Tag: Self Defense

What Do Americans Celebrate July 4th? Political Extremism

I have found it more entertaining every year to hear what Americans think of the 4th of July. Most have never read the Declaration of Independence or even understand the political dynamics of the days in 1776. Most just know it is a day off, an excuse to party. The state (government in control of this land) could not be happier.

Test drive these words and see if your average politician might be tempted to put up barb-wire fences and gun turrets around the US Capitol:

When in the Course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature’s God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation .. We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.–That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, –That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness…

Alter or abolish is the remedy for a government that no longer has the consent of the people, yet here we are.

The role of government in society has been argued for centuries, yet common sense dictates that every generation could and should struggle with the proper extent that government (i.e. force, coercion, monopoly) should try to “help”.

From an insightful article written by a man 10 years my senior, I have found some interesting “truths” for me to ponder, as well as my kids and grand-kids. For example:

.. can’t we at least be happy when the government helps needy people? No, we can’t. The more goodies the government doles out, the more violent society becomes. That’s because it becomes more and more vital to be at the head of the line for those goodies; without them, you’re left with a crippling tax bill and nothing to show for it. The higher the fraction of people’s income that comes from the government, the more intense becomes the jockeying. You do your best to smear anyone who is claiming to be more worthy of largess than you. Society becomes spontaneously pulverized and at war with itself, all thanks to “help” from the government.

A society at war with itself is advantageous to the state as this distraction can serve to allow it to not only offer to fictitiously broker peace between the warring factions while “managing” the “crisis but also allows it to weigh in violently around the globe as a world-stage bully. A hobby that the state/empire loves to do, experiment around the world with ideas for democracy which then can be modified for use domestically to enhance the “police state”.

The rights that the founding fathers were willing to be called and hunted as “traitors” for can be seen in the following list of illegitimate government actions:

  • If you are sick, you have the right to be treated by whomever you please, for a price negotiated to the satisfaction of both parties, without government intrusion.
  • If you have services you wish to offer to the world, you have the right to do so without asking permission from the government. Only if you engage in force or fraud does the government have a right to intrude.
  • The government has no right to enslave you or your children to fight and die in some trumped-up war. If the nation were ever in genuine danger, there would be no shortage of volunteers to defend it.
  • The government has no right to tax an amount approaching half of your earnings. The legitimate functions of government can be financed by a tiny fraction of that.
  • The government has no right to rob you in order to pass out money to some favored victim group. Genuine charity is voluntary, but when the government gets involved, waste and fraud and theft are built in.
  • The government has no right to force you to pay for the worthless indoctrination centers called “public schools.” That money rightfully belongs to parents so they can make an informed decision for how best to educate their children.
  • The government has no right to deprive you of the means of self-defense. Any government official who attempts to use force to do so is committing the worst order of crime and should expect an appropriate response.
  • The government has no right to pull your car over on the highway and steal any cash you may be carrying. Any criminals who participate in this practice should expect an appropriately enraged response from those they seek to rob.
  • The government has no right to condemn and raze your home to enable some private developer to build a shopping mall.
  • The government has no right to lock you up if you have committed no crime, on the pretense that some people are irrationally frightened of some microscopic bug, and therefore everyone must hide until the last traces of irrational fear have vanished.
  • The government has no right to shut down your business for any reason, unless you have been found to have engaged in force or fraud by a non-corrupt court of law.
  • The government has no right to require you to wear a diaper on your face, or to be injected with an experimental biological agent.
  • The government has no right to force you to do business with someone you don’t want to do business with. It’s not nice to be a bigot, but bigots pay for discriminating through higher labor costs, lost trade, and a general echoing back of the world to the spirit one projects onto it. For the law to criminalize bigotry merely bottles it up, where it achieves higher and higher pressure until it explodes. It also creates a lawsuit-happy nation where everybody is terminally aggrieved over some perceived slight and wants to whine about it endlessly. The right to freedom of association is absolute.
  • The government has no right to apply coercion in any way to stop or influence anything you are doing, unless you are violating someone else’s rights. A free individual runs his own life, and that’s how it’s supposed to be. Anything else is tyranny.

On July 4th, will you be celebrating your “freedom”? Asking for a friend!

