000, and the times main as much as the protest put the state on edge. The FBI arrested members of the neo-Nazi group the Base, who had allegedly stockpiled firearms and ammunition, mentioned plans to recruit members on the rally to assist kickstart a race struggle, and talked about committing acts of violence in opposition to folks of shade. Northam declared a state of emergency to ban weapons on the grounds of the state capitol constructing, however the crowd was so giant that the majority armed attendees couldn’t even match within the space, as an alternative spilling into the aspect streets of downtown Richmond. Alex Jones, the infamous conspiracy theorist and Infowars founder, drove around the streets in an armored automobile screaming by way of a bullhorn, “In the event that they attempt to take our firearms, 1776 will begin once more!”

The rally was a bellwether: the sudden downfall of the nation’s strongest gun group and the rise of extra radical pro-gun organizations and militias in search of to take its place. Since 2016, the NRA has seen a gradual decline in its ranks. In the meantime, there’s been a boon in membership for extra excessive teams just like the VCDL and the Second Modification Basis, which lately filed various lawsuits difficult state gun management legal guidelines, and the Nationwide Affiliation for Gun Rights, which paints itself as a extra conservative various to the NRA.

There’s little doubt a void to be crammed by the NRA, but it surely’s unclear what teams will dominate. “We’ve acquired 100 million gun house owners on this nation,” says Joshua Powell, the NRA director’s former chief of workers. “Whether or not it’s the NRA or another group, someone’s going to must fill these sneakers.” Powell was fired from the NRA final 12 months amid allegations of sexual harassment, and he’s since revealed a memoir detailing the behind-the-scenes corruption throughout the group. “It is very important have an establishment that represents Second Modification supporters, gun house owners,” Powell provides. “That is half and parcel to the material of our nation. The Second Modification isn’t going wherever.” Van Cleave can be assured that there will likely be a bunch, or a splintered coalition of smaller teams, to step into the NRA’s sneakers. “There’s not going to be a void there,” he says. “Anyone’s going to fill that.”

The NRA’s downward spiral began with its best accomplishment: spending $54 million to assist elect Donald Trump in 2016. However the first indicators of monetary bother emerged the next 12 months, which the NRA ended with a $1.1 million shortfall due to shrinking member income, in all probability as a result of it not had Barack Obama as a liberal boogeyman to fundraise off of, in addition to a rise in spending. The subsequent 12 months, 2018, noticed a rise in income from membership dues, however the nonprofit once more spent extra money than it introduced in, digging an excellent deeper gap of $10.8 million within the purple, as its money owed piled up.

The dam broke for the NRA in 2019 when, simply earlier than its annual assembly and conference in Indianapolis, the New Yorker and the Hint published a bombshell report detailing allegations of self-dealing amongst its high distributors, gratuitous spending, sweetheart offers, and different monetary improprieties among the many group’s management—mainly its government vice chairman, Wayne LaPierre, who has led the group since 1991. On the assembly, then-NRA President Oliver North unsuccessfully tried to oust LaPierre and demanded his resignation.

LaPierre survived the rebellion, as a majority of the NRA’s 76-member board backed him unanimously and North resigned. However the harm was achieved. An nameless supply leaked monetary paperwork that uncovered years of corruption, together with a damning letter that North penned. In a court filing from later final 12 months North’s legal professionals stated that “LaPierre — demonstrating his whole dictatorial management over the NRA…stopped all of North’s inquiries and prevented others on the NRA from trying into the considerations that North raised.”

Days after North’s tried coup in opposition to LaPierre, New York Legal professional Basic Letitia James opened an investigation into the NRA’s tax-exempt standing. After spending a 12 months investigating, in August her workplace filed a massive lawsuit in opposition to the NRA, accusing it of widespread corruption and in search of to dissolve the group in its entirety. “The NRA’s affect has been so highly effective that the group went unchecked for many years whereas high executives funneled hundreds of thousands into their very own pockets,” James stated in assertion asserting the lawsuit. “The NRA is fraught with fraud and abuse, which is why…we search to dissolve the NRA, as a result of no group is above the regulation.” The lawsuit has since been tied up in various challenges by the NRA’s authorized group. After years of denying allegations of monetary misconduct, the NRA lastly admitted in its most up-to-date tax submitting that the group solely lately turned conscious “of a big diversion of its property” between LaPierre and 5 former executives. 

The NRA has all the time been notoriously cagey about its membership numbers, however its tax returns and different monetary paperwork supply a glimpse into the dire state of affairs. An audited financial statement exhibits that income from member dues dropped from $170 million in 2018 to $113 million final 12 months—a 34 % decline— marking the bottom annual membership income determine that the NRA has posted since 2012, which is very troubling contemplating that the price of membership dues has sharply increased in that point—no less than twice within the final 4 years alone. (The NRA didn’t reply for a request for clarification on membership numbers and the decline in income from member dues.) That drop in income, together with the hundreds of thousands of {dollars} it has tied as much as battle the New York legal professional normal’s lawsuit and different litigation, meant a much smaller struggle chest for the 2020 election. This time round, the NRA spent solely $24 million on federal elections—lower than half of what it did in 2016 and barely greater than the mixed $22.1 million spent by two of the nation’s largest gun reform organizations, Everytown for Gun Security and Giffords. In the meantime, the Gun House owners of America spent $900,000 within the 2020 election cycle, 14 times more than in 2016.

“That’s an enormous lower in political spending,” Adam Winkler, a constitutional regulation professor and gun coverage skilled at UCLA’s College of Legislation, says of the NRA’s involvement within the 2020 election. “Particularly at a time when the gun management aspect is changing into extra energetic, extra engaged, placing extra money into elections, and doing higher get-out-the-vote mobilization efforts than ever earlier than.” All of the whereas, increasingly more NRA members turned disenchanted and disillusioned with the group. “They’ve definitely misplaced members over this,” says Van Cleave, who claims that his group’s membership greater than quadrupled within the six weeks following its 2020 Foyer Day rally, rising from about 8,000 to greater than 35,000. Lots of the new members of his group, he says, had stop the NRA. “I see a whole lot of disappointment,” he provides. “The way in which a whole lot of the cash is getting used. That’s the priority.”

The Virginia Residents Protection League came into existence in 1994, simply as congressional Democrats pushed by way of a pair of gun security payments—together with a decade-long ban on assault weapons—that sparked the fashionable gun management debate. Paul Moog fashioned the group to battle gun security laws not on a nationwide stage, however regionally in Virginia. Initially known as the Northern Virginia Residents Protection League, the group’s first order of enterprise was to strain state lawmakers to alter the state’s hid carry legal guidelines from its “might situation” authorized standing—that means that the state might situation a hid carry allow solely to individuals who can show they’ve a very good motive—to “shall situation,” granting anybody eligible to personal a firearm to additionally receive a hid carry allow.

Constructing on the early success, Moog quickly dropped the “Northern” from VCDL’s title and set his sights on making certain that the entire state was as gun-friendly because it might probably be. To take action, the group established a playbook of lobbying lawmakers—very like the NRA—coupled with public protests meant to intimidate any push for tightening Virginia’s gun legal guidelines. In 1998, VCDL members protested a Northern Virginia church’s gift-for-guns program, which inspired folks to give up their undesirable firearms in alternate for reward certificates to native companies. In 2002, the group led a boycott in opposition to the Valley View Mall in Roanoke over its ban of firearms within the mall. And in 2004, after a slew of gun management payments did not make it out of the state’s normal meeting, the VCDL encourage firearm house owners to show up at eating places and buying facilities with their sidearm strapped to their hip in celebration—in flip intimidating some clientele.

In 2001, Van Cleave turned the group’s president and, one 12 months later, members staged their first Foyer Day protest. Underneath his management, the VCDL has expanded its nationwide profile, displaying an eagerness to go on nationwide information applications to defend his extremist views on the Second Modification—particularly within the wake of mass shootings. After the Sandy Hook bloodbath in 2012, Van Cleave gleefully defended the semiautomatic military-style rifle utilized by the shooter, Adam Lanza, to the Washington Post. “Weapons are enjoyable, and a few of them are far more cool than others,” he stated. “It’s similar to we now have tv units that look cool, and others are far more boxy.” He has additionally criticized the NRA for not going far sufficient of their feedback calling for armed guards in faculties. “In case you have acquired a allow, in the event you’re carrying all over the place else you go…a college isn’t any completely different,” Van Cleave advised WWBT, Richmond’s NBC affiliate.

However Van Cleave’s most notable brush with public notoriety can be his most embarrassing. In 2018, he was duped by infamous prankster Sacha Baron Cohen for his Showtime collection “Who Is America?” in a phase the place he movies a faux-PSA for a gun-training program for youths, “KinderGuardians.” Regardless of the embarrassment (which he tried to distance himself from by claiming he knew he was being arrange however went alongside in an try to guard different gun advocates from related ploys), Van Cleave and the VCDL have managed to vastly broaden their coalition inside Virginia, appearing as each a blueprint for native grassroots gun rights teams in different states and as fodder for nationwide ones in search of to capitalize on the NRA’s decline.

For the reason that Foyer Day rally, various militias have fashioned all through Virginia, one thing that Van Cleave says the VCDL wasn’t concerned in organizing however welcomes. However his group has been busy this 12 months: the VCDL fought Northam’s actions to sluggish the unfold of the coronavirus, together with a successful legal effort in April to overturn a part of the governor’s government order that labeled taking pictures ranges among the many companies pressured to shut because the state went into lockdown. The VCDL has additionally been closely concerned within the rising variety of cities and municipalities within the state declaring themselves Second Amendment sanctuaries and vowing to not implement any new gun management legal guidelines handed on the state and county stage. By means of VCDL’s e-mail alert system, which Van Cleave says has tens of hundreds of subscribers, they’re able to ship an SOS to its members every time gun management laws is on the desk wherever within the state, mobilizing members to voice opposition to any such measures in public remark boards. “We don’t let these localities take our primary civil rights and do with them what they please,” Van Cleave told an area Virginia newspaper in July. “In relation to weapons, that’s when the foundations exit the window…we’re not going to allow them to get away with it.”

A number of teams have already ramped up their operations over the previous 12 months, reminiscent of Gun House owners of America, a nationwide group that former Texas Rep. Ron Paul as soon as known as “the one no-compromise gun foyer in Washington.” Van Cleave says the VCDL has “been working fairly a bit with” Gun House owners of America on each state and nationwide points. “I believe what’s going to occur is because the NRA finally ends up being fairly crippled for some time, there are different organizations which might be going to step ahead,” he says. “There’s not going to be a void there, someone’s going to fill that.”

