Category: UGH! Politics

Ya know? I’d be surprised if anyone else from the “old days” of The Liberty Coalition to remembers why I started this site to begin with. It began with a post, then comment, then guest post on another blog about yet another gun grabbing plot. The response was strong enough where I felt the time and political temperature was right to maybe actually accomplish something – like the rollback of just some of the many gun control schemes hatched over the years. I was wrong. Obviously.

Granted in some areas, such as the growing number of states enacting “constitutional carry” laws is encouraging. On the other hand, rabid gun control freaks have unleashed a smorgasbord of anti-liberty, downright unconstitutional bs laws aimed directly at good, honest citizens. So I’m beginning to wonder – when WILL enough be enough? Will the control maniacs have to actually start prying our means of self-defense from our cold, dead hands before those of us still standing will stand up? Some days, it sure seems like it. Just the other day, I was looking at a thread on rimfire topics when someone from my ex-home state of NY said the statists now require semi-automatic rifles to be listed on pistol permits. Got that? Keep in mind, ALL the time I was growing up, or at least for as far as was aware, in order to own a handgun in NY, one had to first obtain a concealed weapon permit and each handgun that person owned was required to be listed on that permit. And now they’ve expanded this to semi-automatic rifles. How long before single shot .22’s will be included in this madness? Wait for it…

Meanwhile, here in Virginia, the democRATS slithered into both houses of the legislature while Dr. “Death” Northam was governor. They promptly enacted a number of malicious anti-liberty legislation, including one of the gun control maniacs brass rings – universal background checks. This insidious and unconstitutional crap requires state approval of both parties who wish to buy, sell, or trade firearms in a private deal. Private? Not anymore. Thinking on this lead to more troublesome thoughts. Like I said before universal background checks, in fact ALL background checks are inherently unconstitutional. Why do I say that?

Think about this – forcing a citizen to prove s/he is NOT a criminal and thus NOT breaking the law when buying a firearm foregoes the assumption of innocence. The assumption of innocence is a, or maybe THE primary tenant of our constitution. How can this not be unconstitutional? Beyond that, citizens have the inherent right to go about our business without government intervention. The assumption that MUST be made is as citizens, we are NOT breaking any laws. That is for everyday life. Add into this the Second Amendment expressly guarantees that our right to keep and bear arms SHALL NOT BE INFRINGED, and my contention doubles down. It doesn’t take a legal scholar, much less an attorney (I am neither) to see this. And it shouldn’t. As WE the People are self-governing citizens, we also have an inherent right to discuss and voice our opinions on the laws of our land – ALL of the laws of our land. But that’s not all…

While I pondered these things, yet another stray thought wandered in and stayed a while. It was a question, really.

WHY are we tolerating this increasingly crushing weight of unconstitutional laws?

Why are these not being challenged? Anyone who has read the landmark novel “Unintended Consequences” by John Ross can relate. There he tells the story of the National Firearms Act (NFA) of 1934 and the subsequent Supreme Court challenge it later entailed. Long story short, this horrendous law was duly declared unconstitutional by a lower court, challenged by the Feds at the SCOTUS level and because of distance, poverty, and such, said challenge had no champion for us citizens and was allowed to stand by FDR’s hand-picked Supreme Court. As far as I know, this statute has not been brought before SCOTUS again and so it stands.

As I see it, this THE major advantage held by the rabid statist gun control freaks. Legislation is typically “assumed” to be within the constrains of the constitution unless specifically overturned. While I can see the reasoning for this – no law would have a modicum of respect unless it was run by the courts – challenging every unconstitutional law puked out by our lawmakers is a time-consuming and expensive process – one most of us cannot afford to do. Not only that, but challenging just the gun laws would likely tie up the Supreme Court for decades – IF they were all heard.

Adding to this problem is the gross instability of legal opinion. We now have more than a century of legal precedents to wade through – enough where almost any legal opinion is likely to be countered by a complete opposite view by a jurist with deist aspirations – i.e. they want to play God.

