Restore Liberty in My Lifetime?

We in the liberty movement all talk about “restoring rightful liberty” whatever that means to the folks talking about it. Many of us call ourselves three percenters, alluding to the three percent of the patriots who fought for liberty during the revolutionary war.

Let’s look at the numbers. In 1776 the colonies numbered some 2.4 million people with about 80% English/Irish/Scottish/Welsh descent, 9% German and 4% Dutch.  About 90% were farmers.  Some 200,000 were slaves from Africa.

Historians suggest that 40-45% of the colonists were Patriots. 15-20% were Loyalists.  35-45% never chose a side.

Some 250,000 men fought for the Patriots, but never more than 90,000 served at any one time. Some 25,000 men of the Loyalists fought for the British.  Another 5000 black slaves fought for the Patriots.  The three percent is the total ever fighting at once of the entire population of the colonies.  The total that took up arms is a little more than 10%.

What motivated folks to be on one side or the other?

For the Patriots, the initial rally to arms was impressive in 1775. As the war dragged on, enthusiasm waned.  Many colonies were compelled to entice soldiers with offers of cash bounties, clothing, blankets and enlistments shorter than the one year term of service established by Congress.  The following year, Congress mandated three year enlistments and offers of cash and land bounties became an absolute necessity.

Longer enlistments radically changed the composition of the Army. Washington’s troops in 1775-76 had represented a cross section of the free male population. But few who owned farms were willing to serve for the duration, fearing loss of their property if years passed without producing revenue from which to pay taxes. After 1777, the average Continental soldier was young, single, propertyless, poor and in many cases an outright pauper. In some states, such as Pennsylvania, up to one in four soldiers was an impoverished recent immigrant. Patriotism aside, cash and land bounties offered an unprecedented chance for economic mobility for these men.

The average Patriot was poor and many were motivated by the writings of Thomas Paine and others like him who suggested an equality of opportunity in a new country.

The typical Loyalist was a little wealthier and was more settled in their ways. They owned shops and businesses.  They were leaders and respected in their communities.  Most of them left America at the end of the war.

This is a very long lead into this post, but the background is needed when we talk about today. 75 to 80% of the colonists weren’t against the Patriots.  Think about that for a second.  Three to ten percent actually took up arms against the British.

The Patriots were motivated by equality, economic mobility and freedom of religion.

What percentage of Americans are motivated by these three things today? We read daily of regular folks begging the government to take their rights away under the notion that we “might” be safer.  The number of folks that really want equality of opportunity is almost none.  Attacks on economic mobility occur from every side of the political spectrum.  Freedom of religion?  Americans are embracing religion at a smaller number every year it seems.

So, what are we restoring? How many Americans even recognize these motivations enough to even want them?

Americans fit far more into the Loyalist camp these days than the Patriot camp. They are happy with what they have and want a government to protect what they have.  If by some magic stroke all of the .gov folks that work to oppress us, stopped doing what they do today, Americans would replace them tomorrow.  They would be mad at whoever wielded the magic stroke.

All the groups like the NRA that ostensibly are there to protect our rights are very pragmatic at best and not lovers of overall liberty at worst. The Tea Party in its heyday wasn’t against large government, merely against large government budgets.  The old “Contract With America” that got Newt Gingrich and crew elected promised to eliminate 95 major programs.  In reality, the combined budgets of these programs increased by 13%.  Congressmen complain that “due process is overrated and needs to be looked at again”.  When offered more “safety and security” Americans are begging to have their rights taken away without even a whimper.

I’m depressed enough right now in realizing that there is no restoration of liberty possible. Even if we are optimistic and think we really have three percent of Americans on our side, 97% are on the other side.  Using that same magic stroke, if we three percenters were suddenly in charge, we would be run out of town for promoting evil things.  We can’t beat our foes with force.

I am optimistic enough though to realize that our liberty is not to be found by looking backwards. We didn’t get in this mess since Obama got elected.  It might take a generation or two or three to fix it.  We’ve got to look at the next 50 years and see how it can be made better.

More to follow in future posts.

Judge Napolitano Nails It

This is a perfect lead in to our next post.