Because the coronavirus despatched a lot of the nation into lockdown this spring, extra new armed teams emerged in protest. Members of the Michigan Liberty Militia stormed the state’s capitol constructing in protest of the “tyranny” that Democratic Gov. Gretchen Whitmer was imposing along with her strict stay-at-home orders. As unrest within the wake of George Floyd’s homicide unfold throughout the nation, so too did armed militia teams, from Portland to Wisconsin, Texas, and Virginia, the place authorities declare that the antigovernment extremist group referred to as the “boogaloo boys”—whose rise this 12 months began on the Foyer Day rally in Richmond—stoked violent confrontations between police and Black Lives Matter protesters. In mid-October, the FBI introduced that members of an extremist militia group had plotted to kidnap Gov. Whitmer, in addition to take over the state’s capitol constructing, the place they’d maintain televised executions of public officers. The group additionally mentioned “taking” Northam, Virginia’s Democratic governor, in line with the FBI. However Van Cleave dismisses any connection between VCDL’s Foyer Day protest and the rise of violence from extremist militia teams, calling it overblown lies from the media. “I’m very skeptical of a whole lot of that,” he says.

Nonetheless, as teams vie to fill the NRA’s void, extremist gun violence is growing in ever extra regarding methods. Two armed males from Virginia had been arrested outdoors of the Philadelphia Conference Middle on November 5 after police received a tip about plans to raid a “truckload of faux ballots.” One of many males, Joshua Macias, co-founded the group Vets for Trump and had attended VCDL’s Foyer Day rally in January, in line with a review of his Twitter account. In a video taken in the course of the rally, Macias can be seen, with a bullhorn in hand, firing up a crowd of tons of on a downtown Richmond aspect avenue: “There are veterans out right here…who made an oath to defend this structure in opposition to international and home enemies!”

Within the aftermath of the election, as Trump refused to concede and peddled conspiracy theories about election fraud, hundreds of his supporters—together with violent extremist teams just like the Proud Boys—marched in DC to protest the outcomes. Although DC regulation forbids carrying firearms in most public locations, together with at public demonstrations, the Oath Keepers, an extremist militia group, posted a be aware on its web site to supporters saying that “our males will likely be standing by, awaiting the President’s orders to name us up because the militia, which might override D.C.’s ridiculous anti-gun legal guidelines.” No less than 4 folks had been arrested on gun expenses on the rally.

Not all gun house owners are flocking to those far-right teams. Different gun teams just like the Socialist Rifle Affiliation and the Nationwide African American Gun Affiliation have additionally seen membership improve, although theirs is far smaller than their ultra-right counterparts. And in October, Giffords, the gun security group co-founded by former Arizona Rep. Gabby Giffords (D), launched a brand new nationwide firearms group for gun house owners that it hopes can take the NRA’s mantle whereas additionally pushing for gun management measures.

It could be handy to hyperlink the rise of extremist gun teams this 12 months to the NRA’s downfall: At a time when gun management teams are extra impactful than they’ve ever been—spending hundreds of thousands of {dollars} to efficiently increase political candidates working on a gun management platform—their greatest foe is down and out, leaving gun house owners throughout the nation feeling powerless. However Winkler doesn’t assume the narrative tracks. He explains that the rise in militia exercise and armed protesters this 12 months “appears to be the pure progress of one thing that began about 10 to 12 years in the past” with the tea celebration motion when weapons turned an emblem of protest. “I don’t assume the overwhelming majority of people that deliver weapons to a protest are planning on beginning a firefight,” he says. “They’re not planning on beginning a struggle. They’re doing it symbolically for protest.” Nonetheless, Winkler worries that it might probably go awry, particularly given the spate of right-wing violence from extremist militias at protests over the summer time. “They’re immediately shifting to self-defense,” he says, “the second they see somebody or one thing taking place that they really feel threatened by.”

Van Cleave sees his group’s Foyer Day protest and continued advocacy for gun rights not a lot as a protest, however as a battle. That’s very true in a Joe Biden–Kamala Harris administration, which Van Cleave says has “principally declared struggle on the Second Modification.” His group was planning one other huge Foyer Day protest subsequent month, however that went awry when gun management teams got permits for the house the place VCDL usually holds its occasion. In retaliation, VCDL despatched a message to members with plans for a caravan rally much like the Trump rallies that occurred throughout the nation earlier than the election. “VCDL goes to try this…however on steroids!” the e-mail said. Past Foyer Day, Van Cleave hints at different occasions and methods to battle any gun management legal guidelines that the brand new administration might attempt to move, whether or not by way of litigation or on the streets. “Our job is to guard that [Second Amendment] proper by no matter means is critical.”

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source https://fikiss.net/a-more-extreme-gun-rights-movement-is-emerging-in-the-nras-wake-mother-jones/ A More Extreme Gun Rights Movement Is Emerging in the NRA’s Wake – Mother Jones published first on https://fikiss.net/ from Karin Gudino https://karingudino.blogspot.com/2020/12/a-more-extreme-gun-rights-movement-is.html

[lakotasafeco-blog]

NSSF:: 80.4% NICS Checks Increase, New Infographic: Buying Your First Gun and More!

This Week: 80.4% NICS Checks Increase, New Infographic: Buying Your First Gun and more! April 6, 2020 | Vol. 21 No. 15

• Featured News •

NICS ADJUSTED BACKGROUND CHECKS POST RECORD  ...NSSF released the adjusted data from the FBI’s National Instant Criminal Background Check System (NICS) which showed March topped every other month since records began with 2,375,525 checks for the sale of a firearm, an increase of 80.4 percent compared to the March 2019 NSSF-adjusted NICS figure of 1,317,114. NSSF members can log in to learn more about the record figures as well as view 20 years’ worth of historical NICS data. KEEPING INDUSTRY WORKING ...Members of NSSF’s Government Relations State and Federal Affairs teams have been working tirelessly to ensure firearm and ammunition manufacturers, retailers, distributors and shooting ranges are deemed “essential businesses” and able to remain open during the COVID-19 pandemic. See how emergency orders affect business in your state. NEW INFOGRAPHIC: BUYING YOUR FIRST GUN  … “Our industry is seeing record-breaking sales in the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic, with a large percentage of these consumers being first-time gun buyers,” said Joe Bartozzi, NSSF President and CEO. “We want to be sure these new gun owners have as much information as possible about how to handle, use and store firearms safely and responsibly.” See Infographic and more safety resources here. A three-judge panel in the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals heard oral arguments in the Duncan v. Becerra case being appealed by the defendants. NSSF filed a supporting amicus brief.   Massachusetts Republican Gov. Charlie Baker revised state orders that allowed firearm retailers to open, but quietly closed them hours later.   Both the NRA and NSSF-member Dark Storm Industries filed separate lawsuits against New York Democratic Gov. Andrew Cuomo alleging his order closing firearm businesses is unconstitutional.   Visit NSSF's Government Relations section for more. As the pandemic evolves, “Behind the Firing Line” will feature ranges working through social and legal challenges. Maxon Shooter’s Supply and Indoor Range shares how it protects its staff and customers while still offering services.   Intelligent social media use by businesses should be viewed as a strategic marketing long game, no matter what is going on in the outside world and especially in time of crisis. Now is a good time to build a social community.   ATF Q&A: More questions came in on our 24/7 NSSF Member Compliance Hotline last week. One question asked, "What documentation must a member of the military on active duty present to an FFL to purchase a handgun from that FFL?"   Read more of NSSF's latest Retailer and Range news. Looking for a fun and inexpensive way to introduce a new hunter to the sport? How about a squirrel hunt? Seasons are long in most states and squirrels abound on most public lands. Give this squirrel recipe a try.   Show support for mentorship, share authentic stories involving products and services and discover amazing shareable content by joining the +ONESM Target Shooting and +ONE Hunting communities on Facebook.   Read more about NSSF's Recruitment, Retention and Reactivation ("R3") efforts. p.p1 {margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px 'Helvetica Neue'; color: #454545} span.s1 {text-decoration: underline ; color: #e4af0a} NSSF donated $25,000 to three groups indispensable to supporting the health and welfare of Newtown, Conn. area residents in response to the COVID-19 pandemic. The funds will assist with the purchase of personal protective equipment (PPE).   The Texas Supreme Court agreed to hear Academy Sports + Outdoor’s appeal of a trial court order denying Academy’s motion to dismiss the case brought against Academy by victim families of the tragic Sutherland Springs murders. NSSF filed an amicus brief in support of Academy’s appeal.   NSSF President and CEO Joe Bartozzi joined USCCA President and Founder Tim Schmidt to discuss what both groups are doing to ensure new gun owners are safe, educated, trained and engaged to protect their Second Amendment rights.   Another casualty of the COVID-19 pandemic that no one saw coming: hunting. Read up on how emergency orders are affecting spring hunting seasons.   It’s often the times of hardship and great difficulty that reveal the true character of a community. Read what NSSF is doing during this health crisis and how others can get involved.   The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives is seeking Firearms Enforcement Officers. Interested individuals can find more at the USAJobs.com listing.   Scholastic Clay Target Program and Scholastic Action Shooting Program use social media to keep student-athletes focused and to reinforce skills and firearm safety every Monday, Wednesday and Friday on the SCTP and SASP Facebook pages.   Allen Company transitioned its manufacturing processes to produce personal protection equipment and other emergency equipment needed by first responders and healthcare workers on the front line of the COVID-19 pandemic.   The Civilian Marksmanship Program (CMP) has announced the cancellation of all activities at its Alabama and Ohio armories, offices, stores, worksites, marksmanship centers and the CMP Talladega Marksmanship Park until May 4.   A proper handgrip is one of the most important fundamentals of accurate handgun shooting. Letsgoshooting.org shared several options available on the market today.   Show your support for the Gun Owners CareSM campaign by adding the profile frame to your Facebook profile picture.

• NSSF Events •

July 13-15 NSSF Range-Retailer ExpoTM July 28-30 NSSF Import/Export Conference Sept. 14-16 NSSF CMO Summit For event sponsorship information, contact Chris Tatulli at [email protected] and Tammy McIntyre at [email protected].

• Industry Jobs •

Machinist Franklin Armory District Sales Manager Smith & Wesson Senior Design Engineer PointsNorth Quality Control Manager Franklin Armory Visit jobs.nssf.org to view more employment opportunities in the shooting, hunting and outdoor industry. NSSF's Mission "To promote, protect and preserve hunting and the shooting sports." COPYRIGHT © 2020 by National Shooting Sports Foundation, Inc. Permission is granted for broadcast, publication, retransmission to email lists, Websites or any other copying or storage, in any medium, online or not, if 1) the text is forwarded in its entirety, including this paragraph, and 2) no fee is charged. "Bullet Points®," "National Shooting Sports Foundation®," "NSSF®," and all other trade names, trademarks, service marks, logos and images of the National Shooting Sports Foundation appearing in this publication are the sole property of the Foundation and may not be used without the Foundation's prior express written permission. All other trade names, trademarks, service marks, logos and images appearing in this publication are trademarks or registered trademarks of their respective owners.National Shooting Sports Foundation 11 Mile Hill Road Newtown, CT 06470 Read the full article

#gunvote #2A #babyyoda #ccw #floridaccw #news #pewpew #pewpewlife #pewpewtactical #thepewpewlife

[gabbykaufman]

NRA video calls for a 'clenched fist' response to protests

A recruitment video released by the National Rifle Association is making waves for its militant tone, denouncing protesters and calling on viewers to “fight this violence of lies with a clenched fist of truth.”