Those who advocate the strategy of “elect better officials” are deluding themselves. Candidates for office always promise to be the new, different, actual, genuine representative of the people who would never violate anyone’s rights. But once they’re elected, it’s only the biggest donors they give a flying consideration about, and they have taken care to ensure that there is no way to sue them for breach of contract. They are accountable to no one but themselves and their own selfish interests, financed with what used to be your money.

Ever-larger government peddles itself as the solution to society’s problems, but intrusive, thieving government is the source of a huge fraction of society’s problems. We do of course need to deal with actual private criminals in order to keep people secure in their homes and property, but when the government turns criminal we have a much bigger problem, and we are left to ourselves to deal with it.

I do hope you see clearly that politics is not the way the people can exit from our existing ramped up tyrannical paradise.

Most people would read that and assume that violence is the only other option at this point, however, as the author of this article suggests, no, but if one is violently attacked by an illegitimate government, self defense is itself a natural right regardless of the law:

Am I in favor of violence? Quite the opposite: I vehemently oppose it. Violence is never justified except in self-defense, where it is absolutely called for in measure proportionate to the threat. That’s why when government officials initiate illegitimate violence, they should not be shocked if their violence is met by necessary self-defense. It is they, and no one else, who are responsible for the illegitimate violence they initiate, and when it is returned to them in equal measure, they have no one to blame but themselves.

When the Redcoats headed to Concord and Lexington to capture the guns the militia had stored in those locations, natural self defense rights were being violated and measures appropriate to the threat were put in place.

Remember that. Wise as serpents, harmless as doves .. and if you don’t have a sword, sell your coat and buy one .. it sure came in handy in Concord and Lexington back in 1775!

-SF1

Preparing (Prepping?) the Next Generation with Love

I am not a fan of labels. Labels are not all that accurate especially when it comes to the generations, for there are always exceptions. I am thinking on the latest buzzword, Millennials, as well as the others like Boomer, Gen X, Silent Generation and the like.

Being peak Boomer (literally, the year that had the most US births in American history, 1958) I also hear that the generation I am a part of did no favors in our raising of the next generation.

I believe if you try to picture me, you might assume that have gray hair, outright own my home, will soon retire with a good pension, healthy portfolio, and have a condo or two in other more temperate states or at least own a cottage in a location where the family can gather each summer.

Well, not so fast. Gray hair, ok .. you got me there, however the path we choose (or in some cases, the paths we might have been forced down) are not as typical as you might think.

From the start we (my wife and I at ages 22 and 19 at that time) really wanted our new family to be a one-family income home where our kids would have a parent to return from school to as well as to enjoy summer vacations. This ended up being quite the financial sacrifice since the economy transitioned to two-income families in the 1970s (about the time the US totally abandoned the gold standard). We would not trade that for the world.

Another thing we did was take the risk of raising our children on a few acres that allowed them to experience a few things that are atypical for kids these days, to have responsibilities in taking care of chickens, pigs and even a pony. While the old farm house needed plenty of upgrades, and at times it was a money pit, the end result is having some very humble children that are aware of life in multiple dimensions!

The result is that we have five awesome, independent and unique millennials that are a-typical for their cohort. Each one has charted their own course in this world and we are so proud of each and every one of them.

Along these lines comes Daisy Luther from Organic Prepper who shares her recipe for raising two daughters toward being women who are prepared much more that the typical millennial for the years and decades to come.

“Millenials” have been the butt of a million jokes about incompetence. The generation born between 1981 and 1996 is considered entitled, ultra-liberal, and naive about how life works. But maybe they’ve gotten a bad rap because what no one ever points out is that maybe the issue isn’t with these young people but with how they were raised. I know that my own millennial daughter is competent, frugal, and independent.

As a parent, the most important job I will ever hold is “mom” to my two daughters. And if I’m not teaching them the important life lessons they need to survive and thrive in this crazy world, I’m not doing a very good job at all. Of course, once they get out there, there are a million variables, but how they deal with those variables has a lot to do with whether they were raised to think independently or raised to wait for rescue.

