Home Forums Miscellaneous Topics Second Amendment Barak--Dang It!!

Barak,

I have asked you this several times, but either you keep missing my small thread or I have missed your response.

In the "libertarian View" thread, you said: "Then I met the government face to face in late 1998"

What happened then that caused you to change your views to what they are now?

Blaine

He filled in a wet spot on his property, and the EPA came down on him for doing damage to a "wet land." Charged a huge fine. He couldn't pay it, so they threw him in jail.

That is a reason to get real pissed. The feds and even local govs. are getting too heavy-handed about what you can do on land you own. Bob

Bob, you are certainly correct, but I have to admit that I just made that particular story up in the hopes of bating Barak into telling us the real story. Now that I think of it, however, Barak probably doesn't want to tell the real story because it may identify him to whatever agency he had a run-in with, and he prefers to remain anonymous. Not a bad move. I have no doubt, however, that the sort of thing I described happens. I have, in fact, read reliable reports about that kind of thing happening.

Hawkeye's right: I don't particularly want to be specific about it. I've had bad experiences going into detail elsewhere. The gist of the story, though, is that I was perfectly happy being a nominal Republican (like most of the folks here, I suspect) until the government decided to turn me into a wild-eyed libertarian. (Sometime during my latest debate with Hawkeye, actually, I may have talked myself clear into capitalist anarchism, which is one of the corners of libertarianism. But I'll have to think about it for awhile longer.)

Suffice it to say that it involved a number of government guns being stuck in my face, along with one moderately thorough beating by government goons, but no arrests, charges, or hearings. Also, no one--not even the goons themselves--would bother trying to argue that I broke any laws.

If you're not satisfied with that level of detail, then I'm sorry; but if you'd like, I can give you a few simple pointers on how to have a story of your own, of which you can divulge as much detail as you like. Let me know.

If you were the victim of assault and battery, why didn't you press charges against the individuals involved, as is your right and duty as a citizen? There are laws against that in every state, I believe. Federal agents are no more immune to those laws than construction workers or veterinarians. Just like anyone else, they have to have the defense of justification, without which they are subject to criminal and civil penalty.

I am aware, of course, that a federal agent murdered Randy Weaver's wife at Ruby Ridge, and got away with it due to extensive corruption in the federal government, but you never know. Perhaps there is enough uncorrupted government left in this country for justice to work in your case. Have you ever given it a try? If pressing charges didn't work, then your next step is to hire a lawyer and charge them with the violation of your constitutional rights, assuming, that is, that the beating wasn't pursuant to a legitimate arrest, i.e., assuming you were not resisting a legitimate arrest, necessitating force on their parts. He will likely contact the media, and get the story out to the general public.

Thanks for your advice, Hawkeye. I am proceeding as I think best. Last year a gang of feds molested my daughter and her friend.

Thanks for the info. Not looking for a story of my own in this area just yet...................

Blaine

It sounds like another case of a whole bunch of heavily armed bullies "playing the role" and then finding out that they goofed. Have you ever seen the movie "An Innocent Man" with Tom Selleck?
Seriously, please tell us how to get involved with the feds, so that we know what NOT to do.

Well, you could try filling in a puddle on your property, as Hawkeye suggested. Or you could try refusing to infiltrate a white-supremacist organization as an informer for the feds, as Randy Weaver did. Or you might consider joining a church with moderately non-standard beliefs and practices that has an unorthodox way of raising money, in a year when the BATF is bucking for a budget increase, as the Branch Davidians did. Or, if part of your riverfront property collapses into the river, you might repair it, like Carl Drega did. Actually, if you have riverfront property, you might not have to do anything at all: if it's desirable enough, the feds might simply claim to have seen marijuana on it and confiscate it, as they did to Donald Scott. Or just own a farm, as Elmer Wade did.