What would be most helpful is a team of true constitutional literalists dedicated to sifting through current legislation to see what holds to a simple standard: does it line up within the framework of our constitution? I contend at least 80% of our current laws would fail this simple litmus test and 100% of gun legislation. Those words “shall not be infringed” are hard to circumvent once you incorporate the meaning of the the word “infringed” into your soul. Go ahead. Call me intolerant. While you’re at it you can bite me too. It means what it means.

So what is the end all, be all, of this? Unless we decide to get real serious about our constitution, and by “serious”, I mean start insisting on total compliance with the absolute law of our land, we are pretty much toast as a nation. There are only two paths from this point – one leads to liberty under our constitution – the other leads to statist rule, by whoever can seize the power from our hands… and I use the term “seize” loosely because, if history is any gauge, they’ll just take what we hand them.

There IS Another Way

It is a long road for sure but this path could also lead the way for our nation to blossom into some semblance of how it was divinely designed. This road also requires WE the People stand up and reclaim our birthright as citizens. The good news is, rather than depending on weak, wishy-washy, or worse, “interpretive” jurists, we can clearly mark the “will of the People”. What is this road? It starts with participation – YOUR participation… and mine.

Short and sweet, we roll up our sleeves and get to work on the business of our governance – self-governance that is. Groan all you want to but its time to play grownup. Here’s the outline:

We recruit and elect individuals who are committed to liberty. That means people determined to flat out refuse to allow our government entities to continue to expand beyond reasonable limitations AND to insist we begin the process of cutting back on government overreach.

Part of this, just part mind you, is repealing gun laws. The ultimate goal should be to eliminate all laws that limit liberty beyond constitutional limitations, but that’s not all. The chopping block should be bloodied from cutting off all those government programs that have gained footholds over the decades. Lean and mean should be our new goal. BTW – while the term “lean” is mostly self-explanatory, no doubt the usurpers will want to define “mean” as “rude or uncaring” such is not the intent here. This term “mean” is better defined as “a quality or way of doing something that is in the middle of two completely different qualities or ways of doing something” (courtesy Cambridge Dictionary Online).

We need to find new ways to solve issues. Rather than trying to grab guns from law-abiding citizens to thwart criminals, we should focus on actually thwarting criminal behavior and so on.

In addition to this, I also propose we citizens work towards the idea of removing the “blank checks” from our legislators. Instead they should be required to ask those citizens they represent for approval of all new spending AND taxes. This idea of simply allowing politicians carte blanche to find new ways to extract money from citizens and spend it however they wish is a complete and utter fail. There has to be a better way.

While “Gun Control” is indeed a major issue that should not be an issue at all, it is a symptom of a greater national ill – government gone wild. How did this happen? I hate to be the one to break it to you but WE the People have only ourselves to blame. Surely we were duped, as were our parents and their parents before them. I get that. But this does not excuse us from what we’ve become. It does not excuse those who simply do not vote. It does not excuse is for accepting the excuses of those who do not vote. It does not excuse is from failing to be informed nor from our failure to insist those we elect and those our representatives hire be held accountable.

The bottom line is we can either reclaim our nation – our birthright as citizens or we can do nothing and allow the controllers, the usurpers, to continue to grab our liberties until we have nothing left.

If this is your first time here or you’ve been living under a rock, I’ll tell you outright – I am now an election official in Virginia. Last year I worked one primary and one election. The primary was a joke as the opponent for the only contended spot bowed out. This primary should have been canceled.

Fast forward to December 2023 – last month. I get a text message from the Board of Elections President in our county. This is how I first learned about the special election. It wasn’t the main topic of the text sequence – it was brought up by one of the recipients. (The Pres mass texts us so…)

Turns out the State Senator for our district has resigned for health reasons. As a good citizen I promptly notified at least one politically active group as this seat is very important for the balance of power in Virginia. I’ve heard nothing from nobody about this election.

