Honestly. If the Left had a modicum of self-respect, its fellow-travelers, a cluster of pimples on the otherwise un-blighted ass of liberty, would literally pop from the pressure of trying to negotiate their own ever-throbbing red-edged hypocrisies:
A recently published “lexicon” distributed to thousands of federal, state, and local law enforcement agencies by the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) targets citizens concerned about their Second Amendment rights and the steady encroachment of the federal government, categorizing such as “militia extremists.”
The “lexicon,” marked Unclassified/For Official Use Only (FOUO), is dated November 10, 2011, and was sent out by email to law enforcement and homeland security agencies on November 14 by LaJuan E. Washington of the DHS Office of Intelligence and Analysis.
[…]
Its definition of “militia extremists” states:
(U//FOUO) Groups or individuals who facilitate or engage in acts of violence directed at federal, state, or local government officials or infrastructure in response to their belief that the government deliberately is stripping Americans of their freedoms and is attempting to establish a totalitarian regime. These individuals consequently oppose many federal and state authorities’ laws and regulations, (particularly those related to firearms ownership), and often belong to armed paramilitary groups. They often conduct paramilitary training designed to violently resist perceived government oppression or to violently overthrow the US Government. (Page 2 of 3, emphasis added)
So what drives militia extremism according to DHS now is “belief that the government deliberately is stripping Americans of their freedoms.” It is demonstrated by opposing “many federal and state authorities’ laws and regulations, (particularly those related to firearms ownership).” Would writing about those topics (as I am now) fall under “facilitation”? On its face, it’s hard to see how it could be excluded under DHS’s broad definition.
Another indicator, according to DHS, is that militia extremists “often belong to paramilitary groups,” which would mean that there are “militia extremists” who aren’t part of a militia. So if you oppose federal regulations and support the Second Amendment to the Constitution, and though you don’t actually belong to a militia, you can still be branded a “militia extremist” by your own government, and presumably be targeted by law enforcement agencies.
[…]
And for those who would scoff that my reading is over the top and claim that DHS would never target anyone who wasn’t knowingly and willingly involved in “facilitating and engaging in acts of violence,” the DHS lexicon adds another category, “unwitting co-optees”:
(U//FOUO) Groups or individuals who provide support to terrorism without knowing that their actions are contributing to terrorism. Such individuals may suspect that they are being used. Not all unwitting co-optees are engaging in criminal behavior.
[…]
In 2009, DHS came under fire for a 10-page report, “Right-wing Extremism: Current Economic and Political Climate Fueling Resurgence in Radicalization and Recruitment,” which classified returning war veterans as potential threats. When government watchdogs submitted FOIAs for the sources used in preparing the report, they found that conspiracy websites and far-left outfits had been used, including the Southern Poverty Law Center, which branded the American Legion veterans organization as a “hate group.” Information also surfaced that the report had been rushed out over the objections of civil liberties officials. DHS Secretary Janet Napolitano was forced to apologize to veterans groups and withdraw the report.
Nor is this the first time that homeland security agencies have pushed the boundaries on defining “militia extremists.”
Just a few weeks prior to DHS coming under fire for that “right-wing” report, the Missouri Information Analysis Center, funded by DHS grants, issued a report titled “The Modern Militia Movement,” which branded pro-life groups and those opposed to illegal immigration as potential domestic terrorists. Indicators identified in the report included support for third-party candidates. Political signs and bumper stickers were also suspect, with the Revolutionary War-era “Gadsden flag” specifically called out as a “militia symbol.” The Missouri fusion center later announced it would stop publishing reports altogether.
In light of the recent publication of the DHS “lexicon” that violates their own guidelines, it seems clear that under Secretary Napolitano, DHS officials are intent on continuing to target innocent citizens merely exercising their constitutional rights.
Meanwhile, groups and individuals that federal prosecutors and even federal judges have identified as supporting foreign terrorist groups are actively courted and legitimized by the Obama administration. Leaders from these terror-tied organizations are even being used to help write the DHS department guidelines on “countering violent extremism.”
Is it any wonder then that just last week it was revealed that a DHS-funded study likened terrorism to “ordinary crime” while omitting any reference to the radicalizing effects of Islamic extremist ideology?