What follows are a few snippets of what schools will not teach your kids but what love of our children might drive us to provide them:

Everyday skills every young person should have

Here are the lessons that I think every parent needs to teach their child, whether you’re raising boys or girls. Before leaving the nest, they should be able to:

Let me hit the pause button right there a minute. In this world of instant gratification there is nothing so awesome than seeing first hand a younger person hold off or actually say “no” to a purchase that might make them incredibly happy, until the credit card statement or monthly payment shows up in an e-mail.

Other categories are covered by Daisy as well:

  • Use basic tools for repairs
  • Cook a healthy meal from scratch
  • Cook a “company” meal – everyone needs one delicious meal that’s a little fancier they can cook when they have a guest
  • Grocery shop within a budget and have healthy food for the week ahead

Yes, this last one is so important in the long term. The diet of food that we live on greatly impacts how our body’s health might be in the decades to come, again, it seems against the grain, and does not have immediate effects, but is important for the long-haul. As someone who has seen the butter to margarine to butter shift for “health” as well as the eggs are bad for you to eggs are good for you, it is important that our kids know how to critically think and research things online in a way that seeks truths about the foods we have available in the US.

  • How to pay off debt if they have it
  • How to keep safe: they need to have basic self-defense and weapons-handling skills.
  • How to navigate with a paper map – not Google or their car’s GPS
  • How to make extra money fast if an emergency arises

Some of these things Daisy share makes perfect sense and are things I had not thought of. Even though all my kids are adults now, it is not too late for them to learn!

Emergency skills every young person should have

Some of the skills above will cross over into emergencies, like First Aid. Outside of the basics of everyday life, your kids leaving home should know:

  • How to light a fire
  • How to cook safely over an open fire
  • How to keep warm when the power is out, whether that means safely operating an indoor propane heater, using the woodstove/fireplace, or bundling up in a tent and sleeping bags in the living room
  • How to keep themselves fed when the power is out – they should have enough supplies on hand that they can stay fed at home for up to two weeks: cereal, powdered milk, granola bars, canned fruit, etc.
  • How to deal with the most likely disasters in their area
  • About the dangers of off-grid heating and cooking, such as the risk of carbon monoxide poisoning in unventilated rooms.
  • How to purify water
  • How to keep safe both at home and when they’re out. Be sure they know the difference between cover and concealment

I found Daisy’s article thought provoking and informative. I challenge you to have discussions with your families around the campfires this week as you “get out there” to enjoy summer in nature!

I know I will ..

-SF1

29APR1992: US History – LA Riots Remembered Now in 2019 as “Roof Korean Week”!

1992 Los Angeles

History class for those that don’t remember, or that do remember but only received their information from the media.

Many thanks to @Sam-flammatory Rhetoric on Twitter for keeping the real history alive!

Roof Korean Week is here again. After the savage beating of Rodney King at the hands of police officers and their subsequent acquittal, rioters took to the streets in what is known as the “LA Riots.”

Y’all know how to use Internet search engines like DuckDuckGo and StartPage (instead of Google, am I right?). Below is the play by play and how true heroes do not wear capes!

Korean citizens and their businesses/homes were intentionally targeted by the rioters. Sure they had nothing to do with King or the police officers who beat him, but “their prices are too high, their attitude is wrong, they have no respect for the community.”

“Respect” for the community. It is tough to do business in a community that does not understand basic economics, triggering envy is what race-baiters love to do.

Koreans were savagely attacked, while their businesses and homes were looted and burned. They did what good citizens do, they called the police and they waited for help.  Unfortunately, police were stretched thin and were also being targeted for violence.

Since this point in time I must mention that the Supreme Court ruled many times about the duty of the police BOTH before and after the LA Riots:

There have BEEN OVER 10 various supreme and state court cases the individual has never won. Notably, the Supreme Court STATED about the responsibility of police for the security of your family and loved ones is “You, and only you, are responsible for your security and the security of your family and loved ones. That was the essence of a U.S. Supreme Court decision in the early 1980’s when they ruled that the police do not have a duty to protect you as an individual, but to protect society as a whole.”

Warren v. District of Columbia, 444 A.2d 1 (D.C. 1981).
“…a government and its agencies are under no general duty to provide public services, such as police protection, to any particular individual citizen…” –Warren v. District of Columbia, 444 A.2d 1 (D.C. App. 1981)

Citizens deserve the right to know, that waiting for police action may mean death for themselves and those they love. Self defense is a natural right given by our Creator.