The minute-long advertisement was originally released in April, but was re-posted on Facebook June 12. It went viral Wednesday when a journalist tweeted it was “barely a whisper shy of a call for full civil war.”

https://twitter.com/JeffSharlet/status/880210733065261060

The video is narrated by conservative commentator and NRA spokeswoman Dana Loesch, who addresses the camera directly and in urgent tones denounces an unnamed “they,” presumably a reference to the anti-Trump left.

“They use their media to assassinate real news,” Loesch begins. “They use their schools to teach children that their president is another Hitler. They use their movie stars and singers and comedy shows and award shows to repeat their narrative over and over again.”

“And then they use their ex-president to endorse the resistance. All to make them march, make them protest, make them scream racism and sexism and xenophobia and homophobia, to smash windows, burn cars, shut down interstates and airports, bully and terrorize the law-abiding, until the only option left is for the police to do their jobs and stop the madness.”

“And when that happens, they’ll use it as an excuse for their outrage. The only way we stop this, the only way we save our country and our freedom, is to fight this violence of lies with a clenched fist of truth.”

“I’m the National Rifle Association of America, and I’m freedom’s safest place,” Loesch concludes. Loesch’s commentary is intercut with b-roll of protests and protestors clashing with police.

The video, which has racked up over 2.5 million views on Facebook, was criticized for its ominous tone, although the video makes no specific reference to the NRA’s signature issue of gun rights and doesn’t mention firearms. Various progressive-leaning news outlets called it “chilling,” “outrageous,” and said it “stops just short of calling for violence.” “What Is This NRA Video Trying to Accomplish, Exactly?” one columnist asked. Deray McKesson, an activist and one of the most visible members of the Black Lives Matter movement, said it was “an open call to violence to protect white supremacy.”

https://twitter.com/deray/status/880409739015766016

Jason Stanley, a philosophy professor at Yale University and the author of “How Propaganda Works,” called the video “utterly terrifying” and took particular issue with its allusions to tamping down protests.

“Dissent against the president is represented as an attack on freedom—when in a democratic society, dissent and protest are the essence of freedom,” Stanley said in an email to Yahoo News.

“’Law abiding’ is used as a contrast with ‘democratic,’” he added. “So political protest—for example at airports—is not ‘law abiding,’ even though it is clearly consistent with the constitution. ‘Law abiding’ here means ‘following whatever the leader says.’ This is an authoritarian notion of law, not a democratic one.”

After the video started receiving renewed attention Wednesday, Loesch took to Twitter to defend it, engaging with both critics and supporters.

The NRA did not immediately respond to a request for comment, but posted a message of support for Loesch.

https://twitter.com/NRA/status/880457108814262274

#_revsp:Yahoo! News #_uuid:9b829ffe-b9f5-3216-91f3-c53bc9cc2391 #_lmsid:a077000000CFoGyAAL #_author:Gabby Kaufman

[harrythegreekblr]

Kaine, Schiff, Gabbard planning another NATO Trump coup Friday in Halifax

Bottom row: starting left is John McCain (R-AZ), Tim Kaine (D-VA), Ted Cruz (R-TX), unidentified

Back row: starting far right is Tulsi Gabbard (D-HA), in middle is Mike Pompeo (R-KS), second from left is Tom Cotton (R-TX), others unidentified

Also in attendance was Adam Schiff (D-CA) and Mike Rogers, former Director of NSA

https://halifaxtheforum.org/partners-sponsors/partners-sponsors/

To see the video of Tulsi Gabbard, please fast forward to 1:09

Mike Rogers of NSA at 29 seconds

Mike Rogers (above), former Director of the NSA

https://brassballs.blog/home/congress-voted-357-22-thursday-to-support-pelosis-trillion-dollar-slush-fund-for-nato-instead-of-5-billion-for-mexican-border-wall

What are NATO’s plans for impeaching President Donald J. Trump?

New plots unfold at the Halifax International Forum in Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada on Friday.

Halifax is to NATO as Norfolk, Virginia is to the U.S. Navy and Naval Academy.

Ukraine is at the core of NATO’s meetings in another attempt to take down Trump.

Ukraine has never been a member of NATO.

This NATO video is from today:

Here was one of the Halifax Forum’s attempted coups.

David J. Kramer distributed copies of the Russian dossier to Congress and the media for John McCain.

At the time, Kramer was McCain’s Chief of Staff.

The coup failed.

Donald J. Trump was elected President.

https://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2018/02/john-mccain-associate-pleads-fifth-dossier-probe/

Kramer’s resume includes:

Board of Directors and initial founders of the Halifax International Forum

coordinator of the CIA’s Russian Working Group

coordinator for a consortium of 38 U.S. colleges who recruit student spies through NATO and the Association of Professional Schools of International Affairs (APSIA)

https://apsia.org/graduate-schools-programs/member-directory/

One of them was Mariia Butina.

She entered the U.S. through Halifax under a work visa submitted by NATO in 2010.

Here is Butina’s picture working for the Potomac Institute, a non-profit organization sponsored by NATO:

Mariia Butina (above right) pictured Oct. 26th, 2010 working at the Potomac Institute in Arlington, Virginia. The Institute is sponsored by NATO. The person on the left is unidentified.

https://brassballs.blog/home/mariia-maria-butina-deports-deported-nra-tonya-chutkan-nato-potomac-institute-russian-spy-convicted-susan-american-university-oneill-rockefeller-gettysburg-torshin-erickson-putin-evidence-destroyed-voided-barr-attorney-general-crowdstrike-dnc-cia-fbi

https://sipa.fiu.edu/people/senior-fellows/profiles/davidj.kramer.html

Tim Kaine (above) was Hillary Clinton’s choice for V.P. in 2016 when she ran for President.

NATO promotes a one world government.

Source is NATO.

https://www.nato.int/

Halifax is a key sea port on the Atlantic Ocean.

From there, Canada’s Navy can protect the St. Lawrence Seaway.

Halifax is also key entry point for immigrants to enter Canada.

Especially Russian hackers like Dmitri Alperovitch of CrowdStrike.

https://brassballs.blog/home/ukrainian-server-crashes-crowdstrike-cia-fbi-dedicated-line-backdoor-consecutive-days-of-losses-webb-report-dnc-elect-democrats-warburg-pincus-google-crwd-holdings-george-kurtz-strzok-rosenstein-lisa-barsoomian-melissa-hodgman-sec-long-tail-down

According to NATO, it received a trillion dollars from Congress.

The Pentagon’s Defense Budget is $792 billion.

NATO admits to having 65,000 troops and 18 war ships.

[bountyofbeads]

Guns seized from Washington man said to be neo-Nazi leader prepping for 'race war'

Kaleb James Cole was not charged with any crime, but the guns were taken under the state's "red flag" law.

By Phil Helsel | Published Oct. 18, 2019, 11:23 PM EDT, Updated Oct. 19, 2019, 2:01 AM EDT | NBC News | Posted October 19, 2019 |

Firearms belonging to the suspected leader of a neo-Nazi group who was thought to be preparing for a "race war" have been seized under a "red flag" law in Washington state, according to court documents.

Authorities removed five rifles, three pistols and other gun components from Kaleb James Cole, 24, under a state law that allows authorities to take guns from people deemed to be a risk to themselves or others for up to a year, authorities said. Cole has not been charged with any crime.

Seattle City Attorney Pete Holmes believes the seizure, which court documents indicate happened Sept. 26, may have prevented a massacre.

"This is a hate-filled human being, but unfortunately one who possesses really alarming numbers of weapons," Holmes said.

Attempts to reach Cole at phone numbers listed in public records that may be linked to him were not successful Friday evening. It was not immediately clear if he has an attorney.

Prosecutors filed a lawsuit against Cole invoking the state’s red flag law and seeking an "extreme risk protection order." Seventeen states and Washington, D.C. have laws allowing family members or police to remove weapons from people who may be dangerous, according to The Pew Charitable Trusts.

The National Rifle Association has opposed some current protection order laws, arguing they deprive gun owners of due process.

Cole is a self-admitted member of the "Atomwaffen Division" — which the Southern Poverty Law Center says is a terroristic national socialist organization that believes in using violence for “apocalyptic, racial cleansing” — and is thought to be the leader of the Washington state chapter, Seattle police said in its petition for the court order.

Police believe Cole participated in recent firearm training and recruitment efforts at “hate camps,” which officials say he helped organize.

"It appears that he has gone from espousing hate to now taking active steps or preparation for an impending 'race war,'" Seattle police said in the petition.

Included with the police petition were a cellphone photo of Cole giving the Nazi salute, and another of him and another person standing in front of the Auschwitz death camp in Poland.

Cole was stopped as he arrived at Chicago’s O’Hare Airport in December 2018 after a 25-day trip to eastern Europe, and officials then noted that he had been identified in an article as being Atomwaffen’s Washington state chapter leader, Customs and Border Protection said in documents attached to the petition.

Cole allegedly admitted his membership, and CBP wrote in its report that he "stated that he shares a fascist ideology, 'strong dominate the weak.'"

But that report also said that Cole told officials he discourages members from doing anything illegal and that his group is not interested in the overthrow of the U.S. government. He said he owned an AK-47 and several handguns for protection. Cole was released after being questioned, the report says.

Cole was deported from Canada earlier this year because officials there felt he was a member of an organization that may engage in terrorism, Seattle police said in its petition for the extreme risk protection order. Cole is said to have been barred from Canada for life.

King County Prosecutor Dan Satterberg told NBC affiliate KING of Seattle that the in addition to the weapons seized, which included what he characterized as military-style assault rifles, components and tools that could be used to make untraceable firearms were also found.

Satterberg said that much of the material presented to the judge was information already on the Internet and involved statements by Cole.

"It wasn’t anything super-secret that we had to tell the judge. It was just: 'here’s what this guy’s about, he’s leading other people in practicing and informing a potentially violent cell that would act on their white supremacist views,'" Satterberg told the station.

"So, that was enough to convince this judge that at least temporarily — let’s take a time out. Let’s take these guns out and see what we’ve got here," he said. "It isn't a crime, he’s not being charged, he’s not in jail ... it is a way to slow things down."

The issue of red flag laws, like the Washington one under which Cole's weapons were seized, has been raised in Congress following mass shootings this year in Gilroy, California, El Paso, Texas, and in Dayton, Ohio.

The NRA's Institute for Legislative Action denied media reports that suggested the group supports red flag laws as they exist in some states, and it said it opposes such laws because they do not protect due process rights.

"We will only support an ERPO process that strongly protects both Second Amendment rights and due process rights at the same time," the NRA said in January.

#racisim #race #hate groups #hate speech #hate crimes #u.s. news #us news #us politics #u.s. department of justice #united states department of justice #criminal justice #neo nazis #white supermacists #top stories google news #top news #trending topics

[docayin-blog]

The Hunter Decline and How We Can Fix It

WE'VE LOST 2.2 MILLION HUNTERS SINCE 2011. HERE'S HOW TO HELP SAVE HUNTING.