Of course it ought to be obvious that making suggestions about what people might do about government atrocity--truly effective means, rather than the standard pablum about writing your politicians and being sure to vote--the way Jim Bell and John Ross have, is a wonderful way to meet the feds.

If you're planning to be a political activist, you need to run right out and get a book called The Ballad of Carl Drega, by Vin Suprynowicz. He's written others, but I think Ballad is probably where you want to start.

Great book. I recommend it too.

I tried to quote but kept getting messed up so here it is. I was asleep the morning the Branch Davidians were attacked by the thugs. A friend called and woke me up and said turn on the tv, something is going on. The scenes I saw were never seen again after about thirty minutes. The spin doctors took over from Sharon Wheeler real quick.
The FBI destroyed evidence at a crime scene, that is a murder investigation.
The double door entrance to the complex was a metal door. It had bullet hole in it showing clearly shot from ouside. This was according to lawyers who went in there before the fire. Strange thing was that the half of the door with the entry bullet holes was never found. The other side was found. DUH!! What happened to the other door? No charges were ever filed against that the criminals who concealed or destroyed evidence. Why? They were above the law, they are the law. We are pawns of the law. Sucks big time. Bob

Exactly right. Today, we live under a tyrannany, where people with connections to the federal government are unreachable by justice. They consider themselves above the law. They can litterally murder at will, and laugh at the idea of ever being punished for it, because they work for Leviathan.

Having not read the book, I can not comment on it. However, living through the event, I may be privy to a tad more inside info than you folks garnered through the (sterilized) media.

I can empathise somewhat knowing the tyrany that occured here in my State that ultimately drove that man to his actions. But his actions where wrong, criminal actions, and I hope that none of you are condoning them.

There were several mistakes and outright frauds that were committed on BOTH sides, over a long period of time that all culminated in the trajedies, and level of trajedy that occured. I don't know what detail the book goes into, but if it doesn't at least touch on those issues point for point, then the book is just what its labeled as. Food for CT's.

As of yet, I have never heard of a case against the State filed by the surviving families. In the litigous society we live in today, this amazes me. Where they paid off pre-emptively? Does the book touch on this?

"The wicked flee when no man pursueth: but the righteous are bold as a lion." Proverbs 28:1

Are you talking about Carl Drega, Vernon Howell, or Randy Weaver?

Barak, that is horrible, about your daughter! I am overall trusting to the government, but not on all issues. I realize that a few bad feds ruin the reputation of all the others. I would like to believe that not every last one of them is like that.

Yes.


I used to be pretty much the same way. Once I got on all the lists, though, experience jaded me somewhat.


Every last one of them is not like that, yet. Unfortunately, when some of them (at least, some of the ones with guns) are, it's dangerous to trust any of them, because the stakes are pretty freakin' high if you're wrong.

Power corrupts, and that's always going to be a big problem as long as one's only recourse to being abused by the government is to go to the government and ask humbly for redress. There are places and circumstances today under which government officials can do pretty much anything they want to you, from stealing your property to throwing you in prison to even killing you or your family, for no reason other than that they've taken a dislike to you, and suffer little if any consequence from it. (Sometimes it goes the other way: David Hawn got a two-week vacation with pay for shooting Alberto Sepulveda in the back with a shotgun as he lay on his face on the floor; Lon Horiuchi actually got a medal for shooting Vicki Weaver in the face as she held her baby daughter in her arms.)

It used to be that they'd at least have to trump up some charges against you and bribe a jury to convict you; that's not the case anymore.

Especially with some provisions of the Patriot Act.
Which I generally approve of, but those couple of provisions make me very uneasy.

You may be the first real person I've ever communicated with who generally approves of the USA PATRIOT Act. (Turns out that USA PATRIOT is actually a lamely constructed acronym for some insipid and misleading phrase that is irrelevant enough that I've forgotten it.) Just about everybody in the circles I tend to run with thinks it's the most dangerous attack on American freedom since the (progressive) income tax.