No. Because to the left — and even to many in the GOP establishment — the real enemy in this country is the newly-engaged citizen who is distressed to see his liberties coopted by government; repulsed to see his future and his family’s future mortgaged to special interests and government cronies; and amazed by the complete and open disregard for the rule of law, creating a “legal” environment of lawlessness thanks in large part to an interpretive paradigm that makes it all but impossible to view the Constitution as a stable foundation for equal protection. The Muslim threat is a romanticized battle with far-away Otherness. The existential battle, for a ruling class elite, is with those it wishes to turn from employers to subjects in a coup that would fundamentally change the relationship between the individual and the State — and in so doing, overthrow the Constitutional republic, albeit by a long march through our institutions rather than with guns or military force.
Mark Levin has described what we’re living in as a post-Constitutional era. If he’s right, than so long as there remains a putative rule of law (albeit one no longer provided rigidity by the Declaration or Constitution), we are of necessity living under a form of tyranny, however soft and benevolent it may appear, and however kid-gloved are the intrusions of the police state that now provide its legal contours.
For noting this, I am likely on some watch list. And while the activist Left screeched at stamped its feet over the supposed violations of civil liberties incurred by data nodes under an NSA “wiretapping” program, they will be far less exercised, for the most part, over the attention paid to those who they see as their actual enemies — namely, those who would stand in the way of attempts to take the US down the road to Utopian democratic socialism.
Which, if they are watching right now, I hope they write this down: Don’t tread on me.
outlaw.
(thanks to jho)
It always only ever gets worse, everytime it is tried.
in response to their belief that the government deliberately is stripping Americans of their freedoms and is attempting to establish a totalitarian regime. These individuals consequently oppose many federal and state authorities’ laws and regulations, (particularly those related to firearms ownership), and often belong to armed paramilitary groups.
There’s a gawdaful oxymoron in there somewhere. Well, truth be told …. a lot of morons.
Not to take anything away from the razor-sharp legal minds at Pajamas, but isn’t the clause directly ahead of the first bolded clause the really essential part? “Groups or individuals who facilitate or engage in acts of violence directed at federal, state, or local government officials or infrastructure…” I mean, for as much as I like to make allusions to tar and feathers and torches and pitchforks, I’m not (yet) advocating for violent actions against the government. The difference between your average Tea Partier and your average Freedom Militiaman is that the former demonstrates peacefully and votes the bums out, as is his civic duty, while the other prepares a forceful defense against the New World Order. One hopes that the Defenders of the Peoples Glorious Revolutionary Republic grasp this fundamental difference.
Not that any of this should blunt the point that we really are a significant, existential threat to the established order. We totally are. I just can’t get my knickers in a twist worrying about a government that defines “extremists” as “groups or individuals who facilitate or engage in acts of violence.” I mean, how else would you define it?
This kind of sloppy analysis might be par for the course at Media Mutters, but I’d like to hold my erstwhile allies to a higher standard.
And while I acknowledge that the author predicted my scoffing, I don’t think he covered my scoffing at his lame deflection of my scoffing. So there.
Squid —
Are you not bothered by the fact that you and I are likely “unwitting co-optees” of terrorism, going by the published standards? Or that things like, eg., the Gadsden flag are indicators that you need watching?
And not to be a dick about it, but I’ve watched how the left has been able to deconstruct terms like tolerance and fairness and liberal. I wouldn’t put it past them to go to work on what it means to “facilitate” — and indeed, what comes to constitute “violence”? Because it seems to me some were quite willing to suggest that surveyor marks on targeted candidates comes to count as, if not violence, certainly the facilitation of it…
As to the legal definition of “violence:” I remember hearing a story about a disturbed parent who showed up to a conference with a hatchet. The teacher stood up and said “put that down before I PUT YOU DOWN” [shouting intended]. Guess which one was charged with assault?
Interesting that thoughts and words can “facilitate” violence, but actual violent acts carried out by avowed enemies of the country are swept under the “tolerance” rug…
Is this the patriotic dissent you were mentioning?
as proud UCOT I’d be happy to serve as a bodyguard for Andrew.
and
Jeff … I really am getting a little weirded out by the call to “not vote”. Makes me want to scream … just a little.
If you all, at all, follow foreign politics, you might just have noticed that your northern neighbours can’t seem to come together with Animal Alliance Environment Voters Party of Canada, Bloc Québécois, Canadian Action Party, Christian Heritage Party of Canada, Communist Party of Canada, Conservative Party of Canada, First Peoples National Party of Canada, Green Party of Canada, Liberal Party of Canada, Libertarian Party of Canada, Marijuana Party, Marxist-Leninist Party of Canada, New Democratic Party, Pirate Party of Canada, Progressive Canadian Party, Rhinoceros Party, United Party of Canada, Western Block Party.
For now, the sane are saner here, but it could all change on your dime.
CUT.IT.OUT.