So much for good citizenship.

Lemme tell ya – JUST voting ain’t gonna cut it no more. Got that?

As citizens in this SELF-GOVERNING nation – we all have a duty and responsibility to participate in the functions of government. Voting is the very least of it all. We’ve gotten ourselves into this swampy mess because of our “set it and forget it” attitude towards governing. It needs to stop and stop quickly because we are about to lose it all.

By all means if you live in one of the two of the above districts – VOTE.

IF there is a special electio0n in your state – VOTE.

At least do that but set yourself to do more.

Hold those in office accountable. It doesn’t matter whether you voted for them or not, they are still required to represent you AND follow the law of the land. Hold their feet to that fire.

Activate – talk to people, write blog posts (you can post them here, subject to approval – I won’t allow any anti-liberty posting here.). How much effort does it take to start and monitor a local F_B group for goodness sake?

Get involved. Stay involved.

Keep the vote honest – become an election official. Already I’ve spotted potential issues and brought them to the attention of the higher ups. I can tell you this much for an absolute certainty – every election official I’ve come in contact with, no matter the party affiliation, is focused on ensuring a free and fair election with an accurate count.

Now is this true everywhere? No. At least I am convinced it is NOT true. Maricopa County, AZ is a prime example. Pennsylvania is another. Michigan is a third. Then there’s Georgia. Every one of those places is suspect. Not to mention the swamp rats in our nation’s capital who promulgated the J6 fiasco. WHY is all this happening? It is happening because WE, the People, have been asleep at the wheel and the wreckage is visible across the country.

It won’t stop unless we citizens stand up, be counted, AND insist on an accurate count.

The subject line above is in response to the meme below. My short response? Bite me.

I just came off of a 15 hour election day. I’m not complaining. It is just a fact. It all started in September of last year when I was mouthing off here about doing one’s part. I put my money where my mouth was and, well, now I am officially an election official in my county. Whoopee.

It was not an easy road. My party head hemmed and hawed about being “full up” or whatever.  Eventually he must have put my name in because I got a letter, did some online training, some group real-time in-person training, worked the primary (even though it was moot by the time primary day arrived – we still had to be there!), got more training, and worked Tuesday’s election. Now I’m ready for the brain dump.

First off all, I get paid. I wasn’t expecting that. It is a now a decent amount. They upped the ante for this last election. Previous officials got peanuts comparatively.  We even get “paid” for training. What a joke. In lieu of the whole ten bucks  (apiece) they are supposed to cough up, we get fed instead. Don’t get me wrong, the food is okay, pizza, usually. This last dinner was actually catered so I had a choice between chicken or ribs. It wasn’t great but it was okay. Anyway, I’m not doing this for free but when I signed up, I wasn’t expecting payment, my intent was to be a good citizen.

Now let’s talk about my coworkers. There were five of us working this polling center. Two from each party. Our chief is an Independent. While they try to balance the political leanings in each group, I don’t think it has to be entirely balanced. I’m not sure the law requires both parties be represented specifically.

As I said, our group is as balanced as they come. The other R in our group was new this election, replacing the R from the  primary.  She was a nice person but there was an issue with the facility that prompted her to ask for reassignment. So what about personalities?

Our chief is a dedicated gal, a hard worker and very conscientious. She’s also very helpful and giving. At our dinner she collected all of our plates and took them to the trash. She just does stuff like that.

The two D’s in the group are both women. (In the primary I was the sole male.) Both are black and both are very nice ladies. One is my age and another is a bit older, I think. Both walk with canes and/or walkers.

The other R in the group this time around is another man. It took me a bit but I finally realized I knew him. I worked on his computer a few years ago. He doesn’t live far from me. He’s a good guy also.