No Fly, No Buy’ Means No Freedom

Published on Jun 23, 2016

The people in the government who want to control our personal choices are the enemies of freedom. And the enemies of freedom can be very clever and seductive.

Last week, these folks, manifesting their lust to keep us dependent upon the government by rejecting the natural right to self-defense, coined a clever phrase: “No fly, no buy.” It sounds rational, yet it rejects core American values.

The phrase was pounded home to average Americans during a one-sided 15-hour televised marathon on the floor of the Senate orchestrated by the gun control crowd. The essence of the argument was that stricter laws regarding gun sales would have prevented the massacre at the Pulse nightclub in Orlando, Florida. In gun control advocates’ dream world, the self-loathing Islamic State-inspired killer, willing to take 49 innocent lives, would somehow have been unwilling to violate restrictive gun purchase laws; and his obedience to those laws would have saved lives.

Their argument is naive and absurd. A person willing to commit mass murder is surely willing to break the law to acquire the means to commit the murders. So blinded were these senators in their misguided utterances about self-defense that they forgot about the Constitution.  (click link on top to read the whole thing)

Three Card Monte

I think everyone is familiar with the famous confidence trick that is called three card monte (also known as “find the lady”, the “three card trick” and the “shell game”). It’s been around since the 15^th century and is a classic confidence game around the world.

For those who aren’t familiar with the game (and it’s variations with a cup and marble, or shells, the three-card Monte game itself is very simple.

The game works because the mark is concentrating on what the mark wants them to see, while the con is in reality doing what they really want.

We’re being played like marks right now over the shootings in Florida. Stop and think about that for a second before you read on. Think about all the discussions out there right now.  Guns, muslims, gays, immigration, ISIS, you name it.  And it’s all a game.

Don’t feel bad though, because our opponents in the liberal camp are being played too.

Neither side in the so-called war on guns really wants to accomplish their stated goals. It’s a con game to keep us distracted from what they are really doing.

The Republicans have had the White House and the Senate and the House and they have never passed real pro-gun legislation. Bought a full auto lately?  Heck, have you priced a full auto lately?

The Democrats as recently as a few years ago had Obama and the Senate and the House. They didn’t pass gun confiscation legislation either.

It’s a game to keep us distracted.  The Republicans get to scare us with threats of Democrat gun control and we send them money and vote them into office.  For the Democrats, it keeps their rabid base energized to send the Democrats lots of money and get them voted into office.

Heck, even the famous NRA would go broke if real gun rights legislation ever passed into law.

So, how does this lead us to the shootings in Florida?

When things like this happen, I always implore the motto, “follow the money”. Who wins with a shooting of this type?

Obviously, the two political parties do. It’s unlikely that any real legislation will be introduced between now and the election.  Republicans want to be reelected.  Of course Republicans and the NRA are now pushing a “real” bill to keep guns out of the hands of the terrorists.  The Democrats will whine and cry that it isn’t enough but will go along.  Of course once it’s passed and folks want to exercise due process over being on the terrorist watch list, we’ll all be told that national security trumps any legal protections.

And both sides will continue their fund raising.  Republicans to get into office to “fix the bill” (kind of like repealing Obamacare) and Democrats to keep control in place.

There will be much posturing by both parties regarding the shootings.

The Democrats will cry for more legislation, but of course they will beg for money and tell folks that they just need more of them to be voted into office.

The Republicans will cry for more members and reelection so that they can protect gun rights.

This is the con.

The real objective and what will happen while we’re concentrating on the guns is three fold.

First they will demand (and pass and fund) a larger surveillance state to combat terrorism at its root.

Second they will demand (and pass and fund) laws to root out domestic terrorists (sold in the law as going after foreigners that live here in America, but in reality use against Americans).

Finally, increase funding to “attack” ISIS overseas. This may or may not include actual American soldiers, but it will certainly include major funding to the neo-con crowd for the actual “fight”.

Neo-cons from both parties will pass these bills with high numbers. Some of us might actually fall for the con.  We’ll think we are making us safer.  We’ll feel so happy that we got to “keep” our gun rights.

A common belief is that the con may let the mark win a couple of bets to suck them in, but this is virtually never true. In a true Monte scam, the mark will never win a single bet.

Like every mark in the three card monte game, we’re going to lose to our Republican and Democrat con men.