Doug Hinkle has a trophy room full of shoulder mounts, a lifetime Missouri hunting license, and the Savage 99 lever-action rifle that belonged to his grandfather.

Doug's father gave him the rifle, chambered in .300 Savage, when the pair shared their first deer hunt, back in 1969, just as whitetails were returning to their county in northern Missouri after a century of depletion. Doug has hunted with the rifle a couple of times since, but the Savage has migrated farther back in his gun safe as Doug has added synthetic-stocked bolt guns and semiautomatic rifles to his firearms collection.

These days, there's no shortage of whitetails around Doug's place. In fact, when we hunted together two Novembers ago, we each could have hung our tags on mature bucks within the first hour of the season. What's lacking in Doug's life isn't deer or guns; it's somebody to pass that Savage 99 down to.

Doug's kids don't hunt. His neighbors have leased their farms to out-of-area hunters who don't bring kids when they come twice a year, once for bow season and again for the rifle season in November. The closest Doug, who just turned 60, can get to a gun-worthy heir is his sister's husband, but he's nearly Doug's age and lives a couple states away.

"I've thought about just giving Granddad's rifle to one of my kids in the hopes that maybe they'll have kids who hunt or shoot, but that seems really unlikely," Doug told me. "My kids were raised as hunters and shooters, but I don't think my grandkids will be."

The License Cliff

You may think you encounter too many camo-clad competitors in the places you hunt, whether it's a public duck marsh or a limited-draw elk unit. But the reality is that the number of licensed hunters is down across the country. Hunter numbers peaked in 1982, when around 17 million of us bought licenses. I was a high school sophomore in rural north Missouri that year, and it seemed like every one of my friends — including Doug's cousins — hunted every chance they got. Full disclosure: I killed my second whitetail with Doug's grandfather's Savage, so its fate is personal to me.

Since 1982, hunting participation in America has declined steadily. In 2016, the last year for which the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service has data, only 11.5 million hunters were counted, a drop of 2.2 million from the USFWS's 2011 survey.

Sure, that's still a lot of hunters, and on opening day of deer season, it can seem like most of them are in your county. We're accustomed to demonizing these anonymous competitors for stealing "our" opportunity, but take a closer look at them. Chances are they look a lot like you: middle-aged white guys craving a chance to do what they love to do.

This is the second problem with America's population of hunters. Not only are we getting fewer, but also we're getting older. According to the USFWS, back in 1991 52 percent of U.S. hunters were between the ages of 25 and 44. Demographers consider this the most productive segment of society, comprising members who are disproportionately physically healthy and actively contributing labor and economic benefit to their communities. By 2011, the percentage of hunters in this age bracket had dropped to 33 percent of the whole. The percentage of hunters aged 45 — 64 had climbed to 44 percent. More troubling is the percentage of hunters over age 65 — 11 percent in 2011 (up from 6 percent in 1991). State wildlife agencies figure that most hunters stop buying licenses when they hit about age 70.

If you are silently cheering this trend because you think it will create more opportunities for the rest of us, consider that as both the absolute number and percentage of hunters decline, so do license sales that support wildlife management in America. So do the markets for guns and bows and the habitat-enhancing excise taxes their sale generates. And so do political and cultural support for hunting.

Statisticians call this decline the "license cliff," and the current trajectory shows the slide accelerating and steepening. Factor in another demographic trend — the urbanization and cultural diversification of America — and it's easy to imagine a future in which hunting is considered a quaint curiosity of a bygone era and not a dynamic part of the modern American culture, economy, and landscape.

Recruitment Redux

Demographic trends are a little like battleships. They take a long time to gain momentum, but once they establish direction, it's hard to influence their trajectory. Will we ever again be a country of 16.7 million hunters, as we were in 1982? Probably not. But Eric Dinger is convinced that we can stabilize the slide toward oblivion and even add hunter numbers, if we do one simple thing.

"We have to replace ourselves," said Dinger, the cofounder and CEO of Powderhook, a digital app that aims to connect hunters and anglers with people who don't currently participate regularly in either activity. Powderhook intends to help create three million new hunters in the next five years, mainly by making it easier for us to talk to each other, help each other, and feel more like companions than competitors.

The idea is that as each of us ages out of hunting we will have recruited someone to take our place, someone who in turn feels both obligated and eager to replace themselves, creating a chain reaction with our hunting heritage as its fuel rod.

"If every one of us took just one person hunting next year that number looks completely different," said Dinger.

In recent years, conservation organizations — most notably the National Wild Turkey Federation, National Shooting Sports Foundation, Sportsmen's Alliance, and the NRA working through the Families Afield initiative — have worked to lower barriers to hunting participation. But many of these efforts have focused on youth and haven't adequately followed up to ensure that activated kids continue to buy licenses and hunt when they become adults.

"That's a key point," said John Frampton, president and CEO of the Council to Advance Hunting and the Shooting Sports and one of the national leaders of the

accelerating R3 movement. R3 stands for Recruitment, Retention, and Reactivation.

"We have to reach out to the population of adults who may have been introduced to hunting earlier in life and have fallen away from it [reactivation] or who have never been introduced to it in the first place [recruitment]. These are people with disposable time and income and who can understand and appreciate that hunting is an activity that can improve their quality of life, provide them with high-quality food, and give them a connection to the natural world."

After years of stop-and-start work aimed at slowing the decline of hunters, this appears to be the year of intentional R3-ing. Commissions are studying the problem. Symposia will discuss solutions. But Dinger says one demonstrated way to fix the slide is to do what hunters do best: talking passionately about hunting.

Digital Mentoring

Don't underestimate the power of connection, even in the relatively anonymous ether of cyberspace. Once hunters start talking to would-be hunters, Dinger says, it's a relatively easy next step to bring the relationship into the real world, one that can blossom on a clays course or in the turkey woods.

Prospective hunters need real-time local answers. They don't want to scour the Internet to piece together the answer to a question. And often they want to communicate anonymously. The Powderhook app enables all those dynamics by incentivizing the exchange of information. By participating in this exchange, digital mentors can earn status points that they can trade in on products or reduced prices at retailers.

But Powderhook's main role is as a virtual campfire, a place to foster dialog between those who have information and those who hunger for it. In simpler days, that relationship was called mentoring and apprenticing.

The idea of Powderhook's app is to give prospective hunters a "mentor in the pocket," a connection not only to knowledgeable individuals in real time, but also to organizations with deep resources. So far, Ducks Unlimited, the NWTF, National Deer Alliance, Quality Deer Management Association, and Union Sportsmen's Alliance are partners of the app, along with brands such as Cabela's, Yamaha, and Federal Premium ammunition.

"Those partners are critical to our work and amplifying the message," said Dinger. "One day, when someone says, 'I'd like to learn to hunt,' I'd like the reflexive response to be, 'You gotta get Powderhook.' Not because we're going to do all the work, but because we can empower everyone to do some of the work."

Will my buddy Doug Hinkle download the Powderhook app? When I asked, he was both candid and dubious — two qualities that define most of the hunters I know, especially those from the Show-Me State.

"Do I wish there were more hunters in my world? Yeah, I do. I'm starting to feel like the only guy around who hunts," said Doug. "Am I gonna give my Savage to a guy I meet online? Not likely. But I've got a lot of deer, and I wouldn't mind helping somebody get their first buck. It honestly doesn't sound like that hard a thing to do."

[ara-la]

‘Patriot’ Militias: Rooted in White Supremacy

Matthew N. Lyons, in his new book from PM Press, “Insurgent Supremacists: The U.S. Far Right’s Challenge to State and Empire,” cites and briefly quotes from my 1995 analysis of the so-called Patriot Militia movement. Since it seems to still have at least that much currency and immediacy, at a moment of new reactionary mass upsurge and organized white racial nationalist influence on broader sectors of white society and the state, I thought it was worth republishing with a couple of minor edits for clarity. I think it has stood the test of time (23 years!!) as an analysis that is still important to grasp.

PART's Perspective: MILITIAS ROOTED IN WHITE SUPREMACY

by Michael Novick, Anti-Racist Action-Los Angeles/People Against Racist Terror (ARA-LA/PART)

from Turning The Tide, Volume 8 #2, Summer 1995

    The Oklahoma City bombing, a bloody atrocity on the anniversary of the deadly events in Waco, thrust the militia movement onto the front pages and to the top of the hour on TV news. But the spate of belated coverage and sensationalism, already abating as we go to press, has done little to enlighten people about the true nature of the phenomenon.

    The militia movement is a genuine mass upsurge, around its stated issues of opposition to gun control, to environmental protections and to abortion; and of mistrust bordering on hatred of the federal government. As a mass movement with a reactionary character, there are many different explicit ideologies and personalities contending with each other for influence and dominance within the movement, and the militias have even exerted some appeal on leftists and libertarians. Therefore, it's vital to be aware of the connections between white supremacy and the militias.

    First of all, conscious white supremacists and neo-Nazis, open and hidden, have been instrumental both in getting the militia movement going in many states and in pushing other elements within that movement towards an embrace of their racist politics and strategy. The Trochmanns, founders of the Militia of Montana, had been associated with the Aryan Nations. Jeff Baker, a U.S. Taxpayer Party leader promoting anti-abortion militias, has espoused anti-Semitic doctrines. "Bo" Gritz, who boasts of providing Green Beret counter-insurgency military training to the "Patriots," and called the bombing of the Oklahoma City Federal Building "a Rembrandt," has longstanding ties to the racist, anti-Semitic Christian Identity sect.

Ex-Green Beret “Bo” Gritz. I believe “SF” is a reference to Soldier of Fortune, a magazine for would-be mercenaries.

    The bombing itself bore a striking resemblance to one in the book "The Turner Diaries" by neo-Nazi William Pierce, a fictional call to arms for racists after "the Cohen Act" outlaws guns. But it's more than a matter of particular, individual militia leaders or the violent actions of a few adherents.

    Much of the national impetus to build the militias as a "direct action" formation in defense of Second Amendment gun rights grew out of a meeting held in Estes Park, Colorado, in October 1992, following the stand-off in Idaho between Federal agents and white separatist Randy Weaver and his family.

    The gathering was convened by Christian Identity pastor Pete Peters (whose followers also helped birth the white supremacist paramilitary underground, the Order, almost a decade earlier), and by Larry Pratt, (head of the Gun Owners of America, a fringe outfit that found the NRA too moderate). Pratt is not coincidentally a former right-wing Virginia state legislator, and previously had led national efforts of the English Only movement as part of an anti-immigrant campaign. Pratt is an officer of the Committee on Inter-American Security (CIS), an outfit whose board included paleo-conservative Pat Buchanan, Adolfo Calera of the Nicaraguan Contras, and the World Anti-Communist League’s John Singlaub (ex-General in the US Army and former arms supplier to the Contras). The CIS helped write Reagan and Bush's policy on Latin America. Pratt is also the author of Armed People Victorious, a book praising the death squads of Guatemala and the Philippines; these may have been his model in promoting the militias.