To all my American cousins: Get a grip! You know from what you did.
Thing is, Squid, the rest of the “memo” goes on to weaken the part about acts of violence. They go so far as to say you can unknowingly facilitate violence. Does that mean that if I bring a can of diesel back from the gas station for my neighbor — who asked because he saw I was headed that way to pick up some gas for my lawn mower — I’ve “facilitated” his ANFO bomb?
And isn’t it curious that the DHS is so fixated on groups that commit, what a dozen and a half? crimes a year TOTAL, while ignoring a group that has been involved in open political violence for months and threatens more and more severe violence in the future?
I think you meant “man caused disaster” or possibly anti-Islamic activity.
Get your thoughts in order before you unwittingly co-opt criminals!
It’s your patriotic duty!
motionview — Why do conservatives hold gatherings in places that do not respect the right to self defense? Why hold a meeting in DC when you could hold it just over the river in Virginia and legally carry to defend yourself against the thugs who threaten you?
Jeff, yeah, I saw that part about “facilitate.”
If government shows up at your door and hauls you off because you’ve been accused of “facilitating” you are looking at hefty legal bills even if, in the end, you’re let go.
Just how threatening is the thought of being bankrupt and possibly going to jail anyway? The legal system has become a crapshoot. Anyone who goes into court thinking they have the law on their side is likely to be very surprised.
Although, this kind of garbage coming out of DHS is incredibly transparent. The people writing this crap are obviously hoping to incite violence that excuses some sort of government crackdown.
“Are you or have you ever been a facilitator?”
It would seem you are (defined) more of as an “Unwitting Co-optee“.
It is however quite easy to make the case, using their definitions, that all of the OWS groups fit into the “Homegrown Violent Extremist” category and are engaged in “Terrorism”, “Radicalization”, and are “Facilitators” thereof.
Shoot didn’t see your #5.
Jeff, my Greek ain’t so good. When I say “Gadsen, Molon Labe”, doesn’t it mean “Don’t tread on me, Motherfucker”?
Hey, if they want militant anti-government extremists, they might just get them.
Which, watch out. The federales and their leftist boosters still have more guns, more thugs, more organization, and more money than we do.
Oh yes they do. Given that many higher-ups in the military are highly PC (“workplace violence with a side of allahu ackbar“), and given that most soldiers (including the Natl. Guard) will follow orders to quell actual violence in the streets, we might need to be careful about rising to the bait.
And bait it is, to be sure. They’ve long established that strict Constitutionalists are “extremists” (and compared to leftists, we are), and now they’ve kicked the Catholic/contraception hornet’s nest, and you just wait: there will be chaos during the election. Results will be widely questioned. Fraud will be plausibly alleged on both sides. The American electorate will be provoked far beyond any hanging chads could.
And then Soros’s final stage will finally come about: clamp down, take control.
One hopes that the Defenders of the Peoples Glorious Revolutionary Republic grasp this fundamental difference.
The Left is NOT about grasping fundamental difference: they’re about conflation, co-option, blurring lines, confusing terms, and erasing as much fine-tuned thinking as they can from public perception.
Once they can turn it all into full binary mode: the 99% vs the 1%, Tea Partiers vs normal people, etc., it’s easier to discredit, marginalize, and finally liquidate your opposition in one swell foop.
THEIR opposition, I mean.
Di, I sadly agree with your analysis. Let’s keep an eye on CPAC security and media coverage. A precursor to the run-up to the election.
Isn’t the violence already against the law? Why the need to qualify it by attaching motivations such as, “… in response to their belief that the government deliberately is stripping Americans of their freedoms and is attempting to establish a totalitarian regime” except to try a little guilt by association? Speaking of guilt by association, they double down in the next sentence, “These individuals consequently oppose many federal and state authorities’ laws and regulations, (particularly those related to firearms ownership), and often belong to armed paramilitary groups.” How dare they oppose many federal and state authorities’ laws and regulations? They must belong to an armed paramilitary group! Often? Really?
So, the guy behind the counter who rented the Ryder van to Mohammad Salameh who used it with Ramzi Yousef to detonate a bomb in the WTC parking garage in 1993 needs to be watched?
It is not enough to obey Big Brother, you must love him.
RI Red: First, it’s Gadsden. Second, I’m pretty sure that’s not what ????? ???? means, as I understand the Greek anyway.
And despair.
Jeff, don’t lose any sleep about it, but you made the watch list years ago.
Isn’t the violence already against the law? Why the need to qualify it by attaching motivations[?]
I’d say the entirely forseen unintended consequences of hate crimes legislation.