So, what do good American citizens do when the police can’t or won’t help them and hordes of armed looters are descending upon them? They become peak American citizens by exercising their God given and constitutionally protected rights.

From Lexington and Concord in April 1775 to 2019, it usually takes extreme times to jar American citizens awake and know that they are on their own.

Unfortunately for the rioters, most of these fine Americans were legal immigrants from Korea. As such, many of them had fulfilled Korea’s mandatory service obligations prior to earning American citizenship and took to the 2nd amendment like beef to bulgogi [fire meat].

Outraged at the attack against their prosperous, law abiding community and abandoned by law enforcement (bUt ThE pOlIcE pRoTeCt YoU), they gathered their arms and ammunition. Many were carried to the rooftops by bald eagles (or so the legend goes) and Roof Koreans were born.

From the rooftops, these legends protected each other’s property, homes, and lives. But even among a group of legends, bigger-than-fiction heroes can emerge. Enter this handsome devil, David Joo. If you know of Roof Korea, you know David Joo by sight of not by name.

On the second day of the riots, April 30, 1992, David, a humble gun shop owner and his friend Richard Park, a purveyor of fine jewelry who owned a store in the same plaza, came under attack. Not being bloodthirsty savages, they called he police.

Four of LA’s finest showed between the waves of attacks. They encouraged the Koreans to flee for their lives and I SHIT YOU NOT promptly FLED as soon as the rioters attacked again and started taking pot shots. YOUR SAFETY IS YOUR RESPONSIBILITY, DO NOT RELY ON POLICE.

This point has been made time and again in the history of the United States. The myth that police (started to be a thing starting in 1830s in Boston and New York City and was in place in all major cities by the 1880s) are in place to serve and protect is something that harms your average citizens that find themselves caught up in riots, unrest and even domestic situations.

David, Richard, and their fellow citizens had to do some on-the-spot soul searching. Yeah they could run for their lives. But what’s life worth if you abandon everything you’ve spent your life toiling for, the existence you’ve sweated and labored for, in the face of danger? … There’s an ancient Korean saying. “F*ck around, find out.” And brotha, let me tell you, rioters found out real quick. David and Richard drew a line in the streets of Los Angeles, got their Leonidas on, and made their stand.

“I didn’t hesitate to shoot them”

Car loads of armed rioters and gang members made several assaults on the Roof Koreans in an effort to kill them or drive them out of the city but were unable to intimidate or defeat these law abiding civil right exercising champions of the American Dream.

Over 5 days, more than 1000 buildings in the LA area were destroyed, and over a billion dollars worth of damage done. But guess which communities endured the storm with minimal damage and injury? That’s right. The store David and Richard fought from still stands today.

Brave Americans refused to surrender their lives and livelihoods to an outraged and murderous horde. They defended themselves exercising the very right a new outrage mob is trying to intimidate, lie, and bully you into surrendering for some illusion of safety. They lie to you claiming there’s no need for high capacity magazines or semiautomatic rifles. They want you to rely on the same people who fled, abandoning American citizens to their own defenses as soon as the shit hit the fan. They stand on the graves of murder victims like a pulpit and they try to blame you and me for the actions of others and use that to try and guilt you into surrendering your constitutionally protected rights. Don’t give them an inch, and don’t let them fool you. When a mob comes for me and the police run away to save themselves or don’t even show up at all, and I’m looking out at a sea of murderous intent, I have a God given right to protect my life, my family’s lives, and our home with whatever weapon I believe best serves that purpose.

This is the bottom line, there is no way to protect yourself once you have decided to disarm for “everyone’s” safety because guess what, there are still guns around AFTER all the disarming has been completed by the collective (communist, socialist, fascist are all the same).

We aren’t responsible for mass shootings, murder, or suicides. Neither are our weapons. You are your own best defense. Don’t let weak cowards scare you into giving up the best tools for that responsibility.

Man up (used in the traditional, this means men AND women). Especially if you are a single parent with children, you need to get trained and get armed because at the end of the day, when seconds count, police are minutes/hours/days away.

“You, and only you, are responsible for your security and the security of your family and loved ones.“

-SF1