    The infrastructure and communications network Peters and Pratt promoted took off in the succeeding months, perhaps beyond their wildest hopes, as the Clinton presidency, the events in Waco, and the passage of the Brady Bill and of a federal ban on assault weapons made opposition to gun control a hot-button organizing issue with a built-in mass base. The numbers attracted to the militias, and into action around these themes, exceeded the anti-gay, anti-abortion, and anti-immigrant movements in which neo-Nazis had been trolling for recruits and seeking to advance their strategy of 'leaderless resistance' and racist terror. Adding to this, some militias in fact focused on the abortion question. Others, particularly in the northwest, took up the anti-environmentalist themes of the corporate-sponsored "Wise Use" movement, further adding to the base of support.

    Furthermore, by targeting the federal government itself, the militia mentality was wide open to key elements of the white supremacist campaign, including notions of the illegitimacy of the so-called "Zionist Occupational Government," and the need for countervailing white state citizenship and sovereignty.

       The concept of state citizenship, in contradistinction to so-called "l4th Amendment citizenship," has been widely if not always formally embraced by the militias. This is typified in the professions by Samuel Sherwood of Idaho's United States Militia Association of support for the so-called “Organic Constitution," the original constitution plus the first ten amendments, the Bill of Rights. A moment's thought exposes the white supremacist, sexist and elitist basis of this position, which has been formalized by the Christian Identity "Jubilee" grouping, and by the militia-affiliated "Refounding Amendment," a proposed "eleventh amendment" to the Constitution which would reformulate the U.S. as a confederacy. While focusing on getting rid of the income tax and the IRS, the militias would also contentedly eliminate the abolition of slavery, women's right to vote, and equal citizenship rights for all, along with popular election of senators and the application of the guarantees of freedom of religion, speech, press, and assembly onto the sovereign state governments they would like to control.

    (Application to the states of the guarantees in the Bill of Rights was only accomplished by the militia-opposed 14th amendment; the Bill of Rights itself only enjoined the federal Congress and government from violating those rights). The anti-democratic nature of this thrust makes the reactionary nature of the militia response to "government tyranny" apparent.

    But we should not let our analysis stop there. To fully understand the militia movement and its propensity for violence, we need to truly understand our history and our society. The media's reluctance to deal honestly with the militia phenomenon stems from its role in obscuring actual power relationships. The militias, just as they claim, are deeply rooted in U.S. history and society.

    In facing this real past and present, we start to struggle honestly for a better future. Liberals like to pretend that the democratic state apparatus enjoys a monopoly on the use of armed power, subject to representative civilian controls, and traditional Marxist analysis has it that the state apparatus is expressed in and relies on "special bodies of armed men." But the re-birth of the militias makes it clear that the U.S., as a settler-colonial society, has in fact depended on the armed organization of masses of the settler populace to establish and maintain itself, not merely on the armed state apparatus.

    This theme is visibly evident in the Declaration of Independence, which lamented the British Crown's unwillingness to properly protect the settlers from the "merciless savages"; in the Constitution, which is concerned with ensuring "domestic tranquility" against unruly, unpropertied elements; and in the Bill of Rights, which does link generalized gun ownership to the need for a militia.

    The militias of today are the descendants of the armed settlers who banded together to take land from the indigenous people. They are descendants of the slave posses that enforced the slave codes before there was any law enforcement apparatus. The white supremacist Arizona Rangers who plotted to bomb federal buildings in the '80s are descendants of the 19th century Arizona, Texas and California Rangers, which developed from rancher-supported lynch mobs terrorizing the conquered Mexican population in the late 1840's into the rudimentary apparatus of law enforcement by the Euro-American state in those territories conquered from Mexico and Native Americans.

    The militias in Idaho and Montana of today are descendants of the original "vigilance organizations," the vigilantes based in the Masonic order that established "law and order" in the territories between the 1860s and 1880s by clandestine violence. The militias are the descendants of the hooded "Bald Knobber" vigilantes of the 1880's in Missouri, who took up arms to defend private property and enforce cultural norms.

    Growing out of this history, it is not necessary for every militia member to be an individual racist or supremacist for us to recognize the white supremacist foundation and thrust of the militia movement.

    The "patriot" militias of today are descended from another mass reactionary movement, the Ku Klux Klan of the 1920s, which also was not exclusively white supremacist, but enforced Protestant "Americanism," patriarchal 'family values,' anti-immigrant hysteria, and Prohibition.

    It is the reactionary nature of mass armed settler colonialism which gives the lie to the militia's opposition to “government tyranny." By denominating themselves as militias, they acknowledge honestly that they are in fact a part of or adjunct to the state, a key force in the ability of the settlers to sustain and expand their colonizing project. And thereby they render themselves incapable of transcending that project in any truly liberatory way. Because the 'colonization' of the secessionist south and of the freed slaves [by Northern financiers and industrialists] was the outgrowth and unavoidable consequence of that colonial project. The militias cannot turn back the clock to some pre-Civil War state of grace.

    Nor do the militias represent a real alternative to the entrenched power of the national security state apparatus that has grown up parallel with the global imperial ambitions of the U.S., because the global empire is also only the logical outgrowth of the continental empire the militias defend. This explains the willingness of many Republican politicians to embrace the militias, and the unwillingness of the state to seriously oppose them.

    This fatal flaw, this reactionary essence of the militia movement, is repeatedly evident. The militia-influenced "county sovereignty" movement in Nevada, for example, proclaims that the constituent counties of the state of Nevada have a precedent claim over the federal government to the public lands that form the bulk of that state's land mass. But what the two sides are fighting over, of course, is the land that was taken in an act of war from Mexico and the Mexican people and from the indigenous peoples of the region.

    Similarly, in the northwest, the militias denounce "globalism" and the threat of a U.N. takeover, while taking up arms against the Forest Service to prevent the enforcement of any environmental regulations--thereby dovetailing neatly with the actual globalist strategy of the International Monetary Fund and World Bank to end all environmental and labor codes that restrict untrammeled exploitation.

    This unity of interest is why the big extractive industries bankroll the "wise use" movement, and why the privatization of public lands that the militias seek is perfectly consistent with the global strategy of privatization of public- and state-owned resources and enterprises being pursued by the multinationals. It's why the militias claim to oppose NAFTA, but would never support the Zapatistas in Chiapas and Mexico, who are the leading force in opposing and overturning the neo-liberalism which created NAFTA. As Larry Pratt would probably proudly acknowledge, the militias are the brethren of the land-owner death squads that have killed and expropriated indigenous campesinos in Guatemala and Mexico.

    Similarly, while claiming to oppose the "jack-booted thugs" of the FBI and the ATF, the militias have never spoken out against the frame-up and illegal extradition and imprisonment of Leonard Peltier. PART opposed the government killings at Waco and at the Weaver homestead in Ruby Ridge (while also condemning Weaver and Koresh); but our opposition is consistent with our condemnation of the bombing of the MOVE organization in Philadelphia, consistent with our denunciation of the FBI-led COINTELPRO war on the Black Panther Party and the American Indian Movement. It's consistent with our exposure of the role of the FBI in promoting the Ku Klux Klan as a means to block the civil rights movement, and of the participation of the FBI and the ATF in promoting and arming the "United Racist Front" of Klansmen and Nazis in Greensboro, North Carolina in 1979, who shot and killed five anti-KKK organizers.

    We oppose the use by the U.S. government of well-honed psychological warfare techniques against Tim McVeigh and the Nichols brothers, just as we opposed the sensory deprivation techniques used against Puerto Rican P.O.W.'s and North American women political prisoners. But we would never support Tim McVeigh as a political prisoner or "prisoner of war," because McVeigh is fighting a racist and reactionary war against the people, not the state. Left analysts and activists like Alexander Cockburn who are attracted to one or another point put forward by militia-led groups about "freedom," such as the Fully Informed Jury Association put forward by Red Beckman, need to be aware of the poison pill of racism and anti-Semitism covered by that sugar coating.

    Are the militias white supremacist? Ask the next militia members you meet whether they support John Brown's militia, which attacked the federal arms depository in Harper’s Ferry, Virginia in an insurrectionary effort to arm the slaves and end slavery. Do they support the so-called "negro militias" (actually New Afrikan ex-slaves and their white allies) that sought to reconstitute the post-Civil War south on a democratic basis and to uproot the ex-Confederate underground that resisted every radical democratic reform? Do they support Malcolm X's call for all "Negroes" to form rifle clubs? 

   Do they support the armed NAACP led by Robert Williams or the armed Deacons of Defense who took on the task of fighting off Klan attacks on the Black freedom struggle? Do they support the worker militias that beat back strike-breaking attacks by goons and Klansmen in the '20s and '30s, and laid the basis for the Abraham Lincoln Brigade, the “premature anti-fascists" who took up arms against Franco, Mussolini and Hitler? It is this standard of principled and democratic internationalist and anti-racist armed action by which we must judge the militia movement; and by that standard, we must oppose it as a racist and reactionary phenomenon.

[theconservativebrief]

Florida voters picked the Democratic and Republican candidates for their state’s critical governor and Senate races in Tuesday’s primary elections, setting up two of 2018’s most important campaigns.

Republicans Ron DeSantis easily won the GOP gubernatorial primary to replace Gov. Rick Scott, who is running for Senate against incumbent Democratic Sen. Bill Nelson.

In a shocking upset, Tallahassee Mayor Andrew Gillum defeated establishment pick Gwen Graham. He supports a progressive agenda: a Medicare-for-all single-payer health care system, abolishing ICE, raising its minimum wage to $15 and raising the corporate tax rate to pay for education. He earned endorsements from Bernie Sanders and Tom Steyer. Before Gillum’s win, he was coming in at just 16 points in the most recent polls.

Democrats also have openings to pick up a few House seats in heavily gerrymandered Sunshine State, and both parties have decisions to make on congressional candidates in Tuesday’s primaries.

Polls close at 8 pm ET. Live results are below, powered by Decision Desk.

!COMPONENT:ad width=300 height=250 position=amp_med_rec

Florida governor primary

Ron DeSantis, Adam Putnam, and Gwen Graham lead the Republican and Democratic fields

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Rep. Ron DeSantis and state agriculture commissioner Adam Putnam are the two main contenders. DeSantis desperately sought, and outright asked for, Donald Trump’s endorsement and got it. That’s all you need in a state where you really can’t run too far to the right in a GOP primary. Meanwhile, Putnam, the establishment choice, sought to walk a tightrope of not disavowing Trump entirely while still criticizing DeSantis for being little more than a Trump puppet. It didn’t work.

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Gwen Graham, a former member of Congress and daughter of a former governor and senator, was the presumed frontrunner. But Tallahassee Mayor Andrew Gillum has attracted a lot of excitement on the left — he supports Medicare-for-all and got the Bernie Sanders endorsement — and he surged to a late-breaking win.

Former Miami Beach Mayor Philip Levine and business leader Jeff Greene finished in double digits and had a lot of money on hand.

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Florida Senate primary

Rick Scott has a clear path to the GOP nomination

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This is one of 2018’s most competitive Senate races.