Diana I am a little confused. I don’t think anyone is calling for people not to vote. I think the call is for people to vote for what they really believe in and the kind of elected officials we all know we need: conservatives, classical liberals, TEA Partiers, people who believe in the Enlightenment ideals embodied in the US Constitution.
Chasaustin at 25: I blame spell-check re Gadsden. My PC is very PC. And I thought “Come and get them” really would be more effective with “motherfucker” appended.
So, in order to do justice to my right-wing extremist, eliminationist rhetoric, I hereby declare that is my new rallying cry.
Gadsden, molon labe!
Ernst, yes. To turn us all into criminals so they can pick and choose which ones to persecute, I mean, prosecute.
I’ve made no call to “not vote”. I’ve said I won’t vote for Mitt Romney.
People I’ve said I will vote for include, but are not limited to: Palin, Pawlenty, Perry, Bachmann, Santorum, Cain, and Gingrich. I will also vote for Senate and House seats if there are conservative options. And for President, I’ll likely vote, but supply a write-in candidate if the nominee is Romney.
I practice what I preach. I am not controlled by any party, and I will not vote the lesser of two evils if that assures me that my only choice ever will be the lesser of two evils.
Alas I wasn’t invited to CPAC. Too bad: I could have provided some muscle — and I don’t scare easy.
@29 I get that … what’s freaking me out is that some of y’all seem to suggest multi-party partying … it’s doesn’t work to work for you.
@32 Jeff … I saw all that for a while now ;) I’m just wishing y’all weren’t pointed north …. it’s too easy to be easy.
Keep on!
If the two parties weren’t just rival teams in game of capture of the spoils, Massively Huge Government League, people wouldn’t be looking to a third party for a way out of the game.
Now these were the good old days of patriotic dissent, when Moscow-directed party leaders could pretend to be liberals, while liberals became classical liberals became conservatives.
Do I qualify as “some” or one of “some”, Diana? I ask, because I would gladly own the view that the Republican Party today has, and for years now, utterly failed to represent my considered political views; that, to repair this deficit, I propose to work with others to form a new political party which will represent those views, after the next election in Nov., though not before (which, as an action, doesn’t preclude thinking to this end, and discussing the circumstances prior to the election). Just by way of explanation, if that’s what you’re getting at.
We’re not for a multi-party state, Diana. We’re simply saying that the GOP, if it will not be reformed, will be replaced. If they’re all fired up about being ruling-class progressive democrats, then let them be absorbed into the Progressive Democrat Party.
I’m looking at the electorate in much the same way as Rupert Murdoch looked at the news-watching audience: half of us aren’t being served by any of the current options. That’s a market vacuum just begging to be filled.
To the rest upthread: I guess I’m just too sanguine. Y’all can hammer away with the I Toldja So when they come for me.
We’ll have to hammer away Squid…
if we want the message to go around the cell block, that is.
They’re outnumbered, and lousy with radical infiltrators. Sucks to be them.
I can only say that I am indeed honored to in such villainous company.
I do wonder, now — does the SCA count as an “armed paramilitary group”?
If so, I’m joining back up. Just because.
Promises of Combat Journalism.
Over time, I guess, we’ll see.
be
to be
@37 sdferr … I understand all of that. What makes me nervous is to see your Repbubs (deliberate) becoming somewhat like our “Progressive” Conservatives. While I’m somewhat satisfied that we have Stephen Harper, I’m sad to say that we too are in a downward spiral …. the gubbmint is in China doing oil deals, when y’all are failing to step up to the mark. And, yes …. it’s about time you classical liberals regrouped to oust the old crones. What is disturbing is watching a “split” vote which will leave us all in limbo for the next generation. It happened here.
Oh, and Jeff …. would that I could … I’d vote for Palin in a heartbeat. That gal has more balls than a Shotmaker.
So, if my son and I go to the range wearing camo, are we now an “armed paramilitary group”?
Gadsden! Molon frickin’ Labe! Or, ????? frickin’ ????! (Thanks, ChasAustin).
Going to the range wearing camo? You trying to sneak up on that bench?
Well, at least I ain’t wearing a ghilly suit. Wonder if Cabela’s has them?
Cabela’s ? Ha. Ha.
Heh.
Well, ok. I think that anyone who has the least problem with the current state of climate science is a global warming denier (even if they happen to think that the Earth might be in a long-term warming cycle) and is no better than a vampire. They’re paid or unwitting tools of big oil.
Our computer modelers and hydrological engineers are better than your climatologists, denialists!