For some reason, although the last commentary (Some more thoughts about lies and history) was “theoretically published” yesterday (15 JUN 2022) at 0600 hours (Mountain Daylight Time), it apparently did not really publish until about 1226 hours today (the 16th). Our apologies from those of us here at TPOL.
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Darkwing’s comments earlier this week trigger additional thoughts on the general subject of lies and history and liberty.
Darkwing commented on Lies about our history support enemies of liberty.
“When I was in school, in the 50’s, I use to condemn groups and countries for what they did to Native American, blacks and the murder of innocent people because to their beliefs. I was told it is part of history and we should learn from it. No one went along with me.”
Our initial reply to Darkwing’s comment: Of course not, for we like our myths and our comfort zones.
But let us elaborate:
For us here at TPOL, with our feet in multiple camps, so to speak, we step on EVERYONE’s toes more often than not. We seek to go by that old and wise saying: “You shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free.” Lying is by its very nature, a tool of enemies of liberty.
Continue readingRecently, I found out that RACISM was the reason for the Salem Witch Trials, way back in the early 1600s. Or so it is claimed today.
According to several prominent black (African-American) religious leaders and influencers, that is. The only reason that there was a panic over supposed witchcraft and related evils back in early Colonial Massachusetts (or what would become Massachusetts) was that an evil racist slaveowner feared the spirituality of his Caribbean slave-woman.
Continue readingIn the era of the Dritte Reich (Third Reich), the German governments and their puppets and slaves spent billions of grams of gold building elaborate concentration camps (Konzentrationslager) (and extermination camps (Tötungszentren: killing centers)). Together with the urban ghettos, these housed the “subhuman” elements of European populations as well as enemies of the State, unbending religious group members, and other undesirables. Including those “un-useful” for any but the most menial work or for anything but disposal and processing for raw materials.
Today we have Shanghai.
If the medical bureaucratic establishment get their way – the Chinese lockdowns will NOT be the only one. For now, at least we seem to be avoiding a MonkeyPox panic and lockdown, but here in the States, the next flu or whatever can be used, will be an excuse.
Continue readingRead part 1 here: a commentary by Margaret Figert.
Over the past weekend, I drove though one of the emptier parts of Wyoming and Utah, passing by Flaming Gorge Reservoir, a spectacular area built decades ago under the jurisdiction of the US Bureau of Reclamation, providing water for hundreds of thousands of acres of irrigated land in Utah and controlling floods downstream in the Great Basin.
Notable and not present on previous trips were two distinct signs. These were posted in a dozen places.
The juxtaposition of the signs is a bit amusing, since BuRec is one of many federal agencies which uses drones to patrol and inspect their domains.
But the presence of these things in remote areas is very much a sign of our times (pun intended). They are a key part of the modern nanny-state’s security and surveillance regimen. The powers-that-be ENCOURAGE – and sometimes DEMAND – that all “good citizens” be snitches.
Perhaps some of these things make sense. Consider:
Is even this justified? It is claimed that safety does justify this sort of thing: even MANDATES that people be willing to rat out strangers. Those who do so are praised. Does it save lives? Perhaps, but at what cost to individuals and society in the long run?
All show how the surveillance regime has expanded more and more: when coupled with government use of private surveillance systems and the nanny impulse of so many people, it causes society – and even civilization – to crumble.
Now, consider some more recent events; notably the murders in Uvalde and the “mass shootings” across the country: especially the first weekend of June 2022. As usual, the various political factions are screaming past each other – and the usual suspects are “doing the will of the people” and “taking action” – mostly by passing laws that the criminals who kill people are going to completely ignore. (While those of us stupid enough to try and be law-abiding are to be disarmed. Making us more vulnerable to governments that are not just actively seeking to destroy our way of life, but are actively KILLING and planning to kill many of us.)
Meanwhile the other wing of the predatory monster called government is calling for more surveillence, more fortification, more intrusion into our minds and souls. The GOP (so-called Conservative) screamers are calling for mental health examinations, establishing permanent guard forces at schools, rebuilding schools by adding bulletproof glass and murder-passages and 24-7 camera coverage. And more. One outspoken person has proposed stationing a fire-team (of veteran Army and Marine troops) at each and every school in the Fifty States.
This is the nanny state on steroids, and they justify it to fight a threat which these actions will NOT stop. The proposals from all sides are merely upping the ante for tyranny, oppression, and lives without privacy and opportunity.
But there is more to it – by surrendering to the State and its officials the power to deal with unsafe and immoral actions, we surrender to it. I am not saying that revenge is necessary or good. But when we wait for the cops to arrive, for the game warden to show up, for the warning of a dangerous act, a dangerous situation to be made by the anonymous 9-1-1 operator or the electronic message signs, are we not surrendering our duties – and our rights – to the State? Yes, there is a hard-to-define line, but are we not abdicating our responsibility – and with liberty MUST come responsibility – when we wait for The Man to do something? Something more than “see something, say something,” that is?
This is a guest column. Margaret Figert is a retired publisher (conservative-somewhat-libertarian politically) in South Dakota and Nebraska. I am reposting some of her column without any comments, just remarks in an afterword in the next column. This follows up my commentaries on “innocent until…” – Nathan Barton
Three more children were shown on TV over the weekend being rescued after being locked alone in overheated vehicles. One died, one was resuscitated, and I think the third one lived too.