Scott is maybe the GOP’s best Senate recruit this cycle: a pretty popular two-term governor with as much money to spend as he wants. His money advantage — he’s outspent Dem Bill Nelson by a 4-to-1 margin thus far — may explain his narrow lead in the early polls against an incumbent in a year that overall favors Democrats.

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Florida’s Sixth Congressional District

A tight race to succeed Republican Ron DeSantis

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DeSantis vacated this seat to run for governor. It was a competitive race to replace him: Michael Waltz is a Marine combat veteran who’s raised a lot of money, John Ward is a Navy vet who is also fundraising well, and former state Rep. Fred Costello has the endorsement of Florida Attorney General and Trump ally Pat Bondi and the NRA. Ultimately, Waltz won.

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Nancy Soderberg, former ambassador to the United Nations, is on the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee’s Red-to-Blue list. She easily defeated Stephen Sevigny, a medical radiologist, and attorney John Upchruch.

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Florida’s Seventh Congressional District

A rare pick-up opportunity for Republicans

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State Rep. Mike Miller, first elected in 2014, defeated his prime competition: business executiveScott Sturgill. They both raised six figures for their campaigns. Vennia Francois, a first-generation American whose family came to the United States from the Bahamas, was also on the ballot.

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Florida’s 15th Congressional District

Two credible GOP candidates, and an establishment Dem battles the left

!COMPONENT:results dd_id=3021

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Rep. Dennis Ross is stepping down. Current state Rep. Ross Spano was one of the two favorites for the GOP nod to replace him. Spano was the fundraising leader and got endorsements from Sen. Marco Rubio and Pam Bondi.

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Attorney Kristen Carlson defeated her competition: Navy vet and business leader Andrew Learned. Carlson describes herself as more moderate and got the Emily’s List endorsement, while Learned said that he would support Medicare-for-all and received the backing of the Indivisible grassroots group.

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Florida’s 16th Congressional District

Democrats vie to challenge Vern Buchanan

!COMPONENT:results dd_id=3022

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David Shapiro, a local attorney, is another name on the DCCC’s Red to Blue battleground list. He defeated Jan Schneider, who was the Democratic nominee for this district in 2016 and lost to Buchanan by nearly 20 points.

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Florida’s 18th Congressional District

Republican Brian Mast faces challenges in primary and general

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Rep. Brian Mast, first elected in 2016, voted for Obamacare repeal and the tax bill. He won his primary against Second Amendment-loving, environmentally conscious Dave Cummings and doctor Mark Freeman, who lost to Mast in the 2016 Republican primary.

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Another DCCC favorite won here: Lauren Baer, who worked in Barack Obama’s State Department. She beat attorney Pam Keith, who ran and lost in the Democratic primary for US Senate in 2016.

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Florida’s 26th Congressional District

Carlos Curbelo awaits his Democratic opponent

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DCCC-backed candidate Debbie Mucarsel-Powell, who works in nonprofits won against and Ret. Navy Cmdr. Demetries Grimes.

Republican incumbent Carlos Curbelo has represented this D+6 rated district since 2015, and was reelected even as the district voted for Hillary Clinton by 16 points in 2016. He’s a moderate Republican who has made headlines trying (and failing) to spur action on immigration reform within the House GOP.

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Florida’s 27th Congressional District

A lively Republican primary to replace Ileana Ros-Lehtinen in toss-up race

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In this crowded field, journalist Maria Elvira Salazar came out on top, defeating Miami-Dade County Commissioner Bruno Barreiro, former Vice Mayor of Doral Bettina Rodriguez-Aguilera (who got the Miami Herald’s endorsement and has the unusual background of having said she was abducted by aliens), veteran Elizabeth Adadi, songwriter and Latin Grammy Award winner Angie Chirino, veteran and entrepreneur Michael Ohevzion, educator Maria Peiro, and documentary filmmaker Gina Sosa.

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Bill Clinton’s former HHS Secretary Donna Shalala, at 77, won the primary for this seat, defeating state Rep. David Richardson, former Miami Herald reporter Matt Haggman, Miami Beach Commissioner Rosen Gonzalez, and former University of Miami academic adviser Michael Hepburn.

!COMPONENT:end-block

Original Source -> Live results for Tuesday’s Massachusetts primaries

via The Conservative Brief

#IFTTT #The Conservative Brief

[investmart007]

ATLANTA | Contentious Georgia GOP runoff tests Trump voters' loyalty

New Post has been published on https://is.gd/ynAndA

ATLANTA | Contentious Georgia GOP runoff tests Trump voters' loyalty

ATLANTA — Casey Cagle and Brian Kemp have run to the Trumpian right as they try to win Georgia Republicans’ nomination for governor in a Tuesday runoff.

The hardline rhetoric and the ads on illegal immigration and gun rights fit right in with Deep South conservatives. The question is whether that course is still the best path to Republican victory in the fall in a state where changing demographics and increasing urbanization have Georgia flirting with swing state status after two decades of GOP domination.

Democrat Stacey Abrams awaits the GOP runoff winner in November, having won her party’s nomination in May. She’s trying to become the first black woman elected governor in any American state.

A well-known figure at the Georgia Capitol, Cagle entered the Republican race with financial backing from much of the state’s lobbying class. Even as a statewide elected official, Kemp positioned himself as an outsider perpetually battling liberal Democrats and Republican insiders.

Both Republicans have tried to align themselves with President Donald Trump, while taking hard lines on immigration, guns and social issues. But as both men swung to the right during the extended Republican contest, Cagle has been widely viewed as the candidate most likely to tack to the center in a general election campaign. The question is whether such apparent moderation is a liability that will prevent him from getting past Republican primary voters Kemp courted with ads featuring guns, chain saws and a pickup truck to “round up criminal illegals.”

Cagle led the initial five-man primary in May, but fell well shy of the majority required to avoid a runoff. The two months since have been a cascade of problems for the veteran politician, and public polls suggest Kemp has closed the gap.

Nichole Jacobs went to Sandy Springs Christian Church to vote Tuesday for Kemp, citing his stance on immigration. Jacobs sends both her children to private schools, and feels her affluent Atlanta suburb is overrun with “illegal immigration.”

“People are moving out of Sandy Springs to get into a better school district or putting their kids in private schools,” Jacobs said. Ron Rosen, 80, has lived in Sandy Springs for over four decades where he is a doctor. He voted for Cagle because he wasn’t impressed by Kemp’s ads. Rosen felt Kemp’s advertisements were too focused on mudslinging rather than what he would do for Georgia if elected.

“Cagle did come up with positive things,” Rosen said. “I wanted to hear about what someone was going to do.” Cagle, however, unwittingly played into Kemp’s framing when he was secretly recorded earlier this year by a former rival who captured the lieutenant governor explaining in detail that he steered legislation in the state Senate based on campaign contributions. Another clip Kemp released revealed Cagle describing the GOP contest as a race to be “the craziest” candidate with “the biggest gun” and “the biggest truck.”

Trump’s unexpected endorsement of Kemp last week, followed by a weekend visit from Vice President Mike Pence, threw the race into overdrive. Both Trump and Pence rallied support Tuesday for Kemp via Twitter.

“Today is the day to vote for Brian Kemp. Will be great for Georgia, full Endorsement!” the president tweeted.  It’s a matter of risk-and-reward for Georgia Republicans and Trump, who was burned last year when he twice backed losing Senate candidates in neighboring Alabama. Kemp offers Trump a chance to back another brash politician who can carry the president’s brand in a state the president won in 2016. But that alliance also alarms some GOP players, who are wary about Georgia’s changing electorate and a national mood that favors Democrats — potentially giving Democrats an opening.

Those concerns became evident when Deal, a broadly popular figure, delivered his own 11th hour endorsement for Cagle, touting him as an able business-recruiting partner and his best potential successor. The move stood out for a governor previously content to leave party faithful to their own choices.

Georgia elects its governor and lieutenant governor independently, so Cagle was never part of Deal’s ticket, though they both hail from the same north Georgia town of Gainesville.

The National Rifle Association also threw its weight behind Cagle in April after he helped kill a tax break benefiting Delta Air Lines, one of the state’s largest employers, after the company ended a discount program for NRA members. Oliver North, president-elect of the gun-rights group, joined Cagle on campaign stops in Savannah, Kennesaw and Gainesville.

Polls remain open Tuesday until 7 p.m. Early in-person voting began July 2. ___

By  Associated Press

#atlanta news #Brian Kemp #Cagle #Casey Cagle #Donald Trump #georgia news #Georgia Runoff Governor #Ron Rosen #TodayNews

[sciwriteblog-blog]

More Ideas on Population and Immigration

If there is one thing that would bring population back into the national debate over immigration it is challenging the media’s near refusal to connect the two. Only rarely does one see the implications for population mentioned in articles about immigration.  This is also true of environmental reporting in general as was first discussed by T. Michael Maher more than four decades ago.  Talk of population is forbidden in the media unless it’s someone else’s population, like China’s or India’s.  Paul Ehrlich’s now classic 1968 book, The Population Bomb, sold 2 million copies and changed not only popular attitudes about population as an environmental issue, but made population a key issue in the media as well.  In 1969, Richard Nixon devoted an Oval Office speech to population and appointed the Rockefeller Commission on Population Growth.  We need to rekindle the national consensus on reducing population growth created by Ehrlich’s book and apply it to immigration.  

One reason The Population Bomb created such a stir is that it came at a time of widespread public questioning of entrenched policies and of anti-establishment skepticism created by the Vietnam war.  The social and political movements of the 60s led to the first Earth Day and the modern environmental movement.  For reasons discussed in Roy and Leon’s “retreat from stabilization” article, population is no longer the signal environmental issue it was 50 years ago and is now taboo among many environmental organizations.  Despite this, the key to reviving population as a domestic issue is access to the media.  In an earlier message, I said that we needed something like the Worldwatch Institute. In fact, there already exists two similar institutions for immigration, the Center for Immigration Studies, and, of course, NumbersUSA.  The closest existing organization for population is Progressives for Immigration Reform (PFIR).  PFIR must raise its profile.  

The following is an example of how that might be done:

Most Americans have no idea how much U.S. population will grow under different immigration scenarios.  But the graph of population drivers pasted into Table 1 from the Census Bureau’s web site and the projections of future population growth pasted into Table 2 from the PFIR EIS report give a glimpse of an overpopulated future no one wants.  There is a YouTube immigration channel in Canada.  Can NUSA set up its own YouTube channel that shows the inevitable future mass immigration will impose?  Such a “channel” would be the most cost effective way of getting the message out.  NUSA could also use the channel to better publicize its work on sprawl and other issues. The audience is potentially much larger than on-line YouTube views of current material, which are short and may be attracting only the converted, that is, immigration activists who may be bumping up the view number with repeated viewing.      