As a group we don’t talk politics. We have talked about a few issues around politics such as taxes, allocation of resources, and such. I can tell you that while we may not see eye to eye on all the issues, we are not all that far apart on any of them. One of the D’s is a former corrections officer. She was talking about the bears in her area keeping her from walking like she should so we got talking about her carrying a gun. She was not at all opposed to the idea. Her greatest concern was the prison Glock she had had too many safety features to be useful. Of course I enlightened her about her choices.

Summing  up, while our group was mixed politically, we are all Americans. We were all there to do our jobs and our job was to help citizens vote and to ensure the vote was fair and accurate. Period. In fact, there is not a lot of room at Virginia polls for fraud. Period. At least not at the polling place I worked. Is it possible some polling places in other precincts could be sullied? I’d say it is possible, but not easy.  Let’s talk about that, shall we?

Let me say first, as an election official, I am still a rookie and on the bottom of the pile at that. I worked at each station there so I can speak about such with confidence. Here, really the only real opportunity to nudge an election, voter-wise, is at the first station – the poll book. The poll book, ours is electronic, is what we use to verify the person standing in front of us is who they say they are AND they are duly registered. Ninety-nine percent (99%) fall into this category. Most hand over their photo driver’s license which is scanned into the system. A couple gave us a voter registration card, also scannable. Now I’d say these cards could be faked so there is a potential for abuse there, but it would take a pretty concerted effort. It is also possible for a voter to simply present a utility bill and vote – a far greater prospect for fraud. These can only vote once but, collect enough utility bills from enough registered voters and wholesale fraud could be perpetrated. I see little standing in the way of dead relatives or friends voting.

As I  pointed out in one of our training sessions, much to the chagrin of the Electoral Board member present, our county is really far too small for anyone intent on massive fraud efforts. He said, correctly, that any potential fraud should be addressed. I agree entirely but I think he missed my point. Sure we should be aware and diligent about any fraud BUT I don’t see it as a festering problem in our county. Someone could flip the whole county to one side and it wouldn’t make a difference in a state or national vote count.

The other gaping hole in our voting system is registration Now Virginia does require a Social Security number to register to vote but I’m not convinced there is a foolproof method of validating this. The issue I raised above concerned bad addresses. If someone’s address is different than what our database says, all the voter has to do is sign a form indicating the correct address. I asked if anyone verified the address. Similarly, if election officials (and I mean those who are charged with validating voters at the system level) are not diligent about verifying eligibility or if the gatekeepers are not kept honest, there is room for fraud. Personally, I’m not convinced security is all that tight.

So let’s move on to the topic of the meme below – start arresting  the poll workers and watch how fast they tell you who told them to cheat. Bite me. Granted there are instances, apparently documented ones at that, where poll workers are suspect. In those cases, by all means, hold them accountable and, yes, election fraud is a prosecutable offence. I am all for prosecution to the fullest. That said, most of us work hard on that day and we are diligent. Our job is is ensure those who vote are legally eligible to do so and every legal vote is counted. In our little group, we did our job admirably, if I do say so myself. Not one of us would even think of allowing cheating.

On the other hand, those who’ve been caught doing stuff they shouldn’t need to be dealt with swiftly and surely.  When this hasn’t happened, the blame rests entirely on those charged with enforcing the law – on every level. If I were to observe fraud, I would report it and I would keep reporting it further up the ladder until someone acted. I would further expect those who did act to act not just on the original perpetrators but on every individual who turned a blind eye up the line. We cannot have this.

A final note.  As I said at the beginning, my day was 15 hours on November 7, 2023. I hear other polling places break the job into shifts. We could not even if it were allowed. (I’m not sure if it is.) The bottom line is, more poll workers are needed. I doubt if our little county is the exception. Why not do your part? Too many gripe and whine about elections and election fraud. Of course our elections should be without question but how can this happen when polling places are understaffed or not properly represented? We invite fraud.

Contact your local Registrar. Put your name in to be an election official.  Come on now, pony up.

 

Ar