I don’t dare condemn the adults responsible for these atrocities because, as my own short-term memory plays games with me, I could become unintentionally guilty of the same crime. I never have and pray I never will.
Today is the 78th Anniversary of the best-known D-Day, the Normandy Invasion of France in 1944 by British, Canadian, and American troops.
An invasion which killed thousands and thousands of young men and a fair number of old people. Why? Because of the stupidity, power-mongering, ambition, greed, and short-sighted nation of their “betters.” Their rulers, their elected officials, their military leaders, the voters, and a lot of other people. Including both the above of the “free” countries who stupidly allowed revenge, humiliation, and abuse of Germany, and then were blind to the results of such actions. And those who stupidly fought a war in a manner that seemed to intentionally be done to kill as many people as possible.
BUT to those men who floated to and waded up and dropped from the sky onto the beaches and fields of Normandy, we give all glory and honor for their sacrifices. Too many people did not survive that day or the remaining eleven months of unrelenting and horrifying combat and bombing and massacres, but to those who survived and are still alive today, please treat them as the treasurers they are.
To them, the words of Shakespeare’s Henry V ring loudly: From this day to the ending of the world,
But we in it shall be remembered- We few, we happy few, we band of brothers; For he today that sheds his blood with me Shall be my brother; be he ne’er so vile, This day shall gentle his condition; And gentlemen in [lands afar yet unborn or ] now-a-bed Shall think themselves accurs’d they were not here,
And hold their manhoods cheap whiles any speaks That fought with us.
Their participation and sacrifice on that day seventy-eight years ago must never be held against them. Certainly not because their nations’ governments behaved like the murderous, rebellious, evil, destructive entities that they were – and still are. The men on those waters, those beaches, those hedgerows and villages? They died, for the most part, believing in a cause which their own: Roosevelt and Churchill and MacKenzie King constantly lied about and frankly, did not believe in themselves. They died for their comrades, for their families and communities. And too often, they died because they had been enslaved: conscripted and hauled from their homes to the battlefield.
Honor them, respect them, love them and their families – and swear eternal hostility to those who forced them to that shore so many years ago.
Wow. As more and more people warn (or call for) open conflict in the Fifty States over political differences, this news comes out.
The meme is being pushed by many groups and people. And it seems to be finding new converts.
The worst poll yet, even for those advocating (not just reporting) the potential for a new internecine conflict here in the States. According to the Washington Times, 53 percent of GOP registered voters believe we ARE headed for a “new civil war” as do 39% of Democrat voters: an average of 44%.
But even more shocking to many people is that 44% of young male Democrats and 34% of young female GOP voters believe that it is right to assassinate politicians if you believe they are harming the county.
Why?
Continue reading
The Price of Liberty 
Distractions and their effect
Last week, we saw a common political phenomenon. The use of distractions to keep the electorate and the mob quiet. In some cases, just SPECIFIC parts of the two groups.
How’s that? In the past six months, fuel prices have increased by somewhere around 50% for American drivers. An example: in South Dakota, gasoline went from $3.109 to $4.719 on average, between 13 January and 13 June. Nationally, in one year, it has gone from $3.059 to $5.019: more than 166%. Along with galloping inflation (see ShadowStats) now estimated at 17% per year, the American economy is staggering. Not just fuel, not just food, but virtually EVERY type of consumer and business purchase of goods and services has seen prices going up at a rate not seen since the nasty economy of the 1970s and 1980s.
It is a serious problem that we must all be aware of and address. Especially since it has been caused by government and will require government to DO something to fix it. (Actually, to STOP doing things, which is far harder.)
But government has more important things to spend time and money on. Their time and your money. Things to distract, things to cause fear and promote their own power and agenda – and wealth. What kinds of things?
One of the best examples is the primetime hearings on the horrible, terrible, evil “insurrection of 6 January 2021” – a year and a half behind us. But it is far from the only way in which the politicians (of BOTH old parties) are seeking to distract people. The entire drama of the Russo-Ukraine War is another. As are the constant drumbeat of “mass shootings” now taking place almost daily. And the weekly “shortage” of this or that: baby formula, meat, computer chips for vehicles, and on and on.
Every one of these can be quickly traced to some government actions. Including many which were carried out months and months ago. Now, even the distractions are something that government wants to distract us from, as the elections near.
I do not know if the SOLE purpose of so many government actions are to simply distract us from our daily lives and making informed decisions about what to buy and sell, and perhaps whom and what to vote for. Again, let me use South Dakota as an example: last week a constitutional amendment was defeated by almost 2 to 1. An amendment that would have increased liberty and limited government in South Dakota by requiring a 60% instead of a 50%+1 vote for any ballot measure that would have cost more than $10 million dollars in taxpayer funds. It should have been a slam-dunk. But the opponents successfully claimed it was an attack on democracy, was stealing people’s vote, and was going to damage minorities – primarily the AmerInd people of the State.
We are and will be seeing other ways in which people are being distracted as their livelihoods (and sometimes lives) are stolen away by politicians and their allies in the various transnational corporate entities.
Eternal vigilance is the price of liberty. If we are not constantly paying attention to what is going on around us, we WILL lose more and more liberty.