                                                      Table 1

         Contributions of Fertility and Migration to Future U.S. Population

https://census.gov/library/visualizations/2018/comm/international-migration.html

                                                     Table 2

Estimated U.S. Population Based on Three Immigration Scenarios:  No Change (green), Reduction (purple), and Expansion (red)

file:///C:/data/immigration/LeonPFIRFina-immigrationEIS2016MayComplete2016.pdf

This Op-Ed by Hahrie Han appeared in the New York Times after the Las Vegas shooting last October.  The author is a Political Science Professor at UC, Santa Barbara, who has also written a book,  ”How Organizations Develop Activists: Civic Associations and Leadership in the 21st Century,” available at Amazon. Chapter 1 is online here.

In explaining why in the debate about gun control at the federal level, gun rights nearly always win over gun control, she notes that,  “Gun-control groups focus on persuasion, while gun-rights groups focus on identity.”  People join the NRA because gun ownership is a way of life.  They find the passage of gun control measures personally threatening and like nothing better than defending gun rights.  The NRA might be the original grass roots lobbying group.  Much like NUSA, the NRA mails warnings to the rank and file of pending legislation on gun rights and provides post cards each member can mail to their elected officials. This has made the NRA a feared lobbying force on Capital Hill with a proven record of unseating congressmen who failed to toe the NRA’s party line.  Han notes that 80,000 NRA members from all over the country attended its annual meeting in 2017.  How many would attend a similar meeting held by NUSA?  Han also notes that she joined a gun-control group and sent emails and made calls until, feeling like “a prop” in someone else’s game, she quit.  Over a number of years starting in 1997, I sent hundreds of faxes, and made thousands of calls, as many as 50 in a day.  But I also quit recently because there was little satisfaction in being one of the “lone wolves” Han describes in her Chapter 1, although other matters were also more pressing.

It might be worthwhile for NUSA to hold a national or regional meeting, just to see what emerges from it.  A meeting would bring people together and build friendships around immigration reform, and might, as Han describes in her Chapter 1, engender a greater sense of commitment among activists.  Another possibility is to create “organizers” in Han’s sense by making one NUSA member a “leader” in an area who contacts others to make sure they send faxes in a timely fashion.  The leader could hold meetings to generate a sense of shared mission.  We need to remind people that if mass immigration isn’t stopped, there will be no place to take a vacation from overpopulation, including their favorite Montana fishing spot.  My guess is that this would be too expensive and would require organizational structure beyond NUSA’s resources.  Despite this, the thought experiment might still be worthwhile.

Here is what Han says about which groups are effective and which not:

“When I studied groups that were most effective at building a grass-roots base, I found that the key factor to success was the nature of the relationships they created. The most effective groups used relationships as a vehicle for bringing people off the sidelines of public life and teaching them to speak truth to power. You can’t convince someone to rethink who they are or what responsibility they want to take for their community through a mailer.”

“Building a movement will require organizations to invest in the leadership of ordinary people by equipping them with the motivations, skills and autonomy they need to act. Most organizations never give people that opportunityIn her Chapter 1, Han mentions on-line video conferencing as a means of organizing.  You might want to keep your eyes peeled for this as a way of having virtual meetings that might serve as an cheap, convenient organizing tool.

In her Chapter 1, Han mentions on-line video conferencing as a means of organizing.  You might want to keep your eyes peeled for this as a way of having virtual meetings that might serve as an cheap, convenient organizing tool.

Start an immigration “truth squad.”  Call out James Fallows whose cheery self-righteous comments about African immigrants in Nebraska meat processing plants left out any mention of how jobs that were once well-paying and unionized are now reminiscent of Upton Sinclair’s Jungle, which was written in an era of mass immigration much like ours.  I may be cherry picking this one comment, which I mentioned in an earlier letter, but someone needs to correct writers who believe that mass immigration has no consequences.  The Times columnists, David Brooks and Brett Stephens, are singularly oblivious in this regard. 

Another whooper was by John Kerry, who commented before he ran for President that, “America is underpopulated.”  And this by the co-author of This Moment on Earth:  Today’s New Environmentalists and Their Vision for the Future.  The book is about the activists Kerry met during his 2004 presidential campaign.  Apparently, it never occurred to Kerry that blowing up this country’s population would undo all the efforts of his “new environmentalists.”  Someone needs to clarify this for him.

A third example is from Senator Lindsey Graham, who recently said, “We can’t reduce immigration because we need economic growth.”   If continual population growth is required to have a “good” economy, then population will have to grow indefinitely.  This is one of the fundamental flaws in the triumvirate globalist policy espoused by Republicans like Paul Ryan and free traders like the Koch brothers:  Tax cuts, free trade in goods and services, and free flow of labor.  This juggernaut is what dominates thinking in the U.S. Senate and makes NUSA’s job impossible.  Note that immigration was not slowed at all during the Great Recession, even with 10 percent unemployment. 

One particular group that might be a source of recruits for the immigration wars is local growth controllers.  After looking at web sites and exchanging emails, I’ve learned that the leadership of groups like American Farmland Trust and Sprawl City don’t want to be seen as blaming immigrants for sprawl.  But some rank-and-file members might feel differently. 

I wouldn’t make too much of the most recent Pew poll on attitudes toward immigration. Even though it was largely done before the “zero tolerance” policy made headlines, which might have created a “social desirability” effect (telling the interviewer what the respondent thinks the interview wants to hear), the poll shows public attitudes on immigration softening.  But the real story is how ignorant the public remains about basic aspects of immigration. Some 35 percent of respondents believe most immigrants are here illegally. This means that a third of the public does not understand the distinction between legal and illegal immigration, the most basic distinction of all.  

In his book, Huddled Masses Muddled Laws, Kenneth Lee describes how in 1996, pro-immigration lawmakers made use of this confusion to essentially hoodwink the public into settling for a weak bill on illegal immigration while leaving legal immigration untouched.  The book is relatively short and should be required reading for all population activists.  Our job is to educate the public on immigration basics (that YouTube channel?) and how the status quo is unsustainable.  

I hope there is at least one good idea here.  It’s ironic that one immigrant “sob story” gets more space in the New York Times than even a mention of projected population growth and all it entails. 

Sincerely,

Fred W. Johnson

[email protected]

#Immigration population sustainability

[d2kvirus]

Dickheads of the Month: March 2018

As it seems that there are people who say or do things that are remarkably dickheaded yet somehow people try to make excuses for them or pretend it never happened, here is a collection of some of the dickheaded actions we saw in the month of March 2018 to make sure that they are never forgotten.

It takes a remarkable lack of awareness to liken somebody wearing a political symbol to the Star of David, the Nazi swastika or a t-shirt bearing the image of Robert Mugabe, yet that’s exactly what FA chief Martin Glenn managed to do - almost word-for-word, in fact.

Defence Secretary Gavin Williamson issued Russia the blood-curdling threat of “Shut up and go away” - which he somehow forgot to say when accepting £30,000 to have dinner with Lubov Chernukin, the Russian banker who happens to be a member of Vladimir Putin’s inner circle.

For whatever reason, NRA TV host  Collins Iyare Idehen Jr. (otherwise known as Colion Noir) broke from the channel’s remarkable similarities to ISIS recruitment ads to mock the Parkland teens by saying that nobody would know who they were if their friends hadn’t been shot - somehow missing how that’s the fucking point as there is no reason for anyone to know the names of any of these kids or their former classmates, but rather than consider the reason why (as that would involve taking responsibility) the only thing he can do is mock, and sneer, and underline just how much of the problem the NRA have become.

Twitter user...sorry, former Twitter user MomsLuvTrump20 hit the dickhead jackpot by doctoring an image of Parkland survivor Emma Gonzalez tearing up a shooting target from a shoot with Teen Vogue so instead it showed her tearing up the US Constitution (quite poorly, it has to be said) and shared it online, not only getting tens of thousands of shares and an undercurrent of seething ignorance that someone would dare tell America that they have a gun problem, but this also led to people sending Gonzalez death threats.  Yes, death threats, to someone who all too recently survived a gun massacre - which, contrary to what Adam Baldwin thinks, is not satire.

On the subject of Photoshopped images, Newsnight editor Jess Brammar really took offence at accusations that the programme she is responsible for was responsible for manipulating images of Jeremy Corbyn in order to make him fit the narrative that he was some sort of Russian stooge, and did so by...posting an image to her Twitter account that made it even more obvious that Newsnight had Photoshopped the image of Corbyn.

Somehow forgetting to uphold the obvious lie that they are in any way left wing, CNN columnist Jeremy Bailenson came up with a quite remarkable crock of shite in an article ripped from the late 1990s where he said gamers playing first person shooters are being trained to be the next generation of mass shooters citing evidence such as...some gibberish about holding a VR controller being exactly the same as holding an AK47.

To the surprise of nobody, certifiable headcase Munroe Bergdorf didn’t last long on the LGBT advisory panel they were appointed to (while a section of the media still wrongly claim that Bergdorf was appointed as LBGT advisor), yet when stepping down from their role Bergdorf’s response was to cite racism instead of the more common diplomatic response stating their appointment had brought undue pressure upon the panel - which merely added more fuel to the fire of the Tory commentators who kept making all manner of false equivalencies between Bergdorf being appointed to an unpaid role on an independent panel to Toby Young being appointed in an official capacity worth tens of thousands of pounds a year by his mat Jo Johnson back in January.

In yet another example of the right using the “Left = Nazis” rhetoric, we had Minnesota Republican Mary Franson making a direct comparison between the March for our Lives march and the Hitler Youth - and after her making a direct comparison between the two (unsurprisingly) led to her being called out for such idiocy, she attempted to defend herself by claiming she didn’t make a direct comparison between the two nor was her intent to...and when that predictably failed, then she decided to apologise which certainly has nothing to do with her being up for reelection.

Filibustering enthusiast Philip Davies took time out from his hectic schedule of campaigning against political correctness as he refuses to treat women, ethnic minorities, homosexuals or the disabled as being equal to him to conduct himself in the most professional manner when being interviewed by Luisa Omielan - by responding to reasonable questions by hurling out insults and accusations before shoving Omielan around his office.

In response to the imminent threat of a whistleblower revealing the Vote leave campaign broke rules on electoral funding, Stephen Parkinson knew there was only one thing he could do: threaten to publicly reveal the homosexuality of the whistleblower to keep him quiet, and when that obviously didn't work he outed him anyway - which was not only sanctioned by Theresa May, but she also supported Parkinson for his gross violation of privacy, use of blackmail, and endangering the safety of the whistleblower and his family.

Let’s see if I’ve got this straight: Tommy Robinson had a camera crew waiting for him outside a random branch of McDonalds, who just so happened to be in place to film a group of “far left extremists” as they “attacked” Robinson and, more importantly, were able to film him fight them off to show who the “real” “man” is - just as I am sure there is a perfectly legitimate reason for Robinson insisting that the police shouldn’t investigate the incident or, for all his talk of him and his crew being assaulted, the paramedics being unable to find so much as a bruise on them.  I can’t think what I could possibly be implying here...

On a similar subject, we have those people wailing about “free speech!!!” at the news of Paul Golding & Jayda Fransen being jailed and, a week later, Facebook shutting down Britain First’s page.  Obviously that was what happened, and nothing to do with the pair violating the terms of their exclusion orders for the former, or spending six years violating several of Facebook’s Terms of Service (without the provider batting an eyelid, it needs to be stressed) for the latter.

On the subject of freedom of speech, Sajid Javid referred to Momentum as “neo fascists” in Parliament knowing full well that he could hide behind parliamentary privilege and not be sued for it there - but if he set foot outside and said the same thing he'd receive a solicitor’s letter within the hour.

One of the approximate 357 Liverpool FC correspondents on Sky Sports’ payroll, Jamie Carragher, showed he could handle the mildest form of criticism by...winding down the window of his car and gobbing in the general direction of somebody reminding him that his beloved Liverpool just lost a game to Man Utd from the window of his car, only to miss and instead coat the taunter’s daughter instead.  The only surprise is he didn't have seven of his mates join in, just like his ex-teammate Steven Gerrard.

Glorified talent show judge with the business acumen of a market stall trader Alan Sugar thought it was a clever idea to tweet an image suggesting that Jeremy Corbyn shares the politics of Hitler’s inner circle.  What is it with Apprentice judges showing levels of judgment and intelligence that would make calling them “halfwit” a compliment?

There’s something remarkably pathetic that it took two hacks from Murdoch’s Hate Comic, Gary O’Shea and Thea Jacobs, to write a sneering article damning “snowflake students” for suggesting that Frankenstein’s monster wasn’t the antagonist of Frankenstein but the victim.  You know who else made the same suggestion?  Mary Shelley, when she wrote the fucking book back in 1818!

In the latest example of their historic women’s division historically making history, the WWE announced a battle royale for WrestleMania 34 named after the Fabulous Moolah - only to find that quite a lot of wrestling fans are aware of Moolah’s reputation for holding back women’s wrestling in North America for the best part of four decades, not only skimming the vast chunk of her trainees’ salaries but also forcing them to pay rent at her motel if they wanted to work, and even pimping out her trainees and they were quick to let the event’s sponsors know about it.

Seemingly not learning from the last time he made a complete tit of himself (and earned a visit from Jeremy Corbyn’s solicitors in the process) Twitter troll and occasional MP Ben Bradley thought it was a good idea to pose with a pair of former Labour councillors and welcome them to the Tory party - only to be reliably informed that those councillors had been suspended and, in one case, deselected from the Labour party for making racist comments, and that them being happy to cosy up to the Tories sort of proves Momentum’s point better than anything else.

In an apparent competition to see who could act like the biggest fuckwit when discussing the same subject, the intense wave of revulsion that comes from a group of Floridian teenagers having a better grasp of what humanity involved led to Laura Ingraham taking to Twitter to mock how David Hogg got rejected by various colleges as his GPA was too low that led to various advertisers dropping Fox News like a hot, faeces-covered stone before she announced she'd be taking a week-long vacation, while the homophobic, pro-gun, child molesting racist Ted Nugent referred to the Parkland kids as “soulless” which led to...not much happening, because who has given a tuppenny fuck about Ted Nugent in the past 25 years?  Either way, still a colossal dickhead.

On that subject, I can’t help notice there’s a lot of pro-gun liars intent on regurgitating the lie that the March for our Lives kids bullied Nathan Cruz, and how the poor innocent victim Cruz fought back against these vicious bullies and we should stop persecuting him for cold-bloodedly murdering seventeen people who, by their own thick-headed excuse for an argument, weren't even the seventeen people he meant to shoot in the first place.  And that, Ted Nugent, is what a soulless person looks like - and there’s a shitload of them all over Twitter.

Be thankful for the Salisbury nerve agent attack as it gave the British media even more reasons than usual to avoid reporting how Drug Minister Victoria Atkins banned the growing of cannabis for medicinal use in the UK with one swipe of the pen - and with another granted Paul Kenward, who just so happens to be her husband, a license to grow medicinal cannabis in the UK for export abroad.

Somebody who thinks it’s a good idea to describe themselves as a “professional shitposter” Count Dankula attempted to say that he was going to jail for teaching a dog the Nazi salute, which of course Breitbart and lots of people who used this as an excuse to make completely unconnected rants about Islam jumped on immediately.  They probably should have broken with tradition and checked their facts before mouthing off, because what actually got him charged with inciting racial hatred was making comments as “Gas the Jews!” throughout the video, as if the systematic extermination of millions is the basis for some good, hearty gut laughs for all the family.

I know that he wasn't aware of the irony that he was unfolding in front of him, but watching how Cambridge Analytica CEO Alexander Nix went into detail about how the company would use hidden cameras in a ploy to honeytrap politicians while being filmed saying this by a hidden camera did almost as much damage to the firm’s image as the revelations that came out as a result of the piece.

And finally, blaming video games while an elephant with the letters N, R and A emblazoned upon it shits on the Oval Office carpet, we have Donald Trump.

#dickheads of the month

[lakotasafeco-blog]

NSSF | 80.4% NICS Checks Increase | New Infographic | Buying Your First Gun and More!

This Week: 80.4% NICS Checks Increase, New Infographic: Buying Your First Gun and more! April 6, 2020 | Vol. 21 No. 15

• Featured News •

NICS ADJUSTED BACKGROUND CHECKS POST RECORD  ...NSSF released the adjusted data from the FBI’s National Instant Criminal Background Check System (NICS) which showed March topped every other month since records began with 2,375,525 checks for the sale of a firearm, an increase of 80.4 percent compared to the March 2019 NSSF-adjusted NICS figure of 1,317,114. NSSF members can log in to learn more about the record figures as well as view 20 years’ worth of historical NICS data. KEEPING INDUSTRY WORKING ...Members of NSSF’s Government Relations State and Federal Affairs teams have been working tirelessly to ensure firearm and ammunition manufacturers, retailers, distributors and shooting ranges are deemed “essential businesses” and able to remain open during the COVID-19 pandemic. See how emergency orders affect business in your state. NEW INFOGRAPHIC: BUYING YOUR FIRST GUN  … “Our industry is seeing record-breaking sales in the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic, with a large percentage of these consumers being first-time gun buyers,” said Joe Bartozzi, NSSF President and CEO. “We want to be sure these new gun owners have as much information as possible about how to handle, use and store firearms safely and responsibly.” See Infographic and more safety resources here. A three-judge panel in the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals heard oral arguments in the Duncan v. Becerra case being appealed by the defendants. NSSF filed a supporting amicus brief. Massachusetts Republican Gov. Charlie Baker revised state orders that allowed firearm retailers to open, but quietly closed them hours later. Both the NRA and NSSF-member Dark Storm Industries filed separate lawsuits against New York Democratic Gov. Andrew Cuomo alleging his order closing firearm businesses is unconstitutional. Visit NSSF's Government Relations section for more. As the pandemic evolves, “Behind the Firing Line” will feature ranges working through social and legal challenges. Maxon Shooter’s Supply and Indoor Range shares how it protects its staff and customers while still offering services.   Intelligent social media use by businesses should be viewed as a strategic marketing long game, no matter what is going on in the outside world and especially in time of crisis. Now is a good time to build a social community.   ATF Q&A: More questions came in on our 24/7 NSSF Member Compliance Hotline last week. One question asked, "What documentation must a member of the military on active duty present to an FFL to purchase a handgun from that FFL?"   Read more of NSSF's latest Retailer and Range news. Looking for a fun and inexpensive way to introduce a new hunter to the sport? How about a squirrel hunt? Seasons are long in most states and squirrels abound on most public lands. Give this squirrel recipe a try.   Show support for mentorship, share authentic stories involving products and services and discover amazing shareable content by joining the +ONESM Target Shooting and +ONE Hunting communities on Facebook.   Read more about NSSF's Recruitment, Retention and Reactivation ("R3") efforts. p.p1 {margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 12.0px 'Helvetica Neue'; color: #454545} span.s1 {text-decoration: underline ; color: #e4af0a} NSSF donated $25,000 to three groups indispensable to supporting the health and welfare of Newtown, Conn. area residents in response to the COVID-19 pandemic. The funds will assist with the purchase of personal protective equipment (PPE).   The Texas Supreme Court agreed to hear Academy Sports + Outdoor’s appeal of a trial court order denying Academy’s motion to dismiss the case brought against Academy by victim families of the tragic Sutherland Springs murders. NSSF filed an amicus brief in support of Academy’s appeal.   NSSF President and CEO Joe Bartozzi joined USCCA President and Founder Tim Schmidt to discuss what both groups are doing to ensure new gun owners are safe, educated, trained and engaged to protect their Second Amendment rights.   Another casualty of the COVID-19 pandemic that no one saw coming: hunting. Read up on how emergency orders are affecting spring hunting seasons.   It’s often the times of hardship and great difficulty that reveal the true character of a community. Read what NSSF is doing during this health crisis and how others can get involved. The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives is seeking Firearms Enforcement Officers. Interested individuals can find more at the USAJobs.com listing. Scholastic Clay Target Program and Scholastic Action Shooting Program use social media to keep student-athletes focused and to reinforce skills and firearm safety every Monday, Wednesday and Friday on the SCTP and SASP Facebook pages. Allen Company transitioned its manufacturing processes to produce personal protection equipment and other emergency equipment needed by first responders and healthcare workers on the front line of the COVID-19 pandemic.   The Civilian Marksmanship Program (CMP) has announced the cancellation of all activities at its Alabama and Ohio armories, offices, stores, worksites, marksmanship centers and the CMP Talladega Marksmanship Park until May 4.   A proper handgrip is one of the most important fundamentals of accurate handgun shooting. Letsgoshooting.org shared several options available on the market today.   Show your support for the Gun Owners CareSM campaign by adding the profile frame to your Facebook profile picture.

• NSSF Events •

July 13-15 NSSF Range-Retailer ExpoTM July 28-30 NSSF Import/Export Conference Sept. 14-16 NSSF CMO Summit For event sponsorship information, contact Chris Tatulli at [email protected] and Tammy McIntyre at [email protected].

• Industry Jobs •

Machinist Franklin Armory District Sales Manager Smith & Wesson Senior Design Engineer PointsNorth Quality Control Manager Franklin Armory Visit jobs.nssf.org to view more employment opportunities in the shooting, hunting and outdoor industry. NSSF's Mission "To promote, protect and preserve hunting and the shooting sports." COPYRIGHT © 2020 by National Shooting Sports Foundation, Inc. Permission is granted for broadcast, publication, retransmission to email lists, Websites or any other copying or storage, in any medium, online or not, if 1) the text is forwarded in its entirety, including this paragraph, and 2) no fee is charged. "Bullet Points®," "National Shooting Sports Foundation®," "NSSF®," and all other trade names, trademarks, service marks, logos and images of the National Shooting Sports Foundation appearing in this publication are the sole property of the Foundation and may not be used without the Foundation's prior express written permission. All other trade names, trademarks, service marks, logos and images appearing in this publication are trademarks or registered trademarks of their respective owners.National Shooting Sports Foundation 11 Mile Hill Road Newtown, CT 06470 Read